Page 11 - Watchman- What of the Night

ChapterⅡ: What of the Rapture?

In our last chapter, ―what of the Millennium‖, we traced some of the findings of
the earliest and best of the church fathers on this momentous question. So far from
discovering what has been widely alleged, by post-millennialists and a-millenialists,

that the pre-millennial coming and earthly reign of Christ is a new doctrine, we found
that it has an ancient and honorable pedigree. It was not until the days of Jerome, in
the last of the fourth century and beginning of the fifth, which parallelled the rise of

Roman Catholic priestcraft, that the doctrine began to fall into disrepute and to be
discounted.
We found that the general outlines of their eschatology were about as conceived
by present-day Bible students of the pre-millennial school, with one great exception.
What is now called ―The rapture‖ is conspicuous for its absence in all of the

quotations that we have surveyed. Luther‘s sentence: ―…in a moment of time
transform the living, raise the dead‖ undoubtedly refers to the ―rapture‖ in the phrase:
―transform the living.‖ But the other writers, while emphasizing the resurrection,

seem to regard the rapture as a detail of such minor importance as not to merit
mention in the catalogue of the events of the end-time. We are forced to this view as a
preferable alternative to the idea that such humble and meticulous students of
scripture, were ignorant of the sentence ―We which are alive and remain shall be
caught up …etc.‖ (I Thess.4:17), or that they disbelieved it.

This statement will come as a shock to those who have been taught to believe that
the rapture of the saints is the focal point of all prophecy as related to believers, and
have magnified it to a prominence and importance, overwhelmingly out of proportion

to that which the New Testament assigns to it. We beseech you, gentle reader, that you
do not permit the shock occasioned by these words to shake this paper from your
hands, but that you tarry with us patiently as we carefully and honestly examine this
whole question in the light of the Divine revelation.
In our preaching and writing on scriptural topics, we have come to adopt this

working principle. Emphasize any subject only in proportion to the emphasis
accorded it in the sacred text. If the scripture deals with a subject only in a casual and
fragmentary manner, let not that subject occupy a place of prominence in our thinking

or discussion. To use musical terminology, if in the great opus of His revelation, the
divine musician has played any strain in a delicate pianissimo, let us beware lest we
tread hard on the pedal and thump out a great fortissimo. Mind you, if there is an
unmistakable melody there, even though it be played ever so lightly, it still must not
be denied or discounted.
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