The Welcoming Committee

That does it...I have to write this.

I've been tempted on occasion to write something about this topic for a number of years, but it just never quite came to the forefront and grabbed center stage. It's as if nothing ever pulled my trigger quite hard enough to make me to sit down and do it. But recently, that trigger got pulled.

And it got pulled hard enough to make me do just that.

(I occasionally use the expression "Somebody finally got their trigger pulled!" to mean that a certain person got saved, but not in this case.)

My Taiwanese wife Phoebe studies the Bible with a zeal that puts me to open shame, but one of the benefits of that is that she often asks me questions or wants my opinion on biblical teachings she's found on YouTube that often lead me to a deeper understanding of something I thought I knew pretty well.

Phoebe and I both hold to a pre-trib view of the Rapture, and recently she asked me about a YouTube video of a nice young Bible teacher who was holding forth in regard to the timing of the Rapture—only this guy was praising and promoting the post-trib view while doing a bang-up job of denigrating the foolish misconception of the pre-trib view. OK...heard all that before.

But in his discussion of a well-known Rapture passage, this guy gushed over what he considered a common interpretive error that has led many naive believers down the rosy path of the pre-trib view, when in fact a more "informed" interpretation of this passage clearly supports the post-trib view. And when I heard his argument, that did it for this old Illinois boy.

Jaw. Clenched.

Text message from the Holy Spirit: "Go easy, bro."

The passage he was discussing is arguably the premier Rapture passage of the entire New Testament, and it comes from the pen of the apostle Paul as he addresses the believers in Thessalonika in his first letter to them:

It turns out that the claim this nice young Bible teacher was making has long been a widely held assumption among many who promote the post-trib view of the Rapture, and the argument goes something like this:

In 1 Thessalonians 4:17, when Paul talks about how the Church will "meet" the Lord in the air, he uses a form of the Greek word apantésis. But what so many scripturally uninformed pre-tribbers fail to realize and so totally miss is that the word apantésis doesn't simply mean to "meet" someone. Oh no. In reality, apantésis is a technical term that invariably refers to the Hellenistic custom in which a large number of people would go out as a group to formally welcome a visiting dignitary as he drew near to their city. After formally meeting and welcoming him with all due pomp and circumstance, they would graciously and joyously escort him back into their city they just left. In other words, people who "apantésis" someone are in effect the formal welcoming committee for a visiting dignitary.

Thus, since Paul uses this technical term apantésis, we are obligated to assume it imports this "formal welcoming committee" meaning into the text, even though no supporting context is actually present. After all, a technical term requires no such clarifying context to be present—it brings its technical meaning along with it wherever it goes. In other words, by using the word apantésis Paul is informing us that the Church will rise into the air to meet and welcome Christ when He returns, and then escort Him back to earth at what can only be the Second Coming. And since the Second Coming clearly occurs after the Tribulation, that means the Rapture must be post-trib. Q.E.D.

In other words, instead of interpreting this verse as:

The Church will meet the Lord in the air
so the Lord can escort the Church up to heaven,

they claim it means…

The Church will meet the Lord in the air
so the Church can escort the Lord down to earth!

That's the post-tribbers' story and they're sticking to it.

Needless to say, this teacher's video lit a fire under me to dig into the details of why what he claimed was not as he claimed, and so here we are. And as usual, I'd prefer to leave this teacher unnamed since I don't mean any of what I write in this article as a personal attack on what may well be an otherwise capable, competent Bible teacher.

But he's promoting an error in regard to the
Rapture, and I hate to sit idly by and watch
this error get palmed off on other believers.

The point is that I feel compelled to show you just how weak and specious this argument is, and I want you to understand in no uncertain terms that this flawed, logically suspect argument in no way validates the post-trib view or invalidates the pre-trib view of the timing of the Rapture.

