David Reagan - Newest Book on the Rapture
Have you been told that the Pre-Tribulation Rapture of the Church is a silly, unbiblical concept? Have you been assured that if the Tribulation begins in your lifetime, that you, as a believer, will have to endure all the horrors of it, and that you will most likely be executed by the Antichrist? Well, I’ve got some very good news for you, so stay tuned!
Dr. Reagan: Greetings in the name of Jesus, our Blessed Hope, and welcome to Christ in Prophecy. I have two colleagues in the studio with me today, Nathan Jones, our Internet Evangelist, and Tim Moore, our Associate Evangelist. They are going to join me in discussing a new book of mine titled, The Rapture: Fact or Fiction? Actually, what they’re going to do is grill me about the book. And that is why I am sitting in the hot seat between the two of them. So, guys, let’s get it over with, get going.
Tim Moore: Alright, so, Dave, why did you decide to write this book about the Rapture?
Dr. Reagan: Well, I was going through my library one day, and I have a lot of books on the Rapture. And I noticed that they fell into two categories, they were either highly theological, or they were down-to-earth but extremely long, and to the point that you almost could not see the forest from the trees. So, I decided what I wanted to do was to write a very simple book for the person who knows little or nothing about the Rapture, that could also be used by a person who wants to teach about the Rapture. And that this book would be less than a 100 pages, that was my goal. I wanted it to be that short, that concise, and that direct and to the point. And I almost achieved that, the book is 104 pages. But that includes reference notes.
Nathan Jones: Yeah.
Tim Moore: I think you hit the mark actually.
Dr. Reagan: Well, the other reason I wrote it was because I had become increasingly concerned about the vicious attacks on the concept of a Pre-Tribulation Rapture, you know all about that Nathan because you get that all the time on the Internet. But the attacks seem to be growing in viciousness and growing in number. And I think the reason for that is because Satan does not want anyone to believe in a Pre-Tribulation Rapture because that gives people hope, and the last thing in the world he wants anyone to have is hope.
Nathan Jones: Right. Right. Well, since you talk about attacks on the Rapture maybe we could cover that a bit. You have actually part three here the objections, you have 13 objections. And you cover all the major ones about why people have objections to the Rapture being Pre-Tribulation, in other words happening before the seven year Tribulation occurs. Let’s start with this first one and I run into it all the time with people who aren’t very familiar with the Rapture concept, they say, “Well, I just can’t find the word in the Bible. Where is it?”
Dr. Reagan: And the tragedy about that is even people who know the Bible in detail will often make that argument.
Tim Moore: They do too.
Nathan Jones: Yes, they do.
Dr. Reagan: Well, it’s just not even mentioned in the Bible, how could it be a legitimate doctrine? Well, it is mentioned in the Bible point blank in the Latin Vulgate. The Latin Vulgate, vulgate means the common Latin. That was the Latin that people spoke in the Middle Ages. That came into being about 400 AD. Jerome translated the Bible into Latin. And that was the fundamental Bible of Western Civilization for almost 1,200 years.
Nathan Jones: Oh, yeah, only one you could get.
Dr. Reagan: Think the King James Version 400 years, this was 1,200 years. The only Bible used in Western Civilization was the Latin Bible. And in 1 Thessalonians 4:17 it says rapture. And in English to express the concept of Rapture, you have to use usually two words; taken out, snatched out, taken away, something like that. So, in terms of speaking in shorthand we use the word rapture, which is a perfectly biblical word. After all a word doesn’t have to be in English for it to be a biblical word. This was a word taken right out of the Latin Vulgate. And there’s a lot of doctrines that we believe in that are not mentioned by name in the Bible. For example–
Nathan Jones: The word Bible right?
Dr. Reagan: The word Bible is not in the Bible. Neither is Trinity. Neither is Atheism. Neither is divinity, monotheism, Shekinah Glory, age of accountability, and incarnation. In fact the word Sunday, you can’t find in the Bible.
Nathan Jones: I like to point people to 1 Thessalonians 4:17 which reads, “Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up,” they’re caught it, “together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus shall we always be with the Lord.” So, like you were saying the Latin Vulgate it is “rapio” and that comes from the Greek which is “harpazo.” But since neither of us read Greek or Hebrew we have to go to the transliterated word, “caught up” is rapture. So, if anyone wants to find it 1 Thessalonians 4:17.
Dr. Reagan: Amen.
