Perhaps today: The imminent coming of Jesus Christ

[missmuffet]

12 minutes ago, Dennis1209 said:

Ah no... Hermeneutics is the theory and methodology of text interpretation. I can't think of the proper word to call it at the moment, to many birthday candles in the way, but I'll eventually cough it up.

I can relate

[Diaste]

On 12/17/2017 at 9:39 PM, Quasar93 said:

The New Testament teaching that Christ could return and rapture His church at any-moment, without prior signs or warning (i.e., imminency), is such a powerful argument for pretribulationism that it is one of the most fiercely attacked doctrines by pre-trib opponents. Non-pretribulationists sense that if the New Testament teaches imminency, then a pre-trib rapture is virtually assured.

DEFINITION OF IMMINENCY

What is the biblical definition of imminency? Dr. Renald Showers defines and describes imminence as follows:

1) An imminent event is one which is always "hanging overhead, is constantly ready to befall or overtake one; close at hand in its incidence." ("imminent," The Oxford English Dictionary, 1901, V, 66.) Thus, imminence carries the sense that it could happen at any moment. Other things may happen before the imminent event, but nothing else must take place before it happens. If something else must take place before an event can happen, then that event is not imminent. In other words, the necessity of something else taking place first destroys the concept of imminency.

2) Since a person never knows exactly when an imminent event will take place, then he cannot count on a certain amount of time transpiring before the imminent event happens. In light of this, he should always be prepared for it to happen at any moment.

3) A person cannot legitimately set or imply a date for its happening. As soon as a person sets a date for an imminent event he destroys the concept of imminency, because he thereby is saying that a certain amount of time must transpire before that event can happen. A specific date for an event is contrary to the concept that the event could happen at any moment.

4) A person cannot legitimately say that an imminent event will happen soon. The term "soon" implies that an event must take place "within a short time (after a particular point of time specified or implied)." By contrast, an imminent event may take place within a short time, but it does not have to do so in order to be imminent. As I hope you can see by now, "imminent" is not equal to "soon."1

A. T. Pierson has noted that, "Imminence is the combinatioin of two conditions, viz,: certainty and uncertainty. By an imminent event we mean one which is certain to occur at some time, uncertain at what time."2

IMMINENCY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

The fact that Christ could return, but may not soon, at any moment, yet without the necessity of signs preceeding His return requires the kind of imminence taught by the pre-trib position and is a strong support for pretribulationism.

What New Testament passages teach this truth? Those verses stating that Christ could return at any moment, without warning and those instructing believers to wait and look for the Lord's coming teach the doctrine of imminence. Note the following New Testament passages:

1 Corinthians 1:7-"awaiting eagerly the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ,"

1 Corinthians 16:22-"Maranatha."

Philippians 3:20-"For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;"

Philippians 4:5-"The Lord is near."

1 Thessalonians 1:10-"to wait for His Son from heaven,"

1 Thessalonians 4:15-18-"For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, and remain until the coming of the Lord, shall not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of {the} archangel, and with the trumpet of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words."

1 Thessalonians 5:6-"so then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober."

1 Timothy 6:14-"that you keep the commandment without stain or reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ,"

Titus 2:13-"looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus;"

Hebrews 9:28-"so Christ . . . shall appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him."

James 5:7-9-"Be patient, therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. . . . for the coming of the Lord is at hand. . . . behold, the Judge is standing right at the door."

1 Peter 1:13 -"fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ."

Jude 21-"waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life."

Revelation 3:11; 22:7, 12, 20-"'I am coming quickly!'"

Revelation 22:17, 20-"And the Spirit and the bride say, 'Come.' And let the one who hears say, 'Come.'"

"He who testifies to these things says, 'Yes, I am coming quickly.' Amen. Come, Lord Jesus."

Not convinced this proves anything other than a coming is 'coming' at any moment, whether before, after, soon, late, etc.

It is significant that all of the above passages relate to the rapture and speak of the Lord's coming as something that could occur at any-moment, that it is imminent. This is why believers are waiting for a person-Jesus Christ-not an event or series of events such as those related to the tribulation leading up to Christ's second advent in which He returns to the earth and remins for His millennial reign.

IMMINENCE AND PRETRIBULATIONISM

As we consider the above passages, we note that Christ may come at any moment, that the rapture is actually imminent. Only pretribulationism can give a full, literal meaning to such an any-moment event.

No. According to pretrib it is not 'any moment'. It must occur 'before'. In reality, 'any moment' would mean any moment until time ends.

Other rapture views must redefine imminence more loosely than the New Testamnet would allow. Dr. Walvoord declares, "The exhortation to look for 'the glorious appearing' of Christ to His own (Titus 2:13) loses its significance if the Tribulation must intervene first.

Not possible to make the glorious appearing less significant no matter when it happens. This is more Pretrib failure. Is it less significant for a person to rescue someone after they have fallen into raging flood waters, than for that same person to stop another person before falling into flood waters? The answer is; No.

