Picture Types of the Rapture

1. Introduction.

When we studied thee Book of James, I said a key to understanding the Bible is determining if a passage is written to us or written for us.

The passages written to the churches in the New Testament are for us. Many of the other passages are not written to us, but they are written for us.

Here is what Paul had to say about it.

1 Corinthians 10:6–8 “Now these things became our examples, to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. And do not become idolaters as were some of them. As it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.” Nor let us commit sexual immorality, as some of them did, and in one day twenty-three thousand fell;”

1 Corinthians 10:9–11 “nor let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed by serpents; nor complain, as some of them also complained, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.”

The desert wanderings of the Israelites are not written to us, but they are written as examples for us. Paul further explained it to us.

2 Timothy 3:16 “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,”

Even though a Scripture may not be written to us, but all Scripture is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness.

Even though the church is not found in the Old Testament, the experiences and troubles of the Israelites serve as examples for us. Tonight, I want to show you three pictures of the Rapture found in the Old Testament, even though the Rapture is not specifically mentioned in the Old Testament.

2. Enoch.

Genesis 5:22–24 “After he begot Methuselah, Enoch walked with God three hundred years, and had sons and daughters. So all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years. And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him.”

Hebrews 11:5–6 “By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, “and was not found, because God had taken him”; for before he was taken he had this testimony, that he pleased God. But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”

Enoch is the first picture of the coming Rapture.

At 65 years of age, Enoch had an experience that changed his life forever. If we were using the vernacular of the New Testament, we would say that Enoch was saved at 65.

At 65, Enoch also had a son and I believe that led Enoch to the Lord. I also believe that God told Enoch what to name his little bundle of joy, and he named his baby Methuselah which means when he dies, it will come.

What was coming? The flood judgment. When Methuselah died, the flood judgment would come, and if you study it closely, you will see that Methuselah died, the flood came.

God’s message about the coming judgment changed Enoch. After his experience with God, the Bible says that Enoch spent 300 years walking with God.

As Enoch daily communed and fellowshipped with God, God gave Enoch incredible insight into the future.

Jude 14–15 “Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.””

If you read Genesis Chap. 5, you will notice something very special about Enoch. In that chapter, the phrase, “and he died,” is mentioned 8 times, but Enoch did not die as God took him. God snatched Enoch from planet earth.

One day Enoch was here and suddenly, he was not. He was taken because he pleased God.

Enoch is a picture of those in the church age that will not taste death but will be translated in the Rapture before the Great Tribulation and God’s wrath

Those who are truly saved in the true church will be raptured because they please or satisfy God. They will have pleased or satisfied God by putting their faith on God’s Son, Jesus Christ. Dear friend, you and I are pleasing to God, not because of who we are or what we do, but because of Jesus Christ.

How does this sound?

One day, you and I, if you are saved, could be here and the next second suddenly vanish meeting our Lord and Savior in the air to live with Him forever more. We could be like Enoch, never tasting of death because we will have been made alive by the Lord Jesus Christ.

3. Lot. (gen. Chap 19:4-11).

Lot had chosen to live in Sodom. He had made the choice as a Christian not to live a separated life but to conform to the world. The city attracted him because of all that it offered. The city was more appealing to him than God was.

Throughout the New Testament, Jesus, Peter, and Jude all speak of Sodom as an example and a warning to all humanity.

Jude 7 “as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.”

Sodom is a warning for Christians to be separated from the lost world. Yes, we are to carry the gospel into the lost world, Sodom if you will, but we are not to dwell in Sodom.

Romans 12:1–2 “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

If you insist on being in the world, like Lot, you will be consumed by the world before you know it.

By the way, can I take a 30-second timeout to say something?

Most Christians totally misunderstand the reasons for Sodom’s destruction.

If I were to ask 100 Christians what caused God to destroy Sodom, the vast majority will say that God destroyed Sodom because of homosexuality, but that is not what the Bible says.

Ezekiel 16:49–50 “Look, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty and committed abomination before Me; therefore I took them away as I saw fit.”

As you can see, abomination was last on the list of Sodom’s sins which is exactly what Paul is saying in Romans when he says this.

Romans 1:20–27 “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man—and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in…”

The connection, and I wished Christians would understand this, is that if a person in pride rejects God when that person can know God, that rejection leads to a lifestyle that is an abomination before God.

Seriously, and I say this without stammer or stutter, a homosexual lifestyle is the byproduct of a life that rejects God. A person will get to the point where God leaves him or her to his or her own lustful desires, and dear friend, you nor anyone else knows what is buried deep within the human heart just waiting to get out.

Sodom rejected God first; as a result, God left the city to its own sinful desires which produced abominations before God. All sinful lifestyles are the result of the rejection of God.

I need to say this for the teenagers.

A homosexual or lesbian can be saved, but a person who will not be saved who continues in that lifestyle will eventually be left to his or her own desires. There is no such thing as a Christian homosexual. There can be a person saved from homosexuality that is transformed into a new creature by the power of Jesus Christ.

