Numerous
eschatological facts can be gleaned from the epistles of Paul to the
Thessalonians. We shall begin by looking at a vital text in 1 Thessalonians
4:13-5:11. With regard to 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, all Bible Presbyterians and Dispensationalists
will agree that it refers to the rapture of the New Testament church.
Commenting
on 1 Thessalonians 4:17, Jeffrey Khoo writes: “The “live” saints will be
raptured soon after “dead” saints have been “caught up.” How soon? The whole
event will happen “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye” (1 Cor. 15:52). It
will all be over in a micro-second.”[1]
Rev Dr Jack
Sin, previously the lecturer in Church History and Pastoral Ministry of Far
Eastern Bible College, explains further:
“The second coming of Christ will be
in two phases - first the Rapture, then the Second Advent. The Rapture,
mentioned in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, is a special event when the Church will
be caught up into heaven. At the Rapture, Jesus Christ will appear out of
heaven and there will be a great shout followed by the voice of an archangel
and the trumpet of God. . . . Both OT and NT saints will be caught up into the
clouds to meet Jesus in the air (1 Thess 4:13-18). The Rapture delivers the
Church from the wrath to come (1 Thess 1:10). So we should expect the Rapture
to precede the period of wrath in the tribulation period (Matt 24:15, Rev
6:17).”[2]
Does 1
Thessalonians 4:13-18 really teach a pretribulation rapture? We shall begin by
examining the issues Paul was addressing in this portion of Scripture.
A Problem in
the Thessalonian Church
In this
passage, the Apostle Paul was dealing with certain questions raised by the
young Thessalonian church. In order to understand this passage better, it is
beneficial for us to ask ourselves, “What exactly were the Thessalonians
worried about?” From 1 Thessalonians 4:13, 18 and 5:11, it is evident that Paul
was comforting the Thessalonians concerning their loved ones who had passed
away. The subject of “comfort” is noticeably the leitmotif of this passage of
Scripture. Paul admonished them to “sorrow not, even as others which have no
hope (1 Thess. 4:13).” Why, then, did the Thessalonians grieve as unbelievers
when their loved ones died? What exactly was the Apostle Paul trying to convey
to the Thessalonians? It is their misunderstanding concerning the resurrection
of believers – both the living and the dead – that Paul is attempting to
correct in this passage of the epistle. The Thessalonians had wrongly thought
that the resurrection of living believers will precede (“prevent”) those that
are “asleep.”
Paul
emphasized his understanding of the resurrection in 1 Thessalonians 4:14, “For if we believe that Jesus died
and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.”
He reassured the Thessalonians that the dead in Christ will not be left behind
in the grave when Christ comes again. Those that “sleep in Jesus” have the
confidence of eternal life with the Lord. Paul reiterated his teachings in 1
Thessalonians 5:10, that “whether we wake or sleep, we should live together
with him.” It is obvious that the Thessalonians had doubts concerning the
resurrection of the dead in Christ. But Paul comforted the young church that
whether believers are dead or alive, all will assuredly be with the Lord when
He returns again. In fact, “the dead in Christ shall rise first (1 Thess. 4:16b)”;
the living Christians will not “prevent” or precede those that are asleep.
Commenting
on 1 Thessalonians 4:15, D. Michael Martin writes:
“Paul stated emphatically that at
the parousia the living “will certainly not precede those who have fallen
asleep.” This may indicate that the church feared that the dead would be raised
at some time after the parousia and so miss the glories of that day. But it is
far from certain that this was the problem in the church. It seems safer to
find the emphasis in Paul’s words on his statement of the problem in v. 14 and
his climactic statement in v. 17. In these verses the emphasis does not seem to
fall on the sequence of the participation of the living and the dead but on the
understanding that the dead will in fact participate in the parousia. This need
not mean that Paul previously had not taught this in Thessalonica. The problem
may well have been the difficulty of appropriating the doctrine of the
resurrection into the way that enabled these Gentile believers to manage the
trauma of death. Paul wanted to spare believers the sorrow of hopeless loss so
common to the pagan world. He did so by reiterating truths in traditional
language and applying them to immediate needs.”[3]
While the
resurrection of the dead believers and the rapture of living Christians occur
in a definite sequence, these events also occur “in a moment, in the twinkling
of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall
be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed (1 Cor. 15:52).”
