by Edward Chamberlain
Philologos Religious Online Books
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by Edward Chamberlain Philologos Religious Online Books |
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How Shall We Tell The Children?
AFFLICTION AND TRIBULATION Matthew 24:9 The word translated afflicted above is the Greek word "thlipsis," which is also translated as "tribulation." In fact every place that the word "tribulation" appears in the New Testament it translates this Greek word "thlipsis." The root from which the word "thlipsis" is derived is "thlibo," which carries a definite connotation of pressure, as from being pressed by the crowd. Since there will soon be over 12.5 billion people on earth, and since most of them will be unregenerated heathens if we do not soon experience world wide revival, it would seem likely that a good bit of the pressure upon the church is going to be a reflection of the crowding together of too many unredeemed, selfish people who do not have the capacity to get along with each other, and who are resentful of anything that would speak to them of their iniquity. Clearly Jesus said that "they" would deliver you, (the Christians) up to be tribulated. We will look at who "they are in a moment, but first we have to settle the issue about the church and the tribulation. I acknowledge that popular opinion today holds the view that the church is going to be "raptured" out of this world before the great tribulation begins. There are many passages in the Bible which are used to support the pre tribulation notion, but most of them involve an interpretation of what is "implied" by the passage. For instance, the passage from Genesis concerning Noah and the flood is interpreted to imply a pre tribulation deliverance of the church, but the Bible does not indicate that Noah's deliverance was a type of rapture or deliverance "from" the flood, but rather the Bible indicates that Noah's deliverance was a type of the everlasting covenant wherein he was divinely protected by "grace" "through" the judgment that came upon the earth. The problem of the church and the tribulation is one of identifying the cause of the tribulation. Popular understanding is that the tribulation is the result of God's wrath upon a sinful world. Jesus and The Revelation have indicated that this is not so. Jesus says the tribulation will come upon the church because of a body of humanity that he referred to as "they." God cannot be the "they" to which he referred. The primary verse used to explicitly, rather than implicitly, support a pre tribulation rapture seems to be Rev. 3:10 which says, "Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth." The word translated "keep" is "tereo" which literally means "guard." The word translated "temptation" is not "thlipsis," which we discussed above, but "peirasmos" which literally means to prove something by an experiment. "Peirasmos" does not mean "tribulation," it means to be tested. Jesus told us in the model prayer that we should pray that we would not be led into "peirasmos" but to pray that we would be delivered from the evil. In The Revelation 3:10, he gives us the formula for ensuring that those prayers are answered. He said if we would "tereo" or guard the word of his patience, he would guard us from being put to that test. So what is "the word of his patience?" "Word" translates "logos" which means something said, and it includes the thoughts that were expressed by the speaking. "Patience" translates "hupomone" which means "cheerful endurance." Jesus said that the generations of Christians who are cheerfully enduring the things which have come upon them because of him and because of the things that he has taught them to confess are those who will be carried away from the evil, and are the Christians that he will guard from the testing or proving of the earth. Since a falling away must occur before the day of the Lord, it is evident that the generation of Christians who are not doing these things will not be thus carried away and guarded from the evil. We must understand that the worldly are continually failing this time of testing. But at the time of the Great Tribulation the things in which they thought they believed and had confidence are going to be forgotten in their acts of self preservation when this testing comes upon the earth. All of which brings us back into Matthew 24:13 where both the word and the thought expressed say that "he that shall endure to the end, the same shall be saved." I would love to believe in a pre-tribulation rapture if I could find any scriptural reason to do so, but Jesus stated emphatically in Matthew 24:9-31 that the rapture would occur after the tribulation. Everything of which Jesus spoke in the 24th chapter of Matthew from verse 9 through verse 28 is speaking to that time of apostasy and great tribulation when the Antichrist will be revealed to the world, and then beginning in verse 29 he speaks to the rapture of the church. Look at verses 24:29-31 below where he said: "IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE TRIBULATION [CAPTIAL LETTERS ADDED FOR EMPHASIS] of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Nothing has to be implied from these verses. They say explicitly that the church is going to be gathered from the four winds of heaven, or raptured, when a great trumpet is sounded immediately after the tribulation. Some hold that Jesus is coming back to the air seven years before he actually lands, but neither can I find any scriptural evidence to support this. The above passage, and those similar passages in the 13th chapter of Mark and the 21st chapter of Luke, are clear and to the point when they say that Jesus gave the order of events at his coming to be a time of apostasy and great tribulation and then his return. In Matthew 24:30-31 it says that his sign will appear in the heavens "immediately after" the tribulation of those days and that all the tribes (races and their offshoots) of earth will see him and mourn, and then he will send his angels to gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Also, be sure to notice that Jesus said that these things will happen with the sounding of a trumpet. If everyone that is on earth is going to see Jesus in the air at the time that the church is gathered from the air, it does not appear likely that he will stay up there another seven years just to taunt them. The precise picture of the "rapture" given in 1 Thessalonians 5:15-17 does not mention a time frame relative to the tribulation, but it does likewise say that one of the trumpet calls will accompany Jesus' return. 