Glory be to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who, in His love, has chosen in these end times to reveal His Word — which is truth — to us by the Spirit; thereby delivering us from all manner of false doctrines propagated in this world, and rendering us thus ready for the day of the coming of His Son: that great and glorious day. May all honour return to Him. Amen!

In these end times, the Church of Jesus Christ is completely inundated by all manner of false doctrines taught by these so-called apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers who proclaim themselves servants of Jesus Christ — when in reality they are agents of Hell, veritable Luciferians, whose one and only purpose is to drag with them into the lake of fire as many of the Lord's sheep as possible. And one of the false teachings by which they have succeeded in seducing the greatest number of the Lord's sheep is that of a supposed Rapture of the Church before the Great Tribulation. In these times in which we live, it is enough for some so-called servant of God to breathe fire or perform a few miracles — and automatically, everything he says becomes true. And many of God's sheep are seduced by the fables and lying words of these heretics.

What is astonishing in all of this is that the Lord's sheep no longer take the care or the trouble to verify the Scriptures with regard to what this multitude of teachers is teaching them. If told that the Rapture of the Church or the return of the Lord Jesus Christ is scheduled for two years from now, they will swallow it whole without even examining the Word of God. The same is true if they are told that the Rapture of the Church has already taken place, or that it will occur before the Great Tribulation — which is already the case today. This sad reality shows simply to what extent the Lord's Church in these end times is light and carried about by every wind of doctrine.

So what does the Word of God truly tell us about the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Rapture of the Church? The Bible declares respectively in Galatians 1:8 and 2 John 10: "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed"; and "If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed."

You will therefore have understood that we will be spending time examining the Word of God — the Truth — about what it tells us concerning the Rapture of the Church. Accordingly, I have found it good to select for this biblical study the following texts that deal — almost or exclusively — with the subject of the Rapture: 2 Thessalonians 2:1–8; 1 Thessalonians 4:13–17; 1 Thessalonians 5:1–3; and Matthew 24:1–31. Other texts may be added to complement the study.

The objective of this message is to demonstrate biblically, point by point, that there will NEVER be a Rapture of the Church — of the Bride — or of the Elect, before the Great Tribulation; and that this lying message of a supposed rapture before the Great Tribulation is a message assembled and fabricated from scratch by Satan himself.

Before launching into the biblical study, it is necessary to understand the concepts of the Coming or return of Jesus Christ and the Rapture of the Church. Let us read Acts 1:6–11, Revelation 1:7, and Matthew 24:30.

Acts 1:6–11
⁶When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? ⁷And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power. ⁸But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. ⁹And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. ¹⁰And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; ¹¹Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.

Revelation 1:7
Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.

Matthew 24:30
And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

From these passages, we can retain that the Coming of the Lord is the event that designates the return of Jesus Christ upon the clouds to the earth. And this will take place on the day that the Bible has chosen to call the Day of the Lord (1 Thessalonians 5:2; 2 Thessalonians 2:1–2); and this Day of the Lord — or Day of the Lord's coming — will be marked and preceded by very specific signs. Acts 2:20 tells us: "The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come." Keep this passage firmly in mind throughout the study, for it will be useful to us in what follows. The Rapture of the Church, for its part, will be nothing other than the consequence of the Lord's return — that is, what will follow after the coming of the Son of God. In other words, the Rapture of the Church and the coming of Jesus Christ will take place on the same day.

Matthew 24:30–31
³⁰And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. ³¹And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

Mark 13:26–27
²⁶And then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. ²⁷And then shall he send his angels, and shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven.

Let us also read

2 Peter 3:10
But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.

Note from this point onward that the Word of God speaks of a single Day of the Lord — and therefore one single, unique coming, which we call the second coming of Jesus Christ, awaited by born-again Christians; the first being when He came to die for us upon the cross. A third coming there will be none. Why? As we have just read in 2 Peter 3, on the Day of the Lord — the day of His return — the Lord will first rapture His Church and will then proceed to judgment; the Lord Jesus Christ will destroy the earth by fire on that day.

Hebrews 9:28
So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.

This means that all those who, through ignorance or seduction, believe that after the Rapture of the Church at the second and final coming of the Lord, Jesus Christ will come yet again a third time to rapture those whom their seducers call the "redeemed" — people who missed the first round of rapture and pulled themselves together afterward — should already disabuse themselves. They should begin working toward the one and only Rapture that will take place very soon; for to miss the Rapture on the Day of the Lord is synonymous with going to Hell. God willing, we may return to this notion of the so-called "redeemed."

2 Thessalonians 2:1–8

Verses 1–3
¹Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, ²That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. ³Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;

What can we draw from these first three verses? In them, the Lord speaks to us clearly and precisely of His coming and of what must happen before it. Note first of all that the Lord begins by putting us on guard against seduction. Why? The subject of the Lord's coming and the Rapture of the Church is of the utmost importance — and Satan knows it. He has therefore mobilized all of his servants with the sole purpose of twisting the biblical meaning of this subject, in order to drag as many people as possible to Hell. This is why the Lord begins with this warning.

