The Ancient Wedding That Explains the End Times

A wedding imagery is often used to describe the relationship of Jesus and the church. Jesus and the apostles are saying things that were very familiar to them that are not familiar to us in the 21st century in Western culture. And that is they were speaking about a wedding, the ancient Jewish wedding. We're going to talk about the ancient Jewish wedding. In other words, the weddings that took place during the days of Jesus. Yeah, because it's totally different.

Yeah, most accurate representation, not just what we've experienced here.

This is why Jesus says No one knows the day or the hour. I believe the Trinity had a discussion at the beginning of the creation before the foundations of the world, when he was the lamb slain from the foundations of the world. And they agreed. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the John Bevere Podcast. I'm joined by my son, Arden. Arden, it's great to see you.

Good to see you, too.

Arden, we might finish 2 Peter on this podcast. It's been a year.

Yes, we're going to try.

We're going to try.

Very exciting.

Okay. We're going to— we're going to kind of review. Okay, just a quick review. 2 Peter chapter 1, it's all about the fact that God has placed his divine nature in us. Mm-hmm.

Maturing as Christians.

We are told that this nature is brought out by his exceeding great and precious promises, which we are to use our faith to employ them so that we can live godly and holy lives, walking in love, walking in the holy fear of God. Because in chapter 2, he says false teachers are going to come along What's the false teachers going to do? Don't worry about living godly. Forget it. It's okay. You got grace. Yeah, you're good. Okay. They're going to lure people into the bondage of sin. Then he comes into chapter 3, why we wanted to live godly. And he talks about the second coming of Jesus, the imminent return of Jesus Christ. And I want to go to verse 14 of 2 Peter. And he says, and so, dear friends, this is almost like the wrap up. While you are waiting for these things to happen. What things? The day of the Lord, the second coming of Jesus.

What we talked about last time.

Make every effort to be found living peaceable lives that are pure. Listen to the word pure and blameless, not in your friend's sight, but in his sight. We have the ability to do that because we've been given the exceeding great and precious promises They bring out the divine nature that he has deposited in us. He put the nature of Jesus Christ on the inside of us. That's why we're to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. Why is this? Because of the coming of Jesus is imminent. Eminent means it can happen at any time. It doesn't need anything as a prerequisite. All right. Eminent is important that we remember the word eminent means nothing needs to happen for it to happen. Yeah. Okay. 1 Thessalonians 4:15-18. Paul says, for this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, that means robust spiritually, and remain, that is a remnant, until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who have died in Christ before us. For the Lord himself, I love that himself, will descend from heaven with a shout. Now remember the word shout with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up. Big word, caught up. Greek word harpazo. Together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord. So we're meeting him in the air. Yeah. Okay. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words or comfort one another with these words, the Greek word harpazo, to grab or seize by force with the purpose of removing and/or controlling, to seize, to snatch away, to take away. There are 14 occurrences in the New Testament we reviewed on the last podcast. Now, why is all of this so important? This is where we're going here with this one. Because Jesus and the apostles are saying things that were very familiar to them that are not familiar to us in the 21st century in Western culture, and that is they were speaking about a wedding.

Yeah.

All right, the ancient Jewish wedding. A wedding imagery is often used to describe the relationship of Jesus and the church. If you look at 2 Corinthians 11, Paul says to the Corinthian church, for I am jealous for you with the jealousy of God himself. I promised you as a pure bride to one husband, Christ. But I fear that somehow your pure and undivided devotion to Christ will be corrupted. By what? False teachers. All right. Ephesians 5: For husbands, this means love your wives just as Christ loved the church. He gave up his life for her. He's referring to the church as her here, as a bride. Many times we're referred to as the body of Christ, which is a he. So we can see that It's both in Scripture to make her holy. There's the word holy again and clean. There's the word pure again, washed by the cleansing of God's word. There's the God's word, which what brings out the divine nature. He did this to present her to himself as a glorious church, glorious bride without spot or wrinkle or any blemish. Instead, she would be holy and without fault. As Scripture says, a man leaves his father and mother, is joined to his wife. The two are united as one. This is actually a great mystery, Paul said, but it says in Ephesians 5:32, but it is an illustration Illustration of the way Christ the groom and the church, the bride, are one. Now, why is this so important? Because of the words of Jesus before he left this earth. Jesus says in John 14, and I have been looking, I've been waiting 2 podcasts to get to these words. Harden, there you go.

Are you ready?

So Jesus is looking at his disciples, the Last Supper, and he says, don't let your hearts be troubled. Okay, what did Paul say? Therefore, comfort one another with these words. Remember, we read that in Thessalonians. Encourage one another. Don't let your hearts be troubled because my Father is going to pour out his wrath and beat the heck out of you. Yeah, that's how ridiculous that sounds. Okay. Don't let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God. Trust also in me. There is more than enough room in my Father's home. Now, that is a key statement. There is more than enough room in my Father's home My Father's home. My Father's home. Remember that. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?

