Ministry Links
|
Hour 1 |
|
||
as well as our monthly prophecy letter via the postal service, send your Name, Postal Address, and Email Address to James@ChristianMediaNetwork.com |
|||
February 24, 2021 Christian
Media Communiqué POSTHUMOUS
PERVERSIONS II: A Gigantic Lie About John
Gill
These lists of alleged early “believers” in the
rapture doctrine commonly include a respected 18th century pastor
and author named John Gill (1697-1771). The most notorious of these historical revisionists was the
late prophecy teacher Chuck Missler -- as well as the late Grant
Jeffrey — both of whom repeatedly claimed John Gill in their dubious
lists of supposed early pretribbers. Although Grant and Missler have both gone
on to their eternal recompense, I mention them because multiple younger
writers, who were profoundly influenced by these liars, continue to perpetuate
this fraud. Unfortunately, there are significant numbers of additional
proponents of the doctrine who consistently twist the statements of numerous
ancient Christian commentators, in a deceitful effort to obscure the true
origin of the doctrine, even as more obscure writers (mostly on the Internet)
unscrupulously emulate their tactics. In this context, we might point out the dissemination
of the pretribulation rapture doctrine has been conclusively traced to the
occult oriented teenager Margaret MacDonald. Her 1830 trance
state facilitated an undeveloped written version of the doctrine; however, the
issue has never been exclusively related to who had the doctrine first
— but more specifically related to the path of its transmission. The doctrine was popularized in America by Irish preacher John
Darby, who had proven influences from her contemporary, another eclectic
cleric named Edward Irving. Irving’s theological antics were
widely considered to be uncouth in his day, so Darby’s biographers sought
to cover up the connection for fear of smearing Darby’s more respectable
credentials. It’s now been proven that both Irving and Darby had contacts
with Miss MacDonald’s “study group” — a group that was
known to be involved in, among other things, levitation. However, at the time he was exposed to MacDonald’s
rudimentary theory of what would now be called “partial” or
progressive Rapturism (one reaches a level of spiritual maturity, then poof!
they’re raptured!), Irving was already translating the work of a Spanish Roman
Catholic Jesuit named Lacunza, whose ideas also anticipated pretrib. Thus we have the Roman Catholic Lacunza’s spiritual
dung entering into one ear of Irving, and the occultist Margaret
MacDonald’s poison going in the other — not exactly facts the
proponents of pretrib want their flocks to become aware of. Because of these
embarrassing facts, the liars (who have hundreds of millions of dollars
staked on the doctrine) continue to try to find links to the doctrine that
precede the period in question. Indeed, since the lengthy research showing the
MacDonald/Lacunza/Irving/Darby link was originally published, another work,
printed well before MacDonald’s pivotal year of 1830 by a maverick
American preacher named Robert Baxter, has also surfaced. Baxter had a
version of pretrib which is even closer to modern pre-trib than
MacDonald’s, but there is no evidence anyone ever read it, or was
influenced by it. In other words, there is no link before or after Baxter, but
there is demonstrable evidence connecting MacDonald to Irving/Darby. John Gill’s work is definitely not pretribulational,
as we shall see. It should also be said that, in his day, Gill’s work was
also of a minimal impact. Gill’s commentaries became greatly appreciated
in later times. Conversely, massive documentation exists showing the high
profile speaking tours of John Nelson Darby in the US, in which he
definitively introduced “the Rapture Cult” to America’s
itching ears. Obviously, Scripture is the final arbiter of all doctrinal
issues, but I’ve already written 5 books elaborating on the Scriptural
truth that says Christ only returns once — and that return will
occur just as Jesus said it would, “immediately after the
tribulation…” (Matthew 24:29). The following is John Gill’s Commentary on I
Thessalonians 4:17 — part of his Exposition of the New Testament
(9 volumes, penned from 1746–48): “Then we which are alive and
remain shall be caught up; suddenly, in a moment, in
the twinkling of an eye, and with force and power; by the power of Christ, and
by the ministry and means of the holy angels; and to which rapture will
contribute, the agility which the bodies both of the raised and changed saints
will have: and this rapture of the living saints will be “together with them; with
the dead in Christ, that will then be raised; so that the one will not come
before the other, or the one be sooner with Christ than the other; but the one
being raised and the other changed, they will be joined in one company and
general assembly, and be caught up together: “in the clouds; the same
clouds perhaps in which Christ will come, will be let down to take them up;
these will be the chariots, in which they will be carried up to him; and thus,
as at our Lord's ascension a cloud received him, and in it he was carried up
out of the sight of men, so at this time will all the saints ride up in the
clouds of heaven: “to meet the Lord in the air;
whither he will descend, and will then clear the regions of the air of Satan,
and his posse of devils, which now rove about there, watching all