The Secret
Silent Rapture
Is it true
that the church will be raptured secretly and quietly? According to
Pretribulationists, the Parousia of
Christ to rapture the saints will be an invisible event; it is a coming that is
concealed from the eyes of unbelievers. 1Thessalonians 4:16 tells us that “the
Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the
archangel, and with the trump of God.” The word “shout” here, according to the Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon, means “an
order, command, spec. [or specially] a stimulating cry, either that by which
animals are roused and urged on by man, as horses by charioteers, hounds by
hunters, etc., or that by which a signal is given to men, e.g. to rowers by the
master of a ship, to soldiers by a commander (with a loud summons, a trumpet
call).”[4]
Leon Morris
writes,
“I do not doubt that, if he so
chose, God could make the voice of the archangel, the shout, and the trumpet
audible only to believers. But I very greatly doubt whether that is what Paul
is saying.”[5]
The student
of the Bible can consult any Greek lexicon available on the market, but he will
not encounter a description of this word which even hints at a “silent,
inaudible” shout. The “shout of command” given at Christ’s Parousia is inevitably an audible shout. The description by Paul of
the “voice of the archangel” and “the trump of God” adds to the conclusion that
Christ’s return is not meant to be a secret, silent event. Can Paul’s language
be any plainer?
Bible
Presbyterian scholars at Far
Eastern Bible
College
William
Hendricksen observes,
“From all this it becomes abundantly
clear that the Lord’s coming will be open, public, not only visible but also
audible. There are, indeed, interpreters, who, in view of the fact that the
Bible at times employs figurative language, take the position that we can know
nothing about these eschatological events. To them these precious paragraphs in
which the Holy Spirit reveals the future convey no meaning at all. But this is
absurd. Scripture was written to be understood, and when it tells us that the
Lord will descend from heaven with a shout, with a voice of an archangel and a
trumpet of God, it certainly must mean at least this: that in addition to the
shouted command of our Lord (which might be compared with John 11:43) . . . a
reverberating sound will actually pervade the universe.”[6]
Meeting with
the Lord
Pretribulationists
characteristically understand 1 Thessalonians 4:17 to mean that during the
secret rapture, believers will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. The
believers will subsequently return to heaven with the Lord. “Then we which are
alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to
meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord (1 Thess. 4:17).”
It is
interesting to consider the Greek word apantesis which is
translated as “meet” in verse 17. The Theological
Dictionary of the New Testament comments that “the word ἀπάντησις (also ὑπάντησις, DG) is to
be understood as a tech. [or technical] term for a civic custom of antiquity
whereby a public welcome was accorded by a city to important visitors.
Similarly, when Christians leave the gates of the world, they will welcome
Christ in the ἀήρ, acclaiming Him as κύριος.”[7]
Notice that
this meeting (apantesis) is a customary welcome whereby citizens of the city
escort the visitors back into the city itself. In this custom, the citizens do
not accompany the visitor to his hometown or his country of origin. The same
Greek word is used only in two other passages of New Testament Scripture.
In Acts
28:15, the preposition and noun εις απαντησιν are used to
denote that the brethren went out “to meet” Paul. Ironically, dispensationalist
Stanley D. Toussaint agrees that the noun apantēsin in Acts
28:15 refers to the customary “meeting” of an official or dignitary going into
the city. Dr Toussaint writes,
“The Christians at Rome soon heard
of Paul’s coming, so they traveled as far as the Forum of Appius (a market town
43 miles from Rome) and the Three Taverns (33 miles from Rome) to meet him and
his companions. The noun apantēsin, translated as an infinitive “to
meet,” was used in Greek literature of an entourage coming out of a city to
meet an official going to the city.”[8]
In the
parable of the ten virgins (Matt. 25:1-13), the virgins were waiting to meet
the bridegroom. They were to return with him to the marriage feast
subsequently. Matthew 25:1 and 6 use the same noun apantēsin (απαντησιν). It should
be obvious to the reader that the virgins were not planning to return with the
bridegroom to where he came from, but back to the marriage feast.
Considering the usage of the Greek word apantesis in the New Testament, “to meet” in
1 Thessalonians 4:17 would mean exactly the opposite of what the
Pretribulationists would want it to mean. Believers, during the rapture, would
meet the Lord in the air, and subsequently escort Him back to earth. The
consistent usage and meaning of the word apantesis in the New
Testament would, at the very least, be unsupportive of the pretribulation
rapture theory.
References
[1] Jeffrey Khoo, 1 Thessalonians: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary (Singapore : Far Eastern Bible College
[2] Jack Sin, “The Judgement Seat of Christ,” The Burning Bush 6, no. 2 (2000):
313-314.
[3] D. Michael Martin, 1, 2 Thessalonians: The New American Commentary (Nashville,
Tennessee: Broadman Press, 1995), 149.
[4] Enhanced
Strong’s Lexicon (1996), s.v. “Κέλευσμα.”
[5] Leon Morris, The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians: New International
Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Co, 1991), 145.
[6] William Hendricksen, Exposition of Thessalonians, the Pastorals, and Hebrews: New Testament
Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House Co, (1955) 2002), 117.
[7] Gerhard Kittel & Gerhard Friedrich,
eds., Theological Dictionary of the New
Testament, vol. 1, trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans,
1964), 380-381.
[8] Stanley D. Toussaint, “Acts” in The
Bible Knowledge Commentary : An Exposition of the Scriptures by Dallas
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