The Truth About the September 23rd 2025 Rapture

By Russell Schmidt

Maybe it’s because I’ve watched quite a few videos claiming they have cracked the biblical code and are calling for a September 23rd, 2025 rapture of the Church, but there seems to be no end to the rapture videos popping up in my YouTube feed.

Not only do we have these self-proclaimed prophets calling for a Fall rapture, but then we have all the rapture dreams people seem to be having. Whether that stems from a late-night pizza, or just the fact that they just finished watching a rapture video before going to bed, I would take these dreamers dreams with a grain of salt.

Now, with that all said, let me clarify. I do believe in the pre-tribulation rapture, and I know scripture tells us that in the last days there will be visions and dreams. I also believe that the rapture will most likely be fulfilled on the Feast of Trumpets, also known in Hebrew as Yom Teruah, and better know to most as, Rosh Hashanah.

Let’s stick with the English translation of Feast of Trumpets (FOT) for the remainder of this article. The FOT is the fifth Holy Day of God’s Holy Day calendar. I believe the day represents the Pre-tribulation rapture of the Church.

I believe that for a few reasons. The first being that the Hebrew, Yom Teruah, which is how the original Hebrew manuscripts name it, means, “the day of blasting or blowing of Trumpets”. Let’s read it direct from scripture. In Leviticus 23:23-25…

“23 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 24 ‘Speak to the children of Israel, saying: In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall have a sabbath-rest, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation. 25 You shall do no customary work on it; and you shall offer an offering made by fire to the Lord.’”

I’ve highlighted “blowing of trumpets” because that is the NKJV translation of the Hebrew word “teruah”. The word Yom means, “the day”. So together they mean, the day of the blowing or blasting of trumpets. So, what’s the significance to all this?

In 1 Corinthians 15:51-52, the apostle Paul writes, “51 Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed— 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. 53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.”

I believe Paul is describing the pre-tribulation rapture here. This isn’t the only reason for me believing in the pre-tribulation rapture, proof of that can be found in other articles on this website.

Following are some Jewish Traditions regarding the FOT, or as they would call it, Rosh Hashanah, that are not necessarily biblical, but traditions that point right to the rapture, unbeknownst to themselves:

1) “It is a piercing wail that serves to awaken slumbering souls that have grown complacent.” Christians view the trumpet blast as Jesus is calling us home. As Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15:52 above, the dead will be raised, and those who are alive shall be changed. Then both the dead in Christ and those alive in Christ, will meet together in the clouds with Jesus.

2) “It evokes the shofar (trumpet) blast that were heard when God descended on Mount Sinai and gave the Ten Commandments.” In like manner, Christians view the trumpet blast as Jesus coming in the clouds to call us home. When God came down to the top of Mount Sinai in Exodus, He didn’t come all the way down to the level of the Israelites, but remained in a cloud at the top of the mountain. Moses, who represented the rapture, went up the mountain to be with God.

3) “It echoes the cries of the prophets who urged Israel to mend their ways and return to God and His Commandments.” When Jesus gave us the Parable of the Ten Virgins (Matthew 25), which is a representation of waiting for the rapture, the parable tells the virgins to keep their lamps well oiled. The oil represents the Holy Spirit in ones life and being sure to staying in line with the guidance of the Spirit. This entails staying close to God and His word, the Bible, and distancing oneself as far from the world as possible.

4) “Made of a ram’s horn, the shofar recalls the near-sacrifice of Isaac, who was saved when God showed Abraham a ram to bring as an offering in his stead.” It’s interesting how the Jews used the comparison to the story of Abraham when God told him to sacrifice Isaac. The Christian view of this story is representative of the rapture, as Isaac was spared after a voice from heaven called to Abraham to stop and not to harm the child. Of course, more-so the ram represents Christ replacing us on the cross, taking on Himself all of our burden.

5) “Its loud piercing sound humbles us and fills us with awe before God.” The rapture will certainly be an “awe” moment, both for those who are raptured, and for those who are left behind. Only, one will be an exuberant “awe”, and the other a devastating “awe”.

6) “It foreshadows the day of judgment at the end of days, which the prophet describes as ‘a day of shofar and alarm against the fortified cities and against the high towers.’” The rapture will certainly alert the world of the last days; at least those who are aware of it. Scripture tells us in Revelation chapter 6 that the rulers of the world will know exactly what’s happening, that Christ’s wrath is about to begin. They then try to hide themselves in cave’s and under the rocks, but there will be no escape. Many of those powerful of the world are already preparing by building underground bunkers for protection. Do they know what’s coming?

