The Rapture Question Answered: Plain and Simple

by Robert D. Van Kampen

Answers the question surrounding the Rapture of the church at Christ's second coming and the timing of the end time events, as clearly taught in Scripture.

Genres: Theology, Christian

211 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1997

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book attempts to reconcile the passages that appear to teach pre trib and post trib rapture, by suggesting that believers will be on earth for half of the tribulation.

It didn't convince me, but it is good to ecamine all viewpoints.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quick read. A clear statement of what the author believes and why, backed up by solid Scriptural reasoning. I've been a pre-wrather for over 15 years, and this book makes a convincing case.

Gets a downgrade for punctuation. Way too many exclamation marks.

[Gary · Rating 1 out of 5]

My view of eschatology is Pre-Tribulational and pre-millennial. Simply put, I believe Christ will return in the air to Rapture His church before the Tribulation and return to earth with His church at the end of the Tribulation to usher in the Millennium, the thousand year reign of Christ on earth. That being said, I fully respect Godly teachers who hold other views (Sproul, James White, Bauchan, etc.) and realize it is not a salvific issue and that God will decide the specifics of His end times. I could be wrong. What I take issue with, though, are teachers who insist that my views are not Biblical (they are) and that I must adhere to their teaching or suffer some horrible outcome to include damnation. That brings me to this book by Robert Van Kampen.

Throughout his book, Kampen misuses and twists Scripture so that it matches his belief in the Pre-wrath Rapture. He also believes that only a certain elite part of the church will be spared this wrath, whom he refers to as the "true bond-servants of Christ". So he makes the unbiblical claim that the book of Revelation is not for the church in general but only for this elite group (those who believe the way he believes). He uses Revelation 22:19 to support his warning but conveniently leaves out Revelation 22:18 that says ADDING to the book will result in having the plagues of the book added to them! He actually is adding to the book of Revelation with the following statement! He can believe what he wants but adding to Scripture places his book in the #forhereticalresearchonly category!

This is the fruit of being so sure of oneself that your primary belief in the sufficiency of Christ and the Scriptures is overtaken by your zeal for your position: The author believes in the Pre-wrath Rapture and that is fine but it's an entirely different position to take that my Pre-Tribulation position will lead me to fall away from Christ because I experience tribulation. How weak must Christ be if He cannot preserve me in spite of my misguided beliefs! Trust Christ NOT your presuppositions! Unfortunately, I am finding this book to be #forhereticalresearchonly .

[Evan Birkby · Rating 5 out of 5]

The arguments for a prewrath rapture are put forth effectively and the analysis of the interpretation of key greek words is very well done. The author added and index to these words and that was an interesting touch.

I was hoping to learn why the Prewrath advocates seem to often suggest a rapture point up to a couple years after the midpoint rather than a Mid-tribulation rapture which also seems to be in their view. Van Kampen unfortunately did not answer that question. The book was good, but as one who now holds a prewrath Midtribulation view, it was unfortunate that Van Kampen simply dismissed the view as not effectively different from the pretribulation view. It was also lacking any argumentation concerning big picture views such as amillennial or post millennial as opposed to premillennialism.

He suggested Michael the Archangel as a possible candidate for the identity of the restrainer that must be removed before the Man of sin is revealed just before the rapture. That seems like a possibility, although I myself have suggested it could also be the Spirit of Enoch.

One of the other reviews claims something I did not see. They claimed VanKampen did not expect the saints without bodies at the fifth seal to have bodies until the millennium. I understood Van Kampen to be saying they would have received their glorified bodies at the rapture and the multitude in Revelation 19 had bodies indicating these were the raptured saints.

Van Kampen did not change my view from mid Trib. He strengthened my confidence.

He did not quote once from Revelation 11. If he had I would have been more impressed.

[Michael Vincent · Rating 4 out of 5]

An important book in the presentation of the pre-wrath rapture argument. Van Kampen was the one who influenced Rosenthal. I don't find his work quite as clear as Rosenthal, but a good explanation of the Scriptures and his view.

[Brett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Solid, biblical presentation and defense of the pre-wrath rapture position.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author of this book originated the Pre-Wrath Rapture theory. The previous book was The Sign. But I think Marvin Rosenthal wrote the first book on the subject, because they were working out the details of this theory together, but Kampen thought it up first.