My Rapture View: Why I Changed My Mind

Hey everybody, welcome to the show together and we are going to jump into a very personal thing. And so, what I want to talk to you about is something that a lot of people have passionate feelings about and they should. People either embrace or push back or even stay neutral passionately on this particular topic and so they should. And that is the biblical, I stress biblical teaching, the doctrine of the Harpazzo. The Harpazzo, and we'll get into it later on, but the Harpazzo is the Greek word for the Latin word. Right, come on, Greek and Latin two separate languages, of course, English yet again, another separate language, the Harpazzo, to be caught up. The Latin, where we get the familiar word rapture, rapture rapture in Latin or the English two compound word caught up. We're going to talk about that, but what you may not, you may not be, you may not be aware of what I'm about to say. And it is this. So, I came to know the Lord on June 20th, 1977 and I was 19 years old and I went into a church service and everything about it was unscheduled in my mind. God had a plan. I'd never been to church before in my life, my family did not attend church. I hadn't even been to a funeral for anyone at a church prior to that night. June 20th, 1977, if you check your Google, it should be a Monday night. That was my first time in a church. Be that as it may, I'm very grateful because at the time, at Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, Greg Laurie, the Evangelist Greg Laurie, many of you know, Harvest Christian Fellowship, Greg Laurie, the Harvest Crusades, Greg Laurie was a young hippie and he came out and he started teaching on the book of Revelation chapter 20. And obviously to me, I'd never heard anything like this before. And so, I was blown away and first of all, I could relate to this guy even though it was a little bit older than I am. I could relate because he's in my generation and here's a young man talking about eternal things and God. I was shocked, wow, this guy knows God. This is amazing. And he gave a tremendous message, by the way, the title of that message was, how to inherit hell? How to inherit hell? Revelation chapter 20. And so, I gave my heart to Christ that night and the amazing thing for me, the good thing for me is when I gave my heart to Christ that night, all of my childhood friends that I had grown up with, even to that moment, I had no idea what was about to happen. When they found out the next day on Tuesday that I'd given my life to Jesus, none of them cursed me and none of them said, what are you an idiot? None of them, we'd been friends, we'd gone through elementary school together, junior high together, high school together, we'd gone through school together. None of them said anything in any derogatory form whatsoever. They just never called me back. That, those relationships immediately evaporated. I didn't know that at the time because how God filled the void of their departure from my life was a pursuit for the Bible. I wanted the Bible. I mean, I just blew up for the Bible. And so, I'm so grateful in the providence of God that back in the 70s, I go into Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa right on the midst of the Jesus revolution. And if you didn't show up to church on Monday night, an hour before service and get in line, you were not going to get in the building. Back in those days, that not getting into the building and even included not all the seats of the sanctuary being filled up, but all of the aisles were filled up. People would sit on the floor, all the way up to the stage. People would sit. Greg would come out and give the message. It was amazing. Well, I got saved on that Monday, and I immediately dove into midweek services. Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa at that time had all kinds of services. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and then Sundays, and then repeat. And there were tremendous Bible teachers on campus in those days, guys by the name, for example, of Chuck Missler would be teaching his Wednesday night class. I attended that forever. Randy Ziegler and Jimmy Kempner were doing Saturday night concerts. I would go to that because the bands like the way and mustard seat faith and. I'm just sorry, losing the names, but Denny Carell and the blues image band guy, all of these things just rock stars were getting saved and they would come to church and sing Jesus songs. And it was amazing on Saturday nights and Sundays for Sundays for pasture Chuck would come out as he always did. Tought the Bible on Sunday morning and then he would teach well over an hour on Sunday nights, verse by verse. It was amazing. Church life, Bible, worship. That's all I did. And moving along in that Chuck was always a student of Bible prophecy and I'm so grateful for that. And so everybody was excited about the last days in those days. And you know, as humans we get excited about stuff and we can either be misunderstood or we make mistakes. But I know that Chuck Smith was labeled as naming the day that Christ is going to return. I'm not sure if he ever did that or not exactly. I never heard it if he did. But he did always say this and I think it's cool. Chuck would say, hey, it's 77. It's the year we could go to heaven. It's 78. The Lord could return and that would be great. It's 1979. Jesus