On Being Rapture Worthy :: By Terry James

Author’s note: While preparing for the speaking session at the Branson Prophecy Watchers conference Saturday, December 7, 2024, my topic “Rapture Ready!” brought me to revisit this article. I wrote it a number of years ago, but never has the topic been more relevant than at this late hour of the Church Age.

We are on the very cusp of looking our Lord in His omniscient eyes when He calls believers into His presence at the Rapture. What does it mean to be “worthy” in our God’s holy eyes?…

Lately, emails and articles I’ve been receiving are trending toward the thought that Christians not living exemplary lives as believers will miss being taken in the Rapture of the Church should they not be fully “repented up” and ready to go. These will be “left behind,” as the LaHaye and Jenkins novel title puts it. First, it is perhaps best to consider what is meant by the “exemplary life” in terms of prerequisites for making it to Heaven in the Rapture.

Those who insist that one must be living an exemplary life usually frame that as “living a life of holiness” or “living righteously.” By this, I presume they mean, for the most part, that one must be doing “good works” rather than living life in the “broad way” along which the pedestrian world moves. I would, of course, agree that the born-again believer in the Lord Jesus Christ should be doing exactly that every day. There’s no question that God’s Word calls us to that model for life while upon this fallen planet.

However, the question is now raised—and it is closely akin to the question raised whenever the declaration is made that one can lose one’s salvation: At what point does one “lose” salvation? What particular “sin-point” is reached that causes the salvation meter in Heaven to go “TILT,” removing the sinner’s name from the Lamb’s Book of Life? Or, for our purposes here, at what point does one sin enough to be taken off the list of those who hold tickets into Heaven, who will be lifted to be with Jesus Christ in that millisecond known as the “twinkling of an eye” when Jesus calls: “Come up hither!” (Revelation 4:1-2)?

Those who believe the names of the redeemed can be removed from the Lamb’s Book of Life, of course, use the following Scripture as one that proves their position is true: “He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels” (Revelation 3:5).

This is proof, say the “conditional security proponents,” that one’s name can be removed from the Book of Life. But let’s have a closer look to examine whether this is true.

Those who hold that believers’ names can be erased from this blessed Book of Life insist that the born-again must “overcome” sin. In their belief dictionary, this means we must stay sin free—that is, either live above sin or stay continually “repented up” in order to keep our names in the Book.

They miss the point entirely as to who actually does the overcoming. It isn’t the believer who overcomes all sin, but the Lord Jesus who died in order to take sin away from those who believe so that we are no longer separated from God the Father in the eternal sense. This is seen, for example, in the following: “For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?” (1 John 5:4-5).

It is simple belief in the Savior who takes away the sins of the world that makes us overcomers. We still sin and come short of the glory of God, but His precious blood shed at Calvary covers all of our sins–past, present, and future. We overcome the world, the flesh, and the devil–all sin in this earthly sphere–only by belief in the only begotten Son of God (John 3:16). Our overcoming is only through God’s great grace, through faith. We can never overcome by our own power.

When we sin, we break fellowship with our Lord, but we never break the eternal, family relationship. We do the following to take steps toward making right the sinful break in fellowship that we have caused. First, we must realize and admit that we are not sinless because repentance cannot truly be made unless we confess that we have sinned. Upon such confession and repentance, there is given blessed remedy: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:8-9).

God’s Word shows us that our salvation and our ability to overcome is totally based on what Christ did for us and our faith in Him alone. This brings us to the matter of “Being Rapture Worthy.”

Going to Christ when He calls, as Paul outlines in 1 Corinthians 15:51-55 and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, and given by John in Revelation 4:1-2, is a salvation matter. We know that from the overall gospel message and from the total context of God’s dealing with His family. Remember when Jesus prayed that beautiful prayer to His Father, as the Lord faced the cross (John 17)? Read it again, and you will see that it is absolutely clear that born-again believers are forever secure in the Father’s hand, based upon what Jesus did on the cross.

We know with absolute certainty that we are once and forever in God’s family because of the words of the One who created all that exists: “My Father, which gave [them] to me, is greater than all; and no [man] is able to pluck [them] out of my Father’s hand” (John 10:29).

Paul confirms that the Rapture is a salvation matter as follows: “For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Wherefore comfort yourselves together, and edify one another, even as also ye do” (1 Thessalonians 5:9-11).

The Rapture will be Christ keeping us from the hour of temptation or Tribulation (read Revelation 3:10). The Tribulation is the time of God’s wrath–to which Paul tells us we are “not appointed.” However, there are many who insist that Christians who haven’t properly confessed their sins will go through that time of God’s wrath (and the entire seven years of the Tribulation will be God’s judgment and wrath). These use the following verse to make their case: “Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man” (Luke 21:36).

The key word they hold forth as relevant here is the word “worthy.” Does this word not mean that we, as born-again believers, must be good enough to stand before Jesus in that raptured throng? Does this word not mean, therefore, that if we fail to live up to God’s standards while on this Earth, we will (at some point in God’s holy view of what it takes to fall from being Rapture ready) lose our ticket in that translation moment, thus not be taken when the shout is heard, “Come up hither!”?

Like in examining the issue of salvation, in looking at the term “overcoming,” we now look at the word “worthy.” What does it mean to be “worthy,” as given in this Rapture example? Again, the answer is wrapped up in the same name as before: “Jesus.” Jesus is the only person “worthy,” in God’s holy eyes, to be in the heavenly realm.

