Thursday, January 5, 2017

The Pre-Trib Mafia


Pastor Dewey Williams: Pre-Trib Rapture Enforcer
All my life I wanted to be a foreign missionary, but instead, I decided to start a church here in the United States. The reason I changed my mind is that I realized how the current missions system works. To raise enough support, I would need to go around getting support from various churches and somehow please them all. I knew that I was not going to be able to do that because my preaching would not be popular among a lot of independent fundamental Baptists.

One of the issues that I knew would be a deal breaker is that I do not believe in the pre-trib rapture. I believe the Bible when it says the rapture will take place immediately after the tribulation. I’ve talked to tons of people who have come to the same conclusion--including other IFB pastors and missionaries. Many of them are in the closet about this since they know that making their true position known would result in losing friends or financial support.

Case in point: Pastor Ram Angad down in Guyana recently lost virtually all his support just for associating with me, because I’m not pre-trib. They wanted him to publicly denounce me as a false teacher and say he believes in the pre-trib rapture, which he refused to do. Unfortunately, Pastor Ram did eventually switch back to his pre-trib position, but it was too late. His mission board won't take him back. Here is a pdf of the disgusting exchange between Ram Angad and his mission board director Chip Stowe, which is like an exchange between 2 devils (Chip's words are highlighted with yellow; the rest is missionary Ram Angad).

I personally would not separate with someone over the issue of the rapture just because they happen to be pre-trib. I would even attend a pre-trib church if it was the best church in the area, but many pre-trib Baptists will separate from post tribbers as if the timing of the rapture was a salvation issue or something.

The reason certain people are so vicious about this issue is because they don’t want anyone to discuss it openly. They want to use fear and intimidation to keep people from bringing up this issue because they cannot prove their position with the Bible. The tactics they resort to remind me of the mafia.

When I started my church, I was advised to wait a while before preaching that the rapture will take place after the tribulation. I decided that I would instead go on the offensive. I went ahead and preached on that subject within the first few months of our church’s existence because as an independent Baptist, I only answer to God.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that the pre-trib rapture is not found in scripture, so there are a lot of us out there who are post trib. Unfortunately, most pastors and missionaries are afraid to speak up if they aren’t pre-trib, which causes the post-trib doctrine to seem uncommon among mainstream IFBs. Maybe if more of us spoke up, it wouldn’t be such a taboo subject in independent fundamental Baptist circles.

That having been said, if you go to a church where the pastor is pre-trib, you shouldn’t be rude about it. The Bible teaches that we should treat pastors with respect. Discuss it in a kind and humble way with your Bible in hand or perhaps encourage him to watch After the Tribulation and see what he thinks. If he still wants to be pre-trib after hearing those 91 verses we used in the documentary, then just agree to disagree.

If you are a pastor or missionary who is post trib, you need to come out of the closet and preach a sermon or perhaps an entire series on end times prophecy. This isn’t something to break fellowship over, but we shouldn’t be afraid to talk about it either. Let’s get a dialogue going and show these pre-tribbers that their arguments won’t hold up in an open discussion.

Click here to watch the documentary “After the Tribulation,” which has the pre-trib mafia running scared.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The second coming is never mentioned as happening before the tribulation, only after. But before God begins to pour out his wrath on the wicked. When the second coming takes place every eye shall see him, and the unsaved will be wailing. This is stated over and over in Matthew 24, Revelation 1 and 6, Luke 21, Mark 13. Not sure why people make it so difficult to understand, I guess people have the tribulation and God's wrath mixed up, or mixed together.

1st witness:
Revelation 1:7 Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him

2nd witness:
Matthew 24:29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: 

Matthew 24:30 And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. 

Matthew 24:31 And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

3rd witness:
Luke 21:25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; 

Luke 21:26 Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. 

Luke 21:27 And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

4th witness:
Mark 13:24 But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, 

Mark 13:25 And the stars of heaven shall fall, and the powers that are in heaven shall be shaken. 

Mark 13:26 And then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. 

Mark 13:27 And then shall he send his angels, and shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven.

Johns witness again:
Revelation 6:12 And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; 

Revelation 6:13 And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. 

Revelation 6:14 And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. 

Revelation 6:15 And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; 

Revelation 6:16 And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: 

Revelation 6:17 For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?

He cometh with clouds (just as he left), he comes after the sun and Moon are darkened (major event), he will overtake the unsaved as a thief (because you brethren are not in darkness that it would overtake you as a thief), he comes after the tribulation but before God's wrath (the wicked will be wailing about what is to come), there is only 1 second coming, not 2. Revelation tells us he comes after the 6th seal, which lines up with the events and timing of Matt 24, Luke 21, Mark 13. And even Thessalonians confirms it happens after the tribulation. There's nothing left up to interpretation if you read all the parallel passages concerning the second coming.

Anonymous said...

It's nuts. And I can imagine IFBs (usually without the F) around the world would also lose their support if they preached post-trib too.

And for that matter, how independent are Independent Baptist churches overseas? When I still went to one in South Africa, before they replaced the real Pastor (who did a duck back to USA) with a "repent of your sins to be saved, I have no sin within me, homos are welcome at church" one, I remember thinking about that. The previous Pastor even spoke in church one time about how they're Independent, meaning not part of a denomination or answerable to a Pope or church body. Yet the church and Pastor were also mostly funded by a church or churches in USA. I sometimes got to help count the tithes and honestly, there's no way on earth they could upkeep even the Pastor, let alone a church too on just the local money. Also, he recorded his sermons on MP3 and then made audio CDs for local distribution; but surely that would've been sent to the planting church back home. So how "independent" is an Independent Baptist church really in that case, outside USA? I could only imagine if a Pastor at the church had let rip and gone all "Steve" on the homos, on post-trib, Zionism... bye bye funding?

(not that we will ever find out since the replacement Pastor doesn't even believe a real gospel!)

Also, they seemed to have a network going - so the Pastors have e-mail and get newsletters via some IFB body somewhere, though I forgot the name of the host, for Pastors being sent around the world. Not very independent is it?

It's sad. It's almost as if these IFBs are esteeming pre-trib and pro-Zionism as importantly as salvation - and yet not as staunch on the right Gospel as they should be.

Kudos for naming and shaming those who are involved in failing Pastor Ram. Pity that some of their IFB counterparts don't feel so passionately about fake preachers and liars entering into other churches they sponsor around the world!

"Turn from your sins to be saved - that's just semantics brother..."
"The Bible says, After the Tribulation - Cut his funding! Cast him out! Crucify him! He doesn't represent Biblical Christianity!"

Anonymous said...

By the way Pastor Anderson, there is a man who is on the FWBC group on FB (they know who he is, I'm sure you do too) who is in America; he meets the requirements to become a Pastor as per 1 Timothy 3; but last year his church refused to send him out and lay hands on him - because he is post-trib and not pro-Zionism.

It's a darn shame. But what does one do in a case like this? He could be out there starting a church somewhere where it's lacking, getting a soul winning program going, etc - but he can't because his church has a hang up about non-salvation issues. Naturally though a church e.g. like yours can't just invite him for the weekend and ordain him, as you don't know from personal experience if he's legit. Sad situation.