Serving the High Plains
Serving the High Plains
“OK, men. Today’s the last game of the season, and we’re about to take the field against the Canaan Giants. Now, these guys are huge. They’re faster, stronger and tougher than we are, and it’s not even close. We’ll try hard, but let’s be honest. We’re about to go get our lunches handed to us. We simply haven’t been given what it would take for us to win this. We’re not even supposed to win. But take heart: There’s a state-of-the-art ambulance waiting to rush you to the emergency room when you get injured. (And you will get injured.) Our victory lies somewhere in the future — after we’ve finished playing this particular sport and losing continually. Are you ready? OK, let’s bring it in. One ... two ... three ... LOSE!”
As that team trots out on the field, it doesn’t take much imagination to see their faces. These are the same faces worn by evangelical Christians who have been told to hunker down and wait for the Rapture to happen.
It took me a while to realize a simple truth about biblical theology: Eschatology matters.
Eschatology is the five-dollar word for the study of “last things,” or the end times, in the Bible. Throughout Christian history, there have been ebbs and flows in end-times theories, where one particular view dominated the landscape. That is to say, the view that is dominant now used to be a non-starter; and these ideas have real effects on the people who believe them, like the coach’s speech would have on those players. The dominant view today (apologizing for the jargon) is dispensational futurism, or simply dispensationalism.
Without space to describe it fully, in the dispensational outline of history, there is nothing but increasing trouble, cultural defeat and persecution for Christians until such time as Jesus rushes them out of the chaos in a heavenly ambulance run we call the Rapture. Popular teachers of this view have discouraged cultural involvement of believers by saying things such as, “You don’t polish brass on a sinking ship.” Our decline is part of God’s plan to close out all things.
In perfect consistency with this view, I’ve witnessed a dispensational pastor rejoicing over horrific news on television because his eschatology taught him that this meant Jesus must be coming “soon.” (This was over 30 years ago.) He was like the coach in the opening paragraph. The more we lose, the better the news.
Violence in Israel! Worldwide pandemic! Skyrocketing food prices! Widespread sexual confusion! Yippee, we’re going home soon!
But, what if, my brothers? What if that’s not actually God’s game plan? What if you’ve been sold a bill of goods by teachers who had boxes of prophecy books to move? What if the actual, biblical plan is for the victorious (though gradual) transformation of all things through the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ? What if, rather than wait to be zapped out of here in the nick of time, the Lord would have you build for the future in expectation of lasting fruitfulness?
In coming columns, I hope to give you reasons to hit the field expecting victory. Until then, maybe try poring over Psalms 2, 22, 72 and 110. God wins in the here and now.
Gordan Runyan is the pastor of Immanuel
Baptist Church in Tucumcari.
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