Calvinism's Roman Catholic Origin: Part 3

Somebody tells you, “The pre-tribulation rapture was invented by Jesuits,” and they say it with total confidence. We decided to slow that claim down and put it on the timeline. If we’re going to talk about Bible prophecy, the Council of Trent, and the Counter-Reformation, then dates matter, sources matter, and reading what people actually wrote matters.

We start with a moving reminder of why truth is never just academic: a listener behind bars writes to say jail became “rescue,” not just arrest. From there, we shift into the heart of our teaching series on the Roman Catholic roots of amillennial Calvinism, and then we tackle five reasons the pre-tribulation rapture did not come from Jesuits. We look at what’s often attributed to Francisco Ribera, what the early church fathers believed about futurism, and why that’s not the same thing as claiming a pre-trib rapture was manufactured in the 1500s.

Then we address the name that gets brought up constantly in conspiracy-style arguments: Manuel de Lacunza. We compare his prophetic system with later dispensational writers like John Nelson Darby and C. I. Scofield, point out what Lacunza actually taught, and highlight the inconvenient detail critics rarely mention: his work was hostile to Rome and was banned by the Pope. We also walk through evidence used to argue pre-trib teaching predates Lacunza, and we end with a simple challenge from Scripture: don’t be deceived, test the spirits, and search the Scriptures.

If you care about end times doctrine, church history, and handling the Bible honestly, listen through and then tell us what you think. Subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

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Transcript

Welcome And Opening Prayer

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Welcome to the Preaching the Cross Radio Podcast, featuring the radio ministry of Pastor James W. Knox of the Bible Baptist Church of Deland, Florida. Our prayer is that these half-hour Bible study programs will bring the lost to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and enable the saved to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Savior. Now here's your host, Pastor James W. Knox.

SPEAKER_02 0:38

Thanks to each and every one of you for tuning in today. I'm Brother James, and I greet you in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. And I welcome you once again to the Preaching of the Cross Radio Broadcast. We're happy to have those of you that are free and walking about and on your jobs and in your homes. We're glad to have you listening into the program today. But uh increasingly the mailbag is showing us that we're also glad to have those of you that are incarcerated listening into the program today. Several letters that have come uh in just this past week from those in various prisons who are listening to the preaching of the cross radio broadcast and uh learning and profiting thereby, and we certainly thank God for each and every

A Jailhouse Letter About Rescue

SPEAKER_02 1:23

one of you. Uh part of one letter, and I'll just just read this to you. I was just looking uh looking through some mail uh before we began uh the broadcast just a moment ago, but uh says uh your ministry has been bearing fruit here at the jail. Uh I am one of the fruit. I have listened uh to many of your uh teachings. And first of all, I'd like to say thank you as another soul in this lost and perishing generation. Thank you for yielding yourself to the Holy Spirit, being used in the capacity you are. You are right when you said you can't deny that you go to great lengths to extract the truth from the truth, and your presentation is unpenetratable by the evil oppressor. I commend you for your stand and dedication to the Lord. I'm very attracted to your teachings and have never been fed this way before. I thank God for you and your ministry. And then listen to this. He asks for prayer, talks about the uh the things that he's done. He's not proud of them in any way. Uh talks about the sin that uh he was uh was uh trapped in before uh he was uh arrested and taken to jail. He says, uh, but uh I was doing this, doing that on the streets prior to my arrest, or rescue may be the proper term. God has cleansed me and holding me responsible to yield to him for regular maintenance on this wretched, sinful flesh. Now, you know what that man said? He said, I wasn't arrested, I was rescued. And uh, had it not been for these uh these dire circumstances, uh I would still be out of the street, still living in sin. And so uh may I say to all of you listening today behind bars that uh if you'll allow this uh this situation uh to allow God to use this situation, get you in the Bible, to change your heart, to bring you to Jesus Christ that your soul might be saved, you might be born again, uh, you'll look back and say, That this is the time of my rescue. For God took me away from that old crowd of those old friends and running mates and brought me into a place where I could come to know the Lord Jesus Christ, the one true friend that sticketh closer than any brother. There's no one that's ever cared for you like Jesus. There's no one that ever will care for you like Jesus. And to know the Lord Jesus Christ is not only to know life eternal beyond the grave, but it's to know life more abundant here in this world. You know sin's never done anything good for anybody. The devil has never been a help to anyone who has followed him. It's all just a lie, it's all a great deception out there in that world, but there's truth to be found in the person of Jesus Christ, there's truth to be found in the pages of the Holy Bible, and we certainly thank and praise the Lord Jesus Christ for those of you that are listening today behind uh prison walls and hope and pray that God will make the program, continue to make the program a blessing to each and every one of you. We

