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THE END OF THE W0M.fi ON EPPS BMfiGE M3A6
t The Seventh-Day Adventists do not want you to see the end ot the world
1« the way Hieronymous Bosch did — as a landscape more recognizable to
the subconscious than the conscious mind, some distant landscape with human
bodies gulped and gnawed on barren, foreign terrain, a landscape where flesh
less skeletons eerily attend to the blue-collar aspects of the day of judgment.
2 According to fliers sent to 40,000 Athens-area residents last week, the
« end of the world will instead be as recognizable as a story in a Marvel
comic book.
J From a blue-black sea, a seven-headed hydra will emerge, flashing
n angry green lizard eyeballs. Riding on its red scales will be a shapely
young female in Wonder Woman garb and a sort of Betty Page hairdo. The top
of her taupe blouse will be cut low, revealing much of her right breast, and
blood will be sloshing from her golden chalice.
4 Meanwhile, good angels (in white sashes) will battle fallen angels (in
« red sashes) with fiery light sabers. The comic book Jesus will ride on a
shining golden horse high above a modern city while it is destroyed by military
trooDS shooting green laser beams from the lenses of high-tech goggles.
Elsewhere, red laser beams will rain from the sky, damaging glassy internation
alist skyscrapers. A Caucasian man in a buttoned-down shirt and blue b'azer
will oversee the carnage. A brown-skinned woman will look on over his shoul
der, sporting tasteful gold clip-on earrings and a red mock turtleneck blouse.
Burned into their foreheads will be the mark of the beast — 666.
5 The fliers are advertisements for a series of lectures to be given over
« four weekends by Dr. Pieter Barkhuizen, a Seventh-Day Adventist
preacher, a South African boer who was “caught in a deadly web of espionage,
suspense and intrigue" until Christ entered his life.
^ The seminars start at 7:30 p.m. and are held at the Adventist Church on
•> Epps Bridge Road The first night, you get a manila envelope. Inside is a
note pad, a “Key Chart to Prophetic Understanding" and a complimentary pen
that reads “Seminars Unlimited — Aventuras en las Profecias Biblicas." A man
in a guayaberra shirt is working the lights in the back of the modest chapel and
attending to the soothing spiritual music playing on a tape deck built into the
wall. Over the altar, a series of slides cliCKS by. One asks. “Is the Year 2000 a
Destiny?"
7 The other is a picture of
« today’s newspaper, scream
ing the news that Janet Rene is in
trouble wit h the Republicans.
M The Seventh-Day Adventists trace their church back to William Miller, a
Id* 19th century preacher who calculated, using a passage from the Book
of Daniel, that the world would end between March 21,1843, and March 21,
1844. When the latter date came and went, some of his followers were sorely
disappointed. Others explained it away. Adventists still believe the end is com
ing, though predicting the exact date is a little out of fashion these days.
•A Later in the 19th century, a Maine woman named Ellen G. White
1R'« became the second-most important Adventist. She was known for
going into long trances, having divine visions, flirting with phrenology, and writ
ing down what was revealed to her.
There are now 7 million or 8 million Adventists in the world.
« According to U S. Catholic magazine (from which much of the above
information was taken), 9 out of 10 Adventists live outside of the U.S. Two great
aids to their evangelizing efforts are their network of schools — there are almost
6,000 of them — and an impressive network of hospitals. Many Adventists are
vegetarian, or mostly vegetarian. They are to abstain from alcohol, tobacco, cof
fee, tea. narcotics and the wearing of jewelry. Adventists also pay a percentage
of their income to the church each year
15
16.
Little Richard is currently a Seventh-Day Adventist preacher.
VM The Branch Davidians were originally a renegade offshoot of the
I/ m Adventists. The Adventist church launched a massive PR campaign
during the Waco incioent to ensure that major news providers didn't confuse
one with the other.
• 5 Pieter Barkhuizen says everything in the world tends toward entropy
PU« — everything but the theory of evolution. He says, “You know it’s get
ting worse. You've read about Ken Starr and all that." He shows a picture of t\u
women getting married. He circles their heads with his laser pointer. “You can
not do that!,” he says. “It's against the Bible. Let’s not pull God’s standards down
to our own.” The amens are murmuied again, but stronger.
19
8
About 50 people are
assembled in the pews:
black people and white people.
Pieter Barkhuizen steps up to the
pulpit, dressed like a salesman with
a salesman suit and a salesman
hair helmet. He is a wonderfully
liglu, addictively cheerful speaker,
apologizing for what he calls his
“funny accent," gesturing througn
his favorite words, sketching the
South African roundness of his vowels with his hand as if he’s turning a giant
knob. “God makes no mistakes," he says, to murmured assent. “The r e's a rea
son you’re here tonight. We sent out 40,000 fliers, but God said that tonight you
and I would be here. Something moved in your heart."
9 Barkhuizen lays down some ground rules. If you attend any eight of the
m 16 lectures, you get a handsome prophesy seminar diploma, which will
make you a trained Bible instructor. Cassette tapes are free, though a $2 dona
tion is suggested. They aren't copyrighted. “You can make copies — do you
understand that?" Barkhuizen asks. If anyone can prove his teachings aren't
Biblical, they get $5,000. “If anybody says you shouldn’t listen to Pieter
Barkhuizen, please tell them to come with you, because if they find I say some
thing that’s not spiritual, they get $5,000.1 don't want you to think you're listen
ing to a cult or sect. You are departing on one of the greatest adventures of your
life this evening."