7) “It gives us hope, mirroring the sound of the “great shofar” that will call together the Jewish people who are scattered to the corners of the earth at the time of the coming of Mashiach.” The trumpet call will bring those in Christ from all corners of the earth together in the clouds with Christ, as He takes us home.

8) “It reminds us of the Revival of the Dead, about which we read, “dwellers of the earth... a shofar is sounded you shall hear.” Not only are the dead in Christ resurrected, even those who are alive and are changed were once dead spiritually before they accepted Christ as their Savior.

Isn’t it interesting that many of the traditions the Jewish people view regarding the FOT, are closely related to the actual meaning of the day, even though they don’t even realize it.

No One Knows the Day or the Hour

“But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only” (Matthew 24:36). With all the videos I’ve watched regarding people prophesying a FOT rapture in 2025, almost every one has this verse mentioned in the comments. And yes, Jesus did say that, and He meant it.

But we also have verses like Daniel 12:9-10, which reads, “9 And he said, ‘Go your way, Daniel, for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end. 10 Many shall be purified, made white, and refined, but the wicked shall do wickedly; and none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand.’”

What is Daniel’s prophecy telling us here? We can only speculate on how much we will ultimately know, but I personally believe that there will be a time where we know things that were impossible to know prior. The Holy Spirit will give us what we need to know, when we need to know it. It’s all a part of keeping our lambs well oiled.

Will the rapture be one of those things? Maybe, maybe not. If you consider the parable Jesus told of the thief in the night, which reads, “42 Watch therefore, for you do not know what hour your Lord is coming. 43 But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into. 44 Therefore you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”  

Verse 44 sums it up, we won’t know the hour, but we can be ready and know the season we are in. How do we do that? By living in His word and not the world. Sure, we have to deal with the world since we are in it, but we also have to be sure to stay in the word, in prayer, and also pay attention to what’s going on in the world. When doing all those things we will stay prepared and know the season we are in.

This takes me back to the self-proclaimed prophets and dreamers calling for a FOT rapture. Can it happen? Sure it can. And another reason why I believe the rapture will occur on a future FOT, if not this coming one, is because Yom Teruah is the only Holy Day on God’s calendar that falls on a new moon.

It is also a two-day event for the Jewish people because according to Jewish tradition, two to three priests were sent out to watch for the first sliver of the new moon, which signifies the beginning of their new month. This may take two nights in order to see it. Isn’t it interesting that the day or the hour wasn’t known for the new moon sighting?  

Sounds like what Jesus said about the rapture, doesn’t it? This is ultimately what convinced me that the rapture must occur on the FOT. Since the first four Feast days were fulfilled on the day that represented it, why wouldn’t God fulfill the remaining Feast days on the day that represents them?

Since no one knows the day or the hour of the new moon sighting, and no one knows the day or the hour for Christ calling us home. And the fact that the only Holy Day that falls on a new moon gives us good reason to believe the rapture will happen on that day.

But as far as pinpointing the rapture in 2025, there are many calculations that these self-proclaimed prophets make to determine that, and I’m not going to go into them, because most are based on the calendar, and calculating days and years according to it. But who’s to say our calendars have been kept accurate through the millennia?  

We know that our current Gregorian calendar was a correction from the Julian calendar. We also know for a fact that the Jewish Pharisees re-calculated their calendar and lost approximately 165 years in the process. Their current calendar says we are in the year 5785 from the beginning of creation. But when you add back in the years lost in their re-calculation, we are in the year 5950.

What is interesting about that calculation is that a calendar found with the Dead Sea Scrolls was a calendar used by the Essenes who claimed the calendar was handed down to them from Enoch. Whether that’s true or not, guess what year that calendar says we are in today? If you guessed 5950, you are correct.

What else did the Essenes say about this year? Well, they said that 5950 is the end of the 119th Jubilee cycle of this Age of Man. A Jubilee cycle is 50-years. Leviticus 25:8-10 tells us, “You are also to count off seven sabbaths of years for yourself, seven times seven years, so that you have the time of the seven sabbaths of years, namely, forty-nine years. You shall then sound a ram’s horn... and consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you.”

How did they know this would begin the final Jubilee cycle? As most scholars do, the Essenes based creation week in Genesis chapters one and two as a representation of God’s plan for creation. For example; the account describes God creating the world in six days then resting on the seventh day.

The Essenes calendar mirrors this and sets the Age of Man, which we are in now, as a 6,000-year plan. Psalm 90:4 reads, “For a thousand years in Your sight are like a day when it is past.” We also have 2 Peter 3:8, where the apostle Peter writes, “But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.”

Although the 6,000 year principle isn’t explicitly mentioned in scripture, it certainly is implied. So, if we take 6,000 years and divide that by 50, we come up with 120 Jubilee cycles. Of which 119 of those have all been completed.

