A REVELATION RAPTURE MYSTERY EXPLAINED USING GOD’S WORD – Part 4
“AND NOW THE REST OF THE STORY”
AND NOW THE REST OF THE TRIBULATION PERIOD RAPTURE MYSTERY DESCRIBED BY PAUL IN I CORINTHIANS AND BY JOHN IN REVELATION, INTERPRETED IN MULTIPLEWAYS BY SERVANTS OF GOD SINCE 1740!
March 7, 2010
http://www.tribulationperiod.com/
Begin Archive Prophect Update Number 234B
SPECIAL PROPHECY UPDATE NUMBER 234B
August 3, 2005
My Search for the First of the Week Position in History!
The Didache or “The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles”
The following extract from “The Apostolic Fathers” by J.B. Lightfoot and J.R. Harmer, as edited and revised by Michael W.
Holmes, provides the historical aspect as to the dating of the Didache.
“The Didache may have been put into its present form as late as 150 AD, though a date considerably closer to the end of the first century seems more probable.
The materials, from which it is composed, however, reflect the state of the church at an even earlier date. In his very thorough commentary J.P. Audet suggests about 70 AD, and he is not likely to be off by more than a decade in either direction.” Later on I will be quoting from it.
I certainly do not believe the Didache to be inspired, but it is an early writing that existed during the time of the Apostolic Fathers, and it does have an outline of what is predicted to occur at the time of the appearance of the antichrist.
I sincerely hope that I have not been offensive to those who hold the pre or mid tribulation period position for the first resurrection by the many articles I have placed on our web site – I assure you it was not my intension. I was born and raised in the northern half of Arkansas, and the preachers of the Baptist churches I attended were not seminary trained. Most of what they taught came from books written by old Baptist writers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. So I was exposed to those teachings in the 1930’s and 40’s. After I was called to preach in 1969, and entered seminary in 1971, I had to take a position to defend myself in the midst of my peers. I did not believe the rapture occurred at the beginning or the absolute end, so I adopted what was called the mid-tribulation position. The “pre-tribbers” did not disassociate themselves from me, and the “last of the weekers,” were happy I thought the church would go into part of the tribulation period. Then I started lecturing in hundreds of churches, and tried to stay off what I believed about the rapture to avoid conflict.
It was mission impossible, but I did try.
In the early eighties, while in east Texas doing a series of lectures, a Pastor who I dearly loved, after he had heard me mention my position, took me aside into his office and, in a very nice way, showed me Revelation 11:18, and asked me what I believed about it, saying I could get back to him later on it.
He was trying to help me, and I appreciated it, and always will, but I knew why he showed it to me. And, Oh my, did it bring back a lot of the memories of my early teachings in the 30’s and 40’s. I will always be grateful to him, because it eventually caused me to stop being concerned about what people thought, and to be concerned about what Christ would say to me at his judgment. He knew what he was doing, but he didn’t know I knew what he was doing. I owe him a great debt. It was then that I began to be convicted to preach what I really believed without regard to maintaining acceptability with the brethren.
I have been presenting what is known as the pre-wrath seventh trumpet rapture at the church where I pastor for some 23 years, but it was the early nineties before I overcame my spiritual cowardice sufficiently to began to present what I believed about the seventh trumpet rapture to other churches.
And although I do not think the aforementioned Texas pastor believes what I believe about Daniel 9:27, his asking me what I believed about Revelation 11:18, also gave me the courage to openly present what I have long believed concerning it in the late nineties.
The first teachings of the first of the week position were met with a steady barrage of opposition by books and articles written by the orthodox theologians of that time, but by the middle of the nineteenth century they had shown a significant drop in number,
and by 1900 were down to a trickle. It was Dr.
Scofield’s study Bible that stopped even the trickle after it came out in 1909.
The reason I have reiterated all this to you now, as I have in the past, is to tell you that I am very concerned about the state of confusion I believe will exist when Israel is eventually attacked, whenever it may be, and a lot of people will be wondering why the rapture has not occurred.
I have studied diligently the writings of those who hold the first of the week position, but I find no evidence of it existing before 1740. And I have read, and considered, the articles they have written since the revival of books, challenging their position, began to be written again in any great number in the 1970’s. In the very small number of quotes
they have used from the age of the early church fathers, I have gone back and examined the context of where each was quoted, and in every case found it to be quoted out of context. I have studied the early church fathers and find no quote in context that refers to a first of the week position. But I will give you one from the Didache, and it does seen to indicate a seventh trumpet position, as opposed to a rapture catching out all the saved at the beginning of the tribulation period. Its context is set in a discourse involving the antichrist appearing as a son of God, and introduces four chronological phases that follow his appearing on the scene.
CHRONOLOGICAL PHASE ONE
Didache 16:5 – Then all humankind will come to the fiery test, and “many will fall away” and perish, but “those who endure” in their faith “will be saved” by the accursed one himself.
1. All of humanity will come to the fiery test of the tribulation.
2. They will all enter into it – Some will fall away from a faith based on religion and works, and not on the sacrificial death of Christ bearing our curse for our not being able to keep the law. (Galatians 3:13 – Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree:)
3. True believers, who have faith that Christ himself took all their sins in own body on the tree, being made the “accursed one” for them, will endure in that faith, and will be taken out, saved from God’s wrath, when the seventh trumpet sounds.
(I Peter 2:24 – Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.)
CHRONOLOGICAL PHASE TWO
Didache 16:6 – And then will appear the signs of the truth: first the sign of the opening in heaven, then the sound of a trumpet, and third, the resurrection of the dead.
I Thessalonians 4;16,17 – For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: [17] 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.
CHRONOLOGICAL PHASE THREE
Didache 16:7 – But not of all, rather, as it has been said, “The Lord will come, and all his saints with him.”
The writer points out that this is not what the old timers called a “general resurrection,” because many are left behind when the seventh trumpet sounds.
The writer is quick to point out that the saints will return with Jesus after the seven vials of wrath have been poured out.
I Thessalonians 5:9 – For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ,
Revelation 16:1 – And I heard a great voice out of the temple saying to the seven angels, Go your ways, and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth.
Luke 21:25,26 – And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; [26] Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.
CHRONOLOGICAL PHASE FOUR
Didache 16:8 – Then the world “will see the Lord coming upon the clouds of heaven.”
Luke 21:27 – And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.
Revelation 1:7 – Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.
Acts 1:9-13 – And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. [10] And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; [11] Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven
? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.
Hebrews 10:24,25 – And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: [25] Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.
I Thessalonians 4:16 – For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:
I Corinthians 15:52 – In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
I Corinthians 15:51 – Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,
Revelation 10:7 – But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets.
Revelation 11:15,18 – And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever. [18] And the nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that thou shouldest give reward unto thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear thy name, small and great; and shouldest destroy them which destroy
the earth.