Incidentally, note that in the pre-trib interpretation of 1 Thessalonians 4:17, we are caught up to meet the Lord in the air and then we keep heading up. The Greek word used for "caught up" in that verse is a form of harpazó, and that means to get seized or snatched up or carried off in a forceful manner, as when someone enthusiastically snatches a prize he has just won. I'm sorry, but that's what it means. And it should be thunderingly obvious that this is basically the exact opposite of the technical meaning of apantésis that post-tribbers so desperately try to wedge into this verse.

Later in the article, I also want to take a look at a few ways in which the pre-trib view of 1 Thessalonians 4:17 dovetails very nicely with the beautiful manner in which Scripture characterizes the relationship between Christ and the Church, many aspects of which are prophetically typified in ancient Jewish marriage customs.

On the other hand, when looked at in the same context, some aspects of the post-trib view of this verse call to mind the old "square peg, round hole" routine: Things just don't seem to fit.

The fallacy

Charles Ryrie (1925–2016) was one of the most influential theologians of the twentieth century, and in the 1960s he wrote that proponents of the pre-trib Rapture were increasingly being forced to contend with what he called "the intellectual attack." He was referring to the fact that it was reaching the point where most serious, critical biblical scholarship was drifting away from the pre-trib view, often for what had the appearance of highly technical reasons that such scholars felt many others failed to properly understand.

Post-trib smart, pre-trib dumb: One thing this drift contributed to was a growing sense of intellectual and scriptural superiority among post-tribbers, which helped foster what you might call a "post-trib smart, pre-trib dumb" ethos that you still run into in certain circles to this day.

This issue of insisting that the Greek word apantésis that Paul uses in 1 Thessalonians 4:17 is in fact a technical term that imports a highly specific meaning into almost every context in which it is used is a prime example of this intellectual attack, and at the heart of it lies an error in logic. The nature of this error is sufficiently well defined that it has a name:

The terminus technicus fallacy.

Terminus technicus is Latin for "technical term," and what I want to do in this article is show you that this "intellectual" argument that is used to claim Paul is really talking about a post-trib Rapture in 1 Thessalonians 4:17 based on his use of the word apantésis is in reality an example of the terminus technicus fallacy. This amounts to creating a flawed argument by assuming a certain word is a true technical term that automatically imports a specific meaning into a passage, irrespective of the absence of appropriately supportive context and based on scant or insufficient evidence that would confirm the fact that the word in question is in fact a technical term.

As D.A. Carson states in his classic work on biblical errors of logic:

This is actually a pretty slick fallacy, and it frequently works like a charm because most people tend to assume the writer knows what he's talking about. After all, he sure sounds like a smart guy who's done his homework, and who possesses a more in-depth understanding of a certain passage than the average reader.

Not only that, but it can take a healthy amount of legwork to uncover the truth behind the terminus technicus fallacy and expose it as the flawed, misleading argument that it is.

And if you ever discover that I have (perhaps unintentionally) employed such a fallacy in any of my articles, feel free to rub it in my face and slap me upside the head until I fix it.

What saith the Scripture?

In regard to determining whether or not apantésis is in fact a technical term with a specific meaning that we are obliged to import into any verse in which it is used in spite of a lack of supportive context, as always the first step is to go to the Word and let Scripture interpret Scripture.

Besides 1 Thessalonians 4:17, the Greek word apantésis is only used two other times in the New Testament, and so we need to take a look at these passages. The first is in the Parable of the 10 Virgins in Matthew 25:1–13, and the word apantésis appears in verse 6:

The question is this: Does the word apantésis import the full, Hellenistic meaning of a group going out to meet and welcome a dignitary and then accompanying him back to the place they came from?

Uhh...not exactly. As I have written before, I am convinced the Parable of the 10 Virgins is not primarily focused on the Church or the Rapture—it concerns Tribulation survivors who come to believe the gospel after the Rapture and during the Tribulation, and who will either be granted or denied entrance into the wedding supper on earth following the Second Coming based on their obedience to the Holy Spirit in the face of great persecution.

