What About The Rapture?

[LindaR]

(05-12-2009 07:51 PM)sheep wrecked Wrote:  

Quote: stefanash:

I am solidly a post tribulation rapture believer. Therefore if I live through the events of the Geat Tribulation I expect to be martyred.

Thus any appeals to anything which justify a belief that we will not be massacred in our thousands or even millions come the day of trouble is to me false

I think perhaps there might be some misunderstanding on what the Day of Judgment is. Some believe it is the tribulation. I take the position that it is the Day of Judgment for all mankind, great and small, redeemed and unredeemed.

I am not sure why people are afraid of the tribulation. I get the impression that Christians who support the pre-trib rapture think that God would not let them suffer that way. But then I think of how the disciples suffered, and how people around the world suffer for the faith with persecution, torture, and being martyred and it makes me wonder why we would think we will not be here for the worst of it. It is a gift to be martyred for Christ, not something to shy away from.

Just my

In John 16:33 Jesus said:

These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. (John 16:33)

The tribulation and trials we all have as believers in Christ are not the same as the Tribulation that is going to overtake the world immediately preceding the Second Coming of Christ. Also, the Tribulation (different than "tribulation and trials") is God's judgment on the Christ-rejecting world...our daily "tribulations and trials" are simply due to the fact that we are still in our "flesh" and live in a "sin infested" world.

For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. (Matthew 24:21)

Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. (Matthew 24:29-30)

I don't believe the Day of Judgment is the Tribulation. There are actually five judgments:

1. The Judgment of the Cross:

Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:1-6)

For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. (2 Corinthians 5:21)

Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: (Galatians 3:13)

For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: (1 Peter 3:18)

2. The self judgment of believers:

For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world. (1 Corinthians 11:31-32)

For the believer who fails to judge himself: CHASTISEMENT (1 Corinthians 11:32). For the believer who does judge himself: FORGIVENESS (1 John 1:9).

3. The Judgment Seat of Christ:

This judgment is only for believers. This judgment has nothing to do with the believer's salvation because this has already been settled when the believer was saved. The issue involved in this judgment will be the BELIEVER'S WORKS:

But why dost thou judge thy brother? or why dost thou set at nought thy brother? for we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. (Romans 14:10)

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. (2 Corinthians 5:10)

Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God. (1 Corinthians 4:5)

Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing. (2 Timothy 4:8)

And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be. (Revelation 22:12)

4. The Judgment of the Nations:

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory: And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left. (Matthew 25:31-33)

This judgment occurs at the Second Coming of Christ preceding His setting up the Millennial Kingdom. The sheep (saved) enter the kingdom (Matthew 25:34) and the goats (unsaved) are eternally punished in fire (Matthew 25:41,46).

Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: (Matthew 25:34)

Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: (Matthew 25:41)

And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal. (Matthew 25:46)

5. The Great White Throne Judgment:

This is the great final judgment for all the unsaved people who have ever lived.

And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. (Revelation 20:11-15)

All sin was judged at the cross (for all mankind), but as Jesus promised in John 14:1-3:

Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. (John 14:1-3)