Are You Pre- or Post- Tribber?

In this regular feature, Dave and Tom respond to questions from listeners and readers of The Berean Call. Here is this week’s question:  Dear Tom and Dave:  As a new Christian, a couple of years now, who wants to learn all he can about Christianity, which I am going about by reading the Bible as much as my time will allow.  One thing that has puzzled me lately is the different views Christians accept regarding the end times.  What I am getting at is, some of my friends believe in pre-trib rapture, most a post trib rapture, but one believes in a pre-wrath rapture.  Another told me he thought the rapture was a hoax altogether.  He calls himself a preterist, which I thought was a pretty strange view.  My question is:  Are any of these views critical to one’s salvation?

Tom:

Lots of different ideas, Dave, and you know, it’s amazing how things shift back and forth.  At one time the pre-millennial, pre-tribulation view was really, popular back when Hal Lindsey wrote, The Late Great Planet Earth and then that went on the wane and now we have Tim LaHaye’s book kind of bringing that back.  But there are still a lot of different views.

Dave:

Well, the Bible is very clear.  We are saved by believing the gospel.  The gospel has nothing to do with pre-trib rapture or post-trib or whatever, or whether even there is a rapture, that’s not part of the gospel.  And, we also have to be careful that we don’t complicate matters when we are trying to win someone to Christ.  Keep it simple and the gospel is, I Corinthians 15, “…how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.  He was buried and rose again the third day according to the scriptures,”—that’s it.  If we believe in Jesus, we believe who he is and what he did, that he is God himself, who paid the penalty for our sins, we are saved.  Now, whether you believe in a pre-mid trib or pre-trib or pre-wrath or post-trib, or whatever, rapture, or no rapture at all, that depends upon how careful you study the Word of God and whether you are willing.  And here in this area as well as what we talked about, you know—don’t confuse me with facts, my mind is made up.  I talked with someone the other evening who was confused on this matter and I just gave—it happened to be a lady at a Bible study—I just gave her a number of things that I would find very difficult to explain away if the pre-trib view was not correct.  The Bible ends with “The Spirit and the Bride say come.”  And, throughout scripture, “even so, come Lord Jesus.”  Now Jesus cannot come until after the Antichrist appears or if Jesus cannot come until the Great Tribulation, seven year tribulation, then that’s like calling a loan due, demanding payment on a loan that isn’t due for seven years.  Why would the Spirit inspire Christians to call upon Christ to return, to come, and rapture them out of here if he can’t do it for seven years?  That’s so simple in itself it doesn’t make sense.  Now, as for a rapture, Jesus said in John 14, “I’m going to my Father’s house of many mansions—If I go away I will come again and receive you unto myself.”  It sounds kind of like he going to take us to his Father’s house, which is what the groom did in those days for the bride.  Then, when Paul tells us in I Corinthians 4:13, (corrected to read I Thessalonians 4:16), “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God:  and the dead in Christ shall rise first:  Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air:  and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”  That sure sounds like a rapture to me.  It sounds like somebody is being taken to heaven.  Definitely, if you are a Christian you believe in the resurrection; what happens to these people?  Will they all just wander around the cemeteries that they are just resurrected from?  No, their bodies will be changed, I Corinthians 15, and they will be caught up and the living will be caught up with them to meet the Lord in the air.  At the Rapture, Christ does not come to this earth, we meet him in the air.  Tom, we have written books about it, we’ve done articles, we’ve got all kinds of tapes, and I don’t think it’s a debatable issue. When I face what the scripture says there is no way that I can put this in any other place.  And Christ himself said, in Luke:12:45But and if that servant say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; and shall begin to beat the menservants and maidens, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken;
See All..., (Corrected Luke 12, beginning at verse 35), “Let your loins be girded about, and your light burning.  And you’re like those who watch and wait for their Lord.”  The early church, without a question, was watching and waiting, Hebrews:9:27And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
See All..., “Unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time.”  Or, I Thessalonians 1:10-11 (Corrected, verses 9-10), “You turned to God from idols to serve the living and the true God; And to wait for his Son from heaven.”  Or, Titus:2:13Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;
See All... “Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ…” and we could give you other verses.  Now, if you are looking for the return, expected to be watching, waiting, on the alert, looking for Christ to return and you tell me he can’t come back for seven years, at least, come on!  Then, why does he have us excited about expecting him—that is not fair and that is not honest and we shouldn’t be calling upon him to come back if he can’t come back until the Antichrist comes.

Tom:

Dave, the last part of the question this person was talking about the Preterist view.  Now for those who don’t understand that term, most Preterists, I mean, there are variations of them, but they believe that every prophecy in the Bible has already been completed.

Dave:

Up through Revelation 20, anyway.

Tom:

Right and the thing that I find stunning is that most people take this view.  I mean they are not stupid people, they are very bright, yet I think it harkens back what we talked about earlier.  What you laid out, somebody could come to the conclusion by just reading the Bible and reading it with common sense.  Not just that we need the illumination of the Holy Spirit, certainly, but there is some very common sense things that you couldn’t come to any other conclusion.  But these guys confuse this in ways of twisting, turning, and allegorizing—

Dave:

Spiritualizing, there is an awful lot that they have to spiritualize.

Tom:

Exactly.  But it’s not just simple reading of the Bible, that’s what I am getting at.

Dave:

They hang much of it on a misunderstanding.  Matthew:24:34Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.
See All..., “This generation will not pass away.”  Now, there is another interpretation and it’s a generation of unbelief, a rejection will not pass away until all is fulfilled.  But you couldn’t say that all that Jesus talked about was all fulfilled.  It certainly didn’t happen in AD 70.