Those not raptured (taken to Heaven) will be purified of sin at this time and will, when Christ returns, be joined by the saints who were raptured before the time of trouble. A strong conservative political right wing party has developed out of the Kingdom and Dominion Theology.  The development of this segment of society (majority of Evangelical and ecumenical Protestant churches) has awesome power and was responsible for the election of George Bush, and now the Republican sweep of the House and Senate. They are anti-abortion, anti-gay, and antiseparation of church and state. Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Oliver North, Dr. James Kennedy, Newt Gingrich, etc. are people who are heavily involved in this movement. Just because they were not highly visible in the of Bill Clinton does not mean they are not working behind the scenes.
 
CRUSADERS ZEAL:

         They have the zeal of crusaders and will not stop until they attain their goal of control of the world's governments, because they feel they have a holy mandate supported by the Bible. Does it not say that "kingdom and dominion...under the whole heavens shall be given to... the saints of the most High" (Dan. 7:27)? Yes, it does, but they take this literally, believing that God has called them to do this.  They feel they have God on their side and will not fail. They claim that until control of the world's people is given into their hands, the Lord will not come.

         Jesus said "Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done" (Matt. 6:10). They interpret this as God's kingdom which will not be set up on earth until His will is done, and His will is that the saints shall rule the earth. Like Judas, their plan is to help influence the outcome of events according to their fallible human reasoning.

         In Genesis 1, God gave man dominion over the earth.  This is interpreted by them to mean that it is the will of God that we, the children of Adam, are to rule the earth. This means that the church is to be involved politically, to "take the steering wheel," as Oliver North puts it, away from the politicians and occupy all of the civil institutions.

         Furthermore, they claim that the troubles, natural disasters, and evils seen everywhere are judgments because people have strayed away from keeping God's ten commandments, and have turned away from God, walking in their own lusts.  Now God is at work to destroy all the unbelieving cultures and give dominion to His people.  Christians, they say, are being challenged by God to take back the authority over the nations He originally gave them. This sounds surprisingly like the beast of Revelation 13 which was given power over all nations.

         They have gone to great lengths to show that the business of the church is to enforce the laws of God, including that of the Sabbath which they interpret as Sunday.  These laws also include the Laws of Moses (the ordinances and statutes found in Leviticus), which they say are still binding. Reading their literature shows that they aim to enforce these laws to the letter;  which means that anyone caught breaking any of the Ten Commandments will be put to death. If a person is caught in an illicit lustful relationship, if he or she is promiscuous or gay, if murder is committed, which would include abortion, the person must die. Those who use mind altering drugs, steal, or bear false witness will all pay the penalty.

         The law of Moses says that if a person breaks the Sabbath command,  he must die.  What about those who refuse to worship on Sunday? Because the Bible is used as their guide, they think that will settle the matter, and they plan to enforce the law to the letter.  It is not hard to see what will happen if the "radical right" ever gets power. The worst atrocities ever committed were done in the name of religion. Taken to its ultimate conclusion, it will lead to "ethnic cleansing," such as is seen today in former Yugoslavia as Greek Orthodox Serbs try to wipe out Muslims and Croatian Catholics.

         Add to this a cataclysmic event in nature which Scripture predicts will take place, and the religious right will not hesitate to annihilate, for example, all the gays in San Francisco, inmates in prisons, those who would violate a Sunday law, etc. This is a good example of what can happen when there is a misapplication of Scripture. In this present situation, a code of ethics, BASED UPON FALSE DOCTRINE, is a DELUSION all in the name of the Lord that will surely turn deadly.
 
WHAT IS THE KINGDOM?:

         Perhaps the basic reason behind the deception of Kingdom and Dominion proponents is their misinterpretation of the word "kingdom." They interpret this word to mean an earthly temporal kingdom, but this is not so. "Kingdom and dominion theology" believes just as did the Jews of Christ's time. Like the Jew they are looking for the Messiah to come and set up His kingdom in Israel, Jerusalem in the land of Palestine. Some believe the temple will be rebuilt and the old sacrificial offerings will be reinstituted.

         As we have seen, when Jesus was asked when the kingdom of God would come (for the Jews wanted to be delivered from the oppressive bondage of Rome), He stated it as clearly as He could: "the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:21).

