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Obama Is Not the Anti-Christ
Dr. John Mark Reynolds
The Torrey Honors Institute
August 13, 2009
MST3K videos and Charlie the Unicorn are good enough reasons to praise You-Tube. My "all-hail" is tempered, however, by the recent spate of emails linking to a vile little video coyly suggesting that our President may be the Antichrist.
The arguments are so very bad and it is so over-the-top that I suspect a Colbert-like mockery of conservative Christians. If so, a disturbing number of people are taking it seriously. Of course if the video is no spoof, but serious, then it is serious in the sense that a deranged 7-11 clerk might really believe he is Elvis. Sadly, the maker of the video has revised it to remove factual errors and attempt to fix his arguments, suggesting a commitment to this epic fail.
Traditional Christians, called to be loving, truthful, and logical, should be the first to reject this foolish video, because it is hateful, wrong, and illogical. The Antichrist is a literary symbol for all that is bad about humanity and many traditional Christians think that eventually there will be one tyrant who incarnates all those evils. Calling or even suggesting that someone is the Antichrist is worse from this perspective than calling a man "Hitler."
Even someone with minimal charity would only think such a thing about another human being, created in the image of God, based on compelling evidence.
If one believes, as I do, that President Obama is making bad, even dreadful policy decisions, strong opposition is justified, but comparing political differences of this sort to cosmic evil suggests, at the very least, a radically sheltered life. In our own time, it would be easy to list numerous international political leaders running regimes remarkably worse than our own. Comparing the political situation for traditional Christians in America to the thousands suffering torture and martyrdom all over the world reminds any reasonable believer how good American Christians have it.
Does any sane man doubt that North Korea would be better off if President Obama ran it? This video, and the people who sent it out, goes even further and says Obama, may be worse comparing President Obama to the most wicked man who will ever live. Conservative Christians should beware when they realize that this is folly so great that one cannot imagine even Joe Biden uttering it.
Needless to say the video gives no evidence that President Obama is the Antichrist. Even if one believed that President Obama was an enemy, such a strong accusation without evidence is uncharitable. Charity applies to everyone, since Christians have it on good authority that we are to love our enemies.
Almost as bad as the lack of charity is the disrespect that the video shows to the Bible. I take old books seriously, particularly the Bible, but by their nature old books are harder to read well than new books. Reading a book badly is in many ways worse than not reading it at all.
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Mark0
9/6/2009 8:36 PM
Obama is just another politician. It's not difficult to imagine that Christians would rally around the flagpole, trying to make Obama out to be the anti-christ. Some even think this right wing move is the beginning of the next revival. If you think rallies protesting political pocket pilfering are a sure sign of revival, where were you late last fall?
I have one interesting question for people on either side of the current health care debacle. An even larger debacle occured last year with the capitulation of large insurance companies, banks, etc.
Although I vaguely remember both parties promising they would get to the bottom of this terrible sham, the only thing I remember actually happening since then on this problem is both sides agreeing almost unilaterally that the corporate execs invovled in the scam should be grudgingly given their hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses. Gee, I guess they all discovered where the bottom of this barrel was. Wake up People!
I have one interesting question for people on either side of the current health care debacle. An even larger debacle occured last year with the capitulation of large insurance companies, banks, etc.
Although I vaguely remember both parties promising they would get to the bottom of this terrible sham, the only thing I remember actually happening since then on this problem is both sides agreeing almost unilaterally that the corporate execs invovled in the scam should be grudgingly given their hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses. Gee, I guess they all discovered where the bottom of this barrel was. Wake up People!
ajcolorado
8/27/2009 10:03 AM
Great article! I remember when that "Bible Code" book was all the rage and, at the time, I thought that most people would do better just reading the Scripture as it is written and doing what it says, instead of trying to use it sideways or backwards as some sort of Christian magic 8 ball.
One of those straightforward verses that people (specifically, the maker of the youtube video referenced) should read and do is Exodus 20:16 "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor." There is nothing Christian about twisting Bible verses to try to make them give authority or credibility to some goofy idea you just made up.
2 Timothy 2:15 says: "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth." If there are correct ways to handle Scripture, then it seems logical that there are also incorrect ways of handling Scripture and that seems to be at work in this situation.
One of those straightforward verses that people (specifically, the maker of the youtube video referenced) should read and do is Exodus 20:16 "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor." There is nothing Christian about twisting Bible verses to try to make them give authority or credibility to some goofy idea you just made up.
2 Timothy 2:15 says: "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth." If there are correct ways to handle Scripture, then it seems logical that there are also incorrect ways of handling Scripture and that seems to be at work in this situation.
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We are to be alert to the signs of the end, but we're also not to judge. Seems to me that calling someone the AntiChrist is pretty close to judging their soul.
God's love and sacrifice on my behalf comes with an eternal, unshakeable inheritance. I want revival to share that blessing with others. So even if I were convinced that the AC is alive and identified...what difference should it make in my walk with Christ, or in the way I live out my salvation? That's what I don't understand underneath all this sort of talk.