ezrider
Member
I have never really believed in the rapture theory, at least not as the church teaches it. I can find no substantial lesson within the scriptures of a time when the Lord simply took them out of the way. It is impossible for me to accept otherwise when the examples we have to guide our spiritual lives show us that the children of Israel remained in the land of Egypt and experienced the same plagues as did the Egyptians. Yet the Lord was a hedge about them and protected them from the tribulations. And by obedience through Faith, they painted their door posts with the blood of the passover lamb, so that the angel of death would pass them by. The children of God did not escape the tribulations and the plagues, they were delivered through them that the Lord might be Glorified. The examples we have through the witness of the scripture is just to powerful for me to imagine in any way of escaping the tribulations. The Lord will be Glorified.
If I were forced to take a position, I would have had to say it would be post-trib; but now I am not completely sold on this idea any longer. I have realized that when I am thinking about the idea of a rapture, I am doing so relative to my perceptions of the flesh, as when we shall put off this earthly tabernacle. But I am finding the idea of a pre-trib rapture does have merit, and the very same stories that witness to me that shall we shall not escape from the tribulations, they also testify that the Lord was with them to instruct them prior to His judgements, and He was their hedge to deliver them and protect them through the plagues and judgements.
In this respect, I would have to say there truly is a pre-trib rapture, just not in the way most expect it to come. The rapture is not about flying away or escaping from any tribulation. The rapture is your spiritual awakening. The moment you are truly “born again,” alive in the resurrection of Christ, led and instructed by the Spirit of God. When faith becomes more than the tenants of ones own beliefs, but the acceptance and trust in the Lord’s personal guidance in your spiritual walk. When we give way to our own understanding to wait upon the Lord’s. The idea that we shall be caught up to meet them in the air I think is better understood in the light of being caught up in the Spirit, like as unto the day of Pentecost, for in the Lord, we are to walk after the Spirit, and not after the flesh. And while flesh and blood can not inherit the kingdom of God, those who walk after the Spirit have already entered therein by Faith.
While I have no hopes or expectations of bypassing any future tribulation that may befall us in the flesh, I can rest assured in Faith knowing that the Spirit of the Lord is with me.
If I were forced to take a position, I would have had to say it would be post-trib; but now I am not completely sold on this idea any longer. I have realized that when I am thinking about the idea of a rapture, I am doing so relative to my perceptions of the flesh, as when we shall put off this earthly tabernacle. But I am finding the idea of a pre-trib rapture does have merit, and the very same stories that witness to me that shall we shall not escape from the tribulations, they also testify that the Lord was with them to instruct them prior to His judgements, and He was their hedge to deliver them and protect them through the plagues and judgements.
In this respect, I would have to say there truly is a pre-trib rapture, just not in the way most expect it to come. The rapture is not about flying away or escaping from any tribulation. The rapture is your spiritual awakening. The moment you are truly “born again,” alive in the resurrection of Christ, led and instructed by the Spirit of God. When faith becomes more than the tenants of ones own beliefs, but the acceptance and trust in the Lord’s personal guidance in your spiritual walk. When we give way to our own understanding to wait upon the Lord’s. The idea that we shall be caught up to meet them in the air I think is better understood in the light of being caught up in the Spirit, like as unto the day of Pentecost, for in the Lord, we are to walk after the Spirit, and not after the flesh. And while flesh and blood can not inherit the kingdom of God, those who walk after the Spirit have already entered therein by Faith.
While I have no hopes or expectations of bypassing any future tribulation that may befall us in the flesh, I can rest assured in Faith knowing that the Spirit of the Lord is with me.