As I write this, I am suffering from a bit of sleep deprivation. I spent too much of last night and early this morning reading the news about the Congressional ratification of Biden's election victory and the riot by pro-Trump thugs in Washington D.C. yesterday. Sleep deprivation tends to make me cranky. To the Thug-In-Chief, I have a message: you're done. Shut up and get out.
I do want to mention that in my morning Bible reading, I started the Book of Revelation a few weeks ago. (I've also been reading the Book of Exodus in the evenings - but lately I slacked off. I need to get back to it. Tonight, however, I may just go to bed early.) Reading Revelation took me on a bit of a trip down memory lane. Way back when I was a new Christian, in the early days of the racking up of the miles of my pilgrimage, I was exposed to a number of white evangelical authors whose books offered to expound and explain Revelation to people like me. The books all tended to have the same formula, with the following elements:
- The preaching of the doctrine of the pre-Tribulation rapture, in which believers will supernaturally be whisked away from the earth to Heaven just prior to the period of human history in which mankind must suffer through the final conflict of this present age.
- The teaching that the reason why the United States is not mentioned in the Biblical account of that final conflict is because most of the people of the United States will be caught up in the pre-Tribulation rapture, thus causing the U.S. to cease to exist as an earthly nation.
- The reason why most of the people of the United States will be raptured is because this is a Christian nation! Hey, it's obvious - especially when we vote Republican, oppose gun control and socialism (note: whenever you say this word, be sure to pronounce the "s's" with a sinister hiss - something like this: "ssssssocialisssssmmmmm..."), support family values and the free market, and believe that the United States is Biblically mandated to kill anyone who thinks otherwise.
These tenets are encapsulated in books like The Late Great Planet Earth, Peace, Prosperity, and the Coming Holocaust, and (of course) the Left Behind books. But there's a funny thing about all of these books (and of the books of the related genre of the baptized version of the myth of redemptive violence, including all the books of Frank Peretti). The thing is that even though the pre-Tribulationists are convinced that Christians will be whisked away from the earth just prior to the appearance of the Antichrist, they are obsessively fixated on the dangers posed by certain cultural trends which they consider to be the deceptions that will trigger the End Times and initiate a wave of persecution of Christians. Note my description of their "definition" of a Christian in the third bullet point in my list of points above. Such a definition is an apt description of many of the Americans who have aligned themselves with white supremacy, so that white supremacy has come to be regarded by many as synonymous with Christianity, and white America has just happened to become regarded as the hero of the drama of the end of this present age.
Don't get me wrong. I accept the Book of Revelation as part of God's holy Word. And I support family values - especially when the proponents of these values practice what they preach (which many of them haven't done). Nor should anything I say in this post be construed as an indication that I think Trump is the Antichrist. I don't. It's not that Trump is not evil enough to be, but rather that he is too stupid. But what if the people who congratulate themselves as the heroes of the End Times are confused about who the real heroes and villains are - like a dog who thinks he's a cat? Consider the support which white evangelical leaders have given to Trump all throughout the sorry pile of used toilet paper that comprises his political career. Consider their statements of their support, such statements as "If God could use a wicked king like Cyrus or Nebuchadnezzar to advance His Kingdom, then we must accept that God is using Trump. We must not criticize Trump, but instead we must support him!" Such statements are usually bundled with admonitions to Trump's critics to submit to their rulers as commanded in Romans 13. Funny, but these same evangelical leaders seem to suffer from collective amnesia regarding Romans 13 when their political opponents win elections. Maybe that's why some of their followers were toting pipe bombs and firearms yesterday.
Let me restate what has been obvious for a long time: white American evangelicals and their leaders do not really accept the Bible as a guide for their own lives. Otherwise, they would obey the Sermon on the Mount, wouldn't they? And they would speak truth to power like John the Baptist did - even when it was politically inconvenient and they had to tell the truth to their own President - wouldn't they? No, rather, the god of white American evangelicals is raw, naked, secular political and economic power. In their pursuit of this power, they have forgotten that the Bible says that no lie is of the truth. By hitching their wagon to a serial liar like Trump, they have become not only nihilists, but syncretists. Like a junkie and his needle, they have shown that they will support and ally themselves with anyone who gives them their power fix - even if the people they support live wicked lives that deny the Gospel, even if they are so corrupt that they try to give themselves Presidential pardons in order to avoid jail, even if they go so far as to sympathize with openly New Age or Satanic white supremacist groups like the Order of Nine Angels. This means that should the Rapture actually occur after the Tribulation, there will be white American evangelicals during the Tribulation who will align themselves with the Antichrist and "take the mark of the Beast" as long as the Antichrist promises them a seat at the table of political power.
Which means that when the Rapture occurs, a lot of evangelicals will be left behind.
