Martin Luther is quoted as saying that there were only two days on his calendar; today and “that day.”¹ In last week’s podcast, we began to talk about certain areas you should understand from the Word of God about ‘that day’, the Day of the Lord, about end-times. These are places in the Bible where our Father God admonished His children to not be ignorant, areas like the Law of Double reference, areas like time. We didn’t quite finish the ‘time aspect’, so we are going to pick right up this week and march on up the road as we talk about Prophetic End-Times: What You Need to Know

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Accept the Challenge

Each week’s podcast contains a call to action. The Word of God will not produce in your life unless you put into operation.
This weeks call is:

Twenty-one centuries ago, the time was short. So, if the time was short then, what do you think it is now? Our instructions from the Word of God is to get smart about end-times.
And, to get busy quick because time is in short supply.

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Each week’s podcast also contains a question designed to encourage testimony. Testimony is vital to a believers life. We overcome by it (Rev. 12:11).
This week’s question is:

What Bible study principles or tools have helped you the most to understand end-times? Please leave your thoughts in the comments section below.

Episode Resources

You can find more information on the subject of End-Times by clicking on the links above.

♦ #S4-042: Why We Need To Be Really Smart About The Things Of God [Podcast]

About Emery

Emery committed his life to the Lord Jesus Christ over 40 years ago and has served as both a full-time pastor and an itinerant minister. Both he and his wife Sharon of 35 years emphasize personal growth and development through the Word of God. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is both the focus and the hallmark of their mission. Read more about them here.

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Podcast Notes

Why We Shouldn’t Be Ignorant of Time

2 Peter 3:8 (KJV) — 8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

• Let’s pick right up with this passage in Second Peter.
• As we said, there are over 550 references to the word ‘time’ in the Bible.
• Many are in the ditch on one side or the other when it comes to this subject.
• There are those who say, I never have enough time.
• AS well as those who say, “I have plenty of time.
• Paul, inspired by the Spirit of God says otherwise.
• He said the time is short.

1 Corinthians 7:29 (KJV) 29 But this I say, brethren, the time is short: it remaineth, that both they that have wives be as though they had none; * He made that statement two thousand years ago.

• Twenty-one centuries ago, the time was short.
• So, if the time was short then, what do you think it is now?
• Our instructions from the Word of God is to get smart.
• And to get busy quick because time is in short supply.
• But, not just time in general that we are to be smart about, but time as God sees it.
• You see that’s what this passage in Second Peter says.
• God’s view of time is astronomically different from ours.
• With Him, from His perspective, looking through His eyes, one twenty-four hour day is AS a 1000 years.
• ‘AS’ means that it’s like this.
• So, if we blow that up a little bit, one day equals a 1000 years.
• Then that would mean the following:
  • 1 hour equals 41.666 years
• According to that, you have one to two hours of life as God sees time.
  • One minute equals 8.333 months or 253 ½ days.
  • One second equals 4.22 days.
• So if God ever says to you, “I’ll get back to you in a minute,” that will be toward the end of the year.
• Get smart about time.

God’s View of Time and Your Everyday Life

• Does this ‘timepiece’ have any application to how I live in the today?
• Here’s one possible application.
• Have you ever struggled in an area where the flesh is concerned especially when you first came to Jesus?
• So, here you are you’re trying to get on top of this thing
• One day you just missed it.
• You sinned.
• And you tell God you won’t do it again.
• You sincerely repent and for a while, you’re doing okay or so you think.
• A few weeks later, maybe two weeks go by and you hit that bump in the road again.
• Your flesh throws you.
• You sin and miss it again in the same area.
• You might think you’re doing pretty good.
• You held out for a whole two weeks.
• But, what is two weeks to God when one day is with Him as a thousand years?
• Two weeks to God as He views is a mere three seconds long.
• When you look at that way it’s like, “Way to go, man, I lasted a whole three seconds.”

The Lord Wants Us to Be Smarter about the Rapture

1 Thessalonians 4:13 (KJV) — 13 But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.

• So, here is another place, where there is an admonition against ignorance.
• The word ‘ignorant’, here in the Greek, is a verb.
• As we said to you before, the word means to not have information about, to not know, to be unaware of, to be ignorant of.²
• It’s not a noun which means that Paul wasn’t labeling the Thessalonian people as ignorant.
• The apostle to the Gentiles wasn’t engaging in name calling.
• His desire was to encourage the Thessalonian people.
• He didn’t want them grieving.
• The Greek words ‘sorrow not’ means to not be sad, unhappy or sorrowful.
• Since the word for ignorance is a verb, that means it’s an active something.
• You have to be active in gaining the knowledge you need to obey this verse.
• So, the opposite of this is an active ignorance.
• Paul was writing a letter to the church to help with active ignorance.
• But, they could have chosen not to read the letter.
• They could have chosen to not listen to the Word and remain unaware of end-times.
• Now, read the rest of this passage in First Thessalonians.

