Category: Exegeting culture

Apocalypse literally means “to unveil.”  It’s the opening word of the Book of Revelation, a revealing.  The writer lifts the veil from the world we see to reveal things as they really are. 

Being killed is not the worst thing that can happen to you in Revelation.  The worst is being seduced, giving ourselves over to forces that will destroy us.  Power is seductive in Revelation.  I can think of no other biblical book that deals with the toxicity of power like Revelation.  The seduction in Revelation is to confuse power with truth, worthiness, or righteousness.

You’ve probably heard the quote, “If you really want to test a man’s character, give him power.”  You’ve probably also heard, “Adversity doesn’t build character, it reveals it.” 

Apocalypse means “to unveil.”  We’ve had a lot revealed lately. 

We’ve had pastors reveal their willingness to compromise principle to be near power.  They’ve replaced loyalty to principles with loyalty to a president.

Our Supreme Court confirmation process has revealed a Senate majority leader willing to make his own rules for partisan advantage.  Because who’s going to stop him? 

The pandemic has revealed how politicians will pressure public health officials, compromising science to benefit the politics.

The president has revealed his unworthiness for the office in his expectation that the government will serve his personal interests, rewarding his friends and punishing his enemies.

We’ve seen a revelation about ourselves as a people.  The problem with the president is not his incompetence, his racism, or his lies.  There are incompetent racist liars everywhere.  The problem is that people vote for him.  People uncritically accept his words and interpret his wealth as a sign of his worthiness and credibility.  He’ll protect them from their shared enemies.  People have been seduced.  Seduced into believing that if you have power, you don’t need law.  Seduced into believing that wealth and the power that comes with it are signs of righteousness.

Apocalypse means “to unveil.”  This is an apocalyptic moment not because of what’s being destroyed, but because of what we’re learning. We haven’t made the progress we thought we had against racism, sexism, or any other ism.

– Our Constitutional government isn’t a set of rules, it is a discipline that must be practiced by the governing and the governed.  It’s only as good as our willingness to live by it.
– People will trade uncomfortable facts for great-sounding lies.
– We are looking for permission to give in to our dark sides and we will enable those who grant it.

I am on the record as opposing comparing people to Hitler and the Nazis.  What I really oppose making those comparisons as a first resort, reflexively, without thinking.  I have been thinking and I want to bring up the Nazis.  Work with me. I grew up hearing that Hitler was an evil genius who bent Germany to his will through brilliant oratory and sinister propaganda.  He repeated his lies often enough that people were programmed into believing them.  Hitler supposedly carried out an evil plan on an innocent population.

I think that’s garbage.  I think Hitler told people what they wanted to hear.  I don’t think he was brilliant, just a slick salesman, giving people permission give in to their dark sides.  People believed his lies because they wanted to.  They believed it all the way into a world war that destroyed the country.

Apocalypse means “to unveil.”  The point of revealing is to recognize and resist the seduction of power.  The people in Revelation 13 marvel at the beast and worship it.  But the beast and its followers are destined for a lake of fire.  The kind of power the beast represents does not come from God and is destined for destruction.  Yet we continue to see that kind of power as worthy, virtuous, even godly.  The most important revelation in Revelation is our capacity to give ourselves over to what will destroy us.

These are apocalyptic times.  See what the times reveal.  That’s my take.  In 666 words.

So many comparisons between 2020 and the apocalypse. And maybe they’re right. Look at what’s happened:

• A world-wide pestilence, disrupting the everything we consider normal parts of life.
• So much of the west coast is on fire that we see the smoke on the east coast.
• Hurricanes causing flooding along the Gulf coast. So many of them we’ve used up the English alphabet and we’re into the Greek. There is no plan for what happens if we use up the Greek alphabet.
• Upheavals and divisions in politics like never before, politicians grooming their followers with falsehoods, and the two sides can’t agree on what facts are.
• And all of this is hitting us at the same time.

I think Robert Jeffress, one of the president’s go-to pastors, may have been right in his 2014 book Perfect Ending, that president Barak Obama was preparing the country for the Antichrist.  In an interview for the National Catholic Reporter, Jeffress didn’t call Obama the Antichrist, “But what I am saying is this: the course he is choosing to lead our nation is paving the way for the future reign of the Antichrist.”  Maybe Jeffress was right.  Maybe that’s what happened.

I heard John Hagee, a San Antonio pastor, explain how all this will come about.  He said things would get so bad that we’d turn everything over to a dictator – the Antichrist, quite literally an agent of Satan, who would seem to set things right, but in fact would be paving the way for the worst time in human history – The Great Tribulation.  Jeffress makes a similar statement in the interview quoted above, “‘. . . Americans are willingly giving up their freedom for what they’re told is a greater good,’ he said. ‘A future world dictator will assume power under the guise of the greater good of the world.’”

It’s clear that Jeffress and those like him thought that Obama had done terrible things as president, things like allowing same-sex marriage and the passage of Obamacare.  We were headed to socialism in a handcar.  Then along comes Mr. Donald “I alone can fix it” Trump.  He’s the one who will save us from socialism, from foreign hordes streaming across the border illegally, from the gun grabbers, the baby-killers, and anyone else out there to take what’s ours.  We can say a lot about appointing judges and Supreme Court justices, a lot about banning abortion, and a lot about tax policy, but we are going through a time of major societal change and there are people who are afraid their world will be swept away by it.  Literally afraid.  For them, the upcoming election is literally about their survival.  They’ll tolerate a lot of constitutionally and morally sketchy things from someone who will save their lives.  Things are bad and we now have a leader, a chosen one, doing a lot of sketchy things in the name of making the country great again. A deliverer.  Do you see the pattern?

Are Hagee and Jeffress players in their own scenario?  Are they enabling the thing they warned us about?  The most ironic outcome is often the most likely.  Much of what they say about antichrist comes from Revelation 13, but there is a less-popular figure there, too.  It’s often called the False Prophet and it forces everyone to worship the Antichrist.  I’m not calling anyone any names, but if Trump fits the antichrist pattern, then we should look for a false prophet.  It’s there in Revelation.

I wonder why a movement that teaches us that Satan’s agent will work through politics has been so careless with its loyalties.  In referring to antichrist, the letter of 1 John tells us to “test the spirits to see whether they are from God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1).  Don’t be too eager to follow what feels good, what confirms your prejudices, what makes you feel safe.  In Revelation, it’s the seductive things that lead us to our doom.  So that’s my take.  In 666 words.