First off, THANK YOU for making this video. I feel so heard. I am seriously considering sending this to my parents with some sort of message like "Yeah that school you sent me to? This is what they were teaching me." 4:05 You basically described how we viewed these books at my Christian school, which was founded by Tim LaHaye. While I have only read one of them cover to cover (for a book report at school, not even sure I "really read" it), they were a constant presence in our Bible lessons and classes. It was a big deal for one of our top students to start reading the "adult" Left Behind series (basically just the main series). During my sophomore and junior years of high school, we had several discussions about the rapture, which my teachers heavily implied was due to happen before our class either graduated high school or finished college. I had started questioning my faith around that time, but they were close to scaring me back into it. I've seen those clips of Tim LaHaye and watched them again recently, on top of pushing an obvious Christian nationalist message, he's also completely full of BS. The U.S., while obviously the result of an imperfect and even white supremacist foundation, was NOT founded on the Christian religion. Christian nationalists refuse to really understand the First Amendment. Edit 1: I actually only recall LaHaye speaking to our school once, sometime in high school and he SUCKED as a speaker. He would jump from talking point to talking point without much cohesion. I remember he referred to public schools as "Satan Schools." Edit 2: LaHaye was a massive conspiracy theorist and basically believed the ACLU, the NAACP, and NOW (groups that support, civil liberties, civil rights, and women's rights) were out to destroy Christians. Edit 3: In the main series, there's blatant homophobia. The anti-Christ is said to have to fathers, who had their seed genetically engineered to fuse with the mother's egg. Weird stuff, I know. Also one of the "heroes" of the book blackmails a female coworker who's in a relationship with another women. HOW HEROIC!
That last one is insane. It’s actually not that far away from us being able to do such a thing. lol But that is not in the bible so 🤷🏼 its not true i guess.
No man knows when the end will happen it is known only to God, which is what the Bible says. He's trying to give brain washed by satan people like you a second chance because he loves you. Those of us who believe and are waiting for him, wanting him to come NOW and some feel like you will never learn. But one day, Jesus will decide we've suffered enough, and you are still blinded by satan, so he will raise the dead in the Lord and that us in the world are ready. Then, though it will hurt Jesus and true believers who are praying for you and love you he will take us all home to a much better place than earth.
I took a “Bible as Lit” class in college. The professor referenced Left Behind one day, and an older Jewish woman auditing the class didn’t know what the Rapture was. He joked, “That’s when all the fundamentalists think Jesus will come take them away so they’re all going to disappear.” Without missing a beat, this lady replied, “Oh, well, that doesn’t sound so bad.” 💀
I'm a principal in a large Elementary Middle School. I was speaking to our 3rd and 4th-grade students about the upcoming Halloween parade. One of the 3rd grade students covered his ears and ran out of the cafeteria screaming. He was terrified because I was doing the devil's work and that we are all going to hell. ..... Poor Kid
With books like this- we didn’t need to celebrate Halloween, we basically lived a warped version of it. Those books were floating around church and youth group and I already knew I wasn’t going to read them- I already had crippling “left behind” anxiety. This was the first time I identified a trigger and respected myself enough to say no. You are the cutest autumn tree I have ever seen. I love that you were able to keep a tradition from that part of your life and it’s a fairly benign and cute one at that.
@@TheFlowerGirl13 Never affected me like that. I was so engrossed in a story based on a metaphoric tale from the Bible that will never actually happen. Besides, I was more invested in the characters than the biblical events.
This was my first religious trauma. My parents are both paranoid about the "end times". Imagine me, 5 years old, watching the twin towers fall, and my dad telling us, "It's starting." Training us to defend our faith in the face of a genocide that would happen before I could be an adult. Well here we are now
I didn't hear all about that until I was 21 and even then it scared me. Imagine how much worse it would be for a child. Though I was brought up on science fiction but at least a part of me realised that it was just fiction though some of it has become true.
@@bmoe4609 I went to a school where there was religious education and morning worship before classes and I had never come across this before I was in my twenties. It isn't talked about in more liberal and mainline churches and faith schools. Plus they certainly don't believe in indoctrinating children with this.
As you read the section about Vickie, I suddenly became aware of a weird trend in Christian fiction. I couldn't come up a single example of this if you asked, but the phrase "she was 14, but looked 18" jumped out at me. I KNOW I've read almost that exact sentence "she was ___, but looked 18" in multiple other examples of Christian fiction. I'm not sure what to make of that, but it's kind of creepy.
I thought so too. Wtf? Why would someone write that about a kid? Is it throwing shade at her dressing up and using make up? Is it a weird sexual thing?
I could be wrong, but i noticed that in alot of teen, tween books that were secular. I think it just plays on young people's desire to look or feel older. I know when I was in middle school, someone thinking I looked older was the absolute biggest compliment.
I know exactly what you mean. That weird way they would talk to or about people they thought were somehow below them, not religious enough or whatever. They used to talk to me like I was a member of AA who had been gone a few sessions.
Omigosh I was just explaining this same thing to my husband the other day. He had no idea what “unequally yoked” meant. He said it sounded cultish when I explained it.
Omg. I’m still traumatized from this. I used to wake up searching for me younger siblings who I thought hadn’t yet reached “the age of accountability” to make sure I hadn’t been left behind.
I feel so validated reading all these comments. To this day, even though I’m an atheist, if I leave the house and don’t see any cars for a few minutes a small part of me panics thinking I’ve been ✨left behind✨
Does anyone else watching this video love it when Elly is asking us questions like “Do you think the drunk man will be left behind?” as if we’re kids at storytime? I think her questions and tone brilliantly matches the tone in which Tim LaHay wrote the books (so patronizing to the reader!)
I just realized something: if Judd hadn't been a runaway and stolen his dad's identity, there would be no way for him or any of the other kids to provide for themselves in this nightmare scenario. So, how can this book shame Judd for what he did when it actually does nothing but objective good in this situation?
Oh I was absolutely TERRIFIED of these books. Took them as fact, too. I fully believed that this was gonna happen, that my parents would disappear and I’d be left alone. Anytime my mom wouldn’t pick up the phone, anytime my parents went somewhere and didn’t tell me or I just couldn’t find them, my first thought was that they were raptured. I remember one specific night when my parents were out late. I didn’t know where they were and they weren’t picking up the phone, so naturally I curled up on the floor, cried and was absolutely convinced that I was left here all alone for not being a good enough Christian. My metric for not being a good Christian? That I liked Doctor Who.
I started reading these as a kid, but eventually the book count became astronomical, and even my younger-teen self recognized the whole thing as a big cash grab. It was actually ridiculous how little plot development happened in each book. My mom almost didn't let me read them just because of the way Vicki's attire was described. Either her shirt or her pants were too short, I don't even remember now. XD At any rate, that was before her conversion, to emphasize how rebellious and worldly she was, but it was almost enough for my mom to forbid the whole series.
I distinctly remember that one of the descriptors of Vicki's "sinfulness" was the fact that she styled her hair differently every day. That little thorn buried itself in my child brain and threw me for such a loop, because I fully believed that I was doing something wrong by choosing to put my hair up every so often.
Not-so-fun fun fact: I read this entire book series not once but twice. Mainly because it was one of the few fiction books my parents approved of. I will say I wasn't taught it would happen exactly like the book but I was taught that the Rapture and the end times were going to happen. I personally managed to view the books not seriously and mainly read them as thriller type books. Looking back from the parts I remember, there was some WILD stuff in there. Especially the guillotine parts.
Now calling the "Left Behind"books is an insult to bad Sci Fi!! To really be Bad Sci Fi you need Mike Nelson;Crooooowwww and Tom Servo!! Or a bunch of Japanese citizens screaming "OH LOOK!!IT'S GODZILLA!!RUN!!" with very badly dubbed English.
MAAAAAN THE GUILLOTINE PARTS LMAO I remember them so clearly, and I've read that when I was 13. I don't think I should've, to be quite honest. The thing I remember the most was the passive homophobia in these books, as well as how there were two characters who were, respectively, ex-Muslim and ex-Jewish that especially rubbed me the wrong way all around 🙃
@@herlocksholmes-uv5qw Speaking of bad acting I saw today that Steve "Just as dooshy as my brother Alec"Baldwin"s daughter Hayley Beiber showed up at some society function wearing a sheer black that showed her black bras and panties!! Now the ironic thing is that Steven Baldwin's supposed to be this "family values/all that violence in movies and sex and violence on TV!!Uugghh!!" Big time Trump sycophant and good fundavangelical!!!
love the wreath, love the sarcasm, love watching you get more comfortable in front of the camera! I hope you have a wonderful halloween with lots of sacrilegious fun.
Word for word, your experience with Fundamentalism was mine. I have Depression and Anxiety and my anxiety was exacerbated by those who told me about the Rapture and burning in Hell. It scared me until I was an adult and realized that if a spiritual path has to scare you into joining then in my opinion it wasn't worth having. Because if all you have is fear, you leave out the joy of living on this Earth and every day living.
I haven't started yet but I'm so happy you are covering this. This series gave me horrific nightmares, anxiety, etc as a kid. "What if you aren't a REAL Christian?"
Thank you for speaking out against people who look down on those who live in trailer parks. I grew up in a trailer park and when I heard the term "trailer trash" I was ashamed.
Please tell me that you're one of those people who overcame growing up in such an environment, and are now living a much better life with a great job and nice home? You'd be surprised how many successful people there are who started out their lives growing up in such conditions.
These were literally our bedtime stories growing up, and now my parents wonder why I’m a horror enthusiast! No dad, it’s not the devil, I just crave the adrenaline
Right?! I was also introduced to these books at a young age. Between these books and chick tracts I was thoroughly traumatized. I also now love horror. By far my favorite genre. I never thought about the fact that there may be a correlation.
I LOVED these books when I was in elementary school! Wild that I was allowed to read these that young, but I remember reading these in 5th grade! And my friends laughed at me because the cover made them look like bad sci-fi. Which at the time I got so offended by because I thought these books were so good and godly lol. Now, I totally agree that they both look like and ARE bad sci-fi lol
My husband and I were casual Christians ( church on holidays) . We've always been agnostic. My stepmother had my son read the series one summer he visited without me. Funnily enough, he told me those books mixed with how fanatical his grandmother was helped his journey out of Christianity.
