The Rapture Exposed
The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation
Barbara R. Rossing, 2004, 236.9 ROS 2004
Harvard/Yale grad Rossing taught New Testament at the Lutheran School of Theology of Chicago
Her goal for this book is to replace Left Behind distortion and bigotry with hopeful Christian ethics
p001 Ch01 The Destructive Racket of Rapture
p007 Interior Secretary James G. Watt "use it or lose it", chief preoccupation is counting down to earth's violent end.
p007 Anne Coulter's 'God:' "Take it. Rape it. It's yours.""
- p009 Genesis 8:21 "I will never again curse the ground because of humankind ... nor will I ever again destroy every living creature as I have done."
- p010 The Bible's message is not that "God so loved the world that he sent World War III"
p012 "Beam me up" theology ... Manicheism
p013 Dwight L. Moody shipwreck analogy ... theology of despair
p014 Left Behind mentality ... only born-again individuals matter.
p016 Martin Luther: "If I knew the word were going to end tomorrow I would plant a tree"
- apocryphal, first quoted by Martin Schloemann(?) in the 1940's?
p017 Pliny the Younger to Trajan Christians "pledge themselves by an oath not to engage in any crime ... pay their legal debts'
p019 Ch02 The Invention of Rapture
p020 Rapture a principle invented 170 years ago, word not found in the Bible
- p021 "Most Christian churches and biblical scholars condemn Rapture theology as a distortion of Christian faith with little biblical basis:" Lutherans, evangelicals, Catholics, Presbyterians
p022 John Nelson Darby invented rapture and seven year tribulation, NOT BIBLICAL
p023 dispensationalism
p023 Cyrus I. Scofield Scofield Reference Bible with dispensationalist annotations and text changes
p024 dispensationalist Dallas Theological Seminary
- p024 dispensationalist bible rewrites claimed the only system making sense of contradictory bible passages
p026 The desolation and abomination in Daniel was a Zeus statue desecrating the Jewish temple in 168 B.C., Darby claimed it was future prophesy instead
- p027 a multi-kiloyear gap invented to insert Rapture prophesy into Greek or Hebrew texts
- p028 Dispensationalism directly contradicts Peter's scripture in Acts 2
- p032 Rapture is not the same as resurrection in Christian theology
- p032 ancient creeds declare Jesus will come again; none describe him returning twice or in two stages
p035 Tribulation is happening to God's people now, God saves us by being with us in this world
- p036 biblical Rapture chronology "unclear" because it was fabricated in the 1830s
p036 ref23 p189 Illinois Bishops' Statement on "Left Behind" Books and Videos
- p037 early Christians were the people who suffered the tribulations described in Revelation, not some fabricated seven year period thousands of years later
- p040 for decades, Lindsey "updated" John's vision to replace old contemporary events with new events
p045 Paul Boyer https://www.chronicle.com/article/john-darby-meets-saddam-hussein-foreign-policy-and-bible-prophecy/
p047 Ch03 The Rapture Script for the Middle East
- p051 No passage in the New Testament requires a Jewish state for Jesus' return
p060 Temple Institute tiny minority of Messianic Jews support temple rebuilding
p061 Gershom Gorenberg End of Days: Fundamentalism and the Struggle for the Temple Mount
- p062 Palestinian Christians don't even exist for dispensationalists
- p064 they do not fit Darby's end-time prophecy
- p073 Zionists: God save us from these people
- p073 author's Evangelical Lutheran Church of America repudiated Martin Luther's anti-Jewish writings
p077 Mitri Raheb I Am a Palestinian Christian 1995 Multco Offsite
- p079 Revelation 22.:2 Healing Tree of Life, most powerful image
- p080 amazing vision of the tree of life and its healing for the world
p081 Ch04 Prophecy and Apocalypse
p081 apocalypse means "unveiling"
- p084 Christians must renounce Babylon/Rome and faithfully worship God
- p085 follow the Lamb, renounce imperial justice and violence, avoid plagues. God will not destroy the world (but we can destroy ourselves)
p086 Tribulation Force heroes sharply contrast with Biblical concern for the hungry and poor.
