The Rapture? It’s Not a Pre-Millennial Escape from Tribulation

In 1 Thessalonians 4:17-18, the apostle Paul refers to the “rapture” while he is discussing the end times when Christ will return.  The word “rapture” comes from the Latin word that translates the Greek word in verse 17 where Paul says that we will be “caught up” (literally, “snatched”) to meet the Lord in the air.

Authors Tim LaHaye of the Left Behind series and Hal Lindsey of The Late Great Planet Earth fame have popularized an approach to interpreting what the Scriptures say about the end times that leans heavily on a modern interpretation of Paul’s “rapture.”

These authors (and others, who don’t always agree among themselves) combine their interpretation of the rapture with their interpretation of the “1000 years” mentioned in Revelation 20:2-3 and other Bible passages to produce an entire timeline of the end times that is not consistent with the historic understanding of the Scriptures.  Their views are based on ideas that mostly did not spread until the 19th century.  Most of Christendom from the time of Augustine in the 5th century until the 19th century has taken a very different approach to interpreting the Bible’s end-times passages.  Currently, the Catholic Church, the Orthodox Churches, and many Protestant denominations – including the Episcopal, Lutheran, and Methodist Churches and others – reject that interpretation of the end times.

This summary of the problem is drawn from a variety of sources, in an attempt to identify the commonalities in Catholic and Protestant thinking about the subject.  In addition to the sources used in my 1 Thessalonians study, it also considers Trent Horn (Catholic), Karlo Broussard (Catholic), Alan S. Bandy (Reformed), the Commission on Theology and Church Relations (Lutheran), and “Where does the Rapture fit into UM beliefs?” (United Methodist).

The historic churches and denominations have much in common in their understanding of the end times.  The main divide on this topic is not between Protestants and Catholics.  The main divide is between a fundamentalist segment of modern Christianity and the rest of Christianity.

Frameworks for thinking about the end times

There are roughly 6 common frameworks for thinking about the rapture, the tribulation, and the 1000-year “millennial” reign mentioned in Revelation 20:2-3:

The first three approaches all revolve around the idea that the rapture will precede a 1000-year millennium of peace and righteousness on earth. However, the pre-millennialists don’t agree on whether the rapture will happen before, during, or after the tribulation that precedes the end:

Pre-tribulation, pre-millennial: Christ will come and take the Christians who are alive to heaven (the “rapture”) before the tribulation.  Then the tribulation will come, in a world devoid of Christians.  Then Christ will come again with the church (which sounds like a second Second Coming, since he already came to rapture people).  Then Christ will reign for 1000 years, and then there will be the final judgment (which sounds like a third Second Coming).  This is the view of the people like Tim LaHaye and Hal Lindsey who have fed the “rapture” industry.

Mid-tribulation, pre-millennial: This approach is similar to the pre-tribulation, pre-millennial approach, except that the rapture will happen in the middle of the tribulation (i.e., halfway through the 7-year tribulation), not before it begins.  Therefore, Christians will experience some of the tribulation and not be fully spared.

Post-tribulation, pre-millennial: This approach says that Christians will not be spared the tribulation at all.  Christians will not join Christ until he comes in his Second Coming at the end of the tribulation.  Then Christ will reign for 1000 years, and then the final judgment will come.

These approaches all separate the Second Coming of Christ from the final judgment.  Jesus never suggests such a separation, nor does Paul.  They both describe one decisive event when Jesus comes, takes believers to himself, and presides over the final judgment.

Amillennial: This view rejects the separation of the “rapture” from the final judgment and the entire pre-millennial framework.  In this view, we are in the 1000-year reign of Christ, which began when Christ broke the power of sin by his death and resurrection and ascended into heaven.  The reference to “1000” years in the Book of Revelation is symbolic, not literal: “1000” means a large number and “1000 years” means “a very long time.”  Revelation 20 says that in this millennial time, the devil is being restrained.  God is giving us time so that the gospel can be spread around the world.

After the period we are now in, which includes its own times of smaller tribulation, Satan will be allowed to try to turn people away from Christ and the great, final tribulation will come.  The Christians and non-Christians suffer now, and both the church and non-believers will suffer during the final tribulation, as Jesus warned from the beginning (see, for example, Matthew 24:29-31, where the tribulation precedes the gathering of the elect to Christ).  After that period of tribulation, the final judgment will begin with Christians being caught up with those who have risen from the dead to meet Christ when he returns (1 Thess. 4:17; also referred to by Paul in 2 Thess. 2:1 as our “assembling” with the Lord).  That event is not a pre-tribulation, pre-millennial escape from suffering; it is part of the Second Coming and final judgment exercised by Christ.

This more traditional approach to interpreting the end-times Scriptures was the generally accepted view throughout the church from the time of Augustine in the 5th century, through the Protestant Reformation, and all the way until the 19th century.  It is more faithful to the Scriptures, and it is followed by the Catholic and Orthodox Churches and a variety of current Protestant denominations, including the Episcopal, Lutheran, and Methodist Churches and others.  Although scholars call this approach the “amillennial” approach, that term is not necessarily used by these churches.  All of those churches reject the pre-tribulation, pre-millennial approach that was popularized in the decades before and after the year 2000.

