The Greek word “harpazo” is from a primitive root word “harp,’ meaning to seize, catch up, or snatch away. It is used 14 times in the New Testament in the following passages:
(All
quotations are from New American Standard Bible 1995)
Matthew
11:12
12 From the days of John the Baptist
until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force.
Matthew
12:29
29 Or how can anyone enter the strong
man’s house and carry off
his property, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he
will plunder his house.
Matthew
13:19
19 When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand
it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart.
This is the one on whom seed was sown beside the road.
John 6:15
15 So Jesus, perceiving that they
were intending to come and take Him by force to make Him king, withdrew again
to the mountain by Himself alone.
John 10:12
12 He who is a hired hand, and not
a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming, and
leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.
John
10:28-29
28 and I give eternal life to them,
and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to Me,
is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s
hand.
Acts 8:39
39 When they came up out of the
water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; and the eunuch no longer saw him, but went on his way rejoicing.
Acts 23:10
10 And as a great dissension was
developing, the commander was afraid Paul would be torn to pieces by
them and ordered the troops to go down and take him away from them by force, and bring him
into the barracks.
2
Corinthians 12:2-4
2 I know a man in Christ who
fourteen years ago—whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do
not know, God knows—such a man was caught up to the third heaven. 3 And
I know how such a man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not
know, God knows— 4 was caught up
into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which a man is not permitted
to speak.
1
Thessalonians 4:16-17
16 For the Lord Himself will
descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel
and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise
first. 17 Then we who are alive and
remain will be caught
up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air,
and so we shall always be with the Lord.
Jude 23
23 save others, snatching them out of the
fire; and on some have mercy with fear, hating even the garment polluted
by the flesh.
Revelation
12:5
5 And she gave birth to a son, a
male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron; and her child was caught up to God and to
His throne.
The use of the word harpazo in I Thess.
4:17, in light of the other scriptures in which this word appears, certainly
confirms that the church will indeed be “caught up,” “snatched away,” in a
moment, in the twinkling of an eye ( I Cor. 15:52.) There is no doubt. The fact
that the same word is used to describe Philip being suddenly translated to
another location, Paul being “caught up” to the third heaven, and Jesus being
“caught up” to God leaves no other option or explanation. Amen! Come, Lord
Jesus!
