Definition
The rapture (from Latin raptus = caught up, translating Greek ἁρπάζω) is the eschatological expectation that Christ will remove believers from the earth to meet him, grounded in 1 Thess. 4:17 (“we shall be caught up together… to meet the Lord in the air”). In dispensationalism the rapture is distinguished from the second coming and precedes the Great Tribulation (pre-tribulational rapture), sparing the Church from God’s wrath. Variants include mid-tribulational and post-tribulational positions.
Usage in the Corpus
Stephen Jones
Jones rejects the pre-tribulational rapture doctrine as biblically indefensible and historically discredited. His critique targets the dispensational expectation linked to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948: “The Christian world immediately threw their support behind that state and boldly proclaimed that the rapture would take place any moment now, the tribulation was nigh, and the Jews were soon to be all converted to Christ. Obviously, this did not take place.” Earlier he notes: “He was expecting the Jews to become Christians en masse at the time of the ‘rapture’ in 1988. But all of these things were assumptions not based upon biblical facts.” Jones treats the escapist theology behind pre-trib rapturism as a category error: the overcomers do not escape tribulation but overcome it. [Jones, Secrets of Time, Ch. 11 and 14]
George Warnock
Warnock rejects rapture theology as motivated by fear of tribulation rather than faith. “Before this cherished rapture or resurrection takes place, there is to arise a group of overcomers who shall appropriate even here and now their heritage of Resurrection Life in Jesus Christ.” Warnock expects a spiritual parousia (the manifestation of the sons of God) before the literal resurrection takes place. The overcomers are not raptured out but overcome on behalf of the Church. [Warnock, The Feast of Tabernacles, Ch. 14]