Article by: Kenneth J. Ester
Problems with the Post-Trib Rapture
The two most common positions on the rapture by a large margin is the Post-Tribulation and the Pre-Tribulation. Logically, only one of them can be right. As I am positive the Pre-Tribulation stance is right, I wrote this article to discredit the Post-Tribulation stance by revealing what I believe are the many problems it creates, both scripturally and logically.
When it comes to any doctrine in the Bible, including the rapture, it is of dire importance that we set aside biased beliefs and look for the truth. Not man's interpretation of the truth, but God's own truth. Most Christians, when they study, look for scripture to prove their beliefs right. When they find scripture that seems to support what they believe, they assume they are correct. The problem with this is that every false doctrine has scripture that is interpreted to support it. So just because you can interpret scripture to support what you believe, it does not mean that what you believe is correct. Instead of looking for scripture that supports what you believe, if you want the truth, you need to look at all the problems others have with what you believe and be able to give them a good logical or scriptural explanation for each problem. If there is a perceived flaw in what you believe, and you cannot explain it with clear scripture or logic, then you must consider the possibility that what you believe is wrong.
As a Pre-tribulation rapture believer myself, I have had many discussions, or shall we just call them debates, with Post-Tribulationists. No matter what they try to throw at me to show the Pre-Trib as false, I have no problem explaining to them why their argument is wrong. Any scripture they can give me to support another stance, I can make it fit the Pre-Trib as well. In my personal opinion, there is absolutely no flaw with the Pre-Trib stance for the simple fact that I can answer any question they put before me. Typically they all give the same flaws and it feels like I am constantly re-writing the same explanations over and over.
So in this article, I want to present the Post-Tribbers with the worst flaws of their stance. I am challenging the Post-Tribbers to go through these flaws and give a logical or scriptural explanation for each one. I would like explanations that are both, logical and scriptural as well. I have presented these to some in the past and their arguments to explain them are always flawed. They either contradict scripture or they throw logic out the window. So I want you to read each of these flaws and come up with a clear scriptural or logical answer for each. If you cannot answer them all, then don’t you have to ask yourself one question? Why can all of the points against the Pre-Trib be answered clearly, when all of the problems with the Post-Trib stance cannot be answered?
If I can answer all the problems with the Pre-Trib rapture, but you cannot answer all the problems with the Post-Trib rapture, and you insist on pushing the Post-Trib rapture anyway, that is absolute proof that you dont care about the truth. You only care about your pride.
As I list the problems with the Post-Trib rapture, you will find I will also quite often explain how the same thing works in the Pre-Trib rapture. Only it fits perfectly in the Pre-Trib rapture and not with the Post-Trib rapture. I will also sometimes address some of the common but flawed answers I have gotten for specific problems, hoping it will save some of the trouble of typing it all out over and over.
1) The Post-Trib rapture has no good logical reason to happen.
Jesus comes back in the second coming and raptures us in His descent. We are caught up into the sky to meet Him in the clouds. ... Just to be brought right back to where we came from? Scripture says that He sends forth angels to gather the elect. If this is the rapture of the saints, why wouldn’t the angels just take us to Mt. Olive where He will set foot? What is the purpose to catching us up to the clouds only to bring us back down again?
I have seen one attempt to make sense of it. They said that it is to prove to the world that He is Lord by showing the world His bride following Him. This is logically flawed because Revelation 19 clearly tells us the armies in heaven will follow Him back on white horses. Even if you deny against all clear reasoning that this army is the Bride, you cannot deny there is in fact an army that will follow Him back. Scripture also states that every eye will see Him when he comes in the second coming. So when everyone looks up and sees the Lord with a massive army behind Him, descending from heaven, there will be no doubt that He is Lord of Lords. Adding the saints in the rapture will not change that one iota. Catching us up to Him just to bring us back down to earth again, is still a completely senseless and useless thing to do. It serves nothing!
Another made a very bad attempt to say that we are not raptured up to Jesus but are taken to Mt. Olive where Jesus will set foot. Only Paul clearly states that we are caught up to Jesus in the clouds. In fact, Jesus clearly says that he will come back to receive us to Himself. So this was clearly just a Post-Tribbers desperate attempt to justify His beliefs.
For the Pre-Trib rapture, He is not coming to earth to fight in Armageddon yet. He comes only to receive us to Himself and take us to His Father's house, where He has prepared a place for us. Scripture clearly says that we will be spared the hour of testing that is coming on the whole world (Revelation 3:10). So he comes and gets His bride and takes us back to heaven, so the wrath of God can happen. But since He is not planning on returning all the way to the earth to fight Armageddon yet, He only comes in the clouds and catches us up to Him and takes us back. Even that has a purpose! Because after the rapture, there will be many who know the Bible but never believed who will recognize what happened. They will see the rapture as absolute proof that the Bible was real and turn to Christ. These will be the tribulation saints. The Christians who are persecuted in the end times. Some of the world will believe it was a mass alien abduction or make other excuses, but there will be many who will recognize the truth. If Jesus lets the entire world see Him coming in the rapture, it would not be seen as proof by some, it will be absolute proof to all. Since we are saved by faith, if He truly proved who He was to everyone, there would be no place for faith. Faith is to believe without proof. So by not coming to earth but only in the clouds, and catching us up to Him, though many will see it as proof, it will not be true proof because many will still be able to make an excuse for what happened in their own mind.
The Pre-Trib Rapture has a second reason as well.
Throughout the Old Testament, the same storyline happens over and over. God loves His people, the Jews. The Jews turn away from God and God allows them to go through tribulations of the world. Then when they turn back to God, He forgives them and protects them again. This happens multiple times. Then God sent His Son to them as their Messiah but they reject the Son. They kill the Son. So God puts a partial hardening on them until the fulness of the gentiles comes in (Romans 11:25) and offers salvation to the gentiles. For the last two thousand years it has been the gentiles, the church, the Bride of the Lamb, that the focus has been on. But the time of the Jews to be reconciled is coming still. God will not forget His people. So when every gentile who will be saved through faith alone is saved, God removes them from the picture and lifts the partial hardening from the Jews and then the Tribulation begins. A time set for the Jews to go through tribulations from the world once again to be reconciled to God. This time through them finally believing in His Son.
There are two logical and scriptural explanations for why there is a Pre-Trib rapture. Yet I have never heard a good one for the Post-Trib rapture.
2) Who are the dead who come to life in Revelation 20?
Revelation 20:4 NASB
4 Then I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their foreheads and on their hands; and they came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.
The very first thing that happens in Revelation chapter 20 is the devil is bound and locked in the abyss. So this is after Jesus has already returned in the second coming and defeated the armies of the world and cast the beast and the false prophet into the lake of fire. Then in verse 4 it starts off with, "Then I saw". Which means this happens "after" the devil is bound. What happens? He sees thrones and they sit in them. Who sits in these thrones? After this, John mentions the dead coming to life, but it cannot be them who sit in the thrones because they don’t come to life until after "they" sit in the thrones! So who are 'they' who sit in the thrones, and who are they who come to life?
Post-Tribulation believers will try to make this to be when the rapture happens but it simply doesn’t say that. In fact it cannot be the rapture! For one, it tells us specifically who they are. They are the ones who are beheaded because their testimony of Jesus and the word of God. They are the ones who do not worship the beast or take the mark. There are two reasons why these cannot be the dead coming to life in the rapture. 1) It does not mention any believers who die of old age or in accidents. It is 'only' those who died during the tribulation. 2) If they are the dead saints in the rapture, that would mean the living are the ones who sit in the thrones. But Paul specifically says the dead rise first and then the living. So if the dead rise first, it is impossible for the living to sit in their thrones before the dead even rise!
These are clearly those who died in the tribulation. It states that clearly! So if Jesus raptures us in His descent during the Second coming, why didn’t He rapture these dead as well? Jesus should be rapturing "all" believers! That they come to life after the second coming, they must have died after the rapture!
The Pre-Trib understanding is that the rapture happens before the tribulation. After the rapture, there will be many who know the Bible and just never believed who will be left behind. They will recognize what happened and see the rapture where millions of Christians suddenly disappeared as proof the Bible was true all along. They will then believe. Unfortunately for them, because they needed proof to believe, and missed the rapture, they will then have to prove their faith by not losing it while going through the worst 7 years this world has ever witnessed. Many will lose faith. Most of those who keep their faith will die, but not all of them. These are what we Pre-Tribbers call the "Tribulation Saints". Because they die after the rapture, they do not rise from the dead until after Armageddon is over. Those who come to life in chapter 20 are exactly who it says they are. The Saints who turn to Christ after the rapture and die during the tribulation.
The Post-Trib rapture does not fit this verse in a logical way. You need to believe it was more than just those who died in the tribulation and not like it says. You need to believe this scripture is out of order. Once again, it fits the Pre-Trib rapture 100% perfectly.
3) Who is in the Millennial Kingdom?
After the Tribulation is over, Jesus will reign on earth for a thousand years of peace. After the thousand years is up, the devil will be set loose for a short time and he will deceive the people and turn them against the Holy City. As the vast army covers the plains, God will rain fire down on them and kill them all. However, in the rapture, all believers will receive new glorified bodies. Once we are in these bodies, it will be impossible for us to sin or be deceived by the devil. So who are these in the Millennial Kingdom that are still in their flesh and blood bodies and are deceived by the devil and caused to turn against the Holy City? Just the action of turning against the Holy City will be a sin in itself!
Some believe they are unbelievers, but that just doesn’t fit. Jeremiah 25:30-33 tells us that all of the wicked will be killed. After Armageddon there will be a judgment of the goats and the sheep. This is where the Lord has all the inhabitants of the earth who survives the tribulation period gathered before Him. The wicked (unbelievers) are killed and cast immediately into the Lake of Fire. The believers (sheep) will be welcomed into the kingdom of God. However, they will not receive glorified bodies until the time comes when they finally die. At the start of the millennial kingdom, there will only be believers alive. It is their descendants who will not believe and question if the second coming ever happened. They are the ones who will be deceived by the devil. But at the start of the millennial kingdom, it will only have believers.