- p087 Revelation's "end" is not about the world, but about the Roman empire
- p088 ally ourselves to God and Jesus, not Rome or any other empire.
- p090 biblical prophesy does not foretelhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Hedgesl inevitable doom, instead a warning and a promise, dependent on human behavior.
- p090 example Jonah 3:4 - Nineveh will be destroyed - but the people turned to God, and God relented.
- p090 Jonah a false prophet by dispensationalist logic, but God does not follow a script.
- p091 "trumpets" turn people to God. Exhortation, not prediction
- p092 God cannot be emprisoned in a predetermined script; dispensationalism is appalling theology and ethics.
p093 Jezebel is a false prophet because she does not teach truth, her predictions aren't the point
- p093 Acts 1:7 ... Jesus says "not for you to know the times and the seasons" Only God knows, not even Jesus
- p095 dispensationalists: Revelation beasts are not literal beasts, hence reinterpretable as technological weapons
- p096 literal Revelation not possible nor desirable; "Lamb" is vulnerable Jesus, he isn't a baby sheep less than 1yo.
p097 Kathleen Norris Revelation "is a poet's book
p098 Amy Johnson Frykholm Rapture Culture: Left Behind in Evangelical America 2005
p103 Ch05 The Journey Begins
- p105 Roman victory coin, Goddess standing on globe (known since 3rd century BC)
- p106 Revelation calls the slave trade fornication
- p107 "Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!" refers to Rome's demise
- p108 Instead of imperial victory, Revelation's victory of God's slain Lamb, Jesus
p109 Ch06 Lamb Power
- p111 arnion: little lamb
- p111 Revelation subverts violence itself, dispensationalists completely miss this.
p115 Ch07 Nonviolence
p117 Four horses ... of Roman power conquest (nikan=victory), war, famine, and death
- p118 Rev 12:11 Conquered Satan by the blood of the Lamb ...
- p119 Satan was thrown out of heaven, will be thrown into the abyss
- p119 blood of the Lamb is Jesus' blood, not anyone else's
- p119 conquer the unjust empire with testimony, more powerful than military force
p123 Ch08 The Exodus Story in Revelation
p125 note 2: E. S. Fiorenza Revelation: Vision of a Just World
p127 oppress the environment, we suffer the consequences
- p128 today the plagues are ecological destruction, arms race, irrational consumerism ...
- p133 Replaced the Roma of victory with empire as a whore
p123 Ch09 Hijacking the Lamb
- p136 Revelation 6 - kings, great men, rich men ... hide from the wrath of the Lamb
- John never again refers to the Lamb as wrathful
- p136 dispensationalists omit the river of life from the throne of the Lamb in chapter 22
p137 John Hagee "next time Jesus will be the Lion"
- in Rev Chapter 5 John deliberately replaces the lion with the Lamb and never again refers to Jesus as a lion.
- p139 voyeuristic aerial view of the end of the world while escaping its torments is what dispensationalism is all about.
p139 Chris Hedges War was a drug, "the most powerful narcotic invented by humankind"
p141 Ch10 Rapture In Reverse
- p141 Left Behind culminates with Revelation 19, but 21 and 22 are far more important ... our renewed world
- p142 a spiritual vision for communities today, which dispensationalists completely deny.
- p144 Sunday was a Roman work day; Christians worshipped early morning, dispersed, then shared a common evening meal
- p148 Heaven isn't mentioned after Rev 21.2, because God's throne moves down to the earth.
- p150 There is no temple in the city ... the temple is the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb
p159 Ch11 The Journey Outward
p171 Epilogue DEBUNKING THE RAPTURE BY VERSE
- ..
- p186 there is no Rapture and tribulation and two-stage return of Christ in the Bible. Jesus will return - once.