opportunities, and taking all advantages to do mischief on earth; these shall
then fall like lightning from heaven, and be bound and shut up in the
bottomless pit, till the thousand years are ended: here Christ will stop, and
will be visible to all, and as easily discerned by all, good and bad, as the
body of the sun at noonday; as yet he will not descend on earth, because it is
not fit to receive him; but when that and its works are burnt up, and it is
purged and purified by fire, and become a new earth, he will descend upon it,
and dwell with his saints in it: and this suggests another reason why he will
stay in the air, and his saints shall meet him there, and whom he will take up
with him into the third heaven, till the general conflagration and burning of
the world is over, and to preserve them from it; and then shall all the elect
of God descend from heaven as a bride adorned for her husband, and he with
them, and the tabernacle of God shall be with men; see Rev 21:1. The
resurrection by the Mahometans is called "a meeting of God," or a
going to meet God: “and so shall we ever be with
the Lord; now the saints are with him at times, and have communion with
him, but not always; but then they shall be ever with him; wherever he is;
first in the air, where they shall meet him; then in the third heaven, where
they shall go up with him; then on earth, where they shall descend and reign
with him a thousand years; and then in the ultimate glory to all eternity: and
this will be the issue and accomplishment of the counsel and covenant of grace,
of the sufferings and death of Christ, and of his preparations and
prayers.” [end of Gill citation] The first time you read these words (especially if you read them
out of context), it sounds as though John
Gill might indeed be preaching some kind of pretribulational rapture
doctrine. However, the Rapturist teachers who cite sources such as Gill as
evidence of a pretrib belief system that was supposedly intact prior to the
crucial time of John Darby and Edward Irving, et al, are trained
to know better. Thus, we expect better scholarship from teachers who claim to
know so much about Bible prophecy. The first thing we notice is Gill actually uses the word
“rapture” in his first paragraph (he uses the word twice). Upon
reviewing the larger body of Gill’s work, we see he has knowledge of
Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and Latin — the latter being the language from
which the word “rapture” is derived. Thus, he has incorporated the
word in his comments as a sort of free flowing transliteration when he comments
on the phrase caught up. It may very well be that Gill was the first to
use this technique. Although this tends to legitimatize the word, our objection
is not to a transliteration, or even the word itself; it is to the meaning
later generations have attached to the term. The term “rapture” has
not come to mean “caught up” in the generic sense, it has come to
mean caught up BEFORE the tribulation. It did not carry that meaning in
Gill’s day, and he is utilizing the word to comment on the fact the text
says the believer will be caught up — or as he put it,
“raptured.” All cults are notorious for attaching novel meanings to
terms utilized by others as a way of insulating their theological captives from
external reasoning processes. This is a particularly useful tactic in
diminishing the corrective power of the Scriptures. Since history plainly shows
us that John Gill was not a Rapture Cultist, because he lived in
an era before the doctrine was developed, his use of the term rapture was
obviously derived directly from the term “caught up” (in the Greek
Harpazo, in the Latin Raptus, rapere, etc) — an application that never
addresses timing at all. The portion of Gill’s comments that most easily lends
itself to the prophetic spin of pretrib, is the statement that, after rising to
meet Christ in the air, “as yet he will not descend on earth, because it
is not fit to receive him; but when that and its works are burnt up, and it is
purged and purified by fire, and become a new earth, he will descend upon
it….” With this phrase, Gill appears to be opening the door to the
idea of an unstated interval of time elapsing between the rising of the dead
and living saints to meet Him in the air, and their collective descent. He
continues with the idea of the saints being with Him in the third heaven
“till the general conflagration and burning of the world is over, and to
preserve them from it….” To fully understand just what Gill meant with these
statements, we should use the same technique we would use on any particular
Scripture; and that is to check the context (and adjacent statements), to get a
2nd witness as to the writer’s intent. This clears things up very quickly. For example, when we look at John Gill’s complete
narratives, and examine his statements on the verses just preceding the
statements included here on I Thessalonians 4:17, we see he plainly states
the return of Christ is indeed the second coming, and connects that
event to other passages that are all obviously post-tribulational. In his
statements on verse I Thessalonians 4:15, we see the following: “I Thessalonians 4:15 For
this we say unto you by the word of the Lord,… The apostle having
something new and extraordinary to deliver, concerning the coming of Christ, the
first resurrection, or the resurrection of the saints, the change of
