Theological Tuesdays: The RAPTURE
This week's "Word we hear in Church, but don't know much about it" is : RAPTURE.
Now the purpose of this weeks blog is not to examine matters of eschatological theory, that could be an entire dissertation for your Doctorate in Theology. In case your wondering, eschatology is the branch of theology which relates to the End Times/ Second Coming/ End of the World. We are going to look at the word "rapture" and define it and see how it relates to our Christian faith.
Rapture can be defined as the "catching up of believers by Christ at the time of His return." In other words the rapture is viewed as the time when Jesus returns back to earth and the believers in Christ are shipped straight on up to heaven before all that bad stuff mentioned in Revelation happens (some have differing views on this as well). You know, the seals, AntiChrist, headed beasts, and all that crazy stuff we don't talk about much in church.
Something important to note here. The word "rapture" is NEVER used in the Bible!! If you don't believe me, go to biblegateway.com and do a key word search for rapture and see how many results come popping back on the screen. Now some of yall are reading this and saying, "well, By George, haven't you read the "Left Behind" series? Obviously if you had then you would know that the Rapture does exist and all of us Christians are going to get whisked away into heavenly saftey while everyone else is left during the Tribulation and subject to all kinds of plagues and super nastiness."
To answer your question: No I've not read the Left Behind books and I don't really plan to. The one thing I do know is that the word Rapture is not used in the Bible. It's a term that we use a lot to describe a future event, and we aren't sure how its going to happen. Now this whole idea of a Rapture was probably first drawn out from 1 Thessalonians 4 and in particular v. 17. Others say that the Book of Revelation talks about a Rapture and tells us how the end of the world is going to happen. So if your interested in this topic do some research. I have a whole .pdf file of a Revelation Commentary. If you would like for me to send it to you, just contact me.
By now you should have an idea of what the word "Rapture" means or the event it describes.
So my challenge is this:
Where does the Rapture happen in Scripture? Is the Rapture mentioned in Revelation but in different terms? Is their even going to be a Rapture? Does it really matter?
I think that what is important to know about this term and how it relates to our faith, is that none of this really matters if we are saved and our faith is in Christ. We don't have to worry about how the world is going to come to an end. Our salvation is secure, or place is reserved in heaven, and so what, if we get stuck around down here on earth during all the Tribulation mess; we will be with Jesus one day!
You'ins comment now ya hear!
2 comments:
Here are some of my thoughts about all this. I still haven’t taken a firm or certain view on this, because its really not all that important as Chance mentioned, but right now I lean more towards the Amillenialism view.
Revelation 20 talks about the 1000 year reign. There are three views on this chapter.
Post-millennialism views that Christ’s return will be after the 1000 years, and during that time God’s kingdom will be established and expanded on earth (by Christians not Himself) and Satan will graduly be defeated, then Jesus will return after almost all sin is wiped out. Basically the world will become better and better up until the return of Jesus. This view is exactly opposite to how the end time is described scripturally.
Amillenialism views that the 1000 years is figurative and basically means along time in between Jesus’ first and second coming. The first coming was when he came to earth and died on the cross and defeated Satan (this does not mean that he is still not active). Then Jesus reigns from heaven for a long time in the hearts of the belivers (there is no physical 1000 year reign of Christ on Earth). The tribulation also occurs during this time. After this time is up, Jesus will return unexpectadly and in full view of everyone, and the Christians will go to Heaven with Him, and the unbelievers will be consigned to Hell and the material world will cease to exhist. You could say that the “rapture” is where the believers will rise to meet Jesus in the sky on Judgement Day, and is a minor part of the second coming.
Pre- millenialism views that Jesus’ second coming occurs before His literal 1000 year reign on earth and is preceed by the literal 7 years tribulation. Then there are 3 more views within the main view.
• Pre-trib which is where the Christians are “raptured” before the 7 year tribulation and don’t have to go through it. You can become a Christian after the rapture. After the 7 years, Jesus and the raptured believers wll come back and reign on earth for 1000 years.
• Mid – trib which is where the Christians are “raptured” at 3.5 years or midway during the tribulation.
• Post-trib where the Christian go through the tribulation before Jesus returns for his 1000 year reign on earth.
Here are some problems I have with Pre-millenialsim and Pre-trib espically. First it is a new teaching. As Chance mentioned it is not found in the Bible, and the ”rapture” was not taught until the early19th century by Darby and McDonald and all those people. Second, the verses that are used to support the rapture do not need a rapture to fulfill them. Third, when Jesus comes back it is described scripturally as one time and in full view of everyone. With a Pre-trib view there has to be two more comings, with one being a “secret” coming in which the Christians are raptured in secret. That just doesn’t make sence to me. I haven’t ruled out Post-trib yet, it follows scripure the most out of the Pre-millenialist view, but it doesn’t make sence why there has to be a literal reign on Earth. Anyway if you have any thoughts let me know.
Walk, I appreciate the comment man. I actually wanted to talk about all the different millenial views but that could have been a separate blog to itself. Thanks for putting all these descriptions up here for us to read. I think I would agree with ya on the Amillenial view, and I wouldn't be opposed to the Post-Trib view either. I can see how you can have that interpretation from Revelation. But anyways, I guess I'm not ever gonna say, "By golly, this is the way it is" Know what I mean, Vern? However I do think it is important for us to examine Revelation, study, search for insight and not run away from it, but not write all these books on it and preach sermons which say, "This is how the end of the world is going to happen."
You agree?
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