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The Rapture and
the Wrath of God Part Two The First-fruits amongst the Overcomers And The Two Witnesses By Mark Greenwood
We now come to the part that causes a lot of discord in the Body of
Christ, the sequence of events that brings in the rule of Christ to the
earth. Before we start I need to clarify myself. I do not believe in being dogmatic but open minded about certain topics
of scripture, the return of the Lord is one of them. We can have our
opinions based on scripture; others may have a different opinion based on how
they see scripture this then develops into what we call “schools of opinion”,
serious contentions can exist between these schools. When it comes to the
return of Christ I have heard people who believe in the preterist version of
events denounce everyone else, and even many people who believe in the
pre-millennium return of Christ attack others vehemently because they believe
differently as regards whether Christ returns according to the pre-trib,
pre-wrath or post wrath theory. To become contentious over this is a work
of the flesh which God warns us against. I believe we are so close to the
return of Christ that we can have our viewpoint, which must line up with
scripture, but also watch closely as events unfold keeping an open mind just in
case one aspect of the actual return of Christ is different from our presumed
point of view. The following is what I see at this moment in time
as a possibility of the sequence of events concerning the Lord’s return. As it gets closer to the Lord’s return my
viewpoint may be changed or adjusted, we can only watch and pray. Previously I believed in the pre-trib theory,
although I now believe the rapture is more likely to be in the mid position,
i.e., after the first three and a half years and before the three and a half
years of God’s wrath. However, I still
enjoy reading articles by people that believe in the pre-trib position. In the west we often view prophecy on a straight time line where once it
is fulfilled that is it, while the Hebrew approach allows for more than one
event fulfilling the same prophecy. Sometimes we may get a type in the Old
Testament then an anti-type in the New Testament both regarding the same
prophecy. The seventy weeks of Daniel’s prophecy (Daniel 9:24-27) is an Old
Testament timeline concerning the Jewish nation which was given to Daniel by
the angel Gabriel (see www.gotquestions.org/seventy-weeks.html). This
timeline involves the exact date of the coming of the Messiah to the Jews.
People who work out these dates don’t always come to the same conclusion
but most of them are convinced they are correct. In general they work out
the date of the crucifixion to be somewhere in the range of AD 30 to AD
33. The reason I mention this is because Daniels prophecy shows that
there is one week left to the Jewish people from the time of Messiah the Prince
(one week in this prophecy is actually representative of seven years).
Jesus openly acknowledged who He was when He rode into Jerusalem on a colt
fulfilling Zechariah’s prophecy, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O
daughter of Jerusalem! Behold your king is coming to you; He is just and having
salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey.” (Zechariah
9:9). A few days after this He was “cut off”, that is crucified. There is one week (seven years) left to the
Jewish people from the time of the crucifixion. Basically this “one week” is given to the Jewish nation as a time when
God calls them to believe in the Messiah, Jesus Christ. This is their chance to accept Jesus as the
One to “Finish the transgression, to make an end of sins, to make
reconciliation for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up
vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy” (Daniel 9:24). The first time Jesus came to them they
rejected Him but one day the Lord will once again reveal Himself to them, this
time they will accept Him as their Messiah and anoint Him as their King. The Chronology of the New Testament by Lewis A. Foster (The Expositors
Bible Commentary Volume 1) gives a time of four years from the crucifixion to
the conversion of Saul. I think this is logical considering all the
things that took place between these two events. This makes the stoning of
Stephen probably 3 to 4 years after Christ was crucified (some believe it was
in the same year as Christ was crucified). Even after the crucifixion of
Christ God still didn’t give up on the Jewish nation but the Spirit witnessed
to them continually right up to the testimony of Stephen when they finally
rejected Christ and stoned Stephen to death. After this the Lord
appointed Paul to go to the Gentiles, and in Acts 13:45-46 we read, "But
when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy; and
contradicting and blaspheming, they opposed the things spoken by Paul. 46 Then Paul and
Barnabas grew bold and said, "It was necessary that the word of God
should be spoken to you first; but since you reject it, and judge
yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, behold, we turn to the
Gentiles. 47a For so the Lord has commanded us:"" Because of the above I do not think there is necessarily another full
seven years allocated to the children of Israel to receive Jesus as their
Saviour, I would guess at three and a half years, it will be the time that the
Bible says, “They will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for
Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a
firstborn” (see Zechariah 12:10). However
I do believe there is a significant seven year period; the first three and a
half years are the two witnesses and the second three and a half years given to
the reign of the antichrist (beast from the bottomless pit) and this also
includes the wrath of God on the earth. Now let us get on with looking at the sequence of events that bring us
to the reign of Christ on this earth. I have named part two of this article, “The First-fruits amongst the
Overcomers”. All Christians are overcomers however there are first-fruits
who are to be presented to the Father; these are representative of the
whole. The first-fruits are the fruit or produce that ripens first. They
are collected first and give an indication of what the rest of the crop will be
like (see Romans 11:16). When the rest of the crop has become ripe it is
gathered in together at the main harvest. At the Harvest Festival the
farmers would bring their first-fruits and present them to the church as an act
of thanksgiving to God for a good harvest. In the New Testament God’s people are looked at as wheat that when fully
ripened need to be harvested. Jesus spoke a parable about the kingdom of heaven being like a man who