Setting The Series Foundation

SPEAKER_02 4:14

began, uh, I believe two broadcasts ago, if I'm not mistaken. This is the third broadcast, and we are dealing with uh what Paul Bailey in his excellent work uh titled The Supreme Irony. It is an exposure of the Roman Catholic roots of a millennial Calvinism. And on each of the first two broadcasts, we have had to lay a foundation and lay a groundwork for those who attend churches where the word of God is not taught and the Bible is not studied. A millennial, that means a belief that Jesus Christ is not coming back to this earth to set up the thousand-year kingdom, even though the word of God in hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of places says that Jesus Christ is coming back to this earth and he will set up a kingdom. And yet those who follow the teachings of John Calvin, though many of them quite quietly, because they don't want anyone to know they're a Calvinist, they don't like the name, though they like the teachings, uh, don't realize that the roots of their of their system and the doctrinal foundations upon which their system uh was built was none other than a man named Augustine, who was also the responsible for the for the cornerstones of the Roman Catholic system.

Debunking The Jesuit Origin Claim

SPEAKER_02 5:25

On the broadcast today, we want to talk about five reasons why the doctrine of the pre-tribulation rapture did not come from the Jesuits. Now, those who criticize the doctrine that the saved born again believers who make up the true church, the body of the Lord Jesus Christ, will be taken out of this world before the seven year time of Jacob's trouble, the seventieth week upon Daniel's people, the Jews, those who deny that truth say that it was invented and made up by Jesuits in order to take the heat and take the pressure off the Pope. It is an historical fact, however, that part of the Roman Catholic Counter-Reformation, which was launched by the Jesuits at the Council of Trent, which was held between 1545 and 1563, included the promulgation of futurist prophetic views, in particular those of Francisco Ribera, R. I B E R A, who lived from 1537 to 1591. These futurist prophetic views were set forth in an attempt to lift the prophetic symbols of Babylon and the Antichrist out of contemporary history. While this is true, it is a complete myth to say that the Jesuits invented the futurist view of prophecy, since the teaching existed long before 1545. A matter of fact, it's in the book of Job, the oldest book of literature on the face of the earth. Many of the anti-Nicene fathers, that is, uh those who lived before 325 AD, were decidedly futuristic in their prophetic teachings. Of course, the A millennial Calvinists will dismiss the importance of this fact by saying this is no surprise, since everything was future to the early church fathers. But this is to miss the point entirely. Early church fathers did not merely look ahead to the fulfillment of prophetic events in the future, they held to an entire system of futurist interpretation, which is opposed to the reformed historicist system, that is, the system that teaches that the prophetic works of the Bible deal with already accomplished history.

Early Church Fathers And Futurism

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Anyone who reads the writings of the Anti Nicene Church Fathers will find among them those who held to some or all of the following points. Number one, the Antichrist will be an individual, not a succession, such as the papacy. Number two, the Antichrist will set himself up as God in the temple at Jerusalem, not as the Pope in Rome. Number three, the ten toes, the ten kings, and the ten horns of Daniel denote individuals. Number six, the twelve hundred and sixty, twelve hundred and ninety, thirteen hundred and thirty-five, and twenty three hundred days of Daniel are literal days, not years. And number seven, the reign of Antichrist and the apocalyptic events of Daniel and Revelation will be a brief crisis. Now, none of those things were invented by Jesuits at the Council of Trent. None of those things were invented after 1545. All of those teachings are found throughout the writings of the so-called church fathers who lived and wrote and taught and labored before 325 AD, that is before Augustine set up the Roman Catholic system. Writers such as H. Grattan Guinness, O. T. Alice, and Michael de Somlean are therefore in error when they suggest that futurism has its source in sixteenth century teachings of the Tridentine Jesuits. In fact, a close study of Francisco Rivera's writings reveals that his prophetic teachings were a mixture of historicism, futurism, and Augustinian abillennialism. Like Augustine, he believed the millennium ran from Christ's resurrection to the Antichrist kingdom. That is, he took a word Mili, meaning thousand. He took a word millennium, meaning a thousand year reign, and said that it doesn't mean a thousand, and it doesn't mean a thousand years, it means from the resurrection of Christ to the kingdom of the Antichrist, which is a pretty sloppy way to handle the Bible, if you ask me. It's important to note that the teachings of Rivera and the other tridentine Jesuits of the Counter-Reformation did not include any reference to a pre-tribulation rapture. Now, follow me. The teaching of those who are out to undermine the faith of God's people and overthrow their belief and their confidence in a pre-tribulation rapture, they say that this doctrine of the pre-tribulation rapture originated with Francisco Rivera and the Council of Trent long about 1545. But if anyone takes the time to read the writings and the teachings of Rivera and study the material produced by the Tridentine Jesuits of the Counter-Reformation, they won't find one reference in any of those writings, in any of those letters, in any of their correspondence to a pre-tribulation rapture. Don't you find that significant? Now you know what these men count on? These men count on the fact that people won't study. They'll just find their favorite preacher and believe everything he tells them, and never check the record, never check the facts, just be make themselves blind followers of blind guides. And people write to us and they call us and they say, Brother James, you sound like you're angry all the time. Brother James, you sound like you're upset with somebody all the time. Those of us that know what's going on are very angry, and we have cause to be. Those of us who check the facts are constantly being infuriated by those who won't check the facts and set themselves up as teachers of truth and leaders of men, and they're leading them into a ditch. That's something to get upset about.

