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Some Scenarios for the Great Tribulation
Posted : 10 Jan, 2011 07:23 AM
Some Scenarios for the Great Tribulation
A Christian Yahoo Group which I was in, was discontinued on
August 1, 2010.
The group had discussed the teachings of one of the moderators on events which will
occur during the Tribulation. She and the group owner made numerous broadcasts over a period of about four years. I don't want to specifically identity the people I am talking about here.
In August of 2010 a former member began a new Yahoo Group. It now has 26 members and had over 300 posts for December.
I am gong to introduce several concepts here which will probably
not be familiar to many on this forum. And the scriptures used here are generally not used by the followers of the Rapture Cult. I am not sure what the classical dispensationalists would make of the prophecy texts I cite here. But it is clear that this theology has a very different set of scenarios for the Tribulation. One of their main doctrines says the "Church" will not even be on earth during the Tribulation. I have never, for example, seen any interpretation of I Peter 2: 9 and I Peter 4: 17 by a dispensationalist leader. Since these texts do not support their theology and end time scenarios, they may try to ignore them. I Peter 2: 9 says Christians are the chosen generation, and I Peter 4: 17 says judgment must begin at the house of God, with Christians, or with what the dispensationalists call the "Church." Followers of the Rapture Cult say the Jews remain the chosen people and that the purpose of the Tribulation cannot be God's judgment upon the Church.
Three groups of players of the Tribulation are found in Revelation 8 and 9,
the Trumpet Judgments. In highly metaphoric language the scorpions,
the serpents and the "the third part of men" (Revelation 9: 18), who are to
be killed, are found in these verses.
Scorpions used as a metaphor for certain people who think they are of God
is found in Ezekiel 2: 3-7.
"And he said unto me, Son of man, I send thee to the children of
Israel, to a rebellious nation that hath rebelled against me: they and
their fathers have transgressed against me, even unto this very day.
4. For they are impudent children and stiffhearted. I do send thee
unto them; and thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD.
5. And they, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear,
(for they are a rebellious house,) yet shall know that there hath been
a prophet among them.
6. And thou, son of man, be not afraid of them, neither be afraid of
their words, though briers and thorns be with thee, and thou dost
dwell among scorpions: be not afraid of their words, nor be dismayed
at their looks, though they be a rebellious house.
7. And thou shalt speak my words unto them, whether they will hear,
or whether they will forbear: for they are most rebellious."
In verse 6 these scorpions are said to speak words, indicating for
sure that scorpions is
a metaphor for people who are in rebellion against the Lord.
Then in Matthew 23: 29- 33 serpents is used as a metaphor to identify
the scribes and Pharisees, the religious leaders at the time of Christ.
"Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build
the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the
righteous,
30. And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not
have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
31. Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the
children of them which killed the prophets.
32. Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.
33. Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the
damnation of hell."
So, in Revelation 9 serpents are one group of players who are the
religious leaders that rule over the church Christians.
The third group in Revelation 9 - the "third part of men" who are
killed - is identified by the former moderator as the Multitude of Revelation 7: 9,
13-14.
"9. After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man
could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues,
stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white
robes, and palms in their hands;...And one of the elders answered,
saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed in white robes? and
whence came they?
14. And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These
are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their
robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb."
The former member who began the new group in August of 2010 said that the
Multitude must be martyred
before they themselves or anyone else knows they are part of the
Multitude.
She divides the apostate church into three groups, the
serpents, the scorpions and the Multitude. The serpents are the
religious leaders, like the Pharisees, who rule over the church
Christians. The scorpions are followers of the serpents, who in the
end times, the former moderator said, will run around looking for members of the
Multitude to turn in to the serpents, and to the authorities who will carry out the death sentence.
Luke 21: 16 says: "And ye shall be betrayed both by parents, and
brethren, and kinsfolks, and friends; and some of you shall they
cause to be put to death." "Some" has been added to the King James
English in Luke 21: 16, because the Greek word
meaning some is not in the Greek Textus Receptus, from which the KJV
is translated.