There are two other views worth mentioning, for the sake of completeness (and there are many other sub-categories and branches dividing all of the approaches).

Postmillennial: In this view, first there will be a (literal or symbolic) 1000-year golden age of prosperity and minimal suffering on Earth, during which most people will be converted to Christ and live in righteousness.  The devil will be bound during that time but will be loosed at the end of the 1000 years.  After that 1000 years of relative peace, there will be a time of tribulation followed by the Second Coming (when believers will be called up to heaven) and the final judgment.  This view was popular in the 19th century (the 1800s), until the World Wars of the 20th century made people rethink whether the world could reach such a golden age of righteousness.

Metaphorical: In this view, most of the end-times references in the Bible are metaphorical and should not be interpreted literally.  There will not be a literal trumpet, a literal 1000-year reign, a literal meeting of Christ in the sky, etc.  God has used figurative language and metaphors to help us understand things that are beyond us.  All of the key points of Scripture will be fulfilled: Christ will return and judge the world, the dead will be raised, there will be a final judgment, the devil and death will be defeated, and Christians will live with Christ forever.  But the details of what it will look like are not for us to worry about.

Problems with the pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture idea

The pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture theory is inconsistent with Scripture in several ways:

• The pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture violates the claim in Acts 1:11 that Jesus will return in the same visible way he left, since the pre-tribulation, pre-millennial story creates a scenario where Jesus remains hidden except to believers.  The theory claims that Jesus doesn’t stay on Earth after the rapture and only returning visibly 1000 years later.

• The word Paul uses in 1 Thessalonians 4:15 for the “coming” of the Lord (the Greek word parousia) in was used by the Greeks before Christ to refer to the ceremonial arrival of a king or ruler.  Pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture proponents argue that in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, Christ only comes partly back, gathers the raptured people, and returns to heaven.  However, Paul does not say Jesus immediately returns to heaven with them; he only says that those who are caught up to meet him in the air will be with him forever.  The word for “meet” in verse 17 is a Greek word used to describe the situation where people go out from their town to meet a visiting official or king and escort that official into their city (in response to the “coming” in verse 15).  Paul is saying that when Christ comes to Earth and the risen Christians and the still-alive Christians join him, they will stay with him as he comes to the Earth and does his work of final judgment.  The idea that Christ aborts his “coming” and returns to heaven, only to return later, has been added by the pre-tribulation advocates without justification or good evidence.

• The pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture theory that Jesus’s coming to gather the elect is separated from his final judgment by 1000 years contradicts Jesus.  1 Thessalonians 4:16 says that Christ’s Second Coming will be announced with an archangel’s voice and the sound of a trumpet, at which point the dead will be raised.  1 Corinthians 15:51-55 also links the trumpet to the raising of the dead.  In Matthew 24:29-31, Jesus links his coming in power and glory (verse 30) with the angels (verse 31), the sound of the trumpet (verse 31), and the gathering of the elect (verse 31).  In Matthew 25:31-33, Jesus links his coming in glory (verse 31) with the final judgment (verses 32-33ff).  These events are all connected and happen together.  The pre-tribulation, pre-millennial approach contradicts Jesus by separating the raising of the dead from the final judgment by 1000 years.

• In Matthew 24:29, Jesus says that these events happen right after the tribulation (verse 29).  The pre-tribulation, pre-millennial advocates seek to escape the tribulation that Jesus clearly foretells.

• The pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture violates Jesus’s statement in Matthew 16:27 that when he comes with his angels, he will repay people according to their deeds (i.e., the Second Coming with the final judgment).  Again, Jesus does not teach any separation between these events.

• Note: Some rapture fans also interpret Luke 17:34-37 as referring to the rapture.  In that passage, Jesus says that one person will be taken and another will be left.  However, when you read that verse in context, starting at verse 26, you see that people are being “taken” in judgment.  They are not being taken to heaven.  They are not being raptured away to be saved from tribulation.

Conclusion: The popular theory is wrong, but the Lord will be with us forever.

In summary, the pre-tribulation, pre-millennial rapture story created in the 19th century and popularized as Americans endured the Cold War and approached the millennial year 2000 does not have a sound basis in Scripture.  The Book of Revelation is filled with symbolic language.  There is no reason to distort the teachings of Jesus and Paul in order to interpret Revelation’s round number of 1000 years as a literal 1000 years.  It is symbolic for the long period of time we are in before the Lord returns.  And Jesus and Paul are very clear that Christians will endure the tribulation before they are united with Christ in his return.  We must reject the distortions of their words that are central to every pre-tribulation rapture theory.

This also means that no one escapes the tribulation except by dying.  What else is true?  The Scriptures tell us clearly:

1. Christ will return.

2. The dead will be raised.

3. Christians (both those who have died and those who are still alive) will be united with Christ and live with him forever.

4. Christ will judge the living and the dead and ask them how they treated “the least of these” among us.

Fortunately, that’s all we really need to know about the end times.