Page 55 - The Rapture Question by John F. Walvoord

The Rapture Question: Revised and Enlarged Edition
judgments will fall until the close of the Tribulation when the
Lord comes. Practically speaking, he denied that the Tribula­
tion will be a time of tribulation. For Reese the wrath docs not
begin at Revelation 6:13 but in Revelation 19. By such rea­
soning the teaching that the church will go through the
Tribulation but without tribulation is preserved. Of impor­
tance here, however, is the illustration of the principle of in­
terpretation used by the posttribulationists—the avoidance of
the literal interpretation of the major passage, the Book of
Revelation. George E. Ladd is. to some extent, an exception to
the rule in that he adopted a futuristic interpretation of Reve­
lation. Like Reese, however, Ladd endeavored to take the
church through the Tribulation but not to expose it to the
wrath poured out in this period.
The peculiar form of posttribulationism advanced by
Gundr)’ cuts across many of these posttribulational argu­
ments. Like many others, he minimizes the trials of the
Tribulation and attempts to avoid the full force of passages
like Revelation 7:9-17. He places the Rapture just before the
final judgments of Armageddon and, in effect, takes the same
line of argument as Reese. This will be considered more at
length later.
The choice of a weakened Tribulation is not an accident,
however, but logically necessary to their position. Only by this
device can passages picturing the hope of the Lord’s return as
a comfort and joy be sustained. It is difficult to harmonize a
literal interpretation of the Tribulation with posttribula­
tionism, though Ladd attempted it. It would weaken not only
the promises of comfort but also the imminency and practical
application of the doctrine of the Lord’s coming. The con­
troversy between pretribulationists and posttribulationists is,
in miniature, a replica of the larger controversy of premillen-
nialism and amillennialism as far as principles of interpreta­
tion are concerned. This is brought out more in detail in the
scriptural revelation of the Tribulation itself.

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