So if Jesus raptures all the believers during His descent in the second coming and gives them all imperishable bodies, who are the ones who live in imperishable bodies during the millennial kingdom? Yet we know for certain there will be death in the millennial kingdom. Isaiah tells us a child who dies at the age of one hundred will be thought to be accursed. That there are children, we also know there will still be reproduction. So these people cannot possibly have imperishable bodies yet. This is further supported by the fact the devil will deceive them when he is set free for a short time at the end of the thousand years. When he turns them against the holy city and God kills them all with fire from heaven. Clearly they do not have imperishable bodies yet.
We know for certain there will be people in flesh and blood in the millennial kingdom. We know for certain that they won’t be unbelievers. There is no clear logical answer a Post-Trib believer can give to explain this. They have to go against scripture and believe they will be unbelievers in the millennial kingdom.
And yet again it does fit the Pre-Trib stance perfectly and logically.
There will be a few Tribulation Saints who will survive the entire Tribulation. At the judgment of the goats and sheep, which happens after the second coming, all unbelievers will be cast into the lake of fire. The Tribulation Saints will be welcomed into the kingdom, but they will keep their flesh and blood bodies. Once they die naturally sometime during that thousand years, they will then receive their glorified bodies and enter the Holy City. Their descendants however will be living. With all the true eye-witnesses of the second coming now dead, it will become a myth to them. They didn’t see it happen so they have no reason to believe it really happened. They will be the ones the devil deceives.
4) The marriage of the Lamb and the army that follows Him back.
In Revelation chapter 19 we have the marriage of the Lamb. Let’s be clear from the start in order to eradicate one of their own arguments before they can try to use it here. This is the marriage of the Lamb. This is not the Marriage supper. The marriage happens first in heaven. The supper comes after in the kingdom on earth.
Scripture says the Bride is made ready and goes on to describe the bride as wearing "fine linen". It clearly says the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. So we know the bride here is in fact the saints; the church from the time of Jesus until the rapture.
Only a few verses later in the same chapter, on the same page, right after the marriage of the Lamb, we have the Lord prepared to return in the second coming. It says he will be followed by armies on white horses. It plainly states this army "is in heaven". It describes this army as wearing what? Fine linen, which it had just taught us that the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.
There is no doubt that the saints are the believers. The Bride is made up of the saints. We, the church, is the bride. We are the army that is in heaven who will follow Jesus back in the second coming on white horses. Of course, if we are following Him back in the second coming, then we cannot possibly be raptured in His descent, now can we?
Because of this problem, I have had people try to claim we are not the bride. That angels wear fine linen too (which scripture never once uses the words "fine linen" to describe an angel), and anything else they could think of to deny this scripture. All because they are willing to deny truth in order to hang onto what they believe.
It literally says the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. Thus the Bride is the saints and to argue against that is a ridiculous attempt to deny truth. It says the army is in heaven. It says they are wearing fine linen, which it also just said was the righteous acts of the saint just a few verses earlier. Not in another book. Not in another chapter. Only a few verses earlier!
5) 2 Thessalonians 2
Interestingly, I quite often see Post-Tribbers attempt to use this scripture to prove their stance, never realizing how, from the Post-Trib view, it doesn’t even make logical sense. Their mistakes are basically always the same mistakes over and over.
Paul states right from the beginning that this letter is in regards to the rapture. There is no denying that and I wouldn’t ever dream of trying to deny it.
The first problem here is the translation of the KJV Bible. I know there are a lot of KJV purists who think it is the only trusted version and it is perfect. My advice would be to put your conspiracies away and try investigating the KJV Bible once. It is not perfect and even the original scholars who translated it wrote a preface in the first edition admitting it has flaws. They literally say that if we ever want the perfect Word of God, we need to continue working on the translations. They did this because they knew it was not perfect yet and they were pressured to release their version sooner than they wanted to. There are multiple places the translation is flawed and on top of that, the usage of the 1600's style of speaking makes it even harder to understand. Which leads to misunderstandings. In some cases the words it uses don’t even have the same meanings as they have today.
In this case, the KJV uses the term "day of Christ" in the third verse. In 1611, all of the oldest manuscripts used that term and so they were correct to use it. However, since 1611, we have gained thousands more manuscripts and today all the oldest manuscripts actually use "day of the Lord". Most scholars agree that likely when someone was copying it, they thought the "day of Christ" fit better and never thought it would make a difference. Unfortunately, there is a huge difference!
If you look each term up in the Bible, you find they are almost opposite terms. Every time the "day of Christ" is used, the context is referring to the rapture, or the second coming. Every single time the "Day of the Lord" is used, it is referring to God's anger, or God's wrath. Not just most of the time. Every single time! So when Paul was saying two different things must happen before the day of the Lord comes, he was speaking of the great day of God's Wrath. The same one Jesus refers to as "the hour of testing that is coming upon the whole world." Post-Tribbers want to believe he is saying that the apostasy and the revealing of the antichrist must happen before the rapture happens. In all honesty, early in my studying, I thought the same thing, but the truth is, that is not what Paul is saying. He is saying that those two things must happen before the day of Gods wrath can happen.
If you really want to know which is true, all you have to do is look at it with logic. Paul teaches that we should look forward to the rapture and second coming both. The Bible never speaks of either of those events as things Christians should fear. So if Paul was saying the rapture cannot happen until those other events happen first, ask yourself one question. Why was the church in Thessalonica so upset that the rapture was at hand, that Paul had to write and settle them down? It is simply illogical to think this church was all upset over the news that the rapture was about to happen.
Some have tried to say that it doesn’t mean the rapture is about to happen but that they missed the rapture and second coming. But I know this is incorrect for one reason. Scripture is very clear that when the Lord returns in the second coming, every eye will see Him descending. So if they have not seen the Lord in the sky, then they already know they have not missed it. So we know for certain they did not believe they missed the rapture if they believed in a post-tribulation rapture.
Post-Tribulationists need to believe the church of Thessalonica was all upset that the second coming was about to happen, and that simply doesn’t make any logical sense. But it makes perfect sense from a Pre-Trib rapture view.
The church believed in a pre-'day of wrath' rapture. When they received a letter as if from the apostles stating that the day of the Lord was at hand, it could mean only one thing. They either missed the rapture or the apostles were wrong to tell them the rapture would be before the day of God's wrath. Now they would have to go through the Wrath of God. A very good reason for the church to be upset. So Paul had to write them a letter. Not to scold them for being upset that the rapture was about to happen, but to let them know that they had not missed it and the apostles were not wrong, because the day of the Lord was not at hand as they were falsely told. Paul's letter paraphrased would go something like this...
In regards to the rapture, do not be deceived by a letter as if it was from us that the day of the Lord was at hand. Don’t you remember what I taught you before? That the day of God's wrath cannot happen until first the apostasy happens and the man of lawlessness is revealed. You know the one I am talking about, he is the one who will enter the temple and claim to be God. Since the day of God's wrath is clearly not at hand, you have no worry about missing the rapture.
As with each of the other problems I have mentioned, the Post Tribulation view simply does not fit logically. However from the Pre-Trib stance, it fits absolutely perfectly with plain logic.
6) It happens before God's Wrath.
There are multiple scriptures that tell us the Lord will return to save us from wrath. (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, Romans 5:9, Revelation 3:10) Though these verses do not necessarily show a Pre-Tribulation rapture, what they do show is that Jesus does not come and rapture us at the Second Coming. He raptures us before the wrath of God.
Now the quick answer from most Post-Tribulationists would be either, A) The Wrath of God is hell. B) The wrath of God happens after Jesus returns.
First off, there is no reference in the Bible to support the day of God's wrath is hell. The closest it comes to that is there is a verse saying we are saved from wrath and then mentions salvation. So they assume the wrath is the opposite of salvation. Christians do way too much "assuming" when trying to interpret the Bible. That scripture does not refer to it as the "day of the Lord" or the "day of God's wrath". It just says we are saved from wrath. You cannot assume it is speaking of the day of Gods Wrath just because it uses the word "wrath". The Bible literally tells us when the Wrath of God begins. In the 6th Seal it tells us plainly that the people great and small are hiding in caves and they say "Their Wrath has come". The day of God's wrath begins in the 6th Seal.
Even more interesting is that the Bible also tells us plainly when the wrath of God is finished. In Revelation 15:1 it tells us that the wrath of God is finished in the 7 angels who are given the seven bowls. So the day of the Lord, God's Wrath, begins with the 6th Seal and it ends with the 7th Bowl. The 7th Bowl is the second coming.
Many try to argue that the 6th Seal happens later in the tribulation. That all the Seals, Trumpets and Bowls happen at the same time. Again, this belief is based off nothing more than man's idea and actually is impossible according to scripture. All of the Seals, Trumpets and Bowls are events that will happen. The event of the 7th Seal is quite literally the handing over of the seven trumpets to the seven angels. Since they don’t even get the trumpets until the 7th Seal, it is literally impossible for them to sound any of the trumpets before the 7th Seal is broken.
None of this is some crazy interpretation. It is all what scripture states plainly. God's Word literally says the day of God's Wrath starts in the 6th Seal. It literally says the seven angels who receive the seven bowls are the finish of God's wrath. When you read everything that happens in the 7 Trumpets and the 7 Bowls, there is simply no logical way it can all happen after Jesus returns. Since the rapture is before the day of Wrath, it must happen "before" Jesus returns in the second coming.
7) The disciples taught an imminent return.
As you read through the Bible, there are places where the disciples believed the Lord could return at any moment. They taught an imminent return, but from a post-tribulation point of view, that would be completely senseless. If the rapture happens at or near the second coming, there are simply too many things that will have to happen before the rapture happens.
A) The revealing of the antichrist.
B) The antichrist enters the temple and claims to be God.
