I come from a prophecy-heavy background. In my early teen years, my Bible notes were a collection of notes, maps, charts, lists, and cross-references for prophecies in Daniel, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and Revelation attempting to understand the last days. Years later, after a great deal of studying Scripture in the original languages and contexts, and a lot of surrendering my pride and naivete, I can now look back on those days, thankful that God has brought me forward and shown me bigger plans than I had dreamed up for Him for the last days. While reading The Prophecy Answer Book by David Jeremiah, I can’t say I experienced the same relief. In fact, it sounded an awful lot like those notes and charts that I had made as a 13 year old.

Presented in a question-and-answer format, Dr. Jeremiah deals with theology surrounding current events (particularly Israel, oil, Islam), the Rapture, the Tribulation, the Antichrist, the Millennium and the New Heaven. Jeremiah’s perspective has echoes of historical dispensationalism and a heavy premillennialism, similar to what is presented by the  Left Behind novels of Tim Lahaye and Jerry Jenkins. On essentially every level of understanding Scripture, this book is unhelpful and, in many places, quite wrong. There is a way to study prophecy, and to understand what the Bible says about the last days, but this isn’t it.