Loud and sustained sounds used to send me into shutters with shivers up my spine. Once in a while they still do, especially if they resemble a brass instrument. Since I live near a firehouse, my overall sensitivity has decreased. How odd…Why the fright, you may ask?
Two words:
Trumpet Blasts
(signaling the Rapture)
The 1980s Mark IV series of fundamentalist apocalypse films are to blame.
The titles are as follows:
1. A Thief in the Night
2. A Distant Thunder
3. Image of the Beast
4. Prodigal Planet
Have you seen any of them? $99 will buy you all 4 here. Horrible stuff.
In more recent times, the Christian mega hit book series by Tim LaHaye, and subsequent movie trilogy based on his books Left Behind, claims to portray the Biblical predicts in the so-called Last Times.
All three movies will cost you just under $20 here. The extra bonus, if you grew up in the 1980s, is seeing teen heartthrob Kirk Cameron acting again.
(I really thought I’d married him one day. In middle school, I wrote him 2 fan letters and everything. Pffft, his LOSS!)
Here’s the real problem:
What many, if not most, of us don’t realize is how recent and uniquely North American this pseudo-theology is. It’s popular just in North Amercia, and hardly heard of nor accepted elsewhere in Christianity, globally, let alone historically.
Here is a quick rundown of it. It’s recent doctrinal misappropriation: The Rapture and Second Coming stuff. (Spoiler Alert: It started “coming to life” rather recently…in the 1700s).
I deeply appreciate NT Wright’s comments called Farewell to the Rapture. It’s a short read.
He shows how Paul’s language colorfully used social, religious, and political metaphors of the particular time. Rapture advocates have wildly attributed his intriguing language to extremely specific and literal occurrences and world events–present and future.
Regarding eschatology (the study of end times), Wright says,
“Understanding what will happen [in the future] requires a far more sophisticated cosmology than the one in which “heaven” is somewhere up there in our universe, rather than in a different dimension, a different space-time, altogether.”
Basically, this invention which is American-flavored End-Times theological subverts God’s current work of redemption in us. It obscures God’s nature, as well, and what God is “up to.”
The Harold Camping rapture nonsense brings this misunderstanding into glaring and ghastly light. How were his followers helped by his understanding of God? What will they do now that they haven’t raptured? Sad.
Even the attempts to map out the book of Revelation on any sort of timeline are terribly misguided. The book reads like an acid trip. Revelation barely made it into the Biblical canon. Martin Luther, who wanted the Bible in the hands of all Christian laity, said it should be included in the canon, but only if it was never used as teaching material.
Nevertheless, I’m quite fond of the Revelation 22:17. It sums it all up for me! For more encouragement, try my friend Ed’s related post here.
How do you view the Book of Revelation?
The prime focus for believers should be the event and meaning of the cross, then and forever. It should be about how this truth of God’s work and grace becomes incarnational reality in our everyday lives. Let it never be degraded to who will get sucked into the sky one day, and when.
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Luther also wanted to exclude James. And anything besides Romans and John were secondary. So his opinion on canon doesn’t count much for me, I’m afraid. I agree rapture theology is bad, but A) Revelation is generally not where it comes from (see 2 Thessalonians) and B) you fight bad theology with good theology, which Revelation is full of. It’s an anti-imperial political manifesto of hope, and doesn’t deserve the reputation it has.
I’ve been reading up on a lot of apocalyptic stuff lately, and I was noticing how much of it focuses on explaining what has already happened as if it was about to happen. After reading Revelation with that kind of mindset, a lot of things jumped out at me. Chapter 21 is especially interesting with the “water of life” and the declaration “It is finished.” I’m not certain about anything in that book, but I am certain what’s not in that book, and the rapture certainly should not be dropped into it, as many have done in America.
To answer your question: How do you view the Book of Revelation?
Revelation is first of all, as stated, the Revelation of Jesus Christ. (v1:1) And it’s not Revelations…as so many often call it. I first have this in mind as I read it – this book is explaining the spiritual and physical revelation of Jesus Christ.
Secondly; Revelation is a letter that John wrote to 7 churches in the region we mostly now call Turkey. They were real churches, with real issues, and real people….I read the letter knowing this as well (chapters 2-3)
Then, in roughly Chapters 4-19 I read as an account of historical events unfolding and the repercussions of those events effects in the spiritual world. John is writing what he sees in the spirit – trying to explain them in the natural – to natural people/minds (a difficult task, without a doubt).
Lastly, Chapters 20-22 I am still under the assertion that these are an account of things “yet to come”…but perhaps, that is fading for me and I am falling more into thinking that most of this is past or present….(although, past tense is not commonplace in Hebraic thought).
Overall, I find The Revelation to be a book of great hope and restoration.
And in studying Revelation more deeply of the last 12-14 months, a lot of my previous presumptions and understandings of the overall history of Creation has been unearthed and vastly adjusted…..and it’s been SO good.
YOU MAY BE A RAPTURE REDNECK….
by Dave MacPherson
(1) If you think that Antichrist is the sister of somebody’s mother.
(2) If “posttrib” to you is the time after the Chicago Tribune arrives.
(3) If you guess that LaHaye is something that’s made while LaSun is shining.
(4) If you’re sure that Plymouth Brethren would excommunicate anyone driving a Ford or Chevy.
(5) If you don’t believe that Thomas Ice is a substance that can slow down and freeze a thinking brain.
(6) If you think someone is stuttering if he says “666.”
(7) If “partial rapture” is what you say you feel when your denture fits.
(8) If you think Grant Jeffrey doesn’t go way back in time.
(9) If you assume that the Early Fathers were folks who were never late to meetings.
(10) If you reckon that the apocalypse are part of the dragon’s mouth.
(11) If you imagine that Scofield’s notes are never flat.
(12) If you think that R-A-P-T-U-R-E is the way to spell “relief.”
(13) If you’re sure that the King James Translation was when King James was raptured away.
(14) If you don’t believe that Hal Lindsey wanted a rapture view that he could bank on.
(15) If you don’t know that a “fig”ment of someone’s imagination can cause “date”-setting.
(16) If you can’t admit that Dallas The-Illogical Seminary was long famous for Walvoord-to-Walvoord carpeting.
(17) If you conclude that “The Rapture Plot” is where the pretrib rapture will be buried.
(18) If you think that an amill is someone who says “Ah!” whenever mill discussion is proposed.
(19)
If you don’t know that Margaret Macdonald’s partial rapturism had her
saying: “SOME of the saints know they’ll be in heaven when
the rapture happens because they aren’t all here!”
(20) But even a rapture redneck knows that just because some don’t want to be left doesn’t mean they’re right!
Incidentally, Cyrus Redneck has just come up with the very best argument for pretribulationism. He says that
the letters in “rapture” can be found in “pretribulationism” but not in “midtribulationism,” “prewrathism,”
“posttribulationism,” or “partial rapturism” !
(If you’re ready for serious rapture stuff, Google “Famous Rapture
Watchers,” “Pretrib Rapture Pride,” “Grant Jeffrey’s
Apocalypse Debacle,” “Pretrib Rapture Dishonesty,” and “Pretrib Rapture
Stealth.”)
[The foregoing article was spotted on the worldwide net. Enjoy.]