So what’s wrong with Left Behind, the movie?
For starters, it’s based on a doctrine that was invented in the mid-1800s and which is built on an incredibly brittle interpretation of Scripture.
We can trace the doctrine back to John Nelson Darby, D.L. Moody, and C.I. Scofield. I told the story elsewhere:
For D.L. Moody, “the church was a voluntary association of the saved.” So staggering was his influence that by 1874 the church was not seen as a grand corporate body but as a gathering of individuals. This emphasis was picked up by every revivalist who followed him. And it eventually entered into the marrow and bones of evangelical Christianity. It is also worth noting that Moody was heavily influenced by the Plymouth Brethren teaching on the end times. This was the teaching that Christ may return at any second before the great Tribulation. (This teaching is also called “pretribulational dispensationalism.”)
John Nelson Darby spawned this teaching. The origin of Darby’s pretribulational doctrine is fascinating. See Dave MacPherson, The Incredible Cover-Up (Medford, OR: Omega Publications, 1975). Scofield’s Bible popularized the new doctrine and so did Moody’s Bible Institute. Since then, the pretrib rapture theory has been in the drinking water of evangelical Christianity, and it has fostered an escapist mentality among believers.
Pretribulational dispensationalism gave rise to the idea that Christians must act quickly to save as many souls as possible before the world ends. With the founding of the Student Volunteer Movement by John Mott in 1888, a related idea sprang forth: “The evangelization of the world in one generation.” The “in one generation” watchword still lives and breathes in the church today. Yet it does not map well with the mind-set of the first-century Christians who did not appear to be pressured into trying to get the entire world saved in one generation.
(Excerpted from Pagan Christianity, Frank Viola and George Barna, Tyndale, 2008.)
I believe it is, but not the way most of us have been taught it.
10 Lies About Porn: A Review
Thank you Frank. Understand His First Coming, first. I like that. Another insightful studied article.
The movie is based on a novel. I don’t get too upset about fiction.
Yes, but the novel is based on a theological viewpoint that still has many followers. No need to get upset, but challenging the premise is a good thing.