Grace Fellowship Church Pastor/Teacher Jim Rickard Thursday May 24, 2007

Memory Verse Rom 11:36, “For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.”

The Upper Room Discourse John John 13:3 Resurrection, Ascension and Session

John 13:3c, "… and was going back to God."

The Session of Christ related to the Rapture of the Church (continued)

Various theories on the timing of the Rapture.

Main theological positions: Pre-Millennial Post-Millennial Amillennial

Premillennialism has four separate viewpoints on the resurrection of the Church.

Partial Rapture Pre-Tribulation Mid-Tribulation (including Pre-wrath) Post-Tribulation

Church AgeTribulationMillennium 2,000 yrs7 yrs1,000 yrs Post-Millennialism Pre-Millennialism Pre-Trib Post-Trib Mid-Trib A-Millennialism New Heavens New Earth P-W

Mid-Tribulation theory: The Rapture occurs half- way through the seven- year Tribulation. Dan 7:25, “saints will be given over to tribulation for time, times, and half a time”.

It’s linked with the Antichrist’s "abomination of desolation" by desecrating the Jerusalem temple.

Pre-wrath Rapture: 1) First 3.5 years is the “beginning of sorrows”, not wrath.

2) The "Tribulation of the Church" begins towards the latter part of the 7 year period.

3) The great Tribulation is of the Antichrist against the Church.

4) The Rapture will occur after the Sixth Seal.

5) After the Rapture comes God's seventh-seal wrath of trumpets and bowls (a.k.a. "the Day of the Lord").

6) The Day of the Lord's wrath against the ungodly will follow for the remainder of the seven years, approx 1.75 years or less.

Problems with these two views include: 1) The beginning years of the Tribulation are not considered part of God's wrath.

2) It is a compromise between Pre and Post Tribulation views.

a) Pre-Trib commonalties:

a) Pre-Trib commonalties: i) The Church is raptured distinctively from the Second Advent and other saints.

a) Pre-Trib commonalties: ii) The restrainer is the Holy Spirit.

a) Pre-Trib commonalties: iii) The Church is promised deliverance from the Wrath of God.

b) Post Trib commonalties:

b) Post Trib commonalties: i) The Church is promised tribulation on earth and is in need of purging.

b) Post Trib commonalties: ii) Scripture does not teach the doctrine of imminence.

b) Post Trib commonalties: iii) The Church is seen on earth after Rev 4:1.

3) It denies or weakens the dispensational interpretation of the Word and the distinctions between Israel and the Church.

4) It breaks the Tribulation into two unrelated parts so that the Church is involved in the first half but not related to the second.

5) It must have some "spiritualizing" of Scripture. i.e. Rev 11, the two witnesses.

6) It denies the Church as a mystery and blends the covenant promises to Israel with the Church.

7) The Seal and (for purist Mid-Tribs only) Trumpet judgements are actually not judgements from God.

The Seals are the outworking of man's evil program and the Trumpets are the out working of Satan's evil. God is only a permissive agent.

8) A denial of the Tribulation being 7 years and that it is only ~3.5 years.

9) Rev 15:1, "the last because in them the wrath of God is finished”, means the wrath of God began prior to this point, including Trumpet and Seal judgments.

10) For the purist Mid-Trib belief, the last Trumpet judgment sounds the Last trumpet of the Rapture.

Grace Fellowship Church Thursday, May 24, 2007 Tape # The Ascension and Session of Our Lord, Part 17 ~ The Rapture, Part 8; Upper Room Discourse, Part 90 John 13:3; 1 Thes 4:13-18; Rev 15:1 James H. Rickard Bible Ministries 2007