Hello John and Doves,
We are now past the
Passover Season.
So what would be a good
watch day can we look forward to in the near future for
the Rapture? The Rapture is a specific day chosen by
God. Will it be on a High Holy Day or a day not
associated with a Jewish feast?
In Acts 1:6 we read that the apostles "KEPT asking him,
"Lord, will You at this time restore again the kingdom to
Israel?" Jesus tells them it is not for them to know
'the times or the seasons, which God fixed as His own
authority'. Then he tells them that the Holy Spirit
will come upon them and they will be His witnesses in
Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria...and to the end of the
earth.
I want to look at His
ascension and what the angels said:
Acts 1:9: "And
when He had spoken these things, while they beheld, He was
taken up; and a cloud received him out of their
sight."
As they watched intently
at this occurrence, "two men stood by them in white
apparel". Suddenly two men in white clothing - angels,
messengers of God, were standing beside them. And
they spoke to them.
Acts 1:11 "Men of
Galilee," they said, 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 has seen him go into heaven."
Jesus will come in the
future in the clouds - He will be seen in the clouds like
on this day.
The apostles had been
told by Jesus that He was coming back and what signs to
look for. In Matthew 24 they are told "They will see
the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with great
power and great glory. And He will send out His angels
with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather His elect
from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the
other." Mathew 24:30,31
This will be during the
Fall Feasts - on Feast of Trumpets. On Day of
Atonement the Books are opened and people are
judged. And the Feast of Tabernacles will be
fulfilled with pilgrimages to Jerusalem during the 1,000
years of peace. This will fulfill these last 3 High
Holy Days.
IF the angels were
talking about the Second Coming - they were just repeating
what Jesus had already told his disciples. Hardly
news at that point. So it does not seem likely that the message
from the angels is about the Second Coming.
So the meaning of this
angelic message must be about something else.
Another time when Jesus appears in the clouds.
This message from God
was so important that He sent TWO angels to deliver
it. Not one, but two! That would make this
message most important.
I would think that this
angelic message would be a 'new' message for the people
witnessing this. Nothing more is said in Acts about
these angels or their message...like this message is not
for these people or their time. Someone in the
future would understand the important of this message
then.
Where else is Jesus seen
in the clouds?
"For this we say unto
you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and
remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them
which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend
from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel,
and the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall
rise first: Then we who are alive and remain shall
be caught up together with them in the clouds to
meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we
ever be with the Lord." 1 Thessalonians 4:14-17
This is not the Second
Coming where Jesus comes to the earth. He stays in
the clouds to receive His own. He does not descent
to earth.
The
picture we see at The Ascension may well be what we will experience at the Rapture - as
Jesus ascended, so shall we ascend up into the clouds
where Jesus will meet us. Was THIS the actual
message of the angels?
I do not think God would
send TWO angels to tell the disciples what Jesus had
previously told them - they were not ignorant of His
coming "to restore again the kingdom to Israel".
I see this as a new
message - with another meaning..for the future, about that
specific day. Giving US, today, a clue for the
Rapture.
Jesus arose on what is
now known as Ascension Day.
"Ascension Day is the
40th day of Easter. It occurs 39 days after Easter
Sunday, April 4." In 2021, Thursday, May 13
is Ascension Day. Ascension
Day
.
What is this day using
the Jewish calendar and the new moon?
The new moon was seen
from Jerusalem on March 14. Making 1 Nissan/Aviv,
March 15
Passover would be on 14
Nissan - sunset 3/28/21 to sunset 3/29/21
Feast of Unleavened Bread
would be 15 Nissan. Feast of Firstfruits would be 16
Nissan, sunset March 30 to sunset March 31.
To count the 40 days,
one starts counting on Feast of Firstfruits, March 31
(when Jesus rose from the grave) Ascension Day
would be May 9 based on the new moon sighting.
On the chabad.org calendar this corresponds to 27
Iyar.
Pentecost, using the new
moon sighting, is May 17, 2021, 4 Sivan.
In Acts 1: 4 we are told
that Jesus "appeared to them over a span of forty days and
spoke about the kingdom of God."
40 is an important number
in the Bible. In Strong's Concordance, Greek, 40
means "sacred, holy", "set apart by (or for) God: holy,
sacred." As in 'the Holy Spirit'. We
are aware of many "40 day" periods in the Bible.
Strong's
Greek: 40. ἅγιος (hagios) -- sacred, holy
Jesus ascended to Heaven
forty days after His resurrection. Before He left,
He told them that "in a few days you will be baptized with
the Holy Spirit." Acts 1:5
Ascension Day is not a
Jewish High Holy Day. It is a "Jesus/Christian" day.
Could the believers in
Christ experience their own ascension on the same day that
Jesus ascended into the clouds? Two angels had a
very important message to man from God on this day.
Were they just repeating what Jesus had told the people or
were they saying that on some future Ascension Day Jesus
will again appear in the clouds?
"It seems that if the Lord
wanted to send a strong message to the Jews and the rest
of the
unbelievers, as to Who did
this (the rapture) and what happened to all the
Christians/children, etc. that He would take us out
on Ascension Day....The Ascension also makes more
sense than connecting the rapture to a Jewish Feast day
because it shows the separate handling of the church and
Israel." Ascension
Day Rapture? – Grace thru faith
This does make much sense. Ascension Day is
not a Jewish Feast Day. It is a Christian
day. The Rapture is not for the Jewish people, it
is for the Gentiles.
So we have two possible
Ascension Dates in May - May 9 and May 13. Both of
these days have a 3% visible moon...with the new moon
being on May 11.
Some have said that the
Rapture will probably occur on a new moon. I believe
that Ascension Day will always be near a new moon, that's
just how it counts out.
I am hopeful that with all
that is going on in the world today - all the evil that is
just spilling out of everywhere - that the day of our
Rapture, the day that God sends His son for us, is very,
very near!
Pray for the peace of
Jerusalem!
Maranatha!
Chance