Biblical Support for the Pre-Tribulation Rapture

SO.
All those who "knew" I'd be back are right. Yes I get fed up with the debate here and want no more to do with it. This time I wasn't even tempted back by some post or other, which is how it usually happens.This time it's because I've been trying to renew my Christian life and that always brings up issues I feel a need to share with others. In this case it is about the nearness of the End, which includes the Rapture, the Tribulation and all that.So I looked for a thread to join for the purpose and it's interesting how many have been started but didn't go very far, as I found when I searched on "Rapture" unde "thread titles:"EvC Forum: SearchAs usual I don't really want to debate, I want to preach. Of course. The whole idea is to get people saved, especially those who don't want to be saved. But debate is certain to happen. This is EvC after all.So I've been listening to one End Times ministry, Jan Markell's "Understanding the Times" radio, which just about always deals with these end times issues, and I don't always agree with them but at least they keep the issues alive, the pot stireed as it were, which is worth something if we really are in the end times.One recent radio show was about the Tribulation period which is understood by a certain Christian camp to follow the Rapture, which is understood by the same camp to be when the Church is taken up to heaven with Christ. The Tribulation that follows is understood to be a seven-year period on Earth during which the Antichrist reigns and God's wrath is poured out on the unbelieving world. If you go back through the Archives of Jan Markell's radio shows you will find lots of programs about these topics.But the one I recently heard was by a pastor Robert Jefress. He spells out the scripture on the subject and at the very end gives four reasons why he believes in the pre-Tribulation Rapture, meaning the removal of Christian believers at the start of the seven-year Tribulation, as opposed to other readings of the scripture that put the Rapture at the time of Jesus' Second Coming, or sometime during the Tribulation period. I'm with the pre-Tribbers.So I've been told here that I am the last one to expect to be raptured, I've even been told I AM the Antichrist. I'm that evil in the eyes of some here. However, I consider my doctrine to be very standard traditional Protestantism, and although I know I'm a sinner who doesn't deserve any favors from God at all I have reason to believe He still includes me in the number of saints. Maybe at the bottom of the list, but on it in any case. I don't think he'd be continuing to "talk" to me as He does if He'd abandoned me completely.Be that as it may I think we can discuss the scriptural bases for all this whether I'm saved or not.One thing I want to bring up is something I wrote about on my blog a few years ago, that is not shared by many in the Christian world. I've been convinced that the Papacy is the seat of the Antichrist because that's what Martin Luther and other leaders of the Protestant Reofrmation concluded from scripture. Yes from scripture. They were Catholics themselves who started out protesting the deviations of the Roman Church from some biblical standards, and as they kept studying the scriptures and in the case of Luther when the Pope excommunicated him for bringing such things to his attention, Luther began to see ways that the papacy is a complete and total violation of the Biblical standards, and concluded that he is the Antichrist.This idea has been rejected since the Reformation by many Protestant teachers, Since I became a believer in the late eighties I herad many times about this figure who is to rise at the very end, all sorts of ideas about this evil political leader, usually from some eastern European nation. But sometimes he's thought to be a Muslim. The Antichrist is identified in the Book of Revelation as being known by "the number of his name" which is 666, so we get all kinds of creative ideas about how that number is to be understood.The Reformation identification of the Pope is often rejected just because there is a succession of Popes while scripture seems to point to a singular figure who appears at the very end of time before Christ returns, as THE Antichrist. Well, the biblical evidence for the papacy as the Antichrist is very strong. The only conclusion has to be that one of them, the very last one, will be the singular figure identified in scripture.And there is one interesting way he can be identified by that number 666 too: It's not clear where the Latin title occurs, whether in his tiara or mitre or throne or what, but the Latin title Vicarivs Filii Dei contains Roman numerals (Latin is interesting that way. Many languages have numbers or Gematria assigned to the letters of their alphabet, but Latin has them embedded IN their alphabet. No, I don't know if this is unique to Latin but it may be. ANYWAY, add up the Roman numerals of that title, a title which is certainly a name of the Pope, "Substitute for the Son of God" or "In the Place of the Son of God." The title alone identifies him as the Antichrist, but add up the numerals: they add up to 666.SO, I for one am convinced that the Antichrist IS a Pope, all are Antichrists but the last one should be THE Antichrist everybody is talking about although most are looking for him in all the wrong places. Hiding in plain sight.NOW, is this latest Pope him? Francis? Well, I think so, and I'll tell you why. For one thing he talks blasphemy. Unbelievers like him because he doesn't talk like a religious man. Most of them at least make an effort to sound Christian even when they are worshipping the idol "the virgin Mary" instead of Christ, and taking the "teachings" of Our Lady of Fatima or whoever as gospel, over the gospel of Christ.So his character is one reason he could be THE Antichrist. But I also think God gave us signs to identify him, that I wrote about in my blog a few years ago: So, the "rational" people at EvC will likely just scoff at all this of course, all this symbolism and odd occurrendes. Just "coincidences" of course. I expect that and we can argue it, but the point here is mostly to alert people to possibilities that MIGHT happen, that you would need to know about IF THEY DID happen. OK?So THE Antichrist is to reign during the Seven Year period called the Great Tribulation, after Chrstians have disappeared from Planet Earth. He'll be worshipped, at least at first. Then all Hell is to break loose. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

