HOUSTON, WE HAVE PRECEDENT

Have you ever felt like giving up when it comes to comforting someone who is mourning, or brethren who are in a state of anxiety over what lies in their future? Well, that's exactly how I feel when it comes to reassuring my brothers and sisters that the Church will not go through any part of the Tribulation. I have shared Scripture showing that the Tribulation is the judgment of God on His people, Israel. That is why the seven year period is also known as the Time of Jacob's Trouble (Jer. 30:7), and Daniel's Seventieth Week (Dan. 9:24). God has promised the Church that He has not appointed it to experience His wrath, the description of the Tribulation (1 Thes. 1:10; 5:9). I have explained that John 14:1-6, 1 Corinthians 15:50-58, and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 clearly speak of believers rising to meet Jesus. After all of that, and more, I still have people challenge the Pre-Tribulation Rapture position, some even saying they are "concerned that the pre-trib position is being presented as derived from Scripture when it isn't." If there is one good thing about it, it is totally based upon Scripture. My pastor encouraged the adult Sunday School class to read it for that very reason.

Some have accused those who hold the Pre-Tribulation Rapture position as "escapists who jumped upon the bandwagon of John Nelson Darby (1800-1882)." Darby, although not the originator of the dispensational approach to interpreting the Scripture, is known as its "Father" because it was he who popularized the method of interpretation in the mid-1800's. His belief in applying a literal interpretation of the Word of God except in the case of metaphor, simile, parable, etc., and his insistence that the Church and Israel are two separate entities, led to the Pre-Tribulation Rapture view.

However, there is clear precedent in the Word for the belief in God's removal of the faithful before sending His judgment. Here are four examples:

Enoch "was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God" (Heb. 11:5).

Noah, along with his family, was lifted up in the ark before the world was destroyed the flood below (Gen. 7:17).

Lot and some of his family were told to leave the city, and the angels took them up into a mountain above the destruction below (Gen. 19:17).

Elijah's experience was similar to that of Enoch, in that he did not die. 2 Kings 2:11 says, "And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.

If God would do that for these four, why is it so hard to believe He will do it for His children?