is coming and that's fine. Do you get the little rhyme? Is that a rhyme? I don't know. Anyway, rhyme. It's 1980 and Christ could return and wouldn't that be, you know, a gravy, whatever I don't know he would say. It's 81. Jesus could come. He always did that. It was awesome. Very cute. But when he would get to the prophetic scriptures of the Bible, he would teach them. And I would have my Bible open and I'm reading and it made perfect sense. I wasn't a scholar but I was absolutely sincere and intensely focused on the Bible. And it's at that time as a brand new believer, I began reading Dr. H.A. Ironside, which is amazing because a couple of weeks ago, Dr. Ironside, Dr. very few of you will know who this is. But Dr. Harry Ironside, H.A. Ironside was a tremendous expositor of the Word of God. And by his books, and I encourage you to do that, just a couple of weeks ago, his grandson, his grandson came to our church. And I got to meet Harry Ironside's grandson. Now the guy is in his 80s. I think his grandson. But Dr. Ironside used to traffic around with a guy by the name of Dr. John Wolverett. And so growing up at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa, we were taught what is called pre-millennial, pre-tribulational, literal futurist understanding of the Bible. Well believe it or not, you fall into categories. You actually do, if you know it or not. You are either pre-millennial or millennial or post-millennial in your theology. So you see, Pastor Jack, how do I know? Go check the denomination that raised you up and see what their prophetic view is of the scriptures. And that's what you are. It's how you view or interpret the Bible through the lens of how you were taught. We all do that. Don't let anybody tell you they don't do it. They are going to be lying to you. Every single one of us view the scriptures by how we are influenced. That's why God comes down hard on false prophets and false teachers because they lead people astray. Bible is the judge, Acts 17-11. If you make sure that Acts 17-11 is your guideline, you'll never be deceived. Don't listen to people, but judge everyone you hear against the Bible, Acts 17-11. And so I was doing that because I was taught that way. Everything's fine. But this is how things happen in all of our lives. I started listening to more and more of Keith Green, the music artist, Keith Green. He played the night by the way I got saved. Greg Laurie had Keith Green out on the piano. I didn't know he was. He's a legend in the Christian music circles. He's in heaven now. But Keith Green began to not only do concerts, he began to teach the Bible. And he founded a ministry called The Last Days Ministry. And then he was influenced by others. Fast forward, started following more and more and listening more and more. And Keith Green started trending toward post-tribulational rapture view. I was in a church that was pre-tribulational rapture view. And when I was being challenged by Keith Green to man up and embrace a post-tribulational rapture view, that it was the more manly, it was the more masculine interpretation. Again, this is a passionate topic. All of you, me, we all have our passion about our view. And my view began to change ever so slowly. Because I'll never forget it. I remember Keith Green saying, look, if you hold a pre-rapture view, you're probably not willing to die for Jesus. I was so hurt by that. I'm willing to die for Jesus. Well, a lot of people hold a post-tribulational view. They're scared of dying for Jesus. Well, I'm not scared. They're more weak. They're more fragile. Listen, they're more of those who want to escape stuff rather than endure stuff. Hey, I don't want to escape anything. I want to endure. And I started reading books by various theologians from various, various eras of church history, time, even up to the present back then in the 70s. And I began to listen to Chuck Smith or Greg Laurie and Chuck Missler and Tim Lehay. He would come and speak at times. There would be others that would be speaking. And when they would mention the Lord could come back at any time, in my mind, I was going, what a weakling. Poor guys, they don't know. They need to get tough. They need to get tough like me, like a jerk. Well, they're not willing to suffer. I was so foolish. You know, when you're a young believer, that's one of the curses of being a young believer. You're very zealous and passionate about things, but you also, because you're not grounded, you can be very foolish about things where emotion begins to be the guardrails or the frame of your theology. Never good. But we usually pass through that phase. But I was more stubborn and I am more stubborn than the average bear. And so if I really believe in something and it's true, you're not going to get me off of it. But having a more, I have a more analytical background, a more a more skeptical background. I want to be proven. So when I began to listen to guys who began to give me verses, you see, Jack, the church is going through the tribulation period. Here's the reason why you guys, I didn't know back then what I later found out. Those guys were using verses out of context because it was referring to the tribulation saints. Those that were being, for example, beheaded. Those who kept the faith and endured into the end, the same shall be saved. And I allowed myself to be convinced that a real masculine