Given your definition, exactly how many
born again true believers in the Church are going to "depart from the faith". A certain percentage? All of them?
I trust you can perceive the absurdities in these statements........
Not at all absurd the way I view it, and the way it's actually been happening in history. Remember that Jesus said the way is wide that leads to destruction, and the way is narrow that leads to life? In modern Christian history we've seen large sections of former Christian Europe fall away. Russia used to be a Christian country. Doesn't look like that anymore, does it?
The Enlightenment was a complete swearing off of Christianity, the "accursed thing," as Voltaire called it. And modern democratic republics have adopted the Enlightenment philosophy and the ethic of religious equality--another name for idolatry.
No, Christians have been fleeing evangelical Christianity en masse, and have only the form of religion anymore. This is, I think, the beginning of the great apostasy under Antichrist. It only remains for Antichrist himself to appear.
No, but the only workable scenario is a REMOVAL (apo-stasia........moving from a formerly stationary position......just like a DEPARTURE from a train station. AAALLLLL ABOARD!) of the true and living Church from the time and place of the wrath of the Lamb.....
The Church is ONE and DONE. Starts at Pentecost ends at the rapture. No other scenario fits the Scripture, and seamlessly fulfills end-time eschatology.
I believe the word "apostasia" can also refer to a "departure from the faith," or in English an "apostasy." What convinces me most of all, however, is the context, which determines what the word means definitively. If the context was all about the departure of the Church from the earth, maybe you would have an argument.
But this isn't what we have. We have Christ mentioned coming for the Church, to assemble the Church, but nothing whatsoever about a "departure." We do have a "catching up" or a "seizing" in 1 Thes 4, but this is 2 Thes 2, a different letter. It's the same event, but the context is different.
In this letter, Paul is talking about what prevents the coming of the Lord for his Church, ie what inhibits the Rapture. It is not talking about the Rapture itself, except incidentally.
The main subject concerns the claim, by Paul, that the Coming of Christ for his Church could not yet have happened, that something is preventing that from happening presently. So we shouldn't be fooled by false claims that it has already happened, ie that Jesus has already come for the Church, or that Jesus' Kingdom has already come.
Can you see that this is a very different context than describing the "departure" of the Church? It is not the Departure of the Church that prevents the Coming of Christ, but rather, the necessity that Antichrist comes first before he is destroyed at Christ's Coming.
As you should be able to see, this is simply a restatement of what Jesus said in his Olivet Discourse. False Christs and false prophets would come, declaring themselves to represent the Messianic Kingdom. But Jesus told his followers not to believe false eschatological systems that precede his actual coming, which will end the age.
The point is, Christ's Coming will fulfill prophecy by bringing the Jewish Diaspora to an end, and bring about a final defeat of Satan over Israel. Even more, it will complete God's promise to Abraham to have a universal people, from all nations. No eschatological system that precedes this great event should be trusted in, because they will lure people into accepting the way the world is in its present wicked state.
Never should we confuse the way the world presently is with the Kingdom of God! That would be like placing our approval on what is presently going on in the world or in a particular government. No government properly represents God's Kingdom, which is to come at the end of the age! Only then can we stopping worrying about remaining watchful against antichrists and false messiahs.
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