I could see it. The idea of the rapture was so utterly silly and ridiculous to me that I couldn't help questioning it. And... people putting so much emphasis on it kind of put me off. Took me a while to realize that the reason why was that most seemed to WANT the world to end.
@@wordforger Yes. I think that was almost harder to grasp. The idea of Armageddon never sounded good to me and the fact that anyone would WANT all of those terrible things for other people sounded downright sadistic, not Godly.
@@wordforger Rapture isn't even a Biblical event. It was invented in Western Christianity based off some of the verse from 1 Thessalonians. Never have to fear it happening that way.
A few small corrections: 14:54 - Judd scoffed at his little brother (not sister) 15:58 - Vicki’s dad crying when she challenges him could still be abusive (just in a different way) 35:09 - The “age of accountability” is 8 (not 7)
For a hot second I didn’t realize this comment was from Ex-fundie and thought someone just passive aggressively let corrections with no commentary as a comment and thought damn that’s weird and mean lol
Wait, there is a specific age of accountability? I thought it was just a vague time that was specific to the child. Man, even when a fundie I didn't agree to AOA. If it was real, then it made it a moral imperative to kill your children. It made no sense to have a system like that. I mean, if heaven is forever and your child- who you love- might not go there if they get too old... then the choice would be obvious. And in fairness, children have died because of this thinking...
I read a bunch of the adult version when I was in high school. Even then, it was so over the top, and u stopped reading simply because it went on for so long
Lol I read ALL of them and was obsessed with Rapture doctrine for years. Then I started reading other theologians take on the rapture and realized how sensationalist the books were and what complete grifters the authors are.
Yep.The same filks who'll scream bloody murder about "R"rated movies somehow don't seem to mind showing kids these "crap on a cracker/Will Wheaton sausage fest" movies!!!
I was raised without religion, but I encountered these books at a half-price store when I was around middle-school age. I didn't know about the rapture, so I read the whole series thinking this was just a scary 'what if' scenario the author came up with! I remember enjoying them in my naivete.
I saw these on my friend's coffee table when I was a kid. I asked about them and she was legit upset. She said she hated the books, and they made her sick, but her parents made her read them so she'd "get" why she had to "be a good Christian". How this isn't considered child abuse is beyond me.
The fear that my whole family would get raptured except for me was major fear for me up until adulthood. I really appreciate you talking about this stuff in a safe and healing way. Thank you so much for helping others like me feel normal humans with normal reactions.
Same here. I never really took much interest in the kid's series because, along with the silly prequel, they were obviously a money-grab by the authors. The storyline is so derivative and boring. Ironically, the "Bible-toting" tribulation prophet-types (Tsion and Bruce) are the most boring characters!
I used to be terrified at the thought of living forever and ever in heaven without any end. My young mind simply could not comprehend eternity. Atheism has brought so much peace to my life. Love your videos
I didn’t read this series until after becoming an atheist and it was a hilarious read. I don’t think I was capable of making it all the way through. As a Black woman it was, let’s say hard to swallow all of the sanctimonious racism and sexism. But what I was able to read was funny
This was written by two old Christian white men, born before the civil rights if I may add, who probably only had a basic knowledge of the Black culture.
I love your videos about fundie books! Once I went to a coworker's funeral and the guy that did the service spent a good 25 minutes talking about how he used to wake up his 5 year old son several times in the night to make sure that he hadn't been raptured without him. He used the entire service to try and convert everyone that attended
Well, being in an "unequally yoked" family causes alot of screaming matches in the middle of the night about how my mom is going to hell, and she's making us go to hell. Also, some things kids really shouldn't know about to prevent us from getting beaten.
That's so stupid, the Bible literally says the wife will be saved by the faith of her husband. 1 Corinthians 7:12-16 But that being said, your dad is an asshole and that's a way bigger problem.
When I was in Bible quizzing and went to tournaments out of state, people from the congregation of the church we were competing at would host us in the evenings. For one tournament, my team stayed in a house that had the Left Behind books prominently displayed . And like the dumb asses they were (I wasn't present) they started discussing the books and how they were boring and not actually well written. At some point, it clicked for them that their host's last name was LaHaye and he was the son of one of the authors. I think they felt simultaneously stupid, but also a bit proud for badmouthing the books to the author's son. I think it could have only been made better if it was Tim LaHaye himself.
Good one!!Now I'm a Christian but I'm not a Fundavangelical!! And "Secular Humanists" don't bother me at all. If someone says "I'm a Secular Humanist" I'm like "Is that anything like rhe Freemasons??I had an uncle and great uncle who belonged to the Masons.". Formal religion wise I'm Southern Baptist but not the Baptist Church of Falwell;LaHaye and Phelps!! Now regarding those really stinking bad "Left Behind" movies. Kirk Cameron against Satan??Satan would bend him over and make him blow his greasy red wang!!Wang!!! Think about it!! Up in Heaven God's got John Wayne;Charles Bronson;Charlton Heston;Steve McQueen and Kirk Douglas to name a few!! Guys who could take on the Ann T.Christ with one hand tied behind their backs!! You really think that the Anti Christ's gonna be scared of "Mike Seaver"from "Groaning Pains"??!! He'd make him his "prison b!tch BFT!!".
So glad LaHaye, along with Falwell, can no longer wield their noxious influence over the world. I hope a lot of these Moral Majority hold overs are also "called up to the Lord" in short order. They have shown time and again their capacity for cruelty and callousness toward anybody who isn't like them and their unwillingness to moderate.
I read all the kids and adult version of those books. I finally threw them all away a few months ago because I could never donate something that was so harmful to me, and I couldn't stand having them in my house after deconstructing.
Also: love how La Haye commented that Europe was “socialist.” $50 says that, just like all Christian nationalists, the instant someone with social democratic leanings were to say they want the US to be more like Norway or some other soc dem nation, all of a sudden he’d be like “BUT NORWAY IS CAPITALIST!” They do that Every. Single. Time.
exactly! if Norway is so capitalist and they're so supportive of capitalism, then why can't we in the US have the social programs that exist in Norway? it makes fully no sense.
I know several people like that lol.I met this one girl a few months ago that was like "Those places like Canada,Norway and Denmark will be 3rd world nations in a few years now that they've become socialist like the democrats wanted them to" After I explained to her that they were capitalist and that neither American political party would stand a chance to be in any other government in the western world ,she couldn't comprehend any of it
‚europe is socialist‘ is literally one of these things americans will say where you can immediately assume they are a formerly homeschooled fundamentalist with no clue about actual economics and an unhealthy sense of nationalism. like, his whole rant about ‚taking things away from the people who have something‘… do you know how taxes work? are you aware that „socialism“ is actually what makes european healthcare affordable? no, because you never had an economics lesson in your life and consider the US spiritually and morally superior to everywhere else for no reason at all.
It's been over a decade, and I still feel that overwhelming sense of dread when the rapture is talked about. I used to always be afraid of walking home from school and finding everyone gone. Truth be told, I don't think I'll ever be able to forgive the people who drilled that bullshit and trauma into my brain, and I'm ok with that.
When I was a teen some people convinced me and some friends to go to their "community center" where they had a lot of fun activities. As soon as we got there they showed us a left behind type of movie. My family members are secular Jews. I had very little experience with what Christians believed and never met an Evangelical Christian before. Thankfully there's no saving me.
They had (and I think still have) the entire series in my local public library. I didn’t grow up in an insanely religious family, we went to church on Easter and for a Christmas service where there was a dinner afterwards but that’s about it. The way my mom talked about Christianity was not out of a place of fear (In fact she HATED when anyone spread the “of if you don’t do this this and this, you’re going to hell) and she actively endorses the idea of evolution happening through creationism and the idea that our day and God’s day are two entirely different things. Just about every fundamentalist group would look at my mom and say she’s a heathen. I actually read a couple of these books and they gave me nagging fear in the back of my mind of “oh, i can’t find this person. DID THE RAPTURE HAPPEN????” For me, because the way I was raised, I don’t strongly fear the premise of this book besides occasional intrusive thought because as long as i’m being a good person for the sake of being a good person, I have nothing to worry about. But, for any kid who grew up with even the tiniest bit of fear of the rapture, this series would be traumatizing.
I'm glad you included the clip of Tim LaHaye because it provides a lot of context but oof, I had to take a couple breaks to get through it because it just pissed me off. He really said that Jimmy Carter was the worst president in the history of America?!? Apparently this man hadn't paid any attention to American history if he truly believed that. He wasn't great but he certainly wasn't the worst, he probably falls somewhere in the middle. Jimmy Carter is a wonderful human being though.
I'd like to think that he angered the fundies and evangelicals because he was more Christ-like than all of them, and they knew and were threatened by it.
The original books came out when I was in my twenties. I was a believer and a huge bookworm, but I avoided reading them because I just didn't want to think about The Rapture. Then someone who had read them told me they were really badly written, so I wrote them off in my mind. Never knew they did a kids version. I remember being told about a "prank" pulled at a Bible College of some sort. Apparently one student had a habit of oversleeping, so one morning everybody else got up early and hid, then they played trumpets over the loudspeakers... Never heard the end of the anecdote.
Former Christian school kid here. My 6th grade teacher read those books aloud every afternoon. A few months in I started having nightmares and let slip to my mom how they happened thanks to those books. A week later my teacher came to me and asked why I wanted her to stop (she mad my mom were talking). However I relented since a lot of other kids in my grade were already into the series and I didn’t want to ruin it for them. The nightmares didn’t stop but I grew accustomed to tuning out the reading…at least until the biblically accurate revelations locusts were introduced. That was a point where I regret keeping my mouth shut.