sowed good seed in his field but while he slept his enemy came in and sowed
tares amongst them. He then explains that He who sows the good seed is
the Son of Man, the field is the world and the good seeds are the sons of the
kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one. The tares will first
be gathered together in bundles to burn them, but the wheat, which is from the
good seed, will be gathered into His barn (Matthew 13:24-43). In the Old Testament we have illustrations or laws which have
significant meaning for us today. This is the same with the harvest. Grain was harvested in April, May, and June, beginning with the barley
harvest and ending with the wheat harvest, the grapes were harvested after the
wheat harvest, sometime in August and September. The first-fruits of the
barley harvest were usually collected in early April which is the month
Nisan in the Jewish calendar. The month Nisan is the time when the Feast
of Passover, the Feast of unleavened Bread and the Feast of First-fruits took
place. The Feast of First-fruits involved bringing a sheaf of the
first-fruits of the harvest to the priest. The Feast of First-fruits is
during the Feast of Unleavened Bread therefore no leaven could be involved in
this presentation as it represents Jesus presenting Himself before the Father
at His resurrection from the dead. Leaven represents sin and Jesus was
sinless, He dealt with all sin on the cross and now came before the Father
without sin. The priest waved this sheaf of the first-fruits of the barley harvest
before the Lord on the day after the first Sabbath following the Passover which
is the first day of the week. This happens usually about early
April. It is a picture of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ
is the First-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. Fifty days later or seven weeks of Sabbaths is the Feast of Weeks, also
known as the day of Pentecost, and falls round about May or June time. It
is the time of the summer wheat harvest and once again an offering is made to
the Lord, this time with the first-fruits of the wheat harvest. This is
also known as the latter first-fruits, or second first-fruits. This new
grain offering is two wave-loaves of two tenths of fine flour baked with
leaven. These are the first-fruits of the wheat harvest which are
presented to the Lord fifty days after the Feast of First-fruits (Leviticus
23:15-17). Are these the first-fruits of the church? It would seem so. After the first-fruits of the wheat harvest are taken, the rest of the
wheat becomes ripe and is harvested. We can see that if the rapture took place today not all the church would
be ripe at the same time; however at the removal of the first-fruits the rest
of the church would quickly mature ready for the main harvest. Now it is important to note that the wheat harvest takes place before
the grape harvest. The grape harvest represents the time of God’s wrath
upon the earth. So by the time of God’s wrath, the church (wheat) has
already been removed from the earth. Romans chapter 8:19-23 says, “For the earnest expectation of the
creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God. “For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because
of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be
delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the
children of God. For we know that the
whole creation groans and labours with birth pangs together until now. “Not only that, but
we also who have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within
ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body.” (NKJV). A
word of explanation here, we are not adopted into God’s family in the
modern sense of adoption but rather we are born into God’s family, we
are
children of God not by adoption but by birth. When God adopts us it is
that He recognizes His children have matured and He now acknowledges
them as sons. It is
the placing of children into the responsible position of a son. Romans 8:14 says, “For as many as are led by
the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” Full adoption it would seem is at the redemption of our bodies. So at this moment in time we are awaiting the redemption of our bodies. The sequence of events after the seven seals, as I see them, is that first the two witnesses (more on them later) after giving testimony for three and a half years (1260 days), are overcome and killed by the beast. They are overcome physically not spiritually, in fact they overcome the accuser of the brethren, by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they loved not their life unto death (see Revelation 12:11). These are resurrected and meet the Lord in the clouds (Rev. 11:12). They are acknowledged as first-fruits (Rev14:1-5), afterwards those Christians who are still alive on the earth at this time are caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air (1 Thess. 4:13-18). The
three and a half years of the two witnesses are followed by three and a
half years of the beast reigning and enforcing everyone to take the
mark of the beast. It is during this time that the seven bowls of God's
wrath are poured out on the earth. Who are the two witnesses in Revelation chapter 11? For three and a half years they have exalted the Lord Jesus Christ with powerful signs and wonders. These two witnesses have a different kind of ministry than what we normally expect from Christians, “If anyone wants to harm them, fire proceeds from their mouth and devours their enemies. And if anyone wants to harm them, he must be killed in this manner. These have power to shut heaven, so that no rain falls in the days of their prophecy; and they have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to strike the earth with all plagues, as often as they desire” (Revelation 11:5-6). This fire which proceeds from their mouth is possibly not literal fire, but fire that is symbolic of the word of God (see Jeremiah 23:29). The death it brings to the hearers of the word is a death to the intentions of harm they purposed to do to the witnesses (see John 7:45-47). The message is still, “Grace, grace” (Zechariah 4:7), but I believe we are right at the end time where lawlessness has increased beyond believe, everyone doing their own thing, no one wanting to listen any more, God in His mercy is making Himself heard in such a way that man can have no excuse. The Bible says, “When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him” (see Isaiah 59:19). These two witnesses are the restrainers who restrain the lawlessness until they are gone and then the lawless one shall be revealed (see 2 Thessalonians 2:6-7).
