Gone?
Why the Rapture doctrine is being left behind.
Rapture, Antichrist, and Tribulation are words Josiah Hesse associates with his apocalyptic upbringing—an upbringing he says was built on “the urgency of avoiding hell.”
In his article “Apocalyptic upbringing: how I recovered from my terrifying evangelical childhood,” Hesse looks back on a stormy night in his Iowa town when he was 10 years old and home alone because his parents were running late after being out for the evening. Unsure of their whereabouts, he feared they had been raptured, and he had been left behind.1
After grabbing snacks, juice boxes, a knife, and his Bible, young Josiah ran down to the basement. He knew being left behind would mean hiding from the Antichrist and denying the mark of the Beast—a branding that seals your doom.
All of a sudden, he heard the sound of his parents returning home, relieving his apocalyptic anxiety. However, Hesse said he carried the same anxiety into adulthood, finally jettisoning the theology of his youth and, sadly, his faith as well.
Josiah Hesse represents a vast number of Christians who, for one reason or another, have abandoned belief in the Rapture of the church—the doctrine that Jesus will snatch His church to heaven in an instant, and only true believers will see Him (1 Cor. 15:52; 1 Th. 4:16–17).
What happened to this once-popular theology? Why do so many evangelical Christians reject it today?
The Pop Culture of the Rapture
Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye’s wildly successful, 16-book series Left Behind introduced eschatology (the doctrine of future things) to a much broader audience by merging popular fiction with premillennial and pretribulational Rapture doctrine. People who are premillennial believe Jesus will return physically to Earth before setting up a literal Messianic Kingdom over which He will rule for 1,000 literal years. People who are pretribulational believe Jesus will rapture His church before seven years of unparalleled tribulation afflict the entire world.
From 1995 to 2007, Left Behind unhinged the Rapture from the confines of a Sunday sermon and made it the framework of suspense novels that Christians and non-Christians alike discussed at the watercooler. Everyone was enraptured with the Rapture.
In the past, books and videos—such as Hal Lindsey’s bestseller The Late Great Planet Earth and the film A Thief in the Night—raised awareness about the pretribulational Rapture. But nothing connected Rapture theology to contemporary pop culture like Left Behind. Seven books from the series rose to number one on The New York Times Best Seller list, selling more than 63 million copies worldwide.
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https://israelmyglory.org/article/gone/
Why the Rapture doctrine is being left behind.
Rapture, Antichrist, and Tribulation are words Josiah Hesse associates with his apocalyptic upbringing—an upbringing he says was built on “the urgency of avoiding hell.”
In his article “Apocalyptic upbringing: how I recovered from my terrifying evangelical childhood,” Hesse looks back on a stormy night in his Iowa town when he was 10 years old and home alone because his parents were running late after being out for the evening. Unsure of their whereabouts, he feared they had been raptured, and he had been left behind.1
After grabbing snacks, juice boxes, a knife, and his Bible, young Josiah ran down to the basement. He knew being left behind would mean hiding from the Antichrist and denying the mark of the Beast—a branding that seals your doom.
All of a sudden, he heard the sound of his parents returning home, relieving his apocalyptic anxiety. However, Hesse said he carried the same anxiety into adulthood, finally jettisoning the theology of his youth and, sadly, his faith as well.
Josiah Hesse represents a vast number of Christians who, for one reason or another, have abandoned belief in the Rapture of the church—the doctrine that Jesus will snatch His church to heaven in an instant, and only true believers will see Him (1 Cor. 15:52; 1 Th. 4:16–17).
What happened to this once-popular theology? Why do so many evangelical Christians reject it today?
The Pop Culture of the Rapture
Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye’s wildly successful, 16-book series Left Behind introduced eschatology (the doctrine of future things) to a much broader audience by merging popular fiction with premillennial and pretribulational Rapture doctrine. People who are premillennial believe Jesus will return physically to Earth before setting up a literal Messianic Kingdom over which He will rule for 1,000 literal years. People who are pretribulational believe Jesus will rapture His church before seven years of unparalleled tribulation afflict the entire world.
From 1995 to 2007, Left Behind unhinged the Rapture from the confines of a Sunday sermon and made it the framework of suspense novels that Christians and non-Christians alike discussed at the watercooler. Everyone was enraptured with the Rapture.
In the past, books and videos—such as Hal Lindsey’s bestseller The Late Great Planet Earth and the film A Thief in the Night—raised awareness about the pretribulational Rapture. But nothing connected Rapture theology to contemporary pop culture like Left Behind. Seven books from the series rose to number one on The New York Times Best Seller list, selling more than 63 million copies worldwide.
continued
https://israelmyglory.org/article/gone/