The Rapture has already occurred and the Church (i.e. the Bride) is long gone, and now the Bridegroom has returned at the Second Coming with the Bride in tow. One effect of this call is to draw the virgins to the wedding supper on earth (hang in there...I'll explain this in a bit more detail later).

When they arrive at the wedding supper, however, they learn that those who possessed a sufficient supply of oil (the Holy Spirit) and so maintained a faithful witness throughout the Tribulation will be admitted and those who failed to do so won't. The Bride is already in at her wedding supper...she doesn't need to be admitted since the entire purpose of the wedding supper is to celebrate the union of the Bridegroom and His Bride.

But the point is that none of the virgins took it upon themselves to go and formally meet the Bridegroom and welcome Him and joyously escort Him to the wedding supper. Escort Him?! Really?! He's the one who either lets 'em in or sends 'em packing when they show up!

What's happening in this parable bears precious little resemblance to the supposed technical meaning of apantésis—this is a far cry from the type of meeting suggested by the Hellenistic custom that post-tribbers seek to attach to apantésis as a technical term.

But what is even more important is that we can gain a good understanding of what happens in this parable from a careful study of the text of Scripture and the context in which it appears, as well as some understanding of the marriage customs of the day (which we will get into shortly).

The point is that such a presumed technical meaning of the word apantésis contributes absolutely nothing to our understanding of what occurs. In fact, importing such a technical meaning of apantésis into this passage, if anything, causes confusion and leads to misinterpretation of elements of the parable.

Q. So...why would this usage in Matthew 25:6 compel anyone to assume apantésis imports a technical meaning into 1 Thessalonians 4:17?

A. Because they want to attack the pre-trib Rapture and those who hold to it.

Now let's look at the last of the three New Testament usages of apantésis, which comes when Luke describes Paul's reception by believers as he approaches the city of Rome in Acts 28:

Admittedly there are some broad-stroke similarities between the formal Hellenistic greetings of dignitaries presumed to be suggested by the word apantésis and what occurred in Acts 28 with these brethren from Rome meeting the apostle Paul and his captors on their way to that city. But in reality, we can easily garner everything we need to know about what occurred in Acts 28 from the context of the passage—certainly not from the word apantésis itself. "They came to meet us"...that's clear enough. Why does apantésis need some kind of technical meaning here?

Again, as in Matthew 25, any supposed technical meaning attached to apantésis contributes nothing to our understanding of what occurred between Paul and these brethren—the context is pretty clear.

The basic point I want you to take away from these two examples is this:

If the word apantésis simply meant "meet" in the ordinary sense and nothing more, we would still walk away from the Parable of the 10 Virgins and Acts 28 with the exact same understanding of events, because we get all our understanding of those events from the context of the passages themselves (and perhaps from studying additional material related to them). And I say that because in both cases, we get zilch from any presumed technical meaning attached to the Greek word apantésis.

At the very least, these observations serve to weaken the claim that apantésis is a technical term that imports the meaning of a group of people coming out some distance from their city to formally greet and escort a visiting dignitary back into that city, and that it imports this meaning into a given context all by itself...which is what genuine technical terms do by definition.

But there's more, and it has to do with the Greek language itself. Now, don't tense up on me, because as you will see no actual knowledge of Greek will be required for this next section (which is a good thing, because I'll be the first to admit my knowledge of Greek wouldn't fill a medium-sized thimble.)

Greek is Greek

OK, so we've looked at two other passages that use the Greek word apantésis, and we have seen that in neither case does that word alone appear to import any technical meaning into the passage that is not already available in the context. This suggests that apantésis is not a technical term.

But that's just the Bible. What about other books and writings? Do we see apantésis used as a technical term in other Greek texts written around the same general time frame?

This is critical, because if apantésis is a true technical term that imports its meaning into the great majority of contexts where it is used the way real technical terms do by definition, then we should expect to see this in other Greek writings—any writing in Koine Greek that comes from the same general time frame as the New Testament. (And in case you're curious, Koine Greek was in common use from approximately 300 BC to AD 600, so the New Testament would have been written around the middle of this period.)