This is huge.

Okay. When everything is ready. In other words, the place I'm preparing for you. Yeah. I will come and get you so that you will always be with me where I am. All right. The second coming is much more than an event. Yeah, it is two lovers being reunited. This is what I love about it. It's a marriage.

Yeah.

Okay, so let's take a look at this. We're going to talk about the ancient Jewish wedding. In other words, the weddings that took place during the days of Jesus. Totally different.

Yeah, most accurate representation, not just what we've experienced here.

Yes, totally different than our weddings. Yeah. All right, so let's go through how does a Jewish wedding begin. It begins with the betrothal, which in the Hebrew is called the ketubah. All right. Now, this ketubah is initiated by the bridegroom. All right. So usually what happened, either the bridegroom alone or the bridegroom and his father would go to the bride, many times her household, and they would say, I want to marry your daughter. And they would negotiate a bride price. Now you see this all through scripture. Jacob had to work 7 years. Yeah, for Leah. And it was 7 years for Rachel. Okay. If you look at David, Saul— David said, how can I marry the king's daughter? I'm a poor boy, the son of Jesse. He's a king. And Saul said, I'm going to get him killed. I want 100 Philistine foreskins. That's all I'm asking for, for my bride price. Okay. There's another incident. Arden, as we're getting ready to go into this scripture, let me say this. So many people ask us, how does John and Arden go so deep in their study? It's easy. We have this program called Logos. I have been using it for years. I use it to write books. Arden, I use it for my podcast. I have my notes on one page of the computer and the Logos is right next to it. I can go into the root word studies. I can go back to the original. I can see what was happening in the time period. It's absolutely amazing. It's a game changer.

And not only that, but Logos is offering everyone who signs up right now for this limited time offer 60 days free.

Okay, that's amazing.

So it is completely free for you. So please, please do not miss this chance. Go to Logos, so logos.com/bavere, and you can sign up right there. Not only that though, there is a video that's a Zoom call that we did that shows you how to better use it. Because if you have a tool and you don't know how to use it, you probably won't use it. And we want people using this every single day because it will help them go deeper in their studying of the word.

So everybody just click the link below and we can jump right back into our study. Why, if you look at Abraham's servant brings 10 camels filled with gifts for the bride and her family. So this was a custom. The bridegroom would come to the bride's family. He would sometimes present gifts to the bride's family, but the big gift was, I'm gonna buy her. I'm going to actually give a price. Now, why is this? Because back in those days, everybody in the family had responsibilities. Alright, we didn't have dishwashers back in those days. We didn't have washing machines. We had fields to tend to. Everybody worked in the family. So when a bridegroom comes to get a bride, he's going to take her from her family. So the bride price made up for her not being there to do those chores anymore. Alright, now bride price could be gold. It could be treasures. It could be animals. Okay, it could be anything, whatever the families agreed to. Now, once they agreed to the bride price, listen to this, they would drink a glass of wine together. Remember Jesus at the Last Supper? I've been really looking forward to having this meal with you. And then he pours a glass of wine. He says, this is the cup. And he said, I won't drink this again until I have it with you. Okay. So the bridegroom would have a glass of wine with the bride. Once they finished it, they would not drink a glass together again, nor would they see each other again, because the bridegroom would then leave and go back to his father's house. And you know what he did? He built a room off his father's house that he and his bride would live in. Now, that's the way it usually happened until they got enough wealth established where they could build a separate structure. It was usually a room right off the father's house.

Okay.

Now, That would usually take a year, but it was an indefinite time. It was not known when he was going to come back. So the father was the only one that would know when that groom was going to come back for the bride, because the father wouldn't give the groom permission until he said, I approve of this dwelling that you have built for your new bride. Now, this is really interesting. While they're separated, they are actually married.

Yeah, because it comes kind of the betrothal. That's right.

This is not an engagement. Okay, so in the Western culture, we're engaged, you can break the engagement, no problem. Yeah, you actually had to go through a divorce. This is why if we think about Joseph, Joseph, when he is betrothed to Mary, finds out she's pregnant. Okay, she is— she has committed adultery on me. Yeah, because they're married. And he was going to privately put her away. And the angel had to appear to Joseph and said, no, no, no, no, no. The child in her is conceived of the Holy Spirit. Okay, so they're married, but they're separated for a year. Yeah. Why was this? This was a chance for the bride to prove her faithfulness to the groom and the groom, his faithfulness to the bride. And a baby usually comes in about 9 months. Oh, so that's why it was usually a year, although it was an indefinite time period. Yeah. It would be maybe a couple of weeks short of a year, a couple of weeks after a year. They knew about the time. Yeah, but it could be at any time. It could be 3 months later. So the bride, her job, the groom's job is to go back and make the room.

