Facts about Rapture

Gary DeMar has jokingly challenged "date setters" to sign a contract turning over all their assets to him on the day after they claim the rapture is to occur.

The midtribulational (or "mid-trib") view holds that the rapture happens at the midpoint of the seven-year tribulation.

That film was followed by three sequels: A Distant Thunder (1977), Image of the Beast (1980), and The Prodigal Planet (1983), and it set up the genre of the rapture film.

Historic premillennialism, which was widespread during the first three centuries of the Christian era, was posttribulational, although it did not use the word rapture.

Many fundamentalist Christians continue to feel that world conditions point to the rapture, tribulation, and return of Christ occurring soon.

In 1995, the doctrine of the pretribulation rapture was further popularized by Tim LaHaye's Left Behind book series, which sold tens of millions of copies and was made into several movies.

In 1950, the novel Raptured by Ernest Angley was published.

The rapture is a major component of the premise of the book and its various spin-offs.

The pretribulation (or "pre-trib") rapture occurs before the beginning of the seven-year tribulation period.

In 1958, J. Dwight Pentecost authored a book supporting the pretribulation rapture, Things to Come: A Study in Biblical Eschatology, that sold 215,000 copies.

The prewrath rapture view is that the rapture will happen before God's wrath, i.e., before the "pouring out" of "God's wrath" to the earth (Rev.

The theological use of the word "rapture" also appeared in the Scofield Reference Bible of 1909.

The doctrine of the rapture was further popularized by an evangelist named William Eugene Blackstone (1841-1935), whose 1908 book, Jesus Is Coming, sold more than one million copies.

The meaning of being caught up may be broader than proponents of the rapture think.

Later popular songs based on the Apocalypse, if not explicitly the rapture, are "1999" by Prince and "It's the End of the World as We Know It (and I Feel Fine)" by REM.

Needless to say, the Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and mainstream Protestant Churches have no rapture tradition and reject the doctrine, because they usually adhere to amillennialism.

Pretribulationism, midtribulationism, and posttribulationism respectively hold that the rapture, being brought at the return of Christ, happens before, at the midpoint of, and after the tribulation.

Lindsey proclaimed that the rapture was imminent, an idea that he based on world conditions at the time.

The first full-fledged rapture movie was A Thief in the Night (1972) produced by Russell S. Doughten.

The rapture is often the plot of films.

In 1957, John Walvoord (1910-2002), a theologian at Dallas Theological Seminary, authored a book, The Rapture Question, that gave theological support to the pretribulation rapture; this book eventually sold over 65,000 copies.

Some characters are actually under attack by reanimated corpses, or by Legion himself, at the time of their rapture.

After the rapture takes away the righteous, God's wrath will fall upon the remaining unbelievers on the so-called "Day of the Lord."

The rest of the film deals with those that were "left behind" as they realize that the rapture has happened and the world is consumed by evil forces and heads towards ultimate destruction.

The story focuses on a man whose mother is raptured along with other Christians, while he is left behind in the tribulation period.

Belief in the rapture gained popularity in the 1830s, and more recently in the 1970s, with proponents of the first view, i.e., pretribulational premillennialism that was expressed in dispensationalism.

When Christ returns at the midpoint of the tribulation, the church will be raptured to be removed from the second half of the tribulation period, which is the more severe part.

Amillennialists did not feel the need for the use of the term "rapture," either.

The prewrath rapture view was presented by people such as Robert Van Kampen (1938-1999) and Roy A. Reinhold, but it was popularized with Marvin Rosenthal's 1990 book, The Pre-Wrath Rapture of the Church.

Others state these events will happen after the rapture.

Conversely, many of those who believe that the precise date of the rapture cannot be known, do affirm that the specific time frame that immediately precedes the rapture event can be known.

The pretribulation (or "pre-trib") rapture occurs before the beginning of the seven-year tribulation period.