Do you believe the rapture will happen during the feast of trumpets?
There are seven Jewish feasts given to us in the Bible. They are: the Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of the First Fruits, Pentecost (the Feast of Weeks), the Feast of Trumpets, the Day of Atonement and the Feast of Tabernacles. These feasts are all given in Leviticus, chapter 23. We won’t look at all these, but we will consider the Feast of Trumpets.
Let’s look at what the Feast of Trumpets is. We read in Leviticus 23:23-25, “And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation. Ye shall do no servile work therein: but ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD.” We also read in Numbers 29:1-5, “And in the seventh month, on the first day of the month, ye shall have an holy convocation; ye shall do no servile work: it is a day of blowing the trumpets unto you. And ye shall offer a burnt offering for a sweet savour unto the LORD; one young bullock, one ram, and seven lambs of the first year without blemish: And their meat offering shall be of flour mingled with oil, three tenth deals for a bullock, and two tenth deals for a ram, And one tenth deal for one lamb, throughout the seven lambs: And one kid of the goats for a sin offering, to make an atonement for you.”
This feast is known as Rosh Hashanah and commemorates the Jewish New Year in September or October. The trumpet blasts were meant to signal to Israel that they were entering a sacred season. There was to be a reckoning with the sins of the Israelites on the Day of Atonement, which followed the Feast of Trumpets. As such, the Feast of Trumpets suggests the Lord’s second coming.
Does this mean that the rapture, or the return of the Lord to gather His people, will happen during the Feast of Trumpets, or especially on the last day, the “day of blowing the trumpets”? While this day is a ‘type’ of the return of the Lord, I believe we limit the Lord when we determine He must return on that day. We read of the day of the rapture of the church in 1 Corinthians 15:52, “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.” We also read in 1 Thessalonians 4:16, “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.” The blowing of the trumpet is definitely related to the coming of the Lord, but we must consider the symbolism and not try to establish that the Lord MUST return on this day in the Feast of Trumpets.
If we do that, we must say the Lord’s return can ONLY occur in one particular time of the year. The Apostle Paul wrote of the saints in Thessalonica in 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, “For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; And to WAIT FOR HIS SON FROM HEAVEN, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.” To actively “wait for His Son” would indicate that His return could happen in any year, any month, any week, any day, any moment. I’m sure none of us would want to limit the time of the Lord’s return by saying that He MUST return in the fall of the year. Instead, may we live in constant expectancy of the Lord’s return, realizing He can return any moment to take His church home to be with Himself. (427.4)