Algebra and Eschatology

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Algebra and Eschatology: Problems with Pretribulationism

Gregg Strawbridge, Ph.D. [For Biblical Worldview (3/98)]

Maybe you don't remember much about Algebra, I don't either. But I do recall how to solve simple equations: X + 2 = 5. X must be 3. Well how about this one: X (a year) + 7 years = the date of the Second Advent of Christ. What is X? To a Pretribulationist, X is the year of the Pretribulation Rapture. This is a chronological-biblical problem which, to my knowledge, has hardly been considered, much less answered by the Pretribulationsts. Let me state it in outline form:

Pretribulationalism teaches a precise time period between the Rapture and the Second Coming (exactly 7 years marked to the day; see Rev. 11:3 per Pretrib. interpretation). For example John Walvoord, in The Rapture Question, says, "The pretribulational interpretation regards the coming of the Lord and the translation of the church as preceding immediately the fulfillment of Daniel's prophecy of a final seven-year period before the second advent" (1957, p. 51).
So anyone (angels, devils, or Hillary Clinton) during the "Seventieth Week of Daniel"--a time period of exactly seven years (1260 days for each 3 1/2 year period, cf. Rev. 11:3)--would be able to predict the Second Coming of Christ to the very day. How would one know when the seven year tribulation begins, you ask? Its beginning will be marked by that not so subtle sign of the instantaneous removal of every believer from the face of the earth (the Rapture). Not only would all those bumper stickers be right, but they'd be left (behind).
Contrary to the Pretribulational chronology, Jesus and the writers of the New Testament assert in clear terms that no one knows the time of the Second Coming and no one can know the time. "Now as to the times and the epochs, brethren, you have no need of anything to be written to you. For you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night" (1Thess. 5:1-2). "But the day of the Lord will come like a thief . . ." (2Pet. 3:10). Also, to those that are Pretribulational, Matthew 24:42-44, Mark 13:33, and Luke 12:40 must refer to the Second Coming (not the Rapture) because it says this coming will be "after the tribulation of those days" (Matt. 24:29).

On reflection, it is comical that ten years ago Edgar Whisenant did a tour de force "last days madness" publication with "88 Reasons Why Christ is Coming is '88" and then, predictably, "89 Reasons Why Christ is Coming in '89." Whisenant taught that no one could know the time of the Second Coming but that one could figure out the time of the Rapture (i.e., one "generation" or 40 years + Israel's national rebirth). Even though Whisenant was a rocket scientist (really, he worked for NASA), he did not do the Algebra!

Jesus is emphatic that it is not possible for one to know the time of the Second Coming. "It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority" (Acts 1:7). As the KJV puts, "But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no . . ." (Matt. 24:36). Whisenant knew not because it was not for him to "knoweth." Even apart from such "last days" rocket scientists, even the more cautious, well-meaning Pretribulationists, should take the Algebra problem into account. If one's futurist eschatology has a set period of time between two "coming" events, someone can do the Algebra and know what "it is not for [us] to know." So perhaps a little Algebra problem might clear up an eschatology problem: Is there a Pretribulation Rapture and Post-tribulation coming? No!