FIRSTLY I MUST STATE: I ask this with no malice! I ask because I have been reading a book my Pastor loaned me by Riddlebarger on the Amil position, in the book Kim, has some VERY NASTY qoutes about how Linsey "really feels" about the Reformed views of End-Time issues, our buddy Hal uses phrases likeemonic, Doctrines of Demons, Heretical, Anti-Semetic, and Evil, to to describe the various Reformed positions, as I said no malice to my question, the reason I ask is this: The sword cuts both ways, if Hal is wrong about us (the Reformed) and is wrong in his own beliefs, what does that make him???

__________________
et

Hal is a false prophet. That's the long and the short of it. He's made so many predictions that have not come to pass its amazing that anyone would give him the time of day. Don't you find it strange that he accuses us of propagating "doctrines of devils" while at the same time he praised pope John Paul II to high heaven. He is a bonafide bible blockhead. I say that with charity of course.

__________________
Psa 55:16 As for me, I will call upon God; and the LORD shall save me.
Psa 55:17 Evening, and morning, and at noon, will I pray, and cry aloud: and he shall hear my voice.
James Farley
Husband of Melissa and father of Ann.
Members of Redeemer Church ARP, Blacksburg Va.
http://www.redeemerblacksburg.org/

Hal Lindsey is Making Predictions–Again

Hal Lindsey is Making Predictions–Again
By Gary DeMar

Hal Lindsey is once again making predictions about the end times using Israel as the prophetic time piece. In his latest article on the subject, he claims that the reestablishment of the Sanhedrin is prophetically significant. Here’s how he explains it: “These religious authorities [in Israel] believe it was necessary to re-establish the Sanhedrin because only this properly ordained body of sages can authenticate a Messiah when he comes. There is a growing expectation of the long-awaited Messiah to appear among devout Jews. The rebirth of the Jewish state and recapture of Jerusalem has increasingly influenced this conviction.”1 So Jesus was not the Messiah, and the NT is a fraud. That’s the logic of Lindsey’s position since the Sanhedrin did not authenticate Jesus as the Messiah. If the Sanhedrin of the first century was wrong, as the NT says it was, what makes Lindsey think that the Sanhedrin of the twenty-first century is going to be right?

Operating from a false premise, Lindsey then makes this observation: “The religious sages began to consider the rebuilding of the Temple and reinstitution of ancient animal sacrifices as prescribed in the Law of Moses.” So what? What verse in the NT mentions anything about rebuilding the temple and reinstituting animal sacrifices? There aren’t any. Not a single verse in the NT even intimates that the temple needs to be rebuilt. The NT doesn’t give any prophetic significance to the temple and the sacrificial system. Jesus does predict the temple’s destruction (Matt. 24:1–34), but nothing is ever said about it being rebuilt. Jesus Himself is the true temple (John 2:19–21) as are believers by redemptive extension (Eph. 2:19–22). The NT couldn’t be any more clear on these points. For those of you who doubt me on this because you’ve heard that the OT predicts that the temple will be rebuilt, let me point out that the temple where Jesus was presented in accordance with the law (Luke 2:21–38), the temple He cleansed (Matt. 21:12–17), and the temple He predicted would be destroyed within a generation (Matt. 24:1–34) is the temple the OT predicted would be rebuilt.

Lindsey believes that these events are “extremely important to students of Bible prophecy.” He believes “that we are very near the final climactic events that end with the Second Coming of Christ.” We’ve heard this before. Let me take you back to 1970 and the book that made Lindsey a prophecy star, The Late Great Planet Earth: “The most important sign in Matthew has to be the restoration of the Jews to the land in the rebirth of Israel. Even the figure of speech ‘fig tree’ has been a historic symbol of national Israel. When the Jewish people, after nearly 2,000 years of exile, under relentless persecution, became a nation again on 14 May 1948 the ‘fig tree’ put forth its first leaves. Jesus said that this would indicate that He was ‘at the door,’ ready to return. Then He said, ‘Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place’ (Matthew 24:34, NASB). What generation? Obviously, in context, the generation that would see the signs—chief among them the rebirth of Israel. A generation in the Bible is something like forty years. If this is a correct deduction, then within forty years or so of 1948, all these things could take place. Many scholars who have studied Bible prophecy all their lives believe that this is so.”2

You do the math: 1948 + 40 = 1988. Seventeen years have passed, and Hal Lindsey is still considered a “prophecy expert.” In an interview that appeared in the April 15, 1977 issue of Christianity Today, Ward Gasque asked Lindsey about his infamous “generation” quotation:

“But what if you’re wrong?” Lindsey replied: “Well, there’s just a split second’s difference between a hero and a bum. I didn’t ask to be a hero, but I guess I have become one in the Christian community. So I accept it. But if I’m wrong about this, I guess I’ll become a bum.”3

This was Lindsey’s assessment of himself. He set the standard for his own work. The 1980s came and went without his end-time scenario coming to pass. This should have made him a “bum” and led to the end of his prophecy career. It didn’t happen. So why is his latest claim that “we are very near the final climactic events that end with the Second Coming of Christ” taken seriously by anyone?

