The relevance of prophecy to Christians in these days rests on their view of the rapture. Whether consciously or not, a person who believes they will rapture before the Tribulation, will probably not be that concerned with prophecy or events that are going to take place during the Tribulation. I don’t mean to paint with a broad brush and say that ALL Christians will feel this way, but certainly most will. The fact that a fourth to a half of the Bible deals with end times prophecy doesn’t seem to mean much in churches today where it is highly unlikely you will hear a message on the subject. Action follows belief and vice versa. If you strongly believe you will be gone, you are not likely to be concerned or do anything about it.

The teaching of the pre-tribulation rapture has the Lord coming for the church in a “secret” rapture prior to the tribulation and then coming with the saints at the end of the tribulation where they meet up with new saints that have been saved and martyred. The arguments for this position are not based on the clear teaching of the Word but supposition or what the scripture calls “private interpretation”. I’m not going to go into great detail. There are many excellent works on the subject by authors such as Dave MacPherson, Marvin Rosenthal, Robert Van Kampen and others that deal with all of the arguments pro and con for those who want to study the issue in detail.

We need to see the clear teaching of the Bible on this issue. There is no justification for two raptures. The plain reading of the Bible can only bring one to a single conclusion. There is the final trumpet, the Lord returns in the clouds and the church meets Him in the air. The main argument for the pre-trib position is that the church is “not appointed to wrath.” (I Thess. 5:9) They are absolutely correct. The problem is that they don’t understand the timing of events in Revelation. They also don’t understand that the church is always the object of wrath of the world and the “enemy” – although, we agree, never the recipient of God’s wrath.

Their failure to understand this distinction has led them into systematized error. If you look on Google or go to your local “Christian Bookstore”, you will see hundreds of books on the pre-trib rapture. What began as a little seed has grown to a huge tree with hundreds of oblique explanations for this false doctrine. The fact that proponents say there are people saved called “tribulation saints” after the church is raptured begs the question, why is God allowing them to suffer? What is different between them and me other than timing?

Why is this important?

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