From Pop-Prophecy to Pop-Culture[1]
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Copyright Š Robert E. Cruickshank, Jr (November 22, 2023)
All Rights Reserved
Daniel E. Harden (Editor)
He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God; Many will see and fear and will trust in the Lord.
-The Psalmist[2]
Right now, the Church rules the nations of the world. We and we alone have been given power and dominion, and if we donât like the way things are going, we have only ourselves to blame.
-James B. Jordan[3]
The culture is a reflection of the Church, and music is a commentary on the culture. Music, in turn, influences the culture.[4] Itâs cyclical like vinyl spinning on the turn table. If Godâs people ever want to break the cycle, we need to lift the needle and put on a new record.
Fundamentalists rant and rail about both our culture and the music of our culture. They donât realize that itâs all a result of the song the Church has been playing since âThe Dispensationalistsâ became the hottest band in the Christian world back at the turn of the 20th century. John Nelson Darby was the warmup act before C.I. Scofield stole the show. Today, Godâs people still canât get Scofieldâs tune out of their heads, and the world is simply dancing along.
Dispensationalismâs doomsday dirge has been echoed in numerous popular tunes of our time. From CCRâs âBad Moon Rising,â[5] to Europeâs âFinal Countdown,â[6] to Metallicaâs âFour Horsemen,â[7] many songs parrot the common understanding of New Testament prophecy in contemporary Christian theology. Needless to say, the songwriters didnât have the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70 in mind when they penned their chart-toppers.
Perhaps the most popular example is Princeâs â1999.â This hit aptly captured what would eventually become the Y2K craze. Itâs hard to refrain from the songâs catchy refrain: âSay, say, 2000-00, party over, Oops, out of time, So tonight I’m gonna party like it’s 1999.â[8]Â Much to Dispensationalismâs dismay, â2000-00â scored a zero on the prophecy charts, and another decade came and went without an apocalyptic trace.
âHello, Iâm Jonny Cashâ
While the Purple One utilized the Armageddon theme as a simple lyrical trope, the Man in Black took doomsday in a more serious tone. In âMatthew 24 (is Knocking on the Door),â[9] Johnny Cashâs lyrical talent brilliantly weaves together Dispensationalismâs less-than-brilliant take on many prophetic passages in the Bible:
I heard on the radio rumors of war
People gettin’ ready for battle
And there may be just one more
I heard ’bout an earthquake
And the toll it took away
These are the signs of the times we’re in today
Matthew 24 is knockin’ at the door
And there can’t be too much more to come to pass
Matthew 24 is knockin’ at the door
And a day or one day more could be the last
The great bear from the Northland
Has risen from his sleep
And the army ranks in red are near
Two hundred million deep
The young and old now prophesy
A coming prince of peace
And last night I dreamed of lightning in the east
Matthew 24 is knockin’ at the door
And there can’t be too much more to come to pass
Matthew 24 is knockin’ at the door
And a day or one day more could be the last
Johnny Cashâs contemporary, Barry McGuire, famously sang, âBut you tell me over and over and over again my friend, Ah, you don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction.â[10] As it turns out, McGuireâs âfriendâ in the song was right all along.  That was 1965, and we werenât on the eve of destruction after all. But we were on the eve of Hal Lindseyâs Late Great Planet Earth. This bestseller would hit the bookshelves in 1970, and its impact would be felt at every level â even at the level of arts and entertainment.
