Hal Lindsey
Hal Lindsey has died at age 95.
At one point, I thought he might get married that many times…
I digress…
Lindsey was the foremost prophecy wonk of our time and his “Late Great Planet Earth” one of the most influential evangelical books of the last century.
The book was a runaway best seller and set the bar for evangelical eschatology and how it was taught.
The book also set the bar for how evangelicals think about Israel…a way of thinking that has political ramifications to this day.
My IFB church was really into Lindsey, until they realized how weird the books were getting. Some of the staff from my church had attended Dallas Seminary, which was one reason he was popular. Fifty years later, I think he was whacked on the wrong side of the head at birth, but I digress.
https://stephenmcalpine.com/the-late-great-hal-lindsey/
A good follow-up article!
I’ve been out of the Evangelical loop for a few decades. Is the Rapture doctrine still being taught as extensively as it used to be?
Xenia,
I don’t think Rapture doctrine is nearly as prominent in Evangelical circles as it was 20-30 years ago, at least in regards to emphasizing it. However, it still remains high profile in some circles, such as old guard Calvary Chapels. My old CC did what must have been like a 10 week “Prophecy Sermon Series” on Sunday mornings soon after the war broke out in Israel.
Hal begat the infamous “Left Be-Hind” series that enriched another pair of well-heeled psuedo-writers.
My church is pre-Trib, but not obsessed with it. Our senior pastor did a series on Revelation last year, but he was honest that not everything in the book is as specific as we would like and it’s easy to arrive at different inclusions.
I looked up Lindsey’s marriages-4!!!!
Theology matters…the new ambassador to Israel is steeped in the pre-trib fantasy…his theology is going to impact international policy…
Thanks, Kevin. That’s pretty much what I thought.
Four marriages? There’s a clear doctrine of covenant. Ah, but he was dispensational… explains it. Nothing did more to help me flee dispensationalism as a young man than pretribulation rapture theory (it was not a theology).
The amount of exegesis in that book could fill perhaps two pages.
Those wall charts from the oldtimers cured me, too. I realized that your chances of coming up with that chart from just reading scripture were about the same chance as throwing dynamite into a room full of letters and getting a dictionary.
Hal Lindsey was surely one of the most influential Bible pundits of his lifetime.
Tribulation Dread
It became safe to teach on Revelation without pre-trib slant about the turn of the millennium. The likelihood of losing half the church was lower by then.
@ Dread:
Your comment about dynamite and letters made me laugh!
I got saved the week after reading The Late Great Planet Earth. I had also just read Chariots of the Gods and 2001: A Space Oddity. I was one messed up 13 year old.
I was very unaware of his multiple marriages and stealth editing of his books regarding his marriages until just recently. Much like Mike Warnke, Jim Bakker, or Randall Terry (who apparently ran for President this year, who knew?!?) this seems to be an afterthought when a suddenly much-younger woman shows up next to a Christian celebrity.
All good points, but serious question…
What tree has beget the worst fruit,
the rapture,
or,
the Moses model?
I grew up in a hyper-Dispensational denomination and when Lindsay’s book became so popular, my pastor actually preached a series of Sunday evening sermons dispelling what he thought to be Lindsay’s biggest errors and misstatements. He didn’t give it a blanket dismissal, but expained more than a grain of salt was in order.
unCC’d,
in my opinion, no one missed the rapture, but a lot of harm was done by the MM.
An argument can be made that the same source proliferated both MM leadership and rapture theology. At the very least, that same source mainlined those two phenomena. The former has numerous obvious deleterious outcomes. The latter outcomes are less obvious but just as negative, IMO, not least the impact on politics that Michael has pointed toward.
Happy Thanksgiving
God can use all kinds. As an unsaved teen in the 80s, I read through the Living Bible, a couple of Hal’s books (Satan is Alive and Well on Planet Earth, There’s a New World Coming), and I watched Frederick KC Price on TV.
Somehow, the Holy Spirit was able to use all of that to show me my need for a savior. I would never recommend any of the above (except for maybe the Living Bible- though the NLT is much better), but I am still thankful God was able to use all of that to bring me to Him.