The Rapture of Babies

Should we expect that babies will be raptured?



If babies are to be rapture, will it be because they are innocent?



If babies are to be raptured to avoid the Great Tribulation, will it be because God does not want them to suffer under His wrath?



If babies are to be raptured to avoid the time of God's wrath, then why were they never raptured in times of God's wrath in the past?













For me, asking these questions began as a reult of seeing "A Thief in the Night" back in the 1970's. The movie was an early version of the currently popular Left Behind series by Dr. Tim LaHaye. After the movie, the pastor made it a point to say the movie was wrong in showing babies present after the rapture. He ws very clear in saying that all babies would be raptured. This was an accepted view and is repeated in Dr. LaHayes series, where even the unborn babies are raptured.



Since the Bible never speaks about the rapture of babies, it must be obvious that answers must be derived not from direct statements of scripture but from some logical reference to a larger doctrinal position. In fact, the question would never be asked without the presentation of a pretribulation rapture.

Now to make the dilemma more obvious, let us proposte that all babies will be raptured just before a worldwide tribulation period begins. Agreeing with Dr. Lahaye's premise, all babies even those yet in the womb will be raptured. Assuming that much, it would seem necessary to include in the rapture all those infants, toddlers, and young children under the age of accountability. Arbitrarily determining the age of accountability to be twelve (because of the age for bar mitzvah) we would now see that the years of the great tribulation would begin with no child under the age of twelve left anywhere in the world.



To push this a bit further, assuming that God will remove all the children under 12 (or you pick the age) because He does not want the innocent to suffere in this period of HIs wrath, why would we think any new babies would be conceived for the next seven years? This would mean that among the billions of earth's population no one could/would conceive for the next seven years. So in this model, by the end of the Great Tribulation there would be no one alive under the age of 19.



Did you follow that camera guy?

Forgive my poor humor, but do you see what I am saying?



Now someone may insist that you can have the rapture and start conception again the nextday, but I would remind you that the reason for rapturing babies to begin with is based on the idea that God will not let the innocent go through the Tribulation. So what difference would a day make?



The apparent absurdity of such a picture coupled with the display of all history says that babies are not exempted from whatever happens to the world at large or to any particular society or nation. Babies suffer when men do evil.