Is there a rapture? Our answer might surprise you! Jeff and Tyler talk about ‘interpreting the times,’ the rapture, and what this has to do with us today. This one brings up a LOT of questions, and we’d love to hear them!
Send questions you have about the “end times” (or anything else!) to theKindFaith@gmail.com
SHOW NOTES:
[00:12] Introduction: Ground to cover; “interpreting the times”
[10:28] Wait, there’s no rapture?
[32:36] Practical: How what we think about the rapture impacts our view of creation now.
MORE DETAILS:
[00:12] Luke 12:54-56 interpreting the “times.” certainly we are always called to urgency and watchfulness… but are we in some sort of “heightened awareness”? No!
The “times” Jesus was calling immediate attention to in many of his “end times’ speeches was actually the destruction of the Jewish temple in A.D. 70, which would happen within a generation and became a very important call to urgency.
Matthew 24 Jesus just predicted the fall of the temple… and the next thing that happens is the disciples sit down on the Mt. of Olives and ask “when will this happen” (see Matthew 24:3).
[10:28] So there’s no rapture?
Referenced: Walter Brueggemann, The Land.
Everything in the life of Israel was about migration toward the land… When we rebel against God, God exiles us from the land. The idea that the faithful would be taken from the land in the rapture would make zero sense in a biblical worldview.
Matthew 24:36-44 “two will be at the field, one taken, one left” But you want to be LEFT BEHIND! To be “taken” means you’re dead! (see verse 37-39!) New T-Shirt Idea: “Left Behind and Lovin’ it!”
Mark 13:14 “Let the reader understand”… was Mark’s hint to his first readers to get out of Jerusalem and save themselves from the Roman Army! (And it worked!)
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18. multiple layers here: {Big shout-out to Tom Wright!} One, this is an image of a town exiting the town to welcome a visiting caesar outside the gates to escort him back into the town. The expectation is not that the Caesar would then take them away from Thessaloniki, but that he was coming to them.
Two, there are way more verbs and images about Jesus coming, rather than any emphasis on us leaving.
Three, there are multiple Hebrew Bible passages at play here—Exodus 19; Daniel 7; Ezekiel 1 to name a few!
[32:36] Practical take-away… how much “this world” matters. How what we think about the rapture matters for how we view the creation. and more on why the guys don’t think the rapture is biblical.