Tim Moore: That was a great explanation. I love the fact that you point out those other words are not in Scripture but they common used words within the Church today. Well, some actually, Dave also object to the Pre-Tribulation Rapture concept because they say it was not taught by any of the Church Fathers. How do you respond to that?
Dr. Reagan: Yeah, they argue that is too new to be true, or it’s not written, adopted by any of the Early Church Fathers. Well, you know the thing is it depends on what you mean by Church Fathers.
Tim Moore: True.
Dr. Reagan: Now, I would argue that it is mentioned by the true Church Fathers which are Peter, and Paul, and John, and Jesus Christ Himself, all talk about the Rapture.
Tim Moore: Amen.
Dr. Reagan: So, the fact that the Early Church Fathers the ones that came let’s say after the Church was established between 100 and 400 AD are usually the Church Fathers, they didn’t speak about the Rapture as such, but the one thing they did talk a lot about was imminency; that the Lord could return any moment. And in those early days they had not really thought through all this to realize the fact that the Lord could not come at any moment if all the prophecies in the Bible are going to be fulfilled. There are so many prophecies that have to be fulfilled before the Second Coming, not a single prophecy that has to be fulfilled before the Rapture. And I don’t think they thought through that. But they certainly emphasized the fact that the Lord could come any moment. And folks, you know if the Lord can come any moment there’s got to be a Rapture because the Second Coming has so many prophecies that have to be fulfilled before the Second Coming occurs.
Nathan Jones: Well, didn’t the early Church Fathers have to deal a lot with: How to build a church? How to keep Gnosticism and other heresies out? They really weren’t terribly interested in eschatology.
Dr. Reagan: And they wrote very little about it.
Nathan Jones: Very little.
Dr. Reagan: They were concerned about those issues that you just mentioned: How do you organize a church? How does one church relate to another church? Are they independent? Do they have somebody over all of them? So, they were concerned about those practical issues.
Tim Moore: I love the fact that you point out when Martin Luther was challenged at the Diet of Worms to defend his new theology of salvation by grace through faith, they said, “Well, that is too new to be true.” And he said, “Actually that is very well established in Scripture. It’s just not been practiced by the existing church in that day and age.”
Dr. Reagan: Yeah, that was their fundamental argument, too new to be true. He said, “None of the Popes ever taught that in the church.” And yet he was teaching right out of the Bible that salvation is by grace through faith and not by works.
Tim Moore: Exactly.
Nathan Jones: I love that Diet of Worms. We’re not talking about a diet of worms here. You keep saying, “Too new to be true.” When did the Rapture view become popular? Because I hear that all the time. Well, you are teaching something that is a new concept, therefore it can’t be true.
Dr. Reagan: Well, what people need to keep in mind is two things, first of all the reason that the Rapture concept came later in Church history is because about 400 AD the Catholic Church adopted Amillennialism as the official eschatology of the Church. This is the idea that Jesus is never going to return and reign on this earth, that He’s just going to appear and we all go to Heaven with Him and that’s it. And because that was the official doctrine anybody who differed from that was burned at the stake with their writings. So, we really don’t know how many people may have had this idea. But there were other problems.
Nathan Jones: They would kill you for believing.
Dr. Reagan: The average person in the Middle Ages could not read or write. And further more they couldn’t get copies of the Bible.
Nathan Jones: Or they would be killed for having a Bible quite frankly.
Dr. Reagan: The Bible was written by scribes. And you had to be very wealthy to have a copy. And the Catholic Church kept the copies from the people so they had to accept what the priest taught. And so, they never had an opportunity to study the Bible. Furthermore the average person could not begin to study the Bible until number one they started getting education, number two they started getting copies of the Bible, which came with the invention of the printing press. And then there’s another problem, and that is that the Bible itself says that many of the end time prophecies will not be understood until the time comes for them to be fulfilled. We’re understanding prophecies today that we never understood before. And this concept of a Rapture, people say, “Well, it all began with a particular person John Darby in the early 19th Century.” No, we now have a publication by a fellow named William Watson who is a professor of history in Colorado Christian University called, Dispensationalism Before Darby. It was published in 2015 and it proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the concept of a Rapture existed 200 years before Darby. And he says, “In fact it demonstrates the belief was held not only by Baptist, but by leading Anglicans, and even by Scottish Presbyterians.”
