This morning while still in bed I heard a "different" sound and perked my ears up: is it the Lord coming to get us, the Body of Christ, His Church?
There is nothing I await with more happiness than this, when finally I will be Raptured and present at the Judgment Seat of Christ!
So why is it that so many SAVED CHRISTIANS find this to be a point of contention? I have had to Unfriend and even block two such who were so very militant and insistent that it will NOT be a Pre-Tribulation Rapture! They are wrong, but, this is not a doctrinal issue over which any would lose their salvation so there is no need to argue about this! They will just be very pleasantly surprised when they are Raptured but will miss getting the Crown of Righteousness of which Paul spoke for having anxiously awaited His blessed appearing!
Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.
2 Timothy 4:8 (King James Bible)
Hating the Rapture
June 7, 2011 David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 866-295-4143 end_of_the_skype_highlighting, fbns@wayoflife.org
Evangelical bookstores typically feature many writers who hate the doctrine of an imminent Rapture of the saints, in spite of the fact that it is plainly described in Paul’s writings and the early saints were living in expectation of it.“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: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).
“Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh” (Matthew 24:44).
“For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come” (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10).
James and Peter and John also taught that the Lord is at hand (James 5:9; 1 Peter 4:7; Revelation 1:3).
In contrast, consider the following heretical statements against the imminent return of Christ:
Tony Campolo hates dispensationalism and rejects the doctrine of Christ’s imminent return. He calls it “a weird little form of fundamentalism.” Speaking at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship’s annual meeting in June 2003, Campolo said: “That whole sense of the rapture, which may occur at any moment, is used as a device to oppose engagement with the principalities, the powers, the political and economic structures of our age” (“Opposition to women preachers evidence of demonic influence,” Baptist Press, June 27, 2003).
Brian McLaren mocks the “fundamentalist expectations” of a literal second coming of Christ with its attendant judgments on the world and assumes that the world will go on like it is for hundreds of thousands of years (A Generous Orthodoxy, p. 305). He calls the literal, imminent return of Christ “pop-Evangelical eschatology” (Generous Orthodoxy, p. 267) and the “eschatology of abandonment” (interview with Planet Preterist, Jan. 30, 2005, http://planetpreterist.com/news-2774.html). McLaren says that the book of Revelation is not a “book about the distant future” but is “a way of talking about the challenges of the immediate present” (The Secret Message of Jesus, 2007, p. 176).
Mark Driscoll mocks the idea of a Rapture for believers and a one-world government with an Anti-christ who makes people wear a mark to buy, sell or trade (Confessions of a Reformissional, pp. 49-50). He adds that this kind of end-time “mission” is not a message from Jesus but rather one “concocted from a cunning Serpent” (“Mark Driscoll Rejects McLaren but Embraces Contemplative,” Jan. 11, 2008, http://www.lighthousetrailsresearch.com/blog/index.php?p=931&more=1&c=1). Driscoll mocks the imminent Rapture. He claims that the Rapture doctrine is evidence of the sickness of American Christians and mocks those who have the goal of leaving “this trailer park of a planet before God’s tornado touches down on all the sinners” (The Radical Reformission, p. 78). He libelously calls dispensationalists “nutty, Christian, end-times-prophecy Kaczynskis” (p. 165). [Ted Kaczynski was the “Unabomber” terrorist who murdered three people and maimed 23 others in his 18-year-long campaign against modern technology.]
Dan Kimball describes how that he rejected dispensational theology and the doctrine of an imminent Rapture and moved to his current position that “the kingdom of God is here, now” (Listening to the Beliefs of Emerging Churches, pp. 87-90, 102).
Ed Stetzer says it is wrong to worry about whether the Rapture is imminent. “When the disciples had an inordinate interest in the end times, much like we do today in North America among evangelicals, Jesus said, ‘Do not get focused on that’” (Breaking the Missional Code, p. 40). Stetzer is referring to Acts 1:6-8, but Jesus was not talking there about the timing of the Rapture but about the coming of the kingdom of God. The disciples were expecting the kingdom to be set up immediately, but Jesus told them to focus rather on preaching the gospel and leave the kingdom to Him. This passage corrects the emerging church doctrine that we are building the kingdom of God in the world today, but it does not support the idea that we shouldn’t be concerned about the imminent return of Christ.
The rejection of the imminent Rapture is not a light matter.
As we have seen, Christ, Paul, James, and Peter taught that the return of Christ is imminent and is to be expected at any time (Mat. 24:44; Phil. 4:5; Jam. 5:8-9; 1 Pet. 4:7). The early Christians lived in expectation of Christ’s return the literal fulfillment of the prophecies (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10).
The doctrine of a pre-tribulational Rapture is a great motivator for purifying one’s personal Christian life.
It encourages the believer in trials and persecutions (1 Thessalonians 4:17-18). It keeps the church’s focus on the Great Commission (Mat. 28:18-20; Mk 16:15; Lk. 24:44-48; Acts 1:8). It teaches us that preaching the gospel, winning people to Christ, and establishing churches as the pillar and ground of the truth is the most urgent matter. D.L. Moody had it right when he said: “I look upon this world as a wrecked vessel. God has given me a lifeboat and said to me, ‘Moody, save all you can.’” The imminent Rapture motivates us to be busy in the Lord’s work (1 Cor. 15:58), to live obedient lives (1 Jn. 3:1-3; 1 Th. 5:4-7), and to separate from evil (Tit. 2:13-14).
How many conservative evangelicals and conservative Southern Baptists have torn down the idol of the hatred toward the biblical Rapture and removed the high places where this heresy has spread?