Lacunza And The Banned Book

SPEAKER_02 12:14

Now the actual Jesuit whose prophetic views pre-tribulation dispensationalists are now being accused of the following, was called Manuel de Lacunza i Diaz or Diaz. He lived in the 18th century, born in 1731, died in 1801, and he allegedly wrote, because no one can prove it, under the pseudonym of Rabbi Juan Yosephat Ben Ezra. But we can be sure that Lacunza did not invent the pre-tribulation rapture of the church, and I'll give you five reasons why. Number one, Manuel de Lacunza i Diaz had a prophecy system that was vastly different from that of J. N. Darby and that of C. I Schofield, whom the modern writers, the modern writers that are trying to deny the pre-tribulation rapture, claim they claim that Darby and Schofield followed the lead of Lacunza. But if you read the writings of Lacunza and the writings of Darby and the writings of Schofield, which these men have never done, or they certainly, if they did read them, they certainly didn't comprehend what they read, you would find that the two prophetic systems are entirely different. Most A millennialists who parrot the Lacunza rumor do not know what Lacunza taught. The fact of the matter is that Lacunza's book, entitled The Coming of the Messiah in Glory and Majesty, actually discredits the Roman Catholic Church. Lacunza viewed the harlot of Revelation 17 as papal, and he taught that the false prophet would be the Roman Catholic priesthood. His book was banned by Pope Leo XII on September the 6th, 1824, and in Spain the Roman Catholic Church sought to suppress the book and withdraw it from circulation wherever possible. And yet these men are telling you that the doctrine of the pre-tribulation rapture was invented by a Jesuit priest and set forth by the papacy to take the heat off the Roman Catholic Church, and the book that these men are now claiming laid the foundation for Darby and Schofield's works, attacked the Roman Catholic Church and the papal system and the priesthood, and was banned by the Pope. That's Pope Leo XII, September 6, 1824. Now Lacunza's prophetic teachings are unlike anything written by any dispensationalist teacher, living or dead. He taught that the Antichrist would be, quote, a moral body composed of innumerable individuals. Darby and Schofield never taught anything like that one day in their life. Lacunza taught that the Antichrist was not a single individual, even though the Word of God says that he will be. Lacunza taught that the tribulation under the Antichrist would precede Christ's second coming, at which point the Antichrist would be destroyed, and a partial rapture would take place. Now, he got that right, it just wasn't the rapture of the church. It was catching the catching away of God's true tribulation witnesses, and the 144,000 that were sealed that they should not die. Has nothing to do with the church. That 70th week has to do with Daniel's people. It's the time of Jacob's trouble. And the hundred and forty-four thousand witnesses were twelve thousand male virgin Jews out of each of the twelve tribes of the nation of Israel. But these men never bothered to read the Bible, or if they read it, they never bothered to believe it. Lacunza also taught that some dead Christians who miss being resurrected at the partial rapture will rise at a final general resurrection with a forty-five day gap between these two events, during which the earth will be renovated by fire. Now you couldn't possibly get your Bible that fouled up unless you just weren't saved. Because the Holy Spirit of God leads and guides the believer into all truth. And the Holy Spirit of God would never lead and guide a man into botching the Bible that that dreadfully. Six times in Revelation chapter number twenty, you're told that the reign of Christ on earth is one thousand years. Where anybody came up with forty-five days is a mystery beyond explanation. He took the twelve hundred and ninety days of Daniel and the thirteen hundred and thirty-five days of Daniel, and figured out there were forty-five days in between them, and just took a shot in the dark, and he missed the mark. Now, that material is taken from present truth publishers, a book by Roy Hubner, entitled Precious Truths Divided and Defended through J. N. Darby. It's clear, therefore, that Lacunza taught a variation of a futurist post-tribulationalism and not a pre-tribulation rapture of the church. So when the men who deny the pre-tribulation rapture of the church say that it was invented by Lacunza, a Roman Catholic writer, they don't tell you that Lacunza's writing was banned by the Roman Catholic Church and that he never taught a pre-tribulation rapture of the Church. They're deceivers.