Tim Moore: Speaking of Scottish Presbyterians, and I have to point out I know people today who will remember Bibles being chained to the pulpit or to the altar in front of their church building, and people not allowed to even take it home and read within their lifetimes. But you mentioned Scottish folks believing in this concept. There are some who scoff today, many of our viewers may not be familiar with a woman by the name of Margaret MacDonald, but a young gal who saw visions. And some scoffers will says, “Well, she’s the one who came up with this whole idea.” Can you respond to that as well?
Dr. Reagan: Well, yes, this came out in 1973 a fellow by the name of Dave MacPherson wrote a book called, The Unbelievable Pre-Trib Origin. And he’s got a kind of cottage industry here. He has republished this book six times, under six different titles, and it is almost the same book every time. Not exactly but almost the same book. I had never even heard of this until I had maybe 20 years ago somebody came to me and said, “Don’t you know the Pre-Trib Rapture came from this little girl who was possessed by a demon?” So, I got the book. I read it. And that was his thesis, it came from this demon possessed little girl in Scotland, and that’s where it came from.
Nathan Jones: John Darby adopted it.
Dr. Reagan: Well, funny thing I read the whole book, then I got to the end, to the appendix it had the vision. I read the vision, and I read the vision, and I read the vision, and I read it. I could never find a Pre-Tribulation Rapture in the vision. It’s just not there.
Tim Moore: It’s not there.
Dr. Reagan: In fact there is a group in California that produced a four hour video attacking the Pre-Trib Rapture and the whole video was based around this girl, and that’s where it came from. And then at the end of the video the guy looks right into the camera who produced it and he says, “Our position is that Margaret MacDonald’s end time Rapture vision is convoluted. And we can’t say for sure that Margaret MacDonald had a partial Pre-Trib Rapture in mind.” Duh.
Tim Moore: I love what you actually write, and this is where I come from as well, you said, “I came to a belief in the Pre-Trib Rapture through my study of the Scriptures.” And I would dare say anyone who opens the Word of God and studies will end up coming to a Pre-Trib Rapture conviction as well.
Dr. Reagan: Well, the important thing is not where it originated, not how old it is, the important thing is does it fit with the Scriptures?
Nathan Jones: Absolutely.
Dr. Reagan: Does the Scriptures teach it? Is it biblical? In fact there is one group that is even attacking on the basis that the people who came up with the idea were immoral in their conduct. Come on! The only thing that is important is whether or not this lines up with the Bible. And it lines up with the Bible, and I think I prove that in this book.
Part 2
Tim Moore: Welcome back to Christ in Prophecy and our discussion of Dr. Reagan’s newest book, The Rapture: Fact or Fiction? So, Dave, I’ve got a really tough one for you now. We are going to turn to 2 Thessalonians 2, verses 1-3 which says, “Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction.” So, does that not teach that the Church will be here, present, to witness the revealing of the Antichrist? And how does that conform–
Dr. Reagan: That certainly does not. It teaches exactly the opposite. And I am so glad we finally got to this, because this is the fundamental biblical argument. All the other arguments are based on myths, and folklore, and emotion, but finally we get to a biblical argument. And this is a strong argument in behalf of a Pre-Tribulation Rapture. What happens is that when they use this to argue against the Pre-Tribulation Rapture they always leave out verse 2, they go from verse 1 to verse 3, and therefore verse 1 speaks about our gathering to Him which is a reference to the Rapture. Then they go to verse 3 and say, “It will not occur until the man of lawlessness is revealed.”
Tim Moore: Yes, I’ve heard that argument.
Dr. Reagan: So, we are going to be here in the Tribulation. But, that’s not what it’s referring to. In verse 2 he goes from the Rapture, to the Day of the Lord. And the “it” in verse 3 refers to the Day of the Lord, not the gathering. They Day of the Lord is the Tribulation and the Millennium. We are currently in the Day of the Holy Spirit. The Day of the Lord is the Tribulation and the Millennium. And eternity is the Day of God. So, what he’s saying here is that the Day of the Lord will not come, the Tribulation will not come, until this happens. And he says, “It hasn’t happened.” The Antichrist has not been revealed, so you are not in the Day of the Lord. Here’s the deal he was with the Thessalonian church only a few weeks, and yet he considered the Rapture to be so important he taught it to them during that time. And so, suddenly they get this letter signed by him but it wasn’t really from him, it was some fake letter. You know we have fake news today, this was a fake letter. And this letter said, “You’re in the Day of the Lord.” They thought they had missed the Rapture. So, they write to Paul and say, “Hey, we’ve missed the Rapture.” He said, “No, no, no, you haven’t missed it. It’s going to occur before the Day of the Lord. You’re not in the Day of the Lord.”
