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September 26, 2025 |
| Pre-Tribulation Rapture | ||
We've had another incident where a significant part of Christianity has participated in another episode of predicting an event that is called the Pre-Tribulation Rapture, and the prediction has failed.
You might think that Christianity would learn from the past failures but that doesn't seem to be possible with this group.
When someone predicts a date for this rapture, it seems like this group forgets everything they learned from the Bible. Their desire for it is so strong that thinking stops.
All through the episode and afterward, another group of Christians keeps shouting, "Jesus said no man knows the day or the hour." They are wrong as well. That isn't all that Jesus said about his coming.
If someday the Pre-Trib (Pre-Tribulation) crowd stops making predictions, the "no man knows" crowd will certainly miss the real rapture.
Then he will send his Angels and gather his elect ones from the four winds and the bottom of the earth even unto the top of Heaven. 28 But learn an allegory from the fig tree: whenever its branches are tender and its leaves bud, you know that summer has arrived. 29 Thus also whenever you see these things happen, know that it is near, at the door. 30 Amen, I say to you, this generation will not pass until all of these things will come to pass. 31 The heavens and the earth will pass away, and my words will not pass away.
Jesus has been describing a bunch of things that must happen before he comes again. The Pre-Tribulation Rapture people do not consider the Pre-Tribulation Rapture to be a "coming," so they can get around what Jesus says here. Jesus summarizes what he has said by saying, once you've seen all these signs, you will know his coming is "at the door", by which he means imminent. So there will be people who have a very good idea when that coming will happen.
32 But of that day and of that hour no man knows, neither the Angels of Heaven, neither the son, but the Father only. 33 Take heed, watch and pray, for you do not know when that time is. 34 It is like a man who traveled abroad and left his house and gave authority to his servants and to each man his work and he commanded the gatekeeper to be watchful. 35 Watch therefore, for you do not know when the Master of the house comes, in the evening or at midnight or at cockcrow or in the morning. 36 Lest suddenly he come and find you sleeping. 37 But what I say to you, I say the same to you all: "Be watching." (Mark 13:27-37)
Now Jesus says that no one will know the exact hour. Because of time zones, that also means no one will know the exact day.
People often twist Jesus' words here into meaning "no man ever will have the slightest idea when he will return." That isn't what he is saying.
Because the Pre-Trib idea is a Just-So story, there is no single theology behind it. The story can change in any way, just so it ends with "Jesus takes the believers to Heaven so they won't have to suffer in the Tribulation." In that, we see the hope behind the idea and the flaw in its followers. They fear for their lives and are making the Bible say what they want to hear.
They don't admit that though. When pressed on it, they say, "We aren't afraid to die; we believe the Pre-Trib idea because Jesus said we won't suffer." They believe they have found verses in the Bible that say what they want. They ignore all the verses that show otherwise and cling to that verse.
In most versions of the Pre-Tribulation Rapture, there is a second rapture that follows the Pre-Tribulation Rapture. This rapture is the one described in the Bible. The Pre-Tribulation Rapture is a secret or hidden rapture that can only be seen in the Bible if you interpret certain verses in certain ways.
Having two raptures creates enormous theological problems. Questions come up like:
The Pre-Tribulation Rapture idea is founded on two verses. Its supporters claim other verses also support the idea but those verses only say there is a rapture that happens along with the Second Coming. All views of the Second Coming agree with that so it isn't a point the Pre-Tribulation Rapture people can use.
Because God has not appointed us to wrath, but to the possession of life in our Lord Yeshua the Messiah, (1 Thessalonians 5:9)
The wrath that is spoken of here is the wrath of God, not the wrath of man. When Jesus returns, the believers rise to meet him in the air. From there he dispenses his wrath on the people of the Earth over a period of 10 days, called the Days of Awe. Paul is correct; we are not destined for that wrath.
Because you have kept the word of my patience, I also shall keep you from the trial that is going to come over the entire inhabited world, to test the inhabitants of Earth. (Revelation 3:10)
This statement is made to one of the Seven Churches in Revelation, the Church of Philadelphia. It is only made to one of those churches so it is specious to assume that every Christian for all time was given this promise.
It isn't clear what is being promised and what is being avoided by the promise. The Israelites were "kept" from the Egyptians by God dividing the waters of the Sea of Reeds, not by being raptured. Why would we think this verse is talking about being raptured? And what is this worldwide trial it speaks of? The only thing like it in prophecy is, again, the wrath of God. This verse lacks the clarity needed to support the Pre-Tribulation Rapture idea.
These groups that predict the date for a Pre-Tribulation Rapture do not consider how God views what they are doing.
In making such predictions, they attract the gaze of much of the world. And when it blows up in their faces, God and Christianity are blasphemed in the eyes of the world. They think, "I knew this was all fake."
Having had it blow up in their faces, you would think that the leaders who supported it would graciously fall on their swords. Instead of saying, "We were fools and we know nothing of God," and rejecting their leadership positions, they skulk away silently.