view of Bible prophecy is embracing a post tribulational view of the rapture. And so I was very strong about that. And I hung under that for about three years. I have to tell you, it cost you to hold that view, by the way, because I had to, in fact, it's amazing. During those three years of time, I wound up struggling with the scripture rather than having peace about it. I wound up having art had to argue about certain things that I wasn't exactly seeing it clearly because it didn't fit, but I was trying to make it fit. I couldn't distinguish between the statements of Old Testament saints, the church age believers who are saints, and the tribulation believers who are saints, but only, listen, the Old Testament saints are not the bread of Christ. Nor are the tribulation saints, the bread of Christ. The church age saints are the bread of Christ, from Pentecost, where the Spirit of God came down to, where the Spirit of God delivers the church into the arms of Jesus at the rapture. And what nailed me was, well, I'll tell you what, I'll talk about it in the second part of our time together. I don't want to get off target. But I began to have to struggle with salvation versus also, because it didn't fit. I had to make things fit. I began to have to bend the word to hold, to get to a post tribulational view. And then, ever so quietly, not bold like it is today, a little bit of deception began to creep in of what we now know today is called replacement theology. Well, you see the reason why, I know it says Israel here, but it's actually the true Israel, which is the church, and that's why it says that. And that's a twist of scripture. But I became a post tribulationist believer. And I'm not going to name, I had, I had three other friends that we hung out with. And I'm not going to tell you their names because you know them. They're in ministry throughout America or the world. But we were, we were chumming together at Costa Mason those days. And I began to influence them. And they had the same, you know, misery loves company. I was able to persuade them to go down my path and follow these guys, these scholars, these church fathers, or those who are on the radio of a particular bet at that time and began to get them cloudy. I didn't mean to. I thought I was right. And they began to experience the same type of conundrum that I was going through. And couldn't get it to fit. Didn't understand that when you're reading Matthew 24, for example, chapter 24, chapter 23, chapter 24, chapter 25, you are reading a discourse by Jesus that has to deal specifically with Israel, Jerusalem, Judea, and the believers at the time of the tribulation period in the second coming. I knew that before, but then my view was changed. And so messes up a lot of other things. So that was a very, very crazy time because I felt like I was just carrying weights. And it wasn't a very happy time. Because after all, you got to be a man. You had to suck it up. You got to be willing to die at any moment to get your head cut off. And if anybody didn't look forward to that, you're a wimp. And it was just, it was totally not godly, not spirit-led, certainly not of grace, because that's not how God operates. And so I became a post-tribulationist. And I began to even have a hard time listening to any pre-tribulationist, because I thought they were all weak. And they were escape artists, you see, because they were looking for Jesus to come back at any moment. You need to be tough like me, suck it up, and lay your head on the block, dude. Be a man about it. So stupid. I'm not saying that that's stupid to be martyred for Jesus. That is not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is God will give you grace to be martyred for Jesus in any era. And look, I hope Jesus comes back during this podcast, but if he doesn't, if somebody flies in here with a machete, I'm trusting God's grace to show up, to possess my life, to lay down my neck on the block, and so see the Lord, to be absent from the bodies to be present with the Lord, right? But over time, something happened. And again, I don't want to get into the details. I decided to get into that later, okay? I came to, in Bible reading, you know, I'm convinced that Satan does not want us to just read the Bible. Just read it. You know, we get some messed up because we, I don't know where to start. Isn't that funny? Look at this book. How many thousands of pages, nearly 2,000 pages? I don't know where to begin, or what do I read today? Hey, why don't you just jump in? But a good Bible reading plan, so I'm reading through the New Testament. This is what happened to me. I came to this, that not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. For in my father's house are many mansions, and if we're not so, I would have told you. I go now to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself that where I am, or where I am, there you may be also. Let not your heart become, wait a minute, that's John 14 verse 1. Jesus was just getting ready to leave the disciples after his resurrection. He would be leaving and going back to heaven. Don't let your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. For in my father's house, that's not here. In my father's house are many mansions, dwelling places. If we're not so, I would have told you, I go now to prepare a place for you. That's not here. That's up there. And