Getting It Wrong: "Left Behind" and the Mainstream Press

BreakPoint with Charles Colson ^ | April 27, 2004 | Charles Colson

[Mr. Silverback]

What will probably be this year’s biggest book-publishing event took place a few weeks ago. It wasn’t the latest thriller by John Grisham or the sixth Harry Potter book; it was Glorious Appearing, the final installment in the Left Behind series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins.

The mainstream media, which usually ignores happenings in the Christian publishing world, took notice this time. But, as usual, they got matters of Christian faith and practice wrong.

Writer Joan Didion, as Wheaton literature professor Alan Jacobs noted, regards Left Behind as “the key to unlocking the hidden agenda of the Bush administration . . . ”—reasoning, if that’s the word, that since the president’s “preferred constituency” has made Left Behind a best-seller, they must be trying to turn what’s in the book into reality. Bush’s Christian faith only deepened Didion’s suspicions—talk about conspiracy theories.

It doesn’t take much to see the flaws in Didion’s logic. But as Jacobs points out, it’s possible to read and even enjoy a book without subscribing to its tenets. What’s more, apart from the fact that Christ will return and that “every knee shall bow and every tongue confess,” orthodox Christian beliefs about the Second Coming are all over the lot. The uniformity that Didion sees is the stereotype conjured up by her overheated imagination.

Amy Johnson Frykholm, a cultural studies professor at Colorado Mountain College, draws a similar conclusion in her new book, Rapture Culture. She credits the Left Behind series with fomenting a “new engagement with the world” among American Christians.

This is nonsense. The civil-rights movement, the pro-life movement, the pro-family movement, and other forms of engagement predate these books by years. As reviewer Stephen Prothero put it, it’s not as though Christians “had their heads buried in the sand before LaHaye and Jenkins joined forces.”

Mistakes like Didion’s and Frykholm’s are possible because of abysmal ignorance of religious truth among many reporters. If these folks were familiar with their subject, they’d realize that, ironically, the beliefs reflected in the Left Behind novels are more likely to produce cultural withdrawal than cultural engagement.

That’s because, as Jacobs wrote in the Boston Globe, this viewpoint takes the position that cultural and social trajectories only travel in a downward direction. Societies will continue to deteriorate until the “only option for redemption is the Second Coming.” If that’s true, then attempting to renew culture is, at best, futile and, at worst, opposed to God’s sovereign purposes.

In fact, taken to its logical extreme, bad news for the culture becomes good news for the Christian, since it’s seen as hastening Christ’s return. That’s one of the problems with this eschatology, because it can often lead to Christian indifference.

Thankfully, most Christians don’t think that way. They understand that Christian hope and love of neighbor, the basis for our engagement, are not in tension with one another. They are manifestations of the same truth: that in God’s good timing, this world will be remade into what God intends it to be.

None of this is hard to figure out—that is, of course, if your goal is to report fairly. Most journalists, however, when it comes to the Christian faith, sadly prefer unfair characterizations.

[navygal]

Sorry, no purple hearts coming from me.

[orionblamblam]

> "Revelations for Dummies" textbooks for people left on earth after the Rapture....

Not just people, but the AntiChrist and Satan as well. What, are they illiterate? If Satan sees the events that supposedly lead to the Second Coming, and he has read the script... he'll do something Completely Different, and all the prophesies won't be worth spit.

Conversely, if Satan hasn't the free will to do anything other than what the porophesis say... then is he Really Evil, or just a puppet?

[stars & stripes forever]

If Satan sees the events that supposedly lead to the Second Coming, and he has read the script... he'll do something Completely Different, and all the prophesies won't be worth spit.

I looked prophesy up in the dictionary. It say to predict with certaintly as if by divine inspiration.

Throughout the Bible God has spoken prophetic messages through His prophets. All prophesies given by God have come true because God keeps His promises. He can't lie.

Satan is a loser because Jesus won the victory when He died on the cross for our sins and arose the third day!

[ladyinred]

My Gosh this is one of the stupidest things yet! These people really have gone off the deep end! I bought all of the books, read them , enjoyed most of them, and I don't even believe in the rapture! So there you paranoid liberal nut! (not you mr. silver, the author)

[LearnsFromMistakes]

evidently, bad theology = good fiction...

[RabidBartender]

I'm sure that next, we'll have protests from the NAACP and Maxine Waters against Jenkins and LaHaye for making the final book cover white instead of black, like the previous eleven.

[ColdSteelTalon]

Well, The Gospel has two messages the most important is the need for everyone to become saved. And they to be saved.

The second is that Christ will return to establish his government on the earth for a certain period of time. Which is what the left behind books are about. It is a "what if" story based much on what the Bible says about the last days before the return of the Messiah. The return of Christ and the end of the world as we know it is a good thing for those who are saved but not a good thing for those who chose to follow the Antchrist.

The reason why so many Christians like the book is that much of it is based on the Bible and so it can be a teaching tool as well as captivating story.

As for me I rely on the Bible. It has much more to say about those things than any story man can conjure up.

[stars & stripes forever]

evidently, bad theology = good fiction...

Wouldn't it be a hoot if pre-tribulation believers were raptured before the tribulation; mid-tribulation believiers were raptured 3 years into the tribulation,and the post-tribulation believers had wait it out' til the very end.

God may give us what we ask for! :)

[Wicket]

People, people,people. There are scriptural arguments that can be made for several points of view and timelines regarding Christ's coming for his church. Left Behind does a pretty good job of presenting the pre-tribulation rapture, 7 year tribulation, and defeat of Satan. It ain't Holy Scripture, but it's a pretty good job.

