Welcome to another broadcast of Hope for the Heart. My name is William Rogers, and I'll be bringing another message today that deals with the subject of the rapture of the church. Last time I brought a message on the rapture of the church, it was last week, and we dealt with some things as far as just the actual fact of an actual rapture happening, as was found in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, verses 13 through 18. But today I want to do something a little different. I want to look at the the change that's coming. In fact, I'm entitling this message in the twinkling of an eye. And the reason I'm doing this series like this, I know I've done a lot of prophecy, is because I hear so much today. I read and listen to a lot of prophecy writers. Somebody sends me a notice saying, watch this YouTube, or watch this, or read this. I read a lot, and I look at a lot, and I just see and hear people talk about In fact, last time I mentioned that the view of the rapture that a lot of Christians have is an old view that we used to see when I first became a Christian. You used to have posters, even in a lot of churches you'd find them. where people are just kind of floating through the air and floating on up to heaven and they're just kind of disappearing out of sight. But that's not the rapture. There's nothing in the scripture that's going to tell us that anything like that will ever happen. So the rapture is different. is there's a lot of people talking about the rapture right now in two ways. One, a lot of people say there is no rapture, and two, a lot of people are dealing with the timing of the rapture, especially around September of this year. I've just heard that so much, but the fact is we don't know. But there's a few things we do know about the rapture. A lot of these I brought out last week, but the one I want to share tonight, or today, excuse me, it's not even nighttime, is It's found in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. So if you have a copy of God's Word and would like to follow along, I will read for you 1 Corinthians 15 verses, I'll read verse 50 through 53 of 1 Corinthians. This talks about the rapture and I want to deal with this. in very general terms. Again, I'm not going to do too specific. I think people get bogged down in specifics on podcasts like this. Specifics are for another setting, but not this setting. So anyway, if you have a copy of God's Word, we'd like to follow along. We're reading out of 1 Corinthians chapter 15, beginning in verse 50, the Word of God says, Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable must put on imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. Well, I think you can see from that text it must deal with something that's pretty dramatic. But from the text, I just want to say just a few general things. One is... In looking through all my prophecy stuff this week, there's very little talk about the actual suddenness of the change. So many people, even today, I mean this week and last week, I've seen video after video and read a lot, even from so many different perspectives, but everybody wants to deal with the timing of it. the timing of when is the rapture going to happen? Are there any signs that have to be fulfilled? And I think I've addressed that, but I'm going to say a word about the timing at the end of this podcast. So, looking at this passage, though, in 1 Corinthians, It becomes very interesting to me just to deal with this because it was one of the very first verses I ever read that got into as far as studying the rapture of the church, and it has just always been a very special verse. But this passage, if you want to follow along, I encourage you to do so. Just make notes. And again, I'm not going to be detailing this too much. It's just some general things that I think are very helpful in just understanding this next event on God's prophetic calendar. What is it actually going to be? I mean, the rapture. Why a rapture? Why are we taken out? We've answered a lot of those questions, but what actually happens at the very moment of the rapture? I hear people say, they debate this. I've seen people get mad at one another debating, is there a rapture? Is there not a rapture? What happens? The timing, whether it's pre-trib, whether it's mid-trib, post-trib, all that deals with timing. People can get hung up on so many things But the thing I want to look at is the change that takes place and it says it in this passage just generally looking verse 51 behold I tell you a mystery we shall not all sleep, but we shall be changed in fact It says that word change several times in here in And the emphasis is on the fact that we are going to be changed. Now another general observation of looking at this is in that particular verse, verse 51. Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep. We shall be changed. Now, if we had the time to go back, and I don't want to spend much time on this because I covered this last time, just under the umbrella of 1 Thessalonians 4, verses 16 through 20, 18 I mean. And so, this word sleep that Paul deals with here is a reference to dying. So just generally speaking, I want you to notice, it says, I tell you a mystery, we shall not all sleep. In other words, we're not all going to die, but we shall be changed. So that is a picture of the rapture in its clearest, rawest form. There's going to be a generation of people that Paul says is not going to experience death. I say a generation of people, a generation of people that will be the true born-again believers of that day, whatever day that is, if it's today or if it's next year or whenever it is. And I know there's people out there that would get upset that I just said maybe next year because there's so many people teaching it's going to happen this September. Whenever it is, there's going to be a group of people that are going to be the true born-again members of the church, the universal church. And I believe it says here, if you look at this, we shall not all sleep is referring to them, referring to this group of people that will not experience death. But what's going to happen to them? Well, they're going to go to heaven. They're going to go directly into heaven, and in that process, they shall be changed. Notice what it says in verse 50. Verse 50 says, Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. What he's saying, generally speaking, again, is that you can't go to heaven. the way you are. In our flesh, our flesh and blood, we can't go into heaven. But there's going to come a time when a group of people known as the true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ will go to heaven without dying. That's fascinating in itself. It's got to be the most fascinating event of all the scripture in talking about the rapture. whether you believe it's real or not real, there's something that's going to take place according to this passage. If it's not the rapture, then you tell me what it is. Because it says that they're not going to, we're not all going to sleep, but we shall be changed. Why would we be changed? Well, he gives that. