There is a new Christian video game flying off the shelves at 10,000 Wal-Mart's, Targets, Circuit Cities and other outlets around the country. It is called “Left Behind: Eternal Forces” and follows the best-selling Left Behind books written by Christian ultra-conservatives, Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins. These books teach what theologians have called a “pretribulation, dispensational, premillennial” eschatology meaning there will be a sudden “rapture” when true believers simultaneously leave earth followed by a seven year period of tribulation and upheaval before the return of Christ. This view borrows from a literal reading of Revelation 20 and was also popularized by the Scofield Reference Bible.
Interestingly, these books were more popular leading up to the recent calendar change from 1999 to 2000, than now when we are nearing the second half of the first decade of the 21st Century. But that’s another point alongside the observation I have about individuals claiming to know the theme of this new millennium when it is hardly a few years old (Who knows what the citizens of 2099 or even better 2999 will say about this new Century and even Millennium when that time comes to look back on it – oh, that’s right, according to the Scofield crowd it won’t matter by then).
Which gets us back to the video game that seeks to prepare believers for these “last days” and allows participants to have the option of either converting or killing non-believers (of course, if you choose the second option you lose “spiritual points”). Bruce Prescott offers a compelling list of questions parents might want to be ready to answer if they choose to allow their children to play this game, which by the way is endorsed by Focus on the Family:
1) Why is this game set in New York City? Does God want me to shoot my fellow Americans?
2) Why are the forces of evil associated with the United Nations? Is God opposed to the United Nations?
3) Why do I have to kill everyone who will not convert to evangelical Christianity? Does God hate unbelievers?
4) Why do I hear "Praise the Lord" every time I kill someone? Does God want me to kill people?
5) Why do I lose "Spirit points" every time I come near a rock musician? Is rock music evil?
6) Does Jesus want me to love my enemies or blow them away?
7) Is Christianity a religion of peace or a religion of war?
8) What would Jesus do? Would he play this game?
I am naturally appalled by this game (and this “Christian” theology) and wonder what kind of reaction we might encounter from the group promoting this “entertainment” for children if a similar game was produced for ultra-conservative Muslims or “secular humanists” teaching their children that you must either convert or kill your opposition.
Instead of this crazy strategy, I have a much more humble suggestion on how we can eagerly await the return of Jesus into the world.
It is as simple, as immediate and as frequent as celebrating every time someone does something Christ-like in the world. When we forgive a wrong, when we offer compassion to the poor, when we pray and work for healing to the afflicted, when we offer kindness to the stranger, clothes to the naked, food and water to the hungry, companionship to the sick and those in prison, when we defend the cause of the powerless, when we reconcile with a neighbor, when we give of ourselves and our resources sacrificially and unconditionally, when we become the church; the living body of Christ in the world, when we do those things and many more Jesus has returned.
While we await the birth of Christ in the world, we also wait for his return. I thank God it is 2,000 years later and Jesus has not come in “shock and awe.” I am thankful that while LaHaye and Jenkins have written best selling fiction, it is, nevertheless, still fiction. I just hope those of us in the church would not be so gullible.
A world waits with us for the presence of Christ. It certainly won’t be found in a new video game that trains Christian children to become violent zealots. But it will be found in the faces of the broken, bruised and forgotten. If there were only a few Christians left to bear his image and not just his name to these needy ones. If so, they are exactly the kind of Christians I hope will be “Left Behind.” The rest, as far as I am concerned, are welcomed to be “raptured”. Now that would be a Christmas miracle!