1 Thessalonians 4:13–18 (ESV) — 13 But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. 14 For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. 15 For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. 18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.

• What Paul is describing here is the Rapture of the Church or the Great Catching Away.
• Look at the Greek words ‘will be caught up’ and with that thought here’s the definition of the day.
• The Greek word for ‘will be caught up’ means to be snatched.
• It means to be or become seized or grasped hastily or eagerly; often in order to be taken away.
• The word occurs fourteen times in the Bible.
• The Bible is clear about the Rapture and you need to be smart about it.
• Those who are alive and remain will be caught up.
• They will be snatched away.
• The Thessalonians were grieving.
• Why were they grieving?
• This is the early church now.
• The early church believed that Jesus was coming back again.

Acts 1:10–11 (NKJV) — 10 And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, 11 who also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.”

• They taught and maintained that Jesus was coming back again.
• They were expecting it like any day now, just like we should be expecting it.
• The early believers were not looking for something to happen, they were looking for Someone to come. Looking for the train to arrive is one thing, but looking for someone we love to come on that train is another matter.³
• But, something very normal began to occur.
• Believers began dying off.
• They had funerals for them.
• “Hold up now, what’s going on.
• We thought Jesus was coming back”, they said?
• So then, they began to grieve and be sorrowful like the world sorrows when they lose a loved one.
• “What’s going to happen to them”, they thought?
• “What’s going to happen to us?”
• This grieving was compounded by the fact that there was false teaching going around that the resurrection was past already.

2 Timothy 2:15–18 (NKJV) — 15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. 16 But shun profane and idle babblings, for they will increase to more ungodliness. 17 And their message will spread like cancer. Hymenaeus and Philetus are of this sort, 18 who have strayed concerning the truth, saying that the resurrection is already past; and they overthrow the faith of some.

• People’s faith was upset because of this false teaching.
• They were sorrowing unnecessarily.
• What’s the answer to unnecessary grief?
• The answer is to study, to be diligent with the Word.
• So diligent, that the end result is you show yourself as approved unto God.
• You’re approved because you can rightly divide the Word of truth.
• You just need to remember that if the Word can be rightly divided, it can also be wrongly divided.
• What is rightly diving the Word of truth referring to in this section of scripture in Timothy?
• It refers to being able to not be overthrown when false teachers come around who say that is no resurrection.
• Who says that there is no rapture.
• With that thought here’s the illustration of the day.
• A woman lost her husband to death. She knew that she would see him again. And this assurance was confirmed when she returned home after the funeral. She found a sign that her husband had used: “Gone out, back soon.” That spoke to her about the fact of the rapture.⁴

The Church Will Not Go Through the Great Tribulation

• There are some believers who maintain that the church will go through the Tribulation.
• That there is no rapture.
• I am not one of those people.
• The reasons for not believing that the church is going through the Tribulation is found in three passages of scripture.
• And, two of these passages are in Thessalonians.
• How about that?
• I want you to hear them.

1 Thessalonians 1:9–10 (NKJV) — 9 For they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

1 Thessalonians 5:9 (NKJV) — 9 For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,

Romans 5:9 (NKJV) — 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.

• So, three times the Spirit of God through the Apostle Paul, informs us that we, the church, is NOT going through the Tribulation.
• We will be saved from the wrath to come.
• How much plainer do people want it than that?
• Let’s get back to this Greek for being ‘caught up’.
• By the way, the Greek word is
• Right now, let’s look at a couple of other passages, where the Bible refers to a snatching away of a person by the Lord.
• You remember there are fourteen of these verses in the Greek.

John 6:15 (NKJV) — 15 Therefore when Jesus perceived that they were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king, He departed again to the mountain by Himself alone.

• Do you see the words ‘take Him by force’?
• That’s the same Greek word snatching away or harpizo – pronounced har-a-pazo.
• This a physical use of the word.
• The crowd wanted to physically snatch Jesus and make Him King.
• So, there are physical uses of the word but there are also spiritual uses of the word.

The Rapture of the Church

2 Corinthians 12:1–4 (KJV) — 1 It is not expedient for me doubtless to glory. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. 2 I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) such an one caught up to the third heaven. 3 And I knew such a man, (whether in the body, or out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) 4 How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.

• Look at the words ‘caught up to the third heaven’ and the words ‘caught up into paradise’.
• It contains the verb used to describe the rapture, harpizo.
• Paul had an experience with God where he was ‘caught up’, snatched or raptured into the third heaven.
• The Bible is very clear and specific about exactly where Paul went.
• He was raptured into the third heaven, specifically into Paradise.

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