July 15, 2025

Republicans and Evangelicals I The Late Great Planet Earth

51 minutes

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Hal Lindsey published The Late Great Planet Earth in 1970. It was a HUGE hit, selling over 35 million copies by 1999. It was also produced into a film narrated by Orson Welles. That film was shown in movie theaters and church basements and made a splash.

The movie is a repackaging of premillennial dispensationalism, which I covered last season. It presents a particular vision of end-times theology, which wrongly predicted that the world would end around 1988.

We're going to discuss the book and movie because they have had a real impact on the way that some evangelicals see the world. I'm joined on this episode by Ray McDaniel, pastor of First Baptist Church in Jackson, WY, and Melvin Benson of the Cinematic Doctrine podcast.

Chris on the Cinematic Doctrine Podcast

Hamilton

Ernest Scared Stupid

Ernest Saves Christmas

Gremlins

Sources:

National Endowment for the Humanities article

The Late Great Planet Earth book and movie

Cortney Basham's Master's Thesis

The Day of the Dolphin trailer

Imdb.com

Questions:

Have you ever seen The Late Great Planet Earth? What did you think of it?

The book and movie echo the Bible in that a false prophet can be identified when their prophecies don't come true. Hal Lindsey's predictions have been wrong for decades. Does that make him a false prophet?

What impact do books and movies like this have on the Christian culture?

If a book or movie like this does some good (like bringing some people to Christ), but also makes false prophesies, is it still valuable?

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