The point to my post is that if the indicators I've given are valid, the final days must be very close. Pope Francis is 83 years old already. If he's the Antichrist who reigns during the Seven Year Tribulation he's going to have to live to be much older. But even a few years older is getting very old, so if he's It the Tribulation must be very very close.I think God really did give us signs of Francis' specialness in some way, such as the thirteens in March 13, 2013, the day he was elected Pops, which occurred at 7:06 PM, which can be written 6:66, the attack on his "peace" doves by the crow and seagull, even the seagull sitting during the deliberations on the chimney where the Pope is announced, seems ominous. Even the lightning hitting St. Peter's when the previous Pope resigned. And that's just specific to Francis.The papacy itself is easily identified with the Latin Vicarivs Filii Dei whose Roman numerals add up to 666. This is the only derivation of that number I've seen that is at all convincing, coming as it does within the phrase itself that actually defines the Antichrist, usurper of the role of Christ, and very tellingly in the language of Rome too, the seat of the Antichrist so designated. No, Christ needed to delegate nobody in His place, that is itself the same blasphemy, because Christ is present everywhere and available to all of us without a mediator. Christ IS our Mediator, the one who defends us before God. AbE: Another indicator of the Pope's identiy as Antichrist is that the RCC calls him "the head of the Church," but scripture in two places calls Christ the head of the Church. Just another way the Pope is the usurper of the role of Christ, which is the definition of Antichrist. /AbE.It was the Protestant Reformers who identified the papacy as the Antichrist from scripture. I didn't invent the idea. And ordinary Catholics are not targeted. If they put all their trust in Christ they may be saved, but not if they worship or pray to Mary or make too much of the Pope, or the pagan superstitions of the RCC such as the rosary or burning candles or bowing down to statues and so on.Robert Jeffress whose talk at "Understanding the Times" radio inspired me to write a post on this subject, gives four reasons at the end of his talk why he believes in a pre-Tribulation Rapture of the Church:

