Mr. Wilson:
I recently came
across your website. Your article
on the rapture is a challenge. I
have been 100% convinced of a
pre-tribulation rapture for more
than twenty years, but in recent
weeks my confidence in this
doctrine is not secure as it once
was. Your article raised some
good questions that I had not
considered. One issue bothers me
a great deal. Why does God permit
His people to be persecuted and
killed during the Great
Tribulation? Didn’t God
rescue Noah? Lot? Rehab? Daniel
and others? Doesn’t the
Bible say that God’s people
will not suffer wrath? (1
Thessalonians 1:10) I hope you
reply.
Sincerely, Paul
Dear Paul:
Thank you for your
question. I am pleased to learn
that you are searching for more
truth. I am sure the Holy Spirit
will guide you into all truth as
you study God’s Word.
(John 16:13) I am
not here to tell anyone what to
believe. You have asked a very
good question that I have asked
myself. I have found some points
from Scripture that may be
helpful to you in your search for
truth. Each believer must
assemble God’s truth for
himself and live according to
what he believes is right and
true. After you read this
response, I hope you will go back
to our website and reread the
article on the rapture. If you do
this, several pieces of the
puzzle may “snap
together” and make a lot
more sense the second time
around.
To begin, you need
to know that persecution and true
Christianity are inseparable.
Jesus warned His disciples: “Remember
the words I spoke to you:
‘No servant is greater than
his master.’ If they
persecuted me, they will
persecute you also…. They
will treat you this way because
of my name, for they do not know
the One who sent me.
(John 15:20,21)
Later, Jesus
warned His disciples again,
“All this I have told you
so that you will not go astray. They
will put you out of the
synagogue; in fact, a time is
coming when anyone who kills you
will think he is offering a
service to God. They will do such
things because they have not
known the Father or me. I have
told you this, so that when the
time comes you will remember that
I warned you…” (John
16:1-4)
Looking into the
future, the Bible warns that
God’s saints are going to be
persecuted: “The
[leopard-like] beast was given
a mouth to utter proud words and
blasphemies and to exercise his
authority for forty-two
months… He [the
leopard-like beast] was given
power to make war against the
saints and to conquer them. And
he was given authority over every
tribe, people, language and
nation.” (Revelation
13:5-7, italics and insertion
mine)
Those who stand up
for righteousness are often
persecuted. Jesus said, “Blessed
are those who are persecuted
because of righteousness, for
theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when people
insult you, persecute you and
falsely say all kinds of evil
against you because of me.
Rejoice and be glad, because
great is your reward in heaven,
for in the same way they
persecuted the prophets who were
before you.” (Matthew
5:10-12) The apostle Peter
understood persecution and the
importance of not giving up. He
wrote, “So then, those
who suffer according to
God’s will should commit
themselves to their faithful
Creator and continue to do good [regardless
of the consequences].” (1
Peter 4:19, insertion mine)
Please consider
one more text: “He [the
little horn] will speak
against the Most High and oppress
his saints and try to change the
set times and the laws. The
saints will be handed over to him
[the little horn] for a
time, times and half a
time.” (Daniel 7:25,
italics and insertions mine) Who
handed the saints over to the
little horn power if not God? For
reasons beyond the scope of this
article, this prophecy was
fulfilled during the Dark Ages.
(A.D. 538 – 1798) During
this time period, some historians
calculate that more than fifty
million Christians died for their
faith. An unescapable fact is in
the past, God handed His saints
over to the little horn for 1,260
years and it is not inconsistent
that He should hand His saints
over to the leopard-like beast
for forty-two month in the
future.
Look at
Persecution from God’s Point
of View
Persecution for
Christ’s sake is a
challenge, but God does not view
persecution as we do. According
to His infinite wisdom and love,
God is able to achieve things
for and through His saint’s
when they are persecuted that He
cannot achieve otherwise. Please
consider the following:
Persecution for
Christ’s sake purifies our
devotion to Christ. When people
are persecuted for humbly obeying
the will of God, there is no room
for bitterness or anger toward
their predators. God’s
people accept, through faith,
that it is His will that they
should stand firm, paying the
price that His truth demands.
