Interestingly enough, I ran across another anti-PreTrib Rapture site, run by Posttribbers who offer the same worn out extra-biblical arguments that you see everywhere:
- believing the PreTrib Rapture creates spiritually dead Christians, who are unprepared for the Tribulation
- the PreTrib Rapture fosters complacency and an escapist attitude
- because PreTrib Rapturists believe they will escape the Tribulation, they have no reason to continue to do the work of the Lord, etc., etc., etc., ad nauseum
What I find constantly amusing is how many individuals firmly believe that the PreTrib Rapture position is high on the list of deceptions that will usher in the last days prior to the Tribulation and beyond. In fact, some are so convinced that the PreTrib Rapture is born of diabolical origins, that they believe it to be THE main deception of the Last Days.
So focused are some folks on broadcasting their belief that the PreTrib Rapture is THE deception that they are unable to see anything else. For instance, there are any number of high-profile deceptions that have been making their way into the Church for a number of years now. Jan Markell has taken the time to point out some of these deceptions:
- SeekerSensitive/Church Growth Movement
- Mystical Movement
- Churches Going Green
- Kingdom Now/Dominion Theology
- Moving Away from Taking the Bible Literally
- Contemplative Spirituality/Spiritual Formation
If you look in the list above, you should notice that there is nothing that is really directly related to Eschatology. It’s all a spiritualizing of God’s Word, which brings about an errant viewpoint. In fact, the very thing that the items above have in common is their propensity toward the mystical, or seeing God in everything.
In many ways, the movements above are spelling disaster for the Church because they are creating an atmosphere within the visible Church that resembles the New Age Movement. In fact, if you notice the photo above, also from Jan Markell, it highlights a symposium on combining Budhism with Christianity. While there is no clear way to do that, apparently people believe that there is and it is to that end that they work.
I would be willing to bet that in this symposium, the Rapture is never mentioned, nor is Eschatology in general discussed. What is discussed is how, through meditation, to achieve a “holiness” that supercedes anything found within Budhism or Christianity separately.
The deception that is being foisted upon the world today has nothing to do with the Rapture. The deception that is being foisted on the world is seen in the New Age Movement. The deception that is overtaking the visible Church is a “Christian” version of the New Age Movement.
The end goal for Satan and his minions is to deceive the world, by pulling them AWAY from God. What he wants to do for those within the visible Church is the exact same thing. However, these individuals will not be deceived that easily. They will have to be woo’d away by religious-sounding terminology and verbiage. The visible Church will reject the “Christ Consciousness” for instance, but it won’t necessarily reject the idea of a unity of religions, for the good of mankind and to glorify God.
So, while many Posttribbers are wasting their time and breath warning the Church about the PreTrib Rapture, people both outside AND inside the visible Church are falling prey to the devil’s schemes. Those schemes involve clever-sounding religious dogma, but in truth, they are nothing less than New Age thought, wrapped in Christian wrapping paper.
A belief in the PreTrib Rapture does not create lazy, unspiritual Christians. What creates lazy and unspiritual Christians is listening to, and heed to seducing spirits, who preach another gospel. That other gospel is found within the New Age Movement, which has surrepticiously made its way into the visible Church.
Funny how something like the New Age Movement can be in plain site, yet still able to hide from too many Christians.
