This isn't easy to organize to understand my question, so I'll probably be making some edits.
I am not sold on the rapture doctrine. I've heard it all my life and never really bought into it because there is so little about it, when it is a major event. I know "the rapture isn't biblical", but "caught up" interprets to 'raptis' in Latin.
So, what exactly is this?
I 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.
4:17 - 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.
This is when Christ is returning to earth to reign with an iron rod, presumably after the Tribulation. Why do we rise to meet him in the air, only to turn around return to earth?
Q1) I know this is the basis for the "rapture" doctrine, but presuming there is no rapture, what exactly is going on here?
Q2) Why would Christians meet Christ in the air, only to come back down and land on the earth? When Christ returns and lands on Mt Zion, he is here to stay for at least 1k years. Why then do Christians meet him in the air?
II Corinthians 5:7-9 To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
Luke 16 has us going to either side of a gulf and being present with the Father after we die, hence the rich man and Lazarus the beggar. The rich man asks if he can go back to his family and warn his brothers of that place. He is in torment, but not yet in hell. He asks for a drop of water off Lazarus' finger.... So he is at the gulf during the second earth age, and before the 7th trump. He is there after his death, but before the millennial reign or the 7th trump. He has already reverted to his spiritual body, and returned to the Father, and his brothers remain on earth. So we don't lie dead in the grave and wait to resurrect, or he wouldn't be aware until after the millennial reign or 7th trump, or all his brothers would be with him there, and he wouldn't be wanting to send a messenger back because it would be too late.
Q3) So what is the point of "The dead in Christ shall rise first", and when do the dead not in Christ rise?
I Thessalonians makes obvious sense only from the "rapture" perspective.