I really feel sorry for Hibbard. Although he is a nice guy, he just has so many misses in his system that he continues to assume and make crazy comments that are all based on his own deductions. There is absolutely no passage which gives any credibility to a rapture in 70ad. No passage that says anything is a past event.
Walt Hibbard
To put it all together in logical and sensible form, when Jesus returned in AD70, He snatched away that combined throng of OT/NT believers and took them to where He was and to where the Father was, to the PLACE THAT HE HAD PREPARED FOR THEM(!!) IN HEAVEN.
This was the HOPE of those first century believers. This hope was realized. Jesus did not disappoint them by leaving them hanging, not receiving the promises, not delivering them from this corrupt and sinful world of persecutionand injustice, but ACTUALLY fulfilled everything that He and His inspired N.T.writers promised TO THOSE LIVING SAINTS OF THAT DAY as to what would happen tothem. SMALL WONDER that these believers were so excited, so amazed, so thrilledthat the long-promised end of that Old Covenant age had arrived. It was BIG NEWSand they were perched on the edge of their seats awaiting that soblime moment inhistory!!
Yes, a real rapture of saints happened in AD 70 (they followed their Savior who had ascended to Heaven in AD 30 to prepare them a place to dwell!!). Read again, brother, that ever-so-descriptive passage in I Thess 4:13-18, andl et those words soak into your mind, words that warmed the hearts of those persecuted first century saints, words that gave them hope of experiencially enjoying all that Jesus had prepared for them to enjoy with Him and His Father.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PretCosmos/message/16750
