A reader of my summary of positions on the Rapture, posted recently, reminded me that I had overlooked a position that is held by some believers—a “partial Rapture.” That is, those folks who are really faithful are taken when Jesus comes for that event, but others who are not faithful are left behind to face the wrath of God with the unsaved.

Right away, that begs the questions of just where the line is drawn, and who draws that line?

When Jesus, in Matthew 16:5, warned His disciples, “Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees,” He was not concerned about their having a faulty recipe for baking bread. But what, exactly, was the “leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees?”

That account Jesus gave in Luke 18:9-14 gives as clear a description of their “leaven” as we need, along with a comparison of the attitude He is looking for in His followers:

“Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’ And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.’”

The introductory statement for that parable reveals the essence of the “leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.” Abraham, father of the Hebrew people, did not assume that position because one day he had a bright idea and decided he would pack up and move to a totally unknown region and start his own nation.

Genesis 12 tells us that God led him out and away from his family ties, where God would make of him a great nation. And Abram (his name then) believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Abraham became one who believed God despite evidence to the contrary in the physical realm, and his legacy is marked by his faith, not by his works. You might say that his leaven was not the leaven of the later religious leaders of Israel.

I relate this for background on what Paul wrote in Romans 4:20-26:

“He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform. And therefore ‘it was accounted to him for righteousness.’

“Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification.”

Perhaps this is a roundabout way to come to the heart of whether or not the partial Rapture position is a valid Bible-based truth. The above verses are quoted to show that from the beginning a person’s relationship to God has been based on faith and not good works or keeping of the commandments. As an analogy with the game of baseball, now the bases are loaded. Let’s see if the following passages will hit the needed home run. First, let’s look at the source of eternal life and then, its availability to mankind:

“For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself…” (John 5:26).

Jesus started out with life existing in Him. Actually, it was and is eternal life. You and I get our life, physically, from our parents, and it goes all the way back to Adam. But only physically can we trace it, for in the spiritual realm, we are dead before Christ comes into our life, as this next passage establishes, and we are dying physically because of Adam’s fall:

“And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life,and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God” (1 John 5:11-13).

Now, how does this truth work out in a believer’s life if certainty of eternal life can be known, based on one having Christ in his life? Paul writes of this in 1 Corinthians 3:11-15:

“For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.”

This speaks to the assurance of salvation, for if Christ in a person’s life is the one single determining factor for salvation, then He is the one single determining factor in who goes to be with Him in the Rapture. Note in the above passage that even with no redeemable good works after his works are tested by the fire of God’s judgment at the judgment seat of Christ (2 Corinthians 5:10), he is still saved.

The basic issue that makes the partial rapture theory one that some folks hang onto is the issue of faithfulness, or good works. Yet Paul would tell us in 2 Timothy 2:13, “If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself.” Thus, God remains faithful to His promises regardless of man’s faithlessness.
In his writing to the Ephesians, in Ephesians 2:8-9, Paul settles this source and issue of salvation:

“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”

The faith that brings salvation is a gift from God and no man’s works has any input to that equation—lest that person should boast of his own part in his salvation. Yet, the very basis of partial rapture is that I, if I am a believer in that theory, am worthy to be raptured because I have been faithful, but you, of course, not being faithful, are not worthy.

The next verse is where Paul deals with works, or worthiness, when he says, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”

Some practical considerations need to be addressed, if for no other reason than just to inject some common sense into the discussion—salted, of course, with the flavor of Bible truth. If the Rapture is when Jesus returns for His Bride, identified also as the “body of Christ” and His Church, then what part of His Bride does He leave behind in a partial Rapture? Is it her feet, because she did not carry the gospel as far as she could have?

Or is it her eyes, because she did not read the Bible and study it consistently? And, of course, the “feet” in the body of Christ are many believers, so how does He take the faithful ones and leave behind the unfaithful? Does His Bride show up crippled in heaven? Dumb thinking, eh? Well, the picture is clear enough, that God indeed is no respecter of persons, and the dividing line is whether or not a person has Christ in his life.

The partial Rapture theory also begs the question of how that plays out in regard to the fact that the dead in Christ will rise first. Those not worthy are left in the grave? But for how long?