Yet people listen to him! Forgive my ignorance, I did not know about his praises for John Paul 2! I thought most dispies would dislike Rome esp. given both their interpretation of the End-Times and the "general" low regard towards toward Israel (which I thought was a sacred Cow to people like Lindsey)???

I can't pass judgement on the man and say that he's a heretic without researching what he actually believes. However, with the brief knowledge that I do have regarding his teachings, his eschatology is in serious error. If he was a member in a confessional church more than likely he would be brought up on charges.

__________________
John
Member
Christ Presbyterian Church (OPC)
Salt Lake City, Utah
www.christpres.net

We can certainly say he is an adulterer.

__________________
Stephen Welch
PCA Teaching Elder
Nova Scotia :cheers:

Here is my take on Hal . . .

1. I heard him during his Jesus Power and Light Company days working for Campus Crusade in the 60s. He was making cocky and confident statements back then that put the terminus ad quem for the Second Coming at 1988 (for reasons already cited in #3 above). His first book only put it in writing.

2. Hal has the same gift that John MacArthur has: the ability to sound convincing and absolutely authoritative, even if he were reading the telephone book. This means that differentiation between true and false, right and wrong, prophetic and pathetic get lost in the shuffle sometimes. The man is able to convince a crowd.

3. I pastored a church just a couple of miles from where he had his ministry back in the 80s/90s. The man is a celebrity in every sense of the term. At this point, he is famous for being famous, not for being right. This has allowed him to get away with manifestly wrong calendarizing, multiple marriages/divorces (3 or 4?), and a pretty "brusque" leadership style. His disparaging comments about Reformed theology are not much different from those of Tim LaHaye, another celebrity preacher.

__________________
Dennis E. McFadden, Ex Mainline Baptist (in Remission)
Atherton Baptist Homes, CEO
First Baptist Church of Alhambra, Member, Transformation Ministries (CA)

Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?

In Rapture Fiction, Gary North says that Hal Lindsey is more interested in collecting wives than properly representing his opponents.

__________________
Daniel Ritchie
Saintfield, Northern Ireland - Queen's University, Belfast:History/Politics
Member of Dromara Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland (Covenanter)

Or is he merely "unorthodox?"

__________________
Will Shin
Rockville, MD

If any of you have access to August 1990 Chalcedon Report (can't find mine) I did a book review of The Road to Holocaust where I detail the Mother Of All Misquotes where he does something beyond belief to Rushdoony.

__________________
Tim Vaughan
Member, Redeemer Presbyterian, OPC,
Santa Maria
California

Dispies I've had contact with in the last couple of years are tripping over themselves, extending the hand of fellowship to RCs in follow-up to ECT, Hal Lindsey and other monstrous departures from the Way, the Truth and the Life...

Yesterday, our minister told us about the time that Ian Paisley had said, "If you can be regenerated by baptism alone, why don't we just turn firehoses on these people?" And yet even HE has turned coat, so to speak. It's disappointing, but we are warned about this type of thing in Scripture.

Hal Lindsay et alia: "All false roads lead to Rome." So he's one more of them.

Margaret

__________________
Margaret
Free Church of Scotland [Continuing]
Michigan

I must confess that Lindsey's book, "The Late Great Planet Earth" played a part in my becoming a Christian.

However it was his showing of OT prophesies that Jesus fulfilled that helped convinced me (with a little help from the Holy Spirit ), definitely not his eschatology.

__________________
Pax,
Richard Elliott
Midlothian, Virginia
Deacon, Presbyterian Church in America
====================================
I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else. , C. S. Lewis

Brother, it is not my wish to judge Lindsey either, I am "working" this like a math equation if you will: HL says the Reformed view is a Doctrine of Demons, the Classic reformed view says he is dead wrong, only one can be right. One party is in SERIOUS error, indeed Heresy. I seek simply to clearly define the lines in this. Pax.