         There are three kingdoms identified by the Bible, and depicted below.  One controlled by Satan, the other two by Jesus. Satan's kingdom on this world is the KINGDOM OF GUILT which runs by the law of sin and death.  Christ's two kingdoms are the KINGDOM OF GRACE which runs by the law of the spirit of life, and the KINGDOM OF GLORY, which is still to come in the millennial and eternal ages.  In every instance in the New Testament, the Greek word "kingdom" refers not to a temporal kingdom, but rather to "the kingdom of God," which is a SPIRITUAL kingdom.

         It refers to the sphere of God's rule, as being in the person of Christ when He was here on earth, and NOW in the workings of the Holy Spirit, as the kingdom of God is set up in each individual heart temple of all who are willing.  (Critical Lexicon and Concordance to the English and Greek New Testament, by Ethelbert W. Bullinger.)

        Kingdom and dominion theology teaches that the saints will rule 1,000  years on earth, during which time there will be peace, but this idea, too, is a twisting of the truth. There is a thousand year period of the saints' reign (Rev. 20:2-7), but it will not be in the city of Jerusalem in Israel. It will be in the New Jerusalem, the beloved HEAVENLY CITY (Rev. 20:9) built by God (Heb. 11:10), where Jesus, when He comes in the clouds of glory, will take the righteous saints (1 Thess. 4:17).

        During this thousand year period Satan and his angels will be the only inhabitants on this destroyed planet. After the thousand years are past, this "holy city, New Jerusalem" will descend to earth (Rev. 3:12; 21:1,2) and remain here forever on a completely purified (Mal. 4:1-3) and remade new earth (Isa. 64:4;  65:17,21-25; 66:22,23), "wherein dwelleth righteousness" (2 Pet. 3:13).

        When the Jews killed the Son of God on the cross, they cut themselves off from the promise that they would be God's chosen people.  They rejected their inheritance as a nation, and the right to inherit the kingdom of God was transferred to the Gentiles (which is all of us who are not Jews). "When we are Christ's, we are Abraham's seed..." and are modern Israel (Gal. 3:29).   When we accept God as our Father and Jesus as our Saviour and Brother,  we are adopted into the family of God more thoroughly and effectively than when human families adopt a son or daughter. Nothing can separate us out of this family (Rom. 8:35-39).

         It is in SPIRITUAL Jerusalem today that Christ is even now silently and invisibly setting up His kingdom here on earth, building His temple in the heart of each believer.

         The contrast between the Kingdom and Dominion teaching and the wonderful work of sanctification and preparation just described is perhaps the greatest tragedy among Christians.

         Christendom has waited for almost 2,000 years for the return of the true Jesus (Yahshua). In each generation untold millions have looked for His return. Ever since Christ returned to Heaven, Christians have looked forward to His second coming. But those who look for a literal, physical kingdom on earth before the millennium have forgotten His words to the Pharisees and the disciples when He described His coming in His Spirit to set up the kingdom WITHIN (Luke 17:20,21).

         It is not the future second coming of our Lord in the clouds that should be the main focus of our attention, but rather the coming of His Spirit NOW to set up residence within the heart (mind) temple. Those who do not establish a personal, intimate relationship with God first will be found with their temple in shambles, inhabited only by "owls...and satyrs [demons]" (Isa. 13:21), instead of the Holy Spirit.  All those who have not understood the importance of having the kingdom of God set up by the Holy Spirit within will be the ones who most readily accept Satan's counterfeits when they come.
 
OTHER ERRORS CONNECTED WITH DELUSION:

         There are several other errors found in this theory such as:  1) What constitutes the rapture; 2) what Jesus will do; 3) where and when He will do it; and 4) The order of events in the millennium. Little do the believers in this delusion know that it is a deception finely tailored by Satan to condition them to accept HIM when he comes as the answer to all the world's problems. Neither are they aware that Kingdom and Dominion theology is a diversionary tactic of Satan to keep them from heeding the last warning message of the three angels of Revelation 14:6-12.

         The first of these angels has "the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people," He says with a loud voice, "Fear God, and give glory to Him; for the hour of His judgment is come:  and worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters."  Fearing God and giving Him glory includes worshiping our Lord as Creator on the Sabbath day which He set aside to commemorate creation.

        The second angel tells us that the Babylonian system, which includes all of the ecumenical churches and many other religio-political and business organizations, has fallen (Rev. 14:8). The true and faithful believers are urged to "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues" (Rev. 17:4).  Those who come out of Babylon form the remnant who will be saved.

