Spiritual Israelite
Well-Known Member
Absolutely false. You are trying to relate unrelated passages yet again. You have failed to take Mark 13 into consideration.David, Matthew 24:31 is not referring to the rapture. That verse is referring to the gathering of the Jews from the nations of the world to the land of Israel.
It is a promise that God made to the children of Israel in Deuteronomy 30:1-6. Compare verse 4 to Matthew 24:31.
Deuteronomy 30:
4 If any of thine be driven out unto the outmost parts of heaven, from thence will the LORD thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee:
5 And the LORD thy God will bring thee into the land which thy fathers possessed, and thou shalt possess it; and he will do thee good, and multiply thee above thy fathers.
Matthew 24:
31 And he shall 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.
Compare the following passages:
1 Thessalonians 4:14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. 15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. 16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
Mark 13:24 But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, 25 And the stars of heaven shall fall, and the powers that are in heaven shall be shaken. 26 And then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. 27 And then shall he send his angels, and shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven.
Notice that "them also which sleep in Jesus" will be with Him when He comes and the rapture occurs. Those are the ones gathered from "the uttermost part of heaven". And those "which are alive and remain" are those gathered "from the uttermost part of the earth".
Jesus will absolutely not descend from heaven more than once in the future. Scripture says he will descend once from heaven in the manner in which He ascended to haven (Acts 1:9-11). And it says "unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation" (Hebrews 9:28). The second time. Never the third time.