ORIGINAL SIN: When confronted with his sin (the breaking of God’s Law), Adam blamed God for giving him Eve who had had offered him the forbidden fruit, which he felt compelled to do partake of because she wanted him to (Gen. 3:11,12). In his thinking, God and Eve shared equal guilt in his downfall. When asked why she sinned, Eve blamed the Serpent for deceiving her into rebelling against her Creator. The only thing that has changed within the church is the source of the blame for parishioners’ sins. Within the Institutional Church, it is neither Satan nor Eve is to blame for man’s continuous sins, For church people, the finger of blame points at Adam. It is certainly NOT man’s fault that he repeatedly rejects God’s rules for engagement with Him. Because of Adam, sin is as natural as eating and drinking. Salvation-seeking man is helpless when it comes to resisting Satan’s temptations to sin. As a local preacher told his local and television congregation: “Don’t even try to be righteous, you’ll just make yourself sick. You’re nothing but a society of sinners.” I heard him say it and watched his lips move. In truth, he spoke professing Christendom’s unspoken motto. With the exception of a minutely few congregations, his words should be painted above the door of every Catholic and Protestant Church on earth. Adam’s supposed guilt in Christianity’s blame game is the subject of this segment.

The “truth” that “everyone knows” to be “Bible fact” is that sin is man’s “nature” which is fixed at the instant of conception. How did this Satanic article of “truth” come to be part of the Word of God–the Law by which all human beings will be judged (Jn. 12:48)? The lie has roots that take us back to North Africa where lived a Catholic priest named Augustine in an area known as Hippo. A disease was taking the lives of many children among his followers and was showing no signs of letting up. The parents, not wanting their children to die without being baptized, demanded that Augustine baptize them immediately.

The priest, knowing that sin was the breaking of God’s Law, and that the children had not broken His Law and had no need to have sin symbolically “washed away,” found himself in a strait between the Word of God and the will of the people. He solved the problem by creating a “truth” that would be embraced by the world-wide church as quickly as her itching ears heard it. The new and improved “truth” was that ADAM HAD MIRACULOUSLY TRANSFERRED HIS SIN GENE INTO EVERY HUMAN BEING EVER BORN. The church joyously agreed that Adam was the first human to perform a miracle. Church sinners now had an “out” which took them off the hook. The sin fix was in so sin was in. Nothing has changed.

Church masses embraced the new “truth” without question. The new “truth” which “everyone knew” to be “Biblical” was that MAN WAS A SINNER FROM CONCEPTION, THEREBY MAKING SIN “NATURAL”–SIN WAS NOT MAN’S FAULT. After all, one cannot change one’s “nature.” Therefore, Jesus died to allow church people to do what was “natural” (sin) and get away with it. Christ’s death nullified God’s Law. Having no more use for it, He supposedly nailed to Christ’s cross. Jesus, the REAL TRUTH made known, obeyed the Law for church sinners by using God’s grace. His church was filled with SINNERS SAVED BY GRACE. All sinners needed to do following their natural inclinations was to repent following each inevitable sin. And thanks to Adam and Eve, man had been given the power to determine his own definition of sin. What’s not to like about that religion? Nothing, which is why Christianity is the largest religion on earth. Read Original Sin and Sin is a Choice. Key words–Original and Choice respectively. 25 lines

THE RAPTURE: Just as popular as the “It isn’t my fault; Adam made me do it” lie is the RAPTURE HOAX which, once it became “Bible truth,” swept through “the church” in record time. One will notice that any belief, no matter how unbiblical, that allows man to do what he wants to do becomes “truth” and popular in record time. The “rapture” lie was no exception. So how did it become one of the most popular falsehoods embraced by “the church?” a status it continues to enjoy to this day. As was the case with Adam’s sin gene-transferal miracle, a single person was responsible for taking the church world by storm and changing it forever.

Her name was Margaret McDonald who, in 1803, received a vision “from God” in which He informed her that everyone in the Catholic Church would be taken up to heaven in a secret “rapture” just before the Great Tribulation began. Margaret, wanting everyone in “the church” to know of their exalted status and future fate, shared her incredible “truth” with her priest. Like any other “truth” that green-lights the expression of man’s “nature,” the “good news from on high” spread like wildfire. And not surprisingly, it was automatically accepted as a message sent by God Himself to (and only to) the Catholic Church.

Before long the Protestant Churches heard the latest “truth” and, like their Catholic counterparts, declared it to be “Bible fact.” Protestants could not allow the Catholics to claim sole ownership of such a wonderful blessing. Before long the “rapture” had become “God’s truth” throughout the whole of professing Christendom, including the New World known as America.

As was the case of Adam’s miracle, there had to be a considerable amount of Scripture-twisting, interpreting, ignoring, replacing, interpolation, etc. in order to make the new “truth” fit into church theology. But man was up to the task. Soon “everyone knew” that everyone in THE ______________ (fill in the blank) CHURCH was not only going to heaven, but would be taken there just before all hell broke loose on earth. Is Christianity a great religion, or what? I have noted that professing Christendom is the most convenient religion on earth. Her “You want it–you got it; it’s all good,” “Come as you are; stay as you are” brand of religion is indeed convenient. For this reason it is called the “Burger King Religion.”

However, when the disciples ask Jesus what would be the sign that the end of the world was immanent, He spoke at length about the “signs” that would take place as His return to earth grew near (Mat. 24:4-8). He told about false prophets who would deceive many salvation seekers. He spoke of coming wars and rumors of wars, He warned about famines and disease pandemics. Incredibly, HE SAID NOT A WORD ABOUT A RAPTURE THAT WOULD REMOVE HIS PEOPLE FROM HARMS WAY. Surely He would have included that important bit of information. Would that not have been one of the “signs of His coming?”

One of the main features of the supposed “rapture” is its secretive nature. People will simply disappear with neither sound nor commotion. Sermons have been preached, books have been written and movies have been made depicting this incredible, totally silent occurance.

However, the Apostle Paul states that when Jesus returns: “The Lord will descend from heaven with a SHOUT, with the VOICE OF THE ARCANGEL, and with the TRUMPET OF GOD” (1 Thes. 4:16). In Matthew 24:27,31 Jesus said that just before His arrival He would send “LIGHTNING FROM EAST TO WEST” accompanied by the “GREAT SOUND OF A TRUMPET.” Not only that, but “every eye will see Him” (Rev. 1:7). So much for a secret rapture. Read the series on the Rapture. Key word–Rapture. L.J.