Why do I spend so much time writing about and defending the biblical foundation of the pretribulation Rapture? It’s because Jesus’ imminent appearing is so much more than just sound theology to me; it’s my precious hope.

My purpose here is not to defend the doctrine of the pretribulation Rapture as I have done in numerous blog posts as well as in my latest book, The Triumph of the Redeemed. Instead, I chose to explain why my hope in Jesus’ appearing is so dear to my heart.

The Rapture Is a Biblical Event

Jesus is my salvation and my righteousness; I know this is true because God’s Word tells me so. My faith rests on what Scripture assures me concerning my salvation, which includes Jesus’ death on the cross in my place, His resurrection, and His promise of eternal life for all those who believe.

“What does this have to do with the Rapture?” you ask. The Bible also tells me about Jesus’ appearing to take me home to the place He’s preparing for me.

Notice the close connection that Paul makes with things that happen during the Rapture with our Gospel hope:

“And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved” (Romans 8:23-24a).

I cherish my hope in Jesus’ appearing because of my love for the words of Scripture that the Lord has cultivated inside me since an early age, but that’s a story for another time. My love of God’s Word certainly extends to what it teaches me about Jesus’ return to take me home to glory (Colossians 3:4).

The Rapture is When I Will See Jesus

In 1 Corinthians 13:12, Paul wrote these words:

“For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.” The Rapture is the time when the Lord will clear away the fog of this life, and I will see Jesus face to face.

In the meantime, I press forward with my calling, writing, and service for Jesus. However, there’s a sense in which I feel the “fog of war” that those engaged in active combat often experience. I have an enemy that messes with my feelings and thoughts and brings fierce opposition to my doorstep, even from those once close to me.

At Jesus’ appearing, I will see my beloved Savior and appear before Him to receive rewards for faithful service in this life. I long both to see Him face to face and hear His true appraisal of my life and service for Him. For now, I “see in a mirror dimly” in anticipation of the day when my faith will be sight, and I will revel in His presence.

The Rapture is When I Will Receive My New Body

The Rapture will also be the time when I will receive my incorruptible and immortal body (Philippians 3:20-21, 1 Corinthians 15:51-55). Perhaps the saddest aspect of pastors ignoring the Rapture is the absence of any teaching about the imperishable bodies we will receive at the time of the Rapture. I don’t recall any sermon in the past twenty-five years where a pastor has preached about this glorious aspect of our “blessed hope” beyond a fleeting mention that everyone soon forgot.

I realize that with age, this promise becomes increasingly precious. I also know how quickly this life passes, and if you have not yet felt the impact of aging, you will soon.

Yet regardless of age, most of us endure illnesses and physical ailments from which we never fully recover; this is also true for me. Why wouldn’t I long for my glorified body, the one that the Lord promises to give to me at His appearing? But this is just one aspect of the glorious future that lies ahead for me and for all who know Jesus as their Savoir.

The Rapture Will Signify Freedom from the Presence of Sin

The Rapture will signify the start of an eternal existence where I will be free from the presence of sin. We all have weaknesses, as I know I surely do, some of which I might even be unaware. But a glorious day is coming when those things will all be part of my past, and I will no longer sin but fully experience the righteousness of Christ that God has already imputed to me. I can hardly wait for that day!

Revelation 21:4 explains what this freedom from sin will mean for all eternity:

“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

I can scarcely imagine the blessedness of the time when all the promises of this verse come true for me. The Rapture just marks the beginning of a joyous adventure in which all things listed in Revelation 21:4 will come true for me, along with all those who know the Savior.

Why wouldn’t I be excited about Jesus’ return to take me home in light of what lies ahead for me in eternity?

The Rapture Will Bring Inner Wholeness

Along with the freedom from sin will come an inner wholeness such as I have never experienced in my lifetime. I long for this with all my heart.

In his book All Things New, author and counselor John Eldredge wrote this:

We are all traumatized and fragmented; no one passes through this vale of tears without it. And our Healer will make us whole again…. Think of it—to be wholehearted. To be filled with goodness from head to toe. To have an inner glory that matches the glory of your new body…” [i]

The Lord has healed so many of the searing wounds from my past. However, I still yearn for the total inner wholeness about which John Eldredge writes. I continue to feel “traumatized and fragmented” in some ways, which causes me to yearn all the more for the time of Jesus’ upward call and the time of inner wholeness that will envelop my entire being as I experience the promises of Revelation 21:4.

My scars, both emotional and physical, remind me that a much better day lies just ahead!

Jesus Is Preparing a Place for Me

I treasure the Lord’s promise in John 14:2-3:

“In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”

What will it be like to see the place that Jesus has prepared for His bride? This promise is for all true New Testament saints, but there’s also a personal element to it as well. Jesus is preparing a special place for me and for you.

