What is the rapture? Michael F. Bird explains.

The Rapture is a belief that Jesus Christ will return initially for the church. He will come—but not quite to earth. Here’s how: Jesus will come, and then the church will be taken up to meet him. This view of the rapture is prominent in a system of theology called premillennial dispensationalism. But here’s the problem: you end up with two second comings. You get Jesus coming the first time for the church to rapture them away. Then after a period of tribulation he comes again for the second time. This is the second part of the second coming, second coming 2.B where he comes with the church largely in judgment to rescue those who also became believers during a great period of great tribulation. However, this isn’t what the Bible says about the rapture. The New Testament doesn’t split up the second coming of Jesus along those lines. Instead, the second coming of Jesus is more singular, more unitary, more comprehensive, more definitive. There is a period of tribulation or trial that comes upon the world. There's apostasy, and there's persecution, the sort of thing spoken about in 1 Thessalonians. Then at the end of that, after a period of tribulation, Christ returns. It's not that the church is raptured to go meet him, but rather he returns definitively. As Paul says, he then hands over the kingdom to the Father. This is the moment where Jesus will be by might what he is by right, Lord of all. LEARN MORE IN MICHAEL F. BIRD'S VIDEO COURSE: https://masterlectures.zondervanacademic.com/evangelical-theology-michael-f-bird?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=evangelicaltheology_cm&utm_content=text_link