Mid-Post Tribulation Rapture

God would never hurt His children.

Often times I have heard it said when asked the thoughts of the rapture that God would never put His children through so much pain, so the rapture must happen before the tribulation starts. I want to say first off that this thought is wishful thinking. It is not backed by scripture. God promises protection, and love, and His mercy, but a good deal of that was rolled out at our salvation. He will continue to keep a watchful eye on His children, but scripture never promises that He will keep us from earthly calamity. His promise is to keep those who place their faith and trust in Jesus Christ from perishing in eternal judgment. You also must look at the past. Though the tribulation will happen in the future, we can look to the past to see what happens during horrendous events in earth’s history. The Israelites were captives in Egypt for four hundred and thirty years. They faced oppressions of various kinds, and God allowed them to endure the suffering. The Jews were also led into captivity twice. First by the Assyrians, and later by the Babylonians. Finally they were scattered in the Jewish diaspora by the Romans in ...... The Jews, God’s chosen people, have been displaced from their homeland multiple times throughout the Bible’s period. Now looking into our more recent history during World War 2 and the atrocities that came by the hand of Adolf Hitler towards the Jews. They were displaced from their homes, beaten, starved, abused, forced into difficult labor, and millions were murdered throughout the duration of the war. Throughout history Jews have been the target of prejudice and hate. God never spared them the pains that they faced. He might have prevented many other situations from befalling them that we do not know of, but obviously God has allowed His children to face difficulties in the past.

God allowed Christians to be hunted down and murdered throughout Europe when the Catholic kings made being a Christian illegal and punishable by death. Many Christians in China have lost their livelihoods and have even gone so far as to be put to death for their faith over the years. To be a Christian in the middle eastern countries that are heavily dominated by Islamic rule could cost you everything that you have including your life. Persecution of Christians has been happening for centuries in various locations at different given moments in time. God never withheld the wrath of mankind when He saw it coming. God knew what we would face. It is very similar to what our Christ faced Himself. This is why He told us to take heart because He has overcome the world.

One might still argue that the wrath that will be faced during the tribulation will not be by the hands of man, but rather the wrath of God Himself. This is true, and God’s wrath will not poor out on His children by way of His focus. His focus will be on those who are not saved and are rebellious. However, we live on the same planet. God will first strike the planet before He strikes the individual people. This will effect the Christians as well. Think of the famine that will take place. It may not effect our gardens directly, but it will effect the shelves at our local grocery story. The diseases may never touch our households, but it could wipe out an entire community across the globe that is responsible for the productions of things that we have become dependent upon. When God sends a celestial object into the ocean it will cause massive tsunamis that will destroy coastal cities. This may not take one single life of a Christian. Every single Christian might have abandoned the cities by this point. Large cities on the coast are typically liberal by nature nowadays, and by the time the tribulations come about this world will be exceedingly dark. Christians may be forced out of these locations by policies and hatred by this point in history. Christians may be in hiding altogether by this point. We simply do not know, but it is quite possible for this event to occur without the lose of a single Christian. When the city of Jerusalem was sacked, and thousands of people slaughtered, not a single Christian lost their lives because they had all heeded Jesus’s words in Matthew 24:15-16 ““So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.” If Christians in coastal cities understand the situation that is presented in the fallout of this occurrence then they may decide to leave the cities themselves. God has given us His word, He has given us His wisdom, and with the knowledge that we possess we are left to make our own decisions. If we choose to make a poor decision then we ourselves must live with the consequence. Much as Lot’s wife did as they were leaving the city of Sodom. She knew the Lord, and she knew His instructions not to look back, but she did anyways. Thus resulting in her turning into the pillar of salt. If we know that a large celestial body (Asteroid, meteor) caused by God’s hand is going to strike the ocean, and we know that science has shown us the effects of throwing stones into water causes waves, then a Christian must do the math and get themselves to a safer location. The way the world is going now it may not be the worst idea to leave these cities anyhow.

Jesus is coming a second time, not a third. How could He come back for His children and then come back for His second coming at the end of the tribulation?

You may argue that we are caught up in the air and Jesus never has to touch the ground. I would argue that this could be a simultaneous event. Jesus comes back as we are going up, and He deals with all those who are left.

Why would God take His best players out of the game during the fourth quarter?