I meant the earth is not going to be destroyed - as in the planet evaporated completely by some sort of nuclear war or whatever, but a new system a new Government, constitution - a new Jerusalem - the Kingdom of God is put in place fully .
What should we do to prepare for the rapture?
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The language concerning the new heavens and the new earth is apocalyptic and symbolic. It is de-creation language. Language like the sky rolling away like a parchment being rolled up is the opposite of God creating an expanding universe. It refers to powers being shifted. No longer is Satan having carte blanche to control mankind but he has become impotent as Jesus builds His church and the gates of hell are unable to retard its growth. Jesus is making all things new.
2Peter 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.
11 Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness,
12 Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?
13 Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.
14 Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot, and blameless.
This is not about political reform, nuclear war, or anything else that can be done by the will of man.
God destroys, and God creates.
It is a final judgement, and the deliverance of the "meek" by God.
Just as Jerusalem was judged, we also must be judged.
1 Peter 1:7
That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:
You have either purposely created a straw man argument to refute, or you just did not understand anything I said
I do not disagree with anything you just said in your reply, nor did anything in the post you replied to.
I sometimes wonder about the new-creation earth and its processes. Will there be any need for soil the is comprised of dead things? Bacteria that consumes dead matter and transforms it? Seeds that fall to the ground and die in order to live? Reproductive organs and processes? The cycle of weather? What replaces day and night cycles? What will we eat? And what of the "ages to come"?
So many systems of the current earth have death and renewal baked into their processes... I wonder what it will be like when death is no longer a consideration.
I personally believe that Jesus is upholding all things by the word of His power and is incrementally restoring all things. I don't believe we will be returning to a garden as the Bible begins in a garden but ends in a city. But your questions are excellent because when we reach the eternal state, death will no longer be a consideration. Imagine all those who have 2 left thumbs having 2 green thumbs. I'll finally be able to grow tomatoes.
If you deny the prospect of the Lord's second coming in a literal, physical sense by spitualizing or symbolizing it, it's preterism.
You have either purposely created a straw man argument to refute, or you just did not understand anything I said
I do not disagree with anything you just said in your reply, nor did anything in the post you replied to.
Sorry if I have taken a wrong understanding of your previous comment.
Of course the new heaven and earth is a complete mystery to me too.
I do not even know if the new earth will operate on the same vibrational frequency that we now call "physical".
It is as much of a mystery as the new Jerusalem, built by God.
At least we know that the temple is living, and Jesus Christ is head stone of the corner (Psalm 118:22).
Thanks. I imagined that preterism meant believing that something had already happened, from the Latin word "preter", meaning "past." Surely people who spiritualize or symbolize the Second Coming could still believe that it is in the future, and thus still something in prospect, though how such people would deal with the angel's words to the disciples after the ascension, I have no idea:
NKJV Act 1:10 And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel,
Act 1:11 who also said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven."
Earth vs world...
When Jesus returns, it's the end of the 'world'. The 'god (little g) of this world' get's locked up for 1000 years. Jesus overcomes 'the world'. Love not 'the world'. etc...
The earth is what God made man from. Apparently, after the 1000 year reign, Day of the Lord, Sabbath day, day of rest or whatever else we may call it, God will destroy this one and make new. No more wars and no more thinking we can govern ourselves without our King.
4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
2 And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.
3 And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?
4 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.
5 For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.
When Jesus returns, it's the end of the 'world'. The 'god (little g) of this world' get's locked up for 1000 years. Jesus overcomes 'the world'. Love not 'the world'. etc...
The earth is what God made man from. Apparently, after the 1000 year reign, Day of the Lord, Sabbath day, day of rest or whatever else we may call it, God will destroy this one and make new. No more wars and no more thinking we can govern ourselves without our King.
2 Corinthians 4
3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
John 16
33 These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.Matthew 24
1 And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple.2 And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.
3 And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?
4 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.
5 For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.
Yes, the return of Jesus ends world history and begins the history of heaven (Matt. 24, 1Thes. 4, 1Cor 15).
Not sure how the millennium jibes.
What 'Caught Up' Actually Means (Harpazo)
1 Thessalonians 4:17 says believers "shall be caught up together... in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air." The word behind "caught up" is the Greek harpazo — and it doesn't mean a gentle lifting. It means a sudden, forcible seizing. It's the same word used in Acts 8:39 for Philip, snatched away by the Spirit after baptizing the Ethiopian eunuch, and in 2 Corinthians 12:2-4 for Paul's experience of being caught up into paradise.Combine this with 1 Corinthians 15:51-54: "In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump... the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." Three components, back to back: the dead in Christ raised first in incorruptible bodies; the living instantaneously changed; both groups seized together to meet the Lord in the air. Nothing gradual, nothing negotiated.
Revelation 4:1 gives us a single individual's experience of this same action: "a door was opened in heaven... which said, Come up hither." John hears a trumpet, sees a door, and is summoned upward — the same elements 1 Thessalonians 4 and 1 Corinthians 15 describe for the whole church at once.
Why does the violence of the word matter? Because it tells us this is not a quiet slipping away that the world barely notices. It's forcible, sudden, and instantaneous — consistent with Jesus' own description of it happening "as the days of Noah," when people were eating and drinking and marrying right up until the flood came and took them all away.
The event itself is not ambiguous in Scripture. What's debated is the timing and the company involved. But the mechanism — a forcible, instantaneous seizing, dead raised first, living changed in the same moment — is stated plainly, and it's worth anchoring on that plain statement before wading into the harder questions of when and to whom.
Interestingly the gematria for Harpazo and the gematria for fruit that is harvested is the same. So think of fruit being plucked up as "the rapture".
Abel, Enoch, Noah, Lot: Four Pictures, One Harvest
Hebrews 11 gives us four figures from Genesis who, taken together, form a complete picture of how Scripture says the harvest at the end of the age unfolds. They are not four separate events. They are four aspects of a single event — what 1 Corinthians 15:23 calls "every man in his own order."Abel is first: "being dead yet speaketh" (Hebrews 11:4). He pictures the dead in Christ who rise first, per 1 Thessalonians 4:16 — already dead, raised at the sound of the trump.
Enoch is second: "translated that he should not see death" (Hebrews 11:5). Genesis 5:24 says simply that Enoch "was not; for God took him." He pictures "we which are alive and remain," caught up without ever passing through death — the second half of 1 Thessalonians 4:17.
Noah is third, and here the picture changes. Noah is not removed before the flood. He's carried safely through it: "moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house" (Hebrews 11:7). He pictures the "afterward" company of 1 Corinthians 15:23 — believers who pass through the tribulation rather than being taken before it.
Lot is fourth, referenced typologically alongside Noah in 2 Peter 2:5-9 and Luke 17:28-32. He's removed at the last possible moment, with property and relationships lost. Leviticus 19:9-10's gleaning law — leaving the edges of the field for those with the least — gives this pattern its name in this study: the gleanings.
Put together: some already dead and raised first, some translated without death, some preserved through the whole trial, and some rescued at the final moment before judgment falls. Four pictures. One harvest. The point isn't that Scripture contradicts itself about who gets raptured and when — it's that Scripture describes more than one company, and Genesis gave us the pictures centuries before Paul gave us the doctrine.
