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Today's Pathway: I Corinthians 15:51-52 Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

Paul has started explaining what happens to the natural bodies of believers when the rapture occurs. He begins by saying that not every believer will die before the rapture, but every believer will be changed. He gives a few details in verse 52. First, this change happens quickly. It takes place "in a moment". The Greek word used here literally means something that is so small that it can not be divided. It is the word from which we get our English word "atom". The rapture will take place in an "atom" of time. Paul also compares this amount of time to the "twinkling of an eye". The length of time it takes for an eye to blink is roughly 1/10th of a second. So, not only could the rapture occur at any time, as we saw yesterday, it will take place so rapidly that there will be no time to prepare. That is why people need to be ready for the Lord's return right now. No unbeliever will get saved when the rapture begins to happen, for it will begin and end in less than a second. No Christian will have time to start doing the will of God, for he will be raptured in an instant. Though not speaking specifically of the rapture, the prophet Amos gave the Jews a great piece of advice in Amos 4:12,

"Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel."

Paul writes that the rapture will take place "at the last trump". This trumpet sound will take place simultaneously with the rapture. The trumpet will not be a forewarning, for we have already been sufficiently warned of the Lord's imminent return. Some have interpreted the expression "last trump" as meaning that this will be the last time that a trumpet sound is made, and so they try to determine where the last mention of a trumpet sounding is found in the Bible. Some equate the timing of the "last trump" with the sounding of the seventh trumpet in Revelation 11:15, which occurs around the middle of the Tribulation, and thus teach that the rapture will take place at that point. There are two problems with this interpretation. First, Paul has already spoken of the imminency of the Lord's return, which rules out a Mid-Tribulation rapture. Second, according to Matthew 24:31, there will be another trumpet sound at the end of the Tribulation period, so the trumpet in Revelation 11 is not the "last trump". Others, who hold to the position that the rapture occurs at the end of the Tribulation say that the "last trump" is the one that occurs in Matthew 24. Again, if that were the case, Christ's return could not be imminent. Harry Ironside had a good explanation of what the "last trump" refers to. He wrote,

"The last trumpet was a figure of speech that came from the Roman military when they broke camp. The first trumpet meant, 'strike the tents and prepare to leave'; the second trumpet meant, 'fall into line'; the third and last trumpet meant 'march away.' This last trumpet describes the Christian’s 'marching orders' at the rapture of the believers."

Don't let the expression "the last trump" lull you into thinking that you have plenty of time before the rapture occurs. It could be today, and once it sounds it will be too late to prepare.