More Than One Resurrection From The Dead

We don't talk about this as we should because death is an unpleasant subject. Now just because it's unpleasant, it doesn't mean that we should avoid it.

1 Corinthians 15 is one of the most revealing passages of Scripture about the resurrection.

However, some of us is under the interpretation that there only going to be one resurrection.

Before Christ came, in the OT, there were three notable resurrections. One by Elijah in 1 Kings 17:17-24 and the second by Elisha in 2 Kings 4:8-37, and the third one was when Elisha died of a disease, a dead man was laid in the tomb of Elisha and the dead man rose again from the dead (see 2 Kings 13:14-21).

It's amazing that Elisha died of a disease but his bones were able to be used by God to raise another dead man from the dead. The question begs to be asked. Why didn't God raise Elisha from the dead with the dead man?

In the OT, there were two types of "raptures" into heaven. One was Enoch, the seventh from Adam (see Genesis 5:21-24 and Hebrews 11:5-6) and the second was Elijah in 2 Kings 2:1-18.

In the NT, the first recorded resurrection took place when the Lord Jesus raised Jairus' daughter from the dead (see Mark 5:21-43). The second resurrection took place in Luke 7:11-17 where the Lord Jesus raised a young man from the dead. The third resurrection was of Lazarus that took place in John 11:1-44. The fourth resurrection was the Lord's own resurrection in Matthew chapter 28.

Now in Matthew 27:50-53 there appears to be a discrepancy as to when a fifth resurrection took place. Whether it happened at the death of Jesus or at the resurrection of Jesus is the discrepancy. There's no way that I'm going to settle this discrepancy. The only thing that we can see is that a resurrection took place.

The sixth resurrection took place in Acts 9:36-43 when Peter was used by the Lord to raise Dorcas from the dead.

The seventh resurrection took place in Acts 14:19-20 when Paul was stoned (see 2 Corinthians 11:22-28) and they all thought that Paul was dead.

The eighth recorded resurrection was when Paul was used by the Lord to raise a young man from the dead that fell three stories to the ground in Acts 20:7-12.

There's only one resurrection where the One raised from the dead never dies again.

Revelation 1:17-18 (NKJV) "And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, “Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last.

I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen.

And I have the keys of Hades and of Death."

There's four NT raptures. A rapture must be both body and spirit.

The first is the Lord that was taken into heaven in His resurrected Body (see Acts 1:8-11).

I must concede that this is debatable because He was taken up on a cloud.

With Enoch and Elijah in the OT, the Lord took them, body and spirit, into heaven but it's possible that these will be the two witnesses in Revelation 11:11-14 that will be killed and raised from the dead. Then they'll be raptured up into heaven.

There's much debate that Moses and Elijah will be the two witnesses because they appeared with the Lord on the mount of the transfiguration in Matthew 17:1-9. Moses died on Mt. Nebo (see Deuteronomy 32:48-52) and there's a dispute with Michael the archangel and satan over the body of Moses in Jude 1:9.

This debate will not end the debate even with these Scriptures.

Nonetheless, the two witnesses will be killed by the Beast during the middle of the 7 year final week of Daniel's 70th week prophesy (see Daniel chapter 9) and then raptured into heaven.

I'll end it here and pick this up at a later date.