Perhaps it would be helpful to define terms here? A person could be seriously wrong in his understanding of scripture, but that would not make him a heretic, right? To be labeled a heretic, you would have and teach errors that misconstrue the means of salvation -- In other words, a freewill Baptist could not be considered heretic but a Mormon would be.

__________________
JWithnell
Member Bethel OPC
Virginia
http://learningyesican.blogspot.com/

In a word...weird. A mainstream dispensational kinda person. Not off the deep end in salvation, but his end times is wacked. (can I say wacked?)

__________________
Timothy Johnson
First United Presbyterian of Moline
PCUSA (Yea, I know)
Theology/Philosophy Sunday School Teacher
Davenport, IA

Is Hal Lindsey a heretic?

Is the sun hot? Is the moon cold? Are pizzas round? Is Kobe Bryant tall? Is sex fun? Are baseballs round? Are your stapes bones smaller than your femur bones? Are cats furry? Is the Puritan Board cool? Is Lawrence Welk dead? Is 2 smaller than 5? Is Burger King better than McDonald's? Is...

__________________
Richard T. Zuelch, M.Div
Ruling Elder, OPC (not currently serving)
Westminster Presbyterian Church, CA (OPC)
www.alexandermaclaren.wordpress.com
www.reiterations.wordpress.com
www.spurgeonswords.wordpress.com

Devout souls do not take offence at the depths and difficulties of God's Word, but are, thereby, drawn to intenser contemplation of them. - Alexander Maclaren (1826-1910)

That's gotta be a first - equating Lindsey with MacArthur. Sounds like you don't care much for Johnny Mac, either...

It was a comparison, not an equation! And, actually I do like MacArthur and have 96 of his books and study guides. I was simply trying to come up with someone else who had that ability to sound authoritative regardless of what he is saying. Now that Big John is a leaky dispensationalist, I find him convincing. Unfortunately, the same was pretty much true when he was a traditional dispensationalist too. The man just has that ability to sound authoritative.

Actually, that was my ONLY point of comparison. Like him or not, MacArthur is as real as they come. What you see is what you get. The man appears (and friends who know him confirm) to be the same guy in and out of the pulpit with a very high commitment to integrity and faithfulness to his wife.

I am glad you added some clarity, I admit (while not agreeing with the "Macster" on a number of points, he is a Godly man and I rather like him myself.

So is he, Richard?

__________________
Bob Vigneault C.O.L, L.E., G.E, Dr.O.P., O.U.T.
The Heartbeat of Heaven (blog)
Deacon/Christ Presbyterian Church, Janesville, WI OPC www.christ-opc.org

Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?

Actually, you can get square Pizzas.

And McDonald's is better that (yuck) Burger King.

No way McDonald's better than Burger King?

In order to answer the question as to whether a person is a heretic or false prophet, we have to be in agreement as to what the terms mean.

I will focus on the false prophet piece first, since being a false prophet and being a heretic are often related.

Take the late John Walvoord, the president of DTS back in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, during its real heyday. In his book He Shall Have Dominion, Gentry cites a quote from Walvoord that was in Newsweek back in 1990 during the first Gulf War. Walvoord confidently stated that Christ would return before his death (he was around 80 at the time).

Well, Walvoord died in 2004, and Christ had not returned by then. So, while Walvoord could not be disciplined by an earthly body, he certainly would have been dealt with by the Lord.

So, Walvoord made the prediction, it did not come to pass, and by numerous Biblical examples, Walvoord would have been declared to be a false prophet.

Now Lindsey has done similar things. While he emphatically denies that he has ever set a specific date for the return of Christ, he has done everything else but set the date. In his book Countdown to Armageddon written in 1981, he said the 1980s "could very well be the last decade before the return of Christ." Notice how he creates his escape hatch. He says "could very well be" not that it will be. But I, along with millions of other hopelessly naive ignoramuses, took him to mean that the 1980s would be it - after all, Israel was established in 1948, a generation in Scripture is 40 years, and 1988 would be it. It all added up.

Since then, I have heard Lindsey on the radio state that Scripture also teaches that a generation can be as long as 100 years - so 2048 is also a viable option. Of course, Lindsey will be long gone by then, so like Walvoord, he cannot be held accountable at that time if Christ has not returned (but if Christ does return before then, he would still be wrong anyway!!)

But in promoting Countdown to Armageddon, Lindsey ran several TV commercials over the large networks. He cited the European Common Market (now the EU), which had just added the 10th nation at that time. Lindsey said that was the 10 nation confederation mentioned in Revelation. Of course, the EU now has many more nations than just 10 in it, so that is no longer valid.

