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As I've been saying, Blaising stretches the meaning of the "Day of the Lord" to include much more than the single day of Christ's Return. Instead, it is based on the notion that historical prophecies intentionally have an eschatological flair, and attempt to instill in readers a sense of imminent expectation. This anxious expectation is associated with a private revelation, instigated by the events designed to herald its beginning.
8) pg. 59 "The question is whether this seal-breaking series presents the day of the Lord as occurring subsequent to the tribulational events of the 1st 5 seal visions or whether all of these events are meant to be taken as the day of the Lord. 3 considerations support the latter view... The 1st is the parallel between the elements of John's seal visions and the early elements of Jesus' Olivet Discourse... The 2nd consideration has to do with the way the day of the Lord is said to begin in the 2nd part of the Olivet Discourse...The 3rd consideration is related to the grammatical/literary description of the day of the Lord's "coming" in Rev. 6... In the visions that correspond to the breaking of the 1st 4 seals, John hears each of the 4 living creatures calling, "Come!"...features of the day of the Lord."
9) pg. 52 "One point of agreement is that "the hour of trial that is coming on the whole world to try those who dwell on the earth" is the future tribulation."
The "hour of trial" was actually an historical experience of the ancient church at Philadelphia, who were given to escape a major problem in their day. And yet Blaising turns this into a future event--something that futurist interpreters often do with prophecies that might ordinarily be viewed as historically fulfilled.
Blaising recognizes that there is general tribulation that all Christians experience, but he, as a futurist interpreter, identifies a future "Great Tribulation" associated with the Reign of Antichrist. However, the "Great Tribulation," as defined by Jesus, is a strictly Jewish punishment, including both believers and unbelievers among the Jews in the suffering.
And it lasts throughout the NT age, which is what actually makes it the greatest tribulation, ie the greatest punishment Israel as a nation has ever suffered. Futurists tend to view the Reign of Antichrist as a fulfillment of the "Great Tribulation," mentioned by Jesus in his Olivet Discourse and also mentioned by Daniel in ch. 12. They feel that this tribulation, in being so terrible, would have to constitute a kind of wrath from God that excludes the Church.
But I believe the "Great Tribulation" is purely a prophecy applying to Jewish history which at the time was still under the Law. Luke 21 makes it pretty clear that this "Great Distress" was a Jewish "punishment!"
Blaising identifies this so-called "Great Tribulation" not just with the Reign of Antichrist, but also with the Wrath of God that is coming from Christ to bring judgment upon the world. It is assumed that this requires some length of time, instead of just a single day. And in fact, some judgments do take time, though they may not necessarily be called the "Day of the Lord."
So despite the fact Blaising acknowledges that Christians, or saints, are in this "Tribulation Period," he denies that the Church of the present age can be in that time period, being that it is God's Wrath and the Church as a whole should be protected from it. But again, general tribulation is the lot of all Christians, and experiencing God's Wrath in our land does not indicate that we are the targets of God's wrath. If Antichrist's Reign is not really the "greatest tribulation" in history, as Blaising seems to think, then it is no more "God's Wrath" upon the whole world than it is "God's Wrath" when we live in lands under Divine judgment.
The greatest wrath of God directed at the whole world will be Armageddon itself, which is the beginning of sentencing men to eternal death in the act of God punishing their rebellion. And this appears to happen on the last day of the age in the book of Revelation. Those who suffer on earth during this period are not the objects of God's wrath necessarily, but may be unfortunate casualties in this battle of Christ versus the Antichrist.
Though Blaising asserts that the Church of the present age cannot be in the time of Antichrist's Reign, he admits that he cannot show a "Rapture" event in the book of Revelation. He can only state that there was ambiguity in Jesus' message warning his Disciples to avoid God's Wrath by watching for him imminently, even though they may not be the ones who actually see the Rapture event.