         The third angel (Rev. 14:9-12) tells us not to worship the beast or his image or to receive his mark (666). If we do not have the seal (mark) of God (7th day Sabbath), we WILL receive the 666 number by default, which is an eternal death warrant.

THIS DELUSION WRECKS HAVOC WITH SCRIPTURE:

         Kingdom and Dominion theology as well as the secret rapture theory wrecks havoc with the plainest Scripture and scrambles so many doctrines, it is hard to know just where to begin. Perhaps a little history: These delusions (part of the counter reformation) were devised by two Catholic Jesuit priests, Alcazar and Ribera, during the great Protestant reformation.

         They purposed to explain away the popular belief that the pope was the antichrist. It was the Catholic endeavor to save face when the embarrassing 666 texts pointed to the "man of sin" (2 Thess. 2:3,4) as the pope.  By pushing the idea of Christ coming to set up an earthly kingdom sometime in the distant future, they were able to counter the accusations of the Protestants that the Pope in office at that time was the antichrist.

         They were successful enough to even get the Protestant world to eventually accept this erroneous view. These ideas were pushed into prominence again by Hal Lindsey in his book The Late Great Planet Earth. Lindsay envisioned the saints being taken to Heaven before Christ's visible return to avoid the time of tribulation and trouble on earth.
 
         The followers of this Kingdom and Dominion theology are not all in agreement with Lindsey as to when this rapture will take place, especially when his predicted date of the rapture did not materialize. Some say it will happen before the time of tribulation; others say it will happen during this time, and yet others believe it will take place after the tribulation. They envision the saints coming back to earth with Christ to reign for 1,000 years in a world where sin still exists. The object for Christ's coming is obscured by false ideas about why He is coming and how He will set up His kingdom.
 
THE OBJECT OF THE TWO COMINGS OF JESUS:    
 
THE TRUE MILLENNIUM MISUNDERSTOOD:  

        Suppositions about how, where and when Jesus is going to set up His kingdom, and who will comprise that kingdom have obscured the truth as taught in the Bible about the millennium. The above chart is how the Bible describes events to take place.

         The thinking of today's Kingdom and Dominion proponents is very much like that of the Jews in Christ's time, as well as His disciples, who believed, even up to the time of His death, that Jesus had come to set up an earthly kingdom. By being so focused upon this misunderstanding, they did not grasp God's plan of salvation for saving mankind.
 
NO SCRIPTURAL EVIDENCE:

         There is no Scriptural evidence for life continuing on during the millennium, much less getting better as people perceive will happen. Scripture plainly says that when Jesus comes the second time that His feet will not touch the earth,  but rather the saints will be gathered up to meet Him in the air, and then be taken to heaven to live with Him for a thousand years.

         At His second coming, fire will come down from heaven and kill all on this earth except for Satan, his angels, and his demons. For one thousand years they will live on this totally desolated earth, awaiting their judgment by God.   At the end of the one thousand years, God will raise up all the wicked dead from the time before the flood to those who died at the brightness of His coming.  This is the second resurrection. All these along with Satan and his angels will hear their sentences pronounced, and they will be destroyed root and branch, by the purging fires of God. This is the true hell fire whose only work is to purge and purify the earth of every trace of sin and sinners. Thus God's plan in existence from the beginning, involves the creation of a new earth out of the ashes of a destroyed earth, in which all trace of sin and sinners will be erased by the purging fires from God's arsenal.   In other words God has told us that He will start all over again and recreate the earth after the fires have purified it of all traces of sin and sinners. We will have more to say about the subject of the Millennium in Monograph #12.
 
DIFFERENCES OF GOD'S TWO CREATIVE ACTS:

         There will be some differences between the two creations. For one, there will not be just Adam and Eve as at first. All their countless redeemed offspring will be with them. Another difference is that the redeemed will have a knowledge of sin and its consequences. They will be a witness to the destruction of sin and sinners.  Thirdly, unlike Adam and Eve, they will be eye witnesses to the recreation of the earth. They will see God speak things back into existence, as He reconstructs the earth to its former beauty.  Thus it is that this delusion about how the kingdom of God is going to be set up, does not address itself to any of these coming events, and leaves its adherents in ignorance, and their souls in terrible eternal danger. This leads our discussion to the delusion eleven (The Secret Rapture), which fits hand in glove with this one.  Those who believe one, usually believes the other.