LEARNING DAILY

 

2 Peter 3:3-4, knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation.”

 

Yes, I have written on these verses before; I am reacting to an article that stated 25% of pastors do not believe that the rapture is real. Believers in the first century, including Peter, believed that Jesus would return in their lifetime. Peter wrote that scoffers were making fun of the promise Jesus made to return for His faithful followers. This caused God’s people then and today to doubt whether Jesus’ promise was true.

 

There are two different events here. One is the sudden removal of God’s faithful people to meet Him in the clouds. This is explained in Paul’s writings in 1 Thessalonians 4-5. The other event is the Second Coming of Christ which occurs after the Great Tribulation and He comes to lock up the devil and his leaders (during the Tribulation) and to establish His reign on earth for 1,000 years.

 

Believers should not be shocked at the teaching about the rapture because Paul warns that the coming of Jesus to gather His people to Him will not happen unless false teaching occurs. 2 Thessalonians 2:3 tells us, “Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away occurs first, ….” The truth must be rejected first – the falling away or apostacy. “The definite article ‘the’ indicates that there will be a specific, unique walking away from the truth people once believed” (DJSB notes). As the truth of God’s Word is rejected or abandoned, the evidence that we are in the “end of times” becomes clearer.

 

Paul wrote to the Thessalonians because the people were facing persecutions and they were troubled with all sorts of questions due to deceitful teachings about loved ones who had already died. He wrote to them to comfort and guide them. The teaching on the rapture and the Second Coming was meant to encourage and motivate them to walk the narrow way to God’s kingdom. Paul was encouraging his readers to be ready, to stay ready for the trumpet to sound when Jesus will signal and call His people to Himself.

 

John 14:1-3 tells us that Jesus was going to His Father in order to prepare a place for His bride (us); His promise is to return for us so we can be with Him for eternity. The “us” is those who have believed in Him and have faithfully walked the narrow way with Him; that includes those who have already died in Him and those of us who are on the narrow way. We are to comfort one another with the Word of God and with the reminders of our ultimate destiny, eternity with Him in His kingdom.

 

From now on DJSB will be used to note information or quotes from the David Jeremiah Study Bible and LSSB will refer to information and quotes from the Life in the Spirit Study Bible.