William West - Premillennialism And The Rapture

THE RAPTURE AND ISRAEL

By William West

Author of

Unconditional Immortality Or Resurrection Of The Dead

THE PREMILLENNIALIST VIEW OF CHRIST

ISRAEL RESTORED

THE BATTLE OF ARMAGEDDON

THE PREMILLENNIAL THOUSAND-YEARS

THE THRONE OF DAVID

DANIEL'S 70 WEEKS AND THE "GAP"

THE "ANTICHRIST" AND "MAN OF SIN"

THE FIRST RESURRECTION AND THE SECOND DEATH

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1: Premillennial beliefs, a multitude of divisions and confusions

Chapter 2: The nature of Christ.

o The nature of Christ before He became flesh

(1) Jesus Christ, the God who made all things and us

Chapter 3: Christ as reviled in the Old Testament

Chapter 4: Christ as reviled in the New Testament

o Jesus in the New Testament

o Jesus as reviled in John's gospel. The person who came from God and returned to God

o Jesus as reviled in Hebrews

Chapter 5: Jesus Christ, the God who became a man

o The nature of Christ while He was flesh and dwelled among us [John 1:14]

(1) Jesus Christ, the God who became a man

(2) Jesus Christ, the God who died my death for my sin

o The nature of Christ now and for all eternity

(1) Jesus Christ, the God who lives

(2) Jesus in John's Gospel: Came from Heaven, sent by God, will return to God

Chapter 6: The nature of mankind

o (1) The nature of mankind from creation to the resurrection

The nature of mankind before the first sin

The nature of mankind after Adam's sin

From birth to death

From death to the resurrection

o (2) The nature of mankind for all eternity after the resurrection

Chapter 7: Was the death and resurrection of Christ foreknown by God?

Chapter 8: Kingdom of Heaven or kingdom of God?

Chapter 9: Did God plan the church or was it just an afterthought?

o If both God and Christ had not failed

Chapter 10: Back to the temple made with hands

o From the blood of Christ back to the blood of animals

o From Christ our High Priest back to the Old Testament priesthood

o From the substance back to the shadow

o From the better New Covenant back to the Old Covenant

o From that which makes alive back to that which kills

o From free back to bondage

Chapter 11: Old Testament passages used by Millennialist to teach Christ would set up a kingdom and rule the world from Jerusalem

Chapter 12: New Testament passages used by Millennialist

o (1) Matthew 24: The destruction of Israel, this chapter is regarded by many Millennialist as being their strongest proof of the Millennium.

Preterit Eschatology - Realized Eschatology - The A. D. 70 Doctrine

The day of the Lord

On the day of the Lord - The second coming of Christ

On the day of the Lord - The resurrection and judgment of the righteous

On the day of the Lord - The resurrection and judgment of the wicked

On the day of the Lord - The final judgment

On the day of the Lord - The total destruction of the earth and the heavens which were made from nothing and will return to nothing

On the day of the Lord - The total destruction of the lost

On the day of the Lord - The second death

On the day of the Lord - Death will be abolished

On the day of the Lord - The saved forever with the Lord

On the day of the Lord - The kingdom will be delivered up to God

On the day of the Lord - Christ will bring the lawless one to an end by the appearance of His coming

On the day of the Lord - "Wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God"

o (2) 2 Peter 3

o (3) 1 Thessalonians 4:17: Will the second coming of Christ be Premillennial? Will there be an invisible return of Christ?

o (4) Revelation 20: The Thousand years

o (5) Other New Testament passages used by Millennialist. The first resurrection and the second death. Is there one resurrection, or two, or more then two resurrections?

Chapter 13: The "last days" passages

Chapter 14: What is the Great Tribulation?

Chapter 15: What is Armageddon?

Chapter 16: Who is John's "Antichrist"? Who is Paul's "man of sin"?

Chapter 17: The Premillennial views of "Hell"

Chapter 18: Well-known Millennium predictions that failed

Chapter 19: The throne of David

o (1) The Jewish earthly kingdom of Israel

o (2) The Millennium earthly kingdom of Israel

Chapter 20: Is the Gospel "The power of God to salvation"?

Chapter 21: Israel, is it still God's chosen people?

o The two-fold promise

The land promise

The seed promise

o God's Israel of today

Chapter 22: The Thirteenth Tribe

Summary: God, Daniel or any others of the Old Testament prophets did not know about The Millennium

FOREWORD

WHAT IS PREMILLENNIAL BELIEFS?

For the most part the Premillennialist beliefs are a revival of the beliefs of the Jews in the time of Christ. Israel was looking for an earthly king who would drive Rome out, conquer other nations, and restore the Kingdom as it was in the time of David. Premillennialist say this is what Christ came to do but that God did not foresee the Jews rejecting and killing Christ, but because they did, the restoring of the kingdom was put off and the church age is an unforeseen substitute, which begins at the death of Christ and will last only unto He comes back, then the unforeseen church age (the "gap") will end, Israel and the Law of the Old Testament will be restored. Christ, who most Millennialist believe to be a created being and did not exist before His birth and He will literally sit on the throne of David in Jerusalem and rule the world. Premillennialist make God and Christ to have failed in their plan to setup the kingdom of Heaven because of the rejection of Christ by the Jews; and His death, resurrection, or God did not foresee the church age which they call the gap. To this basis teaching, different Millennialist adds a seven-year rapture, some before the Millennium and some after it, and many other contradictory variations of beliefs. In the Millennium Satan will be bound for a thousand years, but will be loosed for a "little season." He and his angels will make war on Christ in Jerusalem and all but overcome Him (the battle of Armageddon), but God will save Him. Satan, his angels, and the lost will come to their end in Gehenna just south of Jerusalem, which will have been restored. Most believe Christ and the saved will live forever on this earth and no person will ever go to Heaven. IN BRIEF, THE PREMILLENNIALIST BELIEF IS A COMPLETE REWRITE OF THE BIBLE.

As David Brown puts it, "Premillennialism is no barren speculation--useless though true, or innocuous though false. It is a school of Scripture interpretation; it impinges upon and affects some of the most commanding points of the Christian faith; and when suffered to work its unimpeded way, it stops not till it has pervaded with its own genius the entire system of one's theology, and the whole tone of spiritual character, constructing, I had almost said, a world of its own; so that, holding the same faith, and cherishing the same fundamental hopes as other Christen, he yet sees things through a medium of his own, and finds everything instinct with the life which this doctrine has generated within him" Page 8, and "That the fleshly and sublunary state is not to terminated with the second coming of Christ, but to be then set up in a new form; when with His glorified saints, the Redeemer will reign in person on the throne of David at Jerusalem for a thousand years, over a world of men yet in the flesh, eating and drinking, planting and building, marrying and giving in marriage, under this mysterious way." Christ's Second Coming: Will It Be Premillennial, Page 6, T. and T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1858.

The Messiah Israel looked for was a person who would restore Israel as a nation and make them supreme to all other nations as it was in the time of David. In the restored nation they looked for, there would have been birth, life and death for all just as there was in the time of David. No one thought they would have eternal life. It was not something they looked for. Eternal life was something new to the teaching of Christ.