Posted on 08/10/2010 2:09:49 PM PDT by Viking83
Amen, Salvavida. AMEN
>> About ten years ago, I mentioned to a Catholic friend that I was starting to work on a book critiquing the Left Behind novels.
Those who can, do. Those who can’t ... critique. Greatness is rarely created by piggy-backing on someone else.
The Left Behind Novels are Christian fiction. They’re vaguely based on Biblical Revelation ... but only vaguely. We “fundamentalists” do not believe there exists a Book of LaHaye in the Bible. It is a compelling story of the End Times with a Godly message ... nothing more.
SnakeDoc
I just want to make sure either the pilot or copilot on my plane is at least sufficiently debauched or maybe even an outright heathen if the rapture comes. I don't care if you have wings on your uniform, I don't want you flying off until you've landed the plane! :-)
Oh.... I know! We used to talk about this all the time. How to explain the sudden disappearing populace. Never thought people would be so out-of-touch with reality as to believe aliens would be a part of the scenario. I nixed that idea until we elected Obama. Now I KNOW there are those among us who will believe anything! :)
Darby was not the first dispensationalist.
Ephraem (A.D. 373) wrote extensively on the Rapture, but his writings were not translated from Latin until 1995.
See “Final Warning” by Jeffrey ISBN 0-921714-24-6
Well Karl.....if you’re a born-again Christian...you won’t have anything to worry about! :)
the Church was the New Israel and that Christians -- consisting of both Jews and Gentiles (cf. Romans 10:12) -- had replaced the Jews
If the Church "REPLACES" the Jews. You are calling God a liar.
There are ONLY two theories: Every other is a derivative of one of those two: REPLACEMENT or FULFILLMENT Theology.
God keeps His promises or He changes his mind. Catholics, and most liberal denominations, believe he changes His mind.
Evangelicals, conservative denominations, believe He will literally fulfill ALL His promises on His time schedule.
Lots of inaccuracies about Dispensational history and teaching in that one article...
like this, “The first dispensationalist premise is that Jesus Christ failed to establish the kingdom for the Jews during His first coming.”
You got it!
The Harry Potter books, or the Left Behind books. Harry Potter’s author uses excellent grammar almost all the time, and has clever and realistic dialogue.
Great Post - a little side note to the Catholic bashers. it was the Catholic Councils of the church that decided which books would be in the New Testament and the Book of Revelation was not a shoe-in.
St. Augustine championed its inclusion:
Augustine ... adopted the Book of Revelation partly because it had been so troublesome and its place needed to be stabilized. And partly because it helped him solve some other theological dilemmas that he was wrestling with in his own studies. So around 393, 394 it seems there were several councils that were being convened in his own region where debates ... with people who believed in greater degree of free will and other kinds of theological issues were all taking place. And during this context of these councils the decision on which books to use in the New Testament as the authority, behind which all other Christian theology would be worked out, came up. Augustine championed using the Book of Revelation within the New Testament, assuming, as others had, that it was actually written by the Apostle John, therefore carrying authority. ...
What Augustine does by helping put the Book of Revelation in the Bible really accomplishes two things. One, he provides what will become, at least eventually, the normative reinterpretation of the book by reading all of the symbolism in it as just that, symbolism and not literal history. Now, that doesn’t happen overnight, but his view is the one that will eventually carry the day throughout most of later Christian tradition.
The second thing that he does in canonizing the Book of Revelation is they put it at the end of the New Testament, and this also has a very significant symbolic force. Because at the end of the Book of Revelation, we have a strong warning, “You may not add to or take away from any thing in this book.” Now originally in the Book of Revelation that refers to the revelation that John himself saw—write it, seal it, don’t do anything more with it, it’s over. But when you take that put it at the end of the New Testament, it has the double force of saying John’s revelation of the end is sealed up but also this is the end of the New Testament, there will no longer be any future revelations from God that will stand alongside of the New Testament itself. ...
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/explanation/brevelation.html
I might enjoy the Left Behind books.