Tim LaHaye also wrote a sex and marriage book, "The Act of Marriage." A friend gave it to me and my spouse as a joke. Most of the basic anatomy stuff was correct as far as I recall, but there was a bit in there about how he recommended that every family should have at least 4-5 children, followed by his suggestion that, to save money, you should invest in a single, good-quality condom and wash and reuse it if you were needing to use birth control for a while.
is... is he mixing up condoms with caps? I'm pretty sure that's the only physical contraceptive you can safely reuse, but I doubt it's cheaper considering you need to see a medical professional to get fitted for one (idk how expensive this would be in the us - I'm somewhere with socialised healthcare). and you can't even use them for several months after giving birth, if ever again, bc of how hard infant expulsion is on that whole region of the body. I'd question why he didn't suggest penny pinching by picking up free condoms from places like planned parenthood but... well. I think I can guess why that idea didn't make it into the book.
Clearly he was unaware of the new state of the art methods to prevent unwanted pregnancies, but seriously.....EWWWWWWWW!!! Reusing a condom? That's like saying "Let's save money on diapers by reusing one for a whole month on our baby."
@Ex-Fundie Diaries I am 46. But until I finally deconverted. I was terrified of the rapture and end times. I realize now I was having panic attacks and anxiety 24/7. HOW EVIL TO PUT A KID THROUGH THAT. Also my pastors and teachers talked about it constantly. I was told in 1990 I would never make it to 18 bc Jesus would come back. Disgusting!! I'm released from those terrors and thankful I was older when those nonsense books were written.
According to the Bible, no one is going to know when it is going to happen. So, anyone who tries to present a prediction is in essence a false prophet.
I loved these books when I was a kid, I remember reading the "grown up" ones in 6th grade during class at my baptist school. My teacher let it slide usually. We had a movie night at church to watch the Kirk Cameron Left Behind when it came out. I think one of the reasons I loved them so much at the time was because they were the closest thing to my true genre loves I had read: fantasy/sci-fi. I used to get so panicky when I was left at home alone because I would be terrified that the rapture had happened and I wasn't good enough and so I was going to suffer endlessly for 7 years and maybe even then still go to hell.
I didn't read the books but I saw the movies, and I have vivid childhood memories of times when I'd break down sobbing in terror at the thought that my family would all be raptured but I'd be left behind especially because one of the characters left behind in the film was a pastor! Adults may understand duplicity in their spiritual leaders, but children are taught to think of pastors and priests as prophets and representives of god, so the idea that someone so righteous might not be good enough? Horrifying. P.S. your Halloween look is adorable!
And no good God would ever make you feel bad about yourself. Unless you truthfully did wrong on purpose because you knew it hurt someone else or made them lose something.
This is the kinda thing that makes me look back on my life growing up in the evangelical church and just shake my head. Stepping outside of the church makes all these things so freakin creepy and weird. I can’t believe i grew up with all of this. I’m so happy to be outside of that with my own spirituality and relaxed relationship with God not the judgement and self righteousness rampant in the church.
Thank you so much for making these videos!! It's crazy to me reading through these comments because I thought I was the only one traumatized by these books and being taught the rapture was a real event that could happen at any time. I used to wake up in the middle of the night when I was little and check all my sisters' beds to make sure I had not been left behind. I used to bribe them to sleep with me so I didn't have to be alone. I still panic to this day, now in my 30s when I think I've lost my son, and have to remind myself that the rapture was just a story that I no longer believe. That's how strongly is was ingrained in my head. I'm an atheist now, but I still feel that panic from time to time. 😔 I'm so sorry I'm not the only one traumatized by this fear mongering.
I never read the kids books, but I read all the adult books , as a Catholic! I was a pretty young adult/older teen when I read them and they were very scary and intense. I can’t imagine a young kid reading these.
Memo to Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins: Guess who said to take from the haves and give to the have nots: Give you a hint.You worship him or claim you do. That's none other than Jesus Christ your Lord and Saviour!! And while you and Jerry Falwell condemn former President Carter he's a helluva lot more Christian than you blowholes ever will be!! He's worked with Habitat For Humanity building houses for the less fortunate and his Carter Foundation helps cure diseases in third world countries and he believed that Bible says "Blessed Are The Peacemakers" when he brokered a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt. Hate to tell you this but the Scriptures do not say "Blessed Are The Warmongerers". Point to ponder,Tim LaHaye says "I joined the Air Force in WW2" yet he was very mum regarding "Reverend"*(*And I Use The Term Loosely)Fred Phelps and his demented band of demons protesting at the funerals of fallen servicemen and women as well as veterans!! Oh Well,when his time comes one can only hope that he'll be unpleasantly surprised when he winds up in Hell with Jerry Falwell;Fred Phelps and " The Gypper" himself Ronnie Raygun!Ray gun!! And I'm sure that Matthew Sheppard's gonna recreate the "SQUEAL LIKE A PIG!!!!"scene from "Deliverance" WITH NO VASELINE(tm)!!!!
Goodness,I remember these books. My friend and her family were obsessed by The Rapture. They all had backpacks filled with supplies, in the event of the apocalypse.
I had friends who's family was exactly like that too, from Tabernacle Baptist School in Greenville SC. I went there my freshman year and became close with a girl there and her family. They had rented a storage shed that they kept cans of food, old sleeping bags, an old army tent, etc. I didn't understand this. I fully believed when Jesus would come back, I would be caught up in clouds with Jesus and all the other Christians. Wouldn't they be caught up in the clouds with Jesus, too? Why would they need all those things for the rapture?
@@annasalmans5523 I wouldn't recommend using a storage unit for that though. I had $3000 worth of camping and outdoor supplies stolen from the one I rented. I got a shipping container after that. Much more secure.
@@robertsandberg2246 That was over 20 years ago in 1999 and the storage they used doesn't exit anymore. I don't know what happened to her family. I left that church and school and Christianity a long time ago.
i've been waiting for someone to tackle the left behind series!! i remember reading this first book in 6th grade. i borrowed it from my tiny christian school's library and flew through it during a sick day, and it gave me so much anxiety that the end of the world was coming (which was a nightmare, considering i already had anxiety around a lot of other things). i never continued with the series, thankfully, but for a while paranoid thoughts about the rapture would come back to haunt me. i'm just thankful my family was never evangelical, so my fears around the rapture were never echoed.
My parents and these books (and rapture theology stemming from the Left Behind franchise) traumatized me so deeply that sometimes when I wake up on a quiet morning, or if the power is out, my first groggy thought is that I missed the rapture! Even though I don't believe any of that anymore! It really is funny how fundie parents obsessed with the satanic panic thought these ideas and anxieties were ok, but halloween was too scary and evil!
@@jamescole3152I choose the family of Satan because I value knowledge, curiosity, freedom of mind, self-respect, and diversity. God's family values strict obedience, thought control, rigid gender roles, self-hatred, and intolerance of disagreement or doubt. Who'd want to spend an eternity subjected to that? It sounds worse than hell.
I know someone who was “misbehaving”, so her parents changed their clothes and left the clothes they had been wearing sitting out on their spots in the couch and went to the girl’s grandparent’s house down the street to make her think she had been left behind.
This is off topic but whenever you read it reminds me of one of my elementary school teachers and it's really comforting. You just give off gentle and caring teacher vibes
i was always tricked into seeing the left behind movies as a kid when I would visit my grandma. always thought it was so weird&scary but my grandma LOVED them.
Ugh the movies were just awful. The screen adaptation simply didn't do the books justice (I actually kind of liked the first book, particularly because of the conspiracy- theory stuff). Even when I was a fundie I would actually root for on screen Nicolae because the writers did such a bad job of making him a villain
I didn't read the kid versions of this series, just the adult ones. I was puzzled as to why the authors produced a kids' series, since the adult version was pretty scary. Somebody further down the comments nailed it - this was a cash cow, and being able to market to children was just more cha-ching for them.
As a teen, I read the first one of the adult Left Behind series, and wondered why God would want to leave the world in such chaos with the cars crashing and planes falling out of the sky, etc. I'm very glad my parents didn't believe in this specific version of the Rapture, but a lot of people at my church did.
My family: "Why are you so anxious and depressed?!" Also my family: "Jesus is coming back and will leave everyone here who isn't a perfect Christian to suffer until they inevitably die from war, starvation or disease." I knew I was gay from a young age, and this *terrified* me. Whenever I'd wake up in the morning and my parents and siblings weren't there, I'd immediately have a panic attack because I'd assume they were raptured and I wasn't because I'm gay.
The left behind books and movie were really the driving force in me becoming an atheist. I got obsessed with the apocalypse after them and that led me down many paths that ultimately led to me leaving the church for good.
You and I had a very similar upbringing. This all isn’t lost on me that these books were also published after 9/11 which a LOT of Christians used as a sign of the end of America and therefore the start of the rapture
Earlier than the Left Behind books was the movie “A Thief in the Night.” Same deal: people wake up to find they’ve been left behind in the rapture. My mom took me to a movie theater where there was an alter call after the film. I was still in elementary school. At any rate, the threat of being left behind terrified me, along with cautionary tales of children being taken away from their parents because they were Christian. It wasn’t my parents who drilled it into us, but we attended a very conservative church, and would hear it during Sunday school. It’s not right to subject kids to that kind of abuse.
It's taken me forever to watch any of your videos, because I can tell from the titles that everything will be too close to home! This was irresistible though lol. The first 5 minutes were such validating commentary on how this book functioned in our lives growing up. Thanks for bringing these things to light, and hoping to watch more soon!
I read Left Behind: The Kids around age 13 as a non religious kid. I was so dense, the books were literally just another series to me like Everworld or Diadem. I was saved by indoctrination by being stupid.
I recently discovered your channel and I’ve been binge watching all your videos! Thank you for making this content, it is comforting to know I wasn’t the only person that experienced fear mongering by rapture teachings.
christian men love to try to convince us that children are temptresses. 14 doesn't look 18! 14 doesn't act 18! i work with 14 year olds and they are so palpably 14! this book is such a self report for being a pdf file
I can’t tell you how happy I am to have found your channel. We read all the same books, even though my parents were not exactly fundamentalist. I can remember dozens of times when I was a child where I was absolutely convinced the rapture was about to happen and I was going to be left behind. I know my parents didn’t realize the damage this was doing to me. They underestimate the way that adults like this literally create reality for children. And the reality that gets created is horrific, terrifying, and never safe to question, because there’s that deep seed planted that if you do, you might end up tortured for eternity.
