The Great and Terrible Day of the Lord
The last two posts in this series have had to do with the subject of false teachers. Perhaps we will devote an entire series to that subject at some other time; suffice it to say here that part of the false teaching will involve those who declare that there will be no literal fulfillment to the "Great and Terrible Day of the Lord." It will involve declaring that things will only get better and better until the Lord returns. However, for those who love the truth, it is important to understand what is coming, what believers (mainly in the west - for Voice of the Martyrs http://www.vom-usa.org/ has listed at least 35 nations in the world where the Gospel of Jesus Christ is restricted and where Christians are persecuted for their faith on a regular basis) may have to face, and what believers will be delivered from.
To date, most of the postings in this series have been dedicated to proving from Scriptures that the last days are very near, if not upon us; and that the church (Christians) will enter the last seven years in history known as Daniel's 70th Week. There they will face the false peace, the unravelling of society and culture, the revealing of Antichrist, and the persecution of Antichrist and his one world government, economy and religion. But true followers of Christ, those who remain true to Him in spite of great deception and opposition, will not have to face the "Great and Terrible Day of the Lord."
About that day, the Scriptures declare, beginning in the Old Testament: "And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord" (Joel 2:30-31). Joel's language is very similar to the Lord's when He spoke of end-of-the-age events. "Immediately after the tribulation of those days [He has just described events that occur during the first 3-1/2 years-plus of this 7 year period. The Antichrist has been revealed midway, and his persecution of faithful Jews and Christians has begun] the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of Heaven with power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other" (Matthew 24:29-31). Both Joel and Jesus speak of heavenly disturbances. Jesus goes on to say that these will happen just before He returns. He then goes on to describe in some detail, what we know as the Rapture: the coming on the clouds and the trumpet call (similar to Paul's language in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18). Then in Matthew 24:36-44, He gives further details concerning the Rapture, specifically: 1) how it will come at an unknown hour, catching many by surprise; 2) how one will be taken and another left behind.
Those who are left behind - what are they left to face? Why it's "The great and Terrible Day of the Lord." In the Olivet Discourse, Jesus says very little about this. We are left with Joel and Jesus, both speaking of heavenly disturbances, followed by both the Rapture and the coming of "The Great and Terrible Day of the Lord." This is also referred to as "the great Day of His wrath" (Revelation 6:17) and "the Day of the Lord" (1 Thessalonians 5:2). Next time we will pick up with the parallels in The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which He gave to John, and hopefully see how it all fits, and then see just what it is that the believer is NOT destined for. In the meantime, so that we can again end on a note of encouragement: "But you brethren, are not in darkness, so that this Day [the Day of the Lord] should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness....For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him" (1 Thessalonians 5:4-5, 9-10).
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