We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.
A Guide to the Book of Revelation
Marc Nozell via Compfight
Kurt Willems posted this excellent guide for reading the Book of Revelation as it was intended to be read. As Kurt points out, this is the most misunderstood and misinterpreted book of the Bible. If you were weaned on A Thief in the Night or the Left Behind series of books, this will be refreshing information for you.
From Kurt’s blog:
Revelation is a book that continues to be used as “trump card” against Christian nonviolence as it posits a future tribulation and war in which Christ comes back to lead people into a battle, one that apparently contradicts everything he taught during his earthly ministry. And of course there’s the baggage of the “Left Behind” series that imagines a rapture followed by the rise of an “anti-Christ” and a literal 7-year tribulation which fuels a mentality that the book is mostly about what will happen and how to escape that fate. I want to suggest that most of what you have been taught about Revelation, especially if you watched the cheesy Christian movies or grew up in conservative/fundamentalist expressions of evangelicalism, is wrong.
Category: General
Tags: Book of Revelation, Kurt Willems, Left Behind, Non-Violence, Rapture, Revelation
Related Reading
Responding to Driscoll’s “Is God a Pacifist?” Part I
I’m sure many of you have read Mark Driscoll’s recent blog titled “Is God a Pacifist?” in which he argues against Christian pacifism. I’ve decided to address this in a series of three posts, not because I think Driscoll’s arguments are particularly noteworthy, but because it provides me with an opportunity to make a case against what I’ve…
Blessing the Soldiers of ISIS
In light of the overwhelming response to Greg’s post about loving the soldiers of ISIS, we thought we would explore Jesus’ teaching on this topic further. The following is an excerpt from Myth of a Christian Religion. The perspective below stands in contrast to the perspectives exhibited by many Christians, one being the recent article…
How Revelation Uses Violent Images in an Anti-Violent Way
All the violent scenes in Revelation are symbols for the battle of truth and deception. They never involve literal violence. In fact, they symbolize ANTI-VIOLENCE. The ingenious way John helps us get free of deception of trust in violent power is by taking a standard violent symbol and juxtaposing it with a symbol that undermines…
Cross-like Love and Non-Violence
Cosmo Spacely via Compfight Though it seems to have been forgotten by many today, the cross wasn’t simply something God did for us. According to the NT, it was also an example God calls us to follow. Hence, after John defined love by pointing us to Jesus’ death on the cross on our behalf, he…
Responding to Critics of a Pacifist View of the Syrian Crisis-Part 2
United Nations Photo via Compfight Yesterday I posted a response to Tyler Tully’s criticism of some of my thoughts on the Syrian crisis. The second blog I’d like to review is Two Friars and a Fool by Aric Clark. Like Tully, Aric approved of much of what I said, but also like Tully, he raised several…
The Heresy of “Just War”
Since the time when the Jesus-looking kingdom movement was transformed into the Caesar-looking “militant and triumphant” Church, there has been a tradition of Christians by-passing the enemy-loving, non-violent teachings of the NT and instead appealing to the precedent of divinely-sanctioned nationalism and violence in the OT whenever they felt the need to justify engaging in…