Consider: The New Testament was written in Koine Greek because it was the lingua franca of the period, and there is certainly no reason to believe the word apantésis would have been used with a very special technical meaning by New Testament writers, but used with a plain, ordinary meaning by other writers of the same period, right?

I mean, c'mon...Greek is Greek.

If our friend apantésis is anything resembling the technical term that post-tribbers claim it is in arguing for a post-trib Rapture in 1 Thessalonians 4:17, we would certainly expect to see clear evidence of such in many Greek writings of that general period, wouldn't we?

We sure would...but is that in fact the case?

Be aware that in order to support the view that the word apantésis is a technical term that refers to a group of people going out to meet a visiting dignitary and then escorting him back into the city they came out of, many post-trib commentators have traditionally cited the work of German theologian Erik Peterson (or cited the work of others who have cited the work of Erik Peterson, and so on down the line). In 1930, Peterson purported to show that the word apantésis did in fact possess this technical meaning, and ever since then his work has been so routinely cited by post-trib writers that over the years his work has essentially become regarded as "fact."

You got that right..."fact."

But in 1994, Michael R. Crosby wrote an article about the use of apantésis, and he uncovered something that might be of interest to those who refer to Peterson's work to "prove" that apantésis is a technical term that serves to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that 1 Thessalonians 4:17 is describing a post-trib Rapture:

That means our erudite Herr Peterson was wrong, and that means all the oh-so intellectual post-trib commentators who have so confidently cited his work to bolster their post-trib arguments and haughtily dismiss the views of their pre-trib contemporaries over the last century have been just as wrong.

So the simple truth of the matter is that although the Greek word apantésis can be used to refer to the Hellenistic custom of a group of people coming out to formally meet and welcome a visiting dignitary and escorting him back into the city they came out of, it simply doesn't qualify as a technical term that imports that meaning into every or even most of the contexts in which it is used. As a result, the nature of the meeting in question and the direction in which the parties go after they meet must come from the context in which the word appears, because that information does not come from the word apantésis all by itself. Thus, forcing it to import that meaning when it is absent in the given context is an interpretive error.

And that meaning is absent in the context of 1 Thessalonians 4:17.

I'll just come right out and say it. And please...do not miss this:

This little gem from Michael Crosby I quoted above effectively drives a stake through the heart of the post-trib claim that apantésis is a technical term that proves a post-trib Rapture in 1 Thessalonians 4:17. I mean, we're done...it's over. We can wrap it up and go home now.

That is, go home and wait for a shout, the voice of an archangel, and the sound of a trumpet. Why? Because the catching away of the Church is the next major event on the prophetic calendar...and that's because it happens before the Tribulation ever starts.

Oh, but I'm not quite ready to go home yet because I'm on a roll.

Best fit

As I mentioned earlier, I want to consider how interpreting 1 Thessalonians as a pre-trib passage fits perfectly with how other passages of Scripture describe the relationship between Christ and His Church, while reading a post-trib Rapture into this verse just feels like, well...

Putting your pants on backwards.

Or for the more demure among you, perhaps putting your kid gloves on the wrong hands—that'll work. In other words, one fits well and the other just...doesn't. So another thing I want to do here is consider some of the reasons why I might say such a thing.

One of the most beautiful images used to characterize the relationship between Christ and the Church is the image of a bride and groom—Christ is the Bridegroom and the entire body of Church Age believers is the Bride. Paul draws on this metaphor in his letter to the church in Ephesus:

Paul is briefly referencing the topic of marriage, but he draws on this wonderful image of the relationship between Christ and the Church in the process to get his point across.

What I want to do here is briefly go over several reasons why I am convinced reading 1 Thessalonians 4:17 as a pre-trib verse as opposed to a post-trib verse is a much better fit when we consider what Scripture tells us in regard to the relationship between Christ and the Church. And as you will see, knowing a little bit about the Jewish marriage customs lurking in the contextual background will help us properly understand a few points that are sometimes missed or misinterpreted.