That was my fear also. I used to get up every morning run to my parents room to check if they’re raptured. I vowed then never to put my children through that bs. It’s mental abuse
I was raised by atheist parents and married an atheist woman. In my late fifties, I decided that I was going to identify as a Christian simply because I felt that I was living as a Christian more than most self-proclaimed Christians were. I feel very comfortable as a Christian, and when I adopted children who had been born into a Christian household I read to them from the Bible (taking Matthew 25:40 as the primary text for most of the lessons). As for the Rapture, though . . . the entire concept of the Rapture, the Tribulation and Armageddon have no more basis in Scripture than the Chronicles of Narnia.
Oh god, I remember my mom giving me the first two books from this series when I was about 12 or 13 (maybe younger, idk) because she loved the adult series of books so much she wanted me to be able to experience an, idk, more relatable or age-appropriate version of them. Even as a kid who fully believed in the Rapture and all this stuff, I thought the first book was so boring and full of enough holes to make Swiss cheese jealous. I also thought it was so messed up to focus on all the death and destruction that occurred after the disappearances, because a lot of people left behind would have died so quickly they didn't even have time to learn what they'd "done wrong" to get left behind in the first place. It felt like they were just being doomed to hell instantly while the others who survived got a second chance for no reason other than luck. I don't even think I read the second book, I just quietly put them into my bookcase and ignored them hoping my mom wouldn't notice or take offense that I didn't like them. I reread the first book maybe a year ago purely out of curiosity, and it was so full of stereotypes about atheists and racial minorities it made me feel actually sick. Can't wait to see you dive further into this.
I'm 47 and was a "born again" Christian for around 15yrs (aged 17-32). Then one day I just decided I didn't believe anymore, and have never looked back since. I've never been happier than I have in the last 15 years. Now I'd consider myself agnostic, bordering on atheist.
I read the adult books and it completely terrified me, then my church did a showing of the movies and I was even more terrified. I have PTSD related to balloons flying away thanks to that movie. I spent my entire childhood terrified I was going to hell/going to be tortured forever. Gee, I wonder how I ended up with a panic disorder.
@@DeconstructingDeeJayGee I was also traumatized by this and still suffer from extreme anxiety about life in general and about going to hell. Stupid thing to teach kids.
@@D23595 Romans 1:22-32 King James Version 22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, 23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. Matthew 24:11-13 ESV And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. Matthew 7:21 ESV “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. James 2:19 19 Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble See I can play this game too
@@D23595'd rather be left behind than get raptured up to a place where I'd have to spend eternity with people like you. And who knows - the people that are left behind might just create a better world when the Christians are gone, as a major source of the world's problems would have disappeared in an instant.
Your video and these comments make me feel so validated. I read these books and the adult version as a kid and I was absolutely terrified of the rapture, to the point where I started survival hoarding. I would store non-perishable food, whatever cash I could get for birthday and Xmas, and I even wrote down my parent’s credit card numbers and kept them in a lockbox. So glad I don’t have to live in fear anymore, but I’m really sad that I lost a large portion of my childhood. I really wish I could give little me a hug.
The whole concept of the Rapture completely creeps me out!!! And yeah, it seems very weird to me. My mother was nominally a Christian but my dad was a Humanist/Agnostic/ Atheist and my bother and I were raised with basically no religion. I raised my own children as mostly Pagan, but presented many beliefs and cultures to them (one is definitely Pagan, and the other two are basically secular). WOW!!! There's some VERY revisionist history!!! Is "the worst president in the history of America" supposed to be Jimmy Carter??? He's one of the most honest and true Christians I've ever seen!!! Okay, this book is CRAZY!!! Thanks for sharing!
You unlocked such a repressed memory for me. I also read these books around the same time you did. I also thought they were predictive of future events. I didn’t know about the author, but honestly this all makes SO much sense now.
I was very very obsessed with these when I was younger. When you said you wholeheartedly believed this was the picture of what would happen, I felt that. My mom and I used to talk about it all of the time. I picked them up because I tried to read revelations when I was a kid and was confused and my mom was reading the adult Left Behind series so I figured I could read the kids one (and since there were 40 books and my elementary school had them for AR points, I was BANKING on those AR points). I read them when I was 8-10 years old (it took me a few years to find the last ten books). I reread them at least three times. I cannot BELIEVE how much my perception of God was led by those books, it's insane! ALSO, I'm pretty sure Vicki challenged her dad to tears trying to get him to abuse her again because she would rather be abused than have a religious family. I vividly remember that for some reason.
As a a Christian who was not raised in a toxic Fundie environment celebrating Halloween was never an issue. The Idea of an Autumn tree as a costume is beautiful!
I read an Afrikaans translation, or rip-off I don't remember, as a kid. My Afrikaans reading comprehension had degraded a lot at that point (thanks homeschooling!) so I didn't retain much of it thankfully. But I remember writing a lot my own "left behind" type stories as a kid and thinking about the economic/political implications of the rapture.
I read the adult version at twelve. That book sent me in a downward spiral (I was already a very anxious child). To this day, it still triggers me. The fact that my church encouraged this book because I said I liked to read is honestly sickening.
My family all read the adult Left Behind books when I was growing up. I remember reading the penultimate book and being annoyed that it was a massive tome that took place over three days, and the final book hadn't come out yet. I never read it. These books definitely contributed to the notion that we were a) special, and b) persecuted. The books were where I first heard of the term "proselytizing," oddly enough. The books that were seen more as "Christian horror" in our household were Frank Peretti's "This Present Darkness" and "Piercing the Darkness." They're a real trip, man. I was obsessed with them.
I LOVED "This Present Darkness", but "Piercing the Darkness" was a lot, even for my fundie self. Lol. I read them in later elementary school. I recently tried to reread "This Present Darkness", to see what it was like post-deconstruction, but got too annoyed by the prose in the intro and haven't tried again since. 😅
Ah yes, the book series that still haunts me and has always made me terrified of the rapture, and death in general. Thank you for making this series. It's so cathartic to my inner baby fundie self that was dying for comfort and peace, but instead I got generalized anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder.
Thanks for covering this topic! These books terrified me into being a "devout" Christian as tween/teen. My family didn't even go to an Evangelical church at the time (my parents didn't become born again until I was in the process of deconverting in my 20s), but the authors' insistence that the events could plausibly come to pass was enough to convince my trusting mind. I'm in my 30s now, have been an Atheist for over a decade, and I'm still angry at the authors for deliberately trying to traumatize children.
I read about half of the adult series as a YA but gave up on it midway through. Chloe became such an awful anti feminist character whose purpose was to have a baby... when the world was ending... One of many reasons I abandoned it.
i'm an atheist. one day hubby decided to play a trick on me. he "disppeared" and i didn't know where he was. in the bedroom i saw a stack of his clothing. shoes with the socks still inside under pants and underwear, a shirt the pants and a hat on the top. i looked at the dogs and said, "well, i guess daddy got raptured" and laughed.
I remember when the "Left Behind" series came out. I didn't know there was a kids series too. I was raised in a reformed theological background, and an amillennialist tradition, so our pastors encouraged us to read it critically, and treat it as dispensationalist propaganda. I vaguely remember reading the first couple of books. It was apparent they were written for an audience that was predisposed to a very specific world view.
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First off, THANK YOU for making this video. I feel so heard. I am seriously considering sending this to my parents with some sort of message like "Yeah that school you sent me to? This is what they were teaching me."
4:05 You basically described how we viewed these books at my Christian school, which was founded by Tim LaHaye. While I have only read one of them cover to cover (for a book report at school, not even sure I "really read" it), they were a constant presence in our Bible lessons and classes. It was a big deal for one of our top students to start reading the "adult" Left Behind series (basically just the main series). During my sophomore and junior years of high school, we had several discussions about the rapture, which my teachers heavily implied was due to happen before our class either graduated high school or finished college. I had started questioning my faith around that time, but they were close to scaring me back into it.
I've seen those clips of Tim LaHaye and watched them again recently, on top of pushing an obvious Christian nationalist message, he's also completely full of BS. The U.S., while obviously the result of an imperfect and even white supremacist foundation, was NOT founded on the Christian religion. Christian nationalists refuse to really understand the First Amendment.
Edit 1: I actually only recall LaHaye speaking to our school once, sometime in high school and he SUCKED as a speaker. He would jump from talking point to talking point without much cohesion. I remember he referred to public schools as "Satan Schools."
Edit 2: LaHaye was a massive conspiracy theorist and basically believed the ACLU, the NAACP, and NOW (groups that support, civil liberties, civil rights, and women's rights) were out to destroy Christians.
Edit 3: In the main series, there's blatant homophobia. The anti-Christ is said to have to fathers, who had their seed genetically engineered to fuse with the mother's egg. Weird stuff, I know. Also one of the "heroes" of the book blackmails a female coworker who's in a relationship with another women. HOW HEROIC!
Thank you for sharing!!
@@ExFundieDiaries My pleasure!
That last one is insane. It’s actually not that far away from us being able to do such a thing. lol But that is not in the bible so 🤷🏼 its not true i guess.
No man knows when the end will happen it is known only to God, which is what the Bible says. He's trying to give brain washed by satan people like you a second chance because he loves you. Those of us who believe and are waiting for him, wanting him to come NOW and some feel like you will never learn. But one day, Jesus will decide we've suffered enough, and you are still blinded by satan, so he will raise the dead in the Lord and that us in the world are ready. Then, though it will hurt Jesus and true believers who are praying for you and love you he will take us all home to a much better place than earth.
I took a “Bible as Lit” class in college. The professor referenced Left Behind one day, and an older Jewish woman auditing the class didn’t know what the Rapture was. He joked, “That’s when all the fundamentalists think Jesus will come take them away so they’re all going to disappear.” Without missing a beat, this lady replied, “Oh, well, that doesn’t sound so bad.” 💀
To be honest, many people would welcome the disappearance of the most annoying Christians.
Ironically these are the same people who think Harry Potter is evil.
queen
@@communistsharks6889 hahaha yes I agree :)
Ahahahahaaaaaaa I wish I was in this class just for that moment.
