My grandma is always talking about Jack Van Impe and how he is the man to listen to on TV.\u00a0 I know that he talks about the rapture and he uses Scripture to back it like when Elijah was taken up. He talks about the tribulation period and whatnot. Also, he talks about Revelation and from my understanding Revelation has already happened.<\/p>\n
I was wondering if you can give me some third party input on this guy because my grandma doesn’t listen to me. I would appreciate it a lot.<\/p>\n\t
Citing scriptures, by itself, isn’t enough to tell us whether a person is a good teacher of the Bible or not. After all, Satan quoted Scripture to Jesus during his temptations in the wilderness (Matthew 4). Satan was misusing the passages to make them appear to teach things that were contrary to God’s will.<\/p>\n
Thus, to understand whether Jack Van Impe is teaching the truth or not, we have to examine what he is teaching. You already noted that he teaches premillennialism, which isn’t taught in the Bible, so something must be wrong.<\/p>\n
A while back I did a lesson where I took one teaching of Jack Van Impe and showed how he twisted passages by lifting them out of context and assigned arbitrary meanings to various descriptions found in the Bible. To prove the point, I took a satirical “football prophecy” that a friend wrote and made it sound as if it was from the Bible. See “Of Prophecy and Football<\/a>.”<\/p>\n I don’t know if that will be sufficient to convince your grandmother or not. It is sometimes difficult to teach people in your own family because they tend to think of you when you were a small child instead of as an adult. It is the same problem Jesus encountered. “For Jesus Himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own country<\/em>” (John 4:44). Sometimes the best approach is to make one small point at a time to build up a reputation of speaking accurately in regards to the Bible.<\/p>\n Did you know “Jack Van Impe stated, with the utmost confidence on his television show, On the Edge of Eternity, June 22, 1994, that the Rapture would occur around the year 2000”? And yet there remains no sign of it.<\/p>\n Did you know that Jack Van Impe had prophesied that 2001 would be the beginning of the end of the world? “Jack Van Impe Ministries sponsors the largest Evangelical Christian program devoted to end-time prophecy. On his home page, he discusses his book “On the Edge of Eternity”<\/em>\u00a0in which he predicts that the year 2001 will\u00a0“usher in international chaos such as we’ve never seen in our history.”<\/em>\u00a0He predicts that in 2001, and the years following, the world will experience\u00a0“drought, war, malaria, and hunger afflicting entire populations throughout the [African] continent…By the year 2001, there will be global chaos.”<\/em>\u00a0Islam will become much larger than Christianity. (That would take a sudden growth spurt; Islam is currently followed by 19% of the world’s population vs 33% for Christianity). A one-world church will emerge; it will be\u00a0“controlled by demonic hosts.”<\/em>\u00a0Temple rituals (presumably including animal sacrifice) will resume in Israel.” [Interactive Bible, “220 Dates for the End of the World.”<\/a>]<\/p>\n Weldon Warnock had a good article on Jack Van Impe’s belief that Iraq is a modern Babylon. It is called, “Iraq in Prophecy? Modern Babylon? Think Again!<\/a>” Jack Van Impe is also a conspiracy theorist as the “Fake Television Evangelist I.Q. Test<\/a>” illustrates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Question: My grandma is always talking about Jack Van Impe and how he is the man to listen to on TV.\u00a0 I know that he talks about the rapture and he uses Scripture to back it like when Elijah was taken up. He talks about the tribulation period and whatnot. Also, he talks about Revelation…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[848,478,344,169],"class_list":["post-18023","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-conspiracy-theories","tag-false-teachers","tag-premillennialism","tag-prophecy"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":27201,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-can-you-teach-that-revelation-has-already-happened\/","url_meta":{"origin":18023,"position":0},"title":"How can you teach that Revelation has already happened?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"April 12, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I read\u00a0your article against Jack Van Impe. I am so amazed that you can teach that Revelation has already happened. Are you unable to read? John starts right out being told these visions are of what was, is, and is to come! But what I really want to know\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":14918,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/will-jesus-come-again-when-everyone-has-heard-the-gospel\/","url_meta":{"origin":18023,"position":1},"title":"Will Jesus come again when everyone has heard the gospel?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 11, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I know that Jesus Christ will come again when everybody has heard the gospel. Right? Well, a lot of people at school say that the world is going to end in 2012. Why are they saying this? Answer: \"But of that day and hour no one knows, not even\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":18026,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/of-prophecy-and-football\/","url_meta":{"origin":18023,"position":2},"title":"Of Prophecy and Football","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 7, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"I.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We all know that there are fairly wild predictions concerning the future. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0A.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The prophecies in the Bible are often used to support these off the wall claims. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0B.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One of the reasons why we have been studying Revelation is so you know what the Bible actually says. II.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Consider this page from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sermon"","block_context":{"text":"Sermon","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/sermon\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":20272,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/are-the-problems-in-israel-and-wars-in-iraq-what-revelation-talks-about\/","url_meta":{"origin":18023,"position":3},"title":"Are the problems in Israel and wars in Iraq what Revelation talks about?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 24, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I have had a ton of friends who are part of denominations, mostly Pentecostals.\u00a0Obviously the first problem is the fact that they are part of a denomination. They have this idea that what is going on in Israel and the war in Iraq and around the world is what\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":15777,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-could-satan-be-a-fallen-angel-when-god-did-not-put-cherubim-in-the-garden-until-after-adam-and-eve-fell\/","url_meta":{"origin":18023,"position":4},"title":"How could Satan be a fallen angel when God did not put cherubim in the Garden until after Adam and Eve fell?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 15, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Satan was in the garden in the form of a serpent (Genesis 3:1; Revelation 20:2). Since Satan is not God we know he was created and as all of creation, he was a part of the very good (Genesis 1:31). This one in the garden was a cherub. We\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":36162,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/my-boyfriend-is-handicapped-and-his-life-is-controlled-by-his-grandmother-i-dont-know-if-i-should-continue-dating-him-or-not\/","url_meta":{"origin":18023,"position":5},"title":"My boyfriend is handicapped and his life is controlled by his grandmother. I don’t know if I should continue dating him or not","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 18, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I have been dating this man from church for about half a year now.\u00a0 Our original getting together was through his uncle inviting me over to meet him.\u00a0 I have to mention that he is the victim of a drunk driver over a decade ago. Because of this, he\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18023","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18023"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18023\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18023"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18023"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18023"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}