Who knows. I’ve never seen one or even an excerpt.
The Potter books? Pshaw! Love ‘em. I’ve got collectibles
and a DVD collection and even a real Snitch that Allegra gave me.
Right, most Catholics don’t know what they believe. And they don’t realize they own the “Acre of Diamonds”.
You are right in that it being SECRET is a Myth. A myth put on by the liberal theologians that it is a secret. It will be anything BUT Secret and the Devil has to be READY with some poser to step up and make some sort of explanation for the event.
There is one REAL question I have for the non rapturites. WHY is God going to bring all those plagues and deaths and unbelievably bad things in Revelation down on the world?
I mean what is His goal? Purpose? WHY DO IT?
There are ONLY two answers and NEITHER support a non rapture position.
First: PUNISHMENT. You know, he’s had enough of the bad sinners. OK. So, He is going to punish all his GOOD believers too? At the same time? Ruin their lives in a living hell?
Second: REPENTANCE: You know, “I won’t believe in God until I see X Y Z for myself. OK, you asked for it... ya believe it Now buddy? THAT? Well, what does that do for those who already believe? Jack Nada! To bad, sucks to be you born at this time, all that church was for nothing, you get screwed with the sinners just the same?
NO TO BOTH!
YES TO BOTH!
Both reasons are TRUE. To punish the wicked and wake the others up. He is UNWILLING that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Some just need to see wild shit go down before they “get it”.
Thus, the Church, His bride, US, Believers will be SPARED His Wrath. We are not subject to wrath. We don’t need to be punished or woken up. Oh, some of you reading this do and you WILL BE HERE for the wake up call... pack lots of beans and ammo... it won’t be pretty. But it will be real.
You are so right about the rapture. And WHEN it happens, I hope that everyone left behind go straight to their Bible, and start reading, from Hebrews to Revelation. It will be their survival guide to the tribulation. If they desire to endure to the end to be saved.
Yeah. No kidding. I read that and thought WOAH NELLY! They done slipped their own strawman right into their own critique.
What truly scares me is how many people really embrace the utter SATANIC view that the Jews have been "replaced" or that anything "Jewish" failed at all. They really do not get that God means what He says. Those promises were to David and Abraham, JEWS. And there are no "lost tribes" or other "new Jews" about the place.
Oh, I know WHY hey think this, I mean besides the outright Satanic suggestion, but, Israel was wiped out. Gone. As a nation and a culture and a language. GONE from the utter face of the Earth and a few scattered little hovels of "Jooos" clinging to outdates customs and such did not enter into the minds (clouded anti semitic minds) of men that somehow Israel and the Hebrew Language would come back!
For this same reason the Dome sits upon the Temple mount. But buddy, I gotta tell you all reading this.... NOT FOR MUCH LONGER! K?
The same "magic" that suddenly made Israel a Nation and People and a Language again after 2 thousand years ain't done. The Temple will be back and the Dome gone. Coming soon to a CNN Breaking News Report near you!
In those last days will come scoffers... I shudder... I am awed.
Cool! We don’t have a Snitch, but we have authentic reproduction wands handmade by Anoreth, before she left home. They were popular in the neighborhood; she paid for the wood and varnish out of sales, at least.
“You’ll put your eye out, kid!”
“After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” …
Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, “Who are these arrayed in white robes, and where did they come from?” And I said to him, “Sir, you know.”
So he said to me, “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
-— A LOT will. God the Father is going to SPANK them and THEN they will believe.
But, BLESSED are those, US, who have believed though we did not see.
The author complains of strawmen, while sprinkling strawmen and red herring throughout the essay. When Jesus used the Jewish wedding process to describe His work, we immediately had a form to which the rapture and judgment process may be compared. One needs to ask oneself: Would Christ leave His Bride on Earth while He pours out heavenly wrath upon the place? In answering that querry, the only important note is to understand Whom is The Bride of Christ. [HINT: it is not an institution, but it is drawn from humanity, marked by Spiritual Identity.]
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