Dispensationalism and the Left Behind Theology by Rev. Dr. Bob Mulkey

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Dispensationalism made its first appearance in the middle of the 19th century with the teachings of Anglican preacher, John Darby. His teachings became the official theology of the new movement he founded in Plymouth, England called the Plymouth Brethren.

Darby’s dispensational teachings have had an enormous influence on many Protestant Christians who have never heard of Darby. His teachings have been popularized and perpetuated through two major sources:

• The Scofield Reference Bible, first published in 1909
• The Left Behind series of novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins.

Darby divided up the Bible into seven distinct stages of history which he called dispensations. He said we are living in the last days. The evidence is the degradation of morals, the materialistic seduction of Christians, and “the apostate ways of the churches.”

According to many dispensationalists, Christians will be “raptured” out of the world before the seven years of suffering on the earth, “The Great Tribulation.” Unbelievers and apostate Christians will be left behind. There will then be a literal thousand year reign of Christ in which Satan and all of his demons will be imprisoned and the righteousness of God will reign on earth. Toward the end of the 7 years, Satan will again be released to wreak havoc on the earth. Christ will reappear, Satan and his followers will be destroyed (Revelation 20:7-10), and the saints will be in a new heaven and a new earth.

Here are some dangers of this approach to history.

1. Dispensationalism supports a negative view of the church. It says the church is a “parenthesis” in the period that leads up to the kingdom. Dispensationalism tends to oppose ecumenical cooperation, seeing it as leading to the “great one-world church” which the Anti-Christ will control.
2. Dispensationalism fails to cultivate social action in the church. If the world is spiraling down into total corruption and chaos, you don’t have much motivation to try to improve it. Your job becomes rescuing people out of the world, not changing it. Peace making is of no use because “there will always be wars and rumors of wars” (Matthew 24:6). Some hold the world view that America is God’s instrument to raise up an army to fight the forces of evil and be the victor at Armageddon.
3. Dispensationalists see government as a weak tool for instituting righteousness. Government can accomplish little. The United Nations is viewed as an instrument the Anti-Christ will use.
4. Dispensationalists’ impact on world politics can only lead to war. Out of the Second Coming doctrines of dispensationalism has come Evangelical Zionism. It teaches that the Jews must return to Palestine, reestablish the state of Israel and rebuild Solomon’s Temple on Mount Zion before Christ can return. This plan requires the displacement of the Arab people. They are more committed to it than most of the Jews living in Israel.
5. Dispensationalism leads to neglect of the environment. If the end times are at hand, why work to save the environment. Remember Interior Secretary James Watt under Ronald Reagan? He reasoned that there was no need to protect even Yellowstone National Park from oil drilling because the end would likely come in the next few decades.
6. Dispensationalism discounts the Sermon on the Mount. Dispensationalists recognize the radical nature of the lifestyle called for in Matthew 5-7 and say it is for the next dispensation. They escape it by relegating it to the future after Christ has come.

(Based on Tony Campolo’s analysis of this movement in Speaking My Mind, published by Thomas Nelson, 2004)