Tribulation and Millenium converts

[spjbuilder]

I'm curious to understand about people who will supposedly be saved during the tribulation and also during the millennium. For dispensationalists who believe all who were not raptured before the trib. will not be resurrected until after the mill. I assume they believe that the judgment of Rev 20:11-12 is for these people. Clearly all pretribulation people will have already been separated into saved and unsaved by the rapture. While it is true that those “left behind” could still get “saved” it doesn't seem that they would be saved in the same way that people are today (Rm 10:6-17). There will be no Christians around to witness, and there will be millions of books (The Late Grate …), movies (the “Left Behind” series), and thousands of “Youtube” videos in nearly every language to explain why billions of people have disappeared. It seems that people who get saved during the tribulation will be like Thomas (“you believe because you have seen”). The same thing for sure would have to be said about people who get saved during the millennium (with all those glorified Saints plus Jesus Himself hanging around).

I would like to hear from a true dispensationalist to get some idea of what the understand is about these ideas.

[Paidion]

I don't think there ARE any true dispensationalists who post to this forum, but I used to be one from the time I was fifteen until I was 24. All that you have written was exactly what I believed. I'm not sure what you are asking dispensationalists.

[spjbuilder]

Paidion, thank you for responding. To me dispensatioalists have some ideas that I've never had a chance to ask about. The ideal would be to have a friend that I could sit down over a cup of coffee and have some great talks with. I'm developing such a thing right now with a Seventh Day Adventist. So far he has had his first conversation with a partial preterist amillennialist, and to my surprise I've found a fellow open theist. So I'll keep looking for a flesh and blood dispen's to visit with.

In the meantime I get to ask you some of these ?'s.

Assumption #1:

Dispen's believe the church is Jesus' bride and that Israel is the Father's bride. (Is this a correct assumption?)

A scenario and question based on this assumption:

A Christian is witnessing to a set of Jewish twins and a set of Gentile twins. Two days before the rapture one from each set accepts Jesus. Two days later, boom, the rapture occurs. Then two days after the other half of each set accepts Jesus. Can you see where I'm going with this? Now there appears to be 1 Jew and 1 Gentile who are apart of Jesus' bride and 1 Jew and 1 Gentile who are apart of the Father's bride. They're that way because of decisions made 4 days apart, but apparently could have been made minutes (or seconds) apart with the same result.

Is this scenario accurate?

[dwilkins]

If you find a dispensationalist who wants to talk about it I'd be curious about how they answer a couple of questions.

1. How are any of the Tribulation Saints saved (i.e., what is the mechanism and function of a new spiritual life) when the the Holy Spirit has been removed? Also, how is the salvation of a Jewish person accomplished in the same period?

2. Are saved people in the Millennium part of the Bride of Christ since the marriage of the Bride comes at the 2nd Coming?

3. Is salvation and the spiritual life the same for people in the Millennium as in the per Tribulation age? Since no NT writer postulates that it's possible to attain maturity without hardship, what is the source of the hardship in the Millennium?

4. Since Messianic Jews (and therefore most dispensationalists as far as I know) embrace the idea that the initiation of the Feast of Tabernacles is the same as the Millennium, what OT Feast or celebration depicts the end of human history/end of Millennium/end of Feast of Tabernacles?

5. In Isaiah and Revelation the New Heaven and New Earth is depicted as having unsaved people in it. How can this be?

I'd love to hear the answers.

Doug

[Paidion]

As a former dispensationalist, I will attempt to answer these questions as I understood them. Please remember that I was young at the time, and I may not have fully understood what the disps teach.

Dispen's believe the church is Jesus' bride and that Israel is the Father's bride. (Is this a correct assumption?)

I used to read a lot of disp literature, and listen to disp preachers, but I never encountered this idea. My understanding was that God has a special plan for unsaved Israelites during the millenium.

1. How are any of the Tribulation Saints saved (i.e., what is the mechanism and function of a new spiritual life) when the the Holy Spirit has been removed? Also, how is the salvation of a Jewish person accomplished in the same period?

I understood that they will be saved the same way the Jews will be saved, by trusting in Christ. But at that time there will be a different program for the Jews. Saved Gentiles will be second-class. The Holy Spirit will not be absent per se, but only absent with regard to his present permanent dwelling within believers. In that day, He will come upon believers to convict them, etc., but not continuously dwell within them as He does during the dispensation of grace (that is "the Church age"). It will be much like it was prior to that special day of Pentecost described in Acts. People during OT days could be saved without the indwelling Spirit, and so could Christ's disciples prior to the time the Spirit was given at Pentecost.

2. Are saved people in the Millennium part of the Bride of Christ since the marriage of the Bride comes at the 2nd Coming?

