Belief, Gospel, Heaven, Hope, Pretribulation Rapture
Jonathan Brentner
Jesus Is the Only Path to Eternal Life

Eternal life resides in Jesus and in Him alone. No one else! This is true now and will also be the case after Jesus removes His true church from the earth.

In John 14:6, Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Jesus Is the Only Path to Eternal Life
Eternity, Hope, Jesus, Gospel, Belief
Jonathan Brentner
Salvation In No Other Name

What do people need the most? The answer remains the same as it’s always been: A clear understanding of the Gospel. By this I mean that people need Jesus, not the one that so many today create in their mind but but the One revealed on the pages of Scripture.

Salvation In No Other Name

Hope

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #8: Absence

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #8: Absence

Premillennialists regard the book of Revelation as future prophecy, the very thing it claims to be (22:18). As we have acknowledged from the beginning of this series, a discussion of where to place the rapture only makes sense within premillennialism, which maintains beliefs in a literal tribulation and a thousand year reign of Jesus on earth before the millennium.
This brings us to our next signpost on our way to establishing a biblical basis for a pretribulation rapture: Absence. The book of Revelation excludes the church from judgments of the tribulation.

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No Saint Left Behind

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No Saint Left Behind

When Jesus comes for His church, will He leave any true believer behind on the earth to endure the horrors of the tribulation?

Some say yes. They claim Jesus will only catch up believers who are watching for His appearing or those walking with Him at the time. In other words, the Lord will leave behind saints lacking in some way.

This teaching contradicts both the Gospel and God’s Word.

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #7: Restrainer

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #7: Restrainer

As we saw in our last signpost, the false report informing the Thessalonians that the day of the Lord had already begun put these new believers in a state of severe panic (see signpost #6). In response,

This brings us to the next word on our signposts: “Restrainer.” Why is this word so significant? A key event at the start of the tribulation, the revealing of the antichrist, cannot happen until God removes the Restrainer who is currently holding back his unveiling to the world.

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Moody's Illustration of Grace

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Moody's Illustration of Grace

Dwight L. Moody once gave the following illustration during a sermon to demonstrate that our salvation is all of grace and not of works . . . .

Each and every one of our good works as believers results from our regeneration that occurs at the moment of our rebirth. Works contribute absolutely nothing to our salvation nor do they keep us saved. It’s all of grace from beginning to end.

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #5: Surprise

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #5: Surprise

A news story about a burglar in Rochelle Park, New Jersey recently caught my attention. In the process of robbing a home, the thief woke up the couple who lived there. Not wanting the owners to catch him, the robber climbed out a window and fled from the scene of the crime.

Sticking with his escape plan, he ran down the street and quickly hopped into the backseat of a car. Unfortunately for him, he soon discovered he had gotten into a police car, which made his ensuing arrest rather easy.

In 1 Thessalonians 5;2, Paul compares the arrival of the day of the Lord to the surprise of discovering a intruder in one’s home. He likely had a more competent thief in mind than the bungling burglar in New Jersey.

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #4: Expectations

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #4: Expectations

My wife and I walked into the restaurant with high expectations. Someone had told us this was the best place in the area for Italian food. Maybe it was an off night, but we left unsatisfied with what we ordered that evening. As I look back, I wonder if our anticipation of a really great Italian dinner contributed to our disappointment.

Expectations have a powerful influence on us. The wrong ones, such as what we will see with Paul’s new converts in Thessalonica, can lead to much disappointment and even grief.

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #2: Unique

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Pretribulation Rapture Signpost #2: Unique

The next signpost pointing to the occurrence of the rapture before the tribulation simply says “unique.” For pretribulationism to be biblical, the rapture and second coming cannot be the same event. If they are identical, we obviously cannot separate them by seven years or so.

If premillennialism is true, and it absolutely is, then then the following differences between the rapture and second coming passages argue strongly for regarding them as separate and unique events.

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A Prophet’s Complaint

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A Prophet’s Complaint

My fingers raced to the book of Habakkuk early this morning.

Why would I seek the wisdom of an ancient prophet to ease my troubled mind? His opening complaint, written 2,650 years ago, captures the cry of my heart.

I so often cry out to the Lord to stop the senseless murder of children as well as the killing of those precious little ones who survive the horrific evil of abortion.

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Are You at a Breaking Point?

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Are You at a Breaking Point?

If not for my belief in the rapture, I would have reached a breaking point long, long ago. As it is, I sometimes feel anger boiling up within me as I see entertainers celebrating abortions, the evil that intensifies each and every day, and the greed and hatred rampant in our world.

I also know many believers have reached a breaking point due to illness, grief, and affliction. Pain touches the lives of so many followers of Jesus.

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Our Anticipation of Jesus’ Soon Appearing

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Our Anticipation of Jesus’ Soon Appearing

A GEICO commercial from last year portrays a spy fleeing from armed men on a roof as well as from a black helicopter approaching him from the air. His phone rings as his adversaries appear ready to capture him or perhaps kill him. Thinking the call is from those coming to rescue him he answers the phone shouting, “Where are you?”

We then see his mom relaxing by a pool as she calmly talks to him about his dad’s battle with squirrels in the attic. As she continues talking to her exasperated son the narrator interjects, “If you’re a mom, you call at the worst time. It’s what you do.”

The New Testament cries out with a similar message echoing the words of the narrator in the GEICO commercial, “As followers of Jesus we live in eager anticipation of his soon appearing. It’s what we do.”