Yeah.

The bride's job is to prepare herself. She has to make a wedding dress. She has to get everything packed. She has to choose her bridesmaids. Now we see a parable of the bridesmaids in Matthew 25. The groom would pick his groomsmen. So they did have bridesmaids and groomsmen. So her job is getting her wedding dress ready. Now you look at Revelation 19, it says the bride has made herself, has made herself ready. To her it was given fine linen, which that fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. What are we doing now by living godly, holy lives? Wow. We are preparing ourselves for the return of our bridegroom. We're staying faithful to him. We're not committing adultery with him. We're not sleeping with the world. This is why these false teachers are luring people into a relationship with the world.

Yeah.

See what I'm saying?

Yeah. No, that's good.

Okay, so now they're separated from each other and neither one knows. Neither one knows when he's coming back. Only the father of the groom knows. This is why Jesus says no one knows the day or the hour, not the angels in heaven, No human being, and not even the Son of Man, referring to himself. I personally believe, Arden, even Jesus doesn't know the exact time of his return. I believe the Trinity had a discussion at the beginning of the creation, before the foundations of the world, when he was the lamb slain from the foundations of the world. And they agreed that only the Father would know when the Son would return.

Yeah.

Isn't that amazing?

That's amazing. Yeah. That's so good.

Okay, so now The time has come. The father says to the groom, okay, I approve of the dwelling. Go get your bride.

Right.

So you know what they do? They don't come during the day. They come at night. And there's a reason. Okay. We go out at night. Why? We have lights. Yeah, we have city lights. We have lights in buildings so we can go out at night. Back in those days, everything was done during the day. That's why you see so much Night comes when no man can work. Families were all hunkered down together in their homes at night. Now, many times it was midnight. They wanted to wait until the bride was probably in bed. Everybody's in bed. And you know how the groom would come? He would grab his groomsmen, which was a big— it wasn't, it wasn't like two groomsmen. It was a group of guys. Okay. Yeah. And you know what they would do? They would come into the bride's neighborhood or community shouting and blowing shofar horns. They wake up the whole community.

Yeah.

When she hears the shouting, she hears them. She knows immediately. She gets her dress, she gets her bags, she gets her dress on, she puts a veil on so he can't see her face. Her bridesmaids go out and join the groomsmen and the groom. And this big group comes and they snatch her away.

Hmm. There's that word.

You know how it happened many times? If she was on the second floor of a structure, he'd put a ladder up and just snatch her away.

Really?

He wouldn't wait for her father to come out and say, oh, great, glad you're here. No, he snatched her away.

Oh, okay.

Interesting. And the whole— now the community would join.

Yeah.

So there would be other families joining. And they would all go back to the father of the groom's house where the room was that the groom had prepared. And this is so cool. They would put a hoopah over that chamber that he had prepared. Now, the hoopah refers to the canopy that covers the bride chamber, and it's underneath that hoopah that that bride and groom are reunited. Now, her veil's on her the whole time.

Yeah.

Okay. So she and her groom go into that chuppah, and that's when he finally takes that veil off. Okay. Now, nobody else has seen her face. The bridal party is outside of the chuppah. This is really kind of crazy. Sometimes it was just the best man. Okay. But either the entire bridal party or just the best man is outside the chuppah. Until the bride and groom consummate the marriage. Hmm. And then the bridegroom takes the sheet that had blood on it that proved her virginity to the best man or the wedding party. They would go back to the wedding attendants. This is all the people from her neighborhood and the groom's neighborhood that have come. They'd show the sheet and then they had a big party for 7 days. Now listen to this. The bride and groom stay in the chuppah for 7 days. While there's a party going on.

Is that what we talked about last? 7 years.

Isn't this interesting?

Yes.

After the 7 days, the groom brings out his bride unveiled and presents her to all the guests of the wedding feast. All right. She's been hidden away for 7 days.

Yeah.

What a party.

7 days.

Can you imagine being alone with your wife for 7 days? Yeah. And that's even better.

Yeah, that's even better. And then you go to the other side. It's just everyone's enjoying having fun for 7 days.

I know. Yeah, I know. So listen to Revelation 19:7. Let us be glad and let us rejoice and let us give honor to him, for the time has come for the wedding feast of the Lamb, and his bride has prepared herself. She has been given the finest pure white linen to wear, for the fine linen represents the righteous acts or the good deeds of God's holy people. Now, remember, we talked about this a few podcasts ago. I said, Arden, I don't even know if the Western church has got enough material to make a bikini, let alone a bride's dress. All right. So there is something. Our works don't save us, but our works do prepare us.

