Rapture = Second Coming and Happens at Same Time, on Last Day

Have you been taught all your life that the rapture and Second Coming are distinct events, years apart? Is it difficult to change your cherished belief? The teaching about the Second Coming in the earliest apostolic community was unified and without complications. Here’s the plentiful biblical and nonsymbolic and direct evidence. In the Second Addendum, I tell you my recent decision.

In this post I interpret straightforward and nonsymbolic teachings about the last day and the return of the Lord in John’s Gospel and Paul’s epistles and some verses in Hebrews, and quick reference in the Synoptics (Matthew, Mark, and Luke). What do these passages teach?

I don’t appeal to the most symbolic book in the Bible–Revelation–except in passing. I also add an addendum to clarify this book.

The translations of the Gospels are mine; otherwise the ESV is used. If, however, readers would like to read other translations, they are welcome to click on biblegateway.com.

The main thesis: the rapture and the Second Coming are the same event.

Second thesis: the plain and clear passage must guide our interpretation of the symbolic passages in the Revelation.

Let’s begin.

These verses in John’s Gospel are about final judgment:

²⁸ Do not be amazed at this because the hour is coming when those in their tombs will hear his voice ²⁹ and come out: those doing good things to the resurrection of life, but the ones practicing wickedness to the resurrection of judgment. (John 5:28-29)

Both the good-deed doers and the bad-deed doers will rise together at final judgment. The resurrection of the redeemed and unredeemed happen at the same time. Those verses supply an additional context for the ones in John 6, next.

Jesus focused on one idea in John 6:39, 40, 44, 54. In those verses he said that on the last day he will raise up (from the dead) everyone who believes in him. Once again, this resurrection happens on the last day. Emphasis added:

³⁹ This is the will of the one who sent me: That everyone whom he gives me I will not lose any of them, but I will raise them up on the last day. (39)

⁴⁰ For this is the will of my Father: everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. … (40)

⁴⁴ No one can come to me unless the one who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day. … (44)

⁵⁴ The one eating my flesh and drinking my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. (54)

Paul agrees with the idea of last day. In 1 Cor. 15:51-54 the Second Coming will happen at the resurrection of the dead at the last trumpet.

⁵¹Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, ⁵²in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. ⁵³For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. ⁵⁴When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality… (1 Cor. 15:51-54, emphasis added)

Further, in 1 Cor. 15:26 Paul said that the last enemy to be defeated will be death.

“The last enemy to be destroyed is death” (1 Cor. 15:26, emphasis added).

It’s hard to believe that death will still defeat people after an early rapture (before the Second Coming) and that God will need to “redefeat” death a “second first” time at his Second Coming! Too complicated! No, death will no longer defeat people only at the Second Coming, and the rapture and Second Coming are the same event and happen on the last day, as we see in the next passage.

Here is the clearest teaching in the NT about the rapture, which means, in Latin, “snatching up” or catching up” (Latin: rapto, raptura). In Greek, the language of the NT, the verb harpazô (pronounced hahr-pah-zoh) means the exact same thing: “snatching up” or “catching up.” In the next passage, the dead in Christ will rise first (cf. John 6:39, 40, 44, 54), which is also a kind of rapture, and then the clause “we who are alive” (Paul and the Thessalonians and now us) is linked with the rapture.

¹⁵For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming [parousia] of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep [died]. ¹⁶For 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. ¹⁷Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up [harpazô = rapture] together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. (1 Thess. 4:15-17)

That above passage coordinates perfectly with 1 Cor. 15:25, 51-52 and John 39, 40, 44, 54. To interpret 1 Thess. 4:15-17, the trumpet and the raising (a kind of rapture) of the dead and then snatching up (rapture) of the living occur at the same time or are the same event. And therefore the Second Coming and the rapture occur at the same time. Then we will descend with him and be with him on the reconstituted and renovated and renewed and transformed earth forever.

Why will we descend with him down to earth and remain down here and not shoot back into heaven in the distinct rapture separated from the Second Coming? The Parousia (see 1 Thess. 4:15) by definition typically means arrival or being there. In its historical context, a parousia happens when a Roman dignitary, like a senator or even the emperor, arrived (parousia) in a Roman colony, e.g. Corinth or back to Rome. At his arrival (parousia), the dignitaries of the city went out to meet him, and they escorted him back into their city. Then they had feasts and games to celebrate his arrival (parousia). The dignitaries in the colony did not board the senator’s or emperor’s ship and abscond away for three-and-a-half or seven years.

