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[Saw this revealing piece on the net. Fascinating?]

The Pretrib Rapture Jackpot!

by Bruce Rockwell

Attention, writers. You can make a fortune by promoting the pretrib rapture!
First, some background. As you know, pretrib began in Scotland in 1830. The earliest developers, including Edward Irving and John Darby, admitted that it was then a totally new view that had never been part of any church’s theology.
They also admitted that it had suddenly sprung from only OT and NT “types” and “symbols” and not from any clear Bible statement!
As late as 1957, pretrib expert John Walvoord admitted in “The Rapture Question” (p. 148) that “pretribulationism” is NOT “an explicit teaching of Scripture”!
Since the early 1900s pretrib has been sold by novelists like Sydney Watson (in 1913) and by Salem Kirban whose “Left Behind”-type novel “666” came out in 1970 - the same year Hal Lindsey’s “The Late Great Planet Earth” started breaking sales records.
The very first rapture novel titled “Left Behind” came from the joint pens of Peter and Patti Lalonde in mid-1995, resulting in some competitors being left behind.
The pretrib rapture view, which admittedly is only an “inference” and not “explicit,” rests basically on verses in John 14, I Thess. 4, and I Cor. 15, none of which have either a “taken/left” separation or exciting, nail-biting scenarios that can “sell” pretrib.
You have to go to Revelation’s action-packed chapters instead. When you do, you discover they can be tied to end time details found basically in the Olivet Discourse.
As you know, pretribs believe in two stages; Stage 1 is the pretrib rapture which supposedly occurs several years before Stage 2 which is the posttrib second coming to earth.
Since the three “rapture” chapters listed above don’t have any clear rapture-type separation between the “righteous” and the “wicked,” your best launching pad if you want to be a bestselling author is “the one shall be taken, and the other left” phrase in Matt. 24:40, 41 and Luke 17:34-36.
Trouble is, Dr. Walvoord and many other pretrib leaders declare that the “one taken” are the “wicked” taken in judgment while the “righteous” are left! But since the average pew-sitters don’t seem to know this, you can easily convince them that the “one taken” is a sort of code for an any-moment pretrib rapture!
And the pew-sitters don’t know that Walvoord etc. also teach that the same phrase is part of “non-imminent” Stage 2 which is posttrib (and not pretrib) and is on “Jewish” (and not “Church”) ground!
In order to preserve and emphasize Stage 1 (the pretrib rapture), pretrib merchandisers in recent decades have been stretching forward various aspects found in Stage 2 and quietly applying them to Stage 1. Aspects include “the day of the Lord,” “God’s wrath,” “the taken/left phrase,” “the unknown day and hour,” and Christ’s coming “as a thief” (which is always tied to Armageddon and other posttrib events).
(For more on the above Google “The Correct Answer to Who’s Taken” etc. on Joe Ortiz’s blog of Apr. 12, 2010. Also Google “Pretrib Rapture Stealth.”)
Yes, I’ve told you how you can turn yourself into a bestselling, wealthy author.
But unfortunately you have some competition because Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have already become opportunists and made millions of dollars that are destined to be left behind!
For more on them and their partners, Google “The ‘Left Behind’ Rupture,” “LaHaye’s Temperament,” “Jerry Jenkins Apologizes for Being Seen Gambling in Casinos,” “Pretrib Rapture Diehards,” “Thomas Ice (Bloopers),” “Walvoord Melts Ice,” “Famous Rapture Watchers,” “Margaret Macdonald’s Rapture Chart,” “Pretrib Rapture’s Missing Lines,” “Roots of Warlike Christian Zionism,” “Evangelicals Use Occult Deception,” “Pretrib Rapture Secrecy,” “Letter from Mrs. Billy Graham,” “Pretrib Rapture Politics” and “Pretrib Rapture Dishonesty.”
In closing let me say that Jeremiah 17:11 warns that “he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool.”
And you can bet on this!