I often wonder about what my “place” will look like. I know it will be much more wonderful than I can imagine, as will everything else be in heaven.

The Rapture Marks the Time of Seeing Dear Family Members and Friends who are Already with Jesus

There’s also my hope I will see dear family members, my parents, and my friends already with Jesus in heaven. My dad died when I was ten, and it was then that I first experienced the hope that I possess in the future meeting in the air that Paul describes in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17. I also look forward to seeing family members and friends who are still alive in glory with their imperishable bodies.

I recognize that this aspect of our hope comes with sorrow for many, as it does to me, because of offspring or family members who reject Jesus and His saving message. I live with this sadness every day and pray that once the Rapture happens, if not before, my children will turn to the true Jesus of the Bible.

The Rapture Marks Beginning of the Lord Judging the Wickedness that has Become so Prevalent

Like many of you, the evil, injustice, and violence of our time trouble me at times. There’s coming a time, however, when the Lord will judge all these things in perfect righteousness. Psalm 37:1-20 brings me back to reality and calms my heart amid the turmoil and sickness of this world. Justice will someday prevail through the earth!

The Rapture marks the beginning of the day of the Lord, which includes all of the Tribulation when Jesus will justly deal with the wickedness and wild deception of our world. It only appears as though many are getting away with their vile schemes; the Lord will hold them accountable someday.

The Rapture is my precious hope because it’s the beginning of an exciting and joyous adventure that will never end. I long for the day I see Jesus, and as long as I have breath, I will continue to defend what Scripture teaches about this glorious hope.

The above reasons reveal why my hope is so dear to me; it’s so much more than just sound theology, although it’s all that as well.

Maranatha!!!

Note: Please consider signing up for my newsletter on the home page of my website at https://www.jonathanbrentner.com/. It will help me in reaching more people. Thanks!

My new book, The Triumph of the Redeemed-An eternal Perspective that Calms Our Fears in Perilous Times, is now available on Amazon.

Jonathan C. Brentner

Website: Our Journey Home

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[i] John Eldredge, All Things New, pp. 93–94.

The Rapid Decline of My Nation of Australia, and More General – Our World, and Why

Continuing in Romans 1

We are now looking at Part 2 from the last posting on THE DECAY AND DECLINE THAT IS IN AUSTRALIA. After reviewing some of the awful aspects we are seeing, I then started to move to the reason behind all that. We examined part of Romans chapter 1, and I want to continue that, for it is a progression. Romans 1 is revealing for our age.

Romans 1 is a downward progression of the decay of mankind and nations until it hits rock bottom, and we look at some of that fall in this post. Last time, we saw that the wrath of God will always be revealed from heaven against all ungodliness, but the sin of the world increases. And for the moment, the grace of God is staying off judgment, but not for much longer. It will come and very soon.

This time I want to continue this downward spiral from verse 19 of Romans 1.

Romans 1:19-20 “because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them, for since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.”

Now we have the Holy Spirit outlining to us the downward progression of the human race. This begins at verse 19 and steadily gets darker and more distant as the verses progress. This is not a pleasant situation, but God tells us and wants us to know so that human beings will not even start to go that way.

Look most carefully at 19. “because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them.” The fact of God’s existence is imprinted in men’s souls. The atheists must struggle with their nature to deny the existence of God. The verse clearly says God has made it evident to them. Stephen Hawking and David Attenborough are living a lie. God has made the evidence of His existence known to them. The Creator and First Cause, of all things, has been made evident to them by God Himself.

I saw in National Geographic a detailed diagram of the brain of a flea. It is so intricate, so amazing, yet that is only a flea. Atheists are fools; God says so. They are deniers who deliberately close off their minds to shut God out and then pretend He does not exist. What a shock they will get one day when they enter hell, and even a greater shock when they stand before a God of judgment at the great white throne.

They are the arrogant people of 2Timothy 3.

Verse 20 “for since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse,” expands that, and uses the aspects of creation as the evidence in men’s souls of the existence of a Creator. In fact, God has done that so clearly that He has to declare that all mankind is without excuse. No one has an excuse for walking away from God. The evidence of creation is overwhelming. You have to force yourself to deny it. No atheist has an excuse. No denier has an excuse.

While I was mapping this out, I had cause to read Isaiah chapter 44. Let us consider verses 12 to 20. Isaiah is speaking about man and his created idols. Have a look at the determination in verse 12.