C) The antichrist kills the two witnesses.
D) The False Prophet and antichrist pushes the mark of the beast.
E) World War (Seal-2)
F) The first 6 Trumpets and the first 6 Bowls!
Every one of these things are prophesied to happen before the second coming. So if the rapture happens at the second coming, then logically they must happen before the rapture. Until you see all of these things happen, it is completely senseless to be looking for His return. Yet the apostles did seem to believe in an imminent return.
Philippians 3:20
20 For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;
1 Thessalonians 1:9-10
9 For they themselves report about us as to the kind of reception we had with you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God, 10 and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is, Jesus who rescues us from the wrath to come.
Titus 2:11-13
11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people, 12 instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously, and in a godly manner in the present age, 13 looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus,
James 5:7-8
7 Therefore be patient, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early and late rains. 8 You too be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near.
1 Peter 1:13
13 Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, set your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Revelation 3:11
11 I am coming quickly; hold firmly to what you have, so that no one will take your crown.
The thing you need to remember, is that the writers of the books in the New testament were not writing with the idea that everyone would be reading them 2,000 years in the future. When they said these things to their churches, it was because they meant these words for their churches. They actually believed they could still be alive when the Lord came for them. Why would they have written as if the Lord would return in their lifetime, if they knew that so many things would need to happen before that was possible? From a Post-Trib stance, it makes no sense!
The only thing that fits logically is that they knew the Lord was coming for us at an earlier time to take us back to His Father's house, and then returning to earth after the Tribulation. Only with that understanding would they write as if the Lord can come at any time, even knowing certain things must happen before He could return at the end of the tribulation.
8) How is the change in salvation rules fair?
This is one that most Post-Tribulationists won’t agree with because most of them also believe that works takes part in our salvation.
The one subject I have studied more in depth than the rapture, is salvation. Every doctrine in the Bible is supported by what I call "Primary scriptures". A primary scripture is any scripture that is so clearly stated that it only has one logical interpretation. If you can come up with an alternate interpretation that logically fits the words and does not contradict another primary scripture, that verse becomes only an interpreted verse. Every doctrine is supported by 1 to 3 primary scriptures. Salvation has 19 primary scriptures. Think about that. 19 verses that literally tell us 'how' we are saved. All of them agree that we are saved by believing in Jesus. There is not a single primary scripture in the Bible that says we are saved by any other means. Jesus even says it plainly in John 3:18 when He says "He who believes is not condemned. He who does not believe is already condemned, because he does not believe in the only begotten Son of God."
He breaks everyone into only two groups here. Those who believe and those who do not. Believers are saved. Unbelievers are going to hell. To bring works (anything we must do intentionally) into it in any form, is to make what Jesus says in John 3:18 wrong. I dont care how many scriptures you can interpret to mean something else, if they contradict what Jesus states very plainly, your interpretation is wrong.
So for 2,000 years, millions are saved and the only thing they had to do to get to heaven is believe in Jesus as their Lord. Suddenly in the end times that’s not enough. They still have to believe, but they now also have to refuse to take the mark of the beast. How fair is that?
The mark of the beast will make it so nobody can buy or sell anything without it. That includes food. Try to imagine a man who is a true believer in Christ. He is watching his wife and 3 year old daughter slowly starve to death. Their ribs are showing through and their faces are looking gaunt from hunger. He knows if he takes the mark he will go to hell, but at the same time, if he takes the mark, he can buy food for his wife and child. He breaks down and takes the mark to save his loved ones, hoping that God will see it as a noble sacrifice. And for that moment of weakness, he is going to hell. While ten years earlier his own dad was a drug addict who believed in Jesus, but he never understood how important it was to work on his relationship with the Lord. He continued to do drugs while he still read the bible and prayed. To get the money for the drugs he sometimes stole from others. One day he died of an overdose, but because he truly believed in Jesus as Lord, he still went to heaven.
Most Post-Tribbers don’t believe the man's dad would have gone to heaven. That is because they have been taught false doctrines about salvation. They believe that if we sin and it is not forgiven, we go to hell, even though scripture actually does not teach that. Over and over scripture states plainly that we are saved by believing. It never once says that a believer will go to hell if they sin. At least not until Revelation where believers who take the mark will go to hell.
Somewhere along the line, the rules of salvation change. All believers go to heaven, and then suddenly only the believers who deny the beast and his mark go to heaven.
The only way this change in the rules of salvation works, is through a pre-trib rapture. Because there will be a point of time when every believer who will believe through faith alone is saved. The fullness of the gentiles has come in. Then the Bride (saints) is raptured. After that, every single person who turns to Christ will do so only because they saw proof that the Bible is true and Jesus is Lord. They will see the rapture happen. They will see the antichrist revealed. They will see the mark of the beast issued. These things will cause them to believe, but because they needed absolute proof in order to believe, they need to prove their faith to be saved. The Pre-Trib rapture is the only stance that works with the sudden change in salvation rules.
9) It means that God abuses His own children.
Another argument Post-Tribbers try to make against the Pre-Trib stance is that throughout history, God has never removed His people from tribulation. He has always let them go through it. He let the Jews be enslaved by Babylon, by Egypt and then the Romans. He let the Nazi's kill them off during the Holocaust. So they say there is no reason to believe God would remove the church to save it from the tribulation.
Their mistake is in not recognizing the difference between the Tribulation, which is Daniel's 70th week, and the day of God's wrath.
The tribulation is more about the Jews than anything. Its purpose is to reconcile the Jews back to God again. The Christians will be caught up in it. God does not have a problem letting Christians go through tribulation from the world because it gives them a chance to show their faith and earn rewards. But what God does not do and never has done, is abuse His own. And that is exactly what the day of God's Wrath is about. It is God pouring His wrath out on the world. He is not going to abuse His own children so He removes them before His wrath begins. Which is in the 6th Seal.
To believe that the children of God, His saints, the Lords own Bride will go through the day of Gods wrath is to believe God will abuse His own Children. The Lord will abuse His bride.
If you want Biblical precedence for this, look at Noah. The flood was not tribulations from the world. It was wrath from God himself. So God had Noah build an ark to keep him and his family safe. You can also look at Lott being told to leave the city before God destroys it. Every time the tribulation is from the world, God allows His people to go through it. However, the truth is, every time the event is from God's own hand, He removes those who are true to Him from danger.
10) You have to take things out of order to make it work.
In my studies of Revelation, God has revealed to me that the book can be broken down into sections.
Ch.1 Introduction
Ch.2-3 Letters to the churches
Ch.4-5 Scene in heaven
Ch.6-16 Follows the World through the entire end times.
Ch.17-18 Destruction of great Babylon, the one world religion.
Ch.19+ Follows the Bride through the entire end times.
The 3rd and 6th sections take us through the end times. Once from the eyes of the world and once from the view of the Bride. Every event that each will witness or go through, all in perfect chronological order.
The Post-Tribbers cannot keep things in order. It doesn’t work. They are forced to rearrange God's word in order to make it fit their stance, while Pre-Tribbers only follow what Gods word says in perfect order. When you have to rearrange Gods word in order to make it fit, something is definitely wrong with what you believe.
11) Days of Noah
Matthew 24:36-41 NASB
36 “But about that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. 37 For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. 38 For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, 39 and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be. 40 At that time there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. 41 Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left.
I have heard different theories from Post-Tribbers to show how this verse either supports their belief or contradicts the pre-trib stance. Yet they always seem to either ignore an obvious part of the scripture, or they add ideas to the scripture.
One common argument I see is that in the days of Noah, the Nephilim were alive. They were giants some believe were spawned from angels mating with women. So they will argue that when the rapture happens the sin will be so prevalent that science will be mixing man and beast. This idea fits in with the conspiracist group of Post-Tribbers. Nowhere in this scripture does it even mention the Nephilim and so it is wrong to just toss them in there for no real reason.
The other argument is that "like in the days of Noah", means that the floods came and took the wicked away. Not that it removed the Godly. However, when you really look at the wording, it can be interpreted to go either way. It can be said to mean the wicked were taken away by the floods, or one could just interpret it to say that the floods came and took Noah and his family away while everyone else drowned. Since it can technically be interpreted either way, it is wrong to say it only supports one way.
The truth is, this scripture actually tells us exactly what it means by "in the days of Noah". The verse right after that tell us, for in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking and marrying. In the gospel of Luke, it goes even further to say they were buying and selling and planting and building. This scripture is simply telling us that in the days of Noah and of Lott, the people were warned and they ignored the warnings. They went on with their lives like everything is normal. Then the fire came and destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Then the floods came and destroyed the wicked. By the time they realized the warnings were for real, it was too late for them. In the days of the rapture, the wicked will go on like everything is normal. They will not take heed of the warnings from the Christians that the rapture would happen. Then when the rapture happens and they realize it is all real, it will be too late.
When you understand what this scripture is saying without ignoring its own explanation, or without adding ideas to it, it becomes simple. It also fits the pre-trib rapture perfectly. In fact it makes it clear that the post-trib rapture isn't logical.
When you study everything that happens in the end times. Especially the Seals, Trumpets and Bowls, you realize just how much chaos is going to fall on this world. World War 3 will escalate into an all-out nuclear war. The nukes will cause the tectonic plates to shift and cause massive earthquakes all around the world. They will cause great tsunamis as well. Volcanos will erupt. We cannot forget the persecution of the Jews and Christians that will be worse than any time in history. By the time the Second Coming is here, over half the world’s population will be dead. That is around 4 billion people who will die inside a few years. This world will be in utter chaos. It will be anything but normal! There is absolutely no logic in knowing all the destruction that will happen in the end times and to think that everyone will be going on with life like everything is normal. When half the people you know are dead, you will not be going on with life like its normal. But if the rapture is Pre-Trib, none of that happens yet. Everyone will indeed be going on with life like everything is normal. And again, the scripture fits the pre-trib stance perfectly. It fits it scripturally and logically. It does not truly fit the Post-Tribulation rapture.
