Dave Daubenmire obviously too often listens to people who do not know what they are talking about.
I emailed Dave the last time he made this ridiculous assertion that the Church is sitting around doing nothing waiting for the Rapture. Obviously what I said to him did not sink in so now I will say it publicly since he makes his ridiculous assertion publicly.
Most of the Church could care less about the Rapture and it certainly is not obsessed with end-time prophecy. As I told Dave before, almost nobody is teaching it anymore. The few churches that are, are probably the churches that are actually doing something spiritual in this nation.
We who believe in the Rapture and the soon return of Jesus Christ are not paralyzed by Last-Days madness anymore than any other Spirit filled believers are. You insult the Holy Spirit that works through all His people. You obviously listen too much to heretical dominionists who think the world is not Christianized because the church is failing. The world is failing by rejecting the teaching of the Church. That is not the fault of the Church. Most of the world is pagan because it does not accept the Gospel rather than not heard it.
Part of your problem is that you cannot discern between cultural Christians in this nation and the real Church. You act as if America was and is a Christian nation and all that the Christians have to do is get off their duff like the prodigal Son, return to God and take this nation back for Christ. The Church you imagine in America did not exist and it does not exist. The real Church in this nation has always been a minority and it has always been working for Christ.
You expect a “Christian” people that does not exist in America to suddenly see the light and act like Christians because you rail against them? You are not living in reality.
Dave, you have some wise things to tell Americans about what they need to do to save this nation. But, don’t confuse instructing Americans to return to Christian moral values with telling Americans that most of them are lazy Christians who need to repent from some end-time madness of looking for the Rapture. It is not happening. It is a false argument. It is counterproductive and it is stupid.
Most Americans are pagans that need to be saved but can’t be saved. Most reject the only message that can save them because they love their sins and want to believe a lie.
As for your “heal our land” statement out of Malachi. That promise in context was clearly made to physical Israel and applies to physical Israel. Last I heard we are America. There is no promise to Christians in other nations that if they humble themselves and pray that God will heal their pagan land. Try preaching that nonsense to the persecuted church in China. The promise of restoration is to the land of Israel. You like many just like to take promises to Israel out of context and make them yours but then your promises just become presumptions. America is not the promised land.
Dave, Get a grip!
Dave Daubenmire — The Prodigal Nation
What type of leadership burns our food?
The American Church is paralyzed by what Gary DeMar calls “Last-Days Madness.” In a nutshell, the modern American Church has become so obsessed with End-Time prophecy that Christians have ceased to be the “salt and light” that Christ has commanded us to be. Convinced that things are “only going to get worse” Christians have neglected Jesus’ mandate to “Occupy until I return and have instead turned the gates of authority over to the enemies of the cross.
“Worse is better!” I heard one Christian-radio pundit say. “As things get worse that means the return of the Lord is near.”
What hogwash! Is the Lord glorified by the multiplication of evil? “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on Earth…” Did Jesus pray against His own will?
I don’t want to turn this into a theological discussion and get us all wrapped in the minutia of fig trees and famines. For the Lord’s sake, man, STAND UP AND FIGHT!
I have often wondered what America would look like if the Church believed in revival as much as it believed in the rapture.
Well said! I have not seen anyone else address this so well! There will be no true healing of the nations and the world until the Prince of Peace returns! It seems that what Dave desires is a “christianized” nation. Don’t we already have that in the “emergant” and dominionist churches. Such stupid dominionist thinking!
I can see the same thinking among Christians in Belgium and the Netherlands. The difference is that they are even more likely to give up on straight Biblical thinking and choose to collaborate with the godless left-leaning establishment instead. Some people seem to think that participation in the government up to its highest levels will somehow lead to God blessing their country, and citizens getting more attracted to the Gospel. What a joke!
I can see just the opposite happening. In the Netherlands many Right-wingers are getting totally fed up with many of those self-proclaimed Evangelicals running the current administration. And these Right-wingers are now even more likely to defend gay marriage and sodomy than before, because now they see not only Islam but also Christianity and religion or faith in God as a general problem or even an enemy to their freedom. And despite the fact that I cannot agree with their liberal mores, I do perfectly understand their thinking.
The more “Christians” collaborate with evil ideologies, even making make environmentalist thinking part of what they claim as Christians’ biblical “responsibility”, sympathizing with the idea of “tolerance” for other faiths and particularly Islam, the more they are ridiculing not only themselves and showing how hypocritical they are (especially when they talk about “tolerance” but don’t include homosexuals yet don’t want to admit) but also blaspheming God. Now you would think that’s about the last thing they would want to do but that really is what they are doing basically. No doubt there are good and well-meaning people among them, but their beliefs have become clouded by wordly thinking. Dominionism is just that: worldly thinking. They realize they can’t lead their people to Christ so what they do next is trying to attract people and become more popular by easing up on some issues and incorporate modern thinking.
So here’s a little something:
Government, my dear brothers and sisters, is meant to GOVERN and *not* to spread the Gospel.
Let me add this:
Government is an institution of God and has its place. The Church is another and the two do not mix. At the very heart of society is the institution of what I see as the “little church”, the family. Next is the individual. Whoever in the name of tolerance, either as a Church or as a “Christian” political party, gives up on this little yet sacred compound, is compromising with the world even if the end is to “spread the Gospel”. The ends do not justify the means if it leads you to disregard any part of God’s Word in working to that end, even if you claim that end is to spread the Gospel. How can you testify of the Savior if you break His very Word and go with the flow? That is a question even I struggle with sometimes. What to think if you’re doing so as a Christian in politics?
Christians who want to lead their people to Christ better don’t fool themselves into thinking they can do so through politics. They can’t and I would even say they *shouldn’t* be using government to that end. Power corrupts, they say. Well, the modern pluralistic Democratic system does exactly the same. It corrupts biblical Christian faith.
That is not to say Chrisitians should not go into politics. There’s nothing wrong to go in politics and standing for Biblical values. Just don’t pretend your political platform is as holy as the Bible. And don’t pretend Democracy is somehow a Christian value. Man and his thinking is fallible, and perhaps government (of any type) offers the best evidence for that.