I do think Jenkins and LaHaye stretched the series out further than necessary - shoot, I thought Christ would come before they got the thing finished. And frankly, a couple of the books were snoozers, at least for me. It may have led some to think a bit more about whether Christ's claims are true - and maybe even scared a few folk into repentance.

What is glorified in the Christian faith is also presented well in these books - the salvation found in Jesus Christ alone. I believe we all agree on that. For the rest - we may think we know, but God's got the only "vote" that counts.

I heard once that perhaps God would arrange for each believer to get what they expected - the pre-tribbers would be raptured before the tribulation, mid-tribbers in the middle, and post-tribbers at the end. Those Christians who don't believe in the Rapture would just hang around on earth. We do know that God will give us the grace and strength necessary to stand, whichever of these is true.

[KneelBeforeZod]

Kirk Cameron was just at the playboy mansion a couple weeks ago... shame on him!

[orionblamblam]

> All prophesies given by God have come true because God keeps His promises. He can't lie.

Well, then, Satan is but a puppet, since his actions are pre-ordained. Satan would be thus no more accountable for evil actions than an AK-47 is to blame for being used to shoot a cop.

[AnalogReigns]

Condi Rice attends an evangelical Presbyterian church (which doesn't subscribe to "left behind" "goofy non-Scriptural dispensationalism,") nor does Cheney, nor does Rumsfeld, nor (I doubt) does W. himself.

This is just another example of the paranoia of the Left. I recall similar concerns over Reagan (who rarely even attended church). The Left is now really believing their own (lying) campaign literature. Goes to show what happens to a party headed by such folk as the lying Clintons.

Our foreign policy is based on pragmatic hard-nosed realism, not on any group's interpretation of the book of Revelation.

The paranoid charicature of W. Bush and friends actually works to our advantage. Any fair minded person will look, and not find the monsters the Dim's try to paint us as. I think a majority of Americans are fair minded too.

[kimmie7]

May I add my voice to the cacaphony?

I grew up in very conservative holiness churches. And I've heard more than my fair share of hell-fire and brimstone sermons. I heard them from a very young age...too young, in fact. I wasn't ready to hear about Revelations, what I needed was the rest of the book first! As a result, every time Mom was late from work, or lingered too long in the grocery (we all heard that one -- "I'll only be a minute..." Yeah, right, LOL) I thought I'd been left behind. I vividly remember racing through supermarket aisles searching for Mom, my heart pounding out of my chest! I simply wasn't ready to hear about the end times...and I was terrified. These feelings continued into adulthood. Although I'd asked Jesus into my heart years before, satan used those old feelings to keep me from the fullness of joy in watching for Christ's return.

How does all this relate to the books? I read the first one reluctantly. Then the second. And so on. Then I started reading THE book -- specifically in Revelations. You know what? I'm not scared anymore. I find myself looking heavenward and wishing He would return. I catch myself looking at unusual cloud formations and wondering if today is the day...and the feeling in the pit of my stomach isn't fear. It's anticipation. That's what the books did for me.

Call me crazy if you wish, but the Lord used those books to heal a wound that was many years old. Yes, I'm still concerned about the world. Of course. But now I'm confident in my salvation, and looking forward to seeing Jesus face to face.

My two cents' worth...

[AnalogReigns]

The puppet arguement regarding God and His sovereignty doesn't work. The reason? God, and his relationship to us and all His creation is unique, unlike any other relationship we can even imagine.

When a decision must be made touching you and another human person, only one person's will can prevail, yours or theirs. Their freedom must bend to your's or visa versa. However God is not like any other person...He made and sustains everything that is. Scripture clearly teaches God is fully in charge--nothing is outside His control--but also that creatures are free and responsible.

How that works? I don't understand. However, being finite, its not unreasonable to expect an infinite being and how He works is not understandable to a finite being.

There is not a logical contradition here, because God is not like anyone or anthing else--and scripture clearly teaches God's sovereign free will does not contradict our finite free will--as we are made in His image.

We do what we want...and ultimately...that will work into what He wants--and will be used to glorify Himself, and work to our good too, if we "...know God and are called according to His purpose" (Romans 8:28)

[AnalogReigns]

What a truly beautiful testimony. Thank you for sharing it!

[dangus]

Here's something you might find interesting... compare the stories about Saul conducting a census in Chronicles and Samuel. The stories are almost identical, except one substitutes, "the wrath of God" for "Satan."

[bondserv]

God is a rewarder of the diligent student. 1/3 of the Bible is prophecy. Most churches ignore prophecy. Most churches ignore almost 1/3 of the Bible. Jesus held the Jews of His day accountable for being ignorant of prophecy.

Luke 19:44
44 And shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation.

Referring to:

Dan 9:25
25 Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.
26 And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary;

7+62=69 weeks of years
69x7=483 years

Neh 2:1,5 & 6
1 And it came to pass in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king,...
5 ...that thou wouldest send me unto Judah, unto the city of my fathers’ sepulchres, that I may build it.
6 ...So it pleased the king to send me;

April 32AD, the date of Jesus' triumphal entry!

For further elucidation try:
Link #1
Link #2

[bondserv]

I meant to ping you to above post.

[gawatchman]

He really is evil, and the spirit of anti christ is alive and well in our culture today. satan's number one MO is deception, and this world will not recognize him for who he is because certain events will not have occured (i.e. rapture) when he appears claiming to be Jesus. People won't even know that they are in the tribulation. This is why I rely solely on the word of God for wisdom, and not prophecy based on Biblical commentary by man.

[orionblamblam]

> its not unreasonable to expect an
infinite being and how He works is not understandable to a finite being.

Not strictly true, as understandign of the infinite is certainly possible; but I'll let it stand.

> God is not like anyone or anthing else

The basic arguement is that God's mind is well and truly "alien." Wholly incomprehensible, his ways are mystery.

Sounds like chaos.