The Ohio Patriot

Been a loooooong time since you won that one...

Been a long time since I have been here and tried. 

Dave and I already won the counting forum didn't we Salyan, so might as well do this one to.  

I had a complete post for here, but on second thought all I can say is I will pray for you, may you find the truth of God.

Just because the church is not mentiojed specifically doesn't mean they aren't there. The saints are spoken of a lot. Are we not the saints? Is it possible that, such would be the persecution, that organized churches, assemblies, may be a bit difficult to have? And again, since the main thrust of the GT is Jacob, it would make sense that the church is not spoken of that much-but nowhere does it say they are removed, or taken away.  

In fact, the reaping by the Son of man in the clouds matches well the reaping mentioned in Matt 24, which takes place AFTER the tribulation of those days, as well as the reaping, when the chaff and the wheat are separated. In Rev 14, when it mentions that the harvest is 'ripe', it means 'dry'. Some have said, because of this, it can't refer to the church. However, it fits perfectly, since we are likened to wheat-and how do you know wheat is ready for harvesting? because it is 'dry'. So if there is a reaping because the harvest is dry, it fits perfectly for the separation of the wheat out from the chaff.

I believe the church is present, in Heaven not on the earth any longer.  I believe as I have stated in a Pre-Millennial view of the rapture.  This is the literal reading of scripture.  If you want to stay on the earth during the tribulation, have at it.  

From reading scripture I do not believe that Christ leaves His church on the earth to suffer this.  We may not agree on this issue, which for me is not an issue,  

You folk are robbing the reader of the promised blessing.

Revelation 1:3 (KJV) Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand. 

Notice when this was written, during the latter part of the reign of Domitian which is the accepted time frame from nearly every theologian that exists. When John wrote this was clearly after 70 AD when the temple was destroyed, again documented and accepted by everyone except, the promised blessing was expected soon, the time was at hand but clearly Jesus has not come back.  To claim any other position but a liter pre-millennial dispensational view of eschatology is robbing everyone of the promised blessing.

I would be happy to explain why I use a literal hermeneutics when interpreting prophecy.  The first reason is that all prophecy that has already been fulfilled has been fulfilled in a literal way.  This is  obvious to most people.  The prophecy that has not been fulfilled it would be expected to also be fulfilled in a literal way.  When it comes to Eschatology all methods that replace Israel with the church are simply not valid when scripture is literally interpreted.  A dispensational premillennial view is the only view that makes logical sense.

The early church (Apostles and first century fathers) viewed scripture from a literal standpoint and was still looking for the Messiah to come the second time during their lives.  After the first century many false schools of interpretation starting using an allegorical method to interpret scripture, which continued until Augustine reasoned that the methods used by the Apostles and first century fathers were correct.  This correction was used for everything except Eschatology, and no reason was ever provided why this correction was ever made.  Likely since a post-millennial  view was created during this time to answer other heresies that had crept into Christianity is the reason that sound hermeneutics was never recovered for eschatology.  

Later after the reformation theologians returned to sound Eschatology and this has been the standard since the early 1900's.   Makes sense to use a literal reading, it is so much easier that changing the simple definitions of words like, elect, all, everyone, world, whosoever, etc, etc, etc.  

I happen to agree with Clarence Larkin which is why I posted the above. However, I don't need to answer to why I posted this everyone who uses a logical, literal method of interpretation will come to the same conclusion.

Now, I don't see the taking of John into Heaven as the rapture-I don't see it as being any different than when Isaiah was taken to Heaven and given prophecy for his time. Or Ezekiel-I believe John  was taken to Heaven for the same reason, that being, to receive a prophecy. I have still never been given any particular answer to the events of Rev 14, when the Son of man sits on a cloud and reaps the harvest earth-this is a clear picture of the rapture: after the last (seventh) trumpet, (Notice the importance of the sounding of the seventh/last trumpet: "But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets." Rev 810:7), in the cloud, after an angel out of the temple in Heaven has shouted that the time has come to reap-we see a trumpet, clouds, Jesus and the voice of an angel, (archangel?).

 

How much more specific can it be? In the other, in Rev 4, all we have is a voice LIKE a trumpet, and one guy going, who was brought obviously, stated, to write prophecies. Not what the church will go. we ignore a clear passage that meets all the prophecies given for the rapture of the saints, and instead hold to a very vague interretation of a single passage that has a clear interpretation: prophecy, but hold to it, because it matches what we want: a pre-tribulation rapture that is not backed up in any scripture.

The church is absent from this point until Rev. 19.  The church is not in Rev. 14. it disappears after John's vision.

From Clarence Larkin - The Book of Revelation

1. THE HEAVENLY DOOR.

Rev. 4:1.

"AFTER THIS I looked, and, behold, a DOOR WAS OPENED IN HEAVEN: and the first voice which I heard was as it were a trumpet talking with me; which said, Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter" (after these).