So then, the question is who are these two witnesses? Some say Moses and
Elijah, others Enoch and Elijah, some say the Christians and Jews. The
Bible tells us who they are, "These are the two olive trees and the two
lampstands standing before the God of the earth" (Revelation 11:4). That
actually makes four, so there is more to the meaning than just two persons. We
also have an almost identical passage in the Old Testament that we can refer
to, an angel is talking to Zechariah, "And he said to me, "What do
you see?" So I said, "I am looking, and there is a lampstand of solid
gold with a bowl on top of it, and on the stand seven lamps with seven pipes to
the seven lamps. v3"Two olive trees are by it, one at the right of the bowl and the
other at its left"" (Zechariah 4:2-3). So
the main difference between the passage in the book of Revelation and
the one in Zechariah is that there are two lampstands in Revelation but
in
Zechariah there is only one. That is very significant; it is the
key to
what the lampstands represent. They are witnesses because they have a
testimony
that must be given out in its entirety (Rev. 11:7). In Zechariah
there is
only one lampstand because at that time there was only one lamp, that
is, the
Old Testament, in Revelation there are two lampstands which are the Old
Testament and the New Testament. The lampstands are what hold the
lamp in order for it to shine in the right place. The Old Testament as
well as the New
Testament both testify of Jesus (Luke 24:27, 1 Corinthians 15:1-6). The
Bible
says, "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path" (Psalm
119:105), so the word is a lamp. Also we
are told, “—the seven lampstands that you saw are the seven churches”
(Revelation 1:20), so the word is a lamp and the church is a lampstand. We
have the church of God, proclaiming the word of God (see Acts 9:15), this is one witness. However we need something more because without the Spirit the word is
dead. What
about the two olive trees? The Bible tells us in Zechariah 4:14,
"So he said, "These are the two anointed ones, who stand beside
the Lord of the whole earth."" The olive trees represent the anointing
of the Holy Spirit. It is no longer by our own might or power that we
proclaim the word of God but it is by the Spirit of God that the word
is proclaimed. Who
are the two anointed ones? Well, they are represented here
by Joshua and
Zerubbabel the two ministers that this passage has in view (this
is a different Joshua from the one who led the Children of Israel into
the Promised
Land). Joshua belongs to the priest line and Zerubbabel
belongs
to the royal line of David. Both the priesthood had the anointing
and
also the royal line (the king) had the anointing. The oil represents
the Holy
Spirit (see Zechariah 4:6). Jesus Christ is both the King and the
Priest, the anointed one of God. So we have the lampstand
(the church), the lamp (the word) , the oil (the anointing
of the word) revealing Jesus the light of the world. John 15: 26-27 when Jesus is speaking to His disciples He says, “But
when the Helper comes (the Comforter), whom I shall send to you from the
Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of
Me. And you also will bear witness, because you have been with Me from the
beginning.” So we have the Spirit and the disciples (the church) proclaiming the
truth which is the word of God concerning Jesus who is the light of the world. These are the two witnesses. So Jesus is the anointed word of God who is revealed in the Old
Testament by the Law and the Prophets and also in the New Testament by the Apostles. How does the word witness to the unsaved? Psalm 107:20 says, "He sent His word and healed them, and delivered
them from their destructions." How did God send His word? Hebrews 10:5
says, "Therefore, when He came into the world, He said: "Sacrifice
and offering You did not desire, but a body you have prepared for
Me."" In John 1:1 we read, "In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Then in verse 14 we
read, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His
glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and
truth." So the word needs a body in order to be revealed to the people. We are
the body of Christ, 1 Corinthians 12:27 says, "Now you are the body of
Christ, and members individually." 1 Corinthians 12:13 says,
"For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body --- whether
Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free --- and have all been made to
drink into one Spirit." So we, the church, are one body which is His body, and we have the Holy
Spirit. The Holy Spirit teaches us the word of God and it is the Holy
Spirit who will testify of Jesus through us (see John 15:26, Matthew
10:20). The two witnesses are the vessels of the anointed word of God, the Old
and New Testaments. In the Old Testament it was Moses and the prophets
who gave God's word, and in the New Testament it is the body of Christ.
