Just Gone -- 4 Rapture Scenarios

"Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. "Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left. “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him." [Matthew 24:40-44]

The Husband
Kelly knew she didn't have much time left. She quickly threw clothes in a plastic shopping bag before placing it on the dining room table next to another bag, as quickly as she could. Quickly she ran to the kitchen, grabbed another bag out of the bag caddy on the wall and ran to the bathroom to pack her prescriptions...she heard Ed's keys jumble at the lock. She screamed, silently, and ran for the back door, through the kitchen. She turned, spied the bag of clothes on the dining room table...it was either risk being hit again and again for that bag of clothes, or jump in her car that sat, waiting with keys and purse in it, at the end of the cul-de-sac. "What are you doing!?" Ed screamed, the smell of cheap whiskey fresh on his breath. Immediately she started to cry. Kelly pleaded, tears coursing down her black and bruised eyes. "Ed, I can't do this anymore...you hit me..." Ed flung himself at her, screaming, rearing his fist back. She fell to the floor in a ball, screaming, "Jesus, help --" Ed's fist sliced through the air, aimed right at Kelly's left eye -- he never ever missed -- but this time, his fist slammed into the wall. He reared back, stunned...Kelly was gone. Just gone.

The Prisoner
Dan reached in the sink, grabbed another potato, and started peeling it. Tattoos covered his arms, neck and legs -- tattoos revealing gang affiliations and the like. He peeled one potato, grabbed another, got in a rhythm. Peeling potatoes went faster when there was a rhythm to it. He chuckled -- why make it go faster, I have my whole life to peel potatoes. Dan was in prison for murdering a man, in a drug deal, 23-1/4 years prior. He was in the 21-3/4 year of a life sentence. And here he was, wanting to make peeling potatoes go faster. Still, it did go at least easier when there was a rhythm, so he started singing a song that he had learned a couple of years ago in chapel, when the prison preacher came to do a service. In his deep baritone voice, Dan sang, "When the roll...is called up yonder..." A guard walked in the kitchen about that time, to check on him and the other prisoners on kitchen detail. Deputy Harris listened for a bit then laughed. "You think you're actually going to be going to heaven with what you did?" Dan stopped singing. "Well, I did do something awful, and I know that. And I know the Good Lord saw it too, but I also know 'cause I asked, He forgave me. So...yes. Come death or rapture, I know where I will be." Deputy Harris laughed again, picked up a potato out of the sack and examined it. This struck Dan as odd but he didn't say anything. Deputy Harris laughed again, still with his eyes focused on that potato. "Well, I know I'm gonna be in heaven....I'm a good person. I don't cheat on my wife that much or cheat on my taxes and I certainly never shot a man in a crack deal." He tossed the potato to Dan, just in time to see Dan standing there, holding the peeler...then the peeler fell to the floor from midair and the potato fell with it. Dan had simply vanished. Just gone.

The Preacher
The pastor was in the middle of a sermon on the Beatitudes. He liked preaching the Beatitudes, made people feel good and was a good way to get a good tinkle going in the brass-colored offertory plates. Life was just good, he thought to himself in his black robe and collar, reading from the sermon he had written between a hospital chat to a dying woman named Something-or-other, he couldn't really remember and the golf game he had been practicing for, with members of the church council. He smiled and inflected his tone and did everything by the book from his seminary preaching class. No wonder he made As in that class, he thought. He looked over his congregation and smiled inwardly. I've done some good work here, he thought, with not a small amount of pride. Membership was down but dollars in the plate were up; Vacation Bible School was just around the corner and most of the volunteer slots had been filled for that. He was just about to hit the proverbial preaching ball out of the ballpark with "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God" when, right in front of his very eyes, people just up and disappeared. The rest of the congregation screamed and jumped up, some ran outside...all over town, all over the state, the country...the world...people everywhere were screaming and running outside and calling for loved ones, for co-workers, for children that were just gone.

The Government
The government soon met, quickly, even though Congress had far less people in it before. The senators and representatives that were...missing...could not be reached via telephone, or email, or pager....The media outlets were short people, too, as they tried to make sense of this. Millions of people across the world were just gone. The United Nations called for an emergency summit, elected a committee to do a fact-finding mission to find out where all the people went. The international organization declared that they would prosecute the person or persons responsible for such a global act of terrorism and kidnapping. Right in the middle of that meeting, a dashing, well-spoken and charismatic leader stepped forward. He talked them all down from their frenzied state and reasoned that first and foremost, the small nation of Israel must be secured....This man, the nations declared, would be their savior, to lead them in the absence of leaders, politicians and people who were just gone.

These are just four hypothetical fictional accounts of what the Rapture could be like. For those who have never accepted Christ as Savior, who have denounced God, who follow wicked religions and think they can get buy their way into heaven by "being a good person," woe unto you....you will be left to face horrors unlike you've ever seen on this planet, while Followers of Christ all over the world, dead and alive, will be just gone...to be with Christ Jesus and to worship Him forever and ever. At the end, though -- even Hitler, Hussein, Herod and millions upon millions of people will bow before Him. Every knee will bow. The fact remains: 'tis so much better, with a life worth living for the Lord, if you bow your knees of your own accord.

There is no doubt that Jesus is coming soon. World events and events happening in the United States alone make some Christians shudder and wonder how could America go so far from what the Founding Fathers conceived? But take heart, Followers of Christ. Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” [John 16:33]. We don't need to be scared...we need to keep our eyes upon Jesus, who will soon be coming for us. Soon we will look face-to-Face with the Risen, Ascended, Rapturing Jesus. AMEN!

"For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words." [1 Thessalonians 4:16-18]

Amen. Even so, come Lord Jesus.

Terrie

(c) 2013 Terrie McKee