In Lot’s rescue from Sodom, we see a picture of future events.

The wickedness of Sodom reached a point that demanded God’s judgment.

If you remember the passage, the angels come to Lot, and they tell him that God is about to destroy Sodom. The wickedness of the city had gotten so great that the men of the city wanted to have sex with God’s angels. The angels, as the men of the city approached Lot, dragged Lot into his house and slammed the door behind him.

Genesis 19:9–11 “And they said, “Stand back!” Then they said, “This one came in to stay here, and he keeps acting as a judge; now we will deal worse with you than with them.” So they pressed hard against the man Lot, and came near to break down the door.

But the men reached out their hands and pulled Lot into the house with them, and shut the door. And they struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they became weary trying to find the door.”

The angels opened the door and brought Lot into safety.

In the last days, wickedness will reach the point in this world where God’s judgment is required. At that time, God will open the door to heaven and believers will be snatched away and protected in their heavenly homes.

Revelation 3:21–22 “To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” ’ ””

Revelation 4:1 “After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven. And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking with me, saying, “Come up here, and I will show you things which must take place after this.””

In Lot’s case, the next thing that happened after he was brought into safety was that the men of the city were struck with blindness so that they could no longer find the door.

After the church is snatched away and the door to heaven is closed behind them, the lost world that remains behind will be blinded spiritually.

2 Thessalonians 2:11–12 “And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

Even though Lot was in the world, he had been saved. His clothes might have been singed, but he escaped God’s judgment on Sodom. He is like many that will appear at the Judgment Seat of Christ.

1 Corinthians 3:15 “If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.”

4. Elijah.

Now, Elijah is an incredible picture of the Rapture, the Tribulation, and the witnesses of the Tribulation.

2 Kings 2:11–13 “Then it happened, as they continued on and talked, that suddenly a chariot of fire appeared with horses of fire, and separated the two of them; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it, and he cried out, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and its horsemen!”

So he saw him no more. And he took hold of his own clothes and tore them into two pieces. He also took up the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him, and went back and stood by the bank of the Jordan.”

Elijah left this planet as Enoch did without tasting physical death.

As Elisha watched, Elijah was taken up into heaven in a whirlwind and a chariot of fire. The Bible says that Elisha saw Elijah no more, but Elijah’s mantle was left behind, and Elisha picked up Elijah’s mantle and performed twice as many miracles as Elijah did.

Elisha picked up Elijah’s mantle.

When the church is raptured, the church’s mantle will be picked up by the 144,000 Jewish witnesses of Revelation 7.

As Elisha did, these 144,000 witnesses will take the mantle of the gospel and preach the gospel throughout the world with incredible effectiveness.

Revelation 7:9–10 “After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!””

Now, this really gets interesting.

Elijah was snatched away before 7 years of famine.

2 Kings 8:1–2 “Then Elisha spoke to the woman whose son he had restored to life, saying, “Arise and go, you and your household, and stay wherever you can; for the Lord has called for a famine, and furthermore, it will come upon the land for seven years.” So the woman arose and did according to the saying of the man of God, and she went with her household and dwelt in the land of the Philistines seven years.”

Elijah being snatched prior to the 7 years of famine is a picture of the church being snatched before the Tribulation.

1 Thessalonians 5:9–10 “For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him.”

AMEN!!!

Now, here is something that I have tweaked my thinking just a little bit as I have studied God’s Word more thoroughly.

Preachers sometimes say the Rapture happens and immediately, the Tribulation begins. Well, the Tribulation does happen after the Rapture, but how long after, I do not know.

Why do I say that?

Because the Tribulation, the seven years that make up Daniel’s 70th week, begins when Israel, in its own land, signs a 7-year agreement with Antichrist.

Daniel 9:27 “Then he shall confirm a covenant with many for one week; But in the middle of the week He shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall be one who makes desolate, Even until the consummation, which is determined, Is poured out on the desolate.””

Does this happen immediately after the Rapture? I seriously doubt it unless Israel is back in its land before the Rapture. Now, as I speak, Israel is a long way from being in the land God has given them.

Once again, that is why it is important to separate the church, Israel, and the Gentile world.

1 Corinthians 10:32 “Give no offense, either to the Jews or to the Greeks or to the church of God,”

God has a program for the Jews, for the Gentiles, and for the church, and those plans are specific to each.

These three Scriptural pictures I have shared from the Old Testament are incredible pictures of the future. I hope I did not go through them too quickly. When you read the Bible, there is a shallow truth, and there is a deep Scriptural truth. For example, everyone knows Jonah and the giant fish on a shallow level, but how many realize the Scriptural truth of it being a picture of Jesus Christ being in the grave for three days.

That is why I say the church has got to get beyond a shallow knowledge of the Bible. It is time for us to start maturing spiritually and scripturally.