And With All Your Mind
A Novel About Evangelical Theology
by
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“For example, Matthew 24:40-41 obviously speaks about the Rapture, when it says, ‘there shall be two men in the field; one will be taken, one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken, and one will be left…’”
“Has it ever occurred to you that the ‘one taken’ might be the one who is being destroyed, while the one left behind is the one who is saved?” Silas asked pointedly. “If you read his remark about Noah’s flood, it was obviously the wicked who were taken away by the flood waters―and isn’t that how the ‘angel of death’ or destroyer usually functions in the Scriptures?” …With a smile, he added, “So maybe we as Christians should want to be ‘left behind.’”
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“Can you show me a single clear verse that says, ‘Jesus will come for his church after the Great Tribulation’?”
“Sure: Matthew 24:21-22, and 29-31,” Silas replied easily. “Matthew 24:21 is the only passage in the KJV where Jesus ever used the term ‘great tribulation,’ and verses 22 and 31 say that ‘elect’ will be there during this ‘great tribulation.’ Then in verses 29-31, Jesus said that ‘immediately after the tribulation of those days,’ He will come on the clouds of the sky with great power and glory, and will gather together His elect. So that’s two clear verses.”
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“I mean, nobody interprets everything in the Book of Revelation literally: How about the ‘woman clothed with the sun’ who had ‘a crown of twelve stars’? Or the ‘great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns,’ or the serpent who ‘poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman’ in chapter 12? Will the false prophet in 13:11 literally have ‘two horns like a lamb’? Will there literally be a ‘woman sitting on a scarlet beast’ who has seven heads and ten horns, as it says in chapter 17? Did Jesus literally have a sharp sword go out of his mouth, as 19:15 says? … So then, it’s really not a matter of ‘literal interpretation’ versus ‘non-literal interpretation’―it’s a matter of which particular things you happen to want to take literally.”
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“Ben, how would hundreds of thousands of species of birds and flying insects that weren’t on the Ark have been able to find food and survive during a worldwide flood that lasted more than one year? They couldn’t have even ‘touched down’ to rest anywhere for a whole year, and would have died of exhaustion and starvation! How would freshwater fish have survived if the Earth was covered by salty ocean water? And how would our modern freshwater lakes have been formed as the Flood receded, and become filled with only freshwater fish?”
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“How would animals that require a very specific habitat, and only eat certain types of food―such as the Giant Panda of China―make it all the way to the Ark on foot, and then back again? Were penguins and polar bears on board the Ark? Given that most ‘kinds’ had only two representatives aboard the Ark, what would carnivores like lions and bears have eaten on their way back from the Ark to, say, Australia or South America or Alaska? How did the ‘Old World’ animals found only in Africa and Asia, along with the ‘New World’ animals of the Americas, have travelled to the Ark, without leaving behind any fossilized descendants along the way? And since all of the continents on the face of the earth obviously had to previously be connected in order for all these animals to be able to walk to and from the Ark, what mechanism conveniently ‘split apart’ the continents and ocean islands into their present configuration, just as soon as all the animals―including very slow-moving ones, such as slugs and snails―had made it back to their own continents?”
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“Ben, in your interpretation, if an astronomer is looking at a star that’s ten thousand light years away, he’s looking at something that never existed, because your universe is only about six thousand years old! So when we look at the Andromeda galaxy, and its image that appears to be coming from 2 million years ago, it’s simply an illusion; in fact, almost everything even in our own Milky Way galaxy is an illusion! If we see an exploded supernova that’s 160,000 light years away from us, God would have to create high-energy gamma rays and neutrinos ‘in transit,’ to show us something that never even existed!”
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“For us, evil results from the misuse of our freedom. But suppose that a little girl was kidnapped, raped, and then murdered by some sadistic monster; was this really because God decreed it, in His sovereign power? Or was it because this man chooses to use his freedom to do evil? …If everything is simply based on the ‘decrees’ of God, and not on men’s choices―whether it’s Satan’s rebellion, Adam’s disobedience, Pharoah’s hardened heart, Judas’s betrayal of Jesus, or Hitler’s Holocaust―how can God justly hold men responsible for their actions, and send them to Hell for all eternity?”