Yeah. Yeah, that's good. I think people need to hear that. Our works don't save us, but our works do prepare us. Yes, I think that's really important. And that puts an emphasis on our works, not in a legalistic way, but in a preparation of we live in a way that is purposeful and live a way that's searching and waiting on the day of the Lord.

Okay, now you ready for this?

Yeah.

I'm going to read to you Isaiah 26:20-21 and 27:1. Come, my people, enter your chambers, huppa, and shut the doors behind you. Hide yourself, as it were, for a little moment until the indignation is past. For behold, the Lord comes out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. The earth will also disclose her blood and will no more cover her slain. In that day, the Lord with his severe sword, great and strong, will punish Leviathan, the fleeing serpent. That's a term for Satan.

Now, Leviathan's used within the book of Job 2?

Yes.

Is it the same reference?

Yes.

Satan?

Yes, absolutely. Okay, now I'm going to read a few more scriptures and you'll have more understanding. Revelation 3:10, Jesus says to one of the churches, because you have obeyed my command to preserve, I will protect you from the great time of testing that will come upon the whole earth. Okay, now I'm going to take this all back and we're going to look at 1 Corinthians 15, and then we're going to look 2 Thessalonians, because we haven't even touched those yet. Paul writes to the Corinthian church, but let me reveal to you a wonderful secret. The King James says a mystery. There are about 9 mysteries in the New Testament. What is a mystery? It's not mysterious. It's just a truth that hasn't been revealed to the Old Testament saints. Yeah, these truths were either uncovered by Jesus or uncovered by the Apostle Paul, the Holy Spirit using the Apostle Paul to uncover them. So this is something the Old Testament saints didn't know, which means this is something that the people— when Jesus is talking about the second coming in Matthew 24, in Mark 13, in Luke 21, they didn't know it either.

Yeah.

But I reveal to you a mystery. We will not all die. Okay, stop right there. We, the saints, will not all die, but we will all be transformed. Now, let me say this really quick. There's 3 transformations that take place when we're born again. The first one happens instantaneously. That's when our spirits go from being dead to alive. It's absolutely amazing. We become a brand new creation in Christ, even though we still have the same mind, the same memories. We are a brand new person.

Yeah.

Then at that very moment begins the transformation of the soul. Now, this is a process. The Bible says receive with meekness the implanted word which is able to save your souls. James is writing to Christians. Paul said that we're transformed by the renewing of our mind. Peter said these exceeding great and precious promises are given that what we might be partakers of the divine nature. Paul said we work out our salvation with fear and trembling. This is when what's done in here manifests out here.

Yeah.

And we can either slow that process up or we can speed it up.

Yeah.

Okay. So we— this is the only transformational process we're involved in. The final transformation is when we get a brand new bodies. Yeah. And that's what Paul's talking about here. This is when we get a body just like Jesus. Now, Jesus is the only one that has that body right now. If you were to go to heaven right now, The saints are there, but they have like these spiritual bodies. Okay. Because if you look at Hebrews, it says you've come to the city of spirits of just men made perfect. They have not—

they don't have a body.

Body. So they're just like Jesus. When Jesus went down into the heart of the earth, the 3 days and 3 nights and preached to the spirits in prison, he didn't have his resurrected body yet.

Yeah.

It wasn't until the Holy Spirit joined him to his natural body, which instantly transformed into a heavenly body.

Yeah.

Okay. Okay. So Jesus actually was like that, like the way the saints are right now. He was that way 3 days and 3 nights. So when he comes out, we got to think about it. His body can interact with other human beings on earth. Yeah. He ate breakfast with them by the seashore, right? He said to Thomas, handle me because a spirit doesn't have flesh and bone like you see I have. Mary sees him as a gardener. Yeah. The disciples of Emmaus have a meal with him and talk to him on the whole road. Don't even know who he is. But he can walk through walls.

He can transport.

What's that?

So he can transport. It's pretty much—

yeah, he can disappear and go. I believe when the— when, when, when we have the millennial reign of Christ and we're in those bodies, because this is what's about to happen. Yeah, we can be in Jerusalem leading with Jesus and all of a sudden just have the thought, I want to go to New York City right now, and we'll be in New York City just like that. Natural people won't be able to do that. And there's going to be people with natural bodies during the millennial reign of Christ. There's going to be two people. There's going to be the heavenly bodies and the natural bodies. Yeah, the natural bodies will be much like Adam and Eve. The heavenly bodies are going to be just like Jesus. We're going to see him, right? Because we're going to be just like him.

So you're saying everyone that has passed away and has gotten that heavenly body will be on earth with people who are— have not received that heavenly body. And that just be people that are not believing in the return of God and not believing in Jesus as their salvation. But can I ask a practical question?

