Posted on 10/07/2008 8:41:53 PM PDT by Alex Murphy
The pages of failed end-of-the-world prophecies could make up a whole new testament. Now there's the Rev. David Jeremiah, an East County mega-pastor and TV evangelist who says the end is coming, in the words of a familiar church song, “soon and very soon.”
In a new book that hit bookstores this week, Jeremiah offers 10 “prophetic clues” he says point to an imminent conclusion many Christians have clung to for 2,000 years – the Rapture (when the faithful will be summoned instantly into Heaven), followed by the Tribulation (a seven-year period of turmoil), Armageddon (the final battle of good versus evil) and the Second Coming of Jesus (to reign on Earth).
Jeremiah doesn't set a date in “What in the World Is Going On?” (Thomas Nelson; $22.99). But his urgency is clear: “His return is close at hand,” he writes, adding that Christians should be motivated “as never before to live in readiness.”
“I have no intention of setting any dates or saying this is when this is going to happen,” Jeremiah says, settling back on a couch in his office at Turning Point, his international television and radio ministry headquartered in Lakeside.
“All I'm saying is some of the things that the word of God prophesied would take place as we near this time are happening in ways you cannot contradict.”
The 67-year-old senior pastor of Shadow Mountain Community Church in El Cajon, where he preaches to 7,000 people at weekend services, says he was motivated to write this book after so many people kept questioning him about world events.
He reached out to other biblical prophecy scholars for their thoughts. Among them was Tim LaHaye, co-author of the best-selling “Left Behind” series of Christian apocalyptic novels. In 1981, Jeremiah followed LaHaye as senior pastor of Scott Memorial Baptist Church, which later became Shadow Mountain.
The 10 signs Jeremiah settled on range from the emergence of Israel as the dominant country-of-residence for Jews and the rise in power of Russia and Iran to the world's reliance on Middle Eastern oil and the coming together of countries under the European Union.
“I'm not a sensationalist,” says Jeremiah, a grandfather and two-time cancer survivor who is a well-known speaker at evangelical venues like the Billy Graham Training Center.
“I would be the last person in the world to try to draw sensationalist truths from the Scripture,” he adds. “You can get a crowd if you know how to frame your stuff, but I'm past all that. I don't need to do that. But what I do know is this: This is a different day unlike anything that I've ever known, unlike anything the world has ever known. So what does that mean?”
What it means for him is that conversion efforts need to be jump-started like a battery in a long-idled sedan.
“We've forgotten that there's an urgency about what we've been called to do,” he says. He leans forward on the couch, as if to emphasize his impatience. “I think it puts an urgency and a seriousness into our walk.” Jeremiah is particularly tough on Islam in his book. Islamic terrorism is among the signs he says are pointing toward the end times.
“One of the most baffling and unsettling puzzles about Islam is the constant contention on the part of some Muslim leaders that they are a peace-loving people,” he writes. “Yet even as they make the claim, Islamic terrorists continue to brutally murder any person or group with whom they find fault.”
Jeremiah does not believe Allah and God are the same. He also believes that Islam hates Jews and Christians.
“Experts say that 15 to 20 percent of Muslims are radical enough to strap a bomb on their bodies in order to kills Christians and Jews,” he writes. “If this number is accurate, it means about 300 million Muslims are willing to die in order to take you and me down.”
His solution: convert Muslims to Christianity.
Jeremiah says he is not trying to be incendiary; he's just being true to his convictions. “I'm not intolerant,” he insists. “I just believe totally what I believe, and if I have to go along in order to get along, water down what I believe, I'll never do that.”
But Khaleel Mohammed, associate professor of religious studies at San Diego State University and a voice for moderate Islam, says Jeremiah isn't helping matters.
“It's not constructive in any way for the Christian or the Muslim,” Mohammed says. “Everything he is saying is so divisive.”
Mohammed also thinks Jeremiah's portrait is one-sided; after all, thousands of Muslim civilians have died in the American-led invasion of Iraq.
“I'm not denying there are Christians and Muslims agitating against each other, but I don't think it's religious,” Mohammed says. Still, he adds, the future lies in interfaith cooperation, a move the “old guard” on both sides is resisting. “They are just fighting against the tide. ... Among Muslims, you'll find preachers who are as nonsensical as Jeremiah.”
Scholars who study end-times prophecies say Jeremiah's book, and others like it, should be handled with care.
“I would say the odds are enormous, if not overwhelming, that he, like every other Christian prophet over the last 2,000 years, will be wrong,” says Richard Landes, associate professor of history at Boston University and director of the Center for Millennial Studies.
Jews and Muslims also have their doomsday beliefs, Landes says, but apocalypticism has been particularly rampant in Christianity. It was, after all, Jesus himself who forewarned his followers in the New Testament to “keep watch” and “be ready” for his return.
Ever since, Christians have watched for signs of the Second Coming, scanning the Bible for clues and codes, says Jon Stone, a religious studies professor at Cal State Long Beach.
Stone acknowledges there is a built-in audience for books like Jeremiah's. “I think people like to be in on a secret, to know something other people don't know,” he explains. “This is, by far, the biggest secret in terms of religious things.”
