After the Church Age

Lord, please bless these moments I'm about to spend in Your Word.


"After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven. And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking with me, saying, "Come up here, and I will show you things which must take place after this" (Revelation 4:1).


This verse marks the starting point for the third division of Revelation, revealing the things which will take place after the church age (Revelation 1:19). It begins when something startling happens, turning the apostle John's attention heavenward. There's an open door, a voice like a trumpet calling him upward, and John is caught up. All of this depicts the Rapture.


Now, the word "rapture" is not found in the Bible. It comes from a Latin word which means "to catch away." And you'll find an example of this concept being taught in the Bible in 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17.


Why this catching away? God is calling His church up because He is about to pour out His wrath upon the earth (Revelation 6:17). The Great Tribulation is about to commence, but before it can, the church must be taken out because God is not going to pour His wrath out upon His own dear children.


There is a principle in the Bible that before God pours out judgment, He takes out His own. The great flood was God's judgment on a sinful world. And before the floodgates of His wrath were opened, He took Noah and his family out of the way and into the safety of the ark. God took Lot out of Sodom before He rained down judgment upon that wicked city. God has a way of taking His people out before He pours out His wrath.


This doesn't mean we won't know tribulation in our lives or that we won't experience His chastisement. But it means God's wrath was poured out on Jesus on our behalf (1 Thessalonians 5:9), and it is now reserved for the ungodly.


That door was open in heaven an John was called out and caught up in the Spirit immediately (Revelation 4:2), just as the church will be before God's wrath begins to be poured out on this old sin-soaked, hell-bound world.


~Adrian Rogers~