Dr Paul Allen

When Christians are asked which millennial view they hold, some of the more cynical among them will sometimes answer: “I’m a panmillennialist. I believe it will all pan out in the end.”  Much of this cynicism is due to frustration over the seemingly never-ending debates about the last things. In some cases, it may also be due to exasperation with the endless train of falsified predictions of the rapture and/or second coming of Christ. For centuries, misguided teachers have repeatedly promised or strongly suggested to their contemporaries that they are the generation that will finally witness the end.  Isn’t it as plain as day that Napoleon Bonaparte was the Antichrist and his exile was a sign that the end of the world was imminent? Some Christians who lived in that generation thought so. Their generation was not the first to fall into the trap of date-setting, and it certainly wasn’t the last. For centuries, numerous Christians have compared the headlines of their day with the...

NT Wright says the rapture is a colourful misunderstood metaphor written by Paul. The rapture is an eschatological event in which Christians purportedly will rise into the sky to join Christ as he returns to earth. The word “rapture” is derived from the Latin translation of 1 Thessalonians 4:17. English translations translate the keyword in that verse with “caught up” or “snatched up.” There are several views among Christians about the exact nature and timing of this rapture, this “snatching up,” primarily due to its relationship to other eschatological events in Scripture. The rapture doctrine is employed perhaps the most sophisticatedly in premillennialism. For premillennialists, the rapture occurs in conjunction with the “great tribulation” (Dan 9:24–27; Matt 24:21, 29; Rev 7:14). Premillennialists agree that the rapture is connected to the resurrection of believers before the millennial (thousand-year) reign of Christ.  Premillennialists differ, however, on when the rapture wil...

Like many of you, I long for the Lord’s appearing, and my greatest dream is that He will return in my lifetime. Even so, come, Lord Jesus! But I have a real problem with setting dates for His return. And I have a real problem with the mindset that He could return at any moment. Let me explain why. To be clear, none of us know when we will die, and in many cases, our deaths will be sudden and unexpected. So, at all times, we should live in readiness to meet the Lord. That goes without saying. But when it comes to predicting the day (or year) of the Lord’s return, the first problem is that, to date, every single prediction, without exception, has been wrong. The failure rate is 100 percent. Why should anyone believe the next prediction when all previous predictions have been wrong? Based on what new, definitive data? (For the record, I’ve seen some of the “data,” and I don’t buy it for a second.) The second problem with date-setting actually explains why every previous prediction has bee...

Confused about this topic? In general, I do think we should do the best for the church about the second coming when we don’t focus on distortions and misconceptions but instead on the truth and the beauty of what it really is in the Bible. And yet, it’s right, now and then, to make our people understand there are misconceptions and errors. Five Misconceptions Frankly, I’m really happy that my book is viewed as mainly proactive and positive rather than critical. But of course, even that positive view can be overstated. Suppose we never focus on what’s wrong and show how harmful it is. In that case, we won’t really be biblical because the biblical witness itself describes errors and their harmfulness — like Jesus did with the scribes and Pharisees or like Paul in exposing errors of false teaching in Colossians and other places. So yes, I will point out some misconceptions about the second coming. Let’s just take them one at a time, and I’ll try to explain why I think they’re a problem. 1...

The rapture is that glorious event in which the dead in Christ will be resurrected, living Christians will be instantly translated into their resurrection bodies, and both groups will be caught up to meet Christ in the air and taken back to heaven (John 14:1-3; 1 Corinthians 15:51-54; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17). This means that one generation of Christians will never pass through death’s door. They will be alive on earth in their mortal bodies, and suddenly, in an instant, they will be with Christ in their immortal bodies. What a moment that will be! The Bible offers several clues that the rapture will take place prior to the tribulation period. This means the church will not go through the judgments prophesied in Revelation 4–18. This view seems to be most consistent with a literal interpretation of biblical prophecy. In Revelation 3:10, for example, Jesus promises the church in Philadelphia, “I will keep you from the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world, to try those who dwe...

Belief in the rapture arose from a couple of ambiguous prophecies to become a necessary article of faith for many. Perhaps we can’t work out what prophecy means in advance, but then, what is its purpose? It was the 1960s—and many Christians felt that the world was spiralling out of control. The sexual revolution and an imminent war of mutually assured destruction made it feel like the end was coming soon. Eschatology—the study of the second coming and the end times—became a hot Christian topic. As a teenager during that time, I loved the detailed charts of end-time chronology, with their clear predictions about military deployments and political allegiances. I had a problem with Jesus’ saying that we can’t know the day or the hour of his coming (Matt 24:36), but a Bible teacher assured me that Jesus didn’t say we couldn’t know the year! Every now and then over the years a specific prophecy seemed to have been fulfilled—only to falter subsequently. In 1981, for examp...

Of all twelve statements in the Apostle’s Creed, the most maligned is what is referred to as the descent doctrine. This doctrine teaches that after being crucified, Jesus’ body went into the grave but his soul went into the realm of the dead, from which he ascended on that first Easter morning. In bold is the phrase the Apostle’s Creed uses: I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead. On the third day, he rose again. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead. This teaching has generally been understood to mean that after his physical death, Jesus’s soul really went to Sheol, where his victory over Satan, sin, and the grave were all announced. His victory was declared to the spirits in prison from the ...

We’ve heard it taught for years. Jesus is coming like a thief in the night, so be ready. He could come at any moment, without any warning, so stay alert. You don’t want to be left behind! The signs were all there. The prophecies were being fulfilled in front of our eyes. You could feel it in the air. Jesus was about to rapture His church — to catch us away — at any moment. Hal Lindsey’s mega-bestseller The Late Great Planet Earth laid it all out, and the countdown had clearly begun. We’ll be out of here any second now. But that was a long time ago, almost 50 years now. And still, Jesus hasn’t returned. Have our expectations been wrong? Of course, from 1995-2007, there was the mega-bestselling series of Left Behind novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins, and they fascinated and inspired a new generation of readers. Have our expectations been wrong? Are we following a popular, relatively modern teaching rather than the Scriptures? But still, with all the talk of Jesus ...

Christ’s Return My understanding of the New Testament is that Jesus promised he would return and that in this returning, he would do a final rescue for those who are trusting him and final judgment for those who are not believing in him. I don’t think there are two comings of Christ in the future, but only one. “I don’t think there are two comings of Christ in the future — only one.” Most of those who believe that Christ will come twice believe that the first return, the first of the two, is the coming of the Lord to snatch away the church out of the world, called the rapture. This would be a snatching away of the church back to heaven for seven years, usually, while the great tribulation happens on earth. Then, this is followed by a final — this is kind of the second stage — return of the Lord to establish his kingdom. Now, I grew up in a home and a church that believed that view, called the pre-tribulation-rapture view. It is called that because there is a coming of Christ pre,...

All Bible-believing Christians are expecting the rapture; we all just define that event differently. 1) What is the rapture? The word ‘rapture’ comes from the Latin rapturo, meaning, “I seize, I snatch, or I carry away” which is the Vulgate’s translation of the Greek word harpadzo, meaning “I catch up, I carry away.” As a half-Greek etymology geek I can’t resist mentioning that English sailors sourced their word “harpoon” from the Greek for the implement used to snatch a large fish out the water. “Harpadzo” or “Rapturo” is rendered “caught up” in  1 Thess 4:16-17 where Paul says, For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord, (ESV).” Also, 1 Cor 15:51-53 refers to the fac...