Christians

Edited by lady - 26 May 2011 at 12:43pm

Douggg wrote: lady wrote: This question is an extension to a question Dougg posted today? Do christians plan on taking over the world? A small majority called dominon theologists do believe that they have to convert all of the world to Christianity and then the world as the kingdom of God would be handed over to Jesus when he returns.   The same could be said for the Kingdom now group.    The RCC also, I believe think that it is up to them to save the world when things get really bad.   Their beliefs in this area are a little hazy imo. Certainly during the middle ages, things got way out of control with the popes and the inquisition, and evil reigned.  Similar things were happening in the protestant sector.   But none of those things are in the mindset of Christianity today. For the vast majority of Christians, our orders from Jesus is to spread the gospel throughout the nations.   It is not our mission to take over the world under the banner of Christianity.   Ultimately, the end times events will begin which are beyond our (Christian) control.   Some Christians like me think we will be pulled out of the world in the rapture before the 7 years of the Antichrist.   Other Christians think they will have to go through part or all of it.   In the past few years there has been a line of thought within Christianity, that the Antichrist will be the muslim Mahdi and that Islam will be his religion.    It's an appealing train of thought for us because some of the Muslim expectations line up with the Antichrist passages in the bible. I entertained that idea about 8 years ago before it became popularized.  After talking to many muslims on line regarding their end times prophecies, I concluded that it was not possible once a person gets into the details. What I think is going to happen is that Islam is going to disappear as a religion as a result of the Gog/Magog invasion of Ezekiel 38 and 39.   When God defends the Jews and not the Muslims, it will become apparent even to muslims - the ones who are left - that their religion was not what they thought.    I know muslims make much out of calling the western armies crusaders (Christian), but Christianity is not going to defeat Islam at all.  It will be totally by God by supernatural means in Ezekiel 38 and 39.   It is entirely possible that Christians will be taken out of the world before that event happens. When Islam and the muslim countries in the middle east are destroyed in Gog/Magog, the Antichrist man shows up and the Jews will think he is their king messiah.   Well that starts out the 7 years of the Antichrist. There will be persons who become Christians during that time but they will be persecuted by the Antichrist.  There will be many martyrers and deaths. Islam will not be around... which I know is something impossible for muslims to think possible.   But something similar happened with the collapse of the soviet union and communism. We do believe that Jesus is going to return at the end of the 7 years and defeat the Antichrist.   And that he will reign and rule on this earth for 1000 years.   There will be no religions during that time except what Christians believe regarding Jesus. But it is not by our power that it is going to happen.   We are just the messenger.  And that is the best way to look at us.

islamispeace wrote: Yes, the Christians do want to take over the world so they can continue to bore us with stories about the Rapture and tribulations which will never come!

Have you considered that the Rapture is to take us out of this world?  How are we going to take over the world by not being here?

Doug L.

lady wrote: This question is an extension to a question Dougg posted today? Do christians plan on taking over the world?

None that I've known personally (which would include Christians affiliated with most of the moderate sects, Franciscans, Anglicans and Episcopalians, Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Church of Christ, Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Quakers, Mormons, and a few others I can't recall off-hand).  However, as some "Christian" extremist groups seem to have louder voices and larger numbers now than at any other period during my lifetime, I can't answer your question definitively.  I hope that the answer for the majority of Christians is "no".

One of the Church's early founders, Clement, Third Bishop of Rome, a student of Peter the Apostle, wrote that there is more than one gate, that Christ is but one of them.   rebecca