See the post:

What Does ‘Parousia’ Mean?

At the parousia, the dead in Christ will rise first (1 Thess. 4:16). Recall that John 6:39, 40, 44, 54 say that the dead will rise on the last day. Paul said the last enemy to be defeated will be death (1 Cor. 15:26). He likewise says this will happen with the blast of the last trumpet (1 Cor. 15:52; see 1 Thess. 4:16).

Hebrews

The author of Hebrews says that there are only two comings: the first and second:

But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. ²⁷And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, ²⁸so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him. (Heb. 9:26-28; emphasis added)

Jesus first and once appeared at his birth, and at that time he ministered and put away sin by sacrificing himself. Then he will appear a second time for those eagerly waiting for him. This saving will be a deliverance from the present evil age and from a negative judgment. Why didn’t the author of Hebrews discuss a separate rapture? Here was his perfect chance.

Of course a teacher of the separate rapture could say that those verses do speak of a rapture because he comes a second time to save those who wait for him. In reply, however, v. 27 is about the judgment of everyone; this separate rapture only shifts the question to why the author did not speak of the Second Coming. He was keeping the church “noninformed.”

The truth is simpler: He did not warn the church about a rapture distinct from the Second Coming or parousia because he believed only in two comings: the first and second.

Titus

In his epistle to his mentee or disciple Titus, Paul says the same as what Hebrews says, but without the “first” and “second” qualifiers, though it is clear enough there are only two comings:

¹¹For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. ¹²It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, ¹³while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ …. (Titus 2:11-13)

In v. 11, grace appeared with Jesus’s coming. Verse 12 says we live godly lives in this present age. Verse 13 says we are waiting for Christ’s appearing in his glory. In both Hebrews and Titus, then, we have this simple sequence of eras (the lines mean a continuous chronological flow of events without mathematical precision until the Second Coming):

First Coming ————————————→ Second Coming

So Jesus came the first time and offered grace and salvation to all people. Before his Second Coming, we are to say no to ungodliness and worldly passions and live self-controlled, upright and godly lives. Then the Second Coming happens, which ends the Church Age as we are currently living it. The Second Coming will be glorious (Ti. 2:13) and visible for all. This was Paul’s perfect chance to insert a teaching about a rapture distinct from the Second Coming, but he did not. Why not? No complicated, convoluted reasoning here: he simply believed in a first coming of the Son of God and a second coming of the Son of God.

See the Second Addendum, below, for a fuller flow chart of what the Gospels and Epistles teach.

Three main synoptic chapters in passing

I further note in passing that Matt. 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21:5-38, all parallel eschatological (end-time) passages in the Synoptic Gospels, nowhere teach a separate and distinct rapture happening before the Second Coming. To find in those three chapters a rapture separated by years from the Second Coming is to import this prior belief into them and atomize them beyond their context. This is eisegesis (leading into a text), not exegesis (leading out of a text). Exegesis is better than eisegesis. Such complications violate the best biblical hermeneutics: keep things clear and simple.

See my posts, here:

This one is the easiest:

Matt 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 and 17 in Parallel Columns Are Finally Clear

The next ones formed the foundation of the summarized previous one.

Matthew 24:4-35 Predicts Destruction of Jerusalem and Temple

Matt. 24:36 to 25:46–From Second Coming to New Messianic Age

Mark 13:5-31 Predicts Destruction of Jerusalem and Temple

Mark 13:32-37 Teaches Second Coming

Luke 21:5-33 Predicts Destruction of Jerusalem and Temple (Luke is by far the clearest on this topic)

Luke 17:22-37 and 21:34-36 Teach the Second Coming

John 14:2-3, 23

Many interpreters believe that this passage clearly teaches the rapture before the Second Coming, but verse 23 decisively argues against this interpretation.

This section has moved to a separate post, here:

John 14 Does Not Teach Second Coming or Separate Rapture

The Revelation in passing

Paul and the author of Hebrews knew nothing about the most symbolic book in the Bible because they lived before it was written in the 90s. (Or a few interpreters believe the Revelation was written in the 60s; if so, then in the normal flow of events, documents take a long time to circulate, and Paul and the author of Hebrews show no sign that they knew of it.) It is a sure thing that John wrote his Gospel before he got his visions in the Revelation. But even if he did not, then Jesus’s teachings in the Gospels still stand as clearly as can be in straightforward, nonsymbolic, didactic words.

