If there is a Rapture, who will preach to those left behind? Surely not many churches will be empty the following Sunday. Few congregations will have been 100% raptured, and others will very likely join them to find out what is happening.
Archdruid Eileen offers a preview of that situation in at least one church this Sunday, where the pastor is away at Spring Harvest:
Take the people at Drayton’s chapel. In his absence, his deacon – Mr Obadiah Zebulun – is preaching. He doesn’t often get the chance, and he’s made the most of it.
The pastor of my old church in Essex is currently leading a mission trip to Israel, so the church’s Facebook page announced last night that
Next week is Holy Week and we’re kicking things off tomorrow with a sermon from our very own Easter Bunny
– followed by the name of the lady in question. I give no links here to spare her blushes.
Now I wouldn’t suggest that that godly lady would not qualify for the Rapture. I’m not so sure about the fictional (I presume) Deacon Obadiah Zebulun. But, if there were to be a Rapture, it would surely be most unfortunate if the left behind congregation members, who would be in serious need of spiritual guidance, were instead forced to suffer the lengthy rants and bad exegesis of second rate preachers who were not even born again.
I still wouldn’t want to be raptured – I would prefer to be left behind. Or, more to the point, I hope that when difficult times come none of God’s people are raptured, but all are left behind to minister to unbelievers at the time of their greatest need. We can rely on God to be with us through the worst of times, although that might not protect all of us from suffering and martyrdom. Surely there will be faithful witness to the truth about God right up to the end.
Whay do you think of what scripture says about Christs’ returns for a thousand years with the saints, after being raptured that is ? and satan being bound for that time. I am hopeing that lots of people will turn to Christ then and believe.
Would love to know your response, Blessings
David, that’s a good question. I don’t have time now for a detailed answer. But I give a partial, and rather tentative, answer in my recent post The Marriage of the Millennium: not William and Kate. On this understanding the millennium is in effect the church age, the current age. I accept that this means taking some of the detail in Revelation 20:1-6 figuratively: I suppose the martyrs are reigning with Christ seated in heavenly places, not on earth, compare Ephesians 2:6. But then the whole of Revelation is in more or less figurative language.
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