Home

Why are the churches so blind? Standard Bible teachings on prophecy have created a false hope for millions of people, leaving them blind to the prophetic events happening in the world today.

The average Christian today finds it hard to see biblical prophecy being played out on the world stage right before their very eyes. They are either completely blind to it out of a lack of knowledge of the Bible or they have accepted a false teaching that they will be “raptured” off the earth and, therefore, won't see or experience it anyway, so why bother!

In large measure, the shepherds of the flock are to blame for the ignorance of the people because they are not teaching truth. But each individual has to take their share of the blame as well. The Bible is certainly not shy in declaring its message from beginning to end that each person will be judged for what they do. No one can stand before God’s judgment seat for anyone else and no “excuses” will be accepted.

The shepherds will be judged more harshly than the flock (James 3:1), but it is very clear that their judgment will not spare or exonerate one single member of the flock. Each individual person must account for themselves.

That being said, isn’t it time for the mindless sheep to wake up and start looking out for themselves and their own salvation? Stop allowing those who are supposedly more educated, more spiritual (at least in appearance), or more biblically knowledgeable to lead you down the path of destruction.

Jesus told his followers to “watch” what was happening in the world. When he told his disciples about the signs of the end of the age, it was to prepare them and give them the clues for what to watch for. At no point did he tell them that they would be miraculously spirited off the earth and be spared from witnessing the days of God’s wrath. In fact, his message makes it very clear that that won’t happen.

In Matt. 24:21-22 he says that the tribulation will be so great . . . “such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened [by God the Father], no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.”

If God must shorten the days of tribulation for his elect’s sake, that should certainly point out that his elect are still on the earth. If they had already been mysteriously removed before the tribulation began, why does he need to cut it short to spare them? If they are already gone and living in peace in heaven, then God could just wipe out all the rest of mankind and be done with it.

But that isn’t what the Bible teaches, is it? There is even more proof that the elect are not raptured off the earth before the tribulation begins. In Matt 24:29-31, Jesus says: “Immediately after the tribulation of those days [not before] the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth [all the people from every nationality] will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.”

If Jesus is collecting his elect at this time, after the tribulation, then who was he supposed to have collected before in this so-called silent rapture?

Many are confused in that last verse by the word “heaven.” They think it means that the angels will collect the elect from heaven and bring them to earth. But the word heaven is regularly used in the Bible to refer to the atmosphere that surrounds the earth, not the place where God’s throne is found. In fact, Jesus is the very one who said that “no one has ascended into heaven . . .,” in which verse he is referring to God’s throne room.

The heaven referred to here in Matthew is the same as what Paul was referring to in 2 Thess. 4:17. “Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air . . .”

The mysterious rapture that so many believe in is this very event that both Jesus and Paul are speaking of. Jesus’ angels will travel all around the spherical globe collecting the elect. They will rise from the grave if they have already experienced physical death and they will be changed to incorruptible bodies—spirit bodies. Those who remain alive will be caught up with them, also being changed to incorruptible bodies, and all the elect will be delivered to Jesus in the air (in the heavens, the atmosphere surrounding the earth) and will descend with the Lord on the Mount of Olives.

There is not one scripture anywhere in the Bible that says they will be taken to a different heaven somewhere. Likewise, there is not one scripture that says they will be spared seeing the tribulation. The only ones who will be spared the tribulation are those who have already died physically and are dead and buried.

In Revelation 6:9, when the fifth seal is opened, the saints under the altar are not a collection of raptured elect waiting somewhere in heaven. “I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the Word of God and for the testimony which they held.” These are not raptured saints, they are dead people. They are all the people who have lived for the past 6,000 years who have qualified for the first resurrection to join Jesus on the Mount of Olives. They are the people who will be raised first and caught up in the air when the angels circle the earth collecting all the elect—after the tribulation.

The teaching about a rapture of the church is Satan, pure and simple. It was never a part of the original gospel and never even entered the pages of Christian doctrine until the 14th century. It resided quietly there until the end of the 19th century when a few Protestant preachers picked it up and began promoting it as truth.

Even then it didn’t really gain credence until the middle and end of the 20th century. Jesus never taught it and the Apostles never taught it. Regardless of how creatively the shepherds of the flock today twist and distort the scriptures to make it fit, it just isn’t there anywhere in scripture.

Jesus told his followers to “watch” for the end-time events. It was so important that he said it three times: “When you see all these things . . .” (Matt. 24:33) and twice more he said “Watch, therefore . . .” (Matt 24:42; Matt.25:13). He never told them to bury their heads in the sand and he would come and rescue them from their blindness. He told them to watch what was happening in the world—to watch as world events unfold and reveal the antichrist. One of Jesus’ keys to being prepared for the end time events was watchfulness.

Satan does not want the elect to be prepared. He wants them blind and easy pickings for destruction. So he influenced the introduction of a false hope in the rapture. With most of the Christian church sitting around waiting for the rapture, no one is watching—not the shepherds or the sheep! And all are rushing toward their own destruction.

If you are sitting around waiting to be raptured or are in a church group that is promoting this false teaching, you owe it to yourself to prove it! Dig in and read the scriptures. Search it out. Read the Bible for yourself. Don’t just accept the popular view point. Prove it for yourself.

While the “Left Behind” series of books are a good read, remember they are just fiction. Just because they were written by two preachers does not make them scripture. Your salvation depends on what the Bible says, not on the fanciful imaginings of any man.