"The nutbags...had it right the whole time"

I'm not a film buff, so it should come as no surprise that I never saw 2012 in the cinema and only managed to watch the dvd version with my teenage son on Friday evening.

It's a good yarn in the disaster movie tradition. It does go on; it morphed from a kind of The Late Great Planet Earth meets 24 to Indiana Jones meets Evan Almighty. (For our younger readers The Late Great Planet Earth was a 1970's end-times biblical blockbuster. Although one might question some of its conclusions, it was absolutely compulsive reading - even for a teenager. You can purchase a used copy at Amazon for 36p! I hadn't realised until writing up this post that it was turned into a film starring Orson Welles.).

Mayan prophecies, conspiracy theorists, good guys and bad guys and the triumph of the human spirit - you can find it all in 2012.

It really has very little to do with what the Bible teaches about the last days. And the church comes over as quite anemic and helpless. The only people who seems to have any clue about what's happening are the scientists, an eccentric talk show host, a little known author and - wait for it - according to Carl Anheuser, the bad guy in the White House "the nutbags with cardboard signs" who " had it right the whole time."

It was the nutbags with cardboard signs line that got me. It raised a few questions. Like "Who defines reality?" and "How willing are we to talk about the reality of the future with our lost friends?"

The quote recalled a discussion I had had earlier in the day. It concerned whether we should preach about the end of the world and the themes associated with it at guest services. Do we really want to bring our friends to church and then talk about the end of the world?! (Would love your thoughts on that one.)

About two years ago, I decided to read through Acts to try and learn how to preach the gospel like the apostles - Peter and Paul in particular. I had a few surprises. One was the focus that there seemed to be on the world to come and how history was heading towards the day when God would judge the world. See Acts 2.40, 3.21-23, 17.31, 24.25, for example.

What struck me about this emphasis was not that the apostles were preaching a happy heaven v. a hot hell. It was different to that. I think that they set out to present the gospel not only as a means of personal salvation, but as a means of personal salvation that required you to completely change your outlook on the whole of human history and the destiny of the world. And in this story of God, humanity and the world, Christ was bang in the centre.

If we can't find some way of communicating the full story of the gospel, two things are likely to happen:

Firstly, the gospel might - just might - be received and understood as a kind of self-help message, a formula for a happier life;

Secondly, we will allow secular people, Islam and Christian cults / sects (e.g. JWs, Mormons) to shape how people think about the future of the world. And believe me, no-one from these sectors of the religious market is shy about how they see the future;

Finally, there is a real danger that the church will lose its cutting edge as it tries to conform itself to this world rather than being conformed to the values of the world to come: "Everyone who has this hope in him, purifies himself" says the apostle John, speaking of the return of the Lord (1 John 3.3).

I'm not really suggesting that we take to the streets with cardboard signs. I am advocating that we do present the whole of the gospel story, which includes the return of Christ and the final establishment of his kingdom. God forbid that anyone ever ask "Why didn't you tell us?" And we can only reply "I was afraid you might think I was a nutbag".

The partly Jewish president of Iran

The Telegraph yesterday carried a story claiming that President Ahmadinejad of Iran has Jewish roots. How bizzarre! I suppose in some circles that will strengthen his candidature for Antichrist. And if that were so, I suppose we could thank the Telegraph for helping to reveal the Antichrist! Which in turn might mean that the Telegraph is right up there with Hal Lindsay when it comes to end-times teaching.

David Icke and the End Times

Channel 4's catch up service - the C4 equivalent of the Beeb's iPlayer - looks like a useful tool for those who want to have a bit more control over their viewing. I watched snatches of Who Really Runs The World. It was all about conspiracy theories and those who promote them.

David Icke, not surprisingly was much in evidence. He really does believe that 9/11 was an "inside job". He reckons a mysterious group known as The Illuminati carried it out. I had a look at his website. Amongst his other theories you can find this notion that a secretive group of powerful politicians and wealthy families are trying to take over the world. They want to establish a one world government and have total control over our lives.

Trouble is, this is a bit like some stuff you read in Christian circles about the end times! Perhaps what Icke and the end times teachers have in common is that both parties have observed certain trends in the world and, rightly or wrongly, come to similar conclusions about what is going on. The main difference is that Icke probably thinks Christians are part of the conspiracy and Christians might think Icke and his ideas are all of a piece with the rise of antichrist!

On a more serious note, it does indicate that there are many people out there who distrust the establishment and are looking for some sort of explanation as to what's going on and where it's all going. Which is why in our evangelism we should keep the big picture of God's cosmic purposes in Christ in view.

You can watch the whole programme here .

How end time prophecies can motivate you even if they are wrong

I came across a thoroughly useful piece on end time prophecy at Richard Mouw's blog (Mouw is president of Fuller Seminary).

The upshot of the article is that Mouw sang in the choir of a crusade evangelist in the 1950's, who predicted that Christ would return by 1960. Needless to say the predicted parousia hasn't happened. Mouw goes on to point out that, before we are quick to criticise, other Christians have made predictions about the future - he cites those who believed the twentieth century would be the Christian century - which have proved wrong. He also argues that the prospect of Christ returning by 1960 kept Christians on their toes in the fifties!

I have some sympathy with Mouw. There was a lot of end time teaching and predicting when I was growing up which subsequently proved empty. The EEC, as it then was, seemed an ideal candidate for Antichrist's ten horned kingdom (Revelation 13.1) until what had become the EU had a membership larger than ten states!

Whilst some of the predictions and, in my view, some of the principles of interpretation used to formulate such views, appear misguided, the intention was serious. Those preachers really did believe in the return of Christ. They really did believe that the Bible had something to say about life today and the future. And it certainly kept us on our toes.

Mouw's post is a good reminder that even if some people make wild claims about the end times, the reality behind all of the speculation is that Jesus is coming back. And it might just be sooner than you think! You can read the original post here