Should We Be "Enraptured" with The Rapture? Part 4: Where is Hope for the Christian?
Or, how to have a positive outlook if God won't send you on a vacation in the end times...
This post is the conclusion of a series on why I believe the idea of a pre-Tribulation rapture (so popular in American evangelicalism) is not found in the scriptures. Prior posts in this series reviewed texts from the Gospels, Paul and Revelation, and Wider Trends in the New Testament. If you have not read those posts, I would recommend that you do so before reading these concluding remarks.
Over many years I have heard some of my evangelical peers refer to a pre-tribulation Rapture as the "hope" that believers can look forward to in the midst of a broken world. The present age, while one in which great joy can exist, is also one marked by loss and suffering. And newsworthy events/trends like wars, rumors of wars, social strife, pandemics, and climate change certainly add to personal losses and suffering.
In the midst of such suffering, the hope of escape makes sense. Although I question the "biblical support" for rapture theology, I do not view the hope for escape as illegitimate. I do not believe that we were meant to be indifferent to earthly sorrow. We should genuinely look towards a restored creation as a part of our Christian hope. The desire for a world free of suffering is appropriate, but where I think rapture proponents go wrong is a mislocation of that hope.
The believer's hope is not in an "early exit" and avoidance of earthly suffering. In fact, the NT authors assume that earthly suffering is a likely fate for most believers, although some will face a more severe test demanding martyrdom. Their hope was not that they would be completely exempted from suffering, but rather that suffering and death were not the final words for the follower of Jesus. The hope for the Christian resides in the bodily resurrection, the event that transcends (rather than escapes) tribulation. It is the assurance that Christ has the final say over all of creation, including our mortal bodies.
Such a hope should change how we view the world around us. Rather than a place of suffering that should be escaped, it can be a place where suffering is endured through a life lived in love and service to others. Our secular culture teaches us that a life “well lived” is one of luxury and the absence of hardship. The message of the resurrection tells us that a life “well lived” is one carried out in service to Jesus, no matter the cost. As we hope for a renewed creation, we are challenged to live differently in this current age, as a people living without fear of death. Freed of fear, we can stand with conviction and self-giving love as we follow our risen savior.
“Since, therefore, the children share flesh and blood, he himself likewise shared the same things, so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, 15 and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death.
Hebrews 2:14-15, NRSVue