Posted on 10/04/2013 2:11:50 PM PDT by jodyel
Present Tribulation vs. Future Tribulation, Dr. Thomas Ice
Over the years I have noticed an argument against pretribulationism which goes something like the following: "The New Testament teaches that we will suffer persecution and tribulation as followers of Christ, therefore, I believe the Church will go through the tribulation." The New Testament does teach that Believers will suffer persecution and tribulation, but it does not follow that because of this the Church will go through the tribulation.
Church Age Tribulation
Jesus clearly teaches that the Church Age, before the rapture and the tribulation, would be a time in which Believers would experience "tribulation" from the world. Jesus said,
"If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, 'A slave is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also" (John 15:18-20).
"These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world" (John 16:33).
It is said of the Apostles in the early Church:
"So they went on their way from the presence of the Council, rejoicing that they had been considered worthy to suffer shame for His name" (Acts 5:41).
Later it was also said,
"strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying, 'Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God'" (Acts 14:22).
Paul tells us,
"For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake" (Phil. 1:29).
Paul wrote in his farewell epistle,
"Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted" (2 Tim. 3:12).
Peter noted the following:
"But to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing; so that also at the revelation of His glory, you may rejoice with exultation" (1 Pet. 4:13).
Therefore, there is a clear biblical basis for expecting Church Age persecution from the world toward believers.
Gerald Stanton declares the following about Church Age tribulation:
And one has but to think of Christians being thrown to the lions in a Roman arena, or Christians being torn on the racks of a Spanish Inquisition, or Christians today being put to death in godless Communistic lands to realize that believers have undergone fiery trials down through the years since the days of the early church. Such persecutions with their untold agony, no matter how severe, are nevertheless not "the great tribulation." If they were, one could hardly read Fox's Book of Martyrs without concluding that there have been two or three "great tribulations" every century from the time of Christ.
Down through the centuries, believers have suffered, bled, and died for their faith in Christ, counting it not loss to seal their testimony with their blood. [1]
I have read from various sources that at least 100,000 believers die each year throughout the world in our own day and age, not to mention the various levels of persecution short of death that goes on as well. These are the Church Age tribulations that the New Testament speaks of in relation to believers throughout the entire dispensation of the Church.
The point is that non-pretribulationists believe that future tribulation during the seven-year tribulation is basically more of the same kind of persecution that has been going on for the last two thousand years. On the other hand, pretribulationists believe that the Bible indicates that tribulation during the future seven-years will be something that has never been seen before, it will be the judgment from God upon a Christ-rejecting world. What has been going on since the founding of the Church about two thousand years ago has been the animosity of Satan, his demons and the hatred of the unbelieving world, not the wrath of God.
The Tribulation
The tribulation, which is spoken of dozens of times with various labels like "day of the Lord," time of "wrath," "the tribulation," etc., is mentioned throughout the Bible. Some of the many references include passages throughout almost all of the prophets, the Olivet Discourse (Matt. 24:4, 28; Mark 13:3, 23), and most of the Book of Revelation (4-19). That time is referred to throughout Revelation as the wrath of the Lamb or God. Note the following: "the wrath of the Lamb" (6:16); "for the great day of their wrath has come" (6:17); [God's] "Thy wrath" (11:18); "he will also drink of the wine of the wrath of God" (14:10); "and threw them into the great wine press of the wrath of God" (14:19); "seven plagues, which are the last, because in them the wrath of God is finished" (15:1); "seven golden bowls full of the wrath of God" (15:7); "Go and pour out the seven bowls of the wrath of God into the earth" (16:1); "Babylon the great was remembered before God, to give her the cup of the wine of His fierce wrath" (16:19); "He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God" (19:15).