12) The Post-Trib stance needs to rearrange everything.
As I keep saying, every event fits the Pre-Trib stance perfectly and in perfect chronological order. Far too often the Post-Tribbers need to rearrange the order of events in the Bible to make their stance work.
* The church is in heaven in Revelation 19:1-6. Post Tribbers say the church isn't raptured until the second coming at the end of chapter 19.
* Revelation 19 had the marriage of the Lamb happening in heaven just before the second coming. Post-Tribbers say it has to happen on earth after the second coming.
* They believe the rapture is at the second coming, so the dead who come to life in Revelation 20 must be out of order.
If you have to rearrange God's word to fit your beliefs, the likelihood is that you are more focused on supporting what you believe than you are to believe the truth of God's word. The truth should fit God's word without having to rearrange it. Simple logic would state that if there are two interpretations and one follows everything in perfect order, and the other has to rearrange everything to make it fit, likely the one that is in perfect order is the one that is correct. It is wrong to force God's Word to fit your beliefs.
13) The arguments supporting the Post-Trib rapture are too few and weak.
I have only found a total of 4 arguments that support the Post-Trib rapture. Multiple times now I have gone into groups where Post-Tribbers argue with pre-tribbers and listed the four arguments and then asked if anyone can please give me a 5th argument that supports the post-tribulation rapture. Nobody ever gives me a new argument. Instead, all they do is attack the pre-trib belief. Four arguments that support what they believe. Just four! To make things worse, all four of these arguments are extremely weak at best.
In this next section, I will give all four arguments and explain why they are weak arguments. I will not attempt to prove it wrong outright, but I will show their reasoning is flawed. Their argument is not based on scriptural fact, but only on their biased interpretation of scripture. I will show how every scripture they use to support their stance can also be used to fit the Pre-Tribulation rapture just as well if not better.
Mark 13:24-27 Argument
Mark 13:24-27 (NASB)
24 “But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light, 25 and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken. 26 And then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. 27 And then He will send forth the angels, and will gather together His elect from the four winds, from the end of the earth to the end of heaven.
Post Tribbers read this and look at only two things. 1) It says it happens immediately after the tribulation. 2) The Lord sends forth His angels to gather the elect. By putting these two points together, they see the rapture (gathering of the elect) happens immediately after the tribulation (Second Coming). At first glance, to anyone who has not actually studied it all, this is a sound argument. The problem is, this argument only holds water if it does not fit the Pre-Trib stance as well. If this scripture can logically and scripturally fit the Pre-Trib stance, then it cannot be used to claim the Post-Trib stance is true. Evidence that fits both sides cannot be used as proof for either side.
The "elect" in the Bible, is any true Believer. Just like the word "People" would include every homosapien. However, with People, they can be split into many different sub-groups. You can break them down into races like Caucasian, Asian and many others. You can break them down into male and female. If a boat full of Japanese people was sinking and the coast guard saved them. Then the news reported that all the people were saved, it would still be correct. The word Elect includes any true believer, but true believers can be broken down into sub-groups as well.
Bride: Every believer from the day Jesus died on the cross to the rapture. These are all of the true believers who believed in Jesus as Lord without needing any real proof.
Tribulation Saints: After the rapture, there will be some people who know the Bible, but just never believed. When millions of people suddenly disappear and all of them are Christians, they will know what happened. The rapture will be absolute proof in their eyes. They will then turn to Christ. They will show others the evidence and win more over. These Believers who needed proof in order to believe will be the Tribulation Saints. However, because they needed proof in order to believe, they will need to prove their faith by keeping their faith in the tribulation.
144,000 Jews: At one point in the End Times, there will be 144,000 Jews who will be sealed on their foreheads. They will be Jews who turn to Christ during the Tribulation but dedicate themselves to Him so strongly they stay virgins and do not lie or anything.
These are three different groups of true Believers. All of them are considered the elect, but they are split into three groups.
In this scripture where Jesus sends forth His angels to gather His elect, it is not the Bride, because they are already raptured. It is not the Tribulation Saints because they come to life after Armageddon in Chapter 20. It is only the 144,000 Jews who are gathered.
The rapture happens pre-tribulation. The 144,000 of the Elect are gathered after the Tribulation during the Second Coming. They will not be gathered to Jesus in the sky. They will be gathered and taken to Mt.Olive where Jesus will set foot. Then they will follow Him everywhere he goes.
Now of course, Post-Tribbers will argue against this because it does not fit their beliefs. That is expected. However, the fact still remains. This scripture can be shown to still fit the Pre-Trib Rapture absolutely perfectly. Thus, this scripture does not prove the Post-Trib rapture is correct in any way. It is a weak and flawed argument to support the Post-Trib rapture.
The Last Trumpet Argument:
1 Corinthians 15:52 (NASB)
52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.
According to Post-Tribbers, this verse proves the rapture is after the tribulation because it plainly states it happens at the last trumpet. They believe the "last trumpet" is the 7th Trumpet in Revelation. Which is understandable since the 7th Trumpet of Revelation is literally the victory of the Lord in the second coming. Their mistake is in believing the "last trumpet" has anything to do with the seven trumpets in Revelation at all, when there is nothing else in 1 Corinthians 15:52 to make that connection. I mean, other than the simple fact they use the same word "trumpet" in the verse.
Again, if this is looked at by someone unknowledgeable, it looks like sound reasoning. To me? It doesn't fit. First off, Paul would be saying that the rapture happens at an event that is not mentioned anywhere in scripture until John sees the visions years later on the island of Patmos. That doesn't make sense. The 7 Trumpets in Revelation were prophecies that no other book mentions. Why would Paul be referencing something that isn't known yet? Do you know what would make perfectly logical sense? If Paul was actually referencing the same kind of trumpet that he had just written about one chapter earlier in the same letter.
In 1 Corinthians 14, John is teaching about gifts of the Holy Spirit and tells us that when speaking in tongues it must have an interpreter and such. He goes on to use the example "If a trumpet produces an indistinct sound, who will prepare himself for battle?"
Throughout history, armies have always used trumpets and other horns to relay signals to the soldiers. One sound will tell them to assemble, and another might mean to charge in battle. It just so happens to be that when we are raptured, it is literally the last time a trumpet will be sounded to assemble an army for God. I had explained earlier in this article about the marriage of the Lamb. How the Bride is the armies which are in heaven who will follow Jesus back in the second coming. The rapture happens at the last trumpet. It is the last time an army is called by God. It is the last time that sound of the trumpet is ever used by God.
I personally believe that because Paul had just written about this only one chapter earlier, this is a more logical understanding for the last trumpet than believing Paul was referencing something that is not once written about until John writes Revelation years later. If it was never written about, we have no reason to believe anyone even knew about it. But in the very least, this explanation means that once again, the argument supporting the Post-Trib rapture is only according to their own interpretation and assumption that the last trumpet is the 7th Trumpet. This argument is no stronger than to say, it is the Post Trib rapture because I said so. Very weak at best.
God doesn't Save us from Tribulation Argument:
I cannot even count how many times I have seen this argument made. The truth is, they are right. God does not tend to save His people from tribulations of the world. God has no problem allowing us to go through tribulations of the world. It gives us opportunity to show our faith. The reason this argument is weak is because it assumes that because we call ourselves Pre-Tribulation rapture believers, it means we believe it is the Tribulation that God spares us from.
Sadly, there are many pre-tribbers who think that for the same reason, but its not correct. We aren't saved from the tribulation. We are spared the wrath of God. Though God has no problem allowing us to go through tribulations of this world, what God does not ever do is beat His own children. The Lord is not going to abuse His own Bride.
Every time there is tribulations from the world in the Bible, God allows His people to go through it. Every time the event is by God's own hand, like the flood or Sodom and Gomorrah, God removes His faithful to a safe place. God never abuses His own! So the whole argument that the Post-Trib is right because God doesn't spare us from Tribulations is absolutely flawed. It is wrong because its not the Tribulation we are saved from. It is Gods own wrath we are spared. Which begins in the 6th Seal and ends with the 7th Bowl.
The fourth argument:
The only other argument to support the Post-Trib rapture that I have found is that Jesus tells His disciples "Then they will hand you over to tribulation and kill you." which fits right in with the fact Jesus does not pray for God to remove them from tribulation, but to keep them strong through it.
First off, in both of these cases, Jesus was not speaking to all believers. He was speaking to His disciples personally. What they would go through and praying for them specifically. Neither case has anything to do with the end times yet.
Secondly, as I pointed out. It is not the Tribulation we are spared. It is God's Wrath. Jesus never says that God will do any harm to them. Jesus never prays for the Father to not abuse them. Because He knows He won’t!
These are the simple facts. Most Post-Tribulationists believe they have the clearest and most logical stance, but only because they have never truly compared the two systems side by side. When you really look at both beliefs, you find that the Pre-Trib stance has the strongest case and its not even close.
Pre-Trib has 11 different arguments that support it compared to only 3 or 4 for Post-Trib. All of the Post trib arguments are based solely on their interpretation of scriptures that also fit the Pre-Trib stance as well. Pre-Trib even has a more logical explanation for 'why' we are raptured. The Post-Trib stance needs to rearrange so much of God's word to make it fit while the Word is in perfect Chronological order for the Pre-Trib stance.
Post-Tribbers will read this and get upset. They will likely post comments trying to counter these things. Some of their arguments will sound logic. But this is what I want you to pay attention to. Do they give sound logical and scriptural arguments, not for one or two of these problems, but are all of the problems addressed? Because if there is even one problem that cannot be answered with sound logic or scripture, then there is very good reason to question if their beliefs are right.
1) How many of the problems listed here are answered? If even one is ignored, it is a major red flag.
2) How deep do they need to compare verses to get their interpretation? If their truth is hidden so deep that you have to find five scriptures where their context is not even connected, then you have to wonder why? Remember, God's word is not in code and they make this argument all the time.
