Here is a recent video from Pastor Joel Webbon where he spoke on “The Postmillennial View Of The Rapture.”
In it, he argues that “to meet” in 1 Thess 4:17 refers to an “immediate descent” to earth. Not only does he confuse the Greek word behind “to meet,” which is ἀπάντησιν with “catching up” from the Greek term ἁρπαγησόμεθα, but he confuses the meaning of ἀπάντησιν (“to meet”) claiming it refers to an “immediate decent” (see my article below that debunks this meaning of the Greek word).
But worse, he takes the parable of the virgins in Matt 25 where the term ἀπάντησιν (“to meet”) is used and reads details into the parable to fit his idea of an “immediate descent” to earth.
For example, he forces “and those who were ready went inside with him to the wedding banquet. Then the door was shut” to mean that Jesus will immediately descend to earth. Good grief. If anything, if I had a tendency to read into parables, I could make a better case that this refers to Jesus ushering his people to heaven before the Father (I don’t have to since we have explicit passages that teach this. See below).
This is exactly the stuff that pretribs do with parables, torturing them and reading (forcing) details into what was never intended, but we see a postmillennialist who would criticize pretribs doing this, doing this very thing.
The parable was never intended to go beyond its application of the separation of the elect from the wicked in Matt 24:31. Jesus simply invoked the parable to illustrate that we must be vigilant and prepared for Jesus’s coming during any season in our life, and that there will be a separation at the end. Be like the wise virgins; don’t be like the foolish ones.
But pastor Webbon reads his theology into the parable, forcing rapture-travel details from it!
When you see interpreters abuse parables by reading into them, that should be a red flag that they do not have didactic, clear passages that support the point they are trying to make.
And that brings me to my second point. Postmillennialism (and posttribulationism) do not have a single passage in all of Scripture that teaches that the church is immediately escorted to earth after the rapture.
On the other hand, prewrath has the following verses that show that after the rapture and resurrection, the church will be in heaven (not forever but temporarily):
2 Corinthians 4:14
John 14:1–3
Revelation 7:13–15
Isaiah 26:19–21
See the article below on where believers go after the rapture.
I don’t think Joe Webbon is familiar with prewrath, which teaches that we are ushered before the throne of the Father after the rapture while God’s eschatological wrath is poured out on humanity. Only afterward, as shown at the end of the Book of Revelation, will all of God’s people in the New Jerusalem descend to earth.