Yes.

Obviously, that's a lot of people, and that should be a lot of people because we're talking about from the existence of time all the way till the second coming of Jesus, how does that practically make sense in terms of like people being here on Earth with all of those people? When we're even looking at it right now, we're saying, yeah, there's a lot of people on Earth and we're at 8 billion people on Earth.

Hey everybody, we'll get back to the episode in just a moment, but first I want to thank the patrons who make this podcast possible. Your support behind the scenes is critical to sharing these messages. So thank you. To become a patron, just click the link in the show description or go to johnbevere.com/patron. Now let's get back to the show. You know that the Book of Revelation, the sealed judgments, the first 4, a fourth of mankind is going to be killed. Hmm. Okay. If you look at the further judgments, the bowl judgments, you're going to have a lot more killed. Yeah, there's going to be— remember God said he's going to make human beings as scarce as gold?

Yeah.

Those people that are left, that remnant that's left in their natural bodies, will be the ones who enter the millennium in natural bodies. See, because there's still going to be people having babies in the millennium. It's not going to be us in the glorified bodies. Jesus said when we're glorified, we're going to be like the angels of heaven. We're not going to have reproduction facilities.

Yeah.

I'm talking about genitals.

There will still be people who will be making babies.

Yes. Who is— they'll be the natural people. They'll be the people that were left there on the earth. Yes. There's going to be a massive army that comes to attack. Jesus is going to devour them with the sword of his mouth. But there's still going to be people on the earth that weren't killed by the plagues. They're going to be left over. They're going to be in natural bodies.

Would they be like the people that were not a part of the army? Yes. Stay back.

Yes.

Those things that weren't killed by the plagues or the bulls.

Or, you know, of judgment, weren't killed by the sword that came out of Jesus' mouth. These are people that just survived. And when they see the king come back, they'll believe. But then they go through 1,000 years with Jesus.

Are they in their natural body for 1,000 years?

They're in their natural bodies. That's why it says a young— a man will be considered young when he's 100 years old. That's what Scripture is talking about.

Interesting.

They're going to be reproducing.

Yeah.

Okay. But you're going to have two types of people on the earth. And just as Jesus interacted with natural human beings when he was raised from the dead, we're going to be able to interact with the natural people like Jesus did.

So would our lifespan basically look as similar as the early fathers or like Abraham and Terah and all those early— or not Abraham and Terah, sorry, go back even further.

Lifespan? We're going to—

no, no, sorry.

We're going to be in our bodies, not our lifespan, but those eternal bodies.

Yeah, those people, their lifespan is going to look like what we saw there.

They're going to be able to live of 1,000 years.

Yeah. At least when they're living and having children when they're 500 years old or 600 years old or 400 years old.

Yes.

That's okay.

So then it's kind of coming back to Satan is going to be released. He's going to be locked up for 1,000 years. He's going to be released at the end. So, and, and who's he going to tempt? The people in the natural bodies.

Yeah. So the question is, is then that 1,000 years, what about the spirits that have been released on the earth. So the spirits, obviously that's coming from the Nephilim and everything that was released on the earth. Will those be locked away with Satan?

Yes, they'll be locked away. Satan. All of— there will be no demonic spirits, no forces of darkness on this earth that 1,000 years.

Sickness. Will it be sickness?

I don't believe there will be.

Okay, so for that, children will play right next to a cobra hole.

The lion and the lamb will lay down together. The lion will eat straw just like the ox. This is what the Bible says. And it's going to be that the people that refuse to come up and worship the Lord on a yearly basis, they're going to have a famine. They're going to have no rain. Yeah. So they've not been tested. So at the end of the thousand years, Satan is going to be released. It's going to be one more test of faithfulness. Yeah. Not for us, but for them.

For them.

Okay.

Which I think, you know, in a natural mind, you could look at that and be like, well, how would they even be able to succumb to any kind of testing. You've been seeing this for 1,000 years of watching what God's been doing. But I kind of actually almost look back at the people of Israel. Well, in the people of— well, Adam and Eve. Yes, that's an amazing example. But even the people of Israel is like constantly they see what God does and how he shows up in incredible ways. And that's not just through the desert or through the wilderness, but also through their kingdoms. And yet it's just amazing, like Solomon's son Rehoboam, how he just completely forgets about God's faithfulness and starts leaning to other temptations and everything that happens. You look at this and you're like, you're two generations removed from David. How is it that you are falling this away from God and your love for him? But yet that might be a good example of how people will—

How about the children of Israel seeing the sea split, a pillar of fire, and then now they're complaining three days later. Okay. It's really sad. Yeah.

