What do you mean by again? Do you mean His physical body on the cross the first time.
God poured out judgments on Israel, but protected His people without removing them from the land first. If we consider things similar to the events described in Revelation to previous events in the Bible, what other events are similar. Wouldn't that the plagues in Egypt before the Exodus.
Good day president,
The problem with what you are suggesting is that, God was taking Israel to the land that He had promised Abraham. Likewise, Noah had to be preserved in order to repopulate the earth, else it would be empty. Also, the whole earth was not under God's wrath, just Egypt.
When the coming wrath of God begins, it will affect the entire world. There will be no ark to get on or no small city to flee to.
This coming wrath is the time that the prophets and the apostles spoke of as "the day of the Lord." To give you an example of the destruction, with just the fourth seal and the sixth trumpet, a fourth and a third respectively, over half the earths population will have been killed and that is not including trumpets 1, 2 and 3, nor the fatalities that will occur from the seven bowl judgments. This is supported by the fact that Jesus said, and I paraphrase "if those days had been allowed to go on any longer, no one on earth would be left alive."
A post-trib rapture explains that also, since the saints arise, then descend with Christ.
Really? How do you explain the bride/church present at the wedding of the Lamb which takes place in heaven prior to the Lord returning to the earth and we with Him. Then you have the following Revelation 17:14
"They (beast and ten kings) will wage war against the Lamb, but the Lamb will triumph over them because he is Lord of lords and King of kings—
and with him will be his called, chosen and faithful followers.”
The biggest problem with post-trib, is that it puts the living church through the entire wrath of God, which we are not appointed to suffer.
There are many passages that can be 'spun' in a pre-trib light. Pretribbers interpret a passage around pre-trib and then treat the passage as if it actually teaches pretrib.
I Thessalonians 5 sets the rapture and resurrection at the parousia, the coming of Christ, typically called 'the Second Coming.' In II Thessalonians 2, that wicked is destroyed at the brightness of Christ's parousia/coming. That doesn't fit with pre-trib. Pre-trib has the rapture occurring seven years before the second coming. It has the man of sin being destroyed at the second coming, also. I Corinthians 15:23 says that they that are Christ's will be made alive at His coming...not seven years before His coming.
Like many, you don't recognize the different between "our being gathered to Him" vs. "the day of the Lord," which is your error. Paul starts out with "Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him" and then in verse 2 & 3 he says "asserting that the day of the Lord has already come."
Our being gathered to Him = the church being caught up
The day of the Lord = God's wrath upon the earth
Our being gathered and the day of the Lord, are closely linked together. Once we are gathered, then the day of the Lord begins. You and others look at "our being gathered to Him" and "the day of the Lord" as the same event, which is the error. The day of the Lord, which is the time of God's wrath, follows the church being gathered to Him.
You are here
Our being gathered to Him
The day of the Lord begins when that apostasy takes place and the man of lawlessness is revealed
Sure they can. In Revelation, the city descends from heaven to the new earth. There is also a widely held belief that our disembodied spirits go to heaven between our death and the resurrection that might have some 'hints' of Biblical support.
First of all, the city (new Jerusalem) does not descend after the tribulation, but after the thousand year reign of Christ.
And second, when a believer in Christ dies, their spirit departs and goes immediately to be in the presence of Christ. This is not a resurrection. In fact, the spirit departing from the body is the exact opposite of resurrection. The word "anastasis" is made up of "ana=up and hestemi=to stand" properly, to stand up again in a physical body. Therefore, the spirit departing at the time of death is not a resurrection.
When the resurrection does take place, the spirits of those in Christ will be reunited with their resurrected bodies which will be immortal and glorified. Those who are still alive at the time of the resurrection, will simply be changed immortal and glorified and will be caught with them in the atmosphere to meet the Lord in the air.
To be clear, everyone who has died in Christ from the on-set of the church, their spirits are currently in the Lord's presence in heaven. Below is Strong's definition of the word anastasis translated as resurrection:
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Strong's Concordance
anastasis: a standing up, i.e. a resurrection, a raising up, rising
Original Word: ἀνάστασις, εως, ἡ
Part of Speech: Noun, Feminine
Transliteration: anastasis
Phonetic Spelling: (an-as'-tas-is)
Definition: a standing up, a resurrection, a raising up, rising
Usage:
a rising again, resurrection.
HELPS Word-studies
386 anástasis (from
303 /aná, "up, again" and
2476 /hístēmi, "to stand") – literally, "stand up" (or "stand again"),
referring to physical resurrection (of the body).
Christ's physical resurrection is the foundation of Christianity, which also guarantees the future resurrection of all believers (see Jn 6:39,40,44).
[
386 /anástasis ("resurrection") refers to the
physical,
bodily resurrection of Christ – and people (both of the redeemed and the unredeemed).]