The real issue has to do with the integrity of God’s character and the quality of God’s love for His redeemed. In the account of Lot’s redemption from the judgment of Sodom in Genesis 19, it is difficult to see any redeeming qualities in Lot. We have to go to  2 Peter 2:7 to learn that God looked upon him as a righteous man and worthy to be, literally,  dragged out of the city before the angels could destroy it. And Jesus referred to that incident as a likeness of His coming in the days of this generation (see Luke 17:26 and following).

It comes down to this: When God saves a person like you or me, He stakes His reputation upon us. We are His ambassadors in this world. He entrusts us with Himself. When Jesus says, in John 15, “I am the vine, you are the branches,” He revealed a great truth, for when someone looks at a grapevine.

For example, the vine is obscured by its branches. And the fruit of the vine is revealed in its branches. So God’s love is so strong that it can endure whatever failure of those who receive it experience. As John 5:24 puts it, when a person believes what God says, he has eternal life right then and will never come under condemnation again:

“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.”

The description of faith in the Bible: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). Substance is something you can get hold of, so that puts faith in a category of reality and not a “hope-so” situation.  When we tie this thought to that in Hebrews 11:6:

“But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”

We can see that faith, in God’s sight, is not a casual after-thought. In this definition, faith truly is that sixth sense, so real one can almost taste or feel it. That kind of faith knows what it means to believe that God IS, and is coupled with an expectation of reward for believing.

Not many in the broad number of believers have experienced a steady diet of that kind of faith, suspect.  Could we call it the “George Mueller model of faith?” Yet, faith is proclaimed to be a gift from God. Initially, at the point of salvation, the Scripture says:

“For by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).

And even further, as Paul writes in Romans 12:3:

“For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.”

Even so, we are all told to:

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened” (Matthew 7:7-8).

Realities are the substance that faith had foreseen, now the evidence in hand and visible. Hebrews 11:3 says:

“By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.”

God says that evidence leaves man with no excuse (Romans 1:20 and Psalm 19). The evidences show up in strange and unexpected ways. Often I am at a medical facility , checking in for an appointment, and for identity purposes, I am asked, “What is your date of birth?” When I relate that information, the year being 1934, I am testifying that Jesus Christ was born that many years ago, according to the calendar. (Actually, it was possibly four or so years before  then, like 4 B.C.)

Even the atheists are making that statement, unknowingly! Thus, those prophecies In the Old Testament, such as Isaiah 6:6-7 and others, that told of His coming were realities that became real and are “facts on the ground” that God has shown that His promises are true and reliable.

Then we have prophecy fulfillments evident in current events, such as the return of the Jews to their age-old homeland, the land of Israel. It definitely is a fulfillment of Bible promises to the Jews and made centuries before the birth of Christ (Ezekiel 36). It is truly surprising that some do not admit this is evidence of God’s promise being fulfilled.

Yet the Jews are in Israel, not the Church, and it looks like God has salvaged the Jews from destruction at every turn. He has prepared a table before them in the presence of their enemies, who are infuriated, vowing always to wipe them off the face of the earth!

Years ago I was talking with a friend who had grown up in Missouri, and he related to me some interesting background on the birth of Israel as a new nation on May 14, 1948. He told me that where Harry Truman grew up in Independence, Missouri, he had a Jewish family as neighbors, and their plight as a people without a recognized homeland became a well-known topic with the Truman family over those years.

Later, when Harry Truman became president, and the issue of Israeli statehood was being decided in the United Nations, he quickly moved to vote in favor of Israeli statehood, for the United States, within moments of the announcement for a vote of approval.

When James wrote that if a person fails even one point of the law, he is guilty of the whole law, it seems to establish a principle that could apply in this manner as to the claim that God has rejected His promises to the Jews. That is, if one would believe that God lied on even one promise, or did not believe even one of His promises, it would be as if he did not believe any of them, or that God is not trustworthy on any of His promises.

What an indictment that is for those who claim that God’s promises to the Jews are not valid! Their knees should hit the ground immediately, while they are crying out, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” The prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, along with many of  the minor prophets, cannot be honestly be read without finding repeated promises of God’s plan to restore Israel to its historical homeland that was promised to Abraham and his physical descendants.