But it's, it's why we can't be casual about these things. I think it's just always coming back to these casual things where it's just like, yeah, we saw God do that. That's incredible. But then you just kind of forget about the goodness of God. You forget about what God's done, and then you just start leaning to those things. Because I, in my mind, I'm like, man, if I was tempted after 1,000 years, if I was part of those people, I'm like, there's no way I would be able to be tempted. I would know what the truth is. But the sad thing is, is you will see people that will be.

How could Eve Adam and Eve walking in the cool of the garden with the presence of God, the glory of God, succumbed to the temptation, the deception of a snake.

Yeah. And it's— that's the wisdom of the enemy.

That's crazy how crafty he is. Yeah.

And I think a lot of times we don't—

but God is greater. Greater is he that's in us than he that's in the world.

I was even thinking about that last podcast as you were talking about it, is understanding when Jesus is coming back, us understanding, like you said this a little while back, but the opposite of, of God is not Satan. It is not. And there's no, there's no battle that's going to happen. Like, sure, there's that battle that's going to happen. But when Jesus comes back, it's like a boom, instantaneous victory.

Satan is not a formidable foe to God. Yeah, he is a formidable foe to us.

Yes, correct.

Because we are not past temptation. We have to stay strong, stay vigilant, stay sober-minded. Because our enemy, as a roaring lion, is seeking whom he may devour.

Yeah, that's good. Sorry, I just want to ask.

Oh no, no sorries at all. This is all good. But let me reveal to you a wonderful mystery. We will not all die, but we will be transformed. So, you know, he's talking about our physical bodies. And so just think about it. Just as Jesus in the center of the earth and the Holy Spirit by his power raises him up, his body that's dead in the grave, even so, those spirits in heaven are going to be reunited with their bodies in the air. First, then we in a split second will be caught up together and we'll all be together with the Lord. That's his bride. Okay, so it will happen in a moment. The word moment is actually the Greek word that we get the word atom from. This moment means a time that is not divisible any longer, which quantum physics tells us that's 10^-54 of a second. Okay, I— it might be 45 seconds, but I'm right in the neighborhood. Yeah. In other words, if you divide that moment anymore, you're in oblivion. Okay, that's what quantum physics says. But anyway, what he's saying is this is going to be even faster than the twinkling of an eye. This is an indivisible type of time. In the blink of an eye, when the last trumpet is blown, that is not talking about the trumpet, trumpet in the judgment. The judgments, there are 7 trumpets that are blown. This is talking about the trumpet, I believe, that is a call to his people to assemble. That is the figure that Paul is using here. For when the trumpet sounds, and it's also a type of when the groomsmen come into the community and they're blowing the shofars. Yeah. When the trumpet sounds, those who have died will be raised to live forever. Oh, wow. And we who are living will all be transformed For our dying bodies must be transformed into bodies that will never die. Our mortal bodies must be transformed into immortal bodies. Now I want to take us to 1 Thessalonians 5. Are we, are we, are we tracking? Yeah. Okay. Paul says, but concerning the times and the seasons, brothers and sisters, you have no need that I should write to you, for you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord— that's the 7-year tribulation— so comes as a thief in the night. Now keep that in mind for a second. For when they say peace and safety, then sudden destruction comes upon them as labor pains upon a pregnant woman, and they shall not escape. Now can I say this? They're not going to be saying peace and safety at the end of the tribulation. So this is another reason why I believe that the catching away of the church can't happen at the end of the 7 years. Why? The moment the Antichrist is revealed, the moment he walks into the temple and says he's God, we know it's 1,260 days— or excuse me, might be 1,290 days before Jesus returns. So they're not going to be saying peace and safety on the second half of the tribulation. Then sudden destruction comes upon them as labor pains upon a pregnant woman, and they shall not escape. That's talking about the day of wrath. The day of the Lord. But you, brethren— now listen to this— but you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness. That's why we're doing this podcast. The word of the Lord reveals these mysteries to us so that we're not in darkness, so that that day should overtake us as a thief. You are all sons of the light and sons of day. We are not of the night or darkness. Therefore, let us not sleep as others do, but let us watch and be sober. That's our instruction. That's what Peter said. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. Let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love as a helmet, the hope of salvation. Remember, he is called the blessed hope. What's the blessed hope? His second coming.

Yeah.

For God did not appoint us to wrath. There you go. But to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, comfort each other and edify one another. Twice he tells us to comfort each other with these words. Now there's a space of time between 1 Thessalonians and 2 Thessalonians.

Yeah.

Do you know what happens? The Thessalonian Christians get— many of them get scared. Yeah. They think, oh no, we missed the coming of the Lord because there were people coming in and teaching the coming of the Lord's already happened. And so Paul has to write him back again the second time.

