“And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, ‘Come up here.’” Revelation 4:1
It will be a day like any other day. People will wake up in the morning with no idea of the momentous event that will occur within hours. They get up, eat breakfast, some will argue with their spouse, others will head to work or the gym. All are totally unaware that an army is forming in heaven waiting for God’s final command for His Son
to come to earth to take His bride out of this rebellious place.
On earth people will arrive at offices and get on their computers, make telephone calls or engage in small talk with their peers. Millions of school children will flood into schools, going to their lockers,
doing last minute cramming for tests and joking with their friends. Others head for airplanes, funerals or hospitals – it is a day like any other day.
Suddenly an event completely out of the norm occurs. For a small segment of the world’s population their eyes will be open to the skies. In that instant their ears hear a sound never before heard on earth,
the triumphal shout of the archangel. At the sound of his voice grave yards across the world will give up some, not all, of their dead. Will the graves of believers be disturbed? Does the dirt show evidence of the “snatching away” of the believers’ bodies so that millions will go and see one last testimony of a loved one who begged them to come to Christ? In a split second, totally imperceptible to human senses, millions of people are gone from earth. Cameras that cover the world will record the disappearance. Teachers and students in schools, doctors and nurses performing operations, policemen working accidents, some, not all, members of churches simply disappear from sight. If it happens on a Sunday half (?) of the congregations disappear.
There is much we do not know about that split second in time. Will those who are raptured by Jesus Christ leave their clothes behind as a testimony to what happened? What explanations will the world give to try and explain away this monumental disappearance of people. People will likely search (in vain) for their loved ones as some did Enoch and Elijah?
The scene on earth and heaven will be diametrically opposite (as is always is). In heaven fellowship, rejoicing, the meeting of the Savior and His followers face to face, a reunion with believers that have gone before, amazement at the glories of heaven that Paul said were unlawful for him to tell us about. On earth concern, fear, loss, grief, crisis management and a lot of worry. Some may worry the earth is under attack by aliens, others will wonder if the old stories they heard their grandparents told them of a rapture is true. Preachers who are left behind will try to explain why their presence shows this event cannot be the rapture. People will look at the characteristics of those who disappeared and try to figure out why them and not others.
One thing we know. Believers are told to comfort one another with what is written about the return of the Lord.
There is no comfort on earth. Satan rises up. The church is gone. He must act now. His man will claim he is the Messiah and lead the world to worship Satan. He will even deceive God’s people, the Jews.
In heaven the bride of Christ gets ready for their reward or loss – the Bema seat. On earth the world gets ready for the wrath of God. Two sides created by one phrase, “Come up here”.