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A local Christian television station hosted Hal Lindsey last spring for two evenings of lectures about his new book, "Planet Earth—2000A.D." With chapter titles like "The Perilous Condition of the Human Race," "The Rise of Deceiving Spirits," and "The Coming Great Deception," it is no wonder that, when the host opened the floor for questions, there was no want of inquirers:

- What leads you to believe that the Antichrist is alive, and in what part of the world is he living?

- Does the Bible specify any area of the world that will not be completely destroyed in the battle of Armageddon?

- What are some specific signs that believers can look for to distinguish Christ from the false prophets?

- What are your thoughts concerning crop circles and UFOs?

- Do you think the Antichrist will be completely human?

As planet Earth is poised on the threshold of a new millennium, and as global systems coalesce, there is rising speculation, and angst, among Christians as to what these changes might mean eschatologically.

Some of the beginning-of-the-end events Lindsey and others point to are difficult to ignore—no matter what end-times convictions you hold. For example, the proliferation of chemical and nuclear weapons sophistication on the part of terrorist groups (the "secret power of lawlessness" unleashed, 2 Thess. 2) really has transpired, as the subway sabotage in Japan has painfully revealed. The European Community really has become unified, to a degree, by means of the European Common Market and the Maastricht Treaty (the "revival" of the Roman Empire, the "ten toes/nations" in Daniel 7). At the same time, the economies of other nations have become inextricably linked through the recent ascendance of the World Trade Organization. Laws and standards for economic interchange now exist at the international level, to which all local laws must, in theory, submit (the consolidation of "buying and selling," Rev. 13). On the technological front, global networking in cyberspace has thrust businesses and economies into a cryptographic "brave new world" (the "increase of knowledge" in Dan. 12) where, according to Howard Fineman ("Newsweek," Feb. 27, 1995), "even nationhood itself can seem irrelevant." Add to this Lindsey's statement on TV last March that "the day of the terrorist has come" to be validated so horrifically by the Oklahoma City bombing in April, and it is no wonder that the eschatological preoccupations of many have intensified.

But these speculations have antagonized other sectors of contemporary evangelicalism. Wheaton College professor Mark Noll, for example, writes in his recent book "The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind" (Eerdmans) that modern-day end-times prophets tend to be "blown about by every wind of apocalyptic speculation," even suggesting that they have become "enslaved to the cruder spirits of populist science." These sentiments echo the thoughts of theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, who concluded, "It is unwise for Christians to claim any knowledge of the furniture of heaven or the temperature of hell," and George Eckman, who wrote earlier this century, "Revelation is enough. Speculation is more than enough."

The eschatological titillation of some has caused the disaffection of others and the confusion of many. How then are we to interpret the "signs of the times"—or should we at all?

A dynamic eschatology is vital to a living faith. The Scriptures address "the end" extensively: The Old Testament prophets employed eschatological images vividly; Jesus entertained questions about it seriously; Paul reinforced those teachings authoritatively; the Book of Revelation "unveiled" the events of "the end" dramatically. Surely God intended to say something to us about it all.

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October 2 1995, Vol. 39, No. 11