Hi Ian. I'm not the one you want to talk to about what happens at the end of the age. Usually, I avoid the subject like the plague.
I'll post this from Ray and maybe it will help.
http://bible-truths.com/email11.htm#preteristAs for the resurrection, the 'twinkling of the eye' is ALSO experienced by the dead, even if they have been dead 2000 years. Nobody experiences 'death', though most will experience dying. There is no knowledge in death. As far as the dead are concerned, 'in a moment, in the twinkling of the eye', they were alive, and then they are alive.
I believe, and I believe Ray teaches that ...the Lord Himself will be descending from heaven with a shout of command, with the voice of the Chief Messenger, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ shall be rising first and thereupon we, the living who are surviving, shall at the same time be snatched away together with them in clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. And thus shall we always be together with the Lord...is an actual future event.
However, the 'descending of the Lord from Heaven with a shout' and all these other things also happen in the lives of every believer Spiritually. That's my only concern, personally. In fact it may well be the case that, if they DON"T happen, then that person is not 'in Christ' at all, so this scripture does not apply to them.
I'm going with what Ray said above, and letting the 'futurists' and 'preterists' and the many flavors of both tribes duke it out with Hagee and Lindsey and Scoffield and company. It's one of the 'sexiest' subjects out there. Maybe once they get it all worked out, they can tell me what I'm supposed to do with that information. But I doubt it.