The scene now changes from earth (Patmos) to Heaven. John tells us that After This, after his Vision of Christ in the midst of the "Seven Candlesticks," and his foreview of the history of the Christian Church, as reviewed in the Messages to the Seven Churches, which carried him down to the end of the Church Age, he looked, and behold a DOOR WAS OPENED IN HEAVEN, and the same voice that spoke to him from the midst of the "Seven Golden Candlesticks," which was the voice of Christ (Rev. 1:10-13), said with the clearness and sweetness of a trumpet--

"COME UP HITHER
AND I WILL SHOW THEE THINGS WHICH MUST
BE HEREAFTER"

And John adds

"IMMEDIATELY I WAS IN THE SPIRIT:

and, behold, a Throne was set in Heaven, and ONE sat on the Throne." The experience of John was similar to that of Paul, who was caught up into Paradise. Whether in the body or out of the body they are uncertain, at least Paul was. 2. Cor. 12:2-4. The difference between them however was, that, while Paul heard words that he was forbidden to speak, John was told to "WRITE IN A BOOK" the things he saw and heard, and send them to the Seven Churches in Asia.

In this "Rapture" of John we have a type of the

RAPTURE OF THE CHURCH,

and it is at this place in the Book that the "RAPTURE" of the Church takes place.

After the confession of Peter at Caesarea Philippi, that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God (Matt. 16:13-28), and Jesus had said that upon the rock of that confession He would build His Church, He said to His Disciples'--"Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of Man COMING IN HIS KINGDOM." And then we read in the next chapter (and there should be no chapter division), "And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart, and was TRANSFIGURED BEFORE THEM." Matt. 17:1-9. Now this "Transfiguration Scene" is a type of the Second Coming of Christ, Moses being a type of the "Resurrected Saints," and Elijah of the "Translated Saints."

As the promise of Christ to His Disciples that some of them should not "taste of death" until they saw in vision a rehearsal of the manner of His Second Coming, was fulfilled in the "Transfiguration Scene," so the statement made to Peter as to John, "If I will that heTARRY TILL I COME" (John 21:20-23), finds its fulfilment in John's being caught up in vision and beholding before his death, what he would have witnessed and experienced if his life had been prolonged until Jesus came back. Thus John was permitted to live, until, in vision, he saw the Return of the Lord.

The "Rapture" of the Church is described in 1. Thess. 4:16-17. "For the Lord HIMSELF shall descend from Heaven with a SHOUT, with the VOICE OF THE ARCHANGEL, and with the TRUMP OF GOD; and the DEAD IN CHRIST shall rise first: then we WHICH ARE ALIVE and REMAIN shall be CAUGHT UP TOGETHER WITH THEM in the clouds, to meet the Lord IN THE AIR: and so shall we ever be with the Lord." Note how John's taking up corresponds with this. He was summoned by the "VOICE OF CHRIST," and it will be the "SHOUT of Christ" that shall summon the saints at the Rapture. It was with a "LOUD VOICE" that Jesus called Lazarus from the tomb. John 11:43. And as it was a Trumpet Like Voice that summoned John, so it will be a TRUMPET CALL that will summon the Saints at the Rapture.

As confirmatory proof that the Church is "caught out" at this time and place, we have in the description of the Throne, the statement that the Holy Spirit in the Seven-fold plentitude of His power, is BACK IN HEAVEN. In none of the Epistles is the Holy Spirit invoked along with the Father and the Son, except in 2. Cor. 13:14, because He is viewed as abiding on the earth with the Church, convicting of sin, comforting believers, and gathering out the elect, but here He is no longer on the earth but back in Heaven, and before the Throne. This is the strongest kind of evidence that the Church at this time has been "caught out" and is no longer on the earth, for when the Holy Spirit goes back to Heaven He will take the Church WITH HIM. And the presence of the Holy Spirit in Heaven is conclusive evidence that the events that follow are to take place after the Church has been caught out, and therefore the Church is not to pass through the Tribulation.

I don't see you post has any relevance.

I'm not shocked by that.  If the great tribulation has already occurred as you say then the devil has been cast into the bottomless pit and we are living in paradise?

London

^{(((The church age saints will not go through the tribulation)))}

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1 to 50

Yeah...let me know if you need any for your hourly avatar swap...

Sure send them over you never know when you might need a new pic....

When u is from Ohio use can make ur own rulz.....

50!
Congratulations.
Job well done....
now I am tuckered.

Hmmmm,  it seems like the first time the mods was beat was on who's watch.......

Edited to add 

We won,,,,,,,,

Again!

 

I just started

Charles Spurgeon: Lectures To My Students, Vol 1-4 (Illustrated)

 

At least there is pictures.....  

Sorry, we only speak English -- those are Arabic numerals.

There aren't any English numerals?? I guess it's impossible then to complete your count HaHaHaHaHaHaHa

We were only following the rules as put forth by Brother Matt

2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16,18,20,22,24,26,28,30,32,34,36,38,40,42,44,46,48,50

1,3,5,7,9,11,13,15,17,19,21,23,25,27,29,31,33,35,37,39,41,43,45,47,49

You guys wanna see what Salyan looks like while moderating?

2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16,18,20,22,24,26,28,30,32,34,36,38,40,42,44,46,48,50

16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44,45,46,47,48,49,50

It does not say in the OP that counting to 50 had to be done in SEPARATE posts!!!!