Matthew 24: 9-11 is part of end time prophecy: "Then
shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye
shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake. And then shall many
be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one
another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many."
John 16: 2 says "They shall put you out of the synagogues:
yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think he doeth
God service."
Strangely, here is something from Deuteronomy "To me belongeth
vengeance, and recompense; their foot shall slide in
due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things
that come upon them shall make haste. For the Lord shall judge his
people, and repent himself for his servants, when he seeth that their
power is gone, and there is none shut up or left" (Deuteronomy 32: 35-
36)."
The former moderator has made a lot of use of Deuteronomy 32: 35-36.
Daniel 11: 33 says "And they that understand among the people shall instruct
many: yet they shall fall by the sword, and by flame, by captivity,
and by spoil, many days."
She has applied Daniel 11: 33 to the 144,000 as they that understand
and the many as her Multitude. Yet this had a fulfillment in the
ancient time of Antiochus (about 175 BC to 164 BC), a Greek ruler
who persecuted Jews in
Jerusalem before Christ. And it was also fulfilled in the the time of
the apostles.
Zechariah 13: 8-9 And it shall come to pass, that in all the land,
saith the LORD, two parts therein shall be cut off and die; but the
third shall be left therein.
9And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine
them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they
shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my
people: and they shall say, The LORD is my God.
I think the original mentor of this Christian Remnant group takes Zecharian 13: 8-9 to be a little more general than does the former moderator. He
does not doubt that it applies to the end time division of the apostate
church into three parts, with one part he calls the Seed of God, which she identifies as the Multitude. But
she seems to have taken this in a more excplicit way, implying it is specific to the end times.
End time prophecy says some Christians are going to be killed for
their faith. But who, and why? Again, while we don't usually look to
Deuteronomy for end time prophecy, still what 32: 35-36, says is
specific. "For the Lord shall judge his
people, and repent himself for his servants, when he seeth that their
power is gone, and there is none shut up or left"
When, other than the end times, would this prophecy be fulfilled? In
the two episodes of invasion of the northern
Kingdom of Israel and then the southern Kingdom
of Judah, war, defeat and
captivity - the Assyrian
and Babylonian events - were there "none shut up or left?" Were all
killed? I don't think so.
But still why are the Multitude to be killed? Because, according to
her, they begin to question the false teachings of the churches. If
they are killed because they are in the process of coming to the
truth, then they becoming the Multitude before they
are killed.
When do those who are becoming the Multitude, at some point in the
Tribulation, call on God and he accepts them and says they are my
people? In the guy's scenario I don't see how this could happen before
the time they are faced with death if those of the Multitude don't
know who they are before the time of their testing and death?
In addition since she has also said that the period of rounding up and
killing the Multitude will last over some period of time, then many
who are coming out of false doctrines and are becoming the Multitude
would know whats in store for them, and many or most would have already
made up their minds about how they will face death, to renounce false
doctrines and die for Christ, or not.
The version of her teaching held by the leader of the new group
assumes that the serpents or government acting for
them will demand that the people coming out of the churches and
false doctrines recount and affirm they accept false doctrines, or
die. This may
not happen as often as he thinks it will. Many may be sentenced to
death by the serpents for questioning the doctrines of the serpents,
and they will not be given a chance to change their positions before
being executed..The new group guy seems to me to be going too far
beyond what the scriptures say in making up a scenario.
She has said that she thinks the end time scenario will act out
in general the events of the time of Christ when he was betrayed by Judas
Iscariot - who represents the
scorpions - which led to Jesus being brought before the Roman authority,
Pontious Pilate, by the Pharisees - who represent the serpents. Christ was then
crucified. Scripture does not say that after Pilate gave the order
to crucify him,
Christ was then given an opportunity to recount and claim he was not God.
So if the scenario in the Tribulation is to follow this first century
Gospel scenario in general,
why would the Multitude
be given the opportunity to deny that they had come to the truth and had
embraced doctrines
of Scripture opposed to the doctrines taught by the serpents?
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