Are you looking to see if my doctrine is sound?  Good!  It’s one of the first things I always check out on a new website, too.  Please review my STATEMENT OF FAITH.

Welcome!

I’m glad you have found me and I hope we can grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ together!  I have a number of passions that I would like to share, but above all is my relationship with Jesus.  I try to follow Him as best I can, and have prayed to be convicted of anything in my life that isn’t in alignment with His desires.  Not because I think this earns me salvation or answered prayers, but because I truly love Him and don’t want to hurt His heart!  I want my life to be a pleasing aroma  – a fragrant offering – to God.

I’m a homeschooling mama to 2 children.  I also work part-time in healthcare.  I’ve been married for… quite a while now!  We are learning to apply God’s grace in family life together.  I don’t have all the answers, but I’m committed to continually growing in my faith in Jesus and in my understanding of His Word.  This website, Red Moon Rapture, is about my Bible prophecy study journey.  I chat about life with Jesus on my other blog – The Convicted Mama.  Here is the story of my Journey to Finding Christ.

Many of you know me as Stephanie Dawn on Facebook as I am very active in leading a few groups.  You are welcome to join us:

• Even At the Doors: Pre-Trib Rapture Watchers
• Christian Women, Wives, Moms Supporting Each Other
• Set Apart – Becoming Holy People in an Unholy World (Christian Fellowship)

I feel very honored to have been invited to write for the well-respected prophecy website Unsealed.  I have written an introduction to my prophecy study journey here: The Day When Time Stood Still.

I would love to have you come alongside me. Not that I am anyone significant. But that is exactly the point. I am average.  Plain.

For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God,righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.” 1 Corinthians 1:26-31 ESV

Jesus is coming again, soon.  For believers, the truly born again, this is our Blessed Hope!  Jesus is going to rescue us from this body of sin, and for some of us even from death itself!  And He wants us to be excited!  So much so, that just for being excited, we get a special reward.

Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.  2 Timothy 4:8 ESV

No other book of the Bible promises special blessings just for reading and hearing it than The Revelation (of Jesus Christ).  And yet, He knows that most people will ignore the signs, just as they did the first time He came. He even says, “When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:8 ESV)   The sad truth is that most people, even “Christians,” are more concerned with day-to-day living than they are with the things of God.

Jesus EXPECTS us to WATCH and to be aware of what prophetic time we are in!

He said to the crowd: “When you see a cloud rising in the west, immediately you say, ‘It’s going to rain,’ and it does. And when the south wind blows, you say, ‘It’s going to be hot,’ and it is. Hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and the sky. How is it that you don’t know how to interpret this present time?  Luke 12:54-56 ESV

For the Lord GOD does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets.  Amos 3:7 ESV

The book of Revelation is meant to REVEAL, not conceal.  It’s challenging to understand at times, yes, but God has hidden keys throughout the whole body of Scripture that unlock meaning.  It’s the most amazing and beautiful puzzle which ties together the entire revelation of God to humanity.

When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.  John 16:13 ESV

We all approach the Bible wearing the glasses of our prior learning and understanding.  Sometimes it’s best to temporarily lay aside what we think we know and pray for the glasses of the Holy Spirit – for Him to lead us afresh.  All the interpretations of humanity will be flawed in some way – now we see dimly as in a mirror, but then we shall see face to face.  We can’t see perfectly from here, no, but we can keep polishing our mirrors!  God gives us a challenge, meant to be solved.  It’s complex on purpose – just like the parables – to foil the enemy and turn away those who don’t truly care.

A few years back, I started re-examining Biblical prophecy models right from the beginning.  So I ordered books from the most esteemed authors on each of the prophecy views and sat and picked them all apart.  I like to dissect 🙂  We should not accept the teachings of humans without searching the scriptures for ourselves, to see if it is so.  If an interpretation is true it will stand up to vigorous scrutiny.  If it doesn’t stand up, we need to consider that it might be incorrect or at least improperly positioned.  Some things we will not be able to know for sure until they occur.

Once I finished the books, I printed out all the passages I could find on the end times from the Bible and cut them up and played around with them for months on the living room floor trying to weave them together.  It was slow progress and I won’t lie, I got hung up on certain aspects of study for months.  In fact, I wrestled with pretribulation versus prewrath for several years.

I’m always questioning the things that don’t seem to QUITE fit and seeing if I can rotate them slightly to get a better alignment.  I kind of have an obsessive personality, so when I’m into something I focus on it almost exclusively (that can be both good and bad!).  Dan in and day out I ruminate (meditate).  I also have done a lot of pleading with God for wisdom and understanding of the scriptures.  Then I take to Him one question at a time and keep petitioning Him for answers until I have been satisfied either through scripture or through someone’s teachings.  Then I move on to the next question.

I have come to an understanding of a Literal End Times Prophecy model that is basically the strengths of pre-tribulation and pre-wrath combined.  I have been influenced by such pre-tribulation teachers as Clarence Larkin, Arnold Fruchtenbaum, Thomas Ice, John MacArthur, Jack Kelley; pre-wrath teachers as Marvin Rosenthal, HL Nigro, Chris White; and pre-trib/pre-wrath combo teachers Douglas Berner, David Lowe, John Abent, and Peter Goodgame.

What I post here is my best understanding from Scripture, but it is a human understanding, and thus will be flawed in some points.  I am continually pleading with God for truth and clarity and bouncing ideas off fellow watchmen (tip of the hat, you know who you are my groups and special peeps;)).  Thus I update posts regularly as my understanding improves

 

The Bible is infallible.  I am not.   I encourage you to consider my thoughts as you  examine the scriptures to see if these things are so!