Jack Van Impe

On Sunday I watched Jack Van Impe's enlightening program Jack Van Impe Presents. The show masquerades as a World News program. A waifish-looking woman with a thin head, big blond hair, and a high pitched voice presents news items and then Jack Van Impe, a jolly beefy fellow with a big smile and a tidal wave of hair parted to the one side, presents "Biblical prophecy" on those events.

As I watched the show I grew increasingly confused (well, more amused than confused.) At one point the woman read a news item about the European Union, after which she read news items on Crucifixes being banned in Italian schools, and the pope condemning this. Then Jack Van Impe began to tie this all into Scripture. It really is amazing how much Scripture Mr. Van Impe has memorized - he punctuates his sentences with Scripture references with machine-gun rhythm. Basically the conclusion that Mr. Van Impe came to was that the antichrist was going to rise out of the European Union which was going to begin the one-world nation and force everyone to wear some sort of repetitive three-digit number on their forehead.

According to his website, Russia is still a force of evil (I thought that ended when Gorbachev, with that mark on his head, lost power), and the nations that oppose Russia include "Tarshish and the lions thereof" - namely Great Britain, the USA, Canada, and Australia and their possessions (I suggest calling it the Anglo-Protestent Union) and the EU (which confused me because Great Britain is part of the EU, no?) who will then set up the antichrist on the throne in Jerusalem and all that jazz.

Citing Jermiah 31:5, Mr. Van Impe claimed the Bible contained airplanes. Jeremiah 31:5 reads: "Like birds hovering overhead, the Lord Almighty will shield Jerusalem; he will shield and deliver it, he will pass over it and will rescue it." Perhaps if you read "like" as "with" than you can have some sort of interpretation of prophecy where the USAF has jets hovering over Jerusalem protecting it from the EU.

I'm sure he had a heyday with Iraq being the site of ancient Babylon, there's a lot you can do (read "do" as "abuse") with Biblical prophecy there.

Oi vey.