Still Having Questions about the Timing of the Rapture

Ah well. No, I do't want to debate anyone about anything, but that doesn't mean I don't have questionsa about certain systems of thought, and in this case I'm thinking of the Pre-Tribulation Rapture. I just listened to the latest Understanding the Times radio show by Jan Markell which addresses the arguments against the Pre-Trib point of view, and as usual althougj it touches on my questions it doesn't answer them. Are my questions especially odd or what?

I do have this point of view that they don't share, which is that the Antichrist was shown by the Protestant Reformers to have already been revealed when the Bishop of Rome became preeminent over all the other bishops of the Church. That was the begining of institutional Romanism headed by the Pope, the Bishop of Rome. I've made the case for this view of the Antichrist over and over here and don't think I'll make it again in this post, but he was recognized as the Antichrist, meaning THE Antichrist, over the centuries by hundreds of Christians outside the Church of Rome, then by the Protestant Reformers who found the evidence in scripture.

This difference of viewpoint doesn't challenge much in the Pre-Trib point of view as I see it it, all it means is that we already know who the Antichrist is. We also know the history of the Inquisition or persecutions and martyrdoms of believing Christians by that Pope and his Roman Church-Kingdom throughout the Middle Ages. The horrific persecutions of believers we see in the Book of Revelation by this Antichrist person seem to me to be a renewal of that Inquisition of the Middle Ages, only this time with I Islamists as the main executioners. Which i've also argued before.

At least one of the questions that keeps haunting me does come from my having this point of view, but really it comes from actual history, not just a point of view. That is, in the Rapture according to the Pre-Trib system all the martyrs of the Roman Inquistion of the Middle Ages will be included. So when we see a group of martyrs under the altar in Revelation 6, who are waiting for more martyrs to join them, it raises this question in my mind why they are being treated as a different group from the martyrs who were raptured? Martyrs are clearly singled out as a special group, but then why is that group divided d between those already raptures and those to come later? I really don't get it.

And this is of a piece with the other question who the Church could have been raptured but uncountable others become believers during the ensuing Tribulation period and yet not be considered to be part of that Church. The Church raptured but millions more who come to belief not part of that group of raptured believers? Are not believers in Christ all the Bride of Chrfist? How can the Bride of Christ be divideed into two groups, two brides as it were? I don't get it.

And then the fact that passages that refer to the Rapture also refer to the sound of a trumpet, in one the "last" trumpet, raised the question why this rather blatant indicator of the event of the Rapture is never mentioned, or is lightly dismissed, by the Pre-Trib people It's clearly "the last trumpet" in First Corinthians 15, and it's the "trummp of God" in Thessalonians something or other which I'm going to have to look up, so I guess I'll have to come back with that information.

It's the sounding of the trumpet that suggests the Rapture could occur at the midpoint of the Tribulation period, since the Last Trumpet of the sev3enth seal seems to occur at that time, and it herals the seven vials or bowls of God's wrath which finish the Great Tribulation. HOWEVER, there are clearly martyrs to be made after that point, and their trials are going to be more horrific than anything we can imagine, so the question doesn't stop there.

All this is Bible-based, I'm not bringing up anything extraneous to the Bible. The Reformers derived the identify of the Antichrist as the Pope from the Bible, and the trumpet is in the Bible, so I don't think what I'm saying is open to the criticism that it's not biblical.

I don't want to argue it though. If I get a nice clear answer, great, if I don't they will just remain questions.

Here's Jan's show for reference:

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