rebuilder 454
Well-Known Member
1) been studying in eschatology for over 40 years and the only way I learned of "secret rapture" is from postribbers erroneously ascribing that word to what I believe.What is the Concept of a Secret Rapture? https://www.gotquestions.org/secret-rapture.html
The secret rapture—usually just called the rapture of the church—is the idea that Christ will come to take believers out of the world before His return with them at the second coming. The secret rapture is “secret” in that no one will see Jesus coming except believers; this is in contrast to the second coming of Christ after the tribulation, when “every eye will see him” (Revelation 1:7).
Response: The assertion that Christ will come for his Church "secretly" is not in Scriptures at all. The idea of a "2-stage" Coming of Christ is unbiblical. Christ is depicted as Coming, in Dan 7, as the Son of Man from heaven, descending to earth in order to establish God's Kingdom on earth. Jesus referred to this as the "last day" of the age.
Secret rapture is a term frequently used as a pejorative by those who deny the idea that the rapture of the church is separate from the second coming of Christ.
Response: If non-biblical arguments are being used to "assert things," rather than "prove them from Scriptures, then such assertions should be treated "derisively." They do not deserve a place in Christian teaching.
“One-coming believers” who deny the rapture put themselves in conflict with the Bible and biblical scholarship, as well as the majority of the evangelical world. Among the arguments they pose are that the word rapture doesn’t appear in the Bible. While it is true that the English word rapture doesn’t appear, the concept of the rapture of the church is certainly present.
Response: This is a diversion. Nobody is arguing the word "rapture" is in the Bible. The argument is whether a "Pretrib Rapture" is being taught in the Bible. It is not.
Neither is Pretribulationism the standard Evangelical belief in the Christian world. Evangelicalism began with the Protestant Reformation, and Pretribulationism did not exist until hundreds of years later in the United Kingdom under the teaching of John N. Darby.
Darby’s Dispensationalism, along with Pretribulationism, were exported to the US by his friends who were interested in Futurism, which is not in itself a problem for me. Darby’s cause was helped in particular by his association with Cyrus Scofield who included Pretribulational doctrine in his popular Scofield Reference Bible.
Dispensationalism has therefore filled an important place of interest in Christians who want to understand the "endtimes." Interest in the future is not, in itself, the problem. It was Darby’s version of the future that was the problem.
First Thessalonians 4:16–17 (the definitive passage on the rapture of the church) says that the Lord will descend from heaven and the dead in Christ will rise first; then we who are alive and remain will be “caught up.” The word rapture is derived from rapio (“to catch up or snatch away”), a form of which is found in the Latin Vulgate Bible. To say the rapture won’t happen because the word isn’t found in Scripture is a specious argument. The phrase second coming isn’t found in the Bible, either, but the reality of it certainly is.
Response: What is ignored here is that little phrase "the Lord will descend from heaven." It is *not* being said that the Lord *will not* descend from heaven, or come to the earth. Rather, it is saying he *will* descend from heaven, or come to the earth.
The problem is not whether the word “rapture” is there in the passage. Rather, the question is whether the concept of a Rapture is there in which the Church and Christ do *not* descend from heaven.
If Jesus "descends from heaven" he is coming to the earth. You can't leave heaven unless you land on the earth!
If so, the Rapture of the Church takes place when Christ emerges from heaven to come to the earth. It is a single event, and not spread out over a period of years!
When is the Rapture going to occur in relation to the Tribulation? https://www.gotquestions.org/rapture-tribulation.html
First, it is important to recognize the purpose of the tribulation. According to Daniel 9:27, there is a seventieth “seven” (seven years) that is still yet to come.
Response: This is not true. This is pure conjecture, and it doesn't make sense. A 70 Weeks period was established to lead to an end point at the end of the 70 Weeks. That end point was realized in Jesus’ generation, 70 Weeks of years after the decree of Artaxerxes was given in 457 BC. To extend this period beyond Jesus’ generation into the distant future makes no sense.
The 70 Weeks were intended to lead to the death of Christ, followed by the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, which took place in 70 AD. There is no future element to the 70 Weeks prophecy.
The primary Scripture passage on the rapture is 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18. It states that all living believers, along with all believers who have died, will meet the Lord Jesus in the air and will be with Him forever. The rapture is God’s removing of His people from the earth. A few verses later, in 1 Thessalonians 5:9, Paul says, “For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The book of Revelation, which deals primarily with the time period of the tribulation, is a prophetic message of how God will pour out His wrath upon the earth during the tribulation. It seems inconsistent for God to promise believers that they will not suffer wrath and then leave them on the earth to suffer through the wrath of the tribulation. The fact that God promises to deliver Christians from wrath shortly after promising to remove His people from the earth seems to link those two events together.
Response: That is not said at all. "Wrath," as defined in Scriptures is an expression of divine anger, and saints are often victims of the period of time in which this "wrath" takes place. To keep people from God's "eternal anger" is a given--we are liberated from eternal judgment. But to avoid the problems of tribulation in this life when we are called to live alongside pagans is beyond the scope of God's promises. Jesus said he will keep us from eternal judgment while we live on this present corrupt earth.
Another crucial passage on the timing of the rapture is Revelation 3:10, in which Christ promises to deliver believers from the “hour of trial” that is going to come upon the earth.
Response: The "hour of trial" took place in the time of the Apostle John. Philadelphia was an historical city where Christians had built a Christian community.
Sometimes Christians in various places are promised deliverance from certain trials. Noah was spared from the judgment of the world of his time. Jesus’ disciples were spared from the Roman judgment of 70 AD. None of this is all-encompassing to include all Christian experiences in history.
And it never involved a Rapture to heaven. The only 2 "raptures to heaven" in the Bible, Enoch and Elijah, were not deliverances, but rather, a testimonial to their faithfulness. It is a reward for the believer, as opposed to an escape hatch.
2 Thes 1 portrays the Coming of Christ for his Church as a vindication, rather than as an "escape hatch." If it is an “escape” at all, it is an escape from the mortality of this life, with its various sufferings, so that we can obtain our eternal hope of immortality.
But it is *not* an escape promised to believers every time God sends down judgments upon this sinful world. Even though we’re saved from God’s wrath as Christians, we continue to suffer God’s judgments upon this fallen world, whether wars, natural disasters, or illnesses and deprivations of various kinds.
2) the Antichrist, according to scripture ,kills everyone that doesn't receive the mark of the beast ,and that is during the tribulation, so that alone kind of muddies up any hope that there's a Rapture at the white horses coming.
3) Revelation 14:14 has three gatherings.
two of which are God's people, the Jewish believers. And that is during the tribulation. So no you can't have it both ways.
4) Matthew 24 vividly describes two separate comings by Jesus, one after the tribulation, One before the flood ,and before lot ,which is prejudgment pre-tribulation.
5) Five every single Rapture verse has a setting of peacetime Commerce and normal life. There is not any such of a thing as a rapture of 1Thess 4 at the white horses coming it is impossible.
So your deal is totally non scriptural.
