It's been 10 days since the Great Sign. My thoughts.
Oct 3, 2017 8:01:01 GMT -6
watchmanjim, whatif, and 7 more like this
Post by bruce on Oct 3, 2017 8:01:01 GMT -6
Hi all. I am writing this for myself as much as for everyone else. Since I don't have my own blog, I thought I would post some of my reflections here on what I am thinking 10 days after the Great Sign. My goal is to try to take stock of what we know, what we don't know, what we were wrong about, and what we were right about.
1. Most of us still believe that Revelation 12:1-2 was literally displayed in the heavens on September 23/24.
2. Most of us still believe that Revelation 12:5 is a depiction of the rapture of the church. It stands to reason then that the rapture is close.
3. Many of us thought the rapture would happen within a day or two of September 23. It did not. This was very humbling for many of us. I don't think it was unreasonable for us to conclude that the rapture could have happened in this time frame given the clear connections between Revelation 12 and the rapture, but obviously there is more going on than we could see prior to 9/23.
4. Most of us continue to believe that the mockers were wrong to dismiss the significance of the sign on September 23, but in retrospect many of us (myself included) may have been overly confident that we had determined the approximate timing of the rapture. There's plenty of humility to go around for all of us.
5. Several new dates have been proposed for the rapture since 9/23. I think credible cases can be made for many of these dates based on the feast days, additional movements of the planets, and day counts. Because many of these dates seems plausible, I cannot determine which is the most plausible, and I suspect that the truth is that at this time we cannot know.
6. I still believe that we are in the season. The big picture continues to point to the fall of 2017, the season we are now in, for the culmination of events that leads to the start of the Tribulation. The anniversaries, the movements of the stars and planets, and the geopolitical situation around the world would seem to keep pointing at the time frame we are in now.
7. If this is the season, then that means most of us were wrong about the connection between the Feast of Trumpets and the rapture since the Feast of Trumpets is now over. This should continue to humble us as we speculate about future dates. I certainly don't dismiss the possibility of a Tabernacles rapture (since at the time of this writing, that's the only feast left this year) but one thing that is increasingly clear to me is that there are hints of the rapture in many of the feast days. We may not see how it all ties together until after it happens. I also saw someone point out somewhere that Jesus' Ascension happened on a day that was not a feast day, so major events in salvation history cannot be limited to feast days.
So the bottom line as far as I can see is that the September 23 sign was real, and the rapture is close and will likely happen in the next month or two. There are many additional convergences on the horizon, but we may not be able to know which one is pinpointing the rapture before it actually happens.
1. Most of us still believe that Revelation 12:1-2 was literally displayed in the heavens on September 23/24.
2. Most of us still believe that Revelation 12:5 is a depiction of the rapture of the church. It stands to reason then that the rapture is close.
3. Many of us thought the rapture would happen within a day or two of September 23. It did not. This was very humbling for many of us. I don't think it was unreasonable for us to conclude that the rapture could have happened in this time frame given the clear connections between Revelation 12 and the rapture, but obviously there is more going on than we could see prior to 9/23.
4. Most of us continue to believe that the mockers were wrong to dismiss the significance of the sign on September 23, but in retrospect many of us (myself included) may have been overly confident that we had determined the approximate timing of the rapture. There's plenty of humility to go around for all of us.
5. Several new dates have been proposed for the rapture since 9/23. I think credible cases can be made for many of these dates based on the feast days, additional movements of the planets, and day counts. Because many of these dates seems plausible, I cannot determine which is the most plausible, and I suspect that the truth is that at this time we cannot know.
6. I still believe that we are in the season. The big picture continues to point to the fall of 2017, the season we are now in, for the culmination of events that leads to the start of the Tribulation. The anniversaries, the movements of the stars and planets, and the geopolitical situation around the world would seem to keep pointing at the time frame we are in now.
7. If this is the season, then that means most of us were wrong about the connection between the Feast of Trumpets and the rapture since the Feast of Trumpets is now over. This should continue to humble us as we speculate about future dates. I certainly don't dismiss the possibility of a Tabernacles rapture (since at the time of this writing, that's the only feast left this year) but one thing that is increasingly clear to me is that there are hints of the rapture in many of the feast days. We may not see how it all ties together until after it happens. I also saw someone point out somewhere that Jesus' Ascension happened on a day that was not a feast day, so major events in salvation history cannot be limited to feast days.
So the bottom line as far as I can see is that the September 23 sign was real, and the rapture is close and will likely happen in the next month or two. There are many additional convergences on the horizon, but we may not be able to know which one is pinpointing the rapture before it actually happens.