It is quite clear in the biblical text that tribulation is a time of God's wrath, not of mankind or of Satan. Scripture speaks of some episodes of Satan and the world against God's people, but the emphasis is clearly upon the wrath of God throughout. In fact, throughout the tribulation there is first a fourth of the earth's population that is killed (Rev. 6:8), then a third is killed (Rev. 9:18), and finally, by the end, all unbelievers are killed (Matt. 13:40, 43; 25:31, 46; Rev. 19:11, 16). Obviously, these passages speak of a time unlike anything that has ever happened throughout the Church Age. Kept from the Hour
Clearly the New Testament teaches that the Church will be kept from the time of God's wrath. Paul, in one of his earliest epistles makes note of this fact as follows:
"...and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come" (1 Thess. 1:10).
In the same epistle he says,
"For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Thess. 5:9).
Paul assumes the much used Old Testament term "wrath" to mean what it does in the Old Testament, which is the time of God's wrath or the tribulation period when God's wrath will be poured out upon the earth. Thus, these two passages, which speak of a future time different than the current Church Age which they were in, clearly see that wrath occurring during the tribulation. Therefore, the Thessalonian believers and all Church Age believers have a promise from God that we will not experience the wrath of God. A similar point is made from Paul's statement in Romans 5:9.
Revelation 3:10 says,
"Because you have kept the word of My perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing, that hour which is about to come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell upon the earth."
This promise made to the Church of Philadelphia and thus all believers throughout the Church Age promises that we will be kept out of the time of the tribulation. This passage has very clear pre-trib implications. The "hour" or "time" of testing is what believers will be kept from. Further, the hour of testing is said to be something that will in the future come upon the whole earth. Thus, it is clear that it is not something that has happened during the days of the Church Age, since no one knows of a global testing that came upon the whole earth since the first century. John speaks in this passage of the tribulation period, which is clearly a time in which the Lord will test the earth dwellers (always persistent unbelievers throughout Revelation) and not Church Age believers. The passage makes it clear that the present Church Age is when the Church is being tested and that is the reason given for why we will be exempted from the time period when God will test the earth dwellers during the period we know as the tribulation.
Conclusion
The Bible distinguishes between trials and tribulations that are destined to occur to Believers during the Church Age from the wrath of God, which will be poured out during the tribulation that is intended for the world. To say that the Church will go through the tribulation because the Bible predicts that Believers will experience tribulation is an erroneous statement in light of the Bible's distinction between present and future tribulation. It is also more likely for an American, who has not experience persecution yet, to think that we must, since America has a different history in relation to Christianity than is common throughout the Church Age.
I have often heard Dr. Ed Hindson make an excellent analogy concerning this issue. He says that having the Church, which is pictured in the New Testament as the Bride of Christ, go through the tribulation is like a man taking a girl to whom he is engaged and beating her to the point of near death and then saying, "Hey babe, let's get married." Such behavior would rightly be thought to be crazy. The New Testament clearly teaches that Christ marries the Bride in heaven (Rev. 19:7-10) before she accompanies Him to earth. She is already in heaven since she was raptured before the tribulation in order to experience the judgment seat of Christ during the tribulation. Therefore she is ready, married and victoriously returning to earth at the second coming with Christ (Rev. 19:11-21). Only the pre-trib scenario makes sense of the details, thus demonstrating that the belief that the Church needs to go through the wrath of the tribulation is a false conclusion. Maranatha!
Endnotes
[1] Gerald B. Stanton, Kept from the Hour: A Systematic Study of the Rapture in Bible Prophecy (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1956), pp. 33-34.
Thanks. I’m shacking, baby!
Excellent!
Thanks again and God Bless, smvoice
lol! I don’t know. “shacking” is funnier!
Oh, c'mon. It was important for them to touch him, to understand that he was not just a manifestation, a spirit.
And it is not a belief based on speculation - It is from a study of the function of the High Priest. What he does has meaning. Read up on the functions of the Holy Days, and you will find that Yeshua was acting as both High Priest AND sacrifice.
It isn't a word-play game.
I didn't say there was NO wall of partition. I said it was a function of man made tradition.