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, we'll come back to that. At the last trump, we'll come back to that. We'll sound and the dead will be raised. And we've already looked at that found in 1 Thessalonians. be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For, here's the reason, verse 53, for this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. That is, in order to get into heaven, we have to have the body prepared for heaven. This body is not going into heaven. The new body is going into heaven. So that's just a very general thing. So now, let's take a look at this. And the passage deals with the change in the nature of the bodies of the raptured saints. That's what we're talking about here. This is what we're dealing with, the nature of the bodies of the raptured saints. Now, verse 50 declares the necessity of this change, stating that flesh and blood are unable to inherit the kingdom of God. And decay cannot inherit immortality. It just can't. God has designed the program like that. We have to have a different body prepared for eternity. Just like the people who are going through eternal destruction will have a body prepared for eternal destruction. These bodies wouldn't make it. You can't make it. You can't make heaven or it can't make hell. These bodies would not hold up. And that's basically what he's saying. So the background to this statement is found in Genesis chapter two, verse 17, and then also in Romans chapter two, chapter five, verses 12 through 14, basically saying that man is living under the same sentence of death, every man ever born, We're born with a sentence of death. This physical body is subject to corruption and mortality. The sin nature is in it, and the results of sin are evident in the death of the body. We're born to die, you could say. We're all going to experience death. It's not fun as far as dealing with people. It's sad. It's very, very difficult. It's like every week I hear of someone else. In fact, I'm going to a funeral tomorrow. You just hear of so many. Of course, I've experienced it in my own family. And it's just one of those things that is happening. But the kind of body subject to sin, mortality, death, and corruption cannot enter into the eternal state. That is a fact. So, if that's true, which the Bible says it is, and the rapture happens, then what about those people who are believers at that time, or this week, or next week, or next month, who have not died? And then it says we can't go to heaven with this body, which means that the rapture must happen in order to change the individuals. the believers. So, with that in mind, verse 51 and 52, the change is described. You can see that right here. 51, it says, we shall all be changed. There it is in verse 51, and then in verse 52, We shall be raised and we will be raised imperishable and yet and we shall be changed it says it again so You see there is a change coming and the change is going to be in the body the emphasis on this in 51 and 52 is Emphasis is on the rapidity of the event. In other words, it's on how fast it is. And the emphasis is not necessarily the change. Even though Paul lists it, that's not the real emphasis there. In other words, he's saying the emphasis is on how fast it is going to be. How fast what's going to be? How fast this change is going to happen. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, it will be done in an instant. Now, here's some things that I think help us understand the incident. And this is why I'm doing this, because the posters you may have seen, or you may never seen, you may think, well, that would be a crazy poster. It shows car wrecks, or a plane crashing, or a train, or people just floating out of a house, people floating up to heaven. The picture is an indication of the rapture. The picture even looks like you could probably see somebody down the street going up. The physical bodies around the earth may not see it, but we might see one another. They're just kind of floating up into space, and you kind of get the feeling you could kind of wave to one another. Well, that's not it. This is it in 1 Corinthians 50 through 53. In fact, when it talks about this, it will be done in an instant. The Greek word for instant is atamos. And I don't usually give English words, but this word I've given to Thomas because we get the word atom from it. It originates from this word. The emphasis is that the change will happen in an atom of time. Well, what does an atom of time mean? Well, it means, here's what it means. It means it'll be quick. It will be instant. Furthermore, it will be the twinkling of an eye. So he gives it in two ways, the moment in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye." What is that? Well, in the twinkling of an eye. That is such an interesting phrase. I went all the way back to Dwight Pentecost's book, Things to Come, and John Walvert's book, The Rapture Question, and different books like that. And you can see these old writers, in fact, they were my professors at Dallas Theological Seminary. But the emphasis here is on quick, but it says in a twinkling of an eye. This is not a reference to blinking. We know what a blink is. We can blink and we know how fast that is. But it's even faster than that. It's rather speaking a flash of recognition. Now let me describe what that means. In other words, I'm not talking about a blinking of an eye and your eye gets a little clearer or just blink to water your eye. It's a flash of