I’ve debated with myself over whether I should respond to Tommy Ice’s awful article about me and my book End Times Fiction that Brannon Howse published on his Worldview Weekend site. In his first response to my original argument, Brannon argued that he does not teach on the rapture, and his site and conferences do not spend much time on eschatology. You could have fooled me. The fact is, a great m [...]

By Gary DeMar and David Chilton If there’s one passage of Scripture that is repeatedly brought up as an indictment against anyone who objects to modern-day prophetic speculation, it is 2 Peter 3:3–18. If you dispute with those who argue that all the signs around us indicate that we are living in the “last days,” then you are labeled a “scoffer” or a “mocker” (2 Peter 3:3). If this is true, then ho [...]

For the past two weeks, I have let you in on a debate I’ve been having with Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend conferences (see here, here, and here). I objected to the numerous articles that populate his site that deal with end-of-the-world issues. I described this preoccupation as “worldview schizophrenia.” It’s difficult for me to understand how anyone can claim to be teaching Christian worldvi [...]

Brannon Howse of “Worldview Weekend” responded to my article “A ‘Howse’ Built on Prophetic Sand.” The title of his response article is “Howse, Markell, Hunt, Ice, Reagan, McTernan, Salhus, and Rosenberg, Are Not the Enemy or the Problem with America.” As anyone who read my original article can see, Brannon never responded to a single point I made. This is bad form for the head of a worldview minis [...]

Many Christians believe it’s wrong to argue to reason through a point with believers and non-believers. It’s not. To argue—to reason critically—is to use the God-given faculty of reason and apply it to God’s Word as a search light for truth elsewhere. The Bible tells us to “test the spirits to see if they are from God” (1 John 4:1). To test something means to argue its points. That is, to assume t [...]

You’re thinking that I misspelled “house.” I didn’t. The reference is to Brannon Howse who heads up Worldview Weekend. A better designation would be “World-Ending Weekend” since so many of his speakers and article topics push an end-of-the-world eschatology. Howse warns his young audiences of the dangers facing society with one batch of speakers and then with another batch of speakers tells the sa [...]

Every day we hear of earthquakes, war, floods, volcanoes and other disasters and troubles all over the world. Is this a sign of the end of the world? With the advent of the Tea Party movement and the decline of the Republican party due to its compromise and liberal leanings, is there a need for a third party in America? [...]

Any time American Vision posts an article dealing with Bible prophecy, we get emails from Bible prophecy “experts” chastising us for our “ignorance.” One fellow wrote that since Revelation talks about earthquakes and we see earthquakes today that earthquakes must be a modern-day sign that the end is near. Here’s what he wrote: “I don’t know who this guy [Gary DeMar] is and I don’t want to know but [...]

A few weeks ago, I received an email that an article had been published in the April-June 2010 issue of the dispensational-oriented journal Bibliotheca Sacra. Here’s part of what the emailer wrote to me: “I’ve read your work and heard your debates in [the area of Bible prophecy], and I must say the counter-arguments [in Lawrence A. DeBruyn’s “Preterism and ‘This Generation’”] are very compelling a [...]

When I first became a Christian and started reading the Bible, I found that there were passages that were hard to understand. This was natural since I didn’t know much about the Bible. When I would come across one of these difficult passages, I would set it aside until I could study it further. As I grew in my knowledge and understanding of Scripture, many of these tricky passages became clear. [...]

The Bible was not written in such a way that only seminary-trained Christians are able to interpret it. Many young Christians believe that Bible interpretation is complicated so they lean heavily on study Bibles and the views of popular Bible teachers. To be sure, some passages are difficult to interpret. Even Peter admitted as much: “as also in all [Paul’s] letters, speaking in them of these thin [...]

In order to understand the book of Revelation you have to read it against the backdrop of the Old Testament, and you also have to understand the subject matter and the timing as to when these events were to take place. The book of Revelation isn’t describing events in the distant future, it’s describing events leading up to and including the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. Declaring [...]

Ripping a verse out of context in the book of Revelation is standard fare for a lot of Christians. They look at events in the world around us, then go to the Bible and pull out a prophecy that they can make fit and call it fulfillment of Bible prophecy. In order to accurately interpret the book of Revelation, you must know the rest of the Bible well, and most people lack this Bible knowledge. [...]

Gary receives a lot of emails, some with valid questions and theories, and some completely off base. One such email talks about images the emailer sees in the fault lines in the Gulf of Mexico that supposedly link with Bible prophecy. This is similar to people who see the Gospel in the stars or a secret code hidden in the Bible. [...]

Dispensationalists say that there are no signs leading up to the rapture but there are signs leading up to the tribulation. Since the tribulation is supposed to occur right after the rapture, signs for the rapture would, by default, be signs for the tribulation as well. Throughout history, every major disaster has been touted as a sign of the end, in spite of the fact that we are still anticipatin [...]

The majority of dispensationalism teaches a pretribulational rapture that could happen at any time. If the rapture is an imminent event, then Israel becoming a nation again, or any particular sign, prior to a pretribulational rapture cannot be a prophetic sign. It’s no wonder that so many Christians are confused about Bible prophecy. [...]

Gary DeMar recently debated Jim Fletcher, author of It’s the End of the World as We Know It (and I Feel Fine) and director of Prophecy Matters, on whether or not modern Israel is a fulfillment of Bible prophecy. In preparation for this debate, Gary wrote a new book titled 10 Popular Prophecy Myths Exposed. This book lays out some of the most popular dispensational teachings and refutes them [...]

Many Bible prophecy teachers and writers believe and teach that Israel becoming a nation in 1948 is a fulfillment of Bible prophecy. The revival of the Hebrew language is often taught as a fulfillment of Zephaniah 3:9. Should the Bible be viewed through the lens of current events or should we rather view current events through the lens of the Bible? [...]

Predictions of Armageddon and impending world destruction have the same effect as the boy that cried wolf, weakening the gospel message to unbelievers. Should we be so focused on predicting the end or focused on taking dominion of the world God has given us as commanded by Him? [...]

I knew it would happen. The latest incident in Israel has brought out the prophetic speculators again. “A council of rabbis in Israel says their nation’s conflict with Turkey over a flotilla of ‘aid’ ships headed for the blockaded Gaza Strip controlled by the terrorist Hamas organization just may be the beginning of the ‘Gog and Magog process where the world is against us, but which ends with the [...]