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     <h3 class="panel-title">[[File:Page.png]] '''March's''' featured article</h3>
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===='''Doing the Way to Knowing'''====
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===='''The Return of the Lord'''====
  
"If any man willeth to do His will he shall know of the teaching, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of Myself." John 7:57.
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For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. (I Thessalonians 4:16,17-NIV)
  
There was great division among the Jews as to who Christ really was, and the Divine authority of the truth He taught. They wanted some sign as a clear proof that He was really come from God. Christ's answer tells them that the proof depended upon the state of their heart.
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The above passage is the foundation for the unscriptural teaching of the pre-tribulation rapture to deliver the believers from Antichrist and the great tribulation.
  
A man who wants the Divine evidence of Christ's mission, while he is not ready to do God's will, seeks for it in vain. A man whose will is set upon doing God's will, as far as he knows it, is alone in the fit state for receiving further Divine illumination.
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If you will read the passage carefully you will see there is no mention whatever in the verses or their context that the purpose of resurrecting the dead in Christ, or catching up the saints to meet the Lord in the air, has anything to do with escaping Antichrist or the great tribulation.
  
Our Lord says: "If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the teaching whether it be of God." He speaks of two things: the will of God we are to do, and the teaching about God we are to know. He tells us the second is entirely dependent upon the first. As we will to do, we shall be able to know. It is the contrast and the connection of precept and promise. Will, that is, be ready, be determined to do God's will, and you shall have Divine light and certainty as to all that Jesus has taught. The commands are simple and easy to be understood: he that seeks honestly to do them in the fear of God will learn to know the mystery of Christ. A will, a disposition set upon doing God's will, is the only organ for knowing God's truth.
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Paul wrote these words, not to give the believers hope they would be removed from trouble but to comfort them concerning their dead relatives. I use the passage at funerals, telling the grieving relatives and friends that they will see their loved ones again.
  
There are many Christians who complain of their lack of spiritual discernment. The promises of Christ in this very Gospel of St. John appear beyond their reach. They are eager to know that "the teaching is of God"; they would like to experience and to feel that it is of Divine origin, and in Divine efficacy; that God Himself confirms and makes the words true as a living power. Take the promise of Christ in this chapter, of streams of living water flowing out of the believer. Or, later on, of the life more abundantly; of his followers not walking in darkness, but having the light of life; of our doing greater works than He had done; of His manifesting Himself to us; of His and the Father's dwelling in us; of our abiding in Him and He in us; of our asking what we will, and having it given to us. When a man really knows the teaching is from God, has the truth and power of God in it, it becomes easy to believe it, and receives its fulfilment. To all believers who really long to have these promises shine with Divine light in their hearts, Christ's message comes today: it all depends upon the one thing, that you really will to do the will of God. Let us try and take hold of the lessons we need.
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Notice there is no mention of leaving the earth and going to Heaven. The saints meet the Lord in the air. They go up to meet Him as He descends to the level of the spiritual thrones that govern the earth. These thrones had been occupied by wicked spirits. The thrones in the air are now vacant, ready to be taken by those saints for whom they have been prepared.
  
Christ teaches us that in the growth of the Christian life faith depends upon character. Just as, at conversion, there can be no faith without repentance, so on through life faith cannot grow or inherit the promises without a life given up to the doing of God's will. "Some having thrust from them a good conscience, have made shipwreck of the faith." The great reason why so many pray for an increase of faith and never get it, is that "the will to do God's will" has never taken the place it must have. The will rules the life; the will is the index of the heart; the whole man is to be judged by the will; unless there be a fixed resolve, a seeking with the whole will to do the will of God, there can be no growth in faith or the knowledge of the Divine truth to which it gives access. It is only as God's will is truly and fully taken up into my willing and doing that God can reveal Himself to me.
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Notice that the dead in Christ, many of whom have been in Heaven for thousands of years, have returned with the Lord to claim their bodies from their place of burial. Now they are standing on the earth in glorified bodies.
  