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“Do you realize that none of the Greek words translated as ‘Hell’ even appear in any of the writings of the apostle Paul? Paul said in Romans 6:23 that ‘the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord’; so eternal life is a gift to those who believe in Christ―but for sinners, their end is death! Then Romans 8:13 tells us that ‘if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live’; once again, the alternative is between living or dying, not between two different destinations for living eternally. Or take everyone’s favorite verse, John 3:16: ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life’―the choice isn’t between eternal life in Heaven, or eternal life in Hell; it’s between everlasting life, and perishing!”
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“For me, the death knell is sounded for Open Theism because it absolutely eviscerates biblical prophecy! I mean, whether you’re Pre-Mill, Post-Mill, A-Mill, or Partial Preterist, the one thing that everyone can agree on is that God knows what’s going to happen―He’s not just guessing! That’s why Jesus could tell his disciples in detail what signs to look for before his return. But for the Open Theists, the Book of Revelation is nothing more than a valiant hope―with God Almighty meekly telling us, ‘Well, here’s how I think things are going to pan out, guys…”
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“The idea that unbelievers will be unaware of what’s going on is preposterous; if the Rapture of Christians wasn’t plain enough, then unbelievers … can just read any of the millions of best-selling books written by people like Tim LaHaye, that were ‘left behind’ after the Rapture!”
Lionel said, “But unbelievers and skeptics will scramble to come up with other explanations, such as UFO abductions…”
“A UFO that abducts only Christians? … I don’t think there’s any unbeliever or skeptic who wouldn’t notice that pattern!”
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“Let’s face it: there are some theological dilemmas that are simply insoluble, given our limited range of knowledge in this life. Take the seemingly paradoxical relationship between God’s election of man, and man’s free will; or between divine sovereignty, and human freedom, choice and responsibility; or even navigating the delicate boundary between faith, and works―not to mention the perennial question as to whether we can truly be said to be ‘free,’ if God knows in advance what we are going to do? These are all questions that the most profound theological minds of Christendom throughout the centuries have resolutely grappled with, and yet … they still remain questions, for all of us.”
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About the Book
It’s 1971, and Silas Baker is a high school senior in California, whose main interests are basketball, and weekend parties. But his life takes a dramatic turn, when he encounters a group of committed Christians, who soberly inform him that “Jesus is coming soon!”
They enroll at Riverstent Bible College. It’s an exciting time, as leading Bible teachers have predicted that Jesus will return to Rapture his Church within “one generation” of the 1948 formation of the State of Israel. Popular movies further inflame this passion, as the eager students study Apologetics and Biblical Archaeology; aberrant theologies such as the “Death-of-God” movement; and even conflicting interpretations of the End Times. An activist spirit develops within evangelicalism, culminating in the so-called “Christian Right,” as the evangelical world is rocked in the aftermath of the televangelist scandals.
Confronted by world views such as Calvinism and Christian Reconstruction, the characters passionately debate controversies such as Biblical Inerrancy and the age of the cosmos, in addition to challenging evangelicals who deny traditional doctrines such as that of “endless punishment” in Hell, or who promote an “Open” (yet limited) concept of God himself.
As society evolves, so does evangelicalism: “seeker sensitive” megachurches appear, while Postmodernism and the “Emergent Church” become realities. Theologians wrestle with the question of divorce and remarriage, and the role of women in the church, as well as the divisive issue of homosexuality. As they struggle with life’s realities, they ultimately must also respond to nonchristians who are alienated, indifferent, or engaged in active opposition to Christianity, while searching for the meaning of Christian faith in the modern world.
About the Author
Steve Propp lives in Sacramento, California, and graduated from CSU Sacramento. He has written many spiritual and philosophical novels such as Three Perspectives: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim (2009); After the New Age (2008); Three Brothers: A Novel About Change and Diversity in the Catholic Church (2007); Saved by Philosophy (2007); Josué: Prisoner at Shalem (2005); A Multicultural Christmas (2005); Beyond Heaven and Earth (2003), Tattered Pilgrims (2001), and the nonfiction book Inquiries: Philosophical (2002). He welcomes E-mail from readers at: stevenhpropp@hotmail.com.