Tim Moore: You’re not in the Day of the Lord. That is a perfect explanation. And really I love the fact that this does prove the Pre-Trib Rapture.
Dr. Reagan: Yeah.
Tim Moore: I also love the fact that Paul even though he was only with the Thessalonicans for a matter of weeks was already introducing them to eschatology, end time things. Which means modern churches we shouldn’t wait years, and years, and years.
Dr. Reagan: He considered Bible prophecy that important.
Tim Moore: It surely was.
Nathan Jones: Those who hold to the Mid-Trib Rapture always latch onto that verse and they think well the Antichrist will be revealed Mid-Trib when he desecrates the Temple. But Daniel tells us the Antichrist will be revealed when he makes a peace covenant with Israel, which starts the Tribulation. Well we’ve dealt with a bunch of the objections to the Pre-Trib Rapture. Why don’t we get then into, what supports for the Pre-Trib Rapture, Dave, why don’t we start with that.
Dr. Reagan: Alright, well one of them is the fact that the Bible says over, and over, that we as Christians are promised deliverance from the wrath of God. And that’s what the Tribulation is all about. The Tribulation from beginning to end is the pouring out of the wrath of God upon those who have rejected the grace, mercy, and love that God has provided us in Jesus Christ. One of the greatest passages there is 1 Thessalonians 1, verse 10 which says, that we are waiting for His Son from Heaven whom He raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath that is to come.” Now, that’s pretty definite. He’s going to rescue from the wrath that is coming. Later on 1 Thessalonians 5:9, “God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Revelation 3:10, “Because you have kept the word of My perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing, that hour which is going to come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth.” So, deliverance from wrath is a guarantee for those of us who are believers. Another one is the focus of the Tribulation. Now, I could go into great detail about this. I won’t you can read the book and find out. But the focus of the Tribulation is the Jewish people. The Tribulation is the last seven years of the prophecy that was given to Daniel of the 490 years, the seventy weeks of years. This is the last of those seven years, where God is going to focus on the Jewish people, and He is going to fulfill all the promises that He made to them during that time, all of which are listed in Daniel chapter 9. So, again there is no reason for the Church to be here during the Tribulation because the focus is on the Jewish people. We are in an overlap period right now. The Church Age began with an overlap period, the Church was established about 30 AD. It was 40 years later in 70 AD that God poured out His wrath upon the Jewish people and removed them from the scene and scattered them all over the world. We are now in another overlap period where God is beginning to turn His focus from the Church to the Jewish people. And soon, very soon, we are going to be taken out, the Church, and He is going to really focus on the Jewish people. And the fundamental purpose of the whole Tribulation is to bring a great remnant of the Jews to salvation. And the Bible indicates that every Jew that lives to the end of the Tribulation will come to the end of himself and will look upon Him whom they’ve pierced and will weep, wail, and mourn and accept Him as Lord and Savior.
Tim Moore: Praise the Lord.
Dr. Reagan: Another of them is imminency, which I’ve already mentioned, but I’m mentioning it again. The Bible emphasizes over and over, and I give many, many quotes in here of scriptures that mention imminency, that the Rapture is imminent, that means it could occur any moment. The Second Coming is not imminent. If you only believe in the Second Coming then you cannot believe that Jesus could come today, or He could come tomorrow, because there are too many prophecies that have to be fulfilled.
Tim Moore: You’re looking for the Antichrist, instead of Jesus Christ.
Dr. Reagan: Well, you have to have the rebuilding of the Temple. The Antichrist has to come. All these events have to take place before the Second Coming. So, the only way there can be imminency is for there to be a Rapture that could occur at any moment. And then another one that I mention is biblical examples. We have for example with the previous pouring out of God’s wrath in immense form was the Noahic Flood. God took Enoch out of the world before the Flood. Enoch was a Gentile. Enoch is a type, or symbol of the Church being taken out. Noah is a symbol of the Jewish remnant that is taken through and saved. Or take for example Lot, before Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed, Lot was taken out. God takes out the righteous. Or consider Rahab taken out of the city before the city is destroyed. This is what God does when He pours out His wrath. And it is referred to by Peter when he talks about the fact that God knows how to save those who are going to be subjected to this. So, I think you have all of those as examples of rapture in the Bible. In fact there are many raptures mentioned in the Bible. Most people think the only rapture mentioned would be the rapture of the Church. But I give a whole list in here of raptures that have taken place like Enoch, and Elijah, the two witnesses that you mentioned earlier, the rapture of Jesus. You know there are so many raptures mentioned.
