Okay, my maternal grandfather was a minister in the Assemblies of God church, and my parents got saved in the ol' AofG, and that was the kinda church I attended as a child. Also, I attended a school for missionary kids (Okinawa Christian School) which was administered by missionaries of the Church of the Nazarene, the Southern Baptist Church, the Four-Square Gospel Church, The Bible Believing Pre-millenialist Fundamentalist Soul Winning Maranatha Baptist Church, and, of course, the Assemblies of God Church. So, I knows all about pre-millenialst, pre-tribulation-rapture oh-noes-another-war-in-the-Middle-East-here-comes-Armegeddon-style readings of the Apocalypse of St. John the Divine, or, the Book of Revelation to you of a more Protestant bent. I grew up with the Antichrist hiding around every corner. This was all old hat for me by the time I read
So, I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised to learn that Senator Barack Obama is the Antichrist. Geez Louize! I was trying to figure out how many famous people have been called the Antichrist in my lifetime, but I don't have that kind of time (or patience!). When I hear some
When I read The Apocalypse I don't read it as a prophecy; I read it as a description of what the Church was experiencing in the first century. The more I read the Johannine texts, the more I am convinced that the author didn't see antichrist as a person, but as a spirit; so anyone with the spirit of anti-christ is the Antichrist. I know I'm not the first person to point this out, but Religious Right and the Bush Administration are more antichrist, in my opinion, than Obama, Bill Clinton, the Bishop of Rome, and countless others who have been so named. The Prosperity Gospel is antichrist, as is the idea that God is a capitalist, or that God supports any particular political party*, or that God wants us to invade Iraq, Iran, Vietnam, or wherever in order to bring them the Gospel. Using our national wealth to pay for wars while people starve and are without housing or medical care is antichrist, in my opinion.
Who is the antichrist? Those who work against the coming of the Reign of God.
1930's Image of Antichrist, According to Gramma Johnson
*Okay, I do believe God supports certain political parties. I like to say "Sure, God the Father is a Republican, but his Son is a Democrat. It happens in the best of families! And how do we know that Jesus is a Democrat? Because he rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, not an elephant."
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5 comments:
Kathleen Norris, author of Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith (among other wonderful things), shares a succinct definition from an early pastor of hers that I've never forgotten:
"We are each of us the antichrist, whenever we hear the word of God and do not do it."
I keep hearing "Anarchy in the UK" in my head as I read this, but hey that is just me.
I love what you say about how you read the Apocalypse... Oh you are one wise guy, I mean wise man indeed.
Amen and Amen.
I might point out that George Bush said that God told him to run for president. Apparently, Carl Rove is God. Makes me want to be an atheist again.
When Bush said God told him to run for president, my reaction is to ask them to seek a psychiatrist sooner rather than later. They belong, properly, on the couch... and not the one in the oval office.
Bush most certainly proves my theory.
As I pointed out in my post on The Smirking Chimp, the McCain ad that calls Obama "The One" looks like code to me for the folks who have a little less sense than your grandma had.
Yesterday, I saw George W giving God a "plug" again...he was doing the a press conference in South Korea when suddenly the slyness of his very own spirit came upon him...he figured out (you could see his non-wheels turning) that this very moment would be a GREAT time to GRANDSTAND for God and mention, more than once, how intends to impose God and FREE RELIGIOUS IDEAS upon his upcoming honest in China...I'd love to see that private meeting and notice the non-reply to this idiot by savvy Communists who have managed to grab the ball and score touch down after touch down in the REAL world as Bush rolls around in the immoral damage he has done to ALL of humanity!
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