E-mail in-box: Left Behind

In my in-box this week, two e-mails from very different sources on the same topic: the "Left Behind" series:

Radio Netherlands on this week's Amsterdam Forum

This week Amsterdam Forum focuses on the Christian fundamentalist concept of Rapture and the following "End Time."

In the programme Left Behind co-author Jerry Jenkins explains the key ideas of the Rapture movement and studio guests Bert Jan Lietaert Peerbolte, a professor in theology, and Feike ter Velde, a believer in the Rapture concept from the Dutch End Time group Het Zoeklicht ("the searchlight") debate the pros and cons of this fundamentalist approach.

Listen to the programme in full. (29.30) [RealPlayer required]

Mennonite Weekly Review has an editorial by Robert Rhodes Watching Out For The End of Days. An excerpt:

Several books in the past decade have set out to debunk the “Left Behind” theology of the Rapture and its reliance on what is, at best, an imaginative interpretation of Scripture. At its worst, however, “Left Behind” is nationalistic fear-mongering, for which the war in Iraq and the continuing bloodshed in Israel and Palestine could have been tailormade.

Those who have this kind of Christo-political outlook believe, typically, that the United States is God’s anointed choice to lead the world and make it fit for holy habitation, even if that requires lethal force and violence on the grandest scale. LaHaye and Jenkins don’t exactly extol these anti-virtues outright, but they don’t deny their seductive power, or their pragmatic usefulness, either.

These deceptions are exactly what “Left Behind,” and two companion serials written with political and military storylines, trade in. To look at the leftbehind.com Web site is to see the myth of American triumphalism at its most market-friendly — flag-wrapped, patriotic and bristling with military, and moral, supremacy.

The problem is, none of this has any cogent biblical base. Jesus doesn’t need American-style firepower to prevail over evil. The only means of conquest in his arsenal was, and is, love.

Robert Rhodes includes a link to Dr. Loren Johns' webpage on the Left Behind series. [Johns is academic dean at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary, Elkhart, Indiana.] Here is an excerpt, in which Dr. Johns criticizes the series' rejection of the Gospel:

At the end of the day, this series is ultimately a rejection of the good news of Jesus Christ. I say this because it rejects the way of the cross and Jesus’ call to obedient discipleship and a new way of life. It celebrates the human will to power, putting Evangelical Christians in the heroic role of God’s Green Berets. In this story, premillennialist dispensationalism meets American survivalism. This is a story about so-called Christian men who never really grew up, who still love to play with toys and dominate others, and whose passions are still largely unredeemed. Love of enemies is treated as a misguided strategy associated not with the gospel, but with the Antichrist. Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have the right to offer any kind of interpretation of Christianity and of the end times that they wish. Ultimately, it is not their interpretation of the end times that troubles me so much as their interpretation of Christianity. It is devoid of any real theology, or substantial Christology, or any ethics that are recognizably Christian. This is a vision of unredeemed Christianity.

Mr. Rhodes concludes his editorial:

When Christ returns to this world in glory, he will do so not out of revenge on evil but out of love for his people. With all its reliance on biblical soothsaying and Scriptural sleight of hand, this is one lesson that "Left Behind" seems to have missed.

Fred Clark (Slacktivist) has been reading through the Left Behind books and blogging about these horrible books. Here is a link to an index page of all of his 'Left Behind' posts.

Mennonites and liberal activist Christians aren't the only Christians critical of the Left Behind series. Read Will You be 'Left Behind'? from the March 2001 Lutheran Witness. Or download The End Times: A Study of Eschatology and Millennialism (1989) [pdf file, from the Commission on Theology and Church Relations of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod] if you want a theologically sound appraisal of End Times stuff.

While Jesus was teaching in the temple, he said, "How can the scribes say that the Messiah is the son of David? David himself, by the Holy Spirit, declared, 'The Lord said to my Lord, "Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet."' David himself calls him Lord; so how can he be his son?" And the large crowd was listening to him with delight.
--Mark 12:35-37