This is confirmed in the fact that the rapture involves Christ coming for His saints in the air prior to the tribulation, whereas at the second coming He will come with His saints to the earth to reign for a thousand years (Revelation 19; 20:1-6). The fact that Christ comes with His holy ones (redeemed believers) at the second coming presumes they have been previously raptured. (He cannot come with them until He has first come for them.)