Yeah. Which I want to encourage people to, because we're jumping from 1 Thessalonians to 2 Thessalonians and there's still 14 more verses or 16 more verses. And I've always framed this out as this is an end times checklist for you. We've talked about it before.

Right.

So I would encourage you go through it because this— if you're wondering, like, what do I need to be doing? What do I need to keep pursuing God?

Yes.

Looking at?

Yes.

Yes. Just go through these next 16 verses of the end of 1 Thessalonians 5.

That's the end of 1 Thessalonians 5, right? That checklist. And that's the last verses in chapter 5.

Yes.

Now we— through 28. Now we come to 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to him, we ask you not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as from us, as though the day of Christ had come. So they were all concerned that the day of Christ had come. They missed his coming. Paul is writing to comfort them. Okay. Let no one deceive you by any means. For that day. What day? The 7-year tribulation will not come until the falling away comes first. That's the apostasy we talked about. And the 7-year tribulation will not come until the man of sin is revealed. The son of perdition. Who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he's God. That happens right at the midpoint of the 7-year tribulation. He makes an agreement with Israel at the beginning. He says, build your temple. But at 3.5-year point, he walks in and says, I am God. That's when Israel's eyes are opened up and they realize, oh my goodness, We are following the wrong man. We crucified the Lord of glory. That's when Paul said all of Israel is going to be saved, but they're going to be greatly persecuted. All right. Do, do you not remember that when I was still with you, I told you these things? Now listen to this. And now you know what is restraining. Okay. I want to stop right there. Restraining. Something's restraining. What is restraining that he, the man of sin, will be revealed in his own time? For the mystery of lawlessness has already worked. Many, many antichrists have gone out. The spirit of antichrist has gone out. The mystery of lawlessness is at work. Only he who now restrains— so we see two times what is restraining and he who restrains— will do so until he is taken out of the way. Okay. Now, in the Greek, that word taken out of the way, you know what it means? A sudden takeaway. Sudden. It's not harpazo, but it's a sudden takeaway. It's another word, Greek word that means a sudden takeaway. So there's a restraining force that's keeping the Antichrist from being revealed. And the lawless one, once he is taken or it is taken out of the way, the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of his mouth and the brightness of his coming. All right. Now, the word restraining is the Greek word that means to delay, to hold it back, to postpone, to restrain, to suppress, or to stall. Okay. The verbs that are used with it are neuter and masculine, both in the original text. So it can be a thing or it can be a person or it can be both. Matthew 16:18. What did Jesus say? The gates of hell will not prevail against the church.

Yeah.

In other words, the church can't be prevailed against.

Yeah.

So the hell will—

oh, will not prevail.

Will not prevail.

Yeah.

So now many people say that he, or what is restraining the man of sin from being revealed, is the Holy Spirit. I, I question that.

So that's going back to what I was saying here, why I mentioned this. So when I read this, the gates of hell will not prevail against the church, you know, I've always read that as gates being defensive. So understanding is that the gates of hell are not going to be able to stop the church from prevailing, or not— well, not that it will prevail against church, but the church will not be able to be stopped, and that it will overcome the gates of hell, right?

Yes. So the gates of hell can't basically say you can't come in here. Yeah. The church has penetrated every single sector of society. That's what government, professional sports— the gates of hell hasn't been able to stop us.

So it's more on a natural standpoint and not so much of the physical, or it's not more of a natural— no, sorry, it's more on a spiritual standpoint, not so much the natural. Is that what you're thinking? Yes. Not the natural gates of hell, because obviously hell will still be a place, right?

Yeah. I think what Jesus is saying is any stronghold the enemy has.

Yeah.

The body of Christ can stop it.

Okay.

Because we're a restraint, we're restraining a restraining force.

Yeah.

And so, I mean, I can't think of anything else. I know in church history they taught other things, but I can't think of anything else that's a restraining force. I look at our nation. What would happen if every single Christian was removed from our nation? Our nation would plummet into lawlessness. I mean, it is the godly in our nation, in government, in schools, in education, in healthcare, in the military, that is actually keeping— is restraining lawlessness from going wild. So I see the church as a restrainer, and it's going to be removed suddenly. So I really believe that the Antichrist can't be revealed until Jesus comes. And this is another reason why I believe that the church is going out before the 7-year tribulation, because it's the restraining force. And I just want to end with this. Here's some of the reasons why I believe the church is going at the beginning before the 7-year tribulation. All right. We're not appointed to wrath. We've already said that. Yeah. Made that clear. Number 2, how can he come as a thief in the night when the wrath has already been poured out and the armies are gathered together against Jerusalem and against Israel? We will know, hey, it's the time. All right. The church appears the first 3 chapters of the Book of Revelation. Then you hear in chapter 4, verse 1, come up here. Yeah, I believe that was to John, but I believe that's the church. I believe that's the voice of the archangel. Yeah. If you look, the church is not mentioned again in the Book of Revelation until chapter 22. So here it is 21 times in the first 3 chapters and you don't hear because God is dealing with Israel now during the 7-year tribulation. If you look at Revelation 5:9-10, this is the very beginning. The church has been caught up in chapter 4. Listen to this. They, the 24 elders. Now, what do I— who do I believe the 24 elders are? I believe 12 represent the Old Testament, the 12 tribes of Israel. Yeah. And 12 represent the apostles. I think it's a representation of the church and the Old Testament saints. The 24 elders sang a new song saying, You are worthy to take the scroll. Now, this is happening in heaven. Okay. Before all this wrath is being poured out on the earth.