I have not gone into detail about debatable verses in the Revelation, because no one interpretation can dominate it and clear away all other interpretations. It is unwise hermeneutics, therefore, to impose Revelation on the clear and straightforward and didactic teachings in the epistles and the Gospel of John and Hebrews and the three parallel passages in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Just the opposite is true. The clear verses interpret and guide us to interpret the unclear, symbolic ones.

I note in passing, nonetheless, that even Rev. 11:15-19 says that the seventh and last trumpet is blown after the mighty tribulation when God finally wins the complete victory. But my thesis does not stand or fall on this book.

Please see the addendum below for how I view Revelation in this specific post.

Summary and Conclusion

The main goal of Bible interpretation (hermeneutics) is to keep the plain thing the main thing. Imposing complicated and apocalyptic and debatable verses from Daniel 7 or 9 or 11 or from the Revelation on the clearest verses in Scripture is not the best approach to interpreting the Bible.

All of those verses in John and the synoptic Gospels and Paul’s epistles and Hebrews do not contain complicated symbols that we find in the book of Revelation, the most symbolic book in the Bible.

And the bottom line is this: the Second Coming and the rapture happen at the same time and on the last day. The verses we looked at in the Gospel of John and Paul’s epistles and Hebrews and the Synoptics are straightforward and direct teachings in the context of the end times and the Second Coming (except John 14:2-3, 23). None of those verses teach a rapture between now and before the last day, but Paul’s epistles tell us that the rapture happens at the Second Coming. They are the same event.

Further, nowhere do the eschatological chapters in the synoptic Gospels teach a rapture before the Second Coming or teach a distinct rapture at all. All of these verses are straightforward and didactic, not symbolic (except a few elements, like the terrible scene in the sky that happens to the sun, moon, and stars and so on).

See my post:

Luke 17:22-37: Taken Away = Rapture? (I also look at Matthew’s version)

It seems that the powerful image of the trumpet stuck in the apostolic community’s mind. The trumpet heralds the Second Coming, which entails the raising of the dead and rapture of the Church on the last day.

One more time, for clarity and conciseness, the teaching circulating throughout the earliest apostolic churches was this one:

The Rapture = the Second Coming at the Same Time, on the Last Day

When this one event happens, death will finally and at last be defeated because our bodies will be miraculously transformed into immortal ones, once and for all and forever–on the last day.

If the rapture, distinct from the Second Coming, were such a vital teaching in the original apostolic community, then the writers of Scripture were remiss because they did not clearly warn the church about it. Why not? For them the truth was simpler and they did not multiply complications, as many teachers do today. The earliest apostolic teachers, closest to Jesus’s teachings, believed that there was only a two-time coming: first and second. The first happened at Jesus’s birth; the second will be in the future when he will come in full power and glory and defeat death and set up his eternal kingdom, all heralded by the trumpet blast.

So how does this post help me grow in Christ and wait in purity for the Second Coming?

1 John 3:2-3 says:

“Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.” (1 John 3:2-3).

The Second Coming will happen in God’s time. We don’t need to be scared of it, nor do we get to live a life of sin, because we think we can get away with it. No, the Scriptures tell us everywhere to live godly lives. And we don’t need to be scared into living such lives, either. John 3:3 says it is the hope (not the fear) of his appearing that causes us to purify our lives.

First Addendum: Clearing up my passing reference to Revelation

Some online commenters have said that I don’t emphasize Revelation enough. One even asked, ironically, whether we should discard it.

No, we should not discard it, but we should no longer stridently stomp through it as if the issues are settled in our tidy systems.

My further reply is that the clearer texts should guide people’s interpretation of the less clear ones. For example, Rev. 4:1-2 is not a rapture verse, but believers in the separate rapture before the tribulation have to say it is, because the church must not be around during the tribulation. However, the truth is simpler. John himself and by himself was called by the Spirit to go up and see the visions, alone, not the church as a whole. The clear and didactic and straightforward texts I cite in this post should clarify these teachers’ interpretations of Revelation, so that they don’t import a strange reading into a plain verse.

Another example: some interpreters believe that the seven churches represent different ages within the large Church Age. So the seventh church, Laodicea, which was neither hot nor cold, but lukewarm, was counseled to buy gold refined by fire (purity coming out of trials or persecution), represents this present church age. This typological reading is very stretched. Such interpretations of historical verses–not symbolic ones–need to be reined in. However, I can’t say that this symbolic, dispensational reading is so far off-base that it adds up to heresy, and maybe some tiny elements can be gleaned from the Laodicean church that may be relevant today. Some have become lukewarm, but then people throughout all generations become lukewarm. Nonetheless, I am so convinced that if we would just take the verses in their textual context and not “out-insight” the original writers, the Bible would become as it should be: streamlined and simpler, without the entanglement of complicated interpretational systems, as interpreters jump from verse to verse and book to book, cobbling them together to build their convoluted outcomes which confuse the Body of Christ.