Believers in that case should look for signs."3 If the pre-trib view of imminence is not accepted, then it would make sense to look for signs related to events of the tribulation (i.e., the anti-christ, the two witnesses, etc.) and not for Christ Himself. But the New Testament, as demonstrated above, uniformly instructs the church to look for the coming of Christ, while tribulation saints are told to look for signs.

Poppycock. A less than clever argument. It's leading. It assumes two things; One, that if not X then Y. This is fallacious. Two, that imminence alone looks exclusively to the appearing of Christ in person and other ideas do not. I don't buy anything pretrib says and yet I'm looking even more expectantly for the return of my Lord, King and Savior, in person. Who are you, or anyone, or any ideology, to tell me I'm not? 

The New Testament exhortation to be comforted by the Lord's coming (John 14:1; 1 Thess. 4:18) would no longer have meaning if believers first had to pass through any part of the tribulation. Instead, comfort would have to await passage through the events of the tribulation. No, the church has been given a "Blessed Hope," in part, because our Lord's return is truly imminent.

More of the same. The coming of the Lord is comforting whenever it happens. This idea discounts the reality of eternity. Our mortal lives are short and our true comfort is eternity, not the saving of our short pitiful lives. This idea also relegates all the suffering and dying believers in acute situations all over the world to comfortless lives while in the service of the Lord. Brothers and sisters are dying for the Name of Jesus everyday and pretrib thought tells us, "...and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 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. Wherefore comfort one another with these words." has no meaning to them? This alone should tell all of us there is no truth in the Pretib doctrine. It's a loveless, insensitive, doctrine of devils; soon to be proven false.

MARANATHA!

The early church had a special greeting for one another, as recorded in 1 Corinthians 16:22, which was "Maranatha!" Maranatha consists of three Aramaic words: "Mar" ("Lord"), "ana" ("our"), and "tha" ("come"), meaning "our Lord, come." As with other New Testament passages, Maranatha only makes sense if an any-moment or imminent coming is understood. Such an understanding supports the pre-trib position.

No wonder these ancient Christians coined such a unique greeting which reflects an eager expectation of the Blessed Hope as a very real presence in their everyday lives. The life of the church today could only be improved if "Maranatha" were to return as a sincere greeting on the lips of an expectant people. Maranatha!

From:   http://www.raptureready.com/featured/ice/tt7.html

By Thomas Ice


Quasar93 

A man made doctrine. The idea of this is ludicrous. The arguments above actually destroy the doctrine of 'imminence' by their own evidence of what constitutes 'imminence'."1) An imminent event is one which is always "hanging overhead, is constantly ready to befall or overtake one; close at hand in its incidence." ("imminent," The Oxford English Dictionary, 1901, V, 66.) Thus, imminence carries the sense that it could happen at any moment. Other things may happen before the imminent event, but nothing else must take place before it happens. If something else must take place before an event can happen, then that event is not imminent. In other words, the necessity of something else taking place first destroys the concept of imminency." Something must always take place before any event can occur. The above statement is so general it becomes more like astrology than truth. Even eastern existential thought makes more sense. Take a terrorist attack for instance. It's only imminent after dozens of events already take place, including months of planning. Does that make a suicide bombing less imminent? 

This quote makes a little more sense and is closer to reality, "A. T. Pierson has noted that, "Imminence is the combinatioin of two conditions, viz,: certainty and uncertainty. By an imminent event we mean one which is certain to occur at some time, uncertain at what time." At least this idea shows that an event is imminent AT ANY TIME.

The pretrib doctrine of imminence really stumbles over itself. Pretrib demands the rapture must occur before an event. This means the rapture cannot occur 'at any time', it must occur 'before a time'.

Another excellent point I'm sure you missed, " A person cannot legitimately say that an imminent event will happen soon. The term "soon" implies that an event must take place "within a short time (after a particular point of time specified or implied)." By contrast, an imminent event may take place within a short time, but it does not have to do so in order to be imminent. As I hope you can see by now, "imminent" is not equal to "soon."

No imminent event can have a time frame placed upon it. Sooner or later the event will occur. The idea of 'before' or 'after' also sheds the doctrine of pretib imminence. Pretrib states the rapture must occur 'before' and cannot occur 'after'. No imminence according to your own definition. As above, if imminence is not equal to 'soon' it cannot equate to 'late' nor 'before' or 'after'.

 

[Justin Adams]

Too much Helegian reasoning.

The bad times have not yet hit us in our cushy western places. But they are beyond description in Syria and Nth Africa. So why was it not 'imminent' for them? Rome admitted they killed over 100 million people.

Look at a couple WWII videos and see what bad times are about. Look at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. When it get far, far worse than that. When comm is down and the skies are hard to see for the smoke and the stench is unbearable - and a bunch other things. Then perhaps the tribulation is beginning. FOR ALL OF US.

Do not confuse younger believers that will have to live thru all that will happen. Do not mislead Yahweh's little ones. Just STOP IT.