I'm a principal in a large Elementary Middle School. I was speaking to our 3rd and 4th-grade students about the upcoming Halloween parade. One of the 3rd grade students covered his ears and ran out of the cafeteria screaming. He was terrified because I was doing the devil's work and that we are all going to hell. ..... Poor Kid
I hope that kid will be ok
Waiting to hear kids parent to complain
I hope being in a non-religious school setting can help set that straight. ❤❤❤
@@laurenconrad1799 betting money that he’s gonna get homeschooled after the ‘evil Halloween’ got brought up.
@@BlueBeluga Or that parents complained to the school board that the child's rights had even violated and asking for the principal's dismissal.
With books like this- we didn’t need to celebrate Halloween, we basically lived a warped version of it. Those books were floating around church and youth group and I already knew I wasn’t going to read them- I already had crippling “left behind” anxiety. This was the first time I identified a trigger and respected myself enough to say no. You are the cutest autumn tree I have ever seen. I love that you were able to keep a tradition from that part of your life and it’s a fairly benign and cute one at that.
I read the Left Behind books in high school and it did nothing to calm me. It was terrifying
@@TheFlowerGirl13 if right or wrong we know what happens next lol
@@TheFlowerGirl13 Never affected me like that. I was so engrossed in a story based on a metaphoric tale from the Bible that will never actually happen. Besides, I was more invested in the characters than the biblical events.
This was my first religious trauma. My parents are both paranoid about the "end times". Imagine me, 5 years old, watching the twin towers fall, and my dad telling us, "It's starting." Training us to defend our faith in the face of a genocide that would happen before I could be an adult.
Well here we are now
Are you an Exvangelical?
@@johnvinals7423 not a term i really use. I'm not a Christian anymore though, just an atheist
I didn't hear all about that until I was 21 and even then it scared me. Imagine how much worse it would be for a child. Though I was brought up on science fiction but at least a part of me realised that it was just fiction though some of it has become true.
Yup everyday it end times. Im athiest n cant stand it
@@bmoe4609 I went to a school where there was religious education and morning worship before classes and I had never come across this before I was in my twenties. It isn't talked about in more liberal and mainline churches and faith schools. Plus they certainly don't believe in indoctrinating children with this.
As you read the section about Vickie, I suddenly became aware of a weird trend in Christian fiction. I couldn't come up a single example of this if you asked, but the phrase "she was 14, but looked 18" jumped out at me. I KNOW I've read almost that exact sentence "she was ___, but looked 18" in multiple other examples of Christian fiction. I'm not sure what to make of that, but it's kind of creepy.
I thought so too. Wtf? Why would someone write that about a kid? Is it throwing shade at her dressing up and using make up? Is it a weird sexual thing?
I think we all know what to make of it, these are the ppl pushing to make it legal for adults to marry 12 yr olds
I could be wrong, but i noticed that in alot of teen, tween books that were secular. I think it just plays on young people's desire to look or feel older. I know when I was in middle school, someone thinking I looked older was the absolute biggest compliment.
People used to whisper about my mom being "unevenly yoked," like they were whispering about her having cancer.
I'm guessing your mom was really cool then?
I know exactly what you mean. That weird way they would talk to or about people they thought were somehow below them, not religious enough or whatever. They used to talk to me like I was a member of AA who had been gone a few sessions.
Show up with your dirt bike girlfriend Linda.
That'll get em" talking!!!
Omigosh I was just explaining this same thing to my husband the other day. He had no idea what “unequally yoked” meant. He said it sounded cultish when I explained it.
My apologies if I sound ignorant, but what does 'unevenly yoked' mean? English is not my first language and I have never heard of it before.
Omg. I’m still traumatized from this. I used to wake up searching for me younger siblings who I thought hadn’t yet reached “the age of accountability” to make sure I hadn’t been left behind.
Man, I thought I was the only one who did this! I felt so shameful too, like why was I the only one concerned I wasn't a true believer.
I feel so validated reading all these comments. To this day, even though I’m an atheist, if I leave the house and don’t see any cars for a few minutes a small part of me panics thinking I’ve been ✨left behind✨
I still panic when I wake up and don't see my husband. He's not even Christian and I end up thinking he's been taken 😅 dang ol trauma brain
Same
@@oddds I think the three of you seriously need help!!
Does anyone else watching this video love it when Elly is asking us questions like “Do you think the drunk man will be left behind?” as if we’re kids at storytime? I think her questions and tone brilliantly matches the tone in which Tim LaHay wrote the books (so patronizing to the reader!)
I just realized something: if Judd hadn't been a runaway and stolen his dad's identity, there would be no way for him or any of the other kids to provide for themselves in this nightmare scenario. So, how can this book shame Judd for what he did when it actually does nothing but objective good in this situation?
I guess because the kids should have known better and be raptured in the first place
Oh I was absolutely TERRIFIED of these books. Took them as fact, too. I fully believed that this was gonna happen, that my parents would disappear and I’d be left alone. Anytime my mom wouldn’t pick up the phone, anytime my parents went somewhere and didn’t tell me or I just couldn’t find them, my first thought was that they were raptured. I remember one specific night when my parents were out late. I didn’t know where they were and they weren’t picking up the phone, so naturally I curled up on the floor, cried and was absolutely convinced that I was left here all alone for not being a good enough Christian. My metric for not being a good Christian? That I liked Doctor Who.
Ironically, the Rapture isn't an actual event in the Bible, just crafted by Westernized Christians based on verses from 1 Thessalonians.
I started reading these as a kid, but eventually the book count became astronomical, and even my younger-teen self recognized the whole thing as a big cash grab. It was actually ridiculous how little plot development happened in each book.
My mom almost didn't let me read them just because of the way Vicki's attire was described. Either her shirt or her pants were too short, I don't even remember now. XD At any rate, that was before her conversion, to emphasize how rebellious and worldly she was, but it was almost enough for my mom to forbid the whole series.
I distinctly remember that one of the descriptors of Vicki's "sinfulness" was the fact that she styled her hair differently every day. That little thorn buried itself in my child brain and threw me for such a loop, because I fully believed that I was doing something wrong by choosing to put my hair up every so often.
Not-so-fun fun fact: I read this entire book series not once but twice. Mainly because it was one of the few fiction books my parents approved of. I will say I wasn't taught it would happen exactly like the book but I was taught that the Rapture and the end times were going to happen. I personally managed to view the books not seriously and mainly read them as thriller type books. Looking back from the parts I remember, there was some WILD stuff in there. Especially the guillotine parts.
Now calling the "Left Behind"books is an insult to bad Sci Fi!!
To really be Bad Sci Fi you need Mike Nelson;Crooooowwww and Tom Servo!!
Or a bunch of Japanese citizens screaming "OH LOOK!!IT'S GODZILLA!!RUN!!" with very badly dubbed English.
I always thought "The Rapture" was what "Sister Mary Elephant" did to your knuckles if you misbehaved in Catechism!!
MAAAAAN THE GUILLOTINE PARTS LMAO
I remember them so clearly, and I've read that when I was 13. I don't think I should've, to be quite honest. The thing I remember the most was the passive homophobia in these books, as well as how there were two characters who were, respectively, ex-Muslim and ex-Jewish that especially rubbed me the wrong way all around 🙃
@@herlocksholmes-uv5qw Speaking of bad acting I saw today that Steve "Just as dooshy as my brother Alec"Baldwin"s daughter Hayley Beiber showed up at some society function wearing a sheer black that showed her black bras and panties!!
Now the ironic thing is that Steven Baldwin's supposed to be this "family values/all that violence in movies and sex and violence on TV!!Uugghh!!"
Big time Trump sycophant and good fundavangelical!!!
love the wreath, love the sarcasm, love watching you get more comfortable in front of the camera! I hope you have a wonderful halloween with lots of sacrilegious fun.
I still have nightmares about waking up abandoned by my mom who was taken in the rapture... insane
Word for word, your experience with Fundamentalism was mine. I have Depression and Anxiety and my anxiety was exacerbated by those who told me about the Rapture and burning in Hell.
It scared me until I was an adult and realized that if a spiritual path has to scare you into joining then in my opinion it wasn't worth having. Because if all you have is fear, you leave out the joy of living on this Earth and every day living.
I haven't started yet but I'm so happy you are covering this. This series gave me horrific nightmares, anxiety, etc as a kid. "What if you aren't a REAL Christian?"
Thank you for speaking out against people who look down on those who live in trailer parks. I grew up in a trailer park and when I heard the term "trailer trash" I was ashamed.
Please tell me that you're one of those people who overcame growing up in such an environment, and are now living a much better life with a great job and nice home? You'd be surprised how many successful people there are who started out their lives growing up in such conditions.
These were literally our bedtime stories growing up, and now my parents wonder why I’m a horror enthusiast! No dad, it’s not the devil, I just crave the adrenaline
Right?! I was also introduced to these books at a young age. Between these books and chick tracts I was thoroughly traumatized. I also now love horror. By far my favorite genre. I never thought about the fact that there may be a correlation.
Adrenaline is a gateway drug to dopamine
I LOVED these books when I was in elementary school! Wild that I was allowed to read these that young, but I remember reading these in 5th grade! And my friends laughed at me because the cover made them look like bad sci-fi. Which at the time I got so offended by because I thought these books were so good and godly lol. Now, I totally agree that they both look like and ARE bad sci-fi lol
My husband and I were casual Christians ( church on holidays) . We've always been agnostic. My stepmother had my son read the series one summer he visited without me. Funnily enough, he told me those books mixed with how fanatical his grandmother was helped his journey out of Christianity.
I could see it. The idea of the rapture was so utterly silly and ridiculous to me that I couldn't help questioning it. And... people putting so much emphasis on it kind of put me off. Took me a while to realize that the reason why was that most seemed to WANT the world to end.
@@wordforger Yes. I think that was almost harder to grasp. The idea of Armageddon never sounded good to me and the fact that anyone would WANT all of those terrible things for other people sounded downright sadistic, not Godly.
@@wordforger Rapture isn't even a Biblical event. It was invented in Western Christianity based off some of the verse from 1 Thessalonians. Never have to fear it happening that way.
