Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Progressive Christian
TF: Serving God and Mammon

TF: Serving God and Mammon

Last updated on: August 22, 2011 at 4:09 pm by Fred Clark

TF: Serving God and Mammon 2011-08-22T16:09:01-04:00 Fred Clark

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Tribulation Force, pp. 403-404

The Grand Opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony for the rebuilt temple in Jerusalem gets disrupted by “Moishe and Eli” — Tim LaHaye’s interpretation of the Two Witnesses from the book of Revelation.

“Your blood sacrifices shall turn to water, and your water-drawing to blood!” Moses tells the Jewish faithful gathered there. Thousands of years later, Moses returns and still all he does is scold the people of Israel. You’d think he’d remember that losing his temper with them was why he hadn’t been allowed to go with them into the Promised Land in the first place, and …

Hey, that’s right. Moses is in Jerusalem. Maybe it wouldn’t be a big deal for Elijah to return to Israel after thousands of years, but for “Moishe” this should be huge. He’s never been there before.

“You shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them,” God told him (in Numbers 20), yet here he is. He wandered in the desert for 40 years striving and hoping to reach this place, but his life’s great aspiration was denied him. Until now. You’d think he’d want to look around a little more, check the place out a bit.

Jerry Jenkins switches back to Buck’s POV to tell us what happened after Moses said that business about water and blood:

Buck had been there that day as the new publisher of the renamed Global Community Weekly. He resisted Carpathia’s urging him to editorialize about what Nicolae called the intrusion of the two witnesses, and he persuaded the Global Community potentate that the coverage could not ignore the facts. The blood let from a sacrificed heifer had indeed turned to water. And the water drawn in another ceremony turned to blood in the pail.

I’m pretty well-versed in the arcane mythology of the Darbyverse, but I can’t figure out what this bit is about. The passage in Revelation about the Two Witnesses says that “they have authority over the waters to turn them into blood,” and I suppose that implies they could also turn blood into water. Yet despite all of this water-into-blood, blood-into-water business sounding very Bible-ish, I can’t find any supposed “prophecy” that suggests the Two Witnesses would be mucking about with the dedication of the temple like this.

This seems just to be something the authors made up — some gratuitous piece of additional “Moses vs. The Jews” action that can’t be made to fit into the larger story.

The whole point of rebuilding the temple, remember, is so that Nicolae Carpathia can later defile it and then destroy it again. This is it’s only purpose in LaHaye’s “prophetic” scheme. But Nicolae can’t very well defile a temple that hasn’t been properly consecrated in the first place. If the water for the necessary purifications is turned to blood and the blood for the necessary sacrifices is turned to water then the supposedly prophesied desecration — the desolation that is supposed to be awaiting Nicolae’s pig-fisting abomination — can’t occur. No consecration, no desecration.

By straying from the script, Moses and the authors may have just derailed the whole End Times process. I don’t know precisely what it means if one of the items on LaHaye’s prophetic check list is prevented from happening, but it’s probably not the end of the world (which, in this case, would mean it’s a major problem).

Buck hated the money he was making. Not even an outrageous salary could make his life easier. He had been forced to move back to New York. Much of the old guard at Global Weekly had been fired, including Stanton Bailey and Marge Potter, and even Jim Borland. …

I can’t really say that I can relate to Buck’s lament here, but there would seem to be at least two simple and obvious solutions to the problem of all that hateful money from his outrageous salary: He could give it all away, or he could quit his job.

Either way: Problem solved. Those who learn to give away their money well don’t usually find it hateful. The Gates Foundation, for example, has worked very hard to figure out what money can and can’t do when well-given, and this knowledge has made them appreciate the value of that money more than any miser ever could.

We’ll get back to that money in a moment, but first let’s just consider Buck’s new job. He’s the “publisher” now. That’s an exclusively managerial position and Buck has no management experience. His value to Global Weekly was as a reporter — as the Greatest Investigative Reporter of All Time. So by promoting him to the role of publisher, the magazine loses its star reporter and gains an untested, newbie manager with no taste for the work he’s now required to do. This makes no sense. It’s like if the Miami Heat were to announce that LeBron James has been promoted to CEO and general manager of the team and will no longer be out on the court in uniform.

But LaHaye and Jenkins can’t abide having their surrogate characters anywhere other than the very top of the pecking order. Keeping ace reporter Buck Williams as merely an ace reporter would mean he would also have to report to a boss — that someone else would still be calling the shots. That’s intolerable to the authors, so instead they have Buck get promoted to a job that he never should have been offered and never should have accepted.

He also never should have moved to Manhattan where, we’re told, he now lives in a “penthouse apartment on Fifth Avenue.”