the living saints, and the rapture both of the raised and living in the clouds
to meet Christ in the air, expresses himself in this manner….” [emphasis
mine] With these words, Gill has flat out stated the coming of
Christ, and our gathering unto Him is the first
resurrection. Since the 2nd resurrection occurs at the great white throne
judgment of the wicked, this leaves no place for a supposed pretrib rapture
version of the resurrection. Remember, the pretrib doctrine says the verse
stating the dead in Christ rise first is supposedly not the first
resurrection, as there is only ONE “resurrection of the just” (Luke
14:14) — and John Gill knew this. This goes to the heart of the doctrine’s weakness, for
the doctrine of the resurrection plainly tells us there is to be only two
resurrections, one for “…they that have done good,
unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil,
unto the resurrection of damnation.” — John
5:29 At the end of Revelation, at the second coming, we
see the precise phrase “the first resurrection,” and it clearly
tells us the Gill saw this occurring at the end of the tribulation, at
the 2nd coming of Jesus Christ, when “…the beast was taken, and
with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he
deceived them that had received the mark of the beast…” —
Revelation 19:2 When the “beast” is taken, he’s
cast into the bottomless pit for a thousand years. As that happens, the same
portion of Revelation says “…and I saw the souls of them
that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which
had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark
upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ
a thousand years. Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first
resurrection….” — Revelation 20:4, 6 Since Gill has stated the dead in Christ in I Thessalonians 4
are resurrected at this “rapture,” and has further stated in his
commentary these dead include “all that die interested in
him, and in union with him,” he is clearly tying the first resurrection
to this text. In fact, in this group referenced as “the dead in
Christ,” he also mentions “the martyrs that died for the sake of
Christ, and his Gospel…[and] those who die in the lively exercise of
faith in Christ….” This further ties Gill’s understanding of this event
to the first resurrection in Revelation, because that text
also mentions the martyrs — “the souls of them that were beheaded
for the witness of Jesus….” There is simply no doubt whatsoever that John Gill’s
statements prove that his perception of the I Thessalonians 4 catching
up of the believers was definitely the second coming. In his
statements on verse 15, as he describes believers that are alive when Christ
returns, he again affirms this chapter describes the second coming: “however, from hence it appears,
that there will be saints alive at Christ's second coming….”
[emphasis mine] Another way of measuring the true intent of antiquarian
writers is to note what is not included in their statements. In this
regard, although John Gill theorizes the believers pause in the
“third heaven” with Christ before returning to the earth after the
great conflagration, there is no 2nd catching up, or resurrection of the
so-called “tribulation saints,” as is put forth by the Cult. In Gill’s account, Christ returns for the believers.
They rise to meet Him in the air. They then return to the earth with Him as
what Gill called “the general conflagration and burning of the
world” is concluded. Indeed, if this were the so-called pre
trib rapture, how is it the “conflagration and burning of the
world” is already in progress? Furthermore, there is no trace, or even a suggestion that
Christ then comes back again for the so-called tribulation saints
— those who allegedly get saved after the rapture! In short, he only
returns once, and Gill himself plainly calls this the “second
coming.” Unfortunately, vast numbers of unread (and naïve) believers
have been so conditioned by the Rapture Cult, which has dominated
American churches for over a century, that they’ve been programmed to
ignore even basic scholarship on the subject. The propagandistic liars
disseminating this Antichrist dogma continue to insist pretribulationism was
taught throughout the Christian age, even as their system continues to further
insulate their hapless mindslaves from Scripturally derived truth, which has
been thoroughly studied over the last two millennia. This Cult methodology has the added advantage of assigning
pejorative labels to any Scripturally based analyses of the history of the
doctrine. By inaccurately labeling anything but pretrib as “replacement
theology,” the Cult is able to invoke the boogieman of apostasy without
breaking a sweat in our sound bite driven society. Truly, the Rapture Cult
is ground zero in the great falling away warned of by the Apostle Paul. Ironically, even a very modest helping of scholarship would
provide the requisite ammunition to refute the theocrims at the Cult, who would
tell us the scholars of yesteryear (such as John Gill) were actually
pretribulationists. Thus, the smoking gun which would incriminate the perpetrators
of this fraud is denied to those who need it most. The fact is, Gill, and most of the preachers before and
after him (including Cult convert John Darby before 1830), were Historicist
in perspective. Practically ALL of them held the forty-two month reign of
Antichrist (“power was given unto him to continue forty and two
