32 The taking over of the ruler ship of the world by the Lord Jesus Christ.

The worshiping of God by the twenty-four elders.

The angering of the nations.

The coming of God’s wrath.

The judging of the dead.

The rewarding of the saints.

The destroying of those who have destroyed the earth.

The opening of the Temple of God.

The appearing of the Ark of God’s Covenant in His Temple.

Lightning flashes, sounds, thunderclaps, an earthquake, and a hailstorm.

We know that several of these items cannot take place until after the first resurrection from the dead. Therefore the first resurrection and catching up of the saints already has taken place. Notice that the resurrection of the saints is not in this list. If it had not taken place previously it certainly would be included in this list.

Given that Paul stated we would be raised at the last trumpet, plus the events that immediately follow the sounding of the seventh trumpet (as described in Revelation 11:15-19), can we draw any conclusion other than that the reviving and drawing up to the heaven (up to the level of the clouds) of the two witnesses is one of the major scriptural portrayals of the first resurrection from the dead?—that this is a description of the return of Christ to the earth, of the arrival of the Day of the Lord?

It seems to us there is to be a period of time described as "the days of the voice of the seventh angel." During this period of time the Christian saints will bear the last witness of Christ; Christ will be formed in the members of the Body of Christ (Galatians 4:19); the Divine testimony will be "killed"; the elect will be protected and nourished in places prepared by the Lord; the power of the Divine testimony will be restored in association with the resurrection from the dead of God’s elect (Isaiah 60:1-3); and then the resurrected saints (including those saints who still are alive on the earth) will rise to meet the Lord Jesus Christ in the air.

Perhaps it will be the trumpet of God (voice of the seventh angel) in the mouths of His elect that will gather together the whole army of saints.

Then the part of the trumpet will sound that will announce to the heavens and the earth the assuming of the control of the world by the Lord Jesus Christ.

And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever. (Revelation 11:15)

The righteous, not the wicked, will inherit the earth. Christ, and His saints as coheirs, will inherit the nations and the farthest reaches of the earth as their eternal possession.

Christ will assume the ruler ship of the world and through His saints bring the world into the liberty of the glory of the children of God (Romans 8:21).

The saints will inherit the earth and earth’s peoples. The nations are our land of promise, our inheritance. Christ in us, and God in Him, will reach out to every person on the earth. Every one who chooses to go up to Zion (the Church of the Firstborn) and serve the Lord will be saved and blessed by the Lord Jesus living in and working through His conquering saints.

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