In Reply to: you're a brave man Donny posted by lydia on November 14, 2002 at 10:39:58:
George recommended that I read the book "The Last Days are Here Again (A History of the End Times)", by Richard Kyle. This book does not back up George's preterist position at all. But what it DOES do is give info about (a) the various views that the church has had about the rapture, the endtime and the millennium during the last 2,000 years, and (b) all the nearly hundreds of times people have predicted that Jesus would come back in a certain year. The book is written by a Christian, but he doesn't have a hobby horse to ride and he's not pushing any doctrinal viewpoint. He's merely giving all the facts and allowing the reader to come to his or her own conclusion.
I highly recommend this book. I'd been sort of burned out on end time Bible prophecy since leaving the Family and this book confirmed my feelings. You know, in the Family, there were certain "essential teachings" and if you didn't believe them any more you were practically considered a heretic. And one of them was that you HAD to believe that we were living in the end times, meaning not only did Jesus HAVE to come back in our lifetimes, but more specifically on Berg's birthday, Feb. 19, in 1993. Or at least within ten years or so.
There was such a sense of "imminency" that all hell was going to break loose and the End Times were practically unfolding before our weary eyes, that many people were persuaded to stay in the Family long after they wanted out, because they thought being "in the System" was just about a guarantee that they'd be forced to get the 666 mark, and the ONLY safe place was in the Family, because then you could either hide in the wilderness or live with rich fat kings like Louie and stick straight-pins in his forehead to get rid of his mark. (I guess carrying straight-pins will be part of the end time mandatroy Fleebag.)
I don't carry straight-pins in my wallet and I don't mark my calendar with the year or month or day of Jesus return marked on it. At this point I really don't care much about end time prophecy. Sadam Hussein can fart all he wants in his bunker, but I'm not going to interpret it as the opening shot in the Battle of Armageddon.
Jesus may come back in my lifetime but he may not. I know "all the signs are around us" and "so-called earthquakes have increased so much in recent years, etc etc" but it's really only our own ignorance of past plagues, earthquakes and famines, and ignorance of Bible interpretation for the past 2,000 years that makes us think it HAS to be in our generation.
I've found that reading eye-opening books by lucid, clear-thinking, objective Christians can help liberate my mind from the oppressive weight of living in an emergency state. What so many think are the "obvious" truths (like Jesus is probably coming within 5 to 10 years) is not necessarily the obvious truth. It's just part of Berg's controlling system, and we should be willing to at least question them. And to question them intelligently we need to get information from other sources.
I don't care if lots of Christians outside the Family buy into the "we are the Rapture generation" too. I still don't buy it.