Noah, Lot, and the Rapture (Part 2)

Welcome back to All About the Rapture. Today, we will continue our study of Noah and Lot. In Part 1, we discussed how the Old Testament stories of Noah and Lot teach us important lessons that pertain to the rapture. They show us that when the time comes for God to destroy evil, He will not destroy the righteous along with the wicked, but rather, He will remove His people from harms’ way before the destruction begins. More specifically, they show that instead of removing His people far in advance of the destruction, He removes them immediately before the destruction begins.

But that’s not all that these stories have to show us. They also give us insight into another important detail of the rapture: its visibility. In an earlier post (The Rapture: We Don’t Disappear), we discussed how the New Testament never says, suggests, or implies that Christians will disappear at the rapture, but that, in fact, the New Testament shows that the rapture will be a visible event. Well, that’s a truth that’s also shown in the Old Testament. And as we continue to examine the stories of Noah and Lot today, we will see that before God destroyed evil, He removed His people in undeniably obvious and visible ways.

As we begin, here is a summary of the stories of Noah and Lot (FYI: This is the same summary as is in Noah, Lot, and the Rapture Part 1):

The story of Noah is found in Genesis 6 – 9. The Bible tells us that in those days, the world had become exceedingly wicked. Chapter 6, verse 11 says that the earth was “filled with violence” (NKJV), that the only intent of every heart was evil all the time. The world had become so evil that God had to destroy it. God decided that He would send a great flood upon the earth that would destroy all life.

And yet, despite all the evil, there was one man who remained true to God. That man was Noah. And even though God was determined to destroy the evil world, He would not destroy the righteous along with the wicked, therefore He would spare Noah and his family from the destruction. So, before God sent the flood, He spoke to Noah. He told him that He would soon destroy the world with a flood, and gave him instructions to build an ark so that he and his family could stay inside the ark and be safe. He also instructed him to take two of every living creature into the ark so that after the flood was over, they could replenish the earth.

Noah was obedient and built the ark. Once built, God told Noah to take his family and the animals and get inside. Once inside, Verse 6 says that God sealed them in. Then, that same day, the flood began. Rain came down from the sky, the crevasses in the deep were opened, and water rushed over the earth from every direction. After forty days and nights of rain, the world was completely submerged and all life on earth was completely destroyed. All life, that is, except Noah, his family, and the animals that God had preserved in the ark.

Now we will look at Lot. The story of Lot is found in Genesis 18 and 19 and is very similar to that of Noah. In Genesis 18, we find that the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah had become incredibly wicked. In verse 20, the Lord says, ” ‘The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave. I will go down now, and see whether they have done entirely according to its outcry, which has come to Me; and if not, I will know.’ “ (NASB1995) The cities and their surrounding areas had, in fact, become overtaken with evil. They were so evil that God had to destroy them.

But He wouldn’t destroy them until Lot had been removed. Lot was the one righteous person in the entire land of Sodom and Gomorrah, and God would not destroy him along with the wicked. So, the evening before God destroyed the cities, He sent two angels to remove Lot and his family. When the angels arrived at Lot’s home, the men of the city surrounded the home and demanded that he send the two men (the angels) out to them. When Lot refused, the men of the city started banging on the door in an attempt to break in. The angels then opened the front door and struck the men with blindness so that their attempt wouldn’t succeed. The angels then told Lot that God was planning to destroy the cities, so he must leave. They told him to take his wife, his daughters, and any other relatives he had in the town and get out immediately because they were in danger. Lot rushed out to gather his sons-in-law and his married daughters, telling them about the impending destruction and that they had to leave, but they didn’t believe him. Disheartened, Lot returned home alone. But he didn’t leave the city.

Then, as the dawn broke, the angels insisted that he leave. But he hesitated. So, the angels grabbed him by the hand, along with his wife and the two unmarried daughters who resided at the home, and had to practically drag them out of the city. The angels then told them to keep moving, to flee to the mountains and not look back. Lot, however, was somewhat disobedient: instead of complying, he panicked and told the angels that he was afraid of going to the mountains, that he thinks he’ll die there. He begged them for permission to flee, instead, to a little town nearby. The angels relented and gave him permission to go to the town. Once they arrived at the little town of Zoar, God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah by raining down fire and brimstone from heaven. While at Zoar, Lot and his daughters obeyed the angels and didn’t look back, but Lot’s wife disobeyed: she looked back at the destruction of the cities and was turned into a pillar of salt. Meanwhile, by the time the sun had risen overhead, Sodom, Gomorrah, and the surrounding areas were completely destroyed, but Lot and his two daughters were safe.