1. The Tribulation has two purposes, the first is to save a multitude of Jews and Gentiles who resisted salvation up to this point and have to be saved the hard way. The multitude is pictured in Revelation 7 standing before the throne of God waving palm branches. The second purpose is to pour out God's judgments on the unbelieving world, which judgments are depicted in various ways in the Book of Revelation.
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2. The Church is not mentioned in the Book of Revelation during the events of salvation or God's judgment, because Christians ARE saved and are free of God's wrath, which is for the unbelievers. The Church is addressed up to Revelation 3, and depicted in heaven in chapters 4 and 5, and again from Revelation 19, when Jesus returns to Earth with a multitude following Him, but in between there is no mention of the Church at all.
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3. In Revelation 3 the Church at Philadelphia is promised by Christ to be "kept from the trial that is to come upon all the Earth" if they change their ways and become obedient to Him.
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4. Romans 8:1 says that believers are not appointed to God's wrath, "there is no condemnation" to those who are in Christ. We are to undergo persecution and tribulation in this life, of course, but the Great Tribulation is The Day of the Lord, when He sends judgment on the entire Earth, and that is what believers are saved from. Jesus took the wrath of God on the cross and if we are in Him we are saved from that wrath ourselves. (If God shortens the tribulation before it kills everybody, that doesn't mean He's going to shorten the period of seven years, but I haven't studied this point.)

Again, the point of my message is that if Pope Francis is the final Antichrist these events are all VERY close.If you aren't convinced, oh well, but if Christians do suddenly disappear, while there will certainly be all sorts of rationalizations offered to explain it away, maybe you'll be convinced then and maybe my post will be of some use to you in leading you to more information to guide you in facing what's coming.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Why Roman numerals and not Greek numerals? After all, the New Testament was written in Greek, not in Latin. [/qs]It's a phrase that describes the Pope, so Latin with Roman numerals are very appropriate. It's the Pope who is Vicarivs Filii Dei or "in the place of the Son of God," a phrase which in itself alone describes the Antichrist, a usurper of the role of Christ. The Pope is called "the head of the Church" by the RCC, but the Bible in two places says Jesus Christ is the "head of the Church." Another way the Pope is a usurper, and that makes him Antichrist.So then it's just confirmation that the Roman numerals in the Latin phrase happen to add up to 666.Rome usurped the gospel itself and created a false Church that the world accepted as Christianity for a millennium, headed by this Antichrist Pope. When the Byzantine Emperor Phocas in 606 AD declared the Pope "Universal Bishop" he enacted the elevation of this bishop in a way that Pope Gregory had said would be the creation of the Antichrist. I forget the exact order of events here but I know that is what Pope Gregorty said about the idea of putting the Bishop of Rome above all the other bishops in Christendom. (Luther wrote about all this I think, and I probably found it in "The History of Romanism" a tome authored by John? Dowling). It was a usurpation of the Church itself, it created the RCC which dominated for a thousand years until the Reformation came along and took away the power it had wielded all that time over all the nations it presided over. It's the ROMAN Church, it is not the original Church that was born in Jerusalem and enshrined in the Greek Testament. Its whole structure is pagan. In the New Testament all believers are called "priests," and Jesus Christ is the only priest over us, but the RCC created a pagan style priesthood. It brought over all the trappings of the pagan religions of Rome, including the robes and ornaments that show great wealth, and the weird head gear. Scripture tells us that men are not to cover their heads in the assembly, but these "bishops" all wear some kind of head gear, and the Pope wears that little cap like the Jewish yarmulke. And of course there are many more pagan elements I'm not mentioning here. Dowling's History of Romanism lists them all.Latin is the language of Rome. The Pope is the head of the Church of ROME, not the Church of the New Testament. Roman numerals are embedded in Latin as it were, and the phrase that calls the Pope the usurper of the role of the Son of God adds up to 666.Nothing to do with Greek anything. So the rest of your post is irrelevant. But I hope you too will be saved even if it means having to go through the Tribulation. So much easier to give yourself to Christ now and be in the Rapture and avoid all that. But some people have to do it the hard way. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Though the Pope claims to serve Jesus now (although in fact the last few Popes have honored "Mary" above Christ), during the Tribulation when he gets power over the nations again the mask will come off and he will put himself unreservedly in the place of God and demand worship as God.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I was pondering all this last night and one thing that came to mind was something I'd read here fairly recently: Buzsaw's thread in which his OP describes two instances of a witch and someone else who were actually dead but seemed alive because they were completely possessed by a demon (see Message 1). The demon gave them a semblance of life. As I said on that thread I'd never heard of that before, I'm certainly aware of living people being inhabited or possessed by demons, and the New Testament is full of such examples, but not a dead person being completely animated by them. I suppose it would account for the existence of "zombies" if they are real. The lore about zombies can't be true though: why would they want to kill people and eat them? The people Buzsaw described had not eaten or drunk anything for many years, that was a main characteristics. Demons have no need for food or drink.ANYWAY, here it comes: I suddenly had the thought that the final Antichrist would be entirely possessed by Satan himself, not just any old rank and file demon but Satan himself, and his host could in fact be dead. Pope Francis? Well, he's pretty old already. If he's to be Anticrhist while he's alive it has to come soon. Well, even if he's dead I suppose.It's just a thought. You can now run around screaming and tearing your hair out and calling me names.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

