Theological Musings

ecently, Brandon asked on his blog for feedback on whether or not we, his readers, felt that the Bible made a distinction between the rapture of the Church and the second coming of Christ. His post was appropriately entitled, “I’m opening a can of worms…want some?”

Since this blog has demonstrated time and time again how much I enjoy the taste of megadriles, I figured I would bite.

Now, I have to say that, by and large, I believe eschatology is something that should not in any way, shape, or form divide us as believers. It saddens me to see rhetoric in different camps making their viewpoint out to be the only possible interpretation of Scripture that is true to Scripture.

I also realize that many of my readers differ with me on this, and I do not see that as a problem. It’s fun to talk about, but this is not at all an issue to die on a hill for.

Several years ago, I had a conversation with someone who answered the question about the relationship between the rapture and the tribulation by quipping, “It would be nice if it’s pre-trib, I hope it’s no later than mid-trib, but I’m prepared if it’s post-trib!” And, then, of course, you have the comments on Brandon’s post, in which Alan Knox said that he’s a “pan-tribber”, in the sense that “it will all pan out in the end.”

Well, the reality is, it will pan out in the end. And there will be a point in time when the question is finally answered for good. But until then, all we have is the ability to deduce some ideas from what’s been revealed, and come up with reasonable conclusions. None of those conclusions, however, should be held to so strongly that we forget they are just deductions.

With that being said, I thought I would take a few moments here on my blog to share some of the reasons I switched from a pre-trib view to a post-trib view several years ago.

I had been challenged by someone to back up my pre-trib assertions. Specifically, I had made a comment that the rapture and the second coming of Christ were two different events. The person who challenged me asked me why I thought they were two different events. I responded with one of the main elements of pre-trib defense: the belief that no prophecy needs to be fulfilled in order for the rapture to take place. Therefore, the rapture is the next event on “God’s calendar”, so to speak, and must happen before the tribulation.

The response to this was to ask me to defend that from Scripture. I said that it had been a while since I had studied about it, and I would have to search for it and get back to them. (Any of my readers are welcome to prove it from Scripture for me, if they’d like to.)

As of this point, I have not found it. Within a couple of days and some sleepless nights trying desperately to find what I believed was in the Bible, I realized that not only had I not found it, but I had found other verses that seemed to actually indicate quite a different idea.

Allow me to start first of all by sharing what I found wrong with the key proof-texts I had always held to for a pre-trib rapture:

• 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 — this “classic” pre-trib proof-text doesn’t mention anything about the timing of the rapture with relation to the tribulation. It merely talks about how we will meet Christ when He appears in the clouds. Not only does it not specifically refer to a timing with regard to the tribulation, but it also goes on in the next chapter (1 Thess 5:4) to show that believers actually will be quite aware of when the rapture will take place. This was a far cry from the “secret rapture” idea that I had held to for so long.
• John 14:3 — Jesus says that if He goes, He will come again and receive us unto Himself, that where He is, we may be also. Technically speaking, Jesus does not say that He will come and get us and take us to heaven. Rather, He just says that He will come and we will be with Him wherever He is.
• Titus 2:13 — the “blessed hope” and “the appearing” are said by many to be two separate things. Therefore, the blessed hope must refer to the rapture. However, there are a couple of problems with this interpretation. One is that the grammar need not force two separate events. The Greek conjunction kai (translated as “and”) can also be translated as “even”. Therefore, a legitimate translation could be “the blessed hope, even the appearing”. In this sense, “the appearing” would be an amplification of what the blessed hope is, not a separate event from it. Additionally, “blessed hope” is not an event, but rather a description of an event. I believe that this lends more weight to the “and” being understood as an amplification of the meaning.
• 2 Thessalonians 2:1-2 — It is often stated that verse 1’s use of “the coming…and our gathering to Him” again refer to two separate events. However, problems definitely abound here. First of all, the same argument I used for Titus 2:13 could apply here. This need not be two separate events grammatically. Furthermore, the order of events (the “coming” and then “our gathering”) would seem backwards if Paul were trying to explain chronology of events here. Further still, Paul then goes on to explain in great detail how the “Day of the Lord” will not come until after the revelation of the “man of lawlessness”, the apostasy, etc. All of this focus seems rather strange if he was merely trying to assure them that they would not go through the tribulation.

In addition to finding the above difficulties with verses that were so often used in a defense of the pre-trib position, I came across some other things that caused me to change my tune completely.

It is often said that there are no “slam dunk” verses for any of the positions on timing of the rapture. In some sense, this is true.

However, there is one passage that, in my opinion, comes as close as a “slam dunk” for the post-trib position as one could come without a verse coming right out and saying “The rapture will occur after the tribulation”!

2 Thessalonians 1:6-10 — there are a couple of key things that I discovered in this passage that kept me from seeing the rapture and the second coming as two separate events.

• Paul is talking about the “relief” that will come to those who are enduring persecution for the sake of Christ. In verses 8 and 9, he says that relief will come “when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven…dealing out retribution to those who do not know God….” If the relief came seven years earlier, then Paul would not be able to say that the relief would come when Jesus dealt with the world in judgment.
• It is stated here that Jesus “will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire”. This sounds like the “second coming” to me.
• Verse 10 also states that it is on the day of judgment for the unbeliever that Jesus is “glorified in His saints…and…marveled at among all who have believed….”

There are also some similarities that I noticed between the description in Matthew 24:30-31 (referred to as M below) of what is always assumed to be the “second coming” and the description of the rapture in 1 Thess 4:16-17 (referred to as T below).

Consider this:

• M says that the “Son of Man [will be] coming on the clouds of the sky” and T says that “the Lord Himself will descend from heaven”
• M mentions Jesus sending forth “His angels” and T references “the voice of the archangel”. (By the way, the “shout” in T appears to be the voice of the archangel, not Jesus.)
• M mentions “a great trumpet” and T references “the trumpet of God”
• M mentions that His angels “will gather together His elect” and T says that we “will be caught up together with them”

I think it’s quite fair to say that Matthew 24:30-31 and 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 could very easily be referring to the same event. Now, notice in Matthew 24:29 that the events of 30 and 31 will happen “immediately after the tribulation of those days”. This lines up with Paul’s words in 2 Thessalonians 2 which I’ve already referenced above, saying that the coming of Christ and our gathering to Him cannot happen until events normally associated with the tribulation (revelation of the antichrist, etc.).

This is just a brief glance at some of the reasons I have adopted a post-trib view. Again, I recognize that many of my readers may (and probably will) differ with me. I know of some for sure (*cough*Gordon Cloud*cough*)

I welcome the differing opinions. And if I have erred in any of my explanations above, I hope that there will be corrections offered!

In this post, I have not attempted to answer some of the arguments made by some vocal pre-trib proponents (a well-known co-author of a well-known series of fictional accounts of a pre-trib rapture, for example!), such as how a post-trib rapture seems silly because it’s like a quick elevator ride up and back down, or how only the pre-trib position encourages holy living and evangelism.

I have not addressed these here because I wanted to actually deal with Scriptural reasonings for my position. If those straw men appear in the comments section, however, I will write another post to respond to them.

Until next time,

steve