W The faces on the two kids next to me are loose bottlecaps on a bottle
« of mockery that's just been shaken vigorously. A tattoo snakes up
one's arm. They look like they're in high school, maybe early college. Barkhuizen
has asked that we bow our heads. He prays that we avoid the “fanciful interpre
tations of man" He says we are living in the endtime: “Lord, very little time is
left."
n The two kids get up to leave; I grab the complimentary pads they’ve
« been scribbling on once they're gone. “Why are you here?" one had
asked another.
“Waiting for friends to get off work. How about you?“
“Thought it would be freaky."
“My God is a big Black Lesbo!"
“Kill your parents."
“The heat’s gonna break me."
“I am stoned "
W Dr. Pieter Barkhuizen has a picture of a baby monkey up on the screen.
n He is circling its head with his red laser pointer. He says the evolution
ists want us to believe that we originated from a little slimeball, then we became
fish or a bird or whatever, and then a monkey and then a man. “Very few scien
tists today are evolutionists anymore." he says. “You need 1,000 times more
faith to be an evolutionist than a Christian ”
He says the amount of moon dust proves that we’re living on a young
m planet. He offers a beautiful allegory: A man cuts every word out of a
dictionary, then cuts every word
into letters. He puts the letters into
a pillowcase, and goes to the top of
a large building. He sprinkles the
letters over the city. When he
returns to street level, there is his
dictionary, in perfect order.
Believing in evolution, he says, “is
absolutely childish."
20.
We are moving through
the universe at 66,000
miles per hou r — Dr. Pieter
Barkhuizen says we are headed
somewhere. Later in the series, he
is going to tell us about life on
other planets, about the location of
Noah’s Ark, about space ships. He
shows us pictures of the heavens. He speaks of their vastness. Adam and Eve
lived to be 900 years old. We are midgets.
W He says John the Revelator saw a gigantic space ship up in the sky. He
« says there is a vast tunnel within Orion with a mysterious white light at
the end. In the last few years, he says, astronomers have noted that a mighty
hand has been moving heavenly bodies away from the mouth of the tunnel. The
holy city is going to come, and itls going to be a giant space ship. Some
Christian astronomers believe the tunnel in Orion is the pathway for the second
coming. Just read Job 28:31. Now listen here, he says, this is Armageddon I'm
talking about.
» He shows us a slide of '50s-era Rockwell white people bathed in a
« serene cosmic glow that streams down from the heavens. He shows
us a slide of comic book Jesus poised to knock on the door of a handsome sub
urban American house. He prays o*'r r us again. We pray for the bombing vic
tims in Africa. “Jesus, help us to come to the seminars..."
K l ask the couple in front of me what they thought of the perfor-
« mance. “I reserve comment,’ the husband/boyfriend says. The
wife/girlfriend gives him a good-natured you’re-always-embarrassed look, and
says, “I thought it was very interesting — just now what he was talking about
— that the holy city was going to come, and about other galaxies and stuff
like that."
W After the seminar. I drive down to the Epps Bridge Road Golden
« Pantry.! take a 22-ounce bottle of beer up to the counter. The woman
takes her time scrutinizing my out-of state license, says, “You just about seen
the world, ain’t you?” Outside, I look up for Orion. The sky is a starless gray
nothing in the gas station's hazy phosphorescence.
K The next night starts with joyful noise from an Atlanta a cappella
* quartet. They sing “Steal Away To Jesus." The voices bound from the
men, riant and straight sure like train wheels on tracks. The crowd is bigger, with
many of the same folks from last night. After denouncing telephone psychics
and fortune cookies, Barkhuizen explains Nebuchadnezzar’s dream to us. and
hints that the last days will come this October. Or in 2000. Or in 2001.
Richard Fausset
SUMMt*
enjoy a stress free fall
new dosses start soon
Mon. Aug 24 7pm
Toe. Aug 25 1(h30 am
Wed. Aug 26 7 pm
Thurs. Aug 27 lpm^^4
Athens
by calling
546-4200
working towards non-vtoWnc* In Atham
263 WOcyton St. Athens, GA. 30601
J 1 » | 1
ri music
IdExchange
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FLAGPOLE
is seeking...
NEWS, MUSIC, ART AND CALENDAR
INTERNS for fall 1998. Candidates
should be organized, detail-oriented
and dedicated, with a high tolerance
for clerical work and a desire to write.
These positions are unpaid.
Flagpole is also seeking a FREELANCE
WRITER to produce our weekly
restaurant column. We're looking for
a proven writer with a broad knowledge
of the local food scene who can deliver
copy that's accurate and entertaining.
FREELANCE REPORTER positions are
also open. We're looking for good
writers capable of explaining Athens
to Athenians in our City Pages.
INTERESTED? Drop off a resume, cover
letter and writing samples (for writing
positions) at our office on 112 S.
Foundry St. (behind the Farmer's
Hardware Building) between 9am and
5pm, Monday-Friday. No phone calls,
please.
AUGUST 12,
1998 FLAGPOLE B