if I go, I will come again. And I'm going to receive you to myself that where I am, there you may be also. Friends, that stuck in my gears. Listen, and here's the question. God put a question in my heart. How do I get there? I mean, I know I'm saved. I know I'm born again. But how do I get there? If Christ is coming back in the second coming, and in his coming, I go watch this hand and watch this hand. Hopefully I'm not out of the frame. If he's coming in the second coming, right? The didn't Christ are called up. We who are live will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air and them. And so shall we ever be with the Lord? And then we land. So he's reentering earth's atmosphere. We go up on his descent. We connect with him and we land on earth. And that's the end of the seven years tribulation. And then he establishes his earthly kingdom for a thousand years. He has to sit on the throne of David for a thousand years. That's what the Old Testament says. And he has to establish the promised land given to Abraham. That's never happened before. That realm has got to happen. That will happen during a thousand years. Christ returns. Jesus's politics will be the millennial kingdom. Here's the big problem. I don't get up there. My post tribulation view doesn't allow me to get up there to the dwelling places that Jesus calls mansions. Man, that was a struggle. John 14 was Jesus's announcement about the rapture. I didn't make that up. Read it again. And it completely shipped me to the core. I pushed away everyone. No, I mean, I didn't push away people. You know what I mean? I pushed away this teacher, that radio program, that guy's conferences, that guy's newsletter. I pushed them all away. And then I pushed all the commentaries away and all the books away. I purged myself like a liver cleanse or a colon cleanse. Everything out, everything away from me. I'm going back to the Bible. And went back to the Bible and went from a post tribulational rapture view to not only back to a pre tribulational rapture view, but a very masculine, if you guys want to put it that way, a very masculine form of a pre tribulation rapture view. I'll explain. I'm running out of time. But I'll do it on the other side, okay? Next time around. But I thank God for that journey because when I came back to the pre tribulational rapture view, I came back with the vengeance in the sense of the word of God is going to be my truth. I'm going to take what I thought was my truth and I'm going to crucify it. And this is going to be my truth. I'm going to submit myself to this and repeat this. To the day I die or to the day he returns for the church. I don't care which comes first. I'm going to live the same no matter what. And there was this radical, wonderful, liberating epiphany, revelation of peace, joy, excitement, urgency. In fact, some years later, I would be involved in congressional gatherings of believers back in Washington, D.C., a conference speaking, Bible study group speaking, and other pastors would say, wait a minute, you're a Calvary Chapel guy and you're here in Washington, D.C., talking about faith and government and letting your light so shine in the holes of darkness here? That's right. We thought you Calvary Chapel guys were pre tribulational, dudes. Yeah, we are. Well, what are you doing here? What do you mean what I'm doing here? The Bible says be ready. He could come in any moment. I'm ready. But the Bible also says to occupy till he comes. I'm occupying. The Bible says be busy about our father's business. That's what I'm doing. But don't you believe Jesus could come back in any moment? Yes, I do. But then why are you hoping to have Christians registered a vote in this next election coming up? Because that's what we do. And then they were scratching their hat. They were like, what? We never heard such a thing before. This is what I mean by a masculine view of a pre tribulational rapture. A pre tribulational rapture is not lazy. It's not wimpy. It's engaging. I'm planning and preparing for the next 100 years, even though I'll be dead and gone. I've got kids and grandkids and the church that I pastor. It is my fervent prayer that I'm investing in people who generationally are going to take the helm of this church that I pastor. That's been the plan for three and a half decades. And by the way, God's blessing it. We've got a beautiful, deep bench here at this church. And we've got little scholars from better 5, 6, 7-year-olds. Our little kids are growing up in apologetic classes at the church I get to get the chance to pastor. These kids are so well taught. Are junior high kids? They're probably better taught than most adults in churches. Why? Because Christ could come back today. But if He doesn't, they're ready. That's what I mean by a masculine view of being a futurist, literal interpretation of Scripture, pre-millennial, pre-tribulational, follower of Jesus. It fits all of the categories. And so I have, in my opinion, this is my opinion, I thank God humbly, that through my particular journey in this area regarding the rapture, I have been in the various camps defending those camps. And the only place that does no offense to Scripture, but is in direct alignment with Scripture, is the pre-tribulational rapture view as rightly understood from the Bible via no private interpretation. Let the Word of God speak for itself.