Hey Mike,

I have been speaking to and hearing people talk about this great tribulation they want escape. I wanted to ask where do they get this stuff about the antichrist coming and making peace with people and other things? Is this in the bible? I want to study this myself and see how they come to these conclusions. If you have any idea where is it in the bible where they misinterpret these things, please let me know because I want to study this myself.
Y____

Hi Y____,

As far as where people get the doctrine of a rapture is concerned, they get it from 1Th 4:17, 5:9, Mat. 24:40-44, Rev 3:10, and many others. They are all the result of not being given eyes that see that Christ was not raptured out of anything, but instead endured to the end. It is the result of not being given eyes to see that all things are ours and that there is one event to all and that we are told to “keep the things written therein.”

Ecc 9:2  All things come alike to all: there is one event to the righteous, and to the wicked; to the good and to the clean, and to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth, and to him that sacrificeth not: as is the good, so is the sinner; and he that sweareth, as he that feareth an oath.
Mat 4:4  But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
1Co 3:21  Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are yours;
1Co 3:22  Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours;
Rev 1:3  Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.

This desire to escape the trials and tribulations of our walk is natural, but it is not scriptural. This is scriptural:

Act 14:22 Confirming the souls of the disciples, [ and] exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.

The “way of escape” is through the flood of Noah, through the Red Sea, through the lion’s den, through the fiery furnace, and finally through the fire of the cross. The “Not appointed unto wrath” of 1Th 5:9 is true in the same sense as we are not appointed unto death, but to life. The way we get to that life is by losing our life:

Mat 10:39 He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.

These two articles on the site, Who is Taken and Who is Left? and What is the Time of Jacob’s Trouble, deal with the subject of the rapture in greater detail if you would like further study.

I hope this is of some edification for you.
Your brother in Christ,
Mike