God judges of our conduct by the will. Our Lord says: "If any man willeth to do His will." A believer may in his youth, through ignorance or feebleness, fail in doing the will; if He who searches the heart sees that he indeed wills, longs, and thirsts to do it, God will see in this the heart that is ready for spiritual light. "If there first be a ready mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not." A believer, as in Rom. 7:1-25, may be able to say before God that he delights in the law of God after the inward man, and yet have to mourn his terrible failure.  
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The living saints, who are spiritually mature enough to sustain the change from mortality to immortality while standing on their feet, are also glorified.
  
If there be this will really to do, his failure will lead him on to see how Rom. 8:2-4 is the deliverance from the law of sin in the members by the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, so that the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in them that walk after the Spirit. Christ's words are not meant for those who content themselves with the idea that they will to do the will while they do not press on to the life in the Spirit in which God works both to will and to do. It is the heart where the will is needed, with its whole strength, set upon God's will, that the Divine truth and power of Christ's teaching will be known. To do the will of God, the first step is thus to take it up into our will.
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This is the army of the Lord. Do you think these warriors in glorified bodies, living by the life of the Spirit of God, could be harmed by Antichrist or the great tribulation? Let us not be foolish!
  
The will of God is the heavenly treasure in the earthen vessel of our will that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us, and we so learn to trust God to work His own will in us and through us. I cannot repeat the message too frequently or too earnestly; the one object for which our will was given us, its true nobility and blessedness, is that with it we might take in and make our own the very will that God has. Before ever I see all which that will implies, or feel that I have the power to perform it, let me regard it as the one thing God asks from me, the one thing I can do to please Him and become a partaker of His blessedness - day by day to accept, to worship, to will His blessed will, and to do it. He works in us both to will and to do.
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Slowly, majestically, in the sight of Antichrist and the wicked of the earth, the army of the Lord will rise to meet the Commander-in-Chief in the air. There they will mount the white war stallions in preparation for the onslaught of Armageddon.
  
"Willing to do the will" of God is the sure way to all growth in spiritual knowledge and experience. Actually doing all that is within the reach of my spiritual stature, and willing with the whole heart to do all that still appears beyond me, is the single eye which ensures the whole body being full of Divine light. The great reason why so much Bible study and prayer for Divine guidance is so fruitless is this - the heart is not in the right state for receiving God's teaching.
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Don't you think the heroes of faith who have returned with Christ and received back their bodies from the ground would be somewhat dismayed at the thought of returning to Heaven to wait another seven years before they can assume their places of rulership (as is often taught)? They are kings and they are anxious to inherit their kingdoms!
  
Peter writes: "Ye have purified your souls in obedience to the truth": it is the actual doing of God's will, with the entire surrender to God to do it wholly and unceasingly, in the greatest things and in the least, that purifies the soul and inherits the promise, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." There is in the will of God such a Divine vitality and energy that to the heart that wills and does it, not merely as a matter of duty or Christian training, but because God has willed it, and even as God wills it, it becomes life and strength. The spiritual knowledge of God, of His presence, His power, His indwelling is given to the obedient: "If a man love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him."
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You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth. (Revelation 5:10-NIV)
  