(Remember that Jesus uttered the
phrase “Father forgive
them” on the cross (Luke
23:34), and Stephen uttered the
same phrase when the stones were
flying. (Acts7) When faced with
persecution for Christ’s
sake, a bundle of God’s
grace is delivered. The Holy
Spirit empowers the saint to deal
with the situation. God’s
Word becomes paramount and
everyone involved is
affected-even if they do not
comprehend all that is taking
place.
The fires of
persecution separate the
faith-full (the gold) from the
faith-less (the dross). When the
tribulation begins, everyone who
obeys the first angel’s
message will face persecution.
Our Creator’s demand to
worship Him on the seventh day
will stand in direct opposition
to Babylon’s demand that we
worship God on the first day.
When persecution begins, many
Christians will discover that
they really do not have faith in
Christ. They will cry out,
“Oh God, how could You let
this calamity happen to me.
Peter’s
experience is recorded in the
Bible because he perfectly
mirrors between admission and
submission. In the Garden of
Gethsemane, Peter was bold, ready
to die for the Lord. When the mob
rushed into the garden to lay
hands on Jesus, Peter whipped out
his knife and a scuffle ensued.
He managed to cut off the right
ear of Malchus, the high
priest’s servant. (John
18:10) Six hours later, he denied
three times that he even knew
Jesus. What caused Peter to do
this?
Peter did not know
it, but he had no faith in God.
Peter had played the
“admission game.” He
admitted that Jesus was the
Messiah. (Matthew 16:16) Peter
admitted that he was prepared to
die for his master, “…’even
if I die with you, I will never
disown you.’ And all the
disciples did the same.” (Matthew
26:35) And sure enough, when the
mob showed up, Peter proved that
he was ready to fight and die for
Christ’s sake, but his
motive was self-defense. Peter
was self-seeking and he was
willing to die, if necessary, to
get what he wanted.
Six hours later,
Peter saw Jesus submit to
persecution and condemnation
without any self-defense.
Christ’s humility humiliated
Peter. He felt betrayed and he
responded with betrayal. Peter
was not prepared to accept the
Father’s will for Jesus. It
was the Father’s will that
Jesus go to the cross and Peter
did not seek the same destiny as
Christ. It is one thing to die in
self-defense or in defense of God
and country, but it is altogether
another matter to die for no
other reason than God requires
it. This is the element in
Isaac’s story that is so
amazing. He was willing to die on
the altar without resistance or
complaint. Jesus said, “If
anyone would come after me, he
must deny himself [lay aside
self-interests] and take up
the cross [the will of God] and
follow me. For whoever wants to
save his life will lose it, but
whoever loses his life for me
will find it.”
(Matthew 16:24,25,
insertions mine)
After the rooster
crowed a third time, Peter had an
epiphany. He began to understand
the meaning of submission to the
will of God. When Peter saw
Israel’s Messiah, the Son of
God, submitting to inhuman
treatment because this was the
Father’s will for Christ,
Peter became ashamed of himself.
Peter saw through the tears that
faith in God means total
submission to God’s will and
this includes suffering because
of righteousness. Jesus’
persecution changed Peter and
millions of people since who have
studied the life of Jesus.
Persecution purifies the soul of
the persecuted and in this
process, God allows us to see if
self has been set aside so that
the will of God can be fulfilled.
Jesus said, “This third I
will bring into the fire [of
persecution]; I will refine
them like silver and test them
like gold. They will call on my
name and I will answer them; I
will say, ‘They are my
people,’ and they will say,
‘The Lord is our
God.’” (Zechariah
13:9, insertion mine)
Persecution also
keeps faith in Christ vibrant!
When Jesus spoke to the seven
churches in Revelation 2 and 3,
the Christian faith was only
sixty-five years old. Already,
six of the seven churches in Asia
Minor were corrupted by false
doctrines, but the church of
Philadelphia was hanging on.
Because religion mutates quickly,
God allowed the devil to chase
His people into the desert for
1,260 years. (Revelation 12:6,14)
God knows the desert is a good
place for training people. This
is why He took Israel into the
desert when they first came out
of Egypt. I like to call
God’s desert training,
“Desert University.”
When a person is exiled to the
desert, he has to depend upon God
for everything. The desert is an
unforgiving place, a hostile
place, a lonely place, a place
that forbids self-indulgence and
self-reliance. The carnal nature
hates the desert. Instead, it
wants pleasure, luxury, and the
“easy life.” Even
though there is very little
pleasure in the desert, a person
can find joy in the desert. True
joy expands the ability of the
heart to trust God and serve man.