No. The Bride is made up only of Christians who got saved during the present dispensation.

3. Is salvation and the spiritual life the same for people in the Millennium as in the per Tribulation age? Since no NT writer postulates that it's possible to attain maturity without hardship, what is the source of the hardship in the Millennium?

It will be pretty much the same except that their sufferings will be over when they live in the Millenium. They won't need any more hardship in the Kingdom of God (the millenium is believed to be the Kingdom which Christ offered the Jews, and which they refused, and thus it had to be postponed with the dispensation of Grace being inserted until the dispensation of the Kingdom comes about). After they endured the persecution during the tribulation period, the saints won't need further hardships. This may be compared to Christians being persecuted here on earth and then dying and going to heaven. They won't need further hardships.

4. Since Messianic Jews (and therefore most dispensationalists as far as I know) embrace the idea that the initiation of the Feast of Tabernacles is the same as the Millennium, what OT Feast or celebration depicts the end of human history/end of Millennium/end of Feast of Tabernacles?

I cannot answer this question, as I never got into the feasts.

5. In Isaiah and Revelation the New Heaven and New Earth is depicted as having unsaved people in it. How can this be?
Is that the New Heaven and the New Earth being depicted in Isaiah and Revelation?

Isaiah's "New Heavens and New Earth" is actually describing a restored Heavens and Earth. This Restored Earth will be the Millenial Kingdom. There will be unsaved persons among the children born in those days.

In Revelation, the "New Heavens and New Earth" are described as occuring at the end of the millenium. There won't be unsaved in it. In Revelation 20:8, John simply states what will happen to those were did evil things prior to the "New Heavens and New Earth".

[spjbuilder]

Thanks for you answers and comments, Paidion.

I'm pretty sure I heard SG mention this 2 brides idea some where in his teaching mp3's.

Your response to what Doug said about maturity through suffering doesn't cover people who are born after the millennium starts. Maybe dispens don't believe the none “Bride” population out side the “New Jerusalem” will have children. If the don't then by 120 AT (after tribulation) there won't be any nonsaints left. After all “death and hades” still have not been dealt with. Can you enlighten?

Will the rebuilt temple still be functioning during the Mill.?

Growing in my understanding,
SPJ

[dwilkins]

1. I don't think that salvation, as it is defined in the New Testament, existed during the Old Testament period. Those people were hoping or expecting to be justified at some point in the future, and all expected to end up in the grave until that moment happened. And, I don't see any indication that the Disciples were "saved" prior to the resurrection of Christ. They might all have been slated for salvation if they'd died, meaning that they were promised that they would be justified at the final judgment. But, they didn't possess eternal life through the indwelling of the spirit in the same way that the NT saints did post resurrection. Paul seems to make this indwelling the core of a person's ability to successfully deal with sin (Romans 7-8) and is quite clear that the presence of the spirit in a believer is what provides the power for that person to be resurrected. So, I am very suspicious of a millennial paradigm that says that there are a class of future believers who do not have the spirit indwelling them. It seem to me to be categorically impossible.

2. I think you are right that dispensationalists would not see millennial believers as the Bride. That presents an interesting challenge to Amil's, because the wedding seems to clearly be part of what kicks off the millennium. For Amil's to follow this approach would mean that we are not the Bride, but the offspring of the Bride.

3. There is no example in Peter, James, or Paul where believers can accomplish any spiritual growth without hardship. For this to be possible, the practical application of the the NT would be meaningless to Millennial saints (this might be true, but I doubt they've thought of it). Those saints would need a custom revelation as a rule for life. It might be enough that in that period Christ would be personally ruling from the throne, so maybe it would be that he'd teach them personally (with additional implications for Amil's). But, if we assume for a moment that there is such a thing as growth one wonders where the tension would come from that pushes them towards it. Would we even be able to understand the concept of spiritual growth in the Millennium if there were no tests?

5. It's been my experience that dispensationalists make Isaiah 65-66 the Millennium, and Revelation 21-22 the subsequent New Heavens and New Earth. There are no exegetical grounds for doing so in my opinion, but their system requires it. Still, in Rev. 22 you have a city into which no sin can come, and whose gates are always open to receive people. This logically demands that there are people to receive, and that to do so means that before they are received they have sin. Restorationist universalism at least tries to take this seriously by making this imagery a function of restoring people from the Lake of Fire. But, OT imagery of people outside of the future kingdom city (Isaiah 66, Zechariah 14, etc.) seem to indicate that they have option of being belligerent to Christ. This logically requires that they are sinning. Though dispensationalists try to make these passages simply refer to the Millennial period, references to them from Rev. 21-22 seem to tie these passages directly to the NHNE period.

Doug