Here is the way to a strong and joyful spiritual life. Unite yourself to the will of God; it will unite you to Him, it will draw Him to you. Will, with all your will, what God wills; make this the chief exercise of your spiritual life; as much as you truly have of God's will you have of God. Our Lord said: "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." He was this because He came not to do His own will, but the will of the Father. This is the one way in which He will lead you, the new and living way He opened up in His blood by doing God's will. This is the one truth He will be to you, that in the doing of the Father's will is the union with Him perfected. This is the one life He will give you, the life of God given in Christ, revealed and perfected by the will of God, as it is willed and done by us.
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The moment they rise from the earth the fury of God's anger will fall on those who have been left behind. This is not the great tribulation but the Day of Wrath.
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Notice the following verses, which are in context with the above passage.
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For you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, "Peace and safety," destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you, brothers, are not in darkness so this day should surprise you like a thief. (I Thessalonians 5:2-4-NIV)
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To say that Paul has changed the subject, that I Thessalonians, Chapter Four is not speaking of the historic Day of the Lord, and that Chapter Four is not speaking of the same event as the first and second chapters of Second Thessalonians, is to defy every principle of biblical interpretation. The "pre-tribulation rapture" is a "private interpretation." It is one of the deceptions that Jesus warned us would be prevalent in the closing days of the Church Age.
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We see, then, that a close look at the "rapture" passage causes the doctrine of the "pre-tribulation rapture' to evaporate like dew when the sun rises. It is not verified by the Scripture. It is a myth, a delusion, a device to keep God's people from preparing themselves to stand in the evil day.
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I think it is time for God's leaders and statesmen to turn this thing around and bring a true description of the future to the Lord's people.

Revision as of 13:05, 2 August 2022

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Page.png August's featured article


The Return of the Lord

For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. (I Thessalonians 4:16,17-NIV)

The above passage is the foundation for the unscriptural teaching of the pre-tribulation rapture to deliver the believers from Antichrist and the great tribulation.

If you will read the passage carefully you will see there is no mention whatever in the verses or their context that the purpose of resurrecting the dead in Christ, or catching up the saints to meet the Lord in the air, has anything to do with escaping Antichrist or the great tribulation.

Paul wrote these words, not to give the believers hope they would be removed from trouble but to comfort them concerning their dead relatives. I use the passage at funerals, telling the grieving relatives and friends that they will see their loved ones again.

Notice there is no mention of leaving the earth and going to Heaven. The saints meet the Lord in the air. They go up to meet Him as He descends to the level of the spiritual thrones that govern the earth. These thrones had been occupied by wicked spirits. The thrones in the air are now vacant, ready to be taken by those saints for whom they have been prepared.

Notice that the dead in Christ, many of whom have been in Heaven for thousands of years, have returned with the Lord to claim their bodies from their place of burial. Now they are standing on the earth in glorified bodies.

The living saints, who are spiritually mature enough to sustain the change from mortality to immortality while standing on their feet, are also glorified.

This is the army of the Lord. Do you think these warriors in glorified bodies, living by the life of the Spirit of God, could be harmed by Antichrist or the great tribulation? Let us not be foolish!

Slowly, majestically, in the sight of Antichrist and the wicked of the earth, the army of the Lord will rise to meet the Commander-in-Chief in the air. There they will mount the white war stallions in preparation for the onslaught of Armageddon.

Don't you think the heroes of faith who have returned with Christ and received back their bodies from the ground would be somewhat dismayed at the thought of returning to Heaven to wait another seven years before they can assume their places of rulership (as is often taught)? They are kings and they are anxious to inherit their kingdoms!

You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth. (Revelation 5:10-NIV)

The moment they rise from the earth the fury of God's anger will fall on those who have been left behind. This is not the great tribulation but the Day of Wrath.

Notice the following verses, which are in context with the above passage.

For you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, "Peace and safety," destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you, brothers, are not in darkness so this day should surprise you like a thief. (I Thessalonians 5:2-4-NIV)

To say that Paul has changed the subject, that I Thessalonians, Chapter Four is not speaking of the historic Day of the Lord, and that Chapter Four is not speaking of the same event as the first and second chapters of Second Thessalonians, is to defy every principle of biblical interpretation. The "pre-tribulation rapture" is a "private interpretation." It is one of the deceptions that Jesus warned us would be prevalent in the closing days of the Church Age.

We see, then, that a close look at the "rapture" passage causes the doctrine of the "pre-tribulation rapture' to evaporate like dew when the sun rises. It is not verified by the Scripture. It is a myth, a delusion, a device to keep God's people from preparing themselves to stand in the evil day.

I think it is time for God's leaders and statesmen to turn this thing around and bring a true description of the future to the Lord's people.