1 Thess. 5:15-17 This passage clearly describes the rapture of all the saints of Jesus Christ, both of the living and of those who are "asleep" in the Lord. And while this passage does say that this event will occur with the sound of a shout by the voice of the archangel and with the sound of the trumpet of God, it does not say which trumpet will be sounding. In 1 Corinthians 15:51-52, the Bible tells us how the rapture is accomplished when men shall suddenly fly, and that passage specifically identifies at which of the trumpet calls the church will be raptured. "Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 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." Therefore, the Bible says that the church will be raptured at the last trumpet to sound. There are 7 trumpets that are sounded in The Revelation and so the church will be raptured at the 7th. Look at The Revelation in chapter 11 verse 15 where the 7th trumpet begins to be sounded. We will look at all of the ensuing passages in detail a little later, but for now just skim over them from Rev. 11:15 through chapter 14 to see that when the 7th trumpet is sounded, the temple in heaven is opened and that at that time the great panorama of history is revealed in the heavenlies. Among the sequence of those events we are shown that the kingdom of Antichrist first rises upon the earth, and then, beginning in chapter 14 verse 14, we are shown the second coming of Jesus Christ. Then immediately after that, in chapter 15 verse 2, we are shown the scene of all of the saints of God from both the Old Covenant and the New Covenant standing upon the "sea of glass mingled with fire." This sea of glass mingled with fire represents the baptism with the Spirit and with Fire with which Jesus baptizes all the saints of God and makes them fit for the eternal kingdom. Look at Rev. 4:6 where it says that there is a "sea of glass" in front of the throne. We will discuss this "sea of glass" again a little later, but at this time we need to see that it really does depict the "vessel" of the baptism of all the saints of God with the Spirit and with Fire and that this operation is shown as being culminated at the second coming. This "sea" is first mentioned in Rev. 4:6, and then next in the passage which we have been discussing in Rev. 15:2, and lastly, it is mentioned in Rev. 21:1 where it says that it is gone. This heavenly "sea" is the heavenly pattern of the basin which Moses was shown for constructing the bronze laver of the tabernacle. That bronze laver or basin was the place where the priests washed their hands and feet in the performance of their ministry in the tabernacle. It was made from the melted down mirrors of the women of the Children of Israel. As the vessel of cleansing, it pointed to Jesus Christ and his being made from woman. This basin or laver was conveniently situated in the courtyard between the tabernacle of the presence of God, and the great altar that represented the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the lamb of God. The symbology is obvious, no one can come into the presence of God except by way of that sacrifice and the subsequent completion of cleansing in that vessel, i.e. the washing of the hands and the feet. When Solomon built the Temple, he poured such a large basin that it came to be known as the bronze or molten sea. In polishing the outside of this huge basin, it became shiny and mirror like, and thus it is shown in the heavenlies to be the "sea of glass." The next time this sea of glass is mentioned is here Chapter 15, verse 2 which we are discussing in relation to the rapture, and, all of the saints of God are standing upon water mingled with fire on the sea of glass. This sea of glass is still representative of the cleansing vessel of Jesus Christ who baptizes us at the rapture with fire. The scripture is careful to make the point that Jesus personally baptized no one during his first advent, but John the Baptist said that Jesus would baptize us with the Holy Ghost and with Fire. Since the day of the Christian Pentecost, believers have been baptized with the Holy Spirit upon their repentance of sin and confession of faith in Jesus Christ. But now, Praise God, we are at that time being cleansed by fire to sin no more. Self is being burned forever from our souls. We are no longer under the altar. We are free to sin no more. I can hardly wait! Look at the verses below: 2 Corinthians 5:10 1 Corinthians 3:13-15 When the apostle Paul said in 1 Cor. 15:51 that we would all be changed, it was of this event that he spoke when we should all be face to face with Jesus Christ in the baptism of fire. John said in John 3:2 that when we see Jesus, we will be made to be like him. The fulfillment of these prophesies is going to occur in the vessel of Jesus Christ when we are baptized with fire. The 24th chapter of Matthew and the book of Revelation are both in agreement concerning the sequence of events of the tribulation and the rapture, the church is raptured after the great tribulation but before the bowls of wrath (the wrath of God) are poured out upon the earth. The word translated as "Immediately," in Matthew 24:29 is the Greek word "eutheos," and it is defined as meaning " straight or directly." The word "after" translates the primary Greek preposition "meta." "Meta" denotes the idea of accompaniment as being associated with or succeeding something. It can be stated without equivocation that there is no way that