"Antichrist" means both against Christ and usurper of Christ.

I've been taught for years that the Greek for "anti" implies both "against" and "in the place of." I am pointing out that the various descriptions and titles of the Pope make him a usurper. "Vicarious" certainly means substitute, or in the place of something else.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Yes, Luther had a conniption fit when he discovered the writings of the Jews against Christ. He'd been very friendly to them up until that discovery. There are 1.2 billion Catholics and 1.8 billion Muslims. Ask Google. Probably not suddenly. But people will be rather on edge after the Christians all disappear, and that may occur during some kind of worldwide upheaval too, according to some teachers. And the Pope will probably have to do some "miracles" to get their attention. (This is another reason to think he'll be possessed by Satan.)_ But scripture says that multitudes will be saved to the true Christ so not all people are going to be deceived, just a huge number. "Pretty much everyone?" You should supply scripture for that, but remember that the RCC completely ruled Europe for a millennium, and the Pope still heads 1.2 billion Catholics.But consider that even the Protestant churches aren't suspecting the Pope. Lots of them consider the RCC to be just another Christian denomination, and many actually honor the Pope. Some have even gone to the Vatican to be blessed by the Pope. Seems to me he's just about "the last person" many would ever suspect of being the Antichrist. Especially these latest Popes since Vatican II who have been doing their best to bend their doctrine to embrace all other religions and even atheism. Hey, the Pope is a Really Nice Guy in the eyes of most of the world. Catholic traditionalists and some Protestants consider Francis to be violating a lot of Christian teaching, but that's not a very big number. Where would I get such "hatred" if not from learning about what the RCC teaches? And if I hate it what I hate is the doctrines of the papacy, not Catholics themselves, who need to be saved from it. And besides, when I was reading up on religions back in the early eighties, I loved the Catholic mystics and thought for a long time I was going to become a Catholic. It DID take further study to learn that they aren't the true Church. Well, if you really think that based on what I've written here I guess there's no way to dissuade you. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Well, ad hominem is always a reliable port in a storm of ideas you don't like, isn't it?

Please quote me if you are going to accuse me of saying something.

He wasn't wrong about the Jews. They do have all kinds of curses and misrepresentations of Jesus in their writings. Why not? They deny that He's the Messiah, they hate Him. Luther was wrong to advocate punishing them as he did, but in fact that piece against the Jews didn't get read for centuries anyway. it was considered an embarrassment and buried.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Funny, you remind me very strongly of the House Democrats making it all up against Trump while what he said was clear enough and true.