In the Old Testament He says to the children of Israel, "Therefore you are
my witnesses, says the Lord that I am God" (Isaiah 43:10-12). In the
New Testament He says to the disciples, "But you shall receive power when
the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in
Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth"
(Acts 1:8). It
is possible then, that the witnesses who go to Israel
with the word concerning their Messiah are two "Old Testament"
saints, but it is also possible that these two witnesses are modern day
Jews
who are saved and part of the body of Christ today, they go in the
spirit of
Elijah and Moses, just as John the Baptist went in the spirit of
Elijah. Malachi prophesied that before the coming of the great and
dreadful day of the Lord, God would send Elijah the prophet to testify
(Malachi 4:5), whether it is actually Elijah or someone acting in the
spirit of Elijah remains to be seen, the point is, it is before the
coming of the Day of the Lord not after it. There
is also a much larger group of Christians filled with the Spirit (see
Acts 1:8)
who are the first-fruits to the Lord (Revelation 14:1-5). Between
them
they are the two wave loaves of Leviticus 23:17 who are the
first-fruits of the
wheat harvest which are presented to the Lord. These first-fruits are
also mentioned
in Revelation 14:1-5 as 144000 first-fruits redeemed from the
earth. Why does it just say two? Well, apart from the Old and New Testaments,
to have a witness there has to be at least two. Jesus sent the twelve
apostles out two by two (Mark 6:7), and later He sent seventy out also two
by two to be His witnesses (Luke 10:1). Each pair were His two witnesses
to the place that He sent them. In these last days those sent to
Jerusalem to minister to the Jews will no doubt be Jewish, others of the first-fruits
could be sent, two by two, to their own native lands. They will expound to
the people the word of God, showing them in the Old Testament and in the New
Testament the things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. When they have
finished their testimony they are overcome by the beast from the bottomless
pit, that is, the physical bodies of the saints are overcome by the beast not
their spirits, the saints overcome the beast as far as the spiritual side goes.
I
believe that there is a possibility that when the two witnesses
ascend to heaven on clouds they are followed soon after by the rapture
of the
saints. Not only is there a loud voice telling the two
witnesses to come up into the clouds but at the same time there is also
a shout
when the Lord returns for His saints, and the dead in Christ rise first
(this
shout could be the same "loud voice" to the two witnesses). Not
only do the two witnesses rise up but I believe it is shortly after
this,
that all of
the dead in Christ rise up to meet the Lord in the clouds. This
is followed, not long after, by all the Christians who are alive and
remain who will also be caught up
together
with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. In Revelation chapter 12 we read of the overcomers and how they overcome
the devil, verse 11 says, “And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and
by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the
death.” Even in their death they
overcame. The beast was not allowed to
overcome and kill the two witnesses until they had finished their testimony
(see Revelation 11:7). In Revelation chapter 14 there are 144000 first-fruits who are redeemed
from the earth, from among men (see verse 3-4), these are the two wave loaves,
the first-fruit of the wheat harvest (not to be confused with the 144000 Jews
in Revelation chapter 7). In Romans 8:23
we read, “Not only that, but we also who have the first-fruits of the Spirit,
even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the
redemption of our body.” Is this the
adoption (the revelation of the son's of God) that Paul says we are eagerly waiting for, the redemption of our body? After the two witnesses have
risen to the clouds we read in Revelation 14:14-16 that the harvest of the
earth is ripe and ready for reaping, that is, the Christians who are alive on
the earth have now matured therefore they too are caught up to meet the Lord in
the air with those who have died and gone first. Here we have the main harvest
of wheat as in Matthew 13:24-43 and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18. In 1Thessalonians 4:16 there is the voice of
the archangel while in Revelation 14:15 it is the loud voice of the angel
encouraging the Lord to reap the harvest. The harvest is reaped and all the
saints are now safe with the Lord. After this there is the harvest of the vine, the “ingathering” of the
fruit harvest where the grapes are gathered and thrown into the winepress. Revelation 14:17-20 says, “Then another angel
came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. And
another angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire, and he cried
with a loud cry to him who had the sharp sickle, saying, “Thrust in your sharp
sickle and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, for her grapes are
fully ripe.” So the angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the
vine of the earth, and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.
And the winepress was trampled outside the city, and blood came out of the
winepress, up to the horses bridles, for one thousand six hundred furlongs.” Finally the harvests of the Lord are complete and are a perfect
illustration of God’s dealings with man. Updated June 2020 Next: Seven Churches, Seven Seals, Seven Trumpets
Unless otherwise stated scripture quoted is from the New King
James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. The article above is the possible
development of events as I see them at the moment. The reader is advised to keep an open mind
and to “watch” as world events bring us nearer to the coming of the Lord. |