I don’t believe the Bible teaches a strict dispensational framework as some, a minority, in the modern Church era teach.
Just a reminder: John Nelson Darby was not an author of Scripture, and Hal Lindsey’s The Late Great Planet Earth (1970) and Tim LaHaye’s Left Behind series are not books of Scripture.
I think the Bible clearly teaches that the return of Jesus Christ is a singular event—not a Second Coming where the Church is scooped up and taken away for three and a half or seven years, followed by a third coming.
That doesn’t preclude our gathering together unto Him to meet Him in the air at His return, or the Millennial Kingdom that immediately follows. It also doesn’t mean that the people of God aren’t going to suffer great tribulation—they have, they are, and they will until the restoration of all things.
Child of God, husband, father, grandfather, rabblerouser, songwriter, pot stirrer, waiting for the King.
You suggest “It also doesn’t mean that the people of God aren’t going to suffer great tribulation–.” Whereas Paul states in 1 Thess. 1:10 “…even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.” And in 1 Thess. 5:9:”For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation….” And in Romans 5:9 “Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.”
The wrath of God is coming, but true Christians shall be delivered from the wrath to come.
Thanks, David.
When have God’s people not suffered tribulation? Being delivered from the “wrath to come” isn’t a proof text for the man-made doctrines taught in “Left Behind and “Late Great Planet Earth”. 1 Thess. 1:10 isn’t a proof text for the theology of a “rapture” then a Third Coming of Christ after a 7-year tribulation period.