True joy redirects our motives
from self-seeking to selfless
service. “Desert U”
teaches discernment and insight.
“Desert U” is a
holistic experience called
sanctification, or in Bible
terms, “walking with
God.” “This is the
account of Noah. Noah was a
righteous man, blameless among
the people of his time, and he
walked [alone] with
God.” (Genesis 6:9,
italics and insertion mine)
Looking at human nature and
knowing that God’s wisdom is
perfect, we have to admit that
putting the saints in the desert
for 1,260 years had to be the
best thing that God could do for
them.
Attending
“Desert U” is like
putting on a blindfold and after
taking a hold of Christ’s
arm, following wherever He leads.
There is no way of knowing where
you are going, but your
destination is secure! God’s
people often find themselves all
alone in their faith experience.
Family and friends rarely
understand or appreciate
“Desert U.” In fact,
family and friends are often
opposed to God’s will
because they do not know
God’s will. Jesus said, ‘A
man’s enemies will be the
members of his own
household.” I have
mentioned these matters because
there is a special sense of joy
at “Desert U.” God is
there. If necessary, food falls
from the sky and water flows from
rocks. “The woman fled
into the desert to a place
prepared for her by
God…” (Revelation
12:6, italics mine)
The final benefit
that comes from persecution is
exclusion. Persecution keeps
those who love the world and the
things of this world out of
God’s church. (1 John 2:15)
When the threshold for being a
Christian is suffering, the
nucleus of God’s people
remains pure. When the threshold
for being a Christian is easy,
religion mutates and the gospel
suffers. The saints become
invalids when they should be
soldiers of the cross. Instead of
being medics to a dying world,
church members constantly need a
medic to keep them alive.
God’s saints
do not serve Him because they
want to avoid Hell and win
Heaven. God’s saints would
serve God if there were nothing
beyond this life. That is what
Jesus did. He would have gone to
the cross for you and me even if
there were no resurrection. The
saints serve God because He
imparts love, peace, joy, and
sustaining grace.
(Galatians 5:22)
This grace comes through total
submission to God’s will.
This grace enables the saints to
“overcome the world.” “They
[the saints] overcame him [the
devil] by [their faith in]
the blood of the Lamb and by
the word of their testimony; they
did not love their lives so much
as to shrink from death.” (Revelation
12:11)
The apostle Paul
wrote, “In fact, everyone
who wants to live a godly life in
Christ Jesus will be
persecuted.” (2 Timothy
3:12) If persecution were a bad
thing for God’s people, He
would not permit it. God does not
view persecution as we do because
His grace is sufficient. Listen
to Paul, a man who knew
persecution well: “No
temptation has seized you except
what is common to man. And God is
faithful; he will not let you be
tempted beyond what you can bear.
But when tempted, he will also
provide a way out so that you can
stand up under it.” (1
Corinthians 10:13) God’s
saints should not fret over past,
present, or future persecution.
If we surrender to God’s
will today, He will give us every
grace to glorify His wonderful
name today. Today is all that we
have. In closing, consider
Peter’s words, the apostle
who made an about face once he
understood God’s will. “Live
such good lives among the pagans
that, though they accuse you of
doing wrong, they may see your
good deeds and glorify God on the
day he visits us. Submit
yourselves for the Lord’s
sake to every authority
instituted among men: whether to
the king, as the supreme
authority, or to governors, who
are sent by him to punish those
who do wrong and to commend those
who do right. For it is
God’s will that by doing
good you should silence the
ignorant talk of foolish men.
Live as free men, but do not use
your freedom as a cover-up for
evil; live as servants to God.
Show proper
respect to everyone: Love the
brotherhood of believers, fear
God, and honor the king. Slaves,
submit yourselves to your masters
with all respect, not only to
those who are good and
considerate, but also to those
who are harsh. For it is
commendable if a man bears up
under the pain of unjust
suffering because he is conscious
of God. But how is it to your
credit if you receive a beating
for doing wrong and endure it?
But id you suffer for doing good
and you endure it, this is
commendable before God. To this
you were called, because Christ
suffered for you, leaving you an
example, that you should follow
in his steps.” (1 Peter
2:12-21)
Larry Wilson