The Bob Dylan Effect
Bob Dylan was unquestionably one of the most influential artists of our time, and the artist himself wasnât without his own influences. In an article entitled âThe Hal Lindsey Effect: Bob Dylanâs Christian Eschatology,â Jeffrey Lamp of Oral Roberts University writes, âHal Lindseyâs eschatology functions in a multi-faceted way in Dylanâs thought.â[11]Â Lamp gives obvious examples, like this line from Dylanâs song When You Gonna Wake Up: âThereâs a sword being flashed for all those in sorrow and despair, you wonât find it so hard to imagine when you meet it in the middle of the air.â[12] Â On a deeper level than the lyrics of the songs themselves are the words Dylan frequently spoke during his concerts before those songs. Lamp gives the following examples:
âYou know weâre living in the last days of the end of times. In the last days of the end of times, youâre going to need something strong to hang on to, so this song is called âHanging On To A Solid Rock Made Before The Foundation Of The World.â Youâre gonna need something that strong.â[13]
âI suppose youâve been reading the newspapers and watching the TV? And you see how much trouble this world is in. Madmen running loose everywhere. Anyway we, weâre not worried about that though â it doesnât bother us â because we know this world is going to be destroyed. Christ will set up his kingdom for a thousand years in Jerusalem where the lion will lie down with the lamb â we know this is true. No doubt about it. So, itâs a slow train coming. Itâs been coming for a long time, but itâs picking up speed.â[14]
âAll right. Now donât be dismayed by what you read in the newspapers about whatâs happening to the world. Because, now, the world as we know it now is being destroyed. Iâm sorry to say it, but itâs . . . itâs the truth. In the matter of a short timeâI donât know, maybe in three years, maybe five years, could be ten years, I donât knowâthereâs gonna be a war. Itâs gonna be called the war of Armageddon. Itâs gonna happen in the Middle East. Russiaâs gonna come down and attack first and you watch for that sign. Anyway, weâre not worried about that. We know thereâs gonna be a new kingdom set up in Jerusalem for a thousand years. And thatâs where Jesus will set up his kingdom, as sure as youâre standing there, itâs gonna happen. So this is called, âHanging On To A Solid Rock Made Before The Foundation Of The World.â[15]
The Times They Arenât A-Changinâ
One of Dylanâs most popular songs is, âThe Times They Are A-Changinâ.â[16] But not much has changed in the world of Dispensationalism over the last few decades. They continue to claim that weâre in the last decade â decade after decade. The trouble is that todayâs younger Dispensationalists arenât familiar with the songs of previous decades.
In his article, Lamp notes Dylanâs âappeal to current events as portents of the approaching end of times.â[17]Â This is Dispensationalism 101, and you didnât need to go to a seminary to learn it. All you had to do was go to a Bob Dylan concert. The problem is that Dylan was wrong, Hal Lindsey was wrong, and all the Dispensationalists of their day were wrong. The world didnât end in âthree years,â in âfive years,â or even âten years,â as Dylan predicted. Nonetheless, Dispensationalists are still blasting the same tune today, and thatâs the real problem.
When I was a teenager, I heard Bruce Springsteenâs cover of âWar,â by Edwin Starr. I loved the song and thought it was one of the Bossâs best. It was only later that I learned Springsteen wasnât the original artist. A similar phenomenon is happening with the current generation of younger Christians. The performers stealing the show today are men like David Jeremiah, Greg Laurie and Jack Hibbs. They assure their screaming fans that current events equal Biblical portents. With the book sales soaring and the money pouring, everyone is âholding steadyâ and ârapture readyâ. Even today, Dispensationalists still insist that the time is ânearing midnightâ.[18] What todayâs young people donât realize is that this song has been done already.
If youâre a younger believer today, the conditions of the world have most likely left you dismayed. And rightly so. But the cultural decline isnât a prophetic sign. On the contrary, itâs a pathetic sign. Itâs a sad indication that the previous generation left yours behind as they waited anxiously for Jesus to take them to the sweet by and by. Rather than working to change the world, Godâs People have been looking for Him to come and take them out of the world. David Chilton accurately summarized the mentality that has yielded the results that we now see all around us:
âFor too long, Christians have been characterized by despair, defeat, and retreat. For too long, Christians have heeded the false doctrine which teaches that we are doomed to failure, that Christians cannot win â the notion that, until Jesus returns, Christians will steadily lose ground to the enemy. The future of the Church, we were told, is to be a steady slide into apostasy. Some of our leaders sadly informed us that we are living in a âLaodicean ageâ of the Church (a reference to the âlukewarmâ church of Laodicea, spoken of in Rev. 3:14-22). Any new outbreak of war, any rise in crime statistics, any new evidence of the breakdown of the family, was often oddly viewed as progress, a step forward toward the expected goal of the total collapse of civilization, a sign that Jesus might come to rescue us at any moment. Social action projects were looked on with skepticism: it was often assumed that anyone who actually tried to improve the world must not really believe the Bible, because the Bible taught that such efforts were bound to be futile; as one famous preacher put it, âYou donât polish brass on a sinking ship.â That slogan was based on two assumptions: first, that the world is nothing more than a âsinking shipâ; second, that any organized program of Christian reconstruction would be nothing more than âpolishing brass.â Evangelism was an invitation to join the losing side.â[19]
David Chilton wrote this in 1987. And it still holds true today. Modern Christians are slow to change the station despite the fact that Dispensationalism is nothing more than a long series of failed prophecies based on a faulty interpretation of Scripture. They continue to listen to the same songs, even after all this time.
