You sound like a 29 yr old, young man, who has not been out of seminary for very long. How old are you?

David

This is very true, yet the problem still remains: The church and thearm chair theologians do not reflect the academy. Progressive Dispensationalism has had very little influence within the church, in comparison to revised and classical, or even wacko Disp. theology like the hal lindsey types. They are yet to catch up and frankly i dont know if they ever will. I stand proudly as a premillennialist, yet a Historic one, and I pray many will have their eyes opened.

I agree with many of the caricatures on here that disp has been the result of some extremely whacky eschatological views, and has arguably done more harm than good in Christianity. I personally grew up in a tradition that tried to interpret current events in light of biblical prophecy, and now I look back and am ashamed for believing some of it, and I laugh now because of how ridiculous it is.

However, I believe that if we look throughout all of church history, there have always been groups that have done this very thing, regardless of the fact that disp has only been around for around 200 years. We always see sects who claim the world is going to end, who claim that Jesus will come back on such and such a date, who claim that they are the true witnesses and the kingdom will be ushered in by them. So on that note, I just think that kind of whacky disp is following the lead of many of our forebears.

On another note, it agitates me when I hear disp used as a blanket statement. If we look at the academic disp within the last 20 years, we will find that 99% of them would disagree with the Tim LaHaye & John Hagee types. Many of them don’t see the modern nation-state Israel as a fulfillment of biblical prophecy, and they don’t try to interpret all current events in light of biblical prophecy. IMO, they have learned from the absurd statements of many of their forebears and are changing their approach.

Personally, I’m pan-mill (i.e. I don’t give a darn), but I believe we shouldn’t throw disp out because many of its forebears have had whacky eschatological beliefs. For instance, I believe their emphasis on progressive revelation is a good one, and one that we should adopt and learn from. The axiom that God deals with people differently at different points of time is helpful for biblical exegesis. Also, although God is working primarily through the church now, disp has been quick to point out that the NT still affirms a place for Israel in God’s plan. This has often been taken extremely too far, but it’s true nonetheless (and we’re starting to see more non-disp scholars agreeing with it everyday). It’s a shame that what most people think is that you have to choose between disp and covenant theology (i.e. reformed), because I think both of them are very wrong in many places, yet both have their strengths and are right in many places. It’s not an “either-or” for them, it’s a “yes & no” for both. Such is the case with all systems, IMO (although the up and coming missional theology is spot-on, IMO). Disp has many wonderful scholars who shouldn’t even be mentioned in the same breath as LaHaye and Hagee (e.g. Darrell Bock).