Buck knows that the next big items on the End Times check list include famine and a “great earthquake” in which “every mountain and island is removed from its place.” Yet he moves to an island. Buck works for the first horseman of the apocalypse, so he knows that the third rider is coming soon, the rider on a black horse who holds a pair of scales and says, “A quart of wheat for a day’s pay, and three quarts of barley for a day’s pay.” Maybe Manhattan, which grows none of its own food and is connected to the rest of the world only by a handful of tunnels and bridges, isn’t the ideal place to be when that rider arrives.

Here again we see the members of the Tribulation Force ignoring the warning of the mini-apocalypse in Matthew’s Gospel:

Flee to the mountains; someone on the housetop must not go down to take what is in the house; someone in the field must not turn back to get a coat. …

If you claim to take that passage “literally” — insisting that it refers to the future events that Buck is living through in this novel rather than to, say, the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE — then downtown Manhattan is one of the last places you should be living. Any idea how long it would take to flee to the mountains from the penthouse of a Fifth Avenue apartment building? Several hours, at best — and even then you’re only talking about the Catskills, which might not be the best mountains to be fleeing to if you’re trying to escape “great suffering, such as has not been from the beginning of the world.”

The only positive factor about Buck’s new position was that he now had the means to isolate himself somewhat against the terrible crime wave that had broken all records in North America.

Here, yet again, the record-breaking crime wave is asserted, but not shown. I guess Buck’s money not only enables him to isolate himself from this crime wave, but it also isolates Jenkins from having to write about it or have it in any way influence the story or the lives of the characters we’re following.

It’s a telling detail, though, that the authors regard this — the ability to “isolate” oneself — as one of the “positive factors” about wealth. Just like Dives was able to isolate himself from that filthy criminal out there at his gate.

Buck hates his job and he hates his massive income. So why not just quit?

That’s not an option for most people reading the book, or for most people reading this blog, but it is an option for Buck. He doesn’t need to worry about finding another job. He can simply retire.

The fact that he’s only 31 years old doesn’t matter. He’s got enough money to live on for at least another six years and he already knows that he doesn’t have another six years. No one does. God is going to destroy the entire universe in five and a half years. So Buck doesn’t have to worry about outliving his savings, and he doesn’t have to factor in any concern for his heirs — none of them will live longer than another 66 months either.

That 66-month figure actually overstates the case, because his circumscribed life-expectancy isn’t the main factor here in calculating how long his money has to last. The more important deadline, fast-approaching in the faint hoofbeats of that black rider, is the point at which money itself becomes useless. Once the third rider arrives, all that hateful money won’t matter anymore. That’s when, in Larry Norman’s paraphrase (regarded as canonical by most premillennial dispensationalists), “a piece of bread could buy a bag of gold.”

Given that, cash isn’t what Buck needs to be stockpiling. He should be stocking away canned goods, imperishable foods, bottled water, medical supplies and apocalypse-strength sunblock. The need for such things is about to become massive and urgent.

Buck has a brief window of opportunity here, a very short span during which hateful money can still be exchanged for such necessities. With the advantage of perfect prophetic foresight and certain knowledge of what is to come, Buck ought to move someplace cheaper and milk his “outrageous salary” for all the cash he can get. While he’s at it, he should also be using that salary to apply for and max-out every credit card and consumer loan he can qualify for. And just as quickly as all that money is coming in he ought to be spending it back out on supplies in preparation for the calamities to come. Some of that money should also go to the stealthy acquisition of several off-the-grid locations to serve as eventual refuges, hiding spots and caches for all the supplies he’s gathering.

We’re about to hit a passage in which Jenkins lionizes right-wing militia groups as the sole source of resistance to Nicolae’s OWG takeover. The authors admire those groups for their paranoia/vigilance against the threat of just such a one-world government, but they fail to notice what would likely be their more valuable contribution during the Great Tribulation that LaHaye foresees: they’re survivalists. That’s what Buck needs to become too in this story.

Here in the real world, I’d much rather be hanging out at some swanky Manhattan apartment than to be stuck in the mountains of Idaho with some bearded fanatic in camouflage who thinks Glenn Beck isn’t paranoid enough. But put me in this story, in the dystopian nightmare of Tim LaHaye’s “prophetic” fantasies, and I’m headed for Idaho.

Left Behind

Previous Post

August 22, 2011

Job Seekers Open Thread

Next Post

August 23, 2011 Heart and Soul

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category class warfare evangelicals Iraq Left Behind Mammon music Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What metaphor does Paul use in Galatians to describe the law's role before Christ came?

Select your answer to see how you score.

A judge A shepherd A guardian A father