Edited December 24, 2017 by Justin Adams

[Daniel 11:36]

Imminent in this case means the next Biblical event which has not yet taken place within the scope Bible prophecy

The Lord's move to extract His own is still pending and is imminent

Nothing over the last 2000 years is recorded in prophetic scripture .... not one thing

The next prophetic event will involve the Lord's action to immortalize His own followers .... then He will immediately bring His tribulation period upon the earth  

Edited December 23, 2017 by Daniel 11:36

[Diaste]

On 12/22/2017 at 4:12 PM, missmuffet said:

That is what I used to think but I not longer believe that. I think the rapture of the Church is imminent and nothing else needs to happen and that includes the fullness of the Gentiles.I think that is for the second coming. Although God knows who will be raptured and who will come to Him before that time.

The prophecy of the Jews returning to Israel was fulfilled well after Darby came up with his pretrib notion. Even if pretrib is 1st century AD imminence is discredited as the gospel is now preached in all nations, or soon will be, and the Jews have returned to the promised land. Both are prophecies. Both fulfilled. So to what, "nothing else needs to happen" are you referring?

[Diaste]

19 hours ago, Daniel 11:36 said:

Imminent in this case means the next Biblical event which has not yet taken place within the scope Bible prophecy

The Lord's move to extract His own is still pending and is imminent

Nothing over the last 2000 years is recorded in prophetic scripture .... not one thing

The next prophetic event will involve the Lord's action to immortalize His own followers .... then He will immediately bring His tribulation period upon the earth  

Eh? "Nothing over the last 2000 years is recorded in prophetic scripture .... not one thing". What does this mean?

[Diaste]

On 12/22/2017 at 4:22 PM, Dennis1209 said:

I'm going to stick to my six shooters myself. I'm a thinking Romans 11: 25 is talking about the Rapture, and Matt 24: 14 maybe talking about the second coming. I've been wrong before and changed my mind on scripture, so this wouldn't be the first time 

I don't think I understand the gist of Romans 11:25. Could you expand for me, please?

[Justin Adams]

On 12/22/2017 at 11:43 PM, Dennis1209 said:

I think this goes along the same line of thinking and not off topic. But have you noticed in a number of places in scripture, that it will rapidly switch from one verse to the next in time? Did I explain what I mean to say? In other words, say verse one might be prophetical 70 years down the road, and verse two might be referring to something centuries later? Ever noticed that in some scripture?

It is not necessarily linear but talks of one event. The second coming. It is only men and their mental gymnastics that has taken plain reading and woven a very confusing and non-existent timeline. Harmonize the scriptures and there is one coming with multiple facets. Simple!

Edited December 24, 2017 by Justin Adams

[Daniel 11:36]

"Eh? "Nothing over the last 2000 years is recorded in prophetic scripture .... not one thing". What does this mean?"

 

Just what I said .... not one thing

The next prophetic event is still pending as we speak .... the Lord will immortalize is own and then He will bring His tribulation period upon the earth [Revelation 6:12-17]

[Diaste]

23 hours ago, Daniel 11:36 said:

"Eh? "Nothing over the last 2000 years is recorded in prophetic scripture .... not one thing". What does this mean?"

 

Just what I said .... not one thing

The next prophetic event is still pending as we speak .... the Lord will immortalize is own and then He will bring His tribulation period upon the earth [Revelation 6:12-17]

Since you explained nothing about what you meant I'm going make the assumption that you mean, "No prophecy has been fulfilled in the last 2000 years."Two thousand years ago would be 17 AD. Dozens of prophecies were yet to be fulfilled in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus alone. Jesus also said the Temple would be destroyed, the gospel would be preached in all nations, and we have the prophecy, well before Jesus, that Israel would return to the promised land; which happened in 1948, well within the 2000 year period you reference. At least three prophecies off the top of my head have been fulfilled since Jesus resurrection: The Temple destroyed, the gospel preached, and Israel has returned. If I got the meaning  of, "Nothing over the last 2000 years is recorded in prophetic scripture .... not one thing", wrong then I'll need more insight from you.

But lets look at two problems with the imminent coming of Jesus in a pretrib rapture.

1) Let's say the pretrib rapture occurs and all believers are taken and all that's left are unbelievers. This is the pretrib scenario, yes? Believers cannot be in the trib because it's the wrath of God. Fine. Why force the decision to take the mark? There would be no need. This is an interesting argument but it's not the best. What if there are marginal believers left behind? These fence sitters suddenly realize they are in the trib, when they heard they were not supposed to be, and now they are faced with the choice of the mark of the beast or eternal life in Jesus. They repent of the tepid heart they possess, and repent and are filled with the Spirit, and then are faced with the trial of the mark and fire. However, it's possible there would be no believers of any kind left behind, and so why force the mark on the world?

2) Let's say the pretrib rapture occurs as stated by it's advocates. Believers are not appointed to wrath so we must be taken out before the tribulation, as it's the wrath of God. Obviously it's true we are not appointed to wrath. No believer is. God promised and it's a fact I know to be truth. Good thing too, no soul is going to survive into eternal life with the Lord if they are caught in the wrath of God. That's it. It's over. So how is it believers are in the tribulation? If pretrib demands the removal of all believers before the trib, by reason it's the wrath of God, how can believers be in the wrath of God?