recognition. It's like seeing a person and then in a sudden flash of recognizing who that person is. That's the suddenness of this, and that's much faster than you can blink. It's like seeing a person, then in a sudden flash of recognizing who that person is, the sudden flash of recognition that is meant by the twinkling of an eye and so in the expression also emphasizes the rapidity of the change. In other words, think about this. Think about walking into a store and you see someone and instantly you know who that is. You recognize. That is a flash of recognition. You recognize who that is And this is how fast the rapture will take place. Now why is that important? Well, it's important for several reasons. One, when that happens, it will be instantaneous. That's the whole point of this. It will be, I'll tell you a mystery, we shall not all sleep, but we shall be changed. In other words, we will be doing whatever our normal routine might be for a day, or an evening sleeping, or wherever, church, or worship, or somewhere driving, we may be driving a car or sitting in an airplane. But in an instant, in that flash of recognition moment, that fastest of the moments that can come before you can blink an eye, you are going to be that changed person. That's how fast it's going to be. So what will you be? In other words, we will go from, let's just say I'm sitting at my desk right now, in my home, and I'm speaking to the recorder with lights, books around me, and in an instant, without me able to think about it, I'm in heaven. In that moment, in a flash, in an instant, in a twinkling of an eye, however you want to phrase it, the twinkling of an eye, that moment of recognition, flash. I'm going to be moved from my desk, sitting here at my desk, speaking to a recorder, and in heaven. that fast. I'm not going to have time to call my family, to call my brother. I've got several brothers that just, they're just, they're constantly thinking about the rapture, which is not bad. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but I won't have time to call them. And I won't have time to think about them. I won't have time to even think about, is this the rapture? So every event that we read about the rapture, whether it's the next section we're gonna deal with was the last trump. Trump, at the sound of the last trump, which it says in verse 52, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised and perishable and we shall be changed. We won't have a chance to think about anything. It's gonna happen that fast. So it's not like this rapture's gonna happen and we're gonna sit up and be able to hear and have a speaker up there who has been telling us, I told y'all to listen because these are the keys, this is what I told you was gonna happen, this, this, this, this. That's not gonna be the way it is at all. When we get to heaven. All bets are off as to the fact that anybody will know what we're going to be doing. Nobody knows. But we will be there in glory with Christ. And according to 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 verse 16, when we talked about this last week, It says when you close out that chapter, I mean that chapter four, it says, therefore comfort one another with these words. It doesn't say anything other than what it says in verse 16, will meet the Lord in the air and we shall always be with the Lord. Now that is comfort. So we can comfort one another with those, but it doesn't tell us what we're gonna do. I don't think we're gonna have a group of people up there debating on who was right and who was wrong on the actual date. That's just not going to happen. And I'm not being facetious about this. I'm saying that the rapture is a fact according to my study. And I realize there are people out there, people who are listening to this. They say they listen every week. And they're going to disagree again and again that there is no rapture of the church. They say there is not going to happen. that we will go from where we are right into the tribulation period and then we'll see Christ return. Well, I just don't believe that's... I think there's too many scriptures that you'd have to deal with and figure out what you're going to do with them because they don't seem to fit in anywhere. But I want to move on because I know we're looking at this because it is a change in the twinkling of an eye in that flash recognition moment that's how fast it is going to happen not just the snatching up or taking away But in that process of taking away, our bodies are gonna become different bodies. We're going to be what this talks about here in verse 50. Now it says in, I say this, the flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. But look at what it says in verse 52. The trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable. We will take on that human, body, that body equipped for eternity. That's what happens in the change. Well, how can that happen that fast? Well, God doesn't have any problem with that. God does not have any problem with that. Just like somebody was asking me one day, and I was telling them about the 144,000 witnesses during the tribulation period, and I said, there's going to be 12,000 from each tribe. And somebody said, well, a lot of the Jews don't even know what tribes they're with because of the destruction of the temple in AD 70. They don't know who they are. And I said, well, do you think God might know who they are? God doesn't need a temple, reference notes to go to it and look at who is who, follow the lineas all the way up to where, okay, this person is of this tribe, so no. God knows exactly what He's doing. And so we look at this, and I don't know how that's going to happen, but I know that my flesh will go from a flesh of flesh and blood to an imperishable incorruptible body. We will go from an earthly body to a heavenly body and that's the best way you can say it because in that way we tend to understand that a little bit. But this event is said to happen at the last trump of last trump. Both mid-tribulationists and post-tribulationists try to identify this with the trumpet bowls or the trumpet judgments in Revelation, but I don't think that holds water. I think a lot of people have seen through that. They realize that it can't be that. But the Corinthians wouldn't have had