And there you have the summaries of the stories of Noah and Lot. As we look at these stories, we see that God removed His people from impending destruction in very obvious, visible ways. With Noah, God removed him by way of a giant ark (you can’t get more obvious and visible than a giant boat). With Lot, he removed him by having angels lead him out of the city in daylight. In both situations, it was done right in front of the wicked. It wasn’t hidden. It wasn’t a secret. Instead, it happened right in front of the inhabitants of the land and the inhabitants saw it happen. They saw Noah, Lot, and their families leave. And when the destruction began, those left behind knew that Noah, Lot, and their families had escaped the destruction and were safe.

Let’s take a closer look at that, because that is very different that what most Christians have been taught. Most Christians have been told that, one day, Christians everywhere will just disappear. We will just vanish and no one will know what happened to us. No one will know where we went. Those left behind on earth will be scared and confused and will have no idea what’s going on. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. That is not what the rapture is going to be like. The stories of Noah and Lot exist to teach us about the rapture, so it’s important that we listen to them and let them teach us. Noah escaped the destruction of the world in a giant ark, an ark that he undoubtedly spent months and months building right in front of his neighbors. There was noise, and mess, and inconvenience, not to mention the sheer spectacle of watching Noah gather up two of every kind of animal and herd them into the ark. And when the time came for the rain to fall and the destruction to begin, everyone knew where Noah was: in the ark. They most certainly saw him and his family enter into the ark and close the door. And when the waters fell and as the ark was lifted up on top of the waters in safety, those who remained below saw it. They knew what had happened: Noah and his family had gone into the ark and had been lifted up to safety, and they were stuck helplessly watching from below.

In the same way, Lot and his family were removed from their city in a very obvious and visible way. When you look at the timeline, you see that the angels arrived at Lot’s home in the evening. And, with time, evening progressed into night. But that’s not when Lot left. And, at some point during the night, when the townsmen tried to break into Lot’s home, the angels blinded the townsmen. But that’s not when Lot left. The angels didn’t remove Lot until morning when the sun came up. They could have removed him in the middle of the night, under the cloak of darkness, or when the townsmen were blinded, but they didn’t. They waited until the sun was coming up. The Bible says in Genesis 19:15 and 16 that it was only when the dawn broke that the angels insisted that they leave, and they grabbed them by the hands and took them out of the city. The point being that there was light, and anyone watching would have seen them go. Anyone looking out their front door or window in their direction would have seen them go. Anyone out and about getting a start on the day would have seen them leaving. Lot and his family were taken out of the city in a very obvious, visible way.

And that’s how our removal at the rapture will be: obvious and visible. The stories of Noah and Lot serve to show us that when God removes His people from destruction, He does it in a very visible way. It’s not a secret as the pre-Tribulationists believe. It’s not a stealth operation done in the dark of night. It’s visible. When the time comes for Jesus to return for His church, it will be done in a very visible way. As Jesus descends in the clouds and lets out a shout calling His people to His side, everyone across the entire world will see Him and hear Him. And as we Christians are physically and spiritually transformed and rise up to meet Him in the air, the world will see it happen. They will see our transformation and they will watch us leave. Just as their neighbors saw Noah and his family enter into the ark, so will the world see us rise to met Jesus in the air. Just as Lot’s neighbor’s saw Lot and his family leave the city, so will the world see us leave the world to join Jesus.

The rapture is a visible event. It is an obvious, visible event. It will be fully in line with how God operates: not in the dark, not in the shadows, not a secret, but out in the open. It is a grand event that will be held high for all the world to see. It’s the moment when we are finally, truly redeemed. It’s the moment when so many of the promises God made to us will finally be fulfilled. It is the moment when we are finally reunited with God. And it will be visible.

It’s like in Luke 19, when Jesus entered into Jerusalem for the last time before His crucifixion, and His followers gathered along the way and cried out and praised Him, saying, “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!”, and the Pharisees disapprovingly told Jesus to rebuke them. But Jesus didn’t rebuke them. Instead, He replied that if they were silenced, then the very rocks would cry out. The return of Jesus for His church, our complete redemption, our transformation into the very likeness of God, the moment when we receive our inheritance as the heirs of God Almighty (co-heirs alongside Jesus), is such a magnificent event that it is not possible for it not to be seen. Romans 8:19 says that “the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.” If we Christians were revealed to be the sons of God and it were somehow hidden from the world, then all of creation would cry out in recognition of the event. Jesus’ return for His church and our accompanying redemption is such an extraordinary event that it’s not possible for it to be anything but visible.

That’s all for today. I hope you are becoming more confident in your understanding of what the rapture really is and that the Bible does, in fact, show that it will happen at the end of the Tribulation Period. Thank you for reading! See you next time.

Julie

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