Now we can see developing quite a phenomenon in the matter of the church of Rome and its new Pope Francis. That advanced notice from the twelfth century that this Pope in the numerical succession would be the last Pope was not a prophecy in the Word of God. Yet, the circumstances of the prior Pope’s resignation with his scramble for timing of it seems too cohesive to be an ordinary playing out of events.

The fact is, though, John did prophecy that a second beast would appear on the scene who would uplift and support that first seven-headed beast and would have two horns like a lamb (which must be concealed, for no lamb start out with horns—they develop as the lamb becomes mature.

Declarations of this Pope already have many of his subjects concerned—such as, “Atheists can go to heaven if they follow their consciences.” Repentance and belief in Jesus Christ seems to have been discarded in favor of humanistic doctrine of deception that prepares followers for a total rejection of God’s plan of redemption. Think about Paul’s portrayal of the future:

“Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron…” (1 Timothy 4:1-2).

The Camel’s Nose Appears

The tale of the camel getting its nose under the edge of the tent as merely being the first step to occupation of the whole tent seems to be a realization of reality in America today. There is no direct mention of the United States in prophecy, and having heard Henry Kissinger’s declaration that Obama has been primed to lead us into a New World Order, we can readily assess the progress he has made toward that goal.

In order to accomplish a New World Order, a/k/a One World Government, there can be no individual sovereign countries or even dictator-controlled entities. Now, in mid-2015, America is fast becoming a third-world country in many aspects. It is being overrun by illegal immigrants, economic realities are devastating, national debt has doubled in the six years of the Obama Administration with nothing to show for it.

The military force has been down-sized to its pre-World War II strength, corruption is openly evident and unchecked in practically every federal government agency, and…should we go on? The bottom line is this: America’s sovereignty is teetering on the edge of collapse and Obama is not finished with his second term.

There is a strong possibility, I feel, that there will not be any 2016 election, for the global elite who yearn for that New World Order have never come this far in their pursuit of that goal, and they will not turn back now. Bible prophecy speaks of a seven-headed beast which will appear in the last days (Revelation 13), which will be, like the six that preceded this one, will be a world-controlling empire—exactly the goal of the New World Order cronies. Think about realities being real!

Some Real Prophetic Realities

There is the view among many—much more than we realize—who have been taught and may believe that almost all Bible prophecies were fulfilled by the time of the A.D. 70 destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish temple by Titus and his Roman soldiers. Those prophecies that did not make sense to the early promoters of this doctrine were relegated to meaningless allegories having to relationship to the reality of things to come.

As early as the second century these suppositions became fixed in place in the early church, then picked up and embraced by the Roman church. From there it spilled out into the Protestant movement and carries through to this day. Thus, we have the following beliefs being perpetuated as the background belief of many Christians today:

1.      The belief that the Millennium reign of Christ,  His thousand-year reign over the earth, began at that time—A.D. 70, and that He is ruling His kingdom from His throne in heaven.

·         The common sense answer to this is , first, the thousand years, a millennium, has now grown to two thousand years, so that leaves that claim empty. Second, the Bible says He will rule that period from the throne of David in Jerusalem (Isaiah 9:7 and Zechariah 8:3) and with a rod of iron (Revelation 12:5). It is obvious that He is not doing that, but sinfulness is running rampant over the whole earth.

2.      Satan was bound with chains and thrown into the bottomless pit, where he now remains, and that he was so conquered at the crucifixion or at the time of the A.D. 70 destruction.

·         One reason it is obvious that Jesus is not ruling the earth now with a rod of iron is that Satan, still the prince of this world, “walks about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour,” just as Peter declared in 1 Peter 5:8.

·         The Bible declares, at the beginning of Revelation 20, that it is then, at the beginning of the thousand years, that he is cast into the bottomless pit.

3.      There is no such thing as the Rapture.

·         The transforming action is described, first, by Jesus in John 11:25-26, then Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:50-54, and again, in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17.

·         The timing of its happening in relation to other events is presented in 2 Thessalonians 2:6-8.
It is obvious that the principle of Acts 17:11, that a person should search the Word out for himself and not rely on what someone else has said, is sadly lacking in the swarm of false doctrines that abound. You should use that principle in regard to this article.