To me, the Revelation was written first for the seven churches in Asia Minor and then by extension for the church of all ages, to warn them of the troubles to come. It is a book about martyrs. Beyond that, the book is the most symbolic of all the other biblical books. Therefore, it is a good idea to let the clear and didactic and straightforward verses laid out in this post guide all interpretations of this book in the Bible.

Clarity guides the unclear portions. My main point: keep the plain thing the main thing in hermeneutics (science of interpretation), and let the clear verses guide the unclear ones.

In sum, I would like, in my own small way, to bring some interpretive boundaries (and dare I say sanity?) back to the American church and Bible interpretation today.

My main point: keep the plain thing the main thing in hermeneutics, and let the clear verses guide the unclear ones.

Second Addendum

In the Parable of the Wheat and Weeds, particularly Matt. 13:39-43; and in the Parable of the Net, particularly Matt. 13:49-50; and in Matt. 16:27; and in the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats (Matt. 25:31-46), Jesus clearly teaches that the end of This Age and the new Messianic Age (or Kingdom Age or the Age to Come) are ushered in right after the Second Coming; and the judgment of the righteous and the wicked happen at the same time.

Bible Basics about the Final Judgment

We can depict things in this flow chart:

___________← This Age ⸻→| End of This Age

First Coming —————————→ Second Coming → Judgment → Messianic Age / Kingdom Age / That Age

The Second Coming (Parousia) stops This Age. Then there is one big judgment, in which the righteous and wicked are judged together. One can even say that the final judgment happens during the Messianic Age / Kingdom Age / The Age to Come. All three terms mean the same thing. Finally, the Kingdom which Jesus inaugurated at his first coming will have been fully realized and accomplished at his Second Coming (Parousia), after judgment. And so after God sweeps aside the wicked and Satan and demons, the New Messianic or Kingdom Age can begin in true and pure and undisrupted rulership.

Bottom line: All of the New Testament (outside of a few contested verses in the Revelation) fully and clearly and consistently teach this flow chart:

___________← This Age ———⸻→| End of This Age

First Coming → Inaugurated Kingdom —→ Second Coming → Judgment → Fully Realized Kingdom Age

What about the Church? The Father and the resurrected and ascended Son and the outpoured Spirit, by means of the inaugurated kingdom, created the church at Pentecost (Matt. 16:18; Acts 2:1-4). It exists in This Age and preaches the gospel of the kingdom. It will be snatched up or raptured at the Second Coming, meet Jesus in the air, descend with him, go through judgment, and then finally will last forever in the Fully Realized Kingdom Age.

Until and before the Second Coming, we now live in the conflict and battle between This Age and the Inaugurated Kingdom, proclaimed by Jesus during his ministry. (They are not the same things but are at war with each other!) We are in the process of binding Satan and his demonic hordes, by expelling demons from people’s lives but mainly by preaching the gospel, so people surrender to the Son’s Lordship, and then Satan is pushed back and people experience victory in their lives. The gospel and life in the Spirit, coming after Jesus’s ascension in This Age, though happening during the inaugurated Kingdom, are so powerful that saved and redeemed kingdom citizens can experience victory over the power of sin in their lives in This Age. The presence of sin in their lives is not removed until they get their new resurrected and transformed bodies and minds in The Age to Come. The Second Coming stops This Age, which is replaced and displaced with the fully realized Messianic or Kingdom Age or The Age to Come.

There is no word on a literal thousand-year reign with two comings and “several first” resurrections. And there is no separate rapture that makes the church disappear, before the Second Coming. If Jesus believed in a separate rapture, he would have taught it here; he missed his chance. However, he did not miss his chance and he did not teach it. Therefore, he did not believe in a separate rapture. All of it is too convoluted. Instead, the Gospels (and Epistles) present a streamlined picture of salvation history and God’s dealing with his human creation and the return of Christ.

