Millennialism and Dispensationalism and a Web Site Devoted to Spreading False Hope

You'd think this was a joke, if it was not. There is a web site that Christians who are enraptured with the Rapture can use to communicate from the dead. Have they not read what the Lord Jesus Christ said? "He said to him, 'If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.' " [or: even if someone e-mails them from the dead!]. (Luke 16:31).

Either the people doing this are sincere in this effort, or they are scam artists; but either way, this is the height of false doctrine and a horribly, horribly wrong web site. There are no second chances. There are no "do overs" when it comes to Christ and His Gospel. Now is the hour of salvation!

Recently Portals of Prayer had some very pointed rejections of the Rapture and Millennialism. It was disturbing to note the number of comments we received from Lutherans who expressed their shock that we would reject the notion that there will be a millennial kingdom of Christ and a "rapture," or that the modern state of Israel is still God's chosen people. Hello!? We are Lutherans folks. That means we teach what the Bible teaches, not what the false prophets on television and the false teachers who wrote the Left Behind series taught.

Pastors, do be sure to pointedly reject these false teachings. Now is the hour of salvation! There are no second chances. Read this and weep. Thanks, Frank, for pointing this one out.

Here is how the web site explains their service:

Services Overview

We have set up a system to send documents by the email, to the addresses you provide, 6 days after the "Rapture" of the Church. This occurs when 3 of our 5 team members scattered around the U.S fail to log in over a 3 day period. Another 3 days are given to fail safe any false triggering of the system.

We give you 150mb of encrypted storage that can be sent to 12 possible email addresses, in Box #1. You up load any documents and choose which documents go to who. You can edit these documents at any time and change the addresses they will be sent to as needed. Box #1 is for your personal private letters to your closest lost friends and relatives.

We give you another 100mb. of unencrypted storage that can be sent to up to 50 email addresses, in Box #2. You can edit the documents and the addresses any time. Box #2 is for more generic documents to lost family & friends.

The cost is $40 for the first year. Re-subscription will be reduced as the number of subscribers increases. Tell your friends about You've Been left behind.

Comments

[Rev. Jonathan C. Watt]

Wow!
Hey! how do we "know" that the "5 team members spread throughout the US" are all "reeeeeally" saved? What if at least three of them are fakin' it? So much for my $40/month.

Sadly, I have often run across a good number Lutherans who were/are fans of the Left Behind books who think that we shouldn't criticize this doctrine... and some who think this is what we believe! Lord have mercy on the church!

[Dave]

As a seminary student I recently taught a six month Sunday School class at our church on the Augsburg Confession. The subject of the end times came up and a number of class attendees were shocked to discover that Lutheranism did not support Dispensationalism (even though they didn't know what it was called). I asked how many had read the Left Behind series and nearly 1/3 of the class had read all or a portion of the books. I asked how many watched TBN and TV preachers like J. Hagee--nearly half do. Needless to say we had to spend some extra time on that issue.

After digging a little further my future pastoral heart began to break as I learned from several older gentleman that they had not heard the AC taught in that church for almost forty years. Everyone was very thankful to have heard the AC (many for the very first time). So there you go; that's the state of some/many Lutheran churches today. Very sad. No wonder so many are deceived and confused.

[Pastor M]

Living and pastoring in Orange County, California, very near to Calvary Chapel, there is a lot of the premillennial dispensationalism that goes around on the radio and in churches around here. I even heard one deacon talk about his training group as the "premillennial dispensationalist group." Obviously, we need to be teaching and preaching about this, but when? For those of us in liturgical churches, when does this come up in the lectionary?

McCain: The end of the Church Year and the beginning of the new year church year are prime times to cover "end times" issues.

[Liz]

I wouldn't be *that* surprised that a number of "Lutherans" believe in the Pre-Trib rapture. As a number of American Evangelical churches are moving to a more Purpose Driven culture, these Evangelicals (such as myself) are moving to the LCMS. If you grow up in the EFCA or the Baptist General Conference, sermons in the LCMS are (generally) more Christ Centered these days and you can bring your non-Christian friend to these services to hear a good gospel presentation.

So, how do you catechise these adults to assure they are really converting to Lutheran Theology? It took my husband and me a year or so to accept True Presence in the Alter Sacrament, a bit longer for infant baptism, and though my dad, husband, and I were all ready to drop the Pre-Trib rapture theology right away, it took my mom seven years.

At our church, we had a 10 or so week adult membership class; but our church doesn't separate those of Lutheran background from non-Lutheran background, or those who can keep up intellectually with a deep theological discussion with those who cannot.

Anyway, I don't want to take up your blog space... the point is, people are joining the LCMS without being catechised properly into Lutheran Theology, so American Evangelical Theology is bound to creep in.

[Just another liberal professor]

I don’t care what you people say; I loathe Jesus. I’d rather burn in hell for all eternity than spend a nanosecond worshipping the abomination that is the xian god.

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, churchie!

[Mike Baker]

This does not surprise me at all. This is the logical end to the "missional" fanaticism of modern protestantism. Growing up a Southern Baptist, I was treated to this kind of thinking all of the time. We once watched a video that was designed to be watched by family members after the rapture. The creators of the video encouraged Christians to leave it in an easily accessable place in the event that their loved ones were left behind. That was in the mid 90s. Pre-millenialists have been using technology this way since the early 70s. The web makes sense.

This kind of thing has been going on long before the mass-market Tim LaHaye enterprise. If you believe that you are responsible for bringing people to Jesus. You will do just about anything to accomplish your mission. After all... eternal souls are at stake!

Praise God that I am free from this bondage and foolishness.