Pretrib Evidence Before Lacunza

SPEAKER_02 17:44

Number two, the place in history of the pre-tribulation rapture doctrine predates Lacunza. And therefore, it predates anyone who is accused of following him. For example, in a sermon from the first millennium A.D. delivered by Pseudo-Ephraim. Pseudo-Ephraim lived in uh where they lived sometime between 374 and 627 A.D. That's all we can nail down for certain. But he said this all the saints and elect of God are gathered together before the tribulation, which is to come, and are taken to the Lord, in order that they may not see at any time the confusion which overwhelms the world because of our sins. Now you can find that. John Alexander cites it in the Byzantine Apocalyptic Tradition, page 210, University of California Press, 1985. An American writer, and you you've probably heard of him or seen his writings advertised, he advertises extensively in fundamentalist magazines. John L. Bray. John L. Bray is not trying to get lost people saved, he's trying to get saved people fouled up. And John L. Bray spent years falsely accusing those who hold to the pre-tribulation rapture of following Lacunza the Jesuit. John L. Bray offered, in over 114,000 copies of his books, five hundred dollars to anyone who could produce a documented statement earlier than Lacunza, which taught a two-stage coming of Christ separated by a stated period of time. Bray finally had to pay up in 1995 when he was made aware of an edition of a book by Morgan Edwards, who lived from 1722 to 1795. And Morgan Edwards was one of those famous Baptist preachers of the early American colonial period. Edwards was born in Wales. He was educated at Bristol College, England. He was ordained in 1757 in Cork, Ireland. After going to America, he founded Brown University, the oldest Baptist college in America, and most people don't know that. Frank Morata wrote a book on Morgan Edwards, an eighteenth century pre-tribulationalist, uh, in uh it's from present truth publishers, and it's well worth the read. John L. Bray has now admitted that Morgan Edwards' book, entitled Two Academical Exercises on Subjects Bearing the Following Titles, Millennium and Last Novelties, which was published in 1788, clearly taught the pre-tribulation rapture before Lacunza finished his manuscript in 1790. As a matter of fact, uh Edwards wrote his book in 1744, and it was over four decades later that he finally got it published or got around to publishing it. But uh no matter the publication date of 1788 is two years before Lacunza finished his manuscript. Not only that, J.N. Darby never even drew up his views on the rapture until December 1826 or January 1827. This was before Margaret MacDonald was ever born, and you may or may not remember her from our uh series of studies on the rapture, uh, but Margaret MacDonald wasn't even born then. She was the young charismatic uh woman who had visions, and some writers uh have falsely tried to link the origin of the pre-tribulation rapture to Margaret Macdonald, although Margaret MacDonald never taught a two-stage second coming of Christ either. You see, these men just won't tell the truth. And then when I point out that they don't tell the truth, people say I'm critical and that I have a bad attitude. No, I love God, love the truth, love the Bible, and love your soul, and that compels me to point out blind guides whenever we find them. Now, Roy Leibsey, L I V E S E Y, is a British writer. He has popularized the Jesuit conspiracy charge. But even he had to admit in his New Age bulletin of March 1995 that he relied on John L. Bray's research. And the anti-rapture house of cards came tumbling down. You see, Leibsey put out some books and said, Yes, sir, I've got news for you. The pre-tribulation rapture was invented by a Jesuit by the name of Lacunza. Did he know that? Did he even know who Lacunza was? Had he ever read one sentence of Lacunza's writings? No, he didn't. He just saw that John L. Bray was making a lot of money selling books to mess people up, and he figured he could make some money doing the same thing, and so he wrote a book, and then when John Bray was found out to be a false teacher, then Libsey, at least, he was mad enough to admit that he was a false teacher because he'd been following a false teacher. Don't you follow one? The third reason, the third reason why the pre-tribulation rapture of the church was not an invention of Lacunza the uh the Roman Catholic writer.