So - Lindsey said the EU was the confederation; the confederation now has more than the 10 mentioned in Scripture; so Lindsey made a false statement about the Scripture.

No more evidence is needed; he, like most of the other end times prognosticators, has clearly demonstrated himself to be a false prophet.

But in evangelical land, nobody minds; he keeps his TV show, his church, and moves on to the next book deal.

__________________
Randy Harris
Heritage PCA Church
Oklahoma City, OK

Thank you Randy! I have a stupid question, is a false prophet a heretic? I know it seems like I am fooling about with semantics but I was curious. Grace and Peace.

Ouch! You got to love Gary North. He knows how to stick the knife in you and twist it.

While I think he goes a bit OTT in his forewords (especially those written by other people - which puts some of reading them), his use of satire in the main body of his books is excellent.

Brother, why were you writing for that magazine? Did you not know it is post-millenial, theonomic, and reconstructionist

I just busted a gut laughing so hard,

Actually Richard is wrong, Wendy's is better than both

Krystal Burgers are the best! Boy am I derailing my thread or what!

In general, a heretic is a person who maintains beliefs contrary to the established teachings of "a particular system." Confessional Reformed churches would not tolerate Lindsay's eschatology. It is contrary to the Confessions. Therefore his views would rightly be considered "heretical." That is heretical to Reformed theology.

If heretic is made to mean "reprobate," we are probably going too far.

__________________
Jim
1689 LBCF
Independent Bible Church
North Texas, USA

Get Culverized: Experience fresh, delicious food served with a great big side of friendly smiles and warm hospitality.

__________________
Ivan R. Schoen, B.A., M.A., M.L.I.S.
Pastor of Maranatha Baptist Church (SBC)
Poplar Grove, IL, USA
http://maranatha-sbc.org

Alright, now STOP! JUST STOP IT! Brother Dennis recently asked for prayer to stay on his diet. I need to drop 34 pounds myself. What are you guys doing????

Shame on you Ivan. You know I have to drive by that Culver's billboard on my way home. I almost hit a truck trying to avert my eyes. Now let's be sensitive gentlemen.

Now, if you want to see real temptation, check out this little hand maiden of wickedness. I'M SO WEAK!!!! DENNIS, DON'T LOOK!!!!!

Y'all ain't even close. My wife's burgers cooked on a campfire, 1/2 lb of pure hamburger with a little seasnoning salt. Grilled to perfection. On potato bread with your favorite toppins put any other burger to shame. Esp with homemade potato salad. Mmmm! To keep it on topic, I guess I could call it the Hal Lindsey burger since it was cooked over open flames!

YOU have to drop 34!!! Sir, if you do you will have wasted away!!

Thanks for the invitation Timothy. Praise God Iowa isn't far from Ivan and me. Let's us know when she's cooking and we'll be over.

Ivan, it's all belly. My sleep doctor said I should get down to 186 by next May. Does anyone make a girdle for men?

Oh yeah..... what were we talking about? Uh, yeah, Hal Lindsey. I can't believe he's on his fourth wife. That is just sad. He even put his second wife on the back jacket of his book. Like his prophetic accuracy, she disappeared from future books.

ROAD TRIP!!!

If I had a sleep doc I'm sure he'd tell me that same thing.

Sad, indeed. I've had only one and I'm keepin' her! One's enuf!!

He is groselly mistaken and is useing ad homnim arguments that makes him a lousy debater but not a heretic.

__________________
Aaron
Independent Baptist
Holland MI
Blog: earthdwell22.blogspot.com

Toooooooooooooooooooooooo late . . .

Oh well. Besides, those midwestern burgettes can't compare to a real hamburger . . . [ta da!] In 'N Out, the Californiua favorite.



BTW, boys . . . while you have been salivating over burgers, I lost some more weight! 38 lbs and climbing.

Back to brother Hal. Many of you TR brethren would consider dispensational hermeneutics (regardless of eschatology) as "heretical." However, from a broad evangelical perspective, Hal is well within the parameters of the faith. He upholds all of the fundamentals in the short list from the turn of the last century and a few more besides.

In my book, Hal is guilty of seriously errant theology; sinful calendarizing (although Jonathan Edwards had his own literalistic version of postmillennialism with the millennium coming in about the year 2,000), and a proclivity for ignoring biblical admonitions about being a "one woman man" (several times over). Beyond that, he is just another example of the corrupting corrosive of celebrity. And, in that category, he has PLENTY of company.