It's an odd feeling, finding out that not only is everything you were raised believing not considered true, it's actually considered heresy.  The impact is lessened by my having already rejected quite a lot of it, but I'm still finding several underlying assumptions I didn't even know I had.

I was raised in a peculiar branch of American Evangelical Christianity known as Pre-millennial Dispensationalism.  It has its roots in the 19th century writings of John Nelson Darby. Darby's Dispensationalism takes the Bible and uses certain verses to divide up human history into a number of different epochs, or "Dispensations."  Depending on which dispensation you're in, God acts a different way.  There are a number of variations on the list of dispensations, but the way I was taught goes like this:

• Age of Gentiles--Adam to Abraham
• Age of Jews--Abraham to the birth of Jesus
• Hypostatic Union--the 33 year life of Jesus
• Age of the Church--from Pentecost to the Rapture (unknown date)
• Tribulation--7 year hell on earth
• Millennium--Jesus's 1000 year reign of paradise on earth

(some PMD's really enjoy numerology, and so will have 7 dispensations, like the 7 days of creation)

The central part of this is the Tribulation. It's been the subject of Evangelical Christianity's fascination for quite some time now, but the PMD version gained popularity with Hal Lindsey and his books, most notably "The Late Great Planet Earth."  Starting in 1995, the PMD theologian Tim LaHaye began publishing the "Left Behind" series, which chronicles the supposed future of the planet, after the Rapture of the Church.  It predicts the rise of the AntiChrist, an evil dictator who works for the Devil, and culminates in the return of Jesus Christ to slay his enemies.

The Rapture (from what I'm learning) isn't really predicted in the Bible. Darby basically invented it, using verses like 1 Corinthians 15:51-52: ⁵¹ Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— ⁵² in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed." (NIV)

Now, most people (like the ones who've read the preceding verses) might tell you that St. Paul was comforting his audience regarding death.  The Early Church believed Jesus's return was right around the corner, but some members of the community of believers had started dying. Would they be included?  But no! That's a liberal, wishy-washy 'we all get into heaven' reading. You must read it literally, which is to say, read it in a way not supported by the text.

This verse is really referring to the day when Jesus will steal away his church, (Matthew 24:40-41): ⁴⁰ Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. ⁴¹ Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left. (NIV) 

In Matthew, Jesus was talking about the day of his return. He said that in that day, things would be "as in the days of Noah" when people were eating and drinking up until the moment the flood came, and they were washed away (Matthew 24:38-39).  Now, certainly, no man knows the day or the hour, but reading this "as in the days of Noah," it seems like Jesus is saying one day it'll be too late, and those who don't turn from their wickedness to me will be washed away. It's the wicked who will disappear. But to the PMD, Jesus is saying that the Righteous will disappear, and the Wicked will be left.  

This is what makes this hermeneutic "Pre-millennial Dispensationalism"--the idea that, before the millennial reign of Christ, there will be the terrible Tribulation (take just about everything in Revelation starting with chapter 4, add bits of Daniel and Ezekiel, and read "literally"). Other variants are "post-millennial" in which the Second Coming of Christ occurs after a thousand year Golden Age of Peace, independent of Christ's presence on earth, or "amillennialism" which says that Jesus's reign is symbolic, and it's not a literal 1000 year period (sort of a "the Kingdom of God is within you" from Luke 17).

I'll go into further detail on what makes this a heresy in future posts. What got me started on this was a blog I've been reading that goes through the "Left Behind" books page by page (here: http://slacktivist.typepad.com/slacktivist/left_behind) and I started to realize that what I had been taught is actually rejected by most of Christianity.  I started telling my fiance about the version of Christianity I had growing up, and he actually started getting angry about the way the faith had been perverted. It was truly bizarre.

 Do any of you have experience with this brand of American Evangelicalism? Yes, you do. George W. Bush is, for sure, one of these. I'm willing to bet Sarah Palin is too. As we explore this sect, you might start to realize exactly what makes those people tick.