Day Nineteen

I am very excited because I am close to the end of my 21 day fast, and I know that my answer is coming soon!  My question, as regular followers of my blog know, is this being the End Times (everyone agrees): what comes next, and how do we prepare for it?  And I’ve been asking not only for an answer for myself, but for a spirit of revelation so that the whole Body of Christ can know.  What good would it do, if only I know and it’s not confirmed by others?

So, with my answer pending in just 2 more days, one thing has been on my mind lately: the Rapture of the Church.  Oh, the unspeakable joy of being carried away (that’s what “rapture” means) to the wedding chamber with Jesus!

But something has been dampening my joyful anticipation: my sons are not walking with the Lord.  Both of them made decisions for Jesus, but have been seduced away by the world’s pleasures.  I know from my own experience that Jesus really does leave the 99 and go looking for the lost sheep because I was that lost sheep.  He came looking for me when I was not looking for Him.  He knew that I was ready to come back before I ever imagined that I was.  (If you didn’t read that story, here’s the links: Gotcha! And Gotcha! Part 2.)  So I have real reason to hope that they will have a similar experience.

But will they have it in time for the Rapture?  I certainly hope so.  If not, then they will have to go through some really terrible stuff, with no guarantee that they will survive.  So I have done what I can to help them through those days, if they remain here.  I have written them a letter, which I will print out and put with my important papers.  They will know where to look for it.  In the letter, I have explained what has happened with all the disappearances.  But I feel certain that they will already know what’s up.  I made them beneficiaries on my bank and investment accounts.  That will save them from having to go through the long waiting process of Probate Court.  I wrote a list of those accounts so that they will know where to go.  I also included instructions for getting through the next seven years, which are going to be really tough.

Some people think that we have already entered the Tribulation, but we have not.  The Tribulation starts with a peace agreement with Israel in which they will be allowed to rebuild the Temple.  As of this writing, that hasn’t happened yet.  That peace agreement will be put forth by the Antichrist, a world political leader.  There is no single world political leader yet.

Some people think that the Rapture won’t happen until the last trumpet of Revelation.  But that’s just not right.  I’ve been studying this, well, OK, studied on You Tube, but with some discernment, it’s easy to tell what’s right and what’s unsupported conjecture and pure nonsense.  Here is a link to the best Rapture explanation I’ve heard: Rapture Video.  And here is a link to another really great Rapture explanation: Rapture and the Church.

The world after the Rapture is not going to be nice at all because up to now, the Holy Spirit has been restraining the evil.  Look at the news!  If this is what restrained evil looks like, just imagine when we are taken out of the world.  With us goes the Holy Spirit, too.  But not forever.  I believe that Joel’s prophecy is for the Tribulation saints:

I will pour out My Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on My servants, both men and women, I will pour out My Spirit in those days. I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved; for on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be deliverance, as the Lord has said, even among the survivors whom the Lord calls, (Joel 2:28-32).

Peter used this verse on the day of Pentecost to describe what was happening, but the “wonders in the heavens” didn’t happen at that time.  This has got to be a dispensation for the Tribulation saints, as well as a last chance for the rest of humanity.

If they have to go through the Tribulation, then I know that God will help them.  One way or the other, I’ll see them when it’s all over.  But as for me, my bags are packed, I’ve got extra oil for my lamp, and when that trumpet sounds, I’m gone!  God is good!