One mystery of God is the Gentile Church becoming heirs with Israel.   Ephesians 3:6, “This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.”

The Prophet Hosea predicted this mystery: “I will show my love to the one I called, ‘Not my loved one.’  I will say to those called, ‘Not my people,’ ‘You are my people’; and they will say, ‘You are my God’ ” (Hosea 2:23).

Paul refers to the Christians at Corinth as a bride to Christ: “I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him” (2 Cor 11:2).

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.”   “This is a profound mystery - but I am talking about Christ and the church” (Eph 2:25-27, 32).

In Revelation 10 an angel raised his right hand to heaven and swore by God, saying, “There will be no more delay!  But in the days when the seventh angel is about to sound his trumpet, the mystery of God will be accomplished, just as he announced to his servants the prophets” (Rev 10:7).

At this moment, when the seventh trumpet is about to sound, the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled (salvation to the Gentiles) and the Church is about to take its rightful place as the Bride of Christ.  So, we've established that the Bride of Christ will be ready just before the sound of the last trumpet.

THE SEVENTH TRUMPET

The seventh trumpet, the last trumpet, sounds.

We know that the seventh trumpet sounds at the end of the Tribulation, because it is at the sounding of this last trumpet that Jesus Christ returns to Earth in the Second Coming.  John wrote,  “The seventh angel sounded his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, which said: ‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign for ever and ever’ ” (Rev 11:15).

Paul wrote, “For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.  After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air” (1 Thess 4:16-17).

Jesus said, “And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other” (Matt 24:31). 

In I Corinthians 15:51-53 Paul wrote, “Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed - in a flash, in the twinkling of any eye, at the last trumpet.  For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.”

Pre-tribulation theorists argue that the trumpet Paul refers to in 1 Corinthians 15:51 is not the last trumpet of Revelation 8 and 9, but something “special,” blown just for this particular occasion.  They say that there will be a special sounding of a trumpet just to enact the rapture.

Why did Paul say it was the last trumpet?  Why didn’t he just say, “at the sound of a trumpet?”  Perhaps when Paul writes, “last,” he believes that this description is an important distinction.  The only “last trumpet” in the scriptures is the seventh trumpet in Revelation, and it fits the context of what is written and happening here.  We know that the last trumpet signals the return of Jesus, and we know from Paul, that just when it blows the rapture will take place.  And all of this happens at the end of the Tribulation.