Most dispensationalists are in the camp of what is called pre-tribulation dispensationalism. They believe that a great tribulation is coming, and probably soon. God will bring vengeance on His enemies. They interpret Jesus' prophecies about the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 as future events. The best book on this is David Chilton's Days of Vengeance (1987). I paid him to write it. Download it here.
These people do not want to go through the great tribulation. Who could blame them. There is a post-tribulation movement, and it is tiny. It preaches horror soon will come. It is what marketers call a tough sell.
There is something else. Dispensationalists want to avoid the great tribulation, but they also don't want to die before it takes place. "Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die." The doctrine of the imminent pre-tribulation rapture has been the wildly popular solution ever since the 1880's. Here is the message: "Christians alive today will not die at the rapture. They will be pulled into heaven, made perfect, and then will return with Christ after 7 (or 3 1/2) years to rule the world for 1,000 years." The doctrine of the pretribulation rapture is beloved because of this emotionally powerful offer. David Chilton once wrote that when he abandoned this doctrine, for the first time in his life, he believed he was going to die. (He died of a heart attack in 1997.)
The general public does not understand that there are millions of Christians who are firmly convinced that they will never die. The rapture will let them be like Enoch: called up to heaven before dying (Heb. 11:5).
They are told that the rapture is almost here. They think it is imminent. This is one of the central desires of their lives.
It has been a central desire of every pretribulational dispensationalist since 1879. The rapture was not imminent enough!
BIBLE PROPHECY IN THE CHURCH AGE
Basic to dispensationalism is this idea: what they call the Church Age (our era) was not prophesied in the Old Testament. This is the system's most radical theological idea. They teach that the Christian church was a replacement for national Israel after Israel crucified Christ. God substituted the church for national Israel.
They teach that the entire era from Pentecost to the rapture is a separate dispensation. Dispensational theologian Harry Ironside in 1943 called this the Great Parenthesis.
There is a huge theological problem with this doctrine. If the church was a replacement after AD 33, then Old Testament prophecies do not apply to the church. Why not? Because the church age has been inserted into prophetic history.
This is definitively refuted by Peter's sermon in Acts 2. He quoted Joel 2. He said that what was taking place in front of his listeners at that moment was a fulfillment of Joel's prophecy. Peter was starting the church. This means that the church was prophesied by Joel. The church was, therefore, part of God's prophetic plan from the beginning.
The doctrine of the era of the church age is obviously wrong. No Christian group other than dispensationalists has ever preached such a doctrine. Paul called the church "the Israel of God" (Gal. 6:16).
This obvious implication of Acts 2 split the dispensational movement in the early 1900's. A tiny group concluded that Peter was not starting the church at all. Joel really did prophesy Peter's sermon, they said. Therefore, Peter was not starting the church. It was something else. This institution did not last long. Paul started the church after Acts 8. The church replaced Peter's replacement of Israel. This conclusion is logical, given the premise: no fulfilled prophecy in the Church Age. This is hyperdispensationalism. I believed this from the fall of 1962 to the spring of 1964. Then, in one lecture, my systematic theology teacher John Murray inadvertently persuaded me of postmillennialism by discussing Romans 11 on the conversion of the Jews. But I digress.
There is something else. If the Church Age was not prophesied in the Old Testament, then nothing that takes place today -- the era of the church -- can possibly have been predicted in the Old Testament.
Do you see the problem? I hope so. I hope you can follow logic.
If there is no prophecy to be fulfilled between now and the any-moment rapture, then nothing that is happening today can be a fulfillment of prophecy. "Any moment" means any moment. If something must be fulfilled in prophecy before the rapture, then until that prophecy is fulfilled, the rapture cannot be at any moment.
The pastors who preach the any-moment rapture never mention this in the pulpit.
The people in the pews do not want to die. They also want to go to heaven. So, they want the rapture to be soon. They want confirmation that it will be soon. So, they desperately want to believe that some recent event is a fulfillment of prophecy. "The rapture is coming. I won't have to die!"
But if prophecy really is being fulfilled, then the doctrine of the any-moment rapture is false. Something must take place between now and the rapture.
This belief system is schizophrenic. But most people cannot follow chains of reasoning. They do know this: they don't want to die. The doctrine of the any-moment rapture is their ticket to heaven. "Do not pass through death. Go directly to heaven."
If the church was substituted for Israel in AD 33, then all of the Old Testament prophecies regarding Israel will be fulfilled only to the world after the Church Age. This means after the rapture. This means only during the great tribulation and the millennial era.
There is something else. This is the desire to get even with people who ridiculed them.
The rapture teaches that Jesus will come back and set up a kingdom. This will be an international bureaucracy. He will put post-tribulation Christians in charge of the world. This is really exciting news for Christians who have never exercised any leadership, and who have been regarded as nutcases by their friends. You can imagine how popular this idea is. Jesus is going to come back with all of his raptured saints, and they are going to be put in charge of the world. They will be headbangers for Jesus. They are going to get even with all the people who laughed at them. This is a powerful incentive. It is never preached this way in the pulpit, but anybody who believes the doctrine of the any-moment rapture knows that this is what is really being taught. They love it.
So, people want the following. They want to avoid death. They also want to be in charge. But to get the first goal, meaning death-avoidance, they have to hold an idea that denies the any-moment rapture: current fulfillments of prophecy. This means that all those people who died, believing in the any-moment rapture, were misled by their preachers, who said that prophecies a century ago were fulfillments.
I published a book on this: Armageddon Now! It lists lots of these supposedly prophecy-fulfilling current events about Israel and Russia, beginning in 1917. Download it here.
People in the pews who cannot think clearly, and who do not understand their Bibles, never see through this obvious implication.
Any preacher or any obscure theologian who preaches the Bible prophecy is being fulfilled today, and who also preaches the any moment rapture doctrine, also cannot think straight.
Nobody in the pews is going to come to a pastor and ask the obvious questions that I have raised here. Nobody's going to ask how it is possible that a prophecy is being fulfilled by some current event. But if somebody were to do this, the pastor would be hard-pressed to come up with an answer. This is the standard one: "Well, it's not exactly that current events are fulfilling prophecy. They are shadows leading up to the fulfillment of prophecy, but that will take place only after the rapture." This is not the kind of preaching that rivets people. This is not the kind of preaching that gets them coming back to hear more about fulfilled prophecy, week after week. This basically says that maybe everybody in the congregation is going to die before the rapture takes place. No dispensational preacher fills the pews with this kind of message.
WHEAT AND TARES
I now come to the Bible passage of all Bible passages that creates an unanswerable question for all people who believe in the rapture. It is Matthew 13. This is the primary section in the New Testament that deals with the kingdom of heaven, which is the same as the kingdom of God, contrary to at least some dispensationalists. Jesus taught specifically that the wheat and the tares stay in the field until the final judgment. There will be no separation of the wheat from the tares in history.
The doctrine of the rapture says that Jesus will come back to pull all Christians into the heavens, thereby separating them from the evil tares in the field. During the period of the great tribulation, there will be no wheat on earth. Jesus taught that this cannot possibly happen. He prophesied that it will not happen. Here is His explanation of the parable.
Then Jesus sent the multitude away, and went into the house: and his disciples came unto him, saying, Declare unto us the parable of the tares of the field. He answered and said unto them, He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one; The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels. As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear (Matt. 13:36-42).
Do a Google search on rapture, wheat, tares, and Matthew 13. See what you find. See if you find an explanation that is even remotely plausible.
Anyone who wants to read a good book on all this should read Gary Demar's book, Last Days Madness.
Now watch this.
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