I am trying my best to go FROM the BEGINNING to where we are now, but you are trying to mix NOW with THEN, and it won't work. ...clearing throat...2 Tim. 2:15.
There cannot be a NOW and THEN. Whatever is NOW cannot have stepped on what YHWH said from the beginning, and that which He said cannot be changed. Look, this is really, really easy. Look at what YHWH said from the get-go, and look where the prophets declare it will wind up, and your interpretation would necessarily HAVE TO fall on that line.
WHATEVER strays from that line, needfully must be reinterpreted.
Read Ephesians, Chapter 2. You will SEE there is a definite “TIME PAST”, “BUT NOW”, and “AGES TO COME”. I didn’t make the division. Paul didn’t make the division. God did. And gave it to Paul to write down. You just have to figure out when each began and will end, in order for the NEXT one to begin. “But Now” cannot BEGIN until “Time Past” ENDS. Don’t you understand this?
There has always, ever, and only been one way to be saved. I think you need to stop looking at the cross from a linear aspect, and think more like ripples in a pond from a pebble being dropped in...
The point is to save the sons of Adam. Pan out and see the bigger picture. There were millions of gentiles prior to Moses, prior to Abraham, prior to Noah, even. Why this peculiar fondness only for those gentiles living after Moses? By your reckoning, *none* in times before Moses had any chance of salvation at all.
Look, he starts with ONE. From that one, comes a family, and from that family comes a nation. From that nation comes the world. from the world comes heaven and earth together, that which was torn by Adam fully repaired. Can't you see those ripples?
The cross is where the roll-out of information reaches critical mass - no more need for flash-cards and pictures - Now we can use the primer. It was ALWAYS about saving the sons of Adam. There was ALWAYS only one path to salvation. There is only ONE Blood, There is only ONE Torah. There is only ONE WAY.
The spiked koolaid of hyper-dispensationalism is a hard habit to break. It requires two words when Yehova gave us only one, and two ways to salvation, and there is only one.
It requires Grace to be capable of erasing habitual deliberate sin as a way of life. It requires Yeshua to hang on the cross daily, just like the mass.
>> “Let me just save you some time and tell you the two ways that Gentiles could be saved...” <<
.
Which one of those two ways covered Adam, Abel, Seth, Enoch, Methu Selah, Noah, and Lot?
Some of my favorite verses in the Bible...
Praise God!
It was written by L. Cohen and I don't know why, but it always blesses me to think of David and his failure, and that God knows our hearts. The blessing is from God, the music is from Three Talented Girls...
I hope you enjoy. God is always in charge, and sin is always in our lives. But, by faith, and nothing more...
First, you would do well to see who it is that is 'afar off', and ponder why it is that Paul says they were at times afar off... implying that there were times when his audience was indeed near. Those that are 'near', and those that are 'far away' is a minor theme in the Tanakh... Just as you might like to know who it is that is prophesied to be 'the fullness of the Gentiles' (that is a particular person/people)... And the ones called 'not my people'. Then you can see the division you have identified. The wall of partition is not it. It is significant, but only as a man-made division.
And none of the covenants have ended, especially Moses, which we know is still active until it is fulfilled...
You had mentioned that the Law is for the Jews. Tell me, how many tribes received the law at Sinai? How many were there for the covenant of Moab? 'Jews' are the House of Judah. That is Judah, part of Benjamin, and part of the Levites. What about all the others? They too are 'under the law', eh?.
Pay VERY close attention to the covenant at Moab.
How are you doing over there? Any aftershocks? How is everyone coping?
I just looked at the USGS site and there were two today. It has caused a lot of people to sleep outside for fear of being trapped on the other islands, but here, not so much. Everything seems back to normal.
Glad to know that you are safe and sound.
BTW: these men are the reason Paul could take us all the way back to Adam. BEFORE God set up the wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles.
Yehova set up no wall of any kind.
He chose a people, the people that were least among all of the peoples, to bear his son into the world.
Everyone is an exception to the two way rule you created, including yourself.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.