any knowledge of that. Paul wrote about this and then much later John wrote his book on Revelation. But Paul used the definite article before last Trump. So he must have expected his readers to know what he was talking about. This is what I think he's writing here is assuming they know what he's talking about. And so what could they be talking about? The only thing they would have trumpets and spoken of in the Old Testament, that's what they would have known. The last trump refers to the feast of trumpets and the Jewish practice of blowing the trumpet during this feast. There's a series of short trumpet sounds followed by one long blast trumpet, which is called, and it says it in the in the Hebrew here, and in the Greek, but really what it is called is called the Great Trumpet Blast. And I think that's what Paul is referring to. Now, I'm not going to speak about, at this particular meeting, on the Feast of Trumpets, but I do think there's a lot in the Second Coming that has to do with the Feast. And so it would do us well to do that. And so I'm going to mention, I'm going to do a whole lesson either next time or the week after on the Feast so we can have a little bit better understanding of that. In fact, this whole timing is based on the feast that says that the trumpet will sound, the Feast of Trumpets, during the month of September. But Paul meant here, by last trump, is that great trumpet blast in the Feast of Trumpets. And such, it says nothing concerning the timing of the rapture, only that the rapture, whenever it occurs, will fulfill the Feast of Trumpets. Now, I happen to be an advocate for Arnold Frutenbaum in his writings about feasts and trumpets and also the Messiah and the Second Coming. And he does not reference anything related to the feast as far as the rapture. other than this feast of trumpets but He says that the timing of the rapture, only that the rapture, whenever it comes, will fulfill the feast of the trumpets. And I think that's true, but we'll get into more into that and what that means and what actually is the feast of the trumpets, when is it celebrated, and how often, because I think that does play a role. Furthermore, the last trumpet is the same as the trumpet of God found in 1 Thessalonians. We mentioned that last week and didn't cover it then because I'm holding off to cover a look at the feast. This was explained that the sound of the last trump, the dead are raised as incorruptible and the living will be changed. That's the point. The living, us, if the rapture does happen in September, the living believers will be changed. It's so fast we won't even know we've been snatched. We will go from reading a Bible, or reading a book, or watching TV, or having dinner, or driving a car, to suddenly in heaven with the Lord Jesus That is going to be strange. We will have skipped death. We can go straight to heaven. And I don't know that a lot of people realize that. So it's not just a fascination with the instant calling out. Man, it's everything involved with this. The change that's coming. So according to verse 52, the problem that keeps the dead body out of heaven, corruption, will be changed through the resurrection, and the body will become incorruptible. The mortal living will put on immortality, and that is something that we could spend some time looking at the type of body. We're told we have an incorruptible body. We're told it's a glorified body. We're told it's a body of the resurrection power. We're told it's a spiritual body. We're told it's a heavenly body. We're told it's an immortal body. We're told we can relate some of this to what Christ's resurrection body was when he walked around the earth after he was raised from the dead. And that's all true. But I'm not going to cover all of that because that's too much. But I do want to say something about the timing. The timing of the rapture. Because I don't want to get too much into the timing because there's just so much there. But the one thing that people have on the Rapture, well I think what I'm going to do, I'm going to save the timing because I don't want to rush this. And so I think I'm going to end it with right here. Because we look at this and the change is what I'm emphasizing here in the twinkling of an eye. You know, we're going to, I think it's fascinating to just think about the scenarios of what you might be doing when the rapture actually happens. And you know, those are fun, but the point is, we're not gonna know anything. We're just gonna be in that instant in heaven. We're not going to feel bad necessarily. I mean, some of us might be on a sick bed or we might not feel good that day. Or there might be some of us, some believers might be battling cancer or strokes or whatever. But the living will not go through death. They will literally go straight to heaven through this process known as the rapture of the church. It's the rapture of born-again believers, all part of the bride of Christ, the body of Christ, being taken up in an instant. In fact, 1 Corinthians says, And again, if that's not referring to a rapture, if that's not referring to something like the rapture, you tell me what you think that is referring to. When else could that be happening? When else are believers not going to experience death and yet experience the change? That's what this passage says. They're not going to experience death, but they are going to experience the suddenness, the instantaneousness of the change of going from a earthly body to a heavenly body. My friends, that is what the rapture of the church is all about. That's why it is there. So that verse 53, this perishable must put on imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality that happens at the rapture for the living believers of today, whenever it happens. So, again, this has been William Rogers. I hope this has been helpful. There's so much information out there on prophecy, and there's so much information out there on the rapture. For an event that doesn't have to have any signs, there is sure a lot of information out there. So, be discerning in what you're hearing and what you're reading, but enjoy it. And look forward to it, and be alert and be ready. And again, being ready means being a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you for joining me today.