In verse 3, the Scriptures continue by saying: "...for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition" — for the coming of the Lord to take place and consequently for the rapture of the saints. The Lord therefore raises two pivotal events: the apostasy and the man of sin. What is the apostasy, and who is this man who must appear before the coming of the Lord?

The apostasy is the abandonment of the faith or of the revelation of the Truth; it is a complete and public repudiation of Christian doctrine. Something that is already happening in our day — yes, the apostasy is already here. Let us read 1 Timothy 4:1–2 and 2 Timothy 4:3–4.

1 Timothy 4:1–2
¹Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; ²Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;

2 Timothy 4:3–4
³For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; ⁴And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.

Know therefore that all those who cannot endure sound doctrine — the Word of God as it is written; all those who turn their ear from the Truth; and all those who fight against the Truth are apostates — people struck by the apostasy.

In relation to this verse, the apostasy alone is insufficient to speak of the return of the Lord — and therefore of the rapture of the saints. The Word here states: "...except there come a falling away first, AND that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition." Note carefully the presence of AND. Today, most of those who preach on this text of 2 Thessalonians 2 limit themselves only to the apostasy when speaking of the return of the Lord; they do not even dare to speak of the man of sin who must appear before the coming of the Lord. And yet the Word of God is perfectly clear when it says that both the apostasy must have come AND that the man of sin must have appeared before the return of the Lord can be spoken of. To speak only of the apostasy as a sign preceding the return of the Lord, while ignoring the other prerequisite — the appearance of the man of sin — constitutes a gravely erroneous interpretation of the Word of God.

Who, then, is this man who must appear before the return of the Lord is possible? To identify him, let us continue the study with the following verse.

Verse 4
Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.

In this verse, the Lord informs us that it will be a man who will seek to make himself equal to God by proclaiming himself god, and who will also trample upon the Temple of God. Let us read the following passages: Daniel 11:36–37, Revelation 13:1–6, Daniel 7:8, and Daniel 8:9–13.

Daniel 11:36–37
³⁶And the king shall do according to his will; and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvellous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished: for that that is determined shall be done. ³⁷Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all.

Revelation 13:1–6
¹And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. ²And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority. ³And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. ⁴And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him? ⁵And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. ⁶And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven.

Daniel 7:8
I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things.

Daniel 8:9–13
⁹And out of one of them came forth a little horn, which waxed exceeding great, toward the south, and toward the east, and toward the pleasant land. ¹⁰And it waxed great, even to the host of heaven; and it cast down some of the host and of the stars to the ground, and stamped upon them. ¹¹Yea, he magnified himself even to the prince of the host, and by him the daily sacrifice was taken away, and the place of his sanctuary was cast down. ¹²And an host was given him against the daily sacrifice by reason of transgression, and it cast down the truth to the ground; and it practised, and prospered. ¹³Then I heard one saint speaking, and another saint said unto that certain saint which spake, How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice, and the transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden under foot?

From these passages, Daniel 11 informs us that it is a king — a political ruler — who will rise upon the earth; in Revelation 13 the man in question is identified as a beast; and in Daniel 7 and 8 he is identified as a horn. In short, it is the Antichrist — the last political leader (dictator) the world will ever know. We therefore understand from this verse 4 of 2 Thessalonians 2 that the coming of the Lord will only take place when the apostasy has set in AND when the Antichrist has been seen to appear. The Antichrist — also called the lawless one, the son of perdition, or the man of sin — will be the instigator of the Great Tribulation that the saints will endure; and the saints — that is, all persons born again — will be delivered into his hands and he will overcome them: he will cause them to perish by fire, by the sword.

Revelation 13:7
And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations.

Daniel 7:21–22, 25
²¹I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them; ²²Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom. ²⁵And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.

All of this simply means that the born-again Christians who will still be alive for the Rapture will pass through the Great Tribulation. In passing, also note that everything described in this verse 4 of 2 Thessalonians 2 is what is called the abomination of desolation.

Verses 5–7
⁵Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? ⁶And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. ⁷For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way.

If there is one thing that further reinforces this false teaching of a rapture of the saints before the Great Tribulation, it is the misunderstanding and misinterpretation of the expression "he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way." This verse 7 is indeed poorly interpreted. Today, virtually everyone seems to agree that what is restraining the public appearance of the Antichrist is the presence of the Church or of the Holy Spirit; and therefore, for all those who support this theory, the Church must first be raptured — which they interpret as "taken out of the way" — and then the Antichrist will appear. However, upon examining the Scriptures, you will see that the exact opposite is true. You will see that the Holy Spirit and the Church will indeed be present during the Great Tribulation. Otherwise, how do you explain the ministry of the two Witnesses during the reign of the Antichrist — the beast — in Revelation 11? Under what power will they work? We will return to all of this in the second part of this teaching.

Be blessed!