So Long as There Is Faith in Christ (2024 Summer Retreat)

The Bible speaks of a thousand years six times. Depending on how that period is understood, the order of the Second Coming, the Rapture and the Great Tribulation takes on an entirely different shape. Even within the orthodox denominations, differing views on this sequence have long stood apart.

Scholars disagree over whether the Second Coming precedes the Millennium or follows it, or whether the thousand years should be read as a symbol. Premillennialism itself is divided between those who hold that God’s people will pass through the tribulation and those who hold that the Church will be caught up before it begins. Each position has passages on which it rests, and since none can be declared wrong with certainty, they do not brand one another as heretical.

Scripture does not fix that order precisely. What matters, then, is not which theory is correct but whether there is faith in Christ now. Where that faith is present, one can stand before God without fear, whatever comes and whenever it comes.