Agreed. My initial reason for bringing up Gog/Magog was to support God's doctrine of imminence. (A main pre-trib rapture concept). Let me try again. Gog/Magog will truly be a major event in human history. I believe it may be what causes the anti Christ to sign the treaty with Israel. The neat thing to me is that no one knows when Gog/Magog happens. If it is before the rapture, we would be waiting for it instead of the rapture.
I am in the US Military, and I keep a close watch on the current state of affairs that the President has with Islamic nations. I have said from the beginning of my career that I will faithfully and without complaint defend the US. With the caveat, I will never get into a battle with Israel.(Fortunately I retire in 2010, because I see Obama giving up our alliance with Israel to consort with the Iran, Iraq, Etc... )
I tend to agree. To me the preeminent proof of a pre-trib rapture is Christ's teaching of imminence. Once the Anti-Christ is revealed and so forth there no longer remains imminence and we can start to calculate the days down.
So to my thinking the Gog/Magog war has to occur either after the rapture or simultaneously with it so that Christ's teaching 'no man knows the hour' remains intact.
If the rapture were to occur after this war we would know that the rapture is coming and again begin calculating the days down. So there goes the 'no man knows' teaching.
Just my thoughts.
I believe the rapture will take place at or near the beginning of this war.The 'anti-christ' will deceive the world into thinking that he is the messiah.He will claim the gog war was armagedon,that Israel will now have peace,the temple may now be rebuilt and most importantly,that 'he' has judged and removed the 'goats' ie:intolerant,separatist,litteralist,only one way to heaven bible thumping maniacs.
The mortal horror that will grip the world when the gog war erupts will be replaced by the biggest sigh of relief the world has ever breathed, all thanks to 'him'.
Many,many people will trully beleive that they owe him their lives.The only people who will speak out against him will be the new batch of bible thumping maniacs that want to drag the world back to the dark days where 'religion' almost brought about the end.
It won't be fun ,however ,God will provide!
"For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock." Psalm 27:5
God bless us all.