months” – Revelation 13:5), was concurrent with the 1,260 day
period of the two witnesses and Jerusalem being trodden down, even as these
preachers universally held these days represented years already
gone by. Thus, John Gill was one of many who believed the 3½
years of tribulation seen in the Beast passages of Revelation 13 (1,260 days)
represented 1,260 years. Furthermore, as an English preacher peering at the world
through Protestant eyes, like practically every other theologian of the second
millennia AD, he held the Antichrist was the Papacy. In his commentary
on Revelation 13, he also indicated he believed the tribulation had already
been underway for hundreds of years: “And there was given unto him a
mouth speaking great things, and blasphemies; great swelling words of
vanity; calling himself by high and lofty titles, as Christ's vicar, Peter's
successor, head of the church, universal bishop, &c. promising great things
to his followers, riches, honours, pleasures, pardons, and heaven itself; and
uttering things of a blasphemous kind, or great blasphemies, the particulars of
which are mentioned in Rev 13:6; so the little horn, who is the same with
the Romish antichrist, is said to have a mouth speaking great things, very
great things, and his look more stout than his fellows, Dan 7:8 “And power was given unto him to
continue forty and two months; to continue in being, or to continue
blaspheming and speaking great things; and indeed, as long as he continues, he
will continue blaspheming…The phrase rather intends his being, and the
continuance and duration of it; which is the same period of time in which the
holy city is trodden under foot by this beast, and the same with the 1260 days
or years, in which the witnesses prophesy in sackcloth, and the woman,
the church, is in the wilderness, Rev 11:22; “for forty two months, reckoning
thirty days to a month, as the eastern people did, make just 1260 days, for
these things are all contemporary: hence it appears, that 1260 prophetic
days, that is, years, contain the whole period of antichrist's reign and
continuance; so that could we tell where they began, it might be exactly known
when his reign will end; but for want of knowing the former, the best of
calculators have failed in the latter: but seeing the time when he was made
universal bishop by Phocas bids fair for the time of his open appearance, and the
beginning of his reign, and of his blasphemy, which was in the year 859, to
which, if we add 1260, the expiration of his reign will fall in the year 1866;
so that he may have upwards of an hundred and twenty years yet to continue; but
of this we cannot be certain; however, the conjecture is not improbable.”
[end of Gill citation on Revelation 13, emphasis mine] This is the wooden stake in the heart of the Rapture Cult
Vampires who continue to inject their Satanic venom into those foolish enough
to expose the lifeline of their faith to the Cult deceiver’s doctrinal
fangs. In short, how could John Gill believe Christ will return for him before
the tribulation when he was on record as believing the tribulation had
already been underway for hundreds of years? This belief coincides with the
fact that this occurred at a time when every historical account we have,
plainly indicates that not one of his contemporaries ever heard of the
doctrine! The fact the belief in the pretribulational rapture defies a
Scripturally balanced scrutiny is a powerful testimony as to the
doctrine’s cultic nature. The historical record is accurate. A
small group of Satanically inspired instigators channeled the doctrine. The key
figure, Margaret MacDonald, admitted she received it while in a trance.
The more “respectable” ministers, John Nelson Darby among them,
recognized the powerful response the novel doctrine elicited from the masses. By the time we reach the blind dumb dogs (Isaiah 56:20)
in the so called “Church” of our time, the Cult doctrine (now
polished and refined) has become a politically expedient formula from which
even political and military action can be manipulated — to say nothing of
the hundreds of millions of dollars the false doctrine has generated for the
purveyors of the fable. Even more ominously, once an individual has rejected the truth
in favor of the modern tradition of pretrib, they have relinquished the
Spiritual shield of the LORD that would protect them from the next layer of
deception — and this is occurring at a point when we’re all running
out of time to fully embrace the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ, and His soon
return. -- James Lloyd as well as our monthly prophecy letter via the postal service, send your Name, Postal Address, and Email Address to James@ChristianMediaNetwork.com |
Click here to make CMRI your homepage
The Christian Media Ministry makes our materials available through gifts made to the ministry. When you help Christian Media, we reciprocate with the materials in which you've indicated an interest. Supporters of our ministry do so because they believe in the message the LORD has given us, and we seek to follow the Spiritual directive which Christ gave to the Apostle Peter, in that we seek to feed His sheep. This constitutes a contract, in that gifts we receive indicate a willingness to be instructed in the things of the LORD, as the supporting gifts we receive from the body of Christ allow us to continue in the mission He has called us to. |