It seems like the latest film re-incarnation of Tim LaHaye’s Christian novel series Left Behind has brought the pre-tribulation-rapture-critics out of the woodwork. Let me say this up front: I can’t stand Left Behind. Granted, I have not seen the latest re-hash—nor do I plan to. But while Nicholas Cage may be mildly more talented than Kirk Cameron (probably), I really doubt that a new cast, larger budget or improved special effects will help much. If you are one of those Christians who just loves the books or movies, sorry. Schmaltz is not my thing.
But my biggest qualm is that this latest rendering of very poor Christian “art” has turned the idea of the rapture into the latest blogosphere punching bag. This is known as a straw man argument—taking a weak or even caricatured presentation of a position and knocking it down triumphantly. Discrediting the idea of a pre-tribulational (pre-trib from here on) rapture on the basis of the Left Behind movie would be tantamount to saying that we ought to reject a post-tribulation rapture position because there are plenty of people that believe we need to go through it to accomplish our full purification. It would be like bashing postmillennialism because there are a handful of prosperity gospel teachers out there who espouse it, or picking at amillennialism because it's the eschatology of those who worship Mary and accomplish salvation by the addition of their own works. This is, of course, all just a bunch of mudslinging which does nothing to really ground any of these teachings in Scripture. Neither does it prove the nobility of anyone’s eschatological cause. On the contrary, it just makes us look petty and certainly does not reflect a spirit of Christian love and unity.
Rather than trying to exhaustively prove a pre-trib rapture position, I want to look at a few of the issues surrounding the recent discussion of this doctrine and hopefully encourage a more positive dialog on eschatological (end-times) questions. In this first post, I'll be laying out why we should approach the various viewpoints on a level playing field. In part two of this series, I'll deal with some of the recent criticisms of the teaching of the rapture and what the doctrine is really about. And in the third and final post, we'll look at how we can actually benefit from one another's differing eschatological viewpoints in humble dialog.
Let’s Be Honest
I’ll be the first to admit that there are biblical problem passages for the pre-trib rapture view. But there are problem passages for all the other eschatological views as well.
For example, the post-tribulation rapture view (or so-called “classic premillennialism”) has to deal with the issue of “not knowing the day or the hour” of Christ’s return. This position tends to take Revelation more literally than some other views. It generally affirms belief in a literal, seven-year tribulation period. However, if there is a literal seven-year tribulation period, one cannot help but conclude that counting down the thoroughly quantified 1260 days/42 months/3.5 years of Revelation (the second half of the seven-year tribulation period) would lead one to know the exact day of Christ’s return.
The amillennial position does not escape problems either. Passages in Isaiah foretell of a time after Messiah’s return where death and other remnants of the curse are nevertheless present on earth. These are a challenge for the most creative of amillennial interpreters to explain. If, as they affirm, the second advent of Christ is the beginning of the eternal kingdom and total restoration of creation with no intermediate millennial period, then these passages seem to imply that there are a few things Christ doesn’t fix.
Postmillennialism also has some scriptural challenges. (I’m not including the full preterist version in this discussion, which, based on the criteria of The Apostles’ and Nicean Creeds, is probably worthy of the label “heresy”.) Not least among these challenges is the biblical picture of the return of Christ putting an end to the tide of wickedness and destruction, destroying armies of those who are in rebellion against God. Certainly such passages do not bode well for a position that speaks of a golden age of ever-increasing Christian faith, morality, and societal improvement on the earth prior to Christ’s return.
So when posts about the problem passages for a pre-trib view give the impression that there are no similar problems for other views, it just seems disingenuous. My goal in these brief points is not to lay out an exhaustive defense of the pre-trib rapture position over against other commonly held eschatological views. Neither is it to attack any of the aforementioned positions. It is merely to say that we all have passages that are difficult to deal with. While we ought not shy away from working through these texts and challenging one another to dig deeper, there is no justification for pretending like any position is as biblically airtight as the existence of God or that all other positions are laughable.
Next time I'll lay out some of the points of criticism being mentioned recently against a pre-trib rapture and look at what the teaching is really about.
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