Tim Moore: John transported to Heaven to actually witness what was going on in Heaven, and he dictated letters.
Dr. Reagan: And Philip had a horizontal rapture.
Tim Moore: Yes, he did.
Dr. Reagan: Where God picked him up from one place and put him in another.
Tim Moore: Well, I think you’ve just captured the important argument, the most important being the imminence of the Rapture, the most important argument on behalf of it. And even the passage in Revelation pointing to the concept of the rapture included there as well. What about folks who says, “Well, couldn’t the Rapture occur as a stage of the Second Coming itself?” And you’ve answered that in general, but specifically.
Dr. Reagan: Well, this is the most popular thing that people are coming up with these days. They’re saying the Rapture is a part of the Second Coming. This is referred to derisively as the yo-yo rapture. It is the idea that Jesus will appear, we’ll all go up meet Him in the sky, be made immortal on the way up, and then we’ll immediately come back down to earth and reign with Him. There is a lot of problems with that particular concept. And in fact I don’t want to do all the talking here. Why don’t you mention what is one of the major problems with that, about the fact that there can’t be a population for the Millennium.
Nathan Jones: Absolutely. Well, okay, if you rapture everybody up at the end of the Tribulation and they get glorified bodies, and they come down. And God has the Sheep/Goat Judgment and the sheep are the ones that live into the Millennial Kingdom. Our glorified bodies are like the angels we’re told, they don’t reproduce. How then would you have a millennial population during the Millennial Kingdom if everybody is in their glorified bodies? You have to have people remaining in their earthly bodies, therefore the Rapture cannot happen at the end of the Tribulation.
Tim Moore: Great point.
Dr. Reagan: The only way you can have a millennial population is with a Pre-Trib Rapture, because what happens then is that there are people who are saved during the Tribulation. And those people who live to the end, many will be martyred perhaps most, but at the end all believing Jews, and all believing Gentiles who live until the end will go into the Millennium in the flesh. But if you have the Rapture at the end of the Tribulation then everyone who’s a believer has an immortal body and there is nobody left to go into the Millennium in the flesh, and we don’t have anybody to rule over.
Nathan Jones: Well, that brings up the question then, and Tim I think you touched on it just a little bit, can you find the Rapture in the book of Revelation?
Dr. Reagan: Not specifically but it is certainly is implied there, because in the book of Revelation you have the first two, actually the first three chapters are focused on the Church.
Nathan Jones: Yeah, absolutely, all Church.
Dr. Reagan: Totally on the Church. He sends letters to seven different churches. The first chapter is also on the Church. And then suddenly in chapter four there is no more mention of the Church. Instead a door opens in Heaven, John is taken up, and I think, what is a symbol of the Rapture he’s taken to Heaven. And you do not have another mention of the Church until the end of the book of Revelation in the very last chapter, chapter 22. The Church just disappears. And people say, “Oh, but all through the book of Revelation there is a reference to Saints.” Over and over, Saints. Who would they be?
Tim Moore: Well, those are the Saints of the Old Testament Era. Those are people living on this earth who are going to be martyred during the Tribulation time.
Dr. Reagan: Well, he is talking about people who are saved during the Tribulation.
Tim Moore: Exactly. There are references to Old Testament Saints, and we know that they play a part when the Lord comes back and they are resurrected then. But all the Saints that are mentioned throughout the Tribulation are people in the Tribulation who accept Jesus Christ and are martyred by the Antichrist.
Dr. Reagan: Yeah. Now how can–okay, so then that bring another question. I’m going to start turning this on you.
Nathan Jones: Uh-oh. No, we’re supposed to be asking you the questions.
Tim Moore: Oh, yeah, we’re on the hot seat now.
Dr. Reagan: That brings another question. That question is: how can they be saved during the Tribulation when the Church isn’t there? That is one of their major arguments.
Tim Moore: It is a major argument.
Dr. Reagan: If the Church isn’t here how can they be saved? So, fellows tell us how.
Tim Moore: Well, that puts a whole lot of responsibility on the Church. And we are given the privilege of sharing the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But the actual mechanism of salvation is not the Church, it is the Holy Spirit.
Dr. Reagan: Yes.
Tim Moore: And just as the Holy Spirit was here upon the earth prior to the Church, as He filled different individuals throughout the Old Testament, He will again be here touching individual hearts. The Holy Spirit is not going to be persona non grata on the earth.