A few small corrections:
14:54 - Judd scoffed at his little brother (not sister)
15:58 - Vicki’s dad crying when she challenges him could still be abusive (just in a different way)
35:09 - The “age of accountability” is 8 (not 7)
In the Baptist church school that I attended in the early 70's it was 6
I was taught 12 bc that’s when Jesus taught in the temple.
I was taught it was 10. No idea why.
For a hot second I didn’t realize this comment was from Ex-fundie and thought someone just passive aggressively let corrections with no commentary as a comment and thought damn that’s weird and mean lol
Wait, there is a specific age of accountability? I thought it was just a vague time that was specific to the child.
Man, even when a fundie I didn't agree to AOA. If it was real, then it made it a moral imperative to kill your children. It made no sense to have a system like that. I mean, if heaven is forever and your child- who you love- might not go there if they get too old... then the choice would be obvious. And in fairness, children have died because of this thinking...
I read a bunch of the adult version when I was in high school. Even then, it was so over the top, and u stopped reading simply because it went on for so long
Lol I read ALL of them and was obsessed with Rapture doctrine for years. Then I started reading other theologians take on the rapture and realized how sensationalist the books were and what complete grifters the authors are.
Yep.The same filks who'll scream bloody murder about "R"rated movies somehow don't seem to mind showing kids these "crap on a cracker/Will Wheaton sausage fest" movies!!!
@@johnpatterson4816 Will Wheaton sausage fest? Is he in those movies?
@@hannahgast1284 Of course not!!I heard it on"Big Bang Theory".
I was raised without religion, but I encountered these books at a half-price store when I was around middle-school age. I didn't know about the rapture, so I read the whole series thinking this was just a scary 'what if' scenario the author came up with! I remember enjoying them in my naivete.
I saw these on my friend's coffee table when I was a kid. I asked about them and she was legit upset. She said she hated the books, and they made her sick, but her parents made her read them so she'd "get" why she had to "be a good Christian".
How this isn't considered child abuse is beyond me.
The fear that my whole family would get raptured except for me was major fear for me up until adulthood.
I really appreciate you talking about this stuff in a safe and healing way. Thank you so much for helping others like me feel normal humans with normal reactions.
i never read the teens series, but i did read the adult ones,, i’ll never forget how absolutely wild they get towards the later books
Same here. I never really took much interest in the kid's series because, along with the silly prequel, they were obviously a money-grab by the authors. The storyline is so derivative and boring. Ironically, the "Bible-toting" tribulation prophet-types (Tsion and Bruce) are the most boring characters!
I used to be terrified at the thought of living forever and ever in heaven without any end. My young mind simply could not comprehend eternity. Atheism has brought so much peace to my life. Love your videos
Well an eternity in hell is your future, until the lake of fire anyway.
I didn’t read this series until after becoming an atheist and it was a hilarious read. I don’t think I was capable of making it all the way through. As a Black woman it was, let’s say hard to swallow all of the sanctimonious racism and sexism. But what I was able to read was funny
This was written by two old Christian white men, born before the civil rights if I may add, who probably only had a basic knowledge of the Black culture.
I love your videos about fundie books!
Once I went to a coworker's funeral and the guy that did the service spent a good 25 minutes talking about how he used to wake up his 5 year old son several times in the night to make sure that he hadn't been raptured without him. He used the entire service to try and convert everyone that attended
Well, being in an "unequally yoked" family causes alot of screaming matches in the middle of the night about how my mom is going to hell, and she's making us go to hell. Also, some things kids really shouldn't know about to prevent us from getting beaten.
❤ That sounds so hard.
That's so stupid, the Bible literally says the wife will be saved by the faith of her husband. 1 Corinthians 7:12-16
But that being said, your dad is an asshole and that's a way bigger problem.
This is the christian doctrine that upsets me the most. My childhood was spent in miserable daily fear from this idea. Thanks for talking about this.
When I was in Bible quizzing and went to tournaments out of state, people from the congregation of the church we were competing at would host us in the evenings. For one tournament, my team stayed in a house that had the Left Behind books prominently displayed . And like the dumb asses they were (I wasn't present) they started discussing the books and how they were boring and not actually well written. At some point, it clicked for them that their host's last name was LaHaye and he was the son of one of the authors. I think they felt simultaneously stupid, but also a bit proud for badmouthing the books to the author's son. I think it could have only been made better if it was Tim LaHaye himself.
Good one!!Now I'm a Christian but I'm not a Fundavangelical!!
And "Secular Humanists" don't bother me at all.
If someone says "I'm a Secular Humanist" I'm like "Is that anything like rhe Freemasons??I had an uncle and great uncle who belonged to the Masons.".
Formal religion wise I'm Southern Baptist but not the Baptist Church of Falwell;LaHaye and Phelps!!
Now regarding those really stinking bad "Left Behind" movies.
Kirk Cameron against Satan??Satan would bend him over and make him blow his greasy red wang!!Wang!!!
Think about it!! Up in Heaven God's got John Wayne;Charles Bronson;Charlton Heston;Steve McQueen and Kirk Douglas to name a few!!
Guys who could take on the Ann T.Christ with one hand tied behind their backs!!
You really think that the Anti Christ's gonna be scared of "Mike Seaver"from "Groaning Pains"??!!
He'd make him his "prison b!tch BFT!!".
Ooh I did quizzing too!! 😂
So glad LaHaye, along with Falwell, can no longer wield their noxious influence over the world. I hope a lot of these Moral Majority hold overs are also "called up to the Lord" in short order. They have shown time and again their capacity for cruelty and callousness toward anybody who isn't like them and their unwillingness to moderate.
I read all the kids and adult version of those books. I finally threw them all away a few months ago because I could never donate something that was so harmful to me, and I couldn't stand having them in my house after deconstructing.
Also: love how La Haye commented that Europe was “socialist.” $50 says that, just like all Christian nationalists, the instant someone with social democratic leanings were to say they want the US to be more like Norway or some other soc dem nation, all of a sudden he’d be like “BUT NORWAY IS CAPITALIST!” They do that Every. Single. Time.
exactly! if Norway is so capitalist and they're so supportive of capitalism, then why can't we in the US have the social programs that exist in Norway? it makes fully no sense.
I know several people like that lol.I met this one girl a few months ago that was like
"Those places like Canada,Norway and Denmark will be 3rd world nations in a few years now that they've become socialist like the democrats wanted them to"
After I explained to her that they were capitalist and that neither American political party would stand a chance to be in any other government in the western world ,she couldn't comprehend any of it
‚europe is socialist‘ is literally one of these things americans will say where you can immediately assume they are a formerly homeschooled fundamentalist with no clue about actual economics and an unhealthy sense of nationalism. like, his whole rant about ‚taking things away from the people who have something‘… do you know how taxes work? are you aware that „socialism“ is actually what makes european healthcare affordable? no, because you never had an economics lesson in your life and consider the US spiritually and morally superior to everywhere else for no reason at all.
It's been over a decade, and I still feel that overwhelming sense of dread when the rapture is talked about.
I used to always be afraid of walking home from school and finding everyone gone.
Truth be told, I don't think I'll ever be able to forgive the people who drilled that bullshit and trauma into my brain, and I'm ok with that.
When I was a teen some people convinced me and some friends to go to their "community center" where they had a lot of fun activities. As soon as we got there they showed us a left behind type of movie. My family members are secular Jews. I had very little experience with what Christians believed and never met an Evangelical Christian before. Thankfully there's no saving me.
The rapture is evangelical. I was in my 20s when I found out what the rapture was.
I'm afraid of Veloci-Raptures. That's where velociraptors suddenly appear.
Really? I’m scared of Rapptures. That’s where a bunch of rappers suddenly appear
@@onelovelylilidiot4959 Those dinosaurs are hungry.
They had (and I think still have) the entire series in my local public library. I didn’t grow up in an insanely religious family, we went to church on Easter and for a Christmas service where there was a dinner afterwards but that’s about it. The way my mom talked about Christianity was not out of a place of fear (In fact she HATED when anyone spread the “of if you don’t do this this and this, you’re going to hell) and she actively endorses the idea of evolution happening through creationism and the idea that our day and God’s day are two entirely different things. Just about every fundamentalist group would look at my mom and say she’s a heathen. I actually read a couple of these books and they gave me nagging fear in the back of my mind of “oh, i can’t find this person. DID THE RAPTURE HAPPEN????” For me, because the way I was raised, I don’t strongly fear the premise of this book besides occasional intrusive thought because as long as i’m being a good person for the sake of being a good person, I have nothing to worry about. But, for any kid who grew up with even the tiniest bit of fear of the rapture, this series would be traumatizing.
I'm glad you included the clip of Tim LaHaye because it provides a lot of context but oof, I had to take a couple breaks to get through it because it just pissed me off. He really said that Jimmy Carter was the worst president in the history of America?!? Apparently this man hadn't paid any attention to American history if he truly believed that. He wasn't great but he certainly wasn't the worst, he probably falls somewhere in the middle. Jimmy Carter is a wonderful human being though.
I'd like to think that he angered the fundies and evangelicals because he was more Christ-like than all of them, and they knew and were threatened by it.
The original books came out when I was in my twenties. I was a believer and a huge bookworm, but I avoided reading them because I just didn't want to think about The Rapture. Then someone who had read them told me they were really badly written, so I wrote them off in my mind. Never knew they did a kids version.
I remember being told about a "prank" pulled at a Bible College of some sort. Apparently one student had a habit of oversleeping, so one morning everybody else got up early and hid, then they played trumpets over the loudspeakers...
Never heard the end of the anecdote.
Former Christian school kid here. My 6th grade teacher read those books aloud every afternoon. A few months in I started having nightmares and let slip to my mom how they happened thanks to those books. A week later my teacher came to me and asked why I wanted her to stop (she mad my mom were talking). However I relented since a lot of other kids in my grade were already into the series and I didn’t want to ruin it for them. The nightmares didn’t stop but I grew accustomed to tuning out the reading…at least until the biblically accurate revelations locusts were introduced. That was a point where I regret keeping my mouth shut.
“I’m afraid he’s gone off naked” is still something I quote all the time 😂
Mother of toddlers?
