Feeling The Future At Christian End Time Performances

The End is always near. The Apocalypse has sparked imaginations for millennia, while in more recent times, highly publicized predictions have thrust End-Time theology briefly into the spotlight. In the 21st century, fictional depictions of various apocalyptic scenarios are found in an endless stream of films, TV shows, and novels, while real-world media coverage of global issues including climate change and the migrant crisis often features an apocalyptic tone. Feeling the Future at Christian End-Time Performances explores this prevalent human desire to envision the End by analyzing how various live End-Time performances allow people to live in and through future time. ​ The book’s main focus is contemporary Christian End-Time performances and how they theatrically construct encounters with future time—not just images or ideas of a future, but viscerally and immediately real experiences of future time. Author Jill Stevenson’s examples are Hell Houses and Judgement Houses; Rapture House, a similarly styled “walk through drama” in North Carolina; Hell’s Gates, an “outdoor reality drama” in Dawsonville, Georgia; Ark Encounter, a full-size recreation of Noah’s Ark; and Tribulation Trail, an immersive thirteen-scene drama ministry based on the Book of Revelation. The book’s coda considers similarities between these Christian performances and secular survivalist prepper events, especially with respect to constructions of and language about time. In doing so, the author situates these performances within a larger tradition that challenges traditional secular/sacred distinctions and illuminates how the End Times has been employed in our current social and political moment.

The study of early drama has undergone a quiet revolution in the last four decades, radically altering critical approaches to form, genre, and canon. Drawing on disciplines from art history to musicology and reception studies, The Routledge Research Companion to Early Drama and Performance reconsiders early "drama" as a mixed mode entertainment best studied not only alongside non-dramatic texts, but also other modes of performance. From performance before the playhouse to the afterlife of medieval drama in the contemporary avant-garde, this stunning collection of essays is divided into four sections: Northern European Playing before the Playhouse; Modes of Production and Reception; Reviewing the Anglophone Tradition; The Long Middle Ages Offering a much needed reassessment of what is generally understood as "English medieval drama", The Routledge Research Companion to Early Drama and Performance provides an invaluable resource for both students and scholars of medieval studies.

All of us think about the end times. When we reflect on what will happen not only when we die but when this present age ends, some combination of ideas, images, hopes, and fears floods our minds. In The Future of Everything, William Boekestein encourages us to allow our thoughts on the end times to be guided by God’s Word. While combing the Scriptures to find direction related to subjects like death, the millennial kingdom, the return of Christ, the resurrection, judgment, heaven, and hell, Boekestein helps us cultivate a vision for the future that impacts our walk before God’s face today. Table of Contents: Part 1: Introducing Eschatology 1. Why Should I Study the End Times? 2. How Can I Understand Prophecy? Part 2: Personal Eschatology 3. We’re All Going to Die 4. Between Death and the End Part 3: General Eschatology 5. He’s Coming Again 6. A Thousand Years? 7. The Dead Will Rise 8. The Final Judgment 9. Hell 10. The New Heavens and Earth Part 4: Applied Eschatology 11. The End Times and the Kingdom of God 12. The End Time and the Mission of the Church

There is a small groundswell of thinking in the evangelical church that we may not have achieved a proper biblical understanding of end-times events. It is important for us to return to a careful study of these things, because the time is near. In The Sign of the End of the Age: What Jesus Taught about the Future in Matthew 24, author Paul Kalbach helps you discover--or rediscover--the Olivet Discourse, the Lord's clear road map that all other prophetic Scriptures must reckon with. To understand the discourse, we must answer one critical question: what is Matthew 24 about--the future program for Israel or the end of the age events for all believers, including the church? Kalbach presents extensive arguments that show a different timing and sequence of events than is usually taught by proponents of the pretribulation rapture position. His in-depth study adheres to a most literal interpretation method. The Sign of the End of the Age seeks to bring a deeper understanding of the end-times period, vital in a world that shows every sign that this time is near.

When you hear the words "end times," what do you think of? A worldwide tribulation? Wars and rumors of wars? Earthquakes? The antichrist? The church being taken off the earth while the unrighteous are left behind? While that is exactly what many of us have been taught-what if the Bible has a very different story to tell? Every new "end of the world" prediction causes believers from all walks of life to start asking questions. How much time do we have left on earth? What does the future look like? Are we supposed to make the world better now, or will Jesus take care of that in a future millennium? And most importantly, what did Jesus really have to say about all this? Jesus Wins is the true story of one man's thrilling journey to get clarity about what the Bible really teaches about the future. J. A. Hardgrave spent years with questions that couldn't seem to be answered. Then everything changed. While listening to a sermon, he heard an evangelist say a statement about the end-times that was the opposite of what he had been taught. Suddenly, he knew there was a different view of prophecy that he had to discover. Prepare to be filled with optimism for the future, have more confidence than ever to fulfill your destiny, and finally understand Bible prophecy for yourself by receiving simple tools that anyone can use. One thing is certain: after reading this book-you will never see the end-times the same.

Scripture reveals a God who meets us where we are, not where we pretend to be. No More Faking Fine is your invitation to get honest with God through the life-giving language of lament. If you've ever been given empty clichés during challenging times, you know how painful it is to be misunderstood by well-meaning people. When life hurts, we often feel pressure--from others and ourselves--to keep it together, suck it up, or pray it away. But Scripture reveals a God who lovingly invites us to give honest voice to our emotions when life hits hard. For most of her life, Esther Fleece Allen believed she could bypass the painful emotions of her broken past by shutting them down altogether. She was known as an achiever and an overcomer on the fast track to success. But in silencing her pain, she robbed herself of the opportunity to be healed. Maybe you've done the same. Esther's journey into healing began when she discovered that God has given us a real-world way to deal with raw emotions and an alternative to the coping mechanisms that end up causing more pain. It's called lament--the gut-level, honest prayer that God never ignores, never silences, and never wastes. No More Faking Fine is your permission to lament, taking you on a journey down the unexpected pathway to true intimacy with God. Drawing from careful biblical study and hard-won insight, Esther reveals how to use God's own language to come closer to him as he leads us through our pain to the light on the other side, teaching you that: We are robbing ourselves of a divine mystery and a divine intimacy when we pretend to have it all together God does not expect us to be perfect; instead, he meets us where we are There is hope beyond your heartache, disappointment, and grief Like Esther, you'll soon find that when one person stops faking fine, it gives everyone else permission to do the same.

It's the end of the world as we know it," proclaims the popular song. And sometimes the daily news appears to confirm that forecast. The signs of the times hailing Christ's return seem to be all around. Or so it appears. But, is it really the end of the world? Christians through the ages have held to a variety of understandings of the millennium--the belief that a 1,000-year period of utopia will one day come. In this book, prophecy expert and biblical scholar Marvin Pate helpfully highlights the three major views of when Christ will return--premillennialism, postmillennialism, and amillennialism--as well as a fourth skeptical interpretation, expertly analyzing them all. This timely treatment provides a reader-friendly, accessible overview of the ongoing debate over end-times viewpoints.