Jeremiah is planning a series of sermons at Shadow Mountain this fall on living with confidence in a chaotic world. He plans to tell the congregation, among other things, that this is the time for the faithful to hang together, to focus on the church and the Bible.
Jeremiah says biblical prophecy isn't a popular pulpit topic. “A lot of buddies of mine say they don't ever preach on prophecy because they think it's irrelevant. ... Well, if they read the Bible, they will find out that if you study prophecy, it gives you incredible insight as to how you should live your life today.”
He resists efforts to be coaxed into being more specific about when all this is going to happen. It's not about that, he repeats. “It is about the awareness of what the events that are happening in the world today mean and how we can look at it through the third lens of the Bible and make more sense of it than we would otherwise.”
I don’t have time or inclination in the near future to point out the assumptions. Maybe someone else will.
So, now the topic has changed to the fact that the Anti-Christ is satan incarnate?
Didn’t realize anyone had ANY doubt about THAT! LOL.
Assuming, groping, extrapolating, stretching . . .
to avoid the simple meaning of I Thes 4:16-17
is a rather dubious exercise, at best, to me.
Have done no such thing.
Scripture is clear enough
without adding man’s assumptions, extrapolations, fantasies etc. on such scores.
I’m not the one jumping all over the place shoehorning extrapolated meaning on top of extrapolated meaning to dismiss plain Scripture in I Thess 4:16-17.
Excuse me. II Timothy 3:16 ALL (got that ALL) Scripture is given by inspiration of GOD;,
and is profitable for doctrine,
for reproof,
for correction,
for instruction in righteousness:
Now you exhibited the accusatory tone of me ignoring your precious two scriptures as cutting them out, while you have been ignoring the rest and assuming things not in evidence.
Not my reality.
You asked — “What happens to babies born after the rapture?”
They live during the Millennium, the 1,000 year reign of Christ on this earth — the Kingdom of God.
And..., the ones who accept Christ as their Savior during the Tribulation (likewise, “after” the Rapture) also live during the Millennium.
I hope that solves the puzzle for you...
You might find it very interesting to read Randy Alcorn’s book on “Heaven”. It’s extremely enlightening. It even opens the eyes of Christians (if you are one) and presents a totally different picture of Heaven to those who aren’t Christians.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0842379428/
YOu said — “Christ said “I have foretold you all things”, after years and years of searching through scripture I still yet cannot find Him saying ONE word RAPTURE or anything about the mythical ideology of RAPTURE.”
Well, I wouldn’t depend on the fact that the English word — rapture — is not found in the Bible. I say that, because the word “Trinity” is not found in the Bible, either — but it is fully described. The word “Trinity” simply happens to be a short-hand method for saying in one word what would take paragraphs and pages to say otherwise (in “explanation” and “proof”).
Likewise, the word “rapture” is a short-hand method for saying in one word what would take paragraphs and pages to say otherwise (in “explanation” and “proof”).
And, by the way, one cannot be a Christian if they don’t believe in the “Trinity” — since that’s a core and fundamental belief of Christianity.
As a side note, our English translation of the Bible (the one you and I read) has only been around for about 400 years — while the Latin version of the Bible has been around for over a thousand (and more) years. It’s the Latin version that contains the word “rapture” (in the Bible). We’ve just taken the Latin word and carried it over into English and cleaned up the pronunciation a bit for our English ears.
So, actually the word “rapture” — is — in the Bible. You just have to be reading the Latin Bible and not the English Bible.
AND, one more thing, before you demand it be in the “English” Bible. The Bible was not originally written in English...
You said — “My bible says nothing of the rapture.”
Well, you must be reading the wrong Bible, then — because mine does...
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
13 But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope.
14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus.
15 For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep.
16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.
17 Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.
18 Therefore comfort one another with these words.
Also, another aspect of the Rapture is filled in by the Apostle Paul here....
1 Corinthians 15:51-55
51 Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed—
52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
54 So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”
55 ”O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?”
from the emergence of Israel as the dominant country-of-residence for Jews
Note the subtle shift in emphasis. I suppose this starts the "this generation" clock over again.
In 1990, David Jeremiah and co-author C C Carlson claimed to have written Escape The Coming Night — a book about the rapture. It was soon discovered that significant portions of the book were plagiarized from best selling author Hal Lindsey’s (with co-author C C Carlson) 1973 work There’s A New World Coming. After realizing there were at least 47 pages of plagiarized material in the Jeremiah book, his publisher Word Books destroyed the inventory and, in a written statement, actually admitted the theft in late 1998. ( The Mother of Modern Prophecy )I wonder where he got his latest idea from.
You mean with people disappearing and leaving behind a rumpled pile of clothing, and folks looking around wondering what happened to Cousin Agnes? And a bunch of pagan folks going on to live their lives like in the Left Behind pulp fiction series?
When most folks today here the word "rapture" they have been conditioned to think of the pre-tribulational "secret rapture" invented by JN Darby and CI Scofield, and popularized by John Walvoord, Chuck Smith, and Hal Lindsey and a host of others.