@@mgold7503 no but if I ever have kids I will definitely use that 😂
I still think "I am not pout" all the time, though I think that's actually from the adult series
Tim LaHaye also wrote a sex and marriage book, "The Act of Marriage." A friend gave it to me and my spouse as a joke. Most of the basic anatomy stuff was correct as far as I recall, but there was a bit in there about how he recommended that every family should have at least 4-5 children, followed by his suggestion that, to save money, you should invest in a single, good-quality condom and wash and reuse it if you were needing to use birth control for a while.
He *WHAT*
is... is he mixing up condoms with caps? I'm pretty sure that's the only physical contraceptive you can safely reuse, but I doubt it's cheaper considering you need to see a medical professional to get fitted for one (idk how expensive this would be in the us - I'm somewhere with socialised healthcare). and you can't even use them for several months after giving birth, if ever again, bc of how hard infant expulsion is on that whole region of the body.
I'd question why he didn't suggest penny pinching by picking up free condoms from places like planned parenthood but... well. I think I can guess why that idea didn't make it into the book.
Clearly he was unaware of the new state of the art methods to prevent unwanted pregnancies, but seriously.....EWWWWWWWW!!! Reusing a condom? That's like saying "Let's save money on diapers by reusing one for a whole month on our baby."
@Ex-Fundie Diaries I am 46. But until I finally deconverted. I was terrified of the rapture and end times. I realize now I was having panic attacks and anxiety 24/7. HOW EVIL TO PUT A KID THROUGH THAT. Also my pastors and teachers talked about it constantly. I was told in 1990 I would never make it to 18 bc Jesus would come back. Disgusting!! I'm released from those terrors and thankful I was older when those nonsense books were written.
Tim LaHaye is not only an evil cult leader, he's proving Anton LaVey right.
Anton LaVey the first Satanist, believe that God is a tyrannical monster.
According to the Bible, no one is going to know when it is going to happen. So, anyone who tries to present a prediction is in essence a false prophet.
I loved these books when I was a kid, I remember reading the "grown up" ones in 6th grade during class at my baptist school. My teacher let it slide usually. We had a movie night at church to watch the Kirk Cameron Left Behind when it came out.
I think one of the reasons I loved them so much at the time was because they were the closest thing to my true genre loves I had read: fantasy/sci-fi.
I used to get so panicky when I was left at home alone because I would be terrified that the rapture had happened and I wasn't good enough and so I was going to suffer endlessly for 7 years and maybe even then still go to hell.
I didn't read the books but I saw the movies, and I have vivid childhood memories of times when I'd break down sobbing in terror at the thought that my family would all be raptured but I'd be left behind especially because one of the characters left behind in the film was a pastor! Adults may understand duplicity in their spiritual leaders, but children are taught to think of pastors and priests as prophets and representives of god, so the idea that someone so righteous might not be good enough? Horrifying.
P.S. your Halloween look is adorable!
And no good God would ever make you feel bad about yourself. Unless you truthfully did wrong on purpose because you knew it hurt someone else or made them lose something.
As a dyslexic, I was ashamed I didn't read the bible daily, but more ashamed I couldn't get through a single Left Behind: The Kids book.
This is the kinda thing that makes me look back on my life growing up in the evangelical church and just shake my head. Stepping outside of the church makes all these things so freakin creepy and weird. I can’t believe i grew up with all of this. I’m so happy to be outside of that with my own spirituality and relaxed relationship with God not the judgement and self righteousness rampant in the church.
Thank you so much for making these videos!! It's crazy to me reading through these comments because I thought I was the only one traumatized by these books and being taught the rapture was a real event that could happen at any time. I used to wake up in the middle of the night when I was little and check all my sisters' beds to make sure I had not been left behind. I used to bribe them to sleep with me so I didn't have to be alone.
I still panic to this day, now in my 30s when I think I've lost my son, and have to remind myself that the rapture was just a story that I no longer believe. That's how strongly is was ingrained in my head. I'm an atheist now, but I still feel that panic from time to time. 😔
I'm so sorry I'm not the only one traumatized by this fear mongering.
I never read the kids books, but I read all the adult books , as a Catholic! I was a pretty young adult/older teen when I read them and they were very scary and intense. I can’t imagine a young kid reading these.
I never knew there were kids books. I listened to the adult books on cds from the library when I was like 10-12.
Memo to Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins:
Guess who said to take from the haves and give to the have nots:
Give you a hint.You worship him or claim you do.
That's none other than Jesus Christ your Lord and Saviour!!
And while you and Jerry Falwell condemn former President Carter he's a helluva lot more Christian than you blowholes ever will be!!
He's worked with Habitat For Humanity building houses for the less fortunate and his Carter Foundation helps cure diseases in third world countries and he believed that Bible says "Blessed Are The Peacemakers" when he brokered a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt.
Hate to tell you this but the Scriptures do not say "Blessed Are The Warmongerers".
Point to ponder,Tim LaHaye says "I joined the Air Force in WW2" yet he was very mum regarding "Reverend"*(*And I Use The Term Loosely)Fred Phelps and his demented band of demons protesting at the funerals of fallen servicemen and women as well as veterans!!
Oh Well,when his time comes one can only hope that he'll be unpleasantly surprised when he winds up in Hell with Jerry Falwell;Fred Phelps and " The Gypper" himself Ronnie Raygun!Ray gun!!
And I'm sure that Matthew Sheppard's gonna recreate the "SQUEAL LIKE A PIG!!!!"scene from "Deliverance" WITH NO VASELINE(tm)!!!!
Goodness,I remember these books. My friend and her family were obsessed by The Rapture. They all had backpacks filled with supplies, in the event of the apocalypse.
What crazies
I had friends who's family was exactly like that too, from Tabernacle Baptist School in Greenville SC. I went there my freshman year and became close with a girl there and her family. They had rented a storage shed that they kept cans of food, old sleeping bags, an old army tent, etc.
I didn't understand this. I fully believed when Jesus would come back, I would be caught up in clouds with Jesus and all the other Christians. Wouldn't they be caught up in the clouds with Jesus, too? Why would they need all those things for the rapture?
@@annasalmans5523 Well, it is good to be prepared, even if the "Rapture" is BS.
@@annasalmans5523 I wouldn't recommend using a storage unit for that though. I had $3000 worth of camping and outdoor supplies stolen from the one I rented.
I got a shipping container after that.
Much more secure.
@@robertsandberg2246 That was over 20 years ago in 1999 and the storage they used doesn't exit anymore. I don't know what happened to her family.
I left that church and school and Christianity a long time ago.
i've been waiting for someone to tackle the left behind series!! i remember reading this first book in 6th grade. i borrowed it from my tiny christian school's library and flew through it during a sick day, and it gave me so much anxiety that the end of the world was coming (which was a nightmare, considering i already had anxiety around a lot of other things). i never continued with the series, thankfully, but for a while paranoid thoughts about the rapture would come back to haunt me. i'm just thankful my family was never evangelical, so my fears around the rapture were never echoed.
My parents and these books (and rapture theology stemming from the Left Behind franchise) traumatized me so deeply that sometimes when I wake up on a quiet morning, or if the power is out, my first groggy thought is that I missed the rapture! Even though I don't believe any of that anymore! It really is funny how fundie parents obsessed with the satanic panic thought these ideas and anxieties were ok, but halloween was too scary and evil!
So you fell away. There are only 2 families. The family of God or the family of Satan. Might want to change your family.
@@jamescole3152 what the heck, man?? That's incredibly out of line
@@jamescole3152I choose the family of Satan because I value knowledge, curiosity, freedom of mind, self-respect, and diversity.
God's family values strict obedience, thought control, rigid gender roles, self-hatred, and intolerance of disagreement or doubt. Who'd want to spend an eternity subjected to that? It sounds worse than hell.
I know someone who was “misbehaving”, so her parents changed their clothes and left the clothes they had been wearing sitting out on their spots in the couch and went to the girl’s grandparent’s house down the street to make her think she had been left behind.
Wow, that's f-ed up.
@@jadelinny Indeed.
That's incredibly fucked up, but I like the idea that you aren't allowed to bring your clothes to heaven lol
This is off topic but whenever you read it reminds me of one of my elementary school teachers and it's really comforting. You just give off gentle and caring teacher vibes
Thank you, what a kind compliment! ☺️
Dude, I read this stuff when I was like 9. I’m 25 & still dream of the end of the world EVERY SINGLE night. It gets old lolz thanks for the vid ❤️
i was always tricked into seeing the left behind movies as a kid when I would visit my grandma. always thought it was so weird&scary but my grandma LOVED them.
Ugh the movies were just awful. The screen adaptation simply didn't do the books justice (I actually kind of liked the first book, particularly because of the conspiracy- theory stuff). Even when I was a fundie I would actually root for on screen Nicolae because the writers did such a bad job of making him a villain
@@agentj3936 i liked the nicholas cage one
I didn't read the kid versions of this series, just the adult ones. I was puzzled as to why the authors produced a kids' series, since the adult version was pretty scary.
Somebody further down the comments nailed it - this was a cash cow, and being able to market to children was just more cha-ching for them.
I love your seasonal costume!
And thank you for another great video.
As a teen, I read the first one of the adult Left Behind series, and wondered why God would want to leave the world in such chaos with the cars crashing and planes falling out of the sky, etc. I'm very glad my parents didn't believe in this specific version of the Rapture, but a lot of people at my church did.
My family: "Why are you so anxious and depressed?!"
Also my family: "Jesus is coming back and will leave everyone here who isn't a perfect Christian to suffer until they inevitably die from war, starvation or disease."
I knew I was gay from a young age, and this *terrified* me. Whenever I'd wake up in the morning and my parents and siblings weren't there, I'd immediately have a panic attack because I'd assume they were raptured and I wasn't because I'm gay.
The left behind books and movie were really the driving force in me becoming an atheist. I got obsessed with the apocalypse after them and that led me down many paths that ultimately led to me leaving the church for good.