Why The Conspiracy Narrative Collapses

SPEAKER_02 23:15

Tens of thousands of believers all over the world who are convinced that there will be a tree pre-tribulation rapture of the Church, followed by a manifestation of the man of sin, reject the Roman Catholic Church as a pagan Babylonian counterfeit religious harlot. This fact alone proves that it is a lie to teach that Lacunza's theories are part of a great conspiracy by the Roman Catholic Church to bring all the Protestant denominations back under her wing. If the Roman Catholic Church made up a pre-tribulation rapture to get Bible believers to come back to Rome, it sure was a failed experiment. It certainly didn't work. In fact, as A Millennialists will admit, on mainland Europe today, the Reformed denominations have become liberal, whereas the so-called uh Derby assemblies are the strongest group of sound believers anywhere to be found. And the United States of America, the dispensationalists, are the only ones left that stand against the Roman system, while the Amelinialists and the Calvinists are all blowing kisses to Rome and hugging their priests at the promise keepers' rallies.

unknown 24:32

J.

SPEAKER_02 24:33

N. Darby was hated by the Jesuits in his day. They posed a threat to his life in Switzerland. That's uh that's not uh denominational propaganda. That's from the Encyclopedia Britannica, 1953, volume 18, page 93. Uh, Darby had seen many Roman Catholics saved, and as usual, wherever God was working, the Church of Rome showed up to try and kill those that God was using to do the work. To suggest that Darby derived his knowledge of the scriptures through Jesuit eyes is complete and total nonsense and has no foundation at all in the truth. Now, here's what's going to happen. We we broadcast Bible teaching like this, and people people who who who claim to love the truth will call the radio station and ask the station manager to ban this broadcast while crying out that thank God we're Americans and we're free and we have First Amendment rights to free speech. And then these men will go in their churches and uh have their little Bible studies and put out their little pamphlets and call men who have done their homework and present both sides of an issue that people might discern between good and evil, right and wrong, truth and error. They will condemn and criticize us as being hateful and lacking the spirit of Christianity. And the truth of the matter is, we just love the truth, and we love the truth enough to find out what the truth is, and to know what we believe and why we believe it, and to point men and women to two things. Number one, the truth, and number two, their need to stand against error and falsehood. Jesus said, Be not deceived. He said, Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits. He said, Search the scriptures to see whether or not these things are so. And my friend, there is no proof whatsoever. There is no proof whatsoever that the teaching of a pre-tribulation rapture is anything but Bible doctrine revealed by the Holy Spirit to those who study the Bible and believe it. It is not the invention of dispensationalists, it is not the invention of Roman Catholics, it is not the invention of Calvinists, it is not the invention of Darby or Schofield or anybody else. It is recorded in the pages of the Holy Bible, given by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to reveal to man the plans and purposes of a holy God. Amen and amen.

Free CD Offer And Closing

SPEAKER_01 27:12

Thank you so much for listening today to the preaching of the Cross Radio Broadcast. This has been message number three in a six-part series on the Roman Catholic origin of Calvinism. We are going to send this entire series on one compact disc, free of charge to everyone who writes and requests it. No solicitation, no follow-up letters, no obligation whatsoever. Free of charge, we will send you the six-part study, the Roman Catholic Origins of Calvinism. Visit our website, JamesW.Knox.org. Leave your name, your mailing address, and the call letters of the station to which you listen, and we will send you this entire series. That's JamesWnox.org. Come by today and get your free copy. The announcement will be on in just a moment and let you know when this program will be heard again over this radio station. And we hope and pray that at that time you and a friend that you invite to listen with you will join us for the Preaching of the Cross Radio Broadcast. Until then, I'm Brother James. May the Lord richly bless you.

SPEAKER_00 28:33

And thanks for tuning in today. Join us every weekday for another episode of the Preaching of the Cross Radio Podcast. For hundreds of hours of in-depth expository Bible teaching, please visit our YouTube channel, James W. Knox Sermons, our sermon audio page, Bible Baptistland, or our website, Bible Baptisttheland.com. Until next time and throughout eternity, may Jesus Christ be praised.