Jonathan Cahn
FrontLine, 262 Pages, Paper, $16.99
This book is taking born-again Christians by storm, and has been on bestseller lists such as the New York Times’ for some time now. The book posits that in Israel long ago there appeared from the book of Isaiah a series of nine signs warning of coming destruction, and that these same signs are seen to be very precisely emerging in the U.S. A verse in Isaiah, “The bricks are fallen,” for example, is linked with 9-11: “The World Trade Center was a symbol of America’s economic power—proud, majestic, towering. But in a matter of moments it had come crashing down to dust.”
America is in deep moral and spiritual trouble, and the reader will see a definite message calling America back to repentance. However, the book needs careful examination for flaws regarding the Bible. For one thing, are prophecies concerning Israel to be automatically applied to America? Many Bible scholars find little or no reference to the U.S. in Bible prophecy. Also, a clear presentation of the gospel is difficult to find, and the story is lacking in a clear emphasis upon Jesus Christ in God’s future judgment.
The author, a messianic Jewish believer, wrote the book as a fiction thriller, which may be interesting reading, but genuine study of prophecy should be left to the Bible itself and to commentaries and other resources by sound theologians.
Incidentally, FrontLine is not connected with the fundamental magazine by that name.