“The man shapes iron into a cutting tool and does his work over the coals, fashioning it with hammers and working it with his strong arm. He also gets hungry and his strength fails. He drinks no water and becomes weary. Another shapes wood. He extends a measuring line; he outlines it with red chalk; he works it with planes, and outlines it with a compass and makes it like the form of a man, like the beauty of man, so that it may sit in a house.

^“Surely he cuts cedars for himself and takes a cypress or an oak and raises it for himself among the trees of the forest. He plants a fir and the rain makes it grow, then it becomes something for a man to burn so he takes one of them and warms himself. He also makes a fire to bake bread. He also makes a god and worships it. He makes it a graven image and falls down before it. Half of it he burns in the fire. Over this half he eats meat as he roasts a roast and is satisfied. He also warms himself and says, ‘Aha! I am warm. I have seen the fire,’ but the rest of it he makes into a god, his graven image.”

He falls down before it and worships.

He also prays to it and says, “Deliver me for you are my god.” In this section, Isaiah is using the logic God has given in regard to the First Cause.

We might think it is stupid for a man to make a wooden god, then attribute to it all the powers of divinity.

He makes the god, then becomes subservient to it. The amazing part is that a higher reasoning and systems of logic do not expose the stupidity of such actions. Do you know why the natural man thinks that way and logic is locked up? It is demonic delusion.

That is exactly what we have in today’s world.

Why are men running after climate change and so many fanciful delusions? The reason is they have disconnected their minds from God and from the Bible and sail away with Peter Pan into a make-believe world of stupidity.

Isaiah 44:18 “They do not know nor do they understand, for He has smeared over their eyes so that they cannot see, and their hearts so that they cannot comprehend.” That traces the path of a man bent on this downward progression. When a man will not acknowledge the true God, so that his behavior is changed in renewal, then God gives him over to the base, fallen passions of his fallen nature. Man is a fallen creature and is capable of all sorts of the worst evil when he is given over to his own way.

Three times in Romans 1, Paul uses the expression – “God gave them over“: in lusts in verse 24; to degrading passions in verse 26; to a depraved mind in verse 28. Isaiah says because “they do not know nor understand,” which means they have rejected the truth, so God has smeared over their eyes and heart.

I think this means when His light is withdrawn or willfully rejected, then God allows the natural consequence to happen, which in biblical terms is “darkness” in the soul. Verse 18 in Romans says they do not know. They do not understand. Now, unlike our world today that has no accountability, God will be declared the Holy One, the One the whole earth will be accountable to. Isaiah later wrote this regarding man’s departure from the declared precepts of God – Isaiah 46:6-7 “Those who lavish gold from the purse and weigh silver on the scale hire a goldsmith and he makes it into a god. They bow down; indeed they worship it. They lift it upon the shoulder and carry it. They set it in its place and it stands there. It does not move from its place. Though one may cry to it, it cannot answer. It cannot deliver him from his distress.”

BUT then God’s declaration of Himself is that He is the ONLY One – Isaiah 46:8-10 “Remember this, and be assured. Recall it to mind, you transgressors. Remember the former things long past for I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things which have not been done saying, ‘My purpose will be established and I will accomplish all My good pleasure.'”

Isaiah 44:19. “and no one recalls, nor is there knowledge or understanding to say, ‘I have burned half of it in the fire and also have baked bread over its coals. I roast meat and eat it. Then I make the rest of it into an abomination. I fall down before a block of wood!'” The prophet draws attention to a simple logic that would clearly reject the nonsense of fashioning an idol and bowing down before it.

However, the heart of man can’t apply that logic. The true God is dismissed for a counterfeit. Today, God is rejected by Natchez’s catchphrase “God is dead,” and men have gone their own ways to make idols of pleasure, of money, of power and control, of fame, of sexual perversion, of selfishness, of wisdom so-called. Verse 19 uses the word “recall” – “no one recalls.”

That is so relevant, so pivotal.

Who recalls today what made many of the nations great, or what saved England in the time of the Wesleys and Whitfield and helped spur the gospel around the world? It was the repentance of man and a thirst for righteousness.

Very few in the secular world want to know about that or will delve into history to understand God’s workings in the past. Apart from Christians, who in the world wants to recall these things? As Isaiah said, “there is no knowledge.” Knowledge has been perverted. Then it is manipulated according to agendas.

Our nations have their agendas, but there is a higher agenda, a satanic one that Satan is implementing in all the nations to round up the world, locked in under his control. He uses the Great Reset for this.

Isaiah 44:20 “He feeds on ashes. A deceived heart has turned him aside and he cannot deliver himself nor say, ‘Is there not a lie in my right hand?'” could almost be part of Romans 1.

