Tuesday, March 13, 2007

The Most Positive View Of The Future?

Is dispensationalism the most positive viewpoint for the future of our world?

We get to be raptured and watch all the horrors from the safety of heaven...

Dispensationalists in their own words:

“God will destroy this earth that is so marred and cursed by Satan’s evil. He will include the atmospheric heaven to guarantee that all semblance of evil has been cleared away.”
[Tim LaHaye]

“John was hurtled by God’s Spirit through time up to the end of the twentieth century, shown the actual cataclysmic events of the Tribulation, then returned to the first century and told to write about what he had witnessed”
[Hal Lindsey, The Rapture: Truth or Consequences, 101-102]

“We are seeing in my judgment the birth-pangs that will be called in the future the beginning of the end. I believe in my mind that the Third World War has already begun.”
[John Hagee, BBC Interview]

Rayford Steele, Left Behind’s hero, is given multiple opportunities to thwart or destroy the evil Antichrist early in the series. But he refrains from doing so because he views the Bible as a preset script dictating that the Antichrist “must” live for seven more years.
[From Soul Harvest, The World Takes Sides, Volume 4 in the Left Behind Series]

“Scripture had come to life. This was the Red Horse of the Apocalypse. Next would come more death and famine and plagues until a quarter of the population of the earth that remained after the rapture was wiped out.”
[LaHaye and Jenkins, Nicolae, 108]

“The first time He came to earth, Jesus was the Lamb of God, led in silence to the slaughter. The next time He comes, He will be the Lion of the tribe of Judah who will trample His enemies until their blood stains His garments, and He shall rule with a rod of iron. Even so, come Lord Jesus!”
[John Hagee, Daniel to Doomsday, 239]

“That old curiosity was back. Rayford couldn’t shake it. No way he could be this close to Armageddon—he guessed less than seventy miles—and not do a flyover. It was crazy, he knew. He might find himself in an air traffic jam. But the possibility of seeing an aerial view of what he had been hearing and reading and praying about drew him like an undertow.”
[LaHaye and Jenkins, Armageddon, 234]

The new heavens and new earth won’t waste any space with oceans or mountains or deserts, since such landscapes are uninhabitable for humans and are therefore “worthless.”
[LaHaye]

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Jon,

the article you gave me left questions unanswered, which a lot of the literature you're into is guilty of. not that there's anything wrong with that, what an author does in the privacy of his own home is his business and no-one else's.

the question is: Are Christian's questions supposed to be left unanswered? the article fusses over trivial matters for a while. i do not care whether 'taken' means to be slaughtered or to be ascended into heaven with Christ for seven years.

the commentary on the 'olivet discourse' delivers social gospel ideology, once again...not that there's anything wrong with that. the social gospel was a good thing. i still struggle with mat. 25, it just keeps on reminding me that charity is prioritized in scripture, so much more than any pastor will ever ever ever ever admit.

so the epilogue wipes out heaven as well. dang, and i was really looking forward to that! like i said, questions questions questions... no heaven... ok, so where did Jesus go when he ascended? dead Christians, where are they right now? i don't like the epilogue, it doesn't say anything new, i already knew that Christ lived in me, just a bunch of fapwah, (if you know what i mean).

so, are we supposed to have questions answered? this article claims 'no', as is seen from this quote:
"What God gives you instead of a system of answers is a blessing, a new name-a liveing relationship. You are forever changed by the encounter. You have seen the face of God."
it's not to hard to smell the b.s. of the left behind series. that picture is like a product of the telephone game, quite far from the original image.

unanswered questions:

1. where are dead Christians?
2. is a new earth all you believe in? is there no heaven at all, if no, then where did Jesus go when he ascended?
3. have you seen my pants, i can't find them?

ap

Anonymous said...

1st. I think your pants are still in Danny's mom's bedroom.

2nd. I have to mention the last quote left by LaHaye about mountains and deserts... This quote stood out to me the most, because I expected all the others. This just shows how little people with that mind set care about life today, EVEN though they are probably millionares living in mantions. "The authors report that their bestsellers have earned each of them $10 million. LaHaye."

"Because fundamentalists have failed to adopt a positive worldview, they hang onto his every oracular word, believing that their "blessed hope" will come when they take wings with their soon_coming king. LaHaye's notions are the epitome of quick_fix solutions to life's real challenges. What about overpopulation, disease, hunger, and world peace? Fundamentalists haven't a clue about what to do about any of these problems, and it doesn't bother them in the least. Don't worry, Jesus will whisk the believers away – too bad for those left behind. If LaHaye and his fundamentalist followers don't want to be part of the solution, then they shouldn't be part of the problem."

If you want to read more of this article here is the link.

http://www.tylwythteg.com/enemies/lahaye.html

But to AP's question of Heaven and such, to me Jesus went to go back and be with God. Whether it is up in the air somewhere or just another dimension doesn't really seem to be relevant. I don't think the question is whether or not it is a litteral place like Clevland, but what it is to be there.

GED Nate