Page 63 - The Rapture Question by John F. Walvoord

The Rapture Question: Revised and Enlarged Edition
promised: “For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath, but to
receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The wrath
of God will be poured out on the world during the Great
Tribulation. Revelation 6:17 states, “For the great day of their
wrath has come; and who can stand?" The character of the
judgments that will fall is such that they will affect every­
one—famine, pestilence, sword, earthquake, stars falling from
heaven. The only way one could be kept from that day of
wrath would be to be delivered beforehand. The same context
in 1 Thessalonians 5 also affirms that the believer will not be
overtaken by the day of destruction like a thief in the night and
that the believer is not to be included with the children of
darkness who are doomed for destruction. Instead of being
appointed to wrath and sudden destruction as children of
darkness, believers are declared to be appointed to salvation
and to living together with Him. The contribution of 1 Thes­
salonians 5 to the doctrine of the Rapture will be considered
more at length under posttribulational arguments.
First Thessalonians 1:9-10 also affirms that Christians of
the present age will be delivered from the wrath to come. In
1 Thessalonians 1:10, it refers to “Jesus, who rescues us from
the coming wrath.” The possibility of escaping the coming
day of trial is predicted in Luke 21:36: “Be always on the
watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that is
about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the
Son of Man.”
The church at Philadelphia is promised: “Since you have
kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you
from the hour of trial that is going to come upon the whole
world to test those who live on the earth” (Rev. 3:10). As the
translators have made clear, the thought of the Greek is to
“keep from,” not to “keep in.” The promise was to be kept
from “the hour” of trial, not just the trials in the hour. The
primary promise to the church of Philadelphia was that they
would not enter this hour of trial. Historically, it meant just
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