3) When they give scripture, are they giving verses that are plainly stated or do they have to interpret them to mean something they never actually say?
Return to Pre-Trib Rapture Articles
When it comes to any doctrine in the Bible, including the rapture, it is of dire importance that we set aside biased beliefs and look for the truth. Not man's interpretation of the truth, but God's own truth. Most Christians, when they study, look for scripture to prove their beliefs right. When they find scripture that seems to support what they believe, they assume they are correct. The problem with this is that every false doctrine has scripture that is interpreted to support it. So just because you can interpret scripture to support what you believe, it does not mean that what you believe is correct. Instead of looking for scripture that supports what you believe, if you want the truth, you need to look at all the problems others have with what you believe and be able to give them a good logical or scriptural explanation for each problem. If there is a perceived flaw in what you believe, and you cannot explain it with clear scripture or logic, then you must consider the possibility that what you believe is wrong.
As a Pre-tribulation rapture believer myself, I have had many discussions, or shall we just call them debates, with Post-Tribulationists. No matter what they try to throw at me to show the Pre-Trib as false, I have no problem explaining to them why their argument is wrong. Any scripture they can give me to support another stance, I can make it fit the Pre-Trib as well. In my personal opinion, there is absolutely no flaw with the Pre-Trib stance for the simple fact that I can answer any question they put before me. Typically they all give the same flaws and it feels like I am constantly re-writing the same explanations over and over.
So in this article, I want to present the Post-Tribbers with the worst flaws of their stance. I am challenging the Post-Tribbers to go through these flaws and give a logical or scriptural explanation for each one. I would like explanations that are both, logical and scriptural as well. I have presented these to some in the past and their arguments to explain them are always flawed. They either contradict scripture or they throw logic out the window. So I want you to read each of these flaws and come up with a clear scriptural or logical answer for each. If you cannot answer them all, then don’t you have to ask yourself one question? Why can all of the points against the Pre-Trib be answered clearly, when all of the problems with the Post-Trib stance cannot be answered?
If I can answer all the problems with the Pre-Trib rapture, but you cannot answer all the problems with the Post-Trib rapture, and you insist on pushing the Post-Trib rapture anyway, that is absolute proof that you dont care about the truth. You only care about your pride.
As I list the problems with the Post-Trib rapture, you will find I will also quite often explain how the same thing works in the Pre-Trib rapture. Only it fits perfectly in the Pre-Trib rapture and not with the Post-Trib rapture. I will also sometimes address some of the common but flawed answers I have gotten for specific problems, hoping it will save some of the trouble of typing it all out over and over.
1) The Post-Trib rapture has no good logical reason to happen.
Jesus comes back in the second coming and raptures us in His descent. We are caught up into the sky to meet Him in the clouds. ... Just to be brought right back to where we came from? Scripture says that He sends forth angels to gather the elect. If this is the rapture of the saints, why wouldn’t the angels just take us to Mt. Olive where He will set foot? What is the purpose to catching us up to the clouds only to bring us back down again?
I have seen one attempt to make sense of it. They said that it is to prove to the world that He is Lord by showing the world His bride following Him. This is logically flawed because Revelation 19 clearly tells us the armies in heaven will follow Him back on white horses. Even if you deny against all clear reasoning that this army is the Bride, you cannot deny there is in fact an army that will follow Him back. Scripture also states that every eye will see Him when he comes in the second coming. So when everyone looks up and sees the Lord with a massive army behind Him, descending from heaven, there will be no doubt that He is Lord of Lords. Adding the saints in the rapture will not change that one iota. Catching us up to Him just to bring us back down to earth again, is still a completely senseless and useless thing to do. It serves nothing!
Another made a very bad attempt to say that we are not raptured up to Jesus but are taken to Mt. Olive where Jesus will set foot. Only Paul clearly states that we are caught up to Jesus in the clouds. In fact, Jesus clearly says that he will come back to receive us to Himself. So this was clearly just a Post-Tribbers desperate attempt to justify His beliefs.
For the Pre-Trib rapture, He is not coming to earth to fight in Armageddon yet. He comes only to receive us to Himself and take us to His Father's house, where He has prepared a place for us. Scripture clearly says that we will be spared the hour of testing that is coming on the whole world (Revelation 3:10). So he comes and gets His bride and takes us back to heaven, so the wrath of God can happen. But since He is not planning on returning all the way to the earth to fight Armageddon yet, He only comes in the clouds and catches us up to Him and takes us back. Even that has a purpose! Because after the rapture, there will be many who know the Bible but never believed who will recognize what happened. They will see the rapture as absolute proof that the Bible was real and turn to Christ. These will be the tribulation saints. The Christians who are persecuted in the end times. Some of the world will believe it was a mass alien abduction or make other excuses, but there will be many who will recognize the truth. If Jesus lets the entire world see Him coming in the rapture, it would not be seen as proof by some, it will be absolute proof to all. Since we are saved by faith, if He truly proved who He was to everyone, there would be no place for faith. Faith is to believe without proof. So by not coming to earth but only in the clouds, and catching us up to Him, though many will see it as proof, it will not be true proof because many will still be able to make an excuse for what happened in their own mind.
The Pre-Trib Rapture has a second reason as well.
Throughout the Old Testament, the same storyline happens over and over. God loves His people, the Jews. The Jews turn away from God and God allows them to go through tribulations of the world. Then when they turn back to God, He forgives them and protects them again. This happens multiple times. Then God sent His Son to them as their Messiah but they reject the Son. They kill the Son. So God puts a partial hardening on them until the fulness of the gentiles comes in (Romans 11:25) and offers salvation to the gentiles. For the last two thousand years it has been the gentiles, the church, the Bride of the Lamb, that the focus has been on. But the time of the Jews to be reconciled is coming still. God will not forget His people. So when every gentile who will be saved through faith alone is saved, God removes them from the picture and lifts the partial hardening from the Jews and then the Tribulation begins. A time set for the Jews to go through tribulations from the world once again to be reconciled to God. This time through them finally believing in His Son.
There are two logical and scriptural explanations for why there is a Pre-Trib rapture. Yet I have never heard a good one for the Post-Trib rapture.
2) Who are the dead who come to life in Revelation 20?
Revelation 20:4 NASB
4 Then I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their foreheads and on their hands; and they came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.
The very first thing that happens in Revelation chapter 20 is the devil is bound and locked in the abyss. So this is after Jesus has already returned in the second coming and defeated the armies of the world and cast the beast and the false prophet into the lake of fire. Then in verse 4 it starts off with, "Then I saw". Which means this happens "after" the devil is bound. What happens? He sees thrones and they sit in them. Who sits in these thrones? After this, John mentions the dead coming to life, but it cannot be them who sit in the thrones because they don’t come to life until after "they" sit in the thrones! So who are 'they' who sit in the thrones, and who are they who come to life?
Post-Tribulation believers will try to make this to be when the rapture happens but it simply doesn’t say that. In fact it cannot be the rapture! For one, it tells us specifically who they are. They are the ones who are beheaded because their testimony of Jesus and the word of God. They are the ones who do not worship the beast or take the mark. There are two reasons why these cannot be the dead coming to life in the rapture. 1) It does not mention any believers who die of old age or in accidents. It is 'only' those who died during the tribulation. 2) If they are the dead saints in the rapture, that would mean the living are the ones who sit in the thrones. But Paul specifically says the dead rise first and then the living. So if the dead rise first, it is impossible for the living to sit in their thrones before the dead even rise!
These are clearly those who died in the tribulation. It states that clearly! So if Jesus raptures us in His descent during the Second coming, why didn’t He rapture these dead as well? Jesus should be rapturing "all" believers! That they come to life after the second coming, they must have died after the rapture!
The Pre-Trib understanding is that the rapture happens before the tribulation. After the rapture, there will be many who know the Bible and just never believed who will be left behind. They will recognize what happened and see the rapture where millions of Christians suddenly disappeared as proof the Bible was true all along. They will then believe. Unfortunately for them, because they needed proof to believe, and missed the rapture, they will then have to prove their faith by not losing it while going through the worst 7 years this world has ever witnessed. Many will lose faith. Most of those who keep their faith will die, but not all of them. These are what we Pre-Tribbers call the "Tribulation Saints". Because they die after the rapture, they do not rise from the dead until after Armageddon is over. Those who come to life in chapter 20 are exactly who it says they are. The Saints who turn to Christ after the rapture and die during the tribulation.
The Post-Trib rapture does not fit this verse in a logical way. You need to believe it was more than just those who died in the tribulation and not like it says. You need to believe this scripture is out of order. Once again, it fits the Pre-Trib rapture 100% perfectly.
3) Who is in the Millennial Kingdom?
After the Tribulation is over, Jesus will reign on earth for a thousand years of peace. After the thousand years is up, the devil will be set loose for a short time and he will deceive the people and turn them against the Holy City. As the vast army covers the plains, God will rain fire down on them and kill them all. However, in the rapture, all believers will receive new glorified bodies. Once we are in these bodies, it will be impossible for us to sin or be deceived by the devil. So who are these in the Millennial Kingdom that are still in their flesh and blood bodies and are deceived by the devil and caused to turn against the Holy City? Just the action of turning against the Holy City will be a sin in itself!
Some believe they are unbelievers, but that just doesn’t fit. Jeremiah 25:30-33 tells us that all of the wicked will be killed. After Armageddon there will be a judgment of the goats and the sheep. This is where the Lord has all the inhabitants of the earth who survives the tribulation period gathered before Him. The wicked (unbelievers) are killed and cast immediately into the Lake of Fire. The believers (sheep) will be welcomed into the kingdom of God. However, they will not receive glorified bodies until the time comes when they finally die. At the start of the millennial kingdom, there will only be believers alive. It is their descendants who will not believe and question if the second coming ever happened. They are the ones who will be deceived by the devil. But at the start of the millennial kingdom, it will only have believers.