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Is There a Hidden Meaning in Biblical Prophecy?

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Is There a Hidden Meaning in Biblical Prophecy?

We all know the story of the tortoise and the hare.  We instinctively understand this did not actually happen; it’s an allegory representing a moral. C.S. Lewis wrote The Chronicles of Narnia as an allegory to illustrate biblical truths. The characters are fictional, but they tell a story rich with spiritual truth.

Is biblical prophecy written as an allegory with a hidden meaning for us to find? Or can we take the words of Scripture at face value?

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Prelude to the Tribulation

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Prelude to the Tribulation

A common response to those like me who believe we live in the last days is this: “The world has seen violence and wickedness all through its history. What’s so different about today?”

I fully understand that question especially when one considers the world wars of the previous century. Seventy-five years ago many Christians thought Hitler was the antichrist based on his hatred of the Jews and his efforts to establish a worldwide socialist empire. This was truly a terrible time in world history, but it was not the prelude to the tribulation.

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The Repackaging of Amillennialism

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The Repackaging of Amillennialism

For several months I attended a church whose doctrinal statement affirmed its belief in premillennialism, the belief in Jesus’ reign over the nations before the eternal state. So my wife and I faithfully attended assuming the church stood by its statement of faith. Such was not the case.

Later, in discussing prophecy with the pastor I discovered he identified himself as a “covenant premillennialist.” I remained hopeful even then that he believed in a future for Israel and an actual millennium. I later discovered that he did not believe these things.

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The Signs Scream with Both Peril and Hope

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The Signs Scream with Both Peril and Hope

In 1893, Norwegian Expressionist artist Edward Munch painted what has come to be known as The Scream. Munch originally called his work The Scream of Nature.

According to Munch, the inspiration for the work came while on a walk at sunset. As the setting sun turned the sky to red, he sensed an “infinite scream passing through nature.” Historians speculate that a volcano eruption may have turned the heavens him into such a daunting red hue.

For those paying attention; world events scream with great danger for those who do not know Jesus as their Savior. For those who trust Him, we await the sound of the trumpet and shout of an archangel.

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5 Perils of Denying Jesus’ Future Reign

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5 Perils of Denying Jesus’ Future Reign

I could not have written this article several months ago. Although I had no doubts about the biblical truth of premillennialism, I did not fully comprehend the perils of denying Jesus’ thousand year’ reign over the nations of the world as described in Revelation 20:1-10 and Zechariah 14. The denial of Jesus’ rule over a restored Israel is known as amillennialism.

When I heard a popular prophecy preacher refer to amillennialism as a “false teaching” and a “doctrine of demons” (Tim. 4:1), I shuddered; I was not sure I agreed with him. Now I know he was correct.

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7 Reasons Why the Rapture is Not the Second Coming

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7 Reasons Why the Rapture is Not the Second Coming

Is the rapture unique or just another way of describing the second coming?

Pastors, teachers, and Christian writers have differing opinions on this. One assistant pastor at a Bible-believing church once told me he did not believe in the rapture. Along with such denials, many today assert that the book of Revelation is mostly allegory or past history, which necessitates that the rapture and second coming be the same event.

When I look at Scripture, I see two unique events separated by a period of time. The New Testament teaches Jesus will appear to take believers back to His Father’s house in heaven.

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Lessons from My Battle with PTSD

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Lessons from My Battle with PTSD

I know a great many believers, like me, have struggled with issues related to anxiety either in the past or are doing so now. My battle with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was long, much longer than necessary because of my slowness in learning how to combat the anxieties and wounds from my past.

I will not go into the circumstances that led to my PTSD; I did that in another post.

These are not steps to healing, but rather biblical truths and lessons I gleaned along the rugged path to my healing from PTSD.

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Will Jesus Leave Us Behind?

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Will Jesus Leave Us Behind?

I was terrified! I had wondered away from my parents and now I could not see them. For a brief moment, I wondered if they had left me behind. Maybe my parents thought I was with my older sister. Maybe each thought I was with the other. Where were they? I had looked away just for just a moment and now I did not see them!

The unfamiliar surroundings made the situation more frightful.We were visiting my sister in Southern California and after spending the day sightseeing we went to Chinatown for supper and shopping, where I became distracted looking at toys and lost sight of my parents.

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Dealing With End Times Complacency by Britt Gillette

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Dealing With End Times Complacency by Britt Gillette

To say the world is the same today as in years past – that we don’t live in unique times – is just not true. More than any other generation, ours has reason to expect the Second Coming. Jesus and the prophets said to look for specific signs heralding the end times. For over 1,800 years, you couldn’t find one of the signs they said to look for. Today, in one form or another, you can find all of them. Here are just a few examples:

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What Does Jesus Tell Us to Do in Light of His Coming?

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What Does Jesus Tell Us to Do in Light of His Coming?

Though only a small child at the time, I remember the sight of a large old farmhouse with a peculiar small room on top of it with windows on all sides. The farmer told my dad that the previous owner of the homestead had the lookout post built on the pinnacle of the roof so he could watch for the return of the Lord.

While we admire this man’s confidence in Jesus’ promise to return for us, is this really what Jesus meant by watching for His appearing? Although our English word for “watch” fits such passive behavior as looking out a window, the word in the original implies much more than that.

What does Jesus tell us to do in light of His imminent return? What do His instructions tell us about our expectation of His appearing?