News coming out this week makes us really need to think about Jerusalem
From The Rev. Kaji Douša:
News coming out this week makes us really need to think about Jerusalem.
I want to talk a little bit about something that a lot of people don’t understand about a certain strain of Christianity. And what they believe in is what we call “premillennial dispensationalism.” Premillennial dispensationalism is all about trying to figure out how we can prepare for Jesus’ coming. And people who adhere to this thought are concerned based on two passages out of scripture, one from First Thessalonians 4, and the other one from Revelation 20. And the Thessalonians passage talks about the rapture, and the Revelation 20 passage talks about the millennium. And what these folks would like is to make sure that they get to be raptured before the millennium comes – because they believe there will be a period of tribulation that nobody wants to have to live through.
This matters, politically, because this week President Trump declared that he intends to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. And it’s all connected to this premillennial dispensationalist belief that Jerusalem has to be the capital of Israel in order for Jesus to come back. Here we are in the Advent season planning for Jesus’ return.
And this is scary, because it destabilizes the world unnecessarily. Because God doesn’t need our help getting things ready politically for Jesus. God needs our help socially. God needs our help structurally. God needs our help between human beings caring about every life in the Holy Land, and not just one group of people’s lives.
So we need to pay attention, Christians, and talk to our dispensationalist friends who would like to ignore the needs of, say, the Palestinians, or even of the Israelis, by making things very dangerous for them over there. And God forbid there be any further violence. In this Advent season, let’s pray. Amen.