Remember what Jesus said to a man who addressed Him as “Good Master”? “And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is, God” (Luke 18:18).

Jesus, the second person of the Godhead, was not seeking to chastise the man for addressing Him in this way. The Lord was confirming through this question that He is indeed God, the only good, the only righteousness. Righteousness is the only ticket to Heaven–either through the portal of death or through the Rapture. Only through Jesus–being born again into God’s family through belief in Him–can a person enter the heavenly realm.

Jesus spoke to this all-important matter by addressing Nicodemus: “Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3).

God’s Word says about fallen mankind: “As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3:10) and, “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

So, Jesus is the only person “worthy” to enter Heaven. It is through Him that any of us are worthy to stand before Him in that heavenly realm. That is the truth found in the Scripture in question.

On a less magnificent scale, the word “worthy” in this passage means that we should be in a constant mindset of prayerful repentance. We should always want to be found “worthy”–cleansed of all unrighteousness, as stated in 1 John 1:9, so that we will hear our Lord say to us on that day, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:23).

 

Profound Prophetic Pronouncement :: By Terry James

Prophetic stage-setting continues at a torrid pace. No signal of the nearness of the Tribulation (Daniel’s seventieth week) is more observable than the dynamics revolving around the nation Israel.

Anti-Semitism is coming to a boiling point again like in the times of Nazi Germany, beginning with Hitler’s persecution of the Jewish race. America’s universities are at the center of the rise in hatred for the Jews.

We witnessed the October 7, 2023, evil perpetrated against the gathering of young people celebrating in Israel’s southern region. The evil was as heinous as one could imagine even in thinking about times when the Nazi regime was mass murdering God’s chosen people.

It doubtless took satanically engendered rage to do the things the Hamas beasts filmed themselves doing that day.

Yet the world didn’t turn against Hamas and the other terrorist organizations that cheered those wicked ones on. Rather, the hellish activity quickly spread like an infection, bringing about anti-Semitism to the supposed rational Western world. The malicious evil went viral and had college students joining protests against Israel for fighting back against the Hamas murderers, baby killers, and rapists.

Why is this happening? That’s the question of many—not only Jews but Christians and all sane-thinking people as well. Why is God allowing this evil to raise its wicked, satanic head?

The answer, I believe, is found within the following:

“We are telling our Jewish brothers and sisters that Israel is your home… We are bracing ourselves and calling for a mass immigration from Europe,” announced Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu. And they were not just words – a while ago, the Cabinet approved a ₪180 million ($46 million) plan to finance the absorption costs of thousands of potential new immigrants, following numerous anti-Semitic attacks, along with political and economic troubles in the Ukraine, France and Belgium.

Netanyahu broadcasted his message via social media; “I would like to say to all of Europe’s Jews, and Jews everywhere, Israel is the home of every Jew.”

Not everyone is impressed with these remarks – European leaders insist that they can protect their Jewish communities, and many Jewish people just don’t want to leave. But many others are packing their bags nonetheless, feeling they have no choice…

“They shall come trembling from the West…”

“Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when it shall no longer be said, ‘As the Lord lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt,’ but ‘As the Lord lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the north country and out of all the countries where he had driven them’” (Jeremiah 16:14).

The miracles of God’s promises to Israel continue to unfold: the good, the bad, and the ugly. In very many places, the Scriptures prepare us for the fact that God was planning to bring His people back to His land by hook or by crook. With anti-Semitism spiraling out of all control around the world, many Jewish people are now deciding that they would be safer in war-torn Israel under the protection of the IDF than they are in Europe, and are escaping while they still can. (“God Is Gathering His People Back to Israel, ONE FOR ISRAEL Ministry)

And now the most religious of the Jewish community in Jerusalem are calling officially for all Jews to return “home.”

[Excerpt]

The nascent Sanhedrin in Jerusalem has made an official ruling, calling on Jews outside of Israel to come home.

“We are the beis din (rabbinic court) of Yerushalayim (Jerusalem), and we have poskened (officially ruled) that all Jews around the world have an obligation and chiyuv (religious requirement) right now to do whatever is in your power, to come to Eretz Yisrael (the land of Israel), and that is the mitzvah of Torah (Biblical requirement). And that is the mitzvah of today, especially because of what’s happening around the world and the dangers that all the Jews are in around the world. It’s necessary now more than ever to come to Eretz Yisrael, and we as a beis din have poskened that all the Jews have to come as soon as they can back to eretz Yisrael.”

The Sanhedrin’s ruling was intended for Jews worldwide, so it was recorded in English, Hebrew, Yiddish, French, and Spanish. (“Sanhedrin Announces Ruling: All Jews Worldwide Must Come Home to Israel Immediately,” Israel365 News, Biblical News, November 27, 2024)

To those who “watch” as commanded by Jesus (Mark 13: 37; Luke 21: 28):

God’s feathering of His chosen people in order to begin the process of bringing a remnant out of the time of Jacob’s trouble (Jeremiah 30: 7) becomes more obvious with every passing hour. This means, of course, that the Rapture, which must take place before the Lord’s final dealing with Israel in this way, must be even at the door, as Jesus put it.

You want to be a part of Christ’s call in that glorious event, not left behind to go through what Jesus said will be the worst time of all human history.

Here is how to go to the Lord when He steps upon the clouds of Glory and calls all believers to Himself.

“That if you will confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and will believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart man believes unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Romans 10:9-10).