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Originally Posted by ZNPaaneah
I agree that these 2 thousand years have resulted in a very large organization known collectively as "Christianity" which is not to be confused with the church. Based on Rev 2-3 I think this is under the Lord's sovereignty because there are a number of things we need to overcome before we are mature enough to rule and reign with Jesus.
16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven, with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first; 17 then we that are alive, that are left, shall together with them be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
I read the term "we" as referring to the believers collectively who are still alive, not specific to the people who first received this letter.
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Your conception of Christianity may be closer to Witness Lee's than Evengelical's is. Lee said that when Constantine brought thousands of false believers into Christianity he made it into Christendom and thus it was no longer the church.(Life study of Matthew, chapter 38, section 2)
You mention that God is sovereign in doing this. Evangelical made the same point. Is there anything that God is not sovereign over in the universe?
Then you're back to your favorite principal ''ruling and reigning' as justification for the delay. How has humanity matured over the past 2000 years when the human lifespan hasn't gotten appreciably longer. But who knows maybe you can make a speculative case using Steven Pinker's statistics and analysis.
Any way, you address the collective "we" as far as being alive and remaining. But you ignore the fact that Paul told the Corinthians that they were those upon whom the end of the world had come and that they would not all sleep. The collective "we" doesn't work in that context. You also ignore Paul's statements that the appointed time has grown short and that the present form of this world is passing away in 1st Corinthians 7.