An amillennialist believes that the millennium begins with the Inaugurated Kingdom, but apparently it is quiet and behind the scenes (note, for example, the Parable of the Mustard Seed and its slow growth in Matt. 13:31-32); Satan is not literally bound with chains (as if a spirit being could be), even though Jesus did teach that he bound the strongman (Matt. 12:29; Mark 3:27; Luke 11:21-22). So what this binding means is that Satan cannot now fully stop the advance of the kingdom (as Satan did to the ancient Israelites, except a remnant). Before Jesus came, every nation was bound by satanic deception. However, after Jesus inaugurated the kingdom, even under Islamic and communist regimes, the gospel has a way of infiltrating societies, even if underground. Satan can no longer deceive the nations as he did before Jesus came. Instead, kingdom citizens, surrendered to the Kingship of the King and following him, are plundering Satan’s domain of This Age and rescuing people out of it and transferring them to the inaugurated kingdom of God. The final victory over Satan will be fully manifested at his Second Coming.

In contrast, based on his interpretation of a few verses in Rev. 20, one chapter in the most symbolic book of the Bible, a millennialist believes that a literal thousand years of Christ (not shown in flow charts) is ushered in at the Second Coming, where there will be peace and harmony. And Satan is literally bound in chains until the end of the thousand years. He will not deceive the nations. During the literal millennium, people will still die, so the last enemy (death) is not defeated after all, at the Second Coming (even though Paul said death would be defeated, in 1 Cor. 15:23-26, 51-56). However, the theory of a literal thousand years says that death and Satan are defeated at the end of the millennium, when another resurrection and another judgment will take place.

Never mind, however, that in John 5:28-29 and Matt. 13:41-43 and 25:31-46, Jesus teaches that the wicked and righteous are judged together at the end of This Age, as indicated in the above flow charts. Interpreting literally a deliberately and intentionally symbolic book (Revelation) runs aground quickly. Things soon become convoluted and complicated, in comparison with the nonsymbolic, streamlined Gospel and Epistles.

What Is Pretribulational Premillennialism?

What Is Midtribulational Premillennialism?

What Is Posttribulational Premillennialism?

What Is Amillennialism?

So then where does the rapture fit in? As noted, when all peoples are called out of their tombs and those who are alive also respond to Christ descending from heaven at the Second Coming, they will be “caught up” (the rapture) and meet the Lord in the air (1 Thess. 4:15-17). Then they will descend with Jesus to a new heaven and new earth, which will have been recreated, renewed, renovated or reconstituted. They will be judged, and the wicked will be sent away to punishment, and the righteous will be welcomed into the Messianic Age / Kingdom Age / The Age to Come (as distinct from This Age). In other words, the rapture and the Second Coming happen at the same time and are the same event.

There is no reason, biblically, to overthink and complicate these verses and insert a separate rapture that happens before the Second Coming. Just because a teaching is popular does not make it right.

Personally, in my study of the Gospels and Epistles, I have now accepted amillennialism because it is streamlined, and I don’t believe the NT teaches convoluted theories. The entire NT fits together if we adopt amillenialism, from Matt. 1 to Rev. 22. I cannot allow, in my own Bible interpretation, a few contested verses in Rev. 20 to confuse the clear teaching of Jesus in the Gospels and the apostolic teaching in the Epistles. That is, I don’t believe we should allow Rev. 20 (the only few verses where one thousand years are mentioned) or the entire book of the Revelation, the most symbolic book of the Bible (after Chapter 3), to guide our interpretation of these clear teachings in the Gospels and the Epistles. Instead, we should allow the clear, straightforward, nonsymbolic teachings in the Gospels and Epistles to guide our interpretations of the most symbolic book in the Bible, in which even the numbers may be symbolic and probably are. To see everything fit together, all we have to do is turn the kaleidoscope one notch or click and adopt amillennialism. I am willing to do that. And I have now done that.

This interpretation enjoys the beauty of simplicity by eliminating all the complications that popular end-time Bible prophecy teachers have been imposing on the Gospels and Epistles for decades—over a century. Since this tradition has deep roots—not to say entrenched—in the conservative sectors of American Evangelicalism (broadly defined to incorporate the Renewal Movements), these teachers won’t give up their interpretation easily. So I hope to reach and teach the younger generations and all other openminded people of all generations. They need to prepare for tough times ahead. I’m not a pastor, but I can still have a teacher’s pastoral heart.

Matt 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 and 17 in Parallel Columns Are Finally Clear

But in these eschatological (end-time) discussions:

“In essentials, unity; in nonessentials, liberty; in all things, charity (love).”

We should not break fellowship with those with whom we differ in eschatological matters.