Starting in 2026, we begin the last Jubilee cycle if the Essenes are correct. This means we have 50 more years of time before this age of man expires and the millennial reign of Christ begins. However, if our calendar is correct and we are in the year 2025 after Christ’s birth, and 32 AD, or there about, was the crucifixion, then either our calendar is wrong or the Essenes calendar is wrong.

When we calculated time in the Old Testament, we can count approximately 4000-years of time prior to Jesus coming to earth. And depending upon whether we count from Christ’s birth or from His crucifixion, we are either in the year 6025 or approximately 5993.

My point with all this is not to confuse anyone, but to establish that we have no idea what year we are actually in from creation. We are not even told in scripture if God started counting from the moment Adam was given life, or did time begin once Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden.

Are All the Prophecies Fulfilled?

It seems every year around the FOT we have those who claim the rapture is about to occur. But the last couple of years, and particularly this year, for many reasons I won’t go into here, the claims of an eminent rapture are off the charts.

Although there is no prerequisite for the rapture event to happen, as far as prophecy is concerned, I do believe we can view a prophecy like the war of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 38, as a benchmark in determining an approximation of the rapture timing.

Scripture doesn’t tell us if the rapture happens before or after this biblical war, but as we get closer to this war the likelihood of the rapture occurring becomes more evident.  

We do see the nations listed in the prophecy aligning together, which only ten or fifteen years ago it would have been inconceivable to believe that nations like Russia and Iran would be allied together; however, today they are.  

Also, Ezekiel 38 mentions that prior to the war, Israel will be living in peace and in unwalled villages. We certainly can’t say Israel is in peace, and much of the nation is surrounded by barbed wire fencing with checkpoints to get in and out.

With that said, I do believe this peace is not far off. I believe once Israel is done in the Gaza Strip, and Hamas, Hezbollah, and even Iran, if not eliminated, will at least be incapacitated to the point of no longer being a threat to Israel and a sense of peace will be felt in the land.  

And along with that, the Trump administration is brokering the Abrahamic accords with the Arab nations that surround Israel. This will all bring a sense of peace to Israel where they will feel comfortable in letting down the defenses and taking down their checkpoints and walls of protection in fulfilling the Ezekiel 38 prophecy.

Where Does Artificial Intelligence (Ai) Fit In?

We can also look at the tech side of our world with Ai and quantum computing which is soon to be active, and how this system will be the system Antichrist will most likely take control of in order to establish his world dictatorial government. We can certainly see this developing right in front of us.

Many of these tech giants who are creating Ai, are throwing out dates like 2026, 2027, and 2028 as pivotal steps in its development with 2030 as the potential completion date in activating Ai in every aspect of society. Ai will still be a work in progress, but by 2030 they have high hopes for society to be running primarily on Ai.

As we have already experienced, Ai has made a big impact on us with the inception of ChatGPT, which was release to the public in November of 2022. In just a few short years many alternative Ai tools have flooded the tech world. We already are hearing some concerning stories of sentient Ai making decisions on it’s own, and even lying and attempting to deceive it’s users.

How Much Longer Can We Go?

Yet, with all that said, my gut feeling is that we still have some time to go. I don’t know how much time because I have no way of telling how fast all these things mentioned will develop. Since 2020 things have moved so fast it’s hard to fathom. If we go back to 2019, and you told me back then all these things would happen by 2025, it would have been hard for me to believe they would all happen in such a relatively short time.

Yet, here we are. But I will end with this. Does the Bible speak of end time prophets? Yes, the prophet Joel was very clear in Joel 2:28 that in the last days “daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions.” Is that what we are seeing today? Only God knows for sure. We can only pray and seek God for discernment. He will provide us with what we need to know through the Holy Spirit.

But remember one thing, Satan knows the scriptures too. His goal is to distort God’s word and confused God’s people. But also remember Daniel 12:10, “...but the wise shall understand!” Who are the wise? Those who keep their lamps well oiled.  

Be careful not to be deceived by all these self-proclaimed prophets. They could very well be inspired by Satan in setting the stage for when God’s true prophets come forward, then people won’t believe them because of so many false prophets who have come before to plant seeds of doubt.

My warning to those who think they hear God, you better be sure you are being led by God because if you are not, you may be turning away more people than you are warning.

For for those who may be listening to those self-proclaimed prophets, you need to get yourself into God’s word and discerning truth through study and prayer. If not, you will be misled down the wrong road, and when the rapture doesn’t happen you become discouraged and go back into the world and get caught up in the dangers of what’s coming.

So, keep seeking the truth in God’s word and praying, and that will keep your oil full and fresh!