10) pg. 57 "If we are right in assuming that this refers to the rapture, then one naturally expects it to be addressed in the text that follows... Here we find the contrast between "you" and "them."... We have here a clear parallel to 1 Thess. 5.9, "For God did not appoint us...to suffer wrath but to receive salvation."
11) pg. 51 "There is no explicit mention of the rapture in the book of Revelation."
12 pg. 55 "The 2 orientations to the Parousia are most easily seen in the Olivet Discourse. On the one hand, there is the orientation described in the 2nd part of the discourse, in which one does not know the day or the hour... This is the same orientation given to the disciples in Acts 1, where the Lord tells them, "It is not for you to know times or seasons.... The other orientation is that given in the 1st part of the Olivet Discourse and summarized in the illustration of the fig tree: "when you see all these things, you know that he is near... This is the orientation of watching the signs as the tribulation pattern unfolds."
13) pg. 66 "These 2 orientations are different and manifest 2 different forms of "imminency." The imminence of the rapture is due to the lack of any signs by which its proximity may be determined. It may be near or far. The time is unknown. It will occur unexpectedly. It could happen at any moment for those who will form the company that Christ will bring with him when he descends to the earth at the end of the day of the Lord to begin his millennial reign. This is the imminency that pretribulationism has traditionally advocated when describing the rapture."
This problem of separating "Tribulation Saints" from the present Church is compounded by its several contradictions. Not only do Tribulation Saints apparently suffer "God's Wrath" when Blaising indicates Christians shouldn't be there, but he also posits a Rapture that isn't even in the book of Revelation and imposes, arbitrarily, a pretribulational timing in the passage that mentions the Rapture (1 Thes 4).
Saints in the Tribulation are then determined, by Blaising, to not be Spirit-Baptized Christians, simply because he expects that the Church, together with the Holy Spirit, has been removed to heaven. And it is somehow thought that these Tribulation Saints, who are Jewish, must somehow come to faith without the Church being present so that they can enter into the Millennial age as mortals!
14) pg. 68 "The problem is, of course, that the more proximate the rapture is to the judgment of mortals, the fewer if any believers there will be to be admitted as mortals into the kingdom. Postribulationism obviously has the greatest difficulty with this problem."
15) pg. 69 "The church, as a previously unrevealed heavenly program, comes into existence as a parenthesis within the earthly program of God's purpose for Israel.. This parenthesis must be closed for the earthly program to resume... Daniel's chronology of the 70 7s, having been interrupted by the church, would resume... The church by definition cannot be present when Daniel's "earthly" chronology resumes. The church cannot suffer "wrath," because it cannot by definition be present in the time of tribulation wrath."
15) pg. 70 "It logically follows, then, that those who come to faith during the tribulation period are not part of the churches as the church is defined universally to be those united to Christ by the baptism of the Holy Spirit... In accordance with this, dispensationalists have typically identified the restrainer in 2.6-7 as the Holy Spirit in his mode of indwelling the church."
I cannot buy into this Dispensational distinction between the Church of the present age and the so-called "Tribulation Church!" And I can't buy into some notion of an age-long "imminency" inspired by historical events that indicate Christ could come "at any time."
No, the true "Great Tribulation" is an event that must precede the Rapture, which is the Jewish Diaspora of the present age, along with the universal preaching of the Gospel. Furthermore, we are not only not taught a Pretrib Rapture in 1 Thes 4 or in the book of Revelation, but we are in fact taught an explicit Postribulational Coming of Christ, terminating the age of Jewish Tribulation, ending the Antichristian persecution of the Church, and establishing God's Kingdom in a single day.
The "Rapture," in my view, is more descriptive of the event of our glorification and resurrection, than a name for the event itself. It takes place when we are caught up to heaven, and the "event" of the Rapture actually assumes the form of a glorified, resurrected Church appearing at the end of the age of tribulation in the book of Revelation and elsewhere in the Bible.
Thanks for slogging through this conflicted material!
