folly...
You need to keep things in context if you have any desire to understand them -- of course you might just rather sit back and scoff. That is up to you. Either way, I promise you based on the Word of God that Jesus will return and the Rapture will indeed occur -- perhaps soon.
"Crazed charlatans, false prophets, and other holy doom-sayers!... Don't hold your breath on the Rapture -- and no need to clutter the car up with bumperstickers!! Things are no different today than they have been thru all of human history.
2 Peter 3:1-13
3 Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, 4 and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.”
5 For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, 6 through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water. 7 But the present heavens and earth by His word are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
8 But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 9 The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up.
11 Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, 12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, on account of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat! 13 But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.
"About 30 CE: The Christian Scriptures (New Testament), when interpreted literally, appear to record many predictions by Jeshua of Nazareth (Jesus Christ) that God's Kingdom would arrive within a very short period, or was actually in the process of arriving. For example, Jesus is recorded as saying in Matthew 16:28: "...there shall be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom."
And that prophesy was fulfilled, exactly as Jesus had foretold in the first few verses of Chapter 17, at His Transfiguration, witnessed by Peter, James, and John:
"1 And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart,
2 And was transfigured before them: and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light.
3 And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him.
4 Then answered Peter, and said unto Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here: if thou wilt, let us make here three tabernacles; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias.
5 While he yet spake, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them: and behold a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him.
6 And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their face, and were sore afraid.
7 And Jesus came and touched them, and said, Arise, and be not afraid.
8 And when they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no man, save Jesus only.
9 And as they came down from the mountain, Jesus charged them, saying, Tell the vision to no man, until the Son of man be risen again from the dead.
10 And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elias must first come?
11 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things.
12 But I say unto you, That Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them.
13 Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist."
"In Matthew 24:34, Yeshua is recorded as saying: "...This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled." Since the life expectancy in those days was little over 30 years, Jesus appears to have predicted his second coming sometime during the 1st century CE. It didn't happen.
You err in your identification of "this generation". Read the text closely, and you will see that Jesus specifically is speaking of the generation that sees all the signs of His coming, which He had just enumerated. They have yet to occur.
"About 60 CE: Interpreting the Epistles of Paul of Tarsus literally, his writings seem to imply that Jesus would return and usher in a rapture during the lifetime of persons who were living in the middle of the 1st century."
Again, you need to read the passages closely. Paul never says that the Second Coming will necessarily be soon but he always pictures it as imminent -- it could happen at any time.
The rest of your examples are not from Scripture, but from fallible and foolish men who disregarded the admonition of our Lord Jesus that NO MAN knows when He will return -- it is a waste of time and effort to even try to guess. Jesus did say that we can be alert to the signs that will precede the second coming, but we cannot know exactly when it will happen.
I suggest you read and study more on Biblical Prophesy and how it has played out over the centuries. The mark of a true Old Testament prophet is that he was never wrong -- if he made a prediction that did not come true, he was a false prophet and was to be stoned to death. All the prophesies relating to Israel and the First Coming of their Messiah, Jesus, came true exactly, literally, as predicted. The same will be true of the Second Coming. There are many prophesies of His Second coming in both the Old and New Testaments and they will all be fulfilled exactly, literally, to the letter just as those of His First Coming were.
By the way, it was reading about Biblical Prophesy that first raised my curiosity and interest in the Bible.
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