So if Jesus raptures all the believers during His descent in the second coming and gives them all imperishable bodies, who are the ones who live in imperishable bodies during the millennial kingdom? Yet we know for certain there will be death in the millennial kingdom. Isaiah tells us a child who dies at the age of one hundred will be thought to be accursed. That there are children, we also know there will still be reproduction. So these people cannot possibly have imperishable bodies yet. This is further supported by the fact the devil will deceive them when he is set free for a short time at the end of the thousand years. When he turns them against the holy city and God kills them all with fire from heaven. Clearly they do not have imperishable bodies yet.
We know for certain there will be people in flesh and blood in the millennial kingdom. We know for certain that they won’t be unbelievers. There is no clear logical answer a Post-Trib believer can give to explain this. They have to go against scripture and believe they will be unbelievers in the millennial kingdom.
And yet again it does fit the Pre-Trib stance perfectly and logically.
There will be a few Tribulation Saints who will survive the entire Tribulation. At the judgment of the goats and sheep, which happens after the second coming, all unbelievers will be cast into the lake of fire. The Tribulation Saints will be welcomed into the kingdom, but they will keep their flesh and blood bodies. Once they die naturally sometime during that thousand years, they will then receive their glorified bodies and enter the Holy City. Their descendants however will be living. With all the true eye-witnesses of the second coming now dead, it will become a myth to them. They didn’t see it happen so they have no reason to believe it really happened. They will be the ones the devil deceives.
4) The marriage of the Lamb and the army that follows Him back.
In Revelation chapter 19 we have the marriage of the Lamb. Let’s be clear from the start in order to eradicate one of their own arguments before they can try to use it here. This is the marriage of the Lamb. This is not the Marriage supper. The marriage happens first in heaven. The supper comes after in the kingdom on earth.
Scripture says the Bride is made ready and goes on to describe the bride as wearing "fine linen". It clearly says the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. So we know the bride here is in fact the saints; the church from the time of Jesus until the rapture.
Only a few verses later in the same chapter, on the same page, right after the marriage of the Lamb, we have the Lord prepared to return in the second coming. It says he will be followed by armies on white horses. It plainly states this army "is in heaven". It describes this army as wearing what? Fine linen, which it had just taught us that the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.
There is no doubt that the saints are the believers. The Bride is made up of the saints. We, the church, is the bride. We are the army that is in heaven who will follow Jesus back in the second coming on white horses. Of course, if we are following Him back in the second coming, then we cannot possibly be raptured in His descent, now can we?
Because of this problem, I have had people try to claim we are not the bride. That angels wear fine linen too (which scripture never once uses the words "fine linen" to describe an angel), and anything else they could think of to deny this scripture. All because they are willing to deny truth in order to hang onto what they believe.
It literally says the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. Thus the Bride is the saints and to argue against that is a ridiculous attempt to deny truth. It says the army is in heaven. It says they are wearing fine linen, which it also just said was the righteous acts of the saint just a few verses earlier. Not in another book. Not in another chapter. Only a few verses earlier!
5) 2 Thessalonians 2
Interestingly, I quite often see Post-Tribbers attempt to use this scripture to prove their stance, never realizing how, from the Post-Trib view, it doesn’t even make logical sense. Their mistakes are basically always the same mistakes over and over.
Paul states right from the beginning that this letter is in regards to the rapture. There is no denying that and I wouldn’t ever dream of trying to deny it.
The first problem here is the translation of the KJV Bible. I know there are a lot of KJV purists who think it is the only trusted version and it is perfect. My advice would be to put your conspiracies away and try investigating the KJV Bible once. It is not perfect and even the original scholars who translated it wrote a preface in the first edition admitting it has flaws. They literally say that if we ever want the perfect Word of God, we need to continue working on the translations. They did this because they knew it was not perfect yet and they were pressured to release their version sooner than they wanted to. There are multiple places the translation is flawed and on top of that, the usage of the 1600's style of speaking makes it even harder to understand. Which leads to misunderstandings. In some cases the words it uses don’t even have the same meanings as they have today.
In this case, the KJV uses the term "day of Christ" in the third verse. In 1611, all of the oldest manuscripts used that term and so they were correct to use it. However, since 1611, we have gained thousands more manuscripts and today all the oldest manuscripts actually use "day of the Lord". Most scholars agree that likely when someone was copying it, they thought the "day of Christ" fit better and never thought it would make a difference. Unfortunately, there is a huge difference!
If you look each term up in the Bible, you find they are almost opposite terms. Every time the "day of Christ" is used, the context is referring to the rapture, or the second coming. Every single time the "Day of the Lord" is used, it is referring to God's anger, or God's wrath. Not just most of the time. Every single time! So when Paul was saying two different things must happen before the day of the Lord comes, he was speaking of the great day of God's Wrath. The same one Jesus refers to as "the hour of testing that is coming upon the whole world." Post-Tribbers want to believe he is saying that the apostasy and the revealing of the antichrist must happen before the rapture happens. In all honesty, early in my studying, I thought the same thing, but the truth is, that is not what Paul is saying. He is saying that those two things must happen before the day of Gods wrath can happen.
If you really want to know which is true, all you have to do is look at it with logic. Paul teaches that we should look forward to the rapture and second coming both. The Bible never speaks of either of those events as things Christians should fear. So if Paul was saying the rapture cannot happen until those other events happen first, ask yourself one question. Why was the church in Thessalonica so upset that the rapture was at hand, that Paul had to write and settle them down? It is simply illogical to think this church was all upset over the news that the rapture was about to happen.
Some have tried to say that it doesn’t mean the rapture is about to happen but that they missed the rapture and second coming. But I know this is incorrect for one reason. Scripture is very clear that when the Lord returns in the second coming, every eye will see Him descending. So if they have not seen the Lord in the sky, then they already know they have not missed it. So we know for certain they did not believe they missed the rapture if they believed in a post-tribulation rapture.
Post-Tribulationists need to believe the church of Thessalonica was all upset that the second coming was about to happen, and that simply doesn’t make any logical sense. But it makes perfect sense from a Pre-Trib rapture view.
The church believed in a pre-'day of wrath' rapture. When they received a letter as if from the apostles stating that the day of the Lord was at hand, it could mean only one thing. They either missed the rapture or the apostles were wrong to tell them the rapture would be before the day of God's wrath. Now they would have to go through the Wrath of God. A very good reason for the church to be upset. So Paul had to write them a letter. Not to scold them for being upset that the rapture was about to happen, but to let them know that they had not missed it and the apostles were not wrong, because the day of the Lord was not at hand as they were falsely told. Paul's letter paraphrased would go something like this...
In regards to the rapture, do not be deceived by a letter as if it was from us that the day of the Lord was at hand. Don’t you remember what I taught you before? That the day of God's wrath cannot happen until first the apostasy happens and the man of lawlessness is revealed. You know the one I am talking about, he is the one who will enter the temple and claim to be God. Since the day of God's wrath is clearly not at hand, you have no worry about missing the rapture.
As with each of the other problems I have mentioned, the Post Tribulation view simply does not fit logically. However from the Pre-Trib stance, it fits absolutely perfectly with plain logic.
6) It happens before God's Wrath.
There are multiple scriptures that tell us the Lord will return to save us from wrath. (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, Romans 5:9, Revelation 3:10) Though these verses do not necessarily show a Pre-Tribulation rapture, what they do show is that Jesus does not come and rapture us at the Second Coming. He raptures us before the wrath of God.
Now the quick answer from most Post-Tribulationists would be either, A) The Wrath of God is hell. B) The wrath of God happens after Jesus returns.
First off, there is no reference in the Bible to support the day of God's wrath is hell. The closest it comes to that is there is a verse saying we are saved from wrath and then mentions salvation. So they assume the wrath is the opposite of salvation. Christians do way too much "assuming" when trying to interpret the Bible. That scripture does not refer to it as the "day of the Lord" or the "day of God's wrath". It just says we are saved from wrath. You cannot assume it is speaking of the day of Gods Wrath just because it uses the word "wrath". The Bible literally tells us when the Wrath of God begins. In the 6th Seal it tells us plainly that the people great and small are hiding in caves and they say "Their Wrath has come". The day of God's wrath begins in the 6th Seal.
Even more interesting is that the Bible also tells us plainly when the wrath of God is finished. In Revelation 15:1 it tells us that the wrath of God is finished in the 7 angels who are given the seven bowls. So the day of the Lord, God's Wrath, begins with the 6th Seal and it ends with the 7th Bowl. The 7th Bowl is the second coming.
Many try to argue that the 6th Seal happens later in the tribulation. That all the Seals, Trumpets and Bowls happen at the same time. Again, this belief is based off nothing more than man's idea and actually is impossible according to scripture. All of the Seals, Trumpets and Bowls are events that will happen. The event of the 7th Seal is quite literally the handing over of the seven trumpets to the seven angels. Since they don’t even get the trumpets until the 7th Seal, it is literally impossible for them to sound any of the trumpets before the 7th Seal is broken.
None of this is some crazy interpretation. It is all what scripture states plainly. God's Word literally says the day of God's Wrath starts in the 6th Seal. It literally says the seven angels who receive the seven bowls are the finish of God's wrath. When you read everything that happens in the 7 Trumpets and the 7 Bowls, there is simply no logical way it can all happen after Jesus returns. Since the rapture is before the day of Wrath, it must happen "before" Jesus returns in the second coming.
7) The disciples taught an imminent return.
As you read through the Bible, there are places where the disciples believed the Lord could return at any moment. They taught an imminent return, but from a post-tribulation point of view, that would be completely senseless. If the rapture happens at or near the second coming, there are simply too many things that will have to happen before the rapture happens.
A) The revealing of the antichrist.
B) The antichrist enters the temple and claims to be God.
C) The antichrist kills the two witnesses.
D) The False Prophet and antichrist pushes the mark of the beast.
E) World War (Seal-2)
F) The first 6 Trumpets and the first 6 Bowls!
