No 10

(The Marriage of the Lamb)

This is the second post-rapture event that happens to the Church, the Marriage of the Lamb. The account is described in Revelation 19: “7Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. 8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.” This glorious event occurs between the Rapture of the Church and the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The term “the righteousness of saints” is a direct result of the saints being judged at the judgment seat of Christ that we saw last time (2 Corinthians 5:10). There is no doubt that the place of this ceremony is in heaven and that the wife of Jesus Christ are the New Testament saints in this marriage. A distinction must be made here between the Marriage of the Lamb and the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. There are different interpretations of these two events but the most logical one is that the Marriage of the Lamb occurs in heaven (Rev 19) and the Marriage Supper of the Lamb occurs on earth (Matt 25:1-14). In the parable of the ten virgins in Matthew 25, Israel awaits the bridegroom and the bride and, as the text indicates, some will be ready and some will not. In this context, the marriage supper of the Lamb that occurs on earth will be after the Second Coming where the Bridegroom will introduce His Bride to His friends and is an event to which both Israel and the tribulation Gentiles will participate as observers. As Daniel 12: 2 indicates, Israel and the Old Testament saints will be resurrected after the Second Coming of Christ – “ And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” Therefore the Church which is God’s program for the present age will have been raptured, resurrected and presented to the Son by the Father and thus fulfilling God’s purpose in taking a people for His name… “4 Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for His name.” (Acts 15:14).