There is today a great debate in the church about the second coming of Christ. Most Pastors teach that Jesus will come and take the church before the tribulation. Few say that Jesus will come after the tribulation. Jesus always favors the few. I attended a Baptist church as a child and was taught to believe in a pre-trib rapture. When I began seeking Jesus as an adult, Jesus revealed the truth. I was in church reading a churches statement of beliefs and they stated they believed in a pre-trib rapture. I got excited because I was taught to believe that as well. I was prompted by the Spirit to look up the scripture they used as a reference.1 Thessalonians 4:13-17
At that time I was disappointed because it didn't say He was coming before the tribulation. It doesn't even mention the tribulation. Obviously I was going to have to study and seek Him concerning this subject. That was 20 years ago. I asked Jesus to help me understand when He was coming back. What followed my request was amazing.
Back then I had to use a concordance. For those of you who have never used one, that's a book that's bigger than the bible because it has every word used in the bible and lists every place in the bible that word is used.
Jesus led me on a wonderful quest for the truth. I began by looking for every scripture that refered to His coming. In all of the gospels many times Jesus said He would return at the end of the age with the Holy angels of God. At the end of Matthew, Mark and Luke, Jesus is asked when His coming would be. He said it was after the great tribulation and He would return with the angels to gather us to Him. That's not what they teach in every church I've ever attended.
Jesus kept my focus on the quest He was leading me on. Jesus made it very clear in all those red letters He spoke, that His COMING was after the tribulation. As I continued to study every reference to His coming in the epistles, I found the apostles taught the same thing. Even in the book of revelation, several times it describes His coming at the end of the time of trouble. Now I'm really confused because church tells me one thing and the bible clearly is telling me something different.
Without an abundance of help from Jesus I might have given up. The bible can't be wrong because it's His word. I made the right choice.
Now I understand that 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17
declares that the rapture is after the tribulation because verse 15 states this event will take place at the coming of the Lord. Jesus said His COMING was after the great tribulation.The church said the great tribulation was God's wrath and we are not appointed to suffer God's wrath, so we must be gone before that happens. Jesus reconciled this conflict very quickly. Again the concordance would have worked but a simple dictionary could solve this. Tribulation: is persecution. Wrath: is punishment. Jesus said in this world we would have tribulation. Jesus said after a specific event takes place there will be a period of great tribulation. Which just means great persecution before He comes. Jesus always referred to his wrath after His coming, which is after the great tribulation. The epistles and the book of revelation concur that tribulation will occur before His coming and wrath after His coming.
Some teach that there will be a secret coming of Christ before the tribulation called His appearing. Secret and appearing don't seem to go together. Appearing means to be revealed or seen. Jesus said in Matthew 24:30 that His appearing is His coming and it's not a secret, or before the great tribulation. The rest of the scriptures, the apostles and the book of revelation agree.
This is the one article that I have not cut and pasted many scriptures in. If you do not seek, you will not find. I hope the Lord leads you on a similar quest to the one He led me on. It was truly amazing, and continues to this day. Ask, Seek and Knock and Jesus will always do something out of this World.
Praise Jesus!!!