Here's the problem though. They might say, well, why wasn't this taught then for a long time?
Well, here's the thing. This is very easy. If you know your history about the Catholic Church, what happened?
That's why it's called Dark Ages. The scriptures were locked up in monasteries. All they knew was Catholic doctrine.
You see that? So, look, you have to give them a break. If this goes on for centuries, without studying the Bible, right doctrine would be lost during that time, see?
You mean to tell me that the Lord Jesus Christ came down to this earth, lived a sinless life, died on the cross, was buried, established the local New Testament church,
men like Paul and Peter gave us the writings, the structure for this movement called the local New Testament church, but then we missed out on the key doctrine for 1800 years?
They were so arrogant as to believe that they had knowledge that God didn't even give the apostles.
You know, until John Nelson Darby came on the scene, no one could understand scripture, understand doctrine. Everybody had it all wrong until John Nelson Darby came.
I mean, does that really make sense to anybody? But prior to 1830, no one knew about these doctrines. No one talked about the imminent return of Christ.
No one talked about a pre-tribulation rapture. He believed that the Church of England had lost any notion of salvation by grace.
And that it had forsaken biblical ideas of what church should be. For Darby, it was time to start afresh with a new church and prepare Jesus' imminent second coming.
They teach that the rapture happens before the tribulation.
We believe that the rapture happens after the tribulation. You say, why do we believe that? Because that's what the Bible says.
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