Christians Need to Stop Date-Setting Predictions Based on Sensationalization

Theology and Politics from a Conservative, Biblical Perspective

I’m tired of it. Are you? Do you pay attention to all the gloom and doom preachers who continually tell us and when we can expect the next huge crash?

IT…NEEDS…TO…STOP.

Unfortunately, it will continue by well-meaning as well as unscrupulous individuals who firmly believe that God is using events on the ancient Jewish calendar to speak to America. It is so ridiculous that it is laughable and simply proves that too often, people interpret Scripture through the lens of emotionalism.

Of course, it isn’t funny because it ascribes to Jesus (God the Son) things that He has not said and creates an expectation that He is going to do “something” terrible in our day based on specific issues related only to ancient Israel. Not only is it not funny, but it is seriously tragic.

Frankly, the apostle Paul was never more correct when he penned the following words as prompted by the Holy Spirit, in 2 Timothy 4:3.

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires…”

Here, Paul is exhorting Timothy and we read in the few verses preceding verse three what Paul is referring to and then immediately following verse three, Paul provides more explanation. Here are verses one through two:

“In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: 2 Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.”

This is a charge to Timothy! Paul was telling him that no matter what, Timothy was to preach the truth of the Word all the time without fail. Notice Paul says Timothy should do three specific things:

1. correct
2. rebuke
3. encourage

Correcting people means to help them understand where they are wrong about what the Bible teaches. The job of a teacher or preacher is to be able to correct people. But notice Paul states that this should be done “with great patience and careful instruction.” Anything else is arrogance or pride and often creates more problems than it solves. We must be consistent in correction but we must never do it in a way that purposefully is divisive. Correcting people – even when done in loving gentleness – can often create divisions. The reason for that is because God’s Word is far sharper than a two-edged sword (Hebrews 4:12). It is able to separate down to the finest detail truth from error. However, people who hang onto their sacred cow beliefs are not so easily convinced and too often dig in their heels, refusing to acknowledge that their beliefs when held up to Scripture, fail. Instead of being corrected, they simply move onto another teacher or set of teachers who will allow them and even encourage them to continue believing their error.

Paul told Timothy to also be ready to rebuke. Rebuke is often seen in a negative manner and rightly so. It is reserved for those who spurn truth, who continue to uphold their false ideologies and theologies even though they have already been corrected in gentleness. A rebuke is what Jesus did often to His own disciples and others. But of course, He rebuked in love because He did not want to see anyone continue in error, even the religious leaders of Israel.

Lastly, Paul told Timothy to encourage people, to spur them onto discovering and embracing God’s truth, which is absolute and is not dependent upon how we feel about things. A Christian leader must always bear these things in mind whenever that sees error being embraced by other Christians.

However, look what exists with too many people today. They have itching ears as I’ve bolded and italicized in the above verse. People too often today come to their beliefs via emotion. That is how truth is determined for them. If something sounds good and seems based on Scripture, then it is good and therefore, acceptable. There are many theologies today which are loosely based on Scripture but are from hell itself. Christians think that our “emotions” will warn us about something. No, the only thing that warns us about something is our knowledge of Scripture. That’s when the Bible becomes the tool that is sharper than a two-edged sword. It is the WORD that reveals truth, not our emotions.

In a recent article written by David Lazarus titled, “The Danger of the Blood Moon Phenomenon,” he makes some very cogent points. He starts his article off by noting that a friend came to him to ask him what he thought about the Shemitah. The person asking had been reading books, magazine and Internet articles related to the Shemitah and the blood moons and was wondering what truth, if any, they might hold for America.

Lazarus’ response was simple and to the point.

“I told him it is wrong for Christians and Messianics to make doom and gloom predictions based on misguided misinterpretations of ancient Jewish practices. America may very well be on the verge of calling down God’s judgments because morality has imploded, not because of Jewish agricultural customs connected to the Land of Israel.”

He explained that Christians and Messianics (Jewish Christians) had gone off the rails with their preoccupation with looking at signs and wonders.

“Christians and Messianics are wasting precious time and resources waiting for a financial collapse that never happens. It reminds me of an old Bedouin Muslim I befriended in the Sinai Desert. When I asked him why the Bedouin’s don’t plant crops on their land, he replied, ‘Seven years ago there was a flood that destroyed all of our crops. It is Allah’s will that it be destroyed, so why should I plant again?’ That is the Islamic belief in fatalism that prevents progress and development. Christians who follow these sensational proclamations about the end of the world likewise paralyze themselves by foolishly believing a lie.”

Aside from selling tons of books and making certain people rich, nothing is accomplished, except promoting fear and confusion. We already know from the Bible that we are in the end times and we also know that as time marches onward, we are marching straight up to the beginning of the final seven-year period known as the Tribulation.

In today’s world though, Christians, rather than adopting the Lord’s attitude (“Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,” Matthew 6:34), too many have become burdened with this artificial sense of doom created by exceedingly poor exegesis of God’s Word! Between so-called Christians leaders and authors and secular con men, it seems that all we hear about these days are things like “the stock market is going to crash!” or “take your money out of the banks!” or “total destruction coming!” or “world war 3 is inevitable!” We end up looking and sounding like the chicken with her head cut off and the world laughs.

The stock market will have its ups and downs. For all the time it’s been down, it goes back up. Precious metals also go up and down. It wasn’t that long ago that the price of gold was just over $1300/ounce. Everyone warned that soon it was going to go through the roof so buy “now”! That was well over a year ago. Now, the price of gold is just about $1100/ounce.

The problem is that while the Bible speaks very clearly about a coming one-world system of governance over which the final man of lawlessness will rule, that same Bible is not real clear on how we get to that point. We don’t know if there will be a huge crash or an incrementally smooth transition that gets us to that point. We really have no clue and the Bible does not tell us. We need to simply trust the Lord.

The most recent Shemitah came and went, yet for two to three years beforehand, certain individuals were highlighting it and warning about God’s impending judgment. Yes, there will be judgment – that’s what the Tribulation is all about – but the Shemitah had nothing to say about that. Now, people have turned their attention to the coming blood moons. It’ll be an interesting phenomenon, but likely nothing more. Oh, by the way, according to some, the New World Order officially begins this Friday, the 25th. Okee doke.

While it is fine to study and learn about the end times or even prophecy in general, I so wish Christians would just focus on the Great Commission. But that isn’t exciting enough for many. They want to “see” or “hear” God. They want desperately to witness the signs in the heavens (that will come at the end of the Tribulation and sporadically throughout), but what then? They’re already in fear now. I cannot imagine how much they will be in fear then.

Folks, we need to stop the foolishness. We need to stop making people rich who write books about “their” predictions they say are based on God’s Word, while denying they’re predicting anything. We need to start using our heads and the common sense that God gave us. We need to stop giving the world reasons to laugh. We need to be about the Father’s business and that business involves spreading the gospel message so that people can be saved.

Let’s get back on track and forget about the foolish meanderings of authors who believe God has spoken to them. I wish they would run out of ink. I wish their computers would cease to work.

We need to be all about living for Jesus and spreading His message that all are sinners in desperate need of His salvation. Can you do that? Do you want to do that? I sure hope so.

Theology and Politics from a Conservative, Biblical Perspective