Mohammed had a smattering of knowledge of both the Old and New Testaments, and it's only smattering that got incorporated into Islam, much of it absurdly confused. He mixed up Mary the mother of Jesus with Miriam the sister of Moses, among other confusions. And he copied out some portion of the book of Isaiah. That's about it though. Well the Popes have been friendly to Muslims, and if one of them does all those miracles, who knows?As a side point, some Protestant historians regard Islam as the other leg of the Roman Empire. You know that statue Nebuchadnezzare dereamed of in the Book of Daniel? The one Daniel interpreted in terms of succeeding empires with Babylonia as the head, and the Roman Empire as the legs and feet? Two legs of the Roman Empire, Catholism one of them, Islam the other. And they both arose in history about the same time, the Bishop of Rome in 606 AD and Islam within a few years of that, I'd have to look it up. Islam did supplant the Eastern portion of Christendom of those days, part of the Roman Empire, which then became the Byzantine Empire, and then Islam. Francis has a reputation as a reformer of the Church in many ways. He's not identified with the pederasty, and he makes statements about identifying with the downtrodden, doesn't like the trappings of the papacy, likes to hobnob with the common people and so on. But who knows how all this will play out? You think Elon Musk has a better chance of winning them all over? Remember that the Vatican is a political entity, a nation unto itself, so it has "secular" standing from that. I don't know anything about Elon Musk and you haven't given me any reason to consider him a contender for the role of Antichrist, whereas I have the Protestant Reformers on my side, who arrived at their identification of the Pope from scripture, and maybe I can find the scriptures they used if you require it of me. And again, the Pope is not suspected by most people of having nefarious intentions. Pope John Paul was just about universally liked, and Francis is popular too.What I am talking about is based on stuff I've LEARNED over the years, not something that just came over me in some mysterious way so that it now clouds my judgment for emotional reasons.

There were the Jews who believed Jesus was the Messiah and the Jews who did not, yes, "the circumcision" is how the unbelieving Jews were identified. The latter are referred to in the NT as "the Jews." It was "the Jews" who voted for the release of Barabbas and the crucifixion of Christ. Sure, we're all guilty of His death but scripture says very clearly that "the Jews" voted for His crucifixion, and even willingly took the responsibility for His death upon themselves. And yes, Jesus forgave them from the cross and we are not to take vengeance on them either, as you say. Luther was wrong to do that. He was acting like the RCC in calling for the state to punish them.The Jews who did not become Christians have been called "the Jews" ever since. They are the Pharisee party known today as the Orthodox. It is not wrong to identify them as "the Jews."Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Yes, Islam practices some of the violence they find in the OT. Yes some of the OT is part of their religion. But not nearly as much as you imply. So what is your point?Again, I did not choose the Pope to be the Antichrist, the Protestant Reformers did, principally Luther, who spelled out the scripture that convinced him, which I'd rather not spend the time looking up but I may try. Certainly people may disagree with the Reformers, but I ended up being most convinced of their arguments, and I do think the calculation of the 666 is very telling, and about Francis the signs I gave for him too, along with his beliefs which are rather more Marxist than Christian.The main evidence ought to be the RCC behemonth itself which is a bastion of Roman paganism that has passed as Christian though there is nothing Christian about it. The existence of the papacy itself is not Christian, the trappings, the garb, are from the Roman pagan religions, the rosary, the candles, the sign of the cross, etc are all pagan in spirit. Then there are the "saints" which have become idols akin to the gods accepted in the Roman pantheon. People actually pray to "St. Jude" or "St. Christopher" fpr various favors. Just like the old gods these saints have their own territory of expertise. The Church also often promotes the worship of Mary over Christ though they will deny that if you bring it up, calling it something else, reverence or something like that? -- oh "veneration," splitting semantic hairs since it ends up meaning the same thing as worship anyway.The RCC does include the Gospel in its liturgy and the priests who got to read the Bible taught much of Christian doctrine, so it is certainly possible for many Catholics to actually be Christians; but the institution itself screams paganism, not Christ.The Bible tells us we will not know the time of Jesus' return, but it doesn't say we can't figure out who the Antichrist is, and that's what the Reformers did. We still can't know when Jesus will return, but we can certainly know "the times and the seasons" which the Bible says we ARE to know. Jesus chides the Jews for not knowing the time of his first coming, which is knowable through the OT, especially the Book of Daniel, and He tells us also to know the times and the seasons of His second coming. No, not the exact day, but the general period in which the signs point to His return. We've been seeing these signs for decades and they are only getting sharper.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.