Par for the course: The subject of ancient Jewish marriage customs is actually a deep and extensive topic, and it takes a good deal of time and effort to deal with it in detail. And to make matters worse, virtually every source you come across has a different view of various details and the interpretation thereof—not to mention the fact that these customs vary from region to region and have changed over time. So I'm gonna go easy here. But don't be shocked if something I say disagrees with something you have read somewhere else. That's par for the course.

First came the betrothal. The bridegroom would go to the home of his prospective bride and negotiate the bride price with her father. After these initial matters were settled, the couple was betrothed—and they were considered a legally married couple at that point.

Jesus paid the bride price for us with His blood on the cross two thousand years ago. And just as in a Jewish marriage, ever since then the Church has officially been betrothed to and considered legally married to Christ. Paul speaks to this idea in 2 Corinthians:

Then the groom would return home and begin making preparations, primarily by building a home for them to live in. This might involve some additional accommodations within his father's house, an addition built on to it, or possibly a new home built nearby.

Jesus makes reference to going to make similar preparations for His Bride in the Last Supper Discourse:

The bride would begin making preparations as well, mastering the various homemaking skills she would need as a wife and mother (as well as spurning any other potential suitors). This betrothal period usually lasted approximately a year (more than long enough to put the bride's "purity" on public display, if you know what I mean).

We see reference to this in the book of Revelation, where Christ's Bride has "made herself ready" and is arrayed in clean, white linen, which is a result of having been rewarded at the Bema in heaven after the Rapture:

As I noted above, most people commonly understand this as the "wedding feast or supper," not simply the "wedding." Revelation 19:1 appears to place the above scene in heaven, where the marriage ceremony takes place. We see in verse 7 above that it's time for the Bridegroom to return to earth with His Bride at the Second Coming to celebrate the wedding supper. But I'm getting ahead of myself:

Then, at a time unknown to the bride (and usually at night), the groom—accompanied by a group of close friends—would show up at the bride's home to sweep her off her feet, so to speak.

This "retrieval" aspect is clearly the Rapture, and just as with the Jewish bride and groom, the next stop for this Bride and Groom is the home He has prepared for them in heaven, not back on earth where the Bride just departed from. We also see this retrieval idea in the same passage in the Last Supper Discourse I referred to earlier:

Before I say any more, a brief word of caution:

The big picture: As is always the case with any parable, we have to be extremely careful not to force-fit too many details into the Parable of the 10 Virgins. Parables are designed to only deal with a few main ideas, and when we try to make a parable walk on all fours, so to speak, we invariably end up misinterpreting something by forcing an overly detailed connection between every detail or subtle nuance of the parable and its intended meaning. We need to look for the broad strokes and be willing to stop when we see that those broad strokes fit into a sensible scriptural interpretation. If we keep pressing for more detailed connections, we're almost certain to go astray sooner or later. So, the best advice I can give anyone for interpreting parables might be "Chill and consider the big picture."

Note that everyone in this procession was expected to carry a lit torch or lamp...and since they might have to wait awhile to get started and it might be a bit of a hike, people were expected to pack extra oil. Those in the procession would look askance at anyone not carrying a lit torch or lamp, and might suspect they were a party crasher looking for a free meal.

This intersects in an intriguing way with the fact that the five foolish virgins who are denied entrance to the wedding supper had lamps that went out and were forced to go and try to buy more oil. And since they were denied entrance into the wedding supper, we have to assume they failed to get any more oil (although the text doesn't actually say). But the key point is this:

They ran out, and they shouldn't have.

The fact that these foolish virgins ran out of oil in the first place speaks to the fact that they allowed the work of the Holy Spirit in their lives to be snuffed out—that's the entire point. They initially had some oil, but were too lazy or irresponsible to ensure they had enough to see them through. We're gonna circle back for the virgins in just a moment.

