Wednesday, September 9, 2015

These are not the answers you have been looking for...

I received a link to this article today by a Oneness Pentecostal named Lee Stoneking that claims to be "Answers you have been looking for" regarding why the church will not go through the Tribulation period. I wanted to point out a few issues with the arguments presented by the author. I should also point out the writer claims to have died and miraculously brought back to life.
Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people – what people?  Who was the Lord addressing?  He was addressing Daniel who was a Jew.  Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people – the Jewish people.  This has nothing to do with the Gentile Church or the Bride of Christ.  The Church Will Not Go Through The Tribulation Period!
This sort of seems like a straw man. Does anyone argue this wasn’t referring to the Jewish people? How does this determine the presence of another group of people (the Gentile Church or Bride of Christ) being present on the earth? Does anyone think that only the Jewish people will be on earth during the Tribulation period?
Definition:
Herein when the word Tribulation is used it distinctly refers to the Great Tribulation, Day of the Lord, or the Great Day of the Lord as stated in the Scriptures.  It does not refer to daily trials and tribulations.
The writer equivocates the Great Tribulation, Day of the Lord, and Great Day of the Lord. Does the Bible say they are the same thing? Where?
The Bible teaches that the Anti-Christ will be the most powerful figure in the world; so powerful in fact that if you do not take his mark in your hand or forehead, you can neither buy nor sell.  He will literally control the whole world and that system and spirit is alive in the earth NOW!!!
However, the same Bible that teaches the Anti-Christ will be the most powerful figure in the earth, also teaches that “….greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.”  (1 John 4:4)  Herein is wisdom,  YOU CAN’T HAVE TWO ‘GREATERS’ HERE AT THE SAME TIME.  Of necessity one of them has to be gone;
Puzzling logic here. Isn’t God always greater than the Anti-Christ? Will God be “gone” after the rapture? "He that is in you, is God, right?" The church isn’t God, right?
The Anti-Christ cannot step on the world scene as long as the Church is here because the Church is GREATER in every way than the powers of the Anti-Christ.  We would totally destroy him by fasting and prayer… It is unbiblical to believe anything else.
How is it unbiblical? Isn’t it God who is greater? If the church can destroy the Anti-Christ with fasting and prayer, why not just do it? Is that biblical? Or why not go ahead and destroy Satan himself? Or is the not church greater than Satan? To assert that not believing something the Bible never says as "unbiblical" is absurd and ridiculous.
In view of the detailed insight within the book of Revelation and elsewhere concerning the Anti-Christ and his reign, there cannot be any ‘alive and remaining’ Acts 2:38 New Testament saints at the end of the Tribulation Period.  They would all be killed if they refused to take his mark in their hand or in their forehead.  And if they take his mark, they will be totally disqualified for the Rapture as the book of Revelation emphatically declares.  There is no exception to this!!!   The Rapture could not possibly come at the end of the Tribulation Period for:  where are the alive and remaining?
There will certainly be someone who is alive and remaining at the end of the Tribulation period. Jesus Himself said, “And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.” Will the Jews who are redeemed at the end of the Tribulation have the mark of the beast????
The Seven Annual Feasts of the Lord were celebrated in type and shadow forecasting the entire Church Age.
Is this so? Why should I accept this bold assertion? Is there Scripture that tells me the seven annual feasts are a "type and shadow" of the Church Age?
The Testimony of God and His Word for a Pre-Tribulation Rapture:
“….I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which will come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth.”  Rev 3:10
“Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass,”  Lk 21:36  (Jesus would not give us a false hope of praying for something that was not going to come to pass for us!)
“And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered (past tense) us from the wrath to come.”  1 Th 1:10
“For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ,” 1 Th 5:9
“Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.” Ro 5:9  The Church Will Not Go Through The Tribulation Period.

Is Rev 3:10 speaking of the Tribulation period? Perhaps, if we suppose there was no actual application to the church he was writing to. Then does “keep thee from” require removal from the earth? The church in question had “kept” His Word… (same word for keep/kept) without removing it from the earth. Hasn't God "kept" His people before without removing them from the earth?

Presuming they are different events, is Luke 21 talking about the Rapture or the Second Coming? How can “you see Jerusalem surrounded by Armies” (v20) and how can “you see these things happening” (v31) if those whom He is talking to are Raptured seven years prior?

The writer’s application of 1 Th 1:10, 5:9, Rom  5:9 presumes that the Tribulation period is the Wrath of God. What is the basis for this equivocation?  In the Revelation, its is only after the 6th seal that the men of the earth begin to claim, "the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?" (Rev 6:17). And by the 24 elders after the 7th trumpet, "The nations were angry, and Your wrath has come, ​​And the time of the dead, that they should be judged" (Rev 11:18)

Basically Stoneking offers more of the same. He equivocates the Tribulation period to the Day of the Lord, and to the Wrath of God. He asserts what seems to be a completely invented typical link between the Hebrew feasts as representative of the Church age (though, I'm rather sure its not original with him). It seems modern prophesy gurus' infatuation with Jewish feast days know no bounds. He seems to misinterpret the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and His Greatness as meaning the church's greatness. He basically calls out anyone who disagrees with him as "unbiblical" and "unrighteous".



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