the literal meaning of the phrase, "immediately after the tribulation of those days," can be construed to mean, "before the tribulation." All of the passages that speak directly to the rapture of the church state emphatically that those believers, who are alive and remain upon earth at the time that Jesus returns, really will be changed and will meet him in the heavens, but they also all give the specific sequence to be after the tribulation at the sound of the 7th trumpet. The question is always asked, "Why would Christ treat his bride so roughly?" We will soon see that the answer to this question is that the time of these events depends not upon our success as Christians, but upon our failure. It is clear that In Matt. 24:9, Jesus said that one of the signs of his return, and of the end of the age, would be that his church would be tribulated and some believers would be killed. Now we can go back to verse 9 to answer the question of who are "they" that deliver the Church up to be tribulated? The answer is that it is those who believe in the humanistic world view from within both the apostate church and all false religions that deliver up the true church to the humanistic, religious, commercial, and political powers of Babylon. But it should also be noted that these political and commercial powers that will exist at the end of the age will also come to hate the Babylonian Whore of false religion because of the way that she has restricted their use of power. Having said this I now need to show some proof for what I've said. When Edward Gibbon wrote the 6 volume history of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" in 1776-88, he traced the course of what is known as the Later Roman Empire. This Empire was divided into two civilizations, one of the West, whose capital was Rome, and one of the east, known as the Byzantine Empire, whose capital was Constantinople. In documenting the "decline and fall" of Imperial Rome, Gibbon stated that many of the problems that contributed to the fall were the inevitable results of the erosion of the classical tradition of intellectual inquiry. He attributed this erosion, in great part, to the rise of Christianity. He concluded his work with the statement that what he had described therein was the triumph of barbarism and religion. That Gibbon was a desperate and a restless soul seeking to find an anchor is evident by the fact that he was expelled from Magdelan College, Oxford in 1753 because he had converted from Protestantism to become a Roman Catholic. He then again reconverted to Protestanism in 1754. Nowhere in religion could he find what his soul sought. His problem was not with real Christianity but with the religion of apostasy. Had Gibbon sought what he needed within the Holy Scriptures instead of in the history of man, he would have found that for which he sought. He would have understood that the reason traditional inquiry had declined in Rome was not because of Christianity. This decline was partly because of apostate Christians who did not have the faith to trust that Jesus Christ could preserve his church in the midst of whatever contradictions come against it, but mostly it was because of a philosophical materialism that had become pervasive in the Latter Roman Empire that debauched the Roman citizenry long, long before Constantine made the church the de facto religious organ of Rome and began the spread of that same materialism within the church in order to enable it to serve Rome. By any fair evaluation of the same barbarism that Gibbon documented within the Roman Empire, and which is now pervading the American culture, it must said that whatever may be the cause, it cannot be Christianity. The reason this must be so is because in America, the darkness only began to invade after Christianity had been systematically excluded from having any influence over the traditional classical investigations and the philosophical notions derived from those investigations. No, the darkness that is coming upon America is the same darkness that engulfed Rome, and it is now being propagated by reprobate minds who continue to place the blame upon a faith which they refuse to allow to influence their course. The Material Enlightenment is the doctrine spoken of by historians to mean the intellectual doctrines of a Humanistic movement that came to dominate Western Civilization in the 1700's. The rise of the investigative techniques of modern science and a world population that had become disgusted with the endless conflicts born of apostate, materialistic, religious, commercial, and political conflicts gave this movement much scholarly and popular impetus. All of the so called "enlightened thinkers" were committed to secular views in which human reason and human understanding were the basis of authority for the rules of life. Even some devoutly Christian thinkers among these philosophers hoped that they could find a basis for civilization based upon enlightened philosophy within the authority of the principles of Christianity. However, the most extreme and the most radical of these philosophers advanced the philosophical notions of rationalism whereby the science of man and natural philosophy would replace all other religions as the means of knowing nature and determining the destiny of humanity. Of course, all such extremists were materialists, pantheists, or atheists. There were also some less fanatic thinkers, who were either agnostics or doubleminded, who left some small room for religious faith but were noticeably unsure of what place it should have. These "liberated, enlightened free thinkers" saw themselves as the heroic followers and disciples of earlier pioneers in the development of the rational and empirical methods of investigation of modern science. They intentionally cultivated the impression that these earlier pioneers of thought had discovered new truths that were contrary to established church doctrine. They all believed that these earlier investigators had proven that man's world could be understood and explained