Page 114 - Ecclesiology Textbook Masters

Study Section 15: The Church in the Future

15.1 Connect

The church was born on the day of Pentecost. So, will this institution last forever? What is
the future plan of God for the church today? Will we have a church in heaven throughout all
eternity? The Bible does tell us the future plans that God has for the church. Today, in this
short lesson, we will review these future plans and try to answer the questions we have
posed. Ready?

15.2 Objectives

1. The student should be able demonstrate that the Church in this age is called the Bride of
Christ and will look into the implications that this relationship between believers and Christ has
for the future.

2. The student should be able show in Scripture that God plans to rapture His Bride in the future.

3. The student should be able discuss that following the rapture, the Church will become forever united
with Christ in a seven-year-long marriage feast.

4. The student should be able describe the seven annual feasts of Israel and how they are significant in
forecasting future events.

15.3 The Church in the future

The church is on the lookout for the second coming of Jesus Christ. Jesus promised His
disciples that He would come again.

John 14:1-3 “Let not your heart be troubled...In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it
were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a
place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be
also.”

Jesus is returning to call his bride home. He is waiting patiently because of His desire that all men
should come to repentance and become his bride.

2 Peter 3:8-9 "But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand
years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count
slackness, but is long suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to
repentance."

This is a future event, and it may be very soon, that Jesus Christ will sound a trumpet, and all members
of the universal church will be caught up to be with Him in the sky. This is described in I Thessalonians 4.

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