This morning I was re-reading Luke 17 and this part of it stands out to me like a neon sign:
Luke 17:29but on the day that Lot went out from Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all.
It is so easy to lose sight of the critical details in the bible that point specifically to what the Lord is trying tell us. What was the driver that set in motion the destruction of Sodom? What was the sign to the wicked in Sodom that destruction was about to take place? The answer to both was Lot leaving Sodom. "On the day that Lot went out from Sodom" is how the Lord coaches His Word to us so we will understand completely what He is trying to tell us.
We know that an event is coming again that will be just like the days of Lot and Noah. On this future day we know that the day the righteous physically leave the place of destruction, then destruction will fall.
We don't have to get creative with our interpretation of this event like the pre-wrath and post-trib teachers do. They have to spiritualize the Word of God in an attempt to make it say something that it does not say. They have to make pieces fit into the puzzle in places where the pieces clearly do not fit. We do not have those problems. We know from the one sentence we have here in Luke 17:29 that:
1. The righteous are physically, bodily leaving the place of destruction
2. We know that the destruction will not fall before the righteous are physically removed
3. We know that in the days of Lot, one city was burned to the ground. It was only one city so Lot had plenty of room in the earth to escape from that one city's destruction. In Noah's day, the destruction was global so there was only one direction Noah could go (physically) to escape the destruction, and that was up. He had to rise up above the earth to escape the world wide destruction. That is biblical fact. We know that the destruction that is coming will also be global in scale. Because that destruction will be global, there will be no place on the face of the earth to escape from it, so once again somehow we must go "up" to escape this destruction. One of many vexing questions to the pre-wrath and post-trib teachers is this: how exactly is it that we will go "up" to escape this coming global destruction?
Being "kept" on the face of the earth is the only explanation the "other tribbers" can give us, but once again they have to deny the face value of the Word of God to arrive at their faulty conclusions. For us to be "kept" (greek "ek" in Rev 3:10) on the face of this earth during a time of global destruction would be the equivalent of Lot being "kept" in the midst of Sodom while fire was raining down on it. Is that how we read the story of Lot? No, it is not. The idea is a laughable absurdity. Again in the story of Noah, for Noah to be "kept" on the face of the earth during a global destruction would have meant he would have been floating along IN the waters of the flood, not above them:
| For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. Where was the escape from the global destruction in Noah's day? It was HIGH ABOVE THE EARTH. No need for literary creativity here. No need to spiritualize the Word of God here. The "other tribbers" are sorely vexed to explain to us the pre-tribulation believers how exactly it is that this time we will be "kept" high above the earth without the harpazo. We have already demonstrated that somewhere "up" is the only direction to go during a time of global destruction. Also remember that the Lord used the stories of Noah and Lot as our context for understanding what is going to happen. If someones interpretation strays from the context of the stories of Noah and Lot, their theories default to non-sense. What have we learned from this little detail in Luke 17:29? We know for a fact that the coming destruction is set in motion by the departure of the righteous. No fancy interpretation skills needed to arrive at this conclusion. That conclusion comes from a straightforward, literal childlike reading of the Word of God. We also know that we are the bride of Christ waiting for the return of our Bridegroom. We also know that the fall feast days are the only feast days waiting for prophetic fulfillment. We also know that we have been commanded to watch for our Lord's return, not the tribulation, not the anti-christ, not anything else written in the pages of Revelation. We have been ordered to watch for the return of Jesus Christ. Anyone telling you some other story today is preaching a "different gospel" from the one we have been taught in the pages of scripture and they should therefore be summarily dismissed. The gospel is the good news of Jesus Christ. Part of that good news is that He is coming back for us. We are to encourage each other with these Words. We are to comfort one another with these Words. The Lord Himself gave us the words "comfort" and "harpazo" in the same passage of scripture: 1 Thess 4:17Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. 18Therefore comfort one another with these words. Comfort and the harpazo go hand in hand. That is in extreme juxtaposition with the doctrine of demons taught as the "pre-wrath" and post-tribulational escape from nothing we hear so much about today. This writer finds no comfort whatsoever from contemplating which way the anti-christ is going to sever my head from my body in the days ahead. The doctrine of demons pre-wrath and post-trib teachings tell you that probable death is what awaits you. Does that comfort you? You connect the dots. There is an escape from all coming. Our bridegroom is coming back for His bride. The fall feasts will be prophetically fulfilled. There is an event that will provide great hope and comfort today for those who have faith in the Words written about it. This writer is not the author who told you to be comforted by the thought of the harpazo, JESUS is that author. Be comforted, be encouraged, be hopeful, be pure and holy. Be a wise virgin who has extra oil for her lamps, prepared to watch for her bridegroom for however long He takes to appear. These are the thoughts this writer has been impressed with today. grace and peace |