Sinking Ships and New Songs
The âsinking shipâ mentality began when John Nelson Darby sang his tune in the early to mid-1800s, and that ship was sailing at full speed ahead by the end of the 19th century. Prior to that, Godâs people envisioned a Gospel that would permeate every area of life and every aspect of society.[20] As the late Gary North wrote, âChristians havenât taken seriously this vision of victory since the 1870âs ⌠For over a century, this vision faded in the hearts and minds of regenerate people. A vision of defeat, in time and on earth, replaced the older vision of victory. The churches went into hiding, culturally speaking. They left the battlefield, and the humanists won by default.â[21]
By the turn of the 20th century, the Scofield Reference Bible with its Dispensational reference notes was the Churchâs manual of survival. The defeatist mentality then hit an all-time high with the works of Hal Lindsey in the 1970s, and the failed predictions soon followed. The fundamental error of the fundamentalists was the propensity to interpret fulfilled prophecy as unfulfilled. Lindsey told the believers of his day that they were âthe terminal generation,â but it doesnât take a rocket scientist to understand that âthis generationâ (Matt. 24:34) meant the generation to whom Jesus was speaking.  The truth is that Matthew 24 was knocking at the door of the disciples, rather than the door of Christians today, and that door swung wide open when Jerusalemâs walls were broken, and the Romans destroyed the city in AD 70.
The condition of the world today isnât a sign of the times, but it is a sign that the Churchâs eschatology has influenced the times. And today, the sign on the Dispensationalistsâ door says: âRapture Postponed: New Date Coming Soon.â Â Indeed, 2028 has become the new 1988,[22] and believers are spinning the same record all over again. Itâs time for believers to stop, think, and learn, and let the Dispensational ship sink into the depths, never to return. We need to break the cycle. If you are a young believer, donât waste your life waiting for Jesus to take you out of the world. Spend your life working to change the world instead. Leave a better world to the next generation than the world the previous generation left to you. Dispensationalism got it wrong, and itâs time for Godâs people to sing a new song (Psalm 40:3).
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[1] Many thanks to Daniel E. Harden and Eric Ogea for their invaluable input and suggestions.
[2] Psalm 40:3
[3] http://www.biblicalhorizons.com/biblical-horizons/no-20-who-rules-the-land-the-meaning-of-the-noahic-covenant-part-2/
[4] https://www.savethemusic.org/blog/advocacy/how-does-music-affect-society/#:~:text=Music%20has%20shaped%20cultures%20and,may%20not%20be%20immediately%20apparent.
[5] https://zinginstruments.com/songs-about-the-end-of-the-world/
[6] https://genius.com/Europe-the-final-countdown-lyrics
[7] https://genius.com/Metallica-the-four-horsemen-lyrics
[8] https://www.bing.com/search?q=1999+lyrics+&qs=n&form=QBRE&sp=-1&ghc=1&lq=0&pq=1999+lyrics+&sc=11-12&sk=&cvid=B707F570AE754D85B833CB59F9661290&ghsh=0&ghacc=0&ghpl=
[9] https://genius.com/Johnny-cash-and-june-carter-cash-matthew-24-is-knocking-at-the-door-lyrics
[10] https://genius.com/Barry-mcguire-eve-of-destruction-lyrics
[11] https://thedylanreview.org/2021/07/25/the-hal-lindsey-effect-bob-dylans-christian-eschatology/?fbclid=IwAR1uSOkCF5WIIGEjcT3mrQoXt7fvgxbuVT4MTvzdE2ESoqRElwDUR0bhT2w
[12] Ibid.
[13] Ibid.
[14] Ibid.
[15] Ibid.
[16] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Times_They_Are_a-Changin%27_(song)
[17] Lamp, Ibid.
[18] https://www.raptureready.com/category/nearing-midnight/
[19] David Chilton, Paradise Restored: A Biblical Theology of Dominion (Tyler, TX: Dominion Press, 1987), p. 3.
[20] See: The Book that Made Your World: How the Bible Created the Soul of Western Civilization, by Vishal Mangalwadi; Under the Influence: How Christianity Transformed Western Civilization, by Alvin J. Schmidt What If Jesus Had Never Been Born, by D. James Kennedy and Jerry Newcomb; God and Government, by Gary DeMar.
[21] Gary North, Backward, Christian Soldiers?, pp. ix-xi
[22] https://burrosofberea.com/heres-hoping-a-future-generation-will-get-this-generation-right/