By ANDREW SULLIVAN, THEATLANTIC.COM
Added: Wed, 16 May 2007 23:00:00 UTC

Thanks to Florian Widder for the link.

Reposted from:
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/05/dobson_armagedd.html

The most influential man in the Republican base, James Dobson, has been interviewing a foreign policy expert about our approach to the Middle East. His guide is Ezekiel, 38. If you are not already scared by fundamentalists dictating foreign policy from the Bible, this might work your nerves a little. No one - but no one - in the current GOP establishment will take Dobson on. But he is quite clearly out of his mind. Here's a transcript of his interview today with one Joel C. Rosenberg, promoting this book.

Dobson: Joel, we've just read quotations telling us that a nuclear attack on the United States in the long run is inevitable. Joel, does that fit your point of view, not as a scientist, but as one who reads the scripture and one who has been remarkably successful in understanding the times? We know that appeasement never works. How can you negotiate with people whose stated intention is to kill you?

Rosenberg: you can't. This is unnverving. Unless you begin look at this as a student of the Bible, a follower of Jesus Christ, and begin to say, OK, the Bible gives us some guidance on this. We can't say for sure that this is a prophetic event, but as followers of Jesus Christ, our command is to "be strong and courageous." That's what God said to Joshua four times in the first chapter of Joshua. We who have the Holy Spirit in us should not cower in the face of this, because the Muslims are lost, and because they are lost they are being driven I believe by THE ENEMY in a way that will confront us but we know that Jesus Christ is powerful and we know he is moving in the Middle East. I think what is most exciting in the Middle East is a story the media is missing: that in the last 30 years in Iran, there are now more than one million Muslims who have converted to faith in Christianity in Iran. If that's not evidence that we are living in the last days, I don't know what is.

Dobson: We know the Lord is in control. We know that he has never lost a battle. And we know he loves us, and he loves the nation of Israel and has made that clear for thousands of years. So what should we do?

Rosenberg: I think the botttom line is found in Matt 28, verses 18-20, where Jesus says "All authority under heaven and earth has been given to me, therefore go and make desciples of all nations." Jesus is calling us to go reach the nations of the Middle East, Russia and elsewhere.

Dobson: Well Joel, let's explain to everybody how Ezekiel 38 turns out because Israel is about to be attacked and a huge number of troops from Russia and Iran are coming toward Israel to destroy it and what happens?

Rosenberg. Well, God is going to move. You won't find in the Scriptures that the United States is coming to rescue Israel or the European Union, but God says he is going to supernaturally intervene, we're talking about fire from heaven, a massive earthquake, diseases spreading through the enemy forces. It is going to be such a clear judgement against the enemies of Israel that Exekiel 39 says that will take seven months to bury all the bodies of the slain enemies of Israel. And the birds of the air and the beasts of the field are going to eat many of these slain soldiers. I think this is the end of radical Islam as we know it, Ezekiel 38 and 39, and in the aftermath, millions, even tens of millions, including radical Muslims, will come to faith in Jesus Christ. And given the events going on in our world today, people at the Pentagon, people at the CIA, people at the White House are asking to sit down and talk about these issues, to understand the Biblical perspective, because it is uncanny what is happening out there and it deserves some study.

Dobson: Joel, you are doing a great work. What you just mentioned of people in the Pentagon and the CIA are asking you for interepretations of what you see that allowed you to write these books. I think that's done by divine inspiration. And I appreciate it.

TAGGED: -, RAPTURE, RELIGION