Has the definition of Premillennialism changed in the past few decades? I ask this because during the past several years, a few pastors told me they were Premillennial, but they didn’t adhere to a futuristic interpretation of the book of Revelation or the restoration of a kingdom to Israel.
5 Popular Lies About the Rapture
Within the walls of most churches that claim to believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, the most unpopular belief today is that of the pre-Tribulation Rapture. In such places of worship, one never hears about it while in other instance, it’s flatly denied.
As a result the backlash against our ‘blessed hope,” much of what people read about it in books and on social media just is not true.
5 Ways to Sift out the Scoffer
It’s ironic when you think of it. Those who attack prophecy teachers for saying we are in the last days are themselves fulfilling a key biblical prophecy of the last days.
Peter wrote this about these end time scoffers, “. . . knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation” (2 Pet. 3:4-5).
The group the apostle addressed denied the Genesis account of the flood and hence the reality of God’s judgment. Today this scoffing springs from a variety of sources, including those in the household of faith.
Is Belief in the Rapture Relatively New?
Those who oppose our beliefs in a pretribulation rapture fill up social media and the Internet with stories mocking the rapture as something no one believed until the nineteenth century. They discredit it based on its recent appearance in the life of the church.
So, is our belief in the rapture relatively new in church history? No, absolutely not! As will see in the following sections, saints in the early days of the church looked for Jesus’ appearing to take away His church ahead of a time of tribulation on the earth. The doctrine existed long before people began calling it “the rapture” during the 1800’s.