Dr. Reagan: Yeah, He is going to be witnessing to people. But let’s get very specific how are people going to be saved during the Tribulation?
Nathan Jones: The Lord has a few mechanisms. For one they will see the Rapture, so the Tribulation may be a time period before, hey look.
Dr. Reagan: Some people will say, “Hey, I’ve heard about that all my life.”
Nathan Jones: Yeah, now I know there is a God. The end of the Gog and Magog War it says that the whole world will know there’s a God. There will be no more Atheists after that. We then get into the Tribulation and we see that there are two witnesses in Jerusalem, and they for the first three and a half years witness on behalf of God. He then leads 144,000 Jewish people, 12,000 from each tribe to come to know Jesus as their Savior and they become evangelist during that time. They’re sealed and protected. And then, and this is the part I love the best, a Gospel Angel, and angel who actually goes out and literally shares the Gospel with every person on the planet. Fulfilling the Great Commission.
Dr. Reagan: Before the final pouring out of God’s wrath.
Nathan Jones: Absolutely.
Tim Moore: You know I’ve heard people today say, “Well, the Lord can’t come back because we have not yet fulfilled the Great Commission.” And that is actually a good argument to say, let’s get busy fulfilling the Great Commission. But again it puts all the expectation on us to do that which only God can do.
Dr. Reagan: Furthermore that is talking about the Second Coming.
Tim Moore: Yes, it is.
Dr. Reagan: And so, all of humanity will hear the Gospel before the Second Coming through that Gospel Angel.
Tim Moore: We should be motivated to evangelize the world.
Dr. Reagan: Sure.
Tim Moore: We should reach lost people groups today in every tribe, tongue and nation. But we know that God Himself has promised. He will fulfill it.
Dr. Reagan: Alright, now let me give you a counter argument to something you said. You said the Holy Spirit is going to be here, and the Holy Spirit is going to be witnessing to people and drawing them to Jesus Christ. Well, those who believe that the Pre-Tribulation Rapture is a bunch of bunk they will say, “Hey, wait a minute, just hold on. You say that the Church is going to be taken out. Isn’t the Holy Spirit going to be taken out at that point?” So, will the Holy Spirit be around during the Tribulation?
Tim Moore: The Holy Spirit is not limited in His presence. So, no, the Holy Spirit will not be taken out in terms of His ability to touch individual hearts, just as He was in the Old Testament.
Dr. Reagan: The point is that the Holy Spirit has a special indwelling in believers.
Tim Moore: Certainly He does.
Dr. Reagan: But He is also omnipresent.
Tim Moore: Yes, He is.
Dr. Reagan: So, when the Church is taken out, yes, He uses us today as a force to limit evil in the world, at least that is what we are supposed to be doing, but we’re not doing a very good job of it. But He takes us out, that doesn’t mean the Holy Spirit is taken out. It means that the Holy Spirit is omnipresent. He will still be here witnessing during the Tribulation.
Tim Moore: Yes, He will.
Nathan Jones: How do you take an omnipresent being out of anywhere? I’ve always wondered and we get this question a lot too, children when the Rapture happens–you know people say will the earth be depopulated with children? Will pregnant woman all of a sudden their stomachs will collapse because the babies are taken to Heaven? Is there something in the Bible that teaches us definitely that’s the case?
Dr. Reagan: That’s probably my longest chapter, I mean longest answer that I give in this book, as to that question.
Tim Moore: And it’s a beautiful answer.
Dr. Reagan: Because I try to give a very balanced answer to it, because people have a lot of good arguments in behalf of that with regard to Jesus’ attitude toward children and so forth. But I conclude that I believe the Bible infers, because it doesn’t directly answer the question, I believe the best inference is that the minors, we’re talking about minors now not people above the age of accountability, that the minors of believers will be taken out with them, but not the children of unbelievers. There is no example in the Bible of children of unbelievers being saved from the wrath of God; in Noah’s time, in Sodom and Gomorrah, whatever. But I think that the children of believers will be taken out, the little children of believers. And I make, there’s even a logical answer to that why would God take out His beloved Church and leave their children? Little minor children behind to be orphans subject to the Antichrist?
Closing
Tim Moore: Dave you did such a good job in the hot seat. I think we’ll keep you there for a while. Well, folks this is our program for this week and I hope it’s been a blessing for you. I hope Lord willing you will be back with us next week. Until then this is Tim Moore speaking for Lamb & Lion Ministries saying, “Look up, be watchful, for our redemption is drawing near.”