Replies

No one escapes tribulation in a fallen world, but God does promise to get those who know Him as Savior off the scene before He sends judgment.

Some hold that Thessalonians was the first of Paul's writing. Now if that be true why was Paul telling the Ephesians later to (Ephesians 6:11) Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.....-17 if the believers were going to escape tribulation? Doesn't one escape the tribulation if they know what the tribulation is?

12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places....

Isn't Paul telling us what the tribulation is... Didn't Christ say the first sign of His return was 'deception' of those claiming to be Christ, or Christian?

Scripture tells us that he who endures to the end shall be saved.

Jesus said there would be "great tribulation" which His followers (the "elect") must endure. Yet for "the elects sake, those days shall be shortened."

God's final people "came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." They did not escape it, but endured through it, being purified.

After describing the “persecutions and tribulations” which the early believers where enduring, Paul wrote: 2 Thessalonians 1:7-10 “And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power; When he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe (because our testimony among you was believed) in that day.”

Paul was expecting that the church would be enduring persecution and tribulation right up until the coming of Jesus at the very end of the world.

The idea that the church will be raptured away before the period of tribulation sounds good, because no one wants to go through persecution or hardship, but the fact is that throughout history Christians have suffered for their faith, and there will be no relief from that until the end of the world.