Because of his evil in rejecting God, he feeds on ashes and probably thinks he partakes of the satisfying works of his own hands. To depravity, ashes taste like the sweetness of honey. Then the prophet says man has a deceived heart which has turned him aside.

When the light of God is rejected, then darkness clasps the person’s hand and leads him into its own dark domain.

The next statement in that verse is almost too self-evident. “He cannot deliver himself.” That is at the heart of the gospel, you know. Man cannot deliver himself from the darkness of sin. As darkness increases in today’s world, more and more people are caught in deception.

The devil is the deceiver. Paul alludes to it in Romans 1. We understand man is not able to prevent the downward spiral, and only God can deliver from that. Man is deceived by his own behavior, by the world’s concepts, by philosophy, and by religion. To end verse 20, in Isaiah 44, we are face to face with a modern man. The person does not have the ability to comprehend or to say, “My life is a lie,” or in Isaiah’s words, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?” That, modern man can’t admit into his belief system. What is the answer to man’s dilemma? Surely, it is only one thing. That is the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Let us move back now to Romans. In chapter 1, Paul brings in the whole Gentile world guilty before God and without excuse. Man can have no excuse when he stands before God in judgment. The human race en large has rejected the light God has given to every individual through Nature. In chapter 2, Paul shows the whole nation of Israel likewise guilty of sin and failed in righteousness, for the Law was not kept, as are the Gentiles. And in chapter 3, he concludes this sweep and spells out the inherent and perverse sinfulness of the whole human race. When all that is laid bare on the table, then Paul proceeds to the way of recovery, which is faith and justification with God through the Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 1:21. Please look at Romans 1:21. “Even though they knew God, they did not honour Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.” This is a critical verse in this passage, for it is the top of the slippery slide. The verse tells of a deliberate rejection of God in the face of God’s declared knowledge, and conviction, found in all creation. It was a choice made in full knowledge, a deliberate decision of the will to reject God. For a moment, let’s consider it like this. The deliberate rejection has shut the door on God, and now man stands outside, in the world of his own choosing. Is it any different from what Adam did, and he finished up also on the outside?

Verse 21 goes further. It begins this downward spiral. Futile speculations took over; their hearts were foolish and became darkened. That means that the darkened state they were already in became increasingly darker. They entered stupidity and wickedness. Mankind was adrift in the middle of nowhere, but it was not “nowhere”; it was on the sea of hell. This is our current world with the tidal wave of wickedness sweeping across it.

Romans 1:22. “Professing to be wise, they became fools.” Darkness gives rise to misplaced values and a breakdown in reality. Enter all the “isms.” Humanism, atheism, socialism, liberalism, intellectualism, and many more. What is darkened imagines itself in the light, and then delusion overtakes them. They imagined themselves to be wise and all intelligent, but the stark reality of it all is that they became fools in God’s eyes. These fools parade around in their deluded wisdom. They are inflated, so full of hot air they could almost float.

The more they elevated their self-deluded wisdom, the more they became fools. Modern man is ignorant of the wisdom and intelligence of the past and places himself on the apex of human intelligence. That is the legacy of Darwin.

The wisdom of man is foolishness with God.

Man thinks he is the master of his destiny, but he is wrong; Satan is. David Attenborough is a fool. He joins Darwin and nearly all the philosophers, and Prince Charles, planning to bring in a new world order as part of the WEF’s Great Reset. We have to realize this is a fallen world, and we see beautiful things in it, marks of God’s creation, but the human race is so far away from God and is becoming worse, very quickly, as we near the Rapture.

Paul had to warn the Colossians about the elementary principles of the world. My nation is there in the pits, and it is sad. It is so godless. I think the USA is going like that too.

Christians who want to be faithful to God are going to find it more and more difficult to remain faithful. Their children are becoming influenced by the evil increasing in the world. In careers, compromise and lying are commonplace. These are difficult times.

The next posting will be the last in this series, and the spotlight falls in the basement, which is where we are right now.

ronaldf@aapt.net.au

P.S. I (Ron) need help – is there anyone?

I am wanting to place on the internet a good deal of my Christian work and study. This will include almost 90,000 words in poems, and then there are messages, articles, series on subjects like the current one I am doing, The Psalms of the Sons of Korah; and of course, some of the eschatology subjects I have written on. Also, I’d like to put some photos, especially tropical rainforest fungi, as they tell amazing stories about the creation of God. Also, I think I’d like to do a small weekly feature.

The trouble is I am quite brainless (well, very) with that sort of technology and feel inadequate at trying to make something.

I would welcome any ideas or suggestions for a web page or site. I am 78 and would like to get the stuff out there while I can still think!! For some years, I have been trying to resolve this problem.

If any could set me in the right direction, it would be appreciated.