Hey friends,

I wanted to start today's newsletter by sharing some exciting changes! I was finally able to compile all my previous newsletters and other important information into one place! Not only will this make it easier for anyone to go back and read any newsletter they like, but it also makes it easier for people to share my newsletters as articles directly to their social media. When you click on the link, you'll see a brief intro, then all my previous "posts," links to my other platforms, and giving options. All in one spot! It took a lot of time, but I am so glad to finally be able to make it "live" for you today! Here's the link to check it out: https://benjamin-cremer.ck.page/profile. Let me know any thoughts you may have about it!

Today's newsletter is the second in a brief series on "end times" theology. We are going to think a bit about the rapture today, a brief history of the rapture, and the main scriptures used to point to the rapture. While I plan on concluding this brief series today, I would love to hear if you have any further questions about this topic that I may not have covered. If you do, we can continue on this series a bit longer! Let me know!

Before we dive into today's content, here are some things that have me thinking:

• Don't forget to check out the list of resources I mentioned in my last newsletter, all pertaining to the Book of Revelation.
• As many of you know, I find the podcast "Hidden Brain" very insightful. I have just finished listening to a two episodes I found really helpful personally. The first is their most recent episode called How to Break Out of a Rut. It not only helped me to understand writer's block and perfectionism in a healthier way, but it gave me deeper insight to the greater overall feeling of "being stuck" in life. It was really encouraging. The second episode is the first of a two part series called The Paradox of Pleasure. This one took a really sincere look at our relationship with pleasure and pain in our American context. How we have access to so much pleasure, yet we have some of the highest depression rates in the world. Very insightful, both spiritually and mentally. I recommend also listening to its second part called, The Path to Enough.
• Lastly, I am currently reading a book called "Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships," by Marshall B. Rosenberg. It has already changed a lot of my thinking on the ways I communicate and how I hear others communicating to me. So often we can communicate to others defensively rather than through empathy. If you are like me and are always searching for better ways to communicate in your relationships through compassion and understanding, I think you will find this helpful as well.

Okay, onto today's content!

What we believe about the end should be connected to what we believe about the beginning.

So, I want to start this conversation about the Rapture “in the beginning.”

The great unfolding of the Genesis narrative begins with heaven and earth being created as one united reality, hence the garden of eden.

What happens as the story unfolds is that sin and evil drive these two realities of heaven and earth apart.

The rest of the Biblical narrative shows us that God has been desiring to work with humanity to bring heaven and earth into harmony again ever since.

For us Christians, this work culminated in Christ's death and resurrection. God's ultimate act of tearing down the walls that separated God from humanity and heaven and earth.

The goal of historical Christianity was never about getting into heaven after death. It was always about bringing life on earth in harmony with heaven. This is why Jesus teaches his disciples to pray, ‘your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

It envisions humanity sharing in Christ's resurrection after death, to enjoy earth and heaven being one again for eternity.

We can see this in what Jesus did during his life. Jesus essentially created little pockets of heaven wherever he went.

He brought good news to the poor, liberated oppressed people, set captives free, brought healing, and declared the year of jubilee (the canceling of all debts). -Luke 4:18-19

This is God's will being done on earth as it is in heaven.

All the accounts of Jesus' death and resurrection point to the reuniting of heaven and earth as well.

Where first humanity communed with the serpent in the garden instead of God, Jesus prayed and communed with God in the garden.

Where first humanity picked the first fruits of sin from a tree, choosing their own way apart from God, Jesus remained faithful to God and became the first fruits of forgiveness on a tree.

Where woman was blamed for bringing sin into the world in a garden while man stood by mute, then blamed her for what had happened when God asked, the first person Jesus met in all four gospel accounts after he rose from the dead, stepping out of a garden tomb, was a woman, who he sent to be the first to preach the good news of the resurrection in all the world. Starting with all the male disciples who were locked in hiding.

Jesus then ascended into heaven and will return again to ultimately reunite heaven and earth for all eternity.

The goal of Jesus is to reunite heaven with earth, humanity with humanity, and humanity with God.

The goal has never been about getting to heaven. The goal has always been bringing life on earth into harmony with heaven.

So, if this was the goal of Jesus, where did this idea come from that God is working towards allowing all followers of Jesus to escape the earth into heaven through a rapture?