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Distributed by Way of Life Literature's Fundamental Baptist Information Service, an e-mail listing for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. Established in 1974, Way of Life Literature is a fundamental Baptist preaching and publishing ministry based in Bethel Baptist Church, London, Ontario, of which Wilbert Unger is the founding Pastor. Brother Cloud lives in South Asia where he has been a church planting missionary since 1979. OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY IS NOT DEVOTIONAL BUT IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR. This material is sent only to those who personally subscribe to the list. If somehow you have subscribed unintentionally, following are the instructions for removal. The Fundamental Baptist Information Service mailing list is automated. To SUBSCRIBE, go to http://www.wayoflife.org/wayoflife/subscribe.html . TO UNSUBSCRIBE OR CHANGE ADDRESSES, go to the very bottom of any email received from us and click "Manage My Subscription." If you have any trouble with this, please let us know. We take up a quarterly offering to fund this ministry, and those who use the materials are expected to participate (Galatians 6:6) if they can. Some of the articles are from O Timothy magazine, which is in its 28th year of publication. Way of Life publishes many helpful books. The catalog is located at the web site: http://www.wayoflife.org/publications/index.html. Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061. 866-295-4143 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 866-295-4143 end_of_the_skype_highlighting, fbns@wayoflife.org. We do not solicit funds from those who do not agree with our preaching and who are not helped by these publications, but only from those who are. OFFERINGS can be made at http://www.wayoflife.org/wayoflife/makeanoffering.html. PAYPAL offerings can be made to https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=dcloud%40wayoflife.org
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[Interesting info from Cloud. BTW, I recently saw this item on the net!]
ReplyDeletePRETRIB RAPTURE – HIDDEN FACTS !
How can the “rapture” be “imminent”? Acts 3:21 says that Jesus “must” stay in heaven (He's now there with the Father) “until the times of restitution of all things” which includes, says Scofield, “the restoration of the theocracy under David’s Son” which obviously can’t begin before or during Antichrist’s reign. ("The Rapture Question," by the long time No. 1 pretrib authority John Walvoord, didn't dare to even list, in its scripture index, the too-hot-to-handle Acts 3:21!) Since Jesus can’t even leave heaven before the tribulation ends (Acts 2:34,35 echo this), the rapture therefore can't take place before the end of the trib!
Paul explains the “times and the seasons” (I Thess. 5:1) of the catching up (I Thess. 4:17) as the “day of the Lord” (5:2) which FOLLOWS the posttrib sun/moon darkening (Matt. 24:29; Acts 2:20) WHEN “sudden destruction” (5:3) of the wicked occurs! The "rest" for "all them that believe" is tied to such destruction in II Thess. 1:6-10! (If the wicked are destroyed before or during the trib, who'd be left alive to serve the Antichrist?) Paul also ties the change-into-immortality “rapture” (I Cor. 15:52) to the posttrib end of “death” (15:54). (Will death be ended before or during the trib? Of course not! And vs. 54 is also tied to Isa. 25:8 which is Israel's posttrib resurrection!)
Many are unaware that before 1830 all Christians had always viewed I Thess. 4’s “catching up” as an integral part of the final second coming to earth. In 1830 this "rapture" was stretched forward and turned into a separate coming of Christ. To further strengthen their novel view, which the mass of evangelical scholars rejected throughout the 1800s, pretrib teachers in the early 1900s began to stretch forward the “day of the Lord” (what Darby and Scofield never dared to do) and hook it up with their already-stretched-forward “rapture.” Many leading evangelical scholars still weren’t convinced of pretrib, so pretrib teachers then began teaching that the “falling away” of II Thess. 2:3 is really a pretrib rapture (the same as saying that the “rapture” in 2:3 must happen before the “rapture” ["gathering"] in 2:1 can happen – the height of desperation!).
Other Google articles on the 181-year-old pretrib rapture view include “Famous Rapture Watchers,” "Pretrib Rapture Diehards," “X-Raying Margaret,” "Edward Irving is Unnerving," “Thomas Ice (Bloopers),” "Walvoord Melts Ice," “Wily Jeffrey,” “The Rapture Index (Mad Theology),” “America’s Pretrib Rapture Traffickers,” “Roots of (Warlike) Christian Zionism,” “Scholars Weigh My Research,” “Pretrib Hypocrisy,” "Pretrib Rapture Secrecy," “Deceiving and Being Deceived,” and "Pretrib Rapture Dishonesty" – all by the author of the bestselling book “The Rapture Plot” (see Armageddon Books).
Thank you, so very much, for visiting and commenting! You are thoroughly mixed up here! Please view the Pre-Tribulation Rapture series by Bryan Denlinger, http://rainhadocanto10-evangelicalchristian.blogspot.com/2010/11/pre-tribulation-rapture-by-bryan.html, who also presents the Post-Tribulation Rapture errors, http://rainhadocanto10-evangelicalchristian.blogspot.com/2010/11/post-trib-rapture-thieves-by-bryan.html.
ReplyDeleteVery good sermons to hear, the pro and the con! I have them all in this blog, you may copy and paste the above-given urls, or spell it out in the search box on the top right side.
Again, please listen to them and you will understand EXACTLY what Scripture says!
May God bless you!
The early church fathers, before the council of Nicea were pre-tribulation rapture believers. And then once people started being able to freely read the Bible again, guess what? The pre-trib rapture was again believed. So just because they didn't teach it during the Dark Ages, doesn't mean a thing. 1 Thess 1:10 - we are saved and rescued from wrath. From the whole 70th week of Daniel.
ReplyDeleteIndeed, harpazo, you are right on this!
ReplyDeletePity you follow a wolf in sheep's clothing such as Creflo Dollar, whom I find disgusting!
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