Every one of these things are prophesied to happen before the second coming. So if the rapture happens at the second coming, then logically they must happen before the rapture. Until you see all of these things happen, it is completely senseless to be looking for His return. Yet the apostles did seem to believe in an imminent return.
Philippians 3:20
20 For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;
1 Thessalonians 1:9-10
9 For they themselves report about us as to the kind of reception we had with you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God, 10 and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is, Jesus who rescues us from the wrath to come.
Titus 2:11-13
11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people, 12 instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously, and in a godly manner in the present age, 13 looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus,
James 5:7-8
7 Therefore be patient, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early and late rains. 8 You too be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near.
1 Peter 1:13
13 Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, set your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Revelation 3:11
11 I am coming quickly; hold firmly to what you have, so that no one will take your crown.
The thing you need to remember, is that the writers of the books in the New testament were not writing with the idea that everyone would be reading them 2,000 years in the future. When they said these things to their churches, it was because they meant these words for their churches. They actually believed they could still be alive when the Lord came for them. Why would they have written as if the Lord would return in their lifetime, if they knew that so many things would need to happen before that was possible? From a Post-Trib stance, it makes no sense!
The only thing that fits logically is that they knew the Lord was coming for us at an earlier time to take us back to His Father's house, and then returning to earth after the Tribulation. Only with that understanding would they write as if the Lord can come at any time, even knowing certain things must happen before He could return at the end of the tribulation.
8) How is the change in salvation rules fair?
This is one that most Post-Tribulationists won’t agree with because most of them also believe that works takes part in our salvation.
The one subject I have studied more in depth than the rapture, is salvation. Every doctrine in the Bible is supported by what I call "Primary scriptures". A primary scripture is any scripture that is so clearly stated that it only has one logical interpretation. If you can come up with an alternate interpretation that logically fits the words and does not contradict another primary scripture, that verse becomes only an interpreted verse. Every doctrine is supported by 1 to 3 primary scriptures. Salvation has 19 primary scriptures. Think about that. 19 verses that literally tell us 'how' we are saved. All of them agree that we are saved by believing in Jesus. There is not a single primary scripture in the Bible that says we are saved by any other means. Jesus even says it plainly in John 3:18 when He says "He who believes is not condemned. He who does not believe is already condemned, because he does not believe in the only begotten Son of God."
He breaks everyone into only two groups here. Those who believe and those who do not. Believers are saved. Unbelievers are going to hell. To bring works (anything we must do intentionally) into it in any form, is to make what Jesus says in John 3:18 wrong. I dont care how many scriptures you can interpret to mean something else, if they contradict what Jesus states very plainly, your interpretation is wrong.
So for 2,000 years, millions are saved and the only thing they had to do to get to heaven is believe in Jesus as their Lord. Suddenly in the end times that’s not enough. They still have to believe, but they now also have to refuse to take the mark of the beast. How fair is that?
The mark of the beast will make it so nobody can buy or sell anything without it. That includes food. Try to imagine a man who is a true believer in Christ. He is watching his wife and 3 year old daughter slowly starve to death. Their ribs are showing through and their faces are looking gaunt from hunger. He knows if he takes the mark he will go to hell, but at the same time, if he takes the mark, he can buy food for his wife and child. He breaks down and takes the mark to save his loved ones, hoping that God will see it as a noble sacrifice. And for that moment of weakness, he is going to hell. While ten years earlier his own dad was a drug addict who believed in Jesus, but he never understood how important it was to work on his relationship with the Lord. He continued to do drugs while he still read the bible and prayed. To get the money for the drugs he sometimes stole from others. One day he died of an overdose, but because he truly believed in Jesus as Lord, he still went to heaven.
Most Post-Tribbers don’t believe the man's dad would have gone to heaven. That is because they have been taught false doctrines about salvation. They believe that if we sin and it is not forgiven, we go to hell, even though scripture actually does not teach that. Over and over scripture states plainly that we are saved by believing. It never once says that a believer will go to hell if they sin. At least not until Revelation where believers who take the mark will go to hell.
Somewhere along the line, the rules of salvation change. All believers go to heaven, and then suddenly only the believers who deny the beast and his mark go to heaven.
The only way this change in the rules of salvation works, is through a pre-trib rapture. Because there will be a point of time when every believer who will believe through faith alone is saved. The fullness of the gentiles has come in. Then the Bride (saints) is raptured. After that, every single person who turns to Christ will do so only because they saw proof that the Bible is true and Jesus is Lord. They will see the rapture happen. They will see the antichrist revealed. They will see the mark of the beast issued. These things will cause them to believe, but because they needed absolute proof in order to believe, they need to prove their faith to be saved. The Pre-Trib rapture is the only stance that works with the sudden change in salvation rules.
9) It means that God abuses His own children.
Another argument Post-Tribbers try to make against the Pre-Trib stance is that throughout history, God has never removed His people from tribulation. He has always let them go through it. He let the Jews be enslaved by Babylon, by Egypt and then the Romans. He let the Nazi's kill them off during the Holocaust. So they say there is no reason to believe God would remove the church to save it from the tribulation.
Their mistake is in not recognizing the difference between the Tribulation, which is Daniel's 70th week, and the day of God's wrath.
The tribulation is more about the Jews than anything. Its purpose is to reconcile the Jews back to God again. The Christians will be caught up in it. God does not have a problem letting Christians go through tribulation from the world because it gives them a chance to show their faith and earn rewards. But what God does not do and never has done, is abuse His own. And that is exactly what the day of God's Wrath is about. It is God pouring His wrath out on the world. He is not going to abuse His own children so He removes them before His wrath begins. Which is in the 6th Seal.
To believe that the children of God, His saints, the Lords own Bride will go through the day of Gods wrath is to believe God will abuse His own Children. The Lord will abuse His bride.
If you want Biblical precedence for this, look at Noah. The flood was not tribulations from the world. It was wrath from God himself. So God had Noah build an ark to keep him and his family safe. You can also look at Lott being told to leave the city before God destroys it. Every time the tribulation is from the world, God allows His people to go through it. However, the truth is, every time the event is from God's own hand, He removes those who are true to Him from danger.
10) You have to take things out of order to make it work.
In my studies of Revelation, God has revealed to me that the book can be broken down into sections.
Ch.1 Introduction
Ch.2-3 Letters to the churches
Ch.4-5 Scene in heaven
Ch.6-16 Follows the World through the entire end times.
Ch.17-18 Destruction of great Babylon, the one world religion.
Ch.19+ Follows the Bride through the entire end times.
The 3rd and 6th sections take us through the end times. Once from the eyes of the world and once from the view of the Bride. Every event that each will witness or go through, all in perfect chronological order.
The Post-Tribbers cannot keep things in order. It doesn’t work. They are forced to rearrange God's word in order to make it fit their stance, while Pre-Tribbers only follow what Gods word says in perfect order. When you have to rearrange Gods word in order to make it fit, something is definitely wrong with what you believe.
11) Days of Noah
Matthew 24:36-41 NASB
36 “But about that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. 37 For the coming of the Son of Man will be just like the days of Noah. 38 For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, 39 and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be. 40 At that time there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. 41 Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left.
I have heard different theories from Post-Tribbers to show how this verse either supports their belief or contradicts the pre-trib stance. Yet they always seem to either ignore an obvious part of the scripture, or they add ideas to the scripture.
One common argument I see is that in the days of Noah, the Nephilim were alive. They were giants some believe were spawned from angels mating with women. So they will argue that when the rapture happens the sin will be so prevalent that science will be mixing man and beast. This idea fits in with the conspiracist group of Post-Tribbers. Nowhere in this scripture does it even mention the Nephilim and so it is wrong to just toss them in there for no real reason.
The other argument is that "like in the days of Noah", means that the floods came and took the wicked away. Not that it removed the Godly. However, when you really look at the wording, it can be interpreted to go either way. It can be said to mean the wicked were taken away by the floods, or one could just interpret it to say that the floods came and took Noah and his family away while everyone else drowned. Since it can technically be interpreted either way, it is wrong to say it only supports one way.
The truth is, this scripture actually tells us exactly what it means by "in the days of Noah". The verse right after that tell us, for in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking and marrying. In the gospel of Luke, it goes even further to say they were buying and selling and planting and building. This scripture is simply telling us that in the days of Noah and of Lott, the people were warned and they ignored the warnings. They went on with their lives like everything is normal. Then the fire came and destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Then the floods came and destroyed the wicked. By the time they realized the warnings were for real, it was too late for them. In the days of the rapture, the wicked will go on like everything is normal. They will not take heed of the warnings from the Christians that the rapture would happen. Then when the rapture happens and they realize it is all real, it will be too late.
When you understand what this scripture is saying without ignoring its own explanation, or without adding ideas to it, it becomes simple. It also fits the pre-trib rapture perfectly. In fact it makes it clear that the post-trib rapture isn't logical.
When you study everything that happens in the end times. Especially the Seals, Trumpets and Bowls, you realize just how much chaos is going to fall on this world. World War 3 will escalate into an all-out nuclear war. The nukes will cause the tectonic plates to shift and cause massive earthquakes all around the world. They will cause great tsunamis as well. Volcanos will erupt. We cannot forget the persecution of the Jews and Christians that will be worse than any time in history. By the time the Second Coming is here, over half the world’s population will be dead. That is around 4 billion people who will die inside a few years. This world will be in utter chaos. It will be anything but normal! There is absolutely no logic in knowing all the destruction that will happen in the end times and to think that everyone will be going on with life like everything is normal. When half the people you know are dead, you will not be going on with life like its normal. But if the rapture is Pre-Trib, none of that happens yet. Everyone will indeed be going on with life like everything is normal. And again, the scripture fits the pre-trib stance perfectly. It fits it scripturally and logically. It does not truly fit the Post-Tribulation rapture.
12) The Post-Trib stance needs to rearrange everything.