You and I had a very similar upbringing. This all isn’t lost on me that these books were also published after 9/11 which a LOT of Christians used as a sign of the end of America and therefore the start of the rapture
As someone who studies public policy- Tim LaHaye is just saying ANYTHING 😭
Earlier than the Left Behind books was the movie “A Thief in the Night.” Same deal: people wake up to find they’ve been left behind in the rapture. My mom took me to a movie theater where there was an alter call after the film. I was still in elementary school. At any rate, the threat of being left behind terrified me, along with cautionary tales of children being taken away from their parents because they were Christian. It wasn’t my parents who drilled it into us, but we attended a very conservative church, and would hear it during Sunday school. It’s not right to subject kids to that kind of abuse.
It's taken me forever to watch any of your videos, because I can tell from the titles that everything will be too close to home! This was irresistible though lol. The first 5 minutes were such validating commentary on how this book functioned in our lives growing up. Thanks for bringing these things to light, and hoping to watch more soon!
I watched the movie adaptation as a really young child and had chronic nightmares about it into my young adult life 😊
Kirk Cameron at his finest!🤣👍
I read Left Behind: The Kids around age 13 as a non religious kid. I was so dense, the books were literally just another series to me like Everworld or Diadem. I was saved by indoctrination by being stupid.
I recently discovered your channel and I’ve been binge watching all your videos! Thank you for making this content, it is comforting to know I wasn’t the only person that experienced fear mongering by rapture teachings.
"Show, don't tell. "
Tim: "You're not the boss of me! "
christian men love to try to convince us that children are temptresses. 14 doesn't look 18! 14 doesn't act 18! i work with 14 year olds and they are so palpably 14! this book is such a self report for being a pdf file
This traumatized me as a child so badly
I can’t tell you how happy I am to have found your channel. We read all the same books, even though my parents were not exactly fundamentalist. I can remember dozens of times when I was a child where I was absolutely convinced the rapture was about to happen and I was going to be left behind. I know my parents didn’t realize the damage this was doing to me. They underestimate the way that adults like this literally create reality for children. And the reality that gets created is horrific, terrifying, and never safe to question, because there’s that deep seed planted that if you do, you might end up tortured for eternity.
That was my fear also. I used to get up every morning run to my parents room to check if they’re raptured. I vowed then never to put my children through that bs. It’s mental abuse
I will rather be left behind and rescue my loved ones during the rapture, than to join a fundie church to be saved.
I’m really enjoying your dramatic reading of the book! The music is great! 😂
I was raised by atheist parents and married an atheist woman. In my late fifties, I decided that I was going to identify as a Christian simply because I felt that I was living as a Christian more than most self-proclaimed Christians were.
I feel very comfortable as a Christian, and when I adopted children who had been born into a Christian household I read to them from the Bible (taking Matthew 25:40 as the primary text for most of the lessons).
As for the Rapture, though . . . the entire concept of the Rapture, the Tribulation and Armageddon have no more basis in Scripture than the Chronicles of Narnia.
Oh god, I remember my mom giving me the first two books from this series when I was about 12 or 13 (maybe younger, idk) because she loved the adult series of books so much she wanted me to be able to experience an, idk, more relatable or age-appropriate version of them. Even as a kid who fully believed in the Rapture and all this stuff, I thought the first book was so boring and full of enough holes to make Swiss cheese jealous. I also thought it was so messed up to focus on all the death and destruction that occurred after the disappearances, because a lot of people left behind would have died so quickly they didn't even have time to learn what they'd "done wrong" to get left behind in the first place. It felt like they were just being doomed to hell instantly while the others who survived got a second chance for no reason other than luck. I don't even think I read the second book, I just quietly put them into my bookcase and ignored them hoping my mom wouldn't notice or take offense that I didn't like them. I reread the first book maybe a year ago purely out of curiosity, and it was so full of stereotypes about atheists and racial minorities it made me feel actually sick. Can't wait to see you dive further into this.
I'm 47 and was a "born again" Christian for around 15yrs (aged 17-32). Then one day I just decided I didn't believe anymore, and have never looked back since. I've never been happier than I have in the last 15 years. Now I'd consider myself agnostic, bordering on atheist.
I read the adult books and it completely terrified me, then my church did a showing of the movies and I was even more terrified. I have PTSD related to balloons flying away thanks to that movie. I spent my entire childhood terrified I was going to hell/going to be tortured forever. Gee, I wonder how I ended up with a panic disorder.
@@D23595 you have to be a bot... You can't be serious. Read the room
@@DeconstructingDeeJayGee I was also traumatized by this and still suffer from extreme anxiety about life in general and about going to hell. Stupid thing to teach kids.
@@D23595 oh honey, I have spent decades studying eschatology, do not cite the dark magic to me, I was there when it was written.
@@D23595 Romans 1:22-32
King James Version
22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
Matthew 24:11-13 ESV
And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.
Matthew 7:21 ESV
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.
James 2:19
19 Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble
See I can play this game too
@@D23595'd rather be left behind than get raptured up to a place where I'd have to spend eternity with people like you.
And who knows - the people that are left behind might just create a better world when the Christians are gone, as a major source of the world's problems would have disappeared in an instant.
Your video and these comments make me feel so validated. I read these books and the adult version as a kid and I was absolutely terrified of the rapture, to the point where I started survival hoarding. I would store non-perishable food, whatever cash I could get for birthday and Xmas, and I even wrote down my parent’s credit card numbers and kept them in a lockbox. So glad I don’t have to live in fear anymore, but I’m really sad that I lost a large portion of my childhood. I really wish I could give little me a hug.
The whole concept of the Rapture completely creeps me out!!! And yeah, it seems very weird to me. My mother was nominally a Christian but my dad was a Humanist/Agnostic/ Atheist and my bother and I were raised with basically no religion. I raised my own children as mostly Pagan, but presented many beliefs and cultures to them (one is definitely Pagan, and the other two are basically secular). WOW!!! There's some VERY revisionist history!!! Is "the worst president in the history of America" supposed to be Jimmy Carter??? He's one of the most honest and true Christians I've ever seen!!! Okay, this book is CRAZY!!! Thanks for sharing!
You unlocked such a repressed memory for me. I also read these books around the same time you did. I also thought they were predictive of future events. I didn’t know about the author, but honestly this all makes SO much sense now.
At least the author's dead now.
I was very very obsessed with these when I was younger. When you said you wholeheartedly believed this was the picture of what would happen, I felt that. My mom and I used to talk about it all of the time. I picked them up because I tried to read revelations when I was a kid and was confused and my mom was reading the adult Left Behind series so I figured I could read the kids one (and since there were 40 books and my elementary school had them for AR points, I was BANKING on those AR points). I read them when I was 8-10 years old (it took me a few years to find the last ten books). I reread them at least three times. I cannot BELIEVE how much my perception of God was led by those books, it's insane! ALSO, I'm pretty sure Vicki challenged her dad to tears trying to get him to abuse her again because she would rather be abused than have a religious family. I vividly remember that for some reason.
As a a Christian who was not raised in a toxic Fundie environment celebrating Halloween was never an issue. The Idea of an Autumn tree as a costume is beautiful!
Halloween is an issue to fundies because they hate Wiccans.
I read an Afrikaans translation, or rip-off I don't remember, as a kid. My Afrikaans reading comprehension had degraded a lot at that point (thanks homeschooling!) so I didn't retain much of it thankfully. But I remember writing a lot my own "left behind" type stories as a kid and thinking about the economic/political implications of the rapture.
I am so sorry that you went through this.
You are a majestic autumn tree.
I spent a lot of time in awe of the kid who had the nerve to steal his dad's credit card, get cash, and just GET ON A PLANE
Omg!! I’m ready!! I was obsessed with these!
@@D23595 i’m waking up to ash and dust i wipe my ass and i slap my nuts
I used to say the whole "Christianity is not a religion" bit... I had buried that one...
I did too 😬
I read the adult version at twelve. That book sent me in a downward spiral (I was already a very anxious child). To this day, it still triggers me. The fact that my church encouraged this book because I said I liked to read is honestly sickening.
My family all read the adult Left Behind books when I was growing up. I remember reading the penultimate book and being annoyed that it was a massive tome that took place over three days, and the final book hadn't come out yet. I never read it.
These books definitely contributed to the notion that we were a) special, and b) persecuted. The books were where I first heard of the term "proselytizing," oddly enough. The books that were seen more as "Christian horror" in our household were Frank Peretti's "This Present Darkness" and "Piercing the Darkness." They're a real trip, man. I was obsessed with them.
I LOVED "This Present Darkness", but "Piercing the Darkness" was a lot, even for my fundie self. Lol. I read them in later elementary school.
I recently tried to reread "This Present Darkness", to see what it was like post-deconstruction, but got too annoyed by the prose in the intro and haven't tried again since. 😅
@@jadelinny Those books are a big reason why it took me so long to be able to meditate! "Clearing your mind" means a demon can get on in there! JFC
@@treeshanklondon 🤣
Ah yes, the book series that still haunts me and has always made me terrified of the rapture, and death in general. Thank you for making this series. It's so cathartic to my inner baby fundie self that was dying for comfort and peace, but instead I got generalized anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder.
These books and movies have probably been the most traumatic of all the stuff I watched as a child.. and it still messes with me now
Thanks for covering this topic! These books terrified me into being a "devout" Christian as tween/teen. My family didn't even go to an Evangelical church at the time (my parents didn't become born again until I was in the process of deconverting in my 20s), but the authors' insistence that the events could plausibly come to pass was enough to convince my trusting mind. I'm in my 30s now, have been an Atheist for over a decade, and I'm still angry at the authors for deliberately trying to traumatize children.
I read about half of the adult series as a YA but gave up on it midway through. Chloe became such an awful anti feminist character whose purpose was to have a baby... when the world was ending... One of many reasons I abandoned it.
i'm an atheist. one day hubby decided to play a trick on me. he "disppeared" and i didn't know where he was. in the bedroom i saw a stack of his clothing. shoes with the socks still inside under pants and underwear, a shirt the pants and a hat on the top. i looked at the dogs and said, "well, i guess daddy got raptured" and laughed.
I remember when the "Left Behind" series came out.
I didn't know there was a kids series too.
I was raised in a reformed theological background, and an amillennialist tradition, so our pastors encouraged us to read it critically, and treat it as dispensationalist propaganda.
I vaguely remember reading the first couple of books. It was apparent they were written for an audience that was predisposed to a very specific world view.