Yeah.

The 24 elders sang a new song saying, You are worthy to take the scroll to open its seals, for you were slain. You've redeemed us to God by your blood out of every tribe, tongue, and people and nation. This is before all the wrath is poured out and have made us kings and priests. There's only 3 groups of people that have made kings and priests in the Bible: Melchizedek, the church, and Jesus.

Yeah.

Okay. You have made us kings and priests to our God, and we shall reign on earth. So the 4th reason is I look at the ancient Jewish wedding And it shows us he's coming back.

Yeah.

For his bride. He's going to catch her away by surprise. It's not going to be a surprise when we've gone through all the wrath in the tribulation. And fifth, who are the people riding on the white horses with Jesus when he returns? If you look at Jude 14 and 15 now, Enoch the seventh from Adam prophesied. About these men also saying, behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his saints to execute judgment on all. If you look at Jesus in Revelation 19, and the armies of heaven clothed in fine linen and white and clean followed him on white horses, I believe that's his saints. So Arden, all that to say, I said it right from the beginning of last podcast, the more I I study, the more I realize how much I don't know. This is not meant to be exhaustive. I'm hoping what it's going to do for you is it's going to incite a great hunger to really seek God. I, I believe God made this so that it had to be— you had to seek. Yeah. To find out.

Yeah.

He just didn't write it plainly so that we could just go, oh, casually, oh, there it is.

Well, we were talking about this as we were driving over is that how the Book of Revelation start— or Book of Revelation starts with these, the, those who read it and understand it. And I'm like looking at the things that was written within the Book of Revelation, and they're not things that you would probably just understand by just reading it. You have to go deeper. And that's what even 2 Peter at the end of it is talking about, the end of chapter 3, where it says the untaught, and then it talks about the untamed, or they put them on the same level. And so understanding that we have to dive deep into this for ourselves and also great news and not just trying to plug it in here, but I just think this is a great way to be able to learn. But understand, we— if you have Logos, you are able to grab and study this on a greater level.

Yes.

And an easier level than you've ever had before. So make sure you're taking advantage of those kind of resources. But please, like, make sure it's something that's pointing you deeper into the word of God, not, not taking you to other different resources.

So we have concluded 2 Peter. Let's review it quickly again. I want to make sure everybody gets it. We've been given the character and nature of God, the exceeding precious promises. Bring it out. The false teachers come along, try to get us to live a very worldly lifestyle. Why? Because Jesus is returning and he's coming back. That are for those that are diligently looking to be what? Pure before God. They're pursuing holiness. They are living blameless lives, peaceful lives, and they are looking for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, they're urgent in their work in advancing the kingdom of God. That's why I chose— a year ago, I felt like the Holy Spirit said, talk about 2 Peter. Little did I know that it would take one solid year for us to even scratch the surface, and I mean it. We scratched the surface. There's so much more. And I want to encourage every single one of you, as Arden said, get into your Logos and search out even deeper what we've shared. We've got all these podcasts. You can go back, you can review them, but go deeper. Yeah, get the word of God so solidly in you that his return is more real to you than the Instagram you look at, than the social media you look at. It's more real than the physical world around you. We have our sights set on the things above, as Colossians 3 says, looking for the blessed hope of his return. Listen, it's an exciting day we're living in, and I believe with all my heart we're gonna see an outpouring of God's Spirit, and you are gonna be involved in it, and we're gonna see a harvest of souls come into the kingdom before he comes. Comes and takes us home.

Yeah, I feel like we need to even just take a moment and understand we just finished our first book of the Bible, which I know you said that, but just the realization of how long we've been able to go through it. And so thankful for all you guys coming on this journey with us. And Dad, I'm excited that— yeah, sure, we, we'd love to hear recommendations, but I'm excited to hear what God speaks to you next of what book of the Bible we're going to be going through and just continuing to keep diving into more and more as we just understand this on a deeper level.

It's going to be great. Arten, it's been a pleasure.