A Brief History

This theology of the Rapture was introduced to the world by the 19th Century figure John Darby. Shortly after he resigned his church, he fell from a horse in October 1827 and was seriously injured. He later stated that it was during his time of recovery that he began to believe that the "kingdom" described in the Book of Isaiah and elsewhere in the Old Testament was entirely different from the Christian church. This led to what we call “dispensationalism” and what we call the rapture.

This dispensational theology didn’t really take root in America though until the early 1900s. Stricken with anxiety over the brewing of WW1, the sinking of the Titanic, the Influenza pandemic, and other tragedies that era, many American Christians took up Darby’s theology to explain the coming “end times.” Unsurprisingly, it was during this time when the Scofield Reference Bible was first published, encouraging its readers to look for the “signs” of the end, both in the newspaper and society.

This then led to books like “The Late Great Planet Earth” in the 1970s, which sold more than 15 million copies, and ultimately the “Left Behind” series in 1995 which sold more than 80 million copies, leaving many, especially Fundamentalists and Evangelicals, to accept this dispensational theory and the rapture as essential to Christian doctrine. This theology though is completely new to Christianity. You will not find it being spoken of in Christian history before the 19th century.

Consequently, this theological view tends to experience a renewal whenever there is a major crisis happening in the world, like a global pandemic and massive political upheaval for instance.

This is an important aspect of end times theology to understand. It is so often used as a way to not only make sense of our current time, but to give us something to hold onto in difficult times for the future. Desiring understanding and hope is never a bad thing. Yet, where we let those good desires lead us is where we might fall into harmful beliefs.

One of the many problems with Dispensational theology for example is it assumes God’s previous “dispensations” were not fully effective.

Dispensations like God’s promises, the Covenant, the Law, the Prophets, the scriptures, and even Christ’s sacrifice on the cross and his resurrection have all failed to induce the proper response from humanity. Therefore, we must need one final “dispensation” to turn humanity back to God.

Obviously, this is deeply problematic because in orthodox Christian doctrine, the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ is God’s final and total dispensation of judgment and salvation in the world. The final judgment at Christ's return is simply the culmination of the cross and resurrection.

With this problematic theology, our current time is always assumed to be the final age. It is seen an age of the greatest depravity the world has every seen. Every proponent of this theology has called their time the "final age," and the age of greatest depravity, whether it was during 1910 or 2020.

So, only a final act or “dispensation” will turn us all back to God, as many claiming to be “prophets” today have called for. As promised in the Book of Revelation (according to dispensationalism), this last act will consist of tribulation violence involving Christians, unbelievers, and apostates. This will be followed by the war of Armageddon ushering in Christ’s thousand year reign, God’s judgment, and the dispensation of rewards and eternal condemnation.

It is this time of tribulation where the rapture comes into play. There are so many different perspectives on when and how the rapture will happen, so here is a link for you to read about them all on your own.

For our purposes here today, I’ll simply mention that the most popular perspective is called Pre-tribulational premillennialism.

This theology is the theology of the “Left Behind” series and it is believed by such figures as Jimmy Swaggart, Robert Jeffress, Tim LaHaye, Chuck Smith, Hal Lindsey, David Jeremiah, John F. MacArthur, and John Hagee, to name a few.

This view advocates that the rapture will occur before the beginning of a seven-year tribulation period, while the second coming will occur at the end of those 7 years. Pre-tribulationists often describe the rapture as Jesus coming for the church and the second coming as Jesus coming with the church. This, in reality, isn’t just a “second coming,” but a third coming as well.

Within this theology, there are two scripture passages in particular that are used to support of the Rapture. I want to spend the last bit of our time together looking at both of them.

First, let’s look at Matthew 24:37-40

37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 40 Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. 41 Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left. 42 “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.

Looking at this text at face value, it is clear why it would be used as justification for the Rapture. Yet, as I mentioned last week, interpreting scripture is about understanding what it meant in its time period first so that we can understand how it might apply to our own, very different, time.

As we see, Jesus said, “As it was in the time of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Human One.”

Jesus tells a little bit about that time of Noah and the great flood. He said, “just like in the days of Noah, before the flood, people were eating and drinking, getting married, all the way up until the day Noah entered the ark.”