True comic book stuff.
When one doesn't know what one is talking about, it helps to have a sliding timeline.
"From my understanding of biblical prophesies, I'm convinced that the Lord is coming for His Church before the end of 1981." (Chuck Smith, Future Survival)
Thanks for the response. My Bible certainly has these versus in them. They refer to the fact that those that have died prior to Christ's second coming will still share in the joy of His death and be united with those who are still alive.
Nonetheless, thanks for the Bible passages; I always wondered which versus were used to justify the rapture. Now I know. God Bless you.
When one doesn’t know what one is talking about, it helps to have a sliding timeline.
Or, to have camped on a stinking pile of Scripture mangling replacementarian post/a millenial stubborn ignorance.
Thanks. It was Darby whose name I was struggling to remember. I think he lived in England in the 1800s when he interpreted certain Bible passages to define the rapture.
Not too sensational.
“I would be the last person in the world to try to draw sensationalist truths from the Scripture,” he adds.
When they stop holding sensational prophecy conferences and writing sensational books, then I’ll believe them.
The 67-year-old senior pastor of Shadow Mountain Community Church in El Cajon, where he preaches to 7,000 people at weekend services, says he was motivated to write this book after so many people kept questioning him about world events.
The blind leading the blind.
Oh, and don’t forget to pick up your prophecy chart so you too can know what’s next.
Sure you have...If you've read the bible as you say, you've seen it...But believing it's another thing, eh???
1Th 4:16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:
1Th 4:17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
The Rapture is a resurrection...Surely you've read about resurrections in the bible...
Anything in those verses you may have missed in the past???
and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
You notice that live people go UP??? They go up and head towards and beyond the NORTH star...There's a lot more detail in the scriptures than many people realize...
Did you also notice that these live people that go up are with the Lord from that moment on??? Know what that means??? No Judgement...No condemnation...
That's a resurrection...That's a Rapture...And you know what else that means??? That means there are no un-saved folks going up...Non Christians will not be 'ever with the Lord'...That's strictly a Christian event...
And if only Christians go up, that leaves a tremendous amount of people on the earth...And they of course, are alive...They are LEFT BEHIND...
What languages did Paul speak? Through Paul the majority of the New Testament came to us, and I have yet to find it to have been in Latin let alone English. You did say it was what only over a thousand years ago the Bible got its Latin translation? Paul of all the New Testament writers knew the Hebrew and what Christ was referencing when He stated I have foretold you all things.
It was John that explained what that ALL included in John 1:1 In the beginning (now we have a book in the Bible that means just that Genesis) *WAS* the Word, and the Word WAS with God, and the Word WAS God.
So in the ORIGINAL languages the word rapture is NOT used, however, there is a place in Ezekiel wherein the Heavenly Father sure did know well in advance what His dear little children would be promoting.
Ezekiel 13: The whole chapter but specifically starting in verse 17
Likewise, thou son of man, set thy face against the daughters of thy People, which prophesy out of their own heart; and prophesy thou against them,
18 And say, 'Thus saith the Lord GOD; WOE to the women that sew pillows to all armholes, and make kerchief upon the head of every stature to hunt souls! Will ye hunt the souls of MY People, and will ye save the souls alive that come unto you?
19 AND will ye pollute ME among My People for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread, to slay the souls that should not die, and to save the souls alive that should not live, by your lying to My People that hear your lies?
NOW what is the false prophecy.... the lies that are pass out for handfuls of barley and pieces of bread... you know pass that plate religions.
20 Wherefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against our pillows, wherewith ye there hunt the souls to make them FLY, and I will tear them from your arms, and will let the souls go, even the souls that ye hunt to make the FLY.
21 Your kerchief also will I tear, and deliver My People out of your hand, and they shall no more in your hand to be hunted; and ye shall know that I am the LORD.
22 Because with lies ye have made the heart of the righteous sad, whom I have not made sad; and strengthened the hands of the wicked, that he should not return from his wicked way, by promising him life:
23 Therefore ye shall see no more vanity, nor divine divinations: for I will deliver My People out of your hand: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.''"
There is what the Heavenly Father had Ezekiel pen long before Paul wrote that couple of scriptures now used as doctrine as escape vehicle for those that can't fathom having to do as Paul said would need be done in Ephesians 6:10-24 11.. Put on the *WHOLE* armour of God,
that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
Paul did not say some Satan incarnate he said the devil.
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Now if all the 'good' believers are going to get zapped out of here why would Paul tell what is require to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand???????
Depending on which version of the story you wish to believe, John Nelson Darby either plagiarized or invented the pre-trib rapture theory that is the mainstay of most independent/fundamentalist/non-confessional churches. One version of history has the notion coming from the ecstatic utterances of a young Scottish girl, Margaret McDonald. And as the story goes, Darby picked up and capitalized on the idea in his founding of the Plymouth Brethren.
In either case, the theory did not exist in Christian theology until the 1830s when it took root in one part of England.
I think the idea that the end is near is egotism. The end of the world could happen any time over the span of trillions and trillions of years. But it’s going to happen on my watch!
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