The Rapture Explained

A question asked on Quora:

"If the Rapture really happened, wouldn't everyone left behind immediately recognise it as being exactly like what happened in popular books and movies like Left Behind?"

EBF response:

No. There are two terms that need to be defined: first, the resurrection. And secondly, the rapture.

In both cases (resurrection & rapture) the elect people of God (which are but a few out of the whole of mankind) enter into heaven. Both occur on the literal last day of earth’s existence. The difference between the two is that the elect who physically died will experience the resurrection (have their bodies transformed into new spiritual bodies and go up to heaven) while the elect still physically alive on that last day will experience the rapture (also have their bodies transformed into new spiritual bodies) and both go up into heaven – leaving all the unsaved masses of people behind for immediate fiery destruction in which they will burn up out of existence along with the world and entire universe and be no more (be annihilated). That will be the end of man’s natural life in this creation.

The elect who were transformed and taken up into heaven will then be given a new earth and a new heaven to dwell in forevermore.

Jesus spoke of this in:

John 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

And the sequence of events (resurrection first/rapture second) can be seen in these verses:

1 Thessalonians 4:15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.

16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words.

To summarize: the word “resurrection” concerns the physically dead. While “rapture” refers to those physically alive. That’s the only difference between them as both accomplish the same thing (transformation of the elect people of God into new spiritual bodies).