When the troop arrived at the groom's new home, there would be additional wedding guests awaiting—and a more formal ceremony would take place where a friend of the groom would "present" the bride to the groom. The bride would be veiled, and then she and the groom would enter the bridal chamber or chuppah to consummate their marriage.

Paul speaks to this idea of Christ presenting His Bride to Himself—a Church without spot or wrinkle:

Sources vary somewhat on some of the details, but many say that after this consummation was announced, the wedding supper, which was seven days' worth of feasting and festive celebration, would get underway. The bride and groom would often remain secluded in the bridal chamber for the entire seven days, and at the end of that period they would emerge with the bride now unveiled. They would then enjoy one grand, final feast* with all their guests to cap off the festivities.

*Note: I believe it is possible that this "grand, final feast" corresponds to the "wedding supper" referred to in the Parable of the 10 Virgins.

Many believe that the bride and groom being secluded in their bridal chamber for seven days represents that fact that after the Rapture, the Church will be in heaven with the Bridegroom all throughout the seven-year period of the Tribulation. When we return with Him at the Second Coming, one of the first orders of business will be to have the wedding supper.

Which brings us back to the 10 virgins.

Like many people, I struggled with various aspects of the Parable of the 10 Virgins for years. But I finally began to sort things out in a way that made sense to me—and I hope it makes sense to you.

I believe the 10 virgins are Gentiles who believe the gospel after the Rapture and during the Tribulation, and who survive until the Second Coming at the end of that period of judgment.

I believe the "call to meet the bridegroom" given in Matthew 25:6 does in fact speak to the Rapture, but the sleeping virgins are not the Bride who just got gathered up by her Bridegroom. She's gone. The virgins are all asleep, the call wakes them all up, and then they're busy dealing with their lamps. Some of them have enough oil and some don't.

In a larger sense, I believe the effect of this "call to meet the Bridegroom" continues well beyond the Rapture. I believe that call reverberates for a good portion of the Tribulation, and as millions of "virgins" begin to wake up and respond to that call and begin to "seek the Bridegroom," they come to believe the gospel and begin to have the Holy Spirit working in their lives.

No? Well...chill and consider the big picture.

Shaken, not stirred: In regard to the idea that this "call to meet the Bridegroom" will continue to reverberate after the Rapture and into the Tribulation, keep one thing in mind: It is very easy for us to overlook the impact the Rapture is going to have on the world. When several hundred million believers suddenly disappear or go flying off into the sky (however you choose to visualize it), it won't just get people stirred up—it will turn the world upside down and shake it...hard. A shocked and terrified world will be screaming for answers, and in no time at all two competing theories as to what in blue blazes just happened will emerge:

1. The Bible's explanation: The Rapture.

2. Satan's explanation: Friendly aliens evacuated them to a fleet of nearby spacecraft so those left behind can evolve spiritually and survive the coming "earth changes" that will usher in a shiny, new world.

Now, I'm quite sure there will no shortage of wack jobs out there with other imaginative theories, but I am convinced that these will be the two leading explanations: God's Truth and Satan's Lie, as usual. The point is that untold millions of people will understand that it was in fact the biblical Rapture, and they will flock to hear the preaching of the 144,000 Jewish evangelists in the biggest evangelistic drive in the history of mankind. So, yeah: That's why I say the "call to meet the Bridegroom" that occurred at the Rapture will continue to reverberate well into the Tribulation.

But as I have discussed previously, only the Church enjoys the blessing of being sealed with the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit, and these 10 virgins won't have that. It will be up to them to allow the Holy Spirit to hold sway in their lives to a sufficient degree to enable them to maintain a faithful witness under intense persecution—and some will and some won't.

Those who do are the wise virgins who packed plenty of oil, their lamps stay lit, and after passing muster at the Sheep and Goat Judgment (see this part of the article I linked to above) they arrive at the wedding supper and are warmly welcomed into the festivities.

Those who don't had so little oil that their lamps went out, they didn't have it within themselves to submit to the Holy Spirit and "get more of Him," and needless to say they are not welcomed into the wedding supper.