People didn’t follow Noah’s example and prepare for the coming flood. They didn’t know what was happening until the flood came and swept them all away. They didn’t care enough to be prepared. Jesus then says the "coming of the Human One" will be just like that too.

We notice something really important here with Jesus pointing to the events of the flood!

Who did the flood "sweep away" in Noah's day?

Those who insisted on living into the ways of evil and death.

Who was “Left Behind?”

It was Noah and his family on the ark with all the animals. (earth being redeemed).

Jesus elaborates on this and says there will be two working in the field, one will be swept away, the other left behind.

Two women will be grinding at the mill, one will be swept away, the other left behind.

This is the opposite of what we are told in things like the Left Behind series or rapture theology (dispensationalism).

Like Noah, you want to be the ones who are left behind, not the ones swept away by the great flood of God’s judgment sent to wipe away evil and death. Why? Because all of creation is what God is seeking to redeem and restore. Reuniting heaven and earth is the focus of God's salvation.

The question Matthew 24:37-40 leaves us with then is, will we be among those found working towards redemption and healing or those who couldn’t care less about bringing goodness into the world?

The second text that is probably most often used as a prooftext for the rapture is 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17:

15 According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.

Again, when we look at this text at face value, it does seem to imply the rapture. Yet, let’s look a little deeper.

Paul is describing a royal entrance liturgy, very common in the first century.

When a king would arrive at the city gates with their entire entourage, a welcoming committee would come out to “meet them.” Then, that welcoming party would escort them back into the city.

Here we see Paul describing that same thing. Where is Jesus coming from? Heaven, where he ascended after his resurrection. He is arriving with his royal entourage, complete with trumpets. Even the dead will rise to greet him. Those of us who are still alive will then join the earthly greeting party and go out to meet Jesus in the air as he approaches earth.

The earth is the destination here for Jesus. Jesus isn’t coming down to then take people back with him. Jesus is coming to complete the cosmic work of redemption once and for all, reuniting heaven and earth.

Even the culmination of Jesus returning in Revelation 21:2 does not mention a rapture, but rather, “I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.” Down to where? Earth.

Some final thoughts.

As one who grew up believing in the rapture and consuming all the end times prophecy I could about it, I soon found myself deeply questioning that belief system. Not just because I started studying church history and scripture more deeply than I had before, but also seeing what it did to my mental health and how it impacted Christian’s view of the world, view of God, and view of others.

I started to see how fear based the whole belief system is around the rapture. It not only envisions a God who threatens to leave people behind to suffer on earth while taking an “elect” group of people away, but it also a God who is intending on destroying all things rather than redeeming all things. This seems so contrary to what we see in Jesus.

I spent so many sleepless nights as a young boy, deeply fearing that my thoughts and actions during the day might make God “leave me behind” if the rapture happened that night. I was terrified of having to live through the tribulation period. Alone.

I have also heard too many people justify disregarding climate change, caring for the earth, or any efforts to help the animal kingdom because “it’s all going to burn in the end anyway.” I have also heard too many justify ignoring people’s current physical, mental, economic, social, and political needs to only focus on people’s “spiritual” salvation, because “the rapture is happening soon and they can’t be left behind.”

I ultimately left dispensational theology and the rapture "behind." After doing so, a core question has been for me, what does my theology of endings, both personally and cosmically, say about God, creation, and others? Does my theology of endings look and sound like Jesus, who loved this world so much he died for it? Or does it sound like a different god who is so angry with this world, they intend to destroy it all and only saving a select few before doing so? Does it look like God trying to reunite heaven and earth, or a God who is only concerned about heaven?

I think once we lean in closer to scripture and lean away from more modern conceptions of the end times, like dispensationalism, we can begin to develop a perspective that looks more like Jesus, one that gives us a healthier theology of endings and new beginnings. A theology of redemption, rather than destruction.

Now I'd like to hear from you. How has your beliefs about the "end times" changed over your life? Are they a source of hope for you or a source of fear? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

If you benefit from this project and would like to support it through a recurring gift, you can do so here: There's a $5/mo, $10/mo, and a $25/mo available.

If you’d like to support it through a one time gift, you can do that here: one-time-gift.​

Thank you all for reading and for all the ways you support me and this project every week.

I deeply appreciate you all,

Ben

Remember, you can view all previous newsletters and invite friends to join through one link now: https://benjamin-cremer.ck.page/profile.