The Left Behind Series

I was just reading Desecration (the latest one) over the long weekend.

Have any of you read them? What do you think?

 

The funny thing was, I wasn't going to read them but one day I heard a dramatic presentation on the radio and my own pastor was one of the voices lol . So I kept listening and figured from the storyline that it must be a dramatization of "Left Behind" (book 1). Just to be clear...my pastor was the voice on the tape of the pastor of a local church who was taken in the rapture. Not someone left behind

Anyway, so then I read the first book and the others. I always want to know 'what happens' in books and movies so once I start...

However, speaking just for myself, it's not really my 'genre' of book. I'm not really into action adventure books about fighting and killing and there's a lot of that in these books, because of the setting. I like Jane Austen and Charles Dickens novels best . I did very much enjoy the Mitford series by Jan Karon, which is much more my preferred style of novel. It's about people living in a small country town, focusing on a local minister; I think the values in it are very Biblical and there is an overt testimony of salvation at one point. Mostly the Christian values are not so directly stated as having characters saying overtly Christian stuff to one another but, such things as self-sacrificial love and the power of God to change, restore, heal people, build communities...all those things are upheld in the series. And there is humor, which I always appreciate.

I respect the authors of the Left Behind series - it's a hard thing to write about at all credibly and I think they have done it pretty well, considering that. I'm not sure about the eschatology that underlies it but as long as people don't rely on it; it is a one mainstream conservative Christian view at least .

At one point in reading the Left Behind series I was getting increasingly outraged at the way one character was behaving...but fortunately this person eventually realized that they were acting out of selfish ambition more than listening to God, and had a significant time of repentance and returning to the Lord. I was very relieved!

I expect the Left Behind books make people think and I'd say that's very good. I've heard that lots of people have been stirred to the extent of coming to faith as a result of reading the books - that doesn't surprise me. I wouldn't want to say much against books that, apart from anything, have been instrumental in many people coming to Christ. But, just for myself, there's too much in them about things that make me go "ewwww" - too many details about people being killed etc etc. I'm sure it could have been even worse but...that's just not my 'cup of tea', to use an English expression

Still, having read the first 8, and seeing 9 in the library, I thought I may as well read it

 

But that's not what this series is, Glen!

It's a series of novels. No-one is suggesting we read them instead of the Bible.

It might be true that some Christians read a lot and yet hardly read the Bible and one might ask, is that pleasing to God?

But - that's really a separate issue.

I'm sure the authors tried to make the series as Scripturally accurate as possible; I'm sure they are delighted when people become more interested in reading the Bible because of their fiction; I'm equally sure they'd be dismayed to think that reading their books had replaced Bible reading in anyone's lives.

As sure as I can be, given that I'm not them, that is...

 

I didn't know that.

I don't read any study Bibles myself. I personally believe they violate this verse:

Rev 22:18 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book.

because practically speaking, they've added to the text. Because, think about it? Who reads a study Bible who doesn't read the notes on a passage? And do they cover up the notes and pray about what the passage meant, before they read the notes? No, I doubt it.

So...practically speaking the notes have been added to the text just like they were part of it.

So, quite a few people are due some plagues for adding their own words to the Bible text, right there on the page, next to the text ...but, that's just my opinion...

 

Hi katie

I understand that the notes are at the bottom of the page. What I am saying is that, practically speaking, people read the text then read the footnotes at the same time. So they may as well be right there in the text. What's the practical difference? The challenge of thinking about what a text means is taken away by the footnotes. Clint wrote of Baptists not simply saying 'my pastor says...' but I truly believe that people end up thinking 'my footnotes say...' - and, I've heard it in Bible studies, how people rely on those footnotes. I'm not just speculating about this. Granted I can't say for sure whether Baptists say it because in the Bible studies I've been in lately, they have strongly Bible-based statements of faith but de-emphasize church affiliation - so as to focus on the Bible and not what church someone goes to. Therefore you don't even know, unless you ask privately, where people attend. All you know is what they share about the Bible. One of the studies explicitly urges people NOT to refer to footnotes or commentaries, etc. until after doing the questions on it and attending the discussion time on the passage. This is so the process of thinking and listening to the Holy Spirit about a passage, is not short-circuited. I saw why when I switched to another similarly structured study without the 'no helps yet' rule and people continually would say "my footnote says...'

To me, this is not about whether the footnotes are 'right'. My concern is that their presence discourages people from thinking for themselves about a passage. All they want to know is "what does the footnote say?", the moment they find a passage challenging...

That's my experience, anyhow. That's why I don't like study Bibles. It's too hard not to read the notes if you have them. And once you've read them it's that much harder to think freely about what a passage means - and means to you, according to the Holy Spirit...