Page 224 - The Rapture Question by John F. Walvoord

The Rapture in 1 Thessalonians 5
text so indicates. The only way all these eschatological terms
can be made to refer specifically to the day of the Lord is to
assume that posttribulationism is true and argue from this
premise. The right procedure is to consider the context and
determine from the context, first, whether the term is used in a
theological sense and then in what sense, as obviously there are
many days in Scripture related to the prophetic program.
Gundry followed much the same approach as Alexander
Reese, who declared that all references to “the day” refer to
the day of the Lord.15 Both Reese and Gundry really do not
support their argument contextually. While 1 Corinthians 5:5
is a textual problem, and some texts read “the day of the
Lord,” pretribulationists are justified in distinguishing the
remaining five texts from the day of the Lord because the
expression “the day of the Lord” is not expressly used. While
the distinction between the day of Christ and the day of the
Lord is not essential to pretribulationism, pretribulationists
can properly claim that if their view is established on other
grounds, these references to the day of Christ may refer
specifically to the Rapture rather than to the time ofjudgment
on the world. This is based on what each passage states. It is,
therefore, manifestly unfair to accuse pretribulationists of ar­
bitrarily lumping things together that have no distinguishing
characteristics. The truth is that posttribulationists are doing
precisely what they are accusing the pretribulationists of
doing, and in the process they are ignoring the context and the
precise wording.
Taken as a whole, the pretribulational point of view gives
sense and meaning to 1 Thessalonians 5 and explains why this
is introduced after the Rapture. In effect, Paul was saying that
the time of the Rapture cannot be determined any more than
the time of the beginning of the day of the Lord, but this is of
no concern to believers because our appointment is not the
wrath of the day of the Lord but rather the salvation that is
ours in Christ.

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