As I keep saying, every event fits the Pre-Trib stance perfectly and in perfect chronological order. Far too often the Post-Tribbers need to rearrange the order of events in the Bible to make their stance work.
* The church is in heaven in Revelation 19:1-6. Post Tribbers say the church isn't raptured until the second coming at the end of chapter 19.
* Revelation 19 had the marriage of the Lamb happening in heaven just before the second coming. Post-Tribbers say it has to happen on earth after the second coming.
* They believe the rapture is at the second coming, so the dead who come to life in Revelation 20 must be out of order.
If you have to rearrange God's word to fit your beliefs, the likelihood is that you are more focused on supporting what you believe than you are to believe the truth of God's word. The truth should fit God's word without having to rearrange it. Simple logic would state that if there are two interpretations and one follows everything in perfect order, and the other has to rearrange everything to make it fit, likely the one that is in perfect order is the one that is correct. It is wrong to force God's Word to fit your beliefs.
13) The arguments supporting the Post-Trib rapture are too few and weak.
I have only found a total of 4 arguments that support the Post-Trib rapture. Multiple times now I have gone into groups where Post-Tribbers argue with pre-tribbers and listed the four arguments and then asked if anyone can please give me a 5th argument that supports the post-tribulation rapture. Nobody ever gives me a new argument. Instead, all they do is attack the pre-trib belief. Four arguments that support what they believe. Just four! To make things worse, all four of these arguments are extremely weak at best.
In this next section, I will give all four arguments and explain why they are weak arguments. I will not attempt to prove it wrong outright, but I will show their reasoning is flawed. Their argument is not based on scriptural fact, but only on their biased interpretation of scripture. I will show how every scripture they use to support their stance can also be used to fit the Pre-Tribulation rapture just as well if not better.
Mark 13:24-27 Argument
Mark 13:24-27 (NASB)
24 “But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light, 25 and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken. 26 And then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. 27 And then He will send forth the angels, and will gather together His elect from the four winds, from the end of the earth to the end of heaven.
Post Tribbers read this and look at only two things. 1) It says it happens immediately after the tribulation. 2) The Lord sends forth His angels to gather the elect. By putting these two points together, they see the rapture (gathering of the elect) happens immediately after the tribulation (Second Coming). At first glance, to anyone who has not actually studied it all, this is a sound argument. The problem is, this argument only holds water if it does not fit the Pre-Trib stance as well. If this scripture can logically and scripturally fit the Pre-Trib stance, then it cannot be used to claim the Post-Trib stance is true. Evidence that fits both sides cannot be used as proof for either side.
The "elect" in the Bible, is any true Believer. Just like the word "People" would include every homosapien. However, with People, they can be split into many different sub-groups. You can break them down into races like Caucasian, Asian and many others. You can break them down into male and female. If a boat full of Japanese people was sinking and the coast guard saved them. Then the news reported that all the people were saved, it would still be correct. The word Elect includes any true believer, but true believers can be broken down into sub-groups as well.
Bride: Every believer from the day Jesus died on the cross to the rapture. These are all of the true believers who believed in Jesus as Lord without needing any real proof.
Tribulation Saints: After the rapture, there will be some people who know the Bible, but just never believed. When millions of people suddenly disappear and all of them are Christians, they will know what happened. The rapture will be absolute proof in their eyes. They will then turn to Christ. They will show others the evidence and win more over. These Believers who needed proof in order to believe will be the Tribulation Saints. However, because they needed proof in order to believe, they will need to prove their faith by keeping their faith in the tribulation.
144,000 Jews: At one point in the End Times, there will be 144,000 Jews who will be sealed on their foreheads. They will be Jews who turn to Christ during the Tribulation but dedicate themselves to Him so strongly they stay virgins and do not lie or anything.
These are three different groups of true Believers. All of them are considered the elect, but they are split into three groups.
In this scripture where Jesus sends forth His angels to gather His elect, it is not the Bride, because they are already raptured. It is not the Tribulation Saints because they come to life after Armageddon in Chapter 20. It is only the 144,000 Jews who are gathered.
The rapture happens pre-tribulation. The 144,000 of the Elect are gathered after the Tribulation during the Second Coming. They will not be gathered to Jesus in the sky. They will be gathered and taken to Mt.Olive where Jesus will set foot. Then they will follow Him everywhere he goes.
Now of course, Post-Tribbers will argue against this because it does not fit their beliefs. That is expected. However, the fact still remains. This scripture can be shown to still fit the Pre-Trib Rapture absolutely perfectly. Thus, this scripture does not prove the Post-Trib rapture is correct in any way. It is a weak and flawed argument to support the Post-Trib rapture.
The Last Trumpet Argument:
1 Corinthians 15:52 (NASB)
52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.
According to Post-Tribbers, this verse proves the rapture is after the tribulation because it plainly states it happens at the last trumpet. They believe the "last trumpet" is the 7th Trumpet in Revelation. Which is understandable since the 7th Trumpet of Revelation is literally the victory of the Lord in the second coming. Their mistake is in believing the "last trumpet" has anything to do with the seven trumpets in Revelation at all, when there is nothing else in 1 Corinthians 15:52 to make that connection. I mean, other than the simple fact they use the same word "trumpet" in the verse.
Again, if this is looked at by someone unknowledgeable, it looks like sound reasoning. To me? It doesn't fit. First off, Paul would be saying that the rapture happens at an event that is not mentioned anywhere in scripture until John sees the visions years later on the island of Patmos. That doesn't make sense. The 7 Trumpets in Revelation were prophecies that no other book mentions. Why would Paul be referencing something that isn't known yet? Do you know what would make perfectly logical sense? If Paul was actually referencing the same kind of trumpet that he had just written about one chapter earlier in the same letter.
In 1 Corinthians 14, John is teaching about gifts of the Holy Spirit and tells us that when speaking in tongues it must have an interpreter and such. He goes on to use the example "If a trumpet produces an indistinct sound, who will prepare himself for battle?"
Throughout history, armies have always used trumpets and other horns to relay signals to the soldiers. One sound will tell them to assemble, and another might mean to charge in battle. It just so happens to be that when we are raptured, it is literally the last time a trumpet will be sounded to assemble an army for God. I had explained earlier in this article about the marriage of the Lamb. How the Bride is the armies which are in heaven who will follow Jesus back in the second coming. The rapture happens at the last trumpet. It is the last time an army is called by God. It is the last time that sound of the trumpet is ever used by God.
I personally believe that because Paul had just written about this only one chapter earlier, this is a more logical understanding for the last trumpet than believing Paul was referencing something that is not once written about until John writes Revelation years later. If it was never written about, we have no reason to believe anyone even knew about it. But in the very least, this explanation means that once again, the argument supporting the Post-Trib rapture is only according to their own interpretation and assumption that the last trumpet is the 7th Trumpet. This argument is no stronger than to say, it is the Post Trib rapture because I said so. Very weak at best.
God doesn't Save us from Tribulation Argument:
I cannot even count how many times I have seen this argument made. The truth is, they are right. God does not tend to save His people from tribulations of the world. God has no problem allowing us to go through tribulations of the world. It gives us opportunity to show our faith. The reason this argument is weak is because it assumes that because we call ourselves Pre-Tribulation rapture believers, it means we believe it is the Tribulation that God spares us from.
Sadly, there are many pre-tribbers who think that for the same reason, but its not correct. We aren't saved from the tribulation. We are spared the wrath of God. Though God has no problem allowing us to go through tribulations of this world, what God does not ever do is beat His own children. The Lord is not going to abuse His own Bride.
Every time there is tribulations from the world in the Bible, God allows His people to go through it. Every time the event is by God's own hand, like the flood or Sodom and Gomorrah, God removes His faithful to a safe place. God never abuses His own! So the whole argument that the Post-Trib is right because God doesn't spare us from Tribulations is absolutely flawed. It is wrong because its not the Tribulation we are saved from. It is Gods own wrath we are spared. Which begins in the 6th Seal and ends with the 7th Bowl.
The fourth argument:
The only other argument to support the Post-Trib rapture that I have found is that Jesus tells His disciples "Then they will hand you over to tribulation and kill you." which fits right in with the fact Jesus does not pray for God to remove them from tribulation, but to keep them strong through it.
First off, in both of these cases, Jesus was not speaking to all believers. He was speaking to His disciples personally. What they would go through and praying for them specifically. Neither case has anything to do with the end times yet.
Secondly, as I pointed out. It is not the Tribulation we are spared. It is God's Wrath. Jesus never says that God will do any harm to them. Jesus never prays for the Father to not abuse them. Because He knows He won’t!
These are the simple facts. Most Post-Tribulationists believe they have the clearest and most logical stance, but only because they have never truly compared the two systems side by side. When you really look at both beliefs, you find that the Pre-Trib stance has the strongest case and its not even close.
Pre-Trib has 11 different arguments that support it compared to only 3 or 4 for Post-Trib. All of the Post trib arguments are based solely on their interpretation of scriptures that also fit the Pre-Trib stance as well. Pre-Trib even has a more logical explanation for 'why' we are raptured. The Post-Trib stance needs to rearrange so much of God's word to make it fit while the Word is in perfect Chronological order for the Pre-Trib stance.
Post-Tribbers will read this and get upset. They will likely post comments trying to counter these things. Some of their arguments will sound logic. But this is what I want you to pay attention to. Do they give sound logical and scriptural arguments, not for one or two of these problems, but are all of the problems addressed? Because if there is even one problem that cannot be answered with sound logic or scripture, then there is very good reason to question if their beliefs are right.
1) How many of the problems listed here are answered? If even one is ignored, it is a major red flag.
2) How deep do they need to compare verses to get their interpretation? If their truth is hidden so deep that you have to find five scriptures where their context is not even connected, then you have to wonder why? Remember, God's word is not in code and they make this argument all the time.
3) When they give scripture, are they giving verses that are plainly stated or do they have to interpret them to mean something they never actually say?
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