Not An Option

Last week one of my dear friends was commenting on the "rapture" and that folks who didn't have their view of the rapture would see them "wave as they departed."  As I thought about this comment I was amused about our propensity to believe that we have all the right answers about issues like the millennium, the tribulation and "the rapture."  It is interesting that the concept we currently call "the rapture" has been around for about 190 years.  Pre-tribulation rapture theology was developed in the 1830s by British evangelist John Nelson Darby and popularized in the United States in the early 20th century by the wide circulation of the Scofield Reference Bible (feel free to read more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapture or any of thousands of views for and against this modern concept).  While the 1 Thessalonians reference (Ch. 4) is clearly Biblical and I am certain will happen (when, who knows), I am less convinced of God's desire to remove the redemptive force of His Church from a clear time of great turmoil ... a time I think God and the Church have done their best work.  I heard one commentator express with certainty that the Church and the redeemed would not face tribulation and suffering.  Where has this dude been?  More Christians have been martyred in the last century than in all of history before that (paraphrased from Dr. Robert Mulholland, Commentary on Revelation).  Christians in Egypt, Iran, China (and you name it) are being pushed down and even killed as I write this blog entry.  Some think Christians in America are persecuted, though most of this persecution is tame compared to what happens in the rest of the world.  But the fact is, God revealed Himself in power, glory, honor, wealth, honor ... and lots of those clear references to God himself ... as he arrives in Revelation 5 as a slaughtered lamb.  The Jewish reference is clear.  The covenant reference is inescapable.  The idea that our God suffered and now seeks to exempt His redeemed from both the pain and redemptive purpose of suffering doesn't seem to fit with Scripture (read the New Testament), Tradition (read the history of the Church), Experience (look at God's people ... pain, sacrifice and suffering seem to go hand-and-hand with God's great work of redemption) and Reason (logic points to God calling His people to follow the greatest example ever ... Jesus, who said "take up your cross" and "don't try to save your life ... give up your life for Jesus").  You get the idea where I stand, but don't believe that I have a corner on the market of this truth.  What I do know is this.  God's opinion trumps anything I think.  No Christian will wave goodbye to other Christians ... we will stay, go, or hover together and at God's call.  Finally, this doctrine is no reason to argue, have conflict or get our hackles up.  If you are a true believer it won"t matter what you think about the millennium, the "rapture" or the tribulation.  You, and your brothers and sisters, will be in God's perfect place and God's perfect will.  Meet ya there!  PR