by the scientific method, and that the world and man could then be remade by the application of that knowledge. This belief has now caused their followers to invade every experience of man and to dispute and deny any and all experiences that do not lend themselves to their notions. In this scheme of things religious experience has been replaced by the psychological social science of secular humanism. While many historians indicate that the Enlightenment ended in western Europe when it became evident through the excesses of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic regime that it was not a workable system, they have found no agreement as to why it did not work there. The fact that it did not die altogether can be seen in the fact that it has now overwhelmed Christianity in those democratized countries today. But in America the enlightenment was able to hang on to some considerable credibility in the 18th and 19th and early 20th centuries because those excesses were not so evident in the American Character. America and all democracies are now the heirs to a system of failed philosophy that has resulted in the destruction of Greece and Rome, and in the excesses of both the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era. The great religious revivals of the 1790s and early 1800s in Europe have had no permanent effect because the children of those "penitents" have been unwittingly turned over to the Babylonish educational system that is inspired by the enlightenment and not the Spirit of God. The effect has been the same in America during the same time frame because the need for repentance during those great Spiritual Awakenings " of the late 1700's and early 1800's did not seem so great as to demand the complete forsaking of the entire humanistic doctrine. The doctrines from which enlightened humanism springs invariably produce an aimless, undirected restlessness in mankind that results in reckless, irresponsible behavior in the pursuit of physical gratifications because they attack his most fundamental need to know why he is, and the doctrines of enlightenment can never answer that question. In fact, the enlightened doctrines of the science of man categorically deny the need to answer such a question because they admit that it cannot be answered by the knowledge and the science of man. When man believes he has no purpose other that to live in the physical world, that is the world that will occupy all of his attention. And since man cannot give himself a rational purpose beyond the physical realm, the most rational thing he can do is devote himself to wholeheartedly experience and acquire as much from the physical realm as possible in the short period of time he has to live. It therefore is evident that the material doctrines of humanism and the spiritual doctrines of Christianity are incompatible and antagonistic to one another. Jesus has described a time when the humanists will resort to the only argument by which they can "win," and the only one which lies entirely within the framework of their philosophy - physical violence. Jesus has definitely told us in Matthew 24:9 that one of the signs of his return will be that his church will be delivered up to be tribulated. The word translated as "delivered" in this passage is a compound Greek word made up from the prefix, "para", which has several meanings depending upon to what it is joined. In this case it is joined to the suffix, "didomi," which completes the word "paradidomi." "Didomi" means to yield or give. In the case of "para" being joined to an action word such as didomi, it can show causality. In other words its subject can be the cause of the action. In verse 9 the subject is "they" and the action is to "give". Whoever "they" are, they are the cause of giving the church up to be tribulated. If the church is to be delivered up, it is implicit that she will be delivered from someone or some place, to someone or somewhere else. This passage is not speaking about deliverance from affliction, but rather into affliction. Those to whom she is delivered are the Godless, humanistic, political authorities who hate the true church for reasons previously noted. The ones that do the delivering are the political humanists who make up all false religions, and the apostate church which has already begun to join itself to these false religions in order to save our humanized civilization. In the course of this book, it will be shown that Biblical prophecy has always revealed that in the last days, the apostate church and all other false religions, and a form of world dominating humanistic political and commercial authority will be joined in unholy political-commercial-religious matrimony for the purpose of mutual benefit. We will explore this union in greater detail later. Since Cain killed Abel, the true church has always suffered persecutions at the hands of the apostate, and Jesus said it was never going to be any different until he returned. John 15:19-20 There has never been any difficulty in telling the apostate church from the true church. The true church is the one with the stripes on her back, and the apostate church is the one holding the whip. It has not changed since Cain slew Abel, and Jesus said that it is only going to get worse until he returns. Just as the Jews gave up their Messiah to the political system seeking the favor and power for which they lusted, so will the apostate church give up, both Jesus and the true church, to the same powers for the same reasons. Next In Matthew 24:9, Jesus said that another sign of his return and the end of the age would be that Christians would be hated of all nations for his name's sake. Once again nations translates ethnos and so this passage says that the majority of people from all cultures on earth will come to hate Christians and Christianity in the time that Jesus returns. It is sad that the only power in all the earth that can overcome racism is rejected and hated by the people of all the races.
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