And their empty lamps remain snuffed out for eternity.

How does that fit?

So, after dismissing all the high-sounding hokum about apantésis being a technical term and correctly interpreting 1 Thessalonians 4:17 as the pre-trib verse that it clearly is, it's not difficult to see that the pre-trib view fits very neatly with what we can learn from Scripture about the relationship between Christ and the Church—things that are typified and foreshadowed by ancient Jewish marriage customs.

On the other hand, if we insist on reading a post-trib Rapture into that verse, we have a few things to explain.

For instance, when we return with Christ at the Second Coming, apparently we have already been rewarded at the Bema and are sporting our robes of white, and are fully prepared to rule and reign with Him in the kingdom He is about to establish. Well, when does all that happen? In a frantic rush while we're on our way back down to earth??

And since I brought it up, it's worth noting that 2 Corinthians 5:6–10 makes it clear that the Bema occurs in heaven, since Paul talks about how we should prepare ourselves for it since we will all be "revealed" so we may be rewarded for the things done in the body (i.e. during our earthly lives) when we stand at this reward-oriented judgment. The point is that some of our preparation to return to earth with Christ at the Second Coming occurs in heaven. But if we buy into all this post-trib "welcoming committee" business concerning the Rapture, how does all that fit?

Also, it's clear in the above Jewish wedding customs that the bridegroom comes to take the bride from her home back to the place he has prepared at his father's house. We don't see her going out to meet him, and then escorting him back to her home. In other words, there is nothing in the wedding customs that suggests the Church goes out to meet the Lord and then comes right back to earth with Him—which is what the post-trib view of 1 Thessalonians 4:17 would have us believe. How does that fit?

Along similar lines, if the bride escorts the bridegroom back to her home, then where is the bridal chamber in which they will consummate their marriage? At the bride's home? No, this is at the groom's home, not the bride's home. Something's just...off.

Home sweet home: Some may quibble about the fact that in the marriage customs, the wedding supper occurs at the groom's home, and so how can the wedding supper of the Lamb we will attend occur on earth, which would seem to represent the bride's home? In response, I might point out that after the Bridegroom returns to earth at the Second Coming to rule His new kingdom with His Bride, it's not hard to consider the earth His new home.

So, it is clear that when we interpret 1 Thessalonians 4:17 as a post-trib verse, suddenly some things just don't seem to fit. But if you insist on trying to read a post-trib Rapture into that verse, be my guest. Don't be surprised, however, if I walk up to you and politely say:

"Uhh, excuse me…but I think you've got your pants on backwards."

Oh, and speaking of welcoming committees...I often catch myself thinking about who will be there to greet me when I arrive in heaven, be it through ordinary physical death or via the Rapture. And I think about my parents, certain relatives, and countless other believers I have known and loved during my lifetime.

The thought once crossed my mind that one potential "drawback" of going up in the Rapture would be that I'd never get a chance to be part of the welcoming committee for another believer that I know who enters heaven—which I'm sure is one of the most joy-filled things anyone could ever experience (outside of arriving there themselves, that is).

But it quickly occurred to me that I'll almost certainly get a chance to be on the welcoming committee for someone I know who didn't go up in the Rapture, but who got saved during the Tribulation and perished during the judgments that God unleashes on the world...and I have no doubt there will be at least a few such people.

And I can't imagine the joy I'd feel if it turned out to be someone I shared the gospel with before I got changed in a moment!

But hey, if I'm gonna be on a welcoming committee, I need a sign...you know, a big banner or poster or something to hold up when I greet them. I mean, at least one big sign like that is pretty much de rigueur for any self-respecting welcoming committee.

But a sign that says what??

WELCOME TO HEAVEN!
MISSED YOU AT THE HARPAZO!
BETTER LATE THAN NEVER!

Naah. C'mon, think...wait, I got it!

Greg Lauer — JUN '25

Top of the page

If you like this article, share it with someone!

 JUN '25 

Site Search

Powered by:
JavaScript Kit