The Vision, pp. 222-226<\/strong><\/p>\n Here we have a section where Magdalene tells Bobbie Jo about all the Bible words searches she\u2019s done that have convinced her that Cheyenne is right, and that her aborted baby, Starlight, will have the chance to grow up during the Millennium, and then Bobbie Jo says:<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re really loving studying the Bible, aren\u2019t you, Kid? I never saw anyone change so much as you have in the last few weeks. It\u2019s like you\u2019re older than any of us. I guess it\u2019s all the Bible study you\u2019ve been doing.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Which. Yes. Magdalene, the only interesting character in this book, has had a complete personality transplant.<\/p>\n Just What Is the Millennium?<\/strong><\/p>\n Let me pause real quick to give you background on the Millennium: the Bible isn\u2019t clear about it, so every Christian denomination has created its own ideas about what the Millennium is, the end. But really, that\u2019s pretty much \u2026 the story.<\/p>\n Some Christians think we\u2019re already living in the Millennium. However, many evangelicals (as well as some others) think the Millennium hasn\u2019t come yet. The layout, roughly, is like this: first the rapture (Christians all disappear to heaven), then seven years of tribulation, then Jesus returns with angel troops and binds Satan. Then all the raptured Christians reappear with new bodies, and for 1,000 years, Jesus reigns as sovereign dictator on earth. At the end of that period\u2014during which children are born, and grow up, and have children\u2014some humans will turn against Jesus, and, together with a newly unbound Satan, will mount a rebellion. Jesus will defeat them and destroy the heaven and earth, and there will be a final judgement.<\/p>\n No wait. Is there a judgement between the tribulation and the Millennium too? I might have things a little jumbled, but having read all that,\u00a0I think you can see why.\u00a0<\/em>None of this is particularly straightforward, and even those who believe that basic outline often switch things around (for instance, there\u2019s a whole group that believes the rapture happens\u00a0after\u00a0<\/em>the tribulation).<\/p>\n For our purposes, what is relevant is this: the Millennium is a 1,000 year period when Jesus will reign on earth in person and things will be very, very good. However, people will still have free will, and new children will still be born. In other words, it\u2019s not Heaven. It\u2019s a sort of in between. But it\u2019s also not purgatory. That\u2019s a\u00a0Catholic\u00a0<\/em>thing.<\/p>\n Magdalene\u2019s Theory<\/strong><\/p>\n Anyway, Magdalene says the whole bit about aborted babies and the Millennium can be found is in Isaiah 65. She explains as follows:<\/p>\n \u201cThat chapter also has a strange verse about different groups of people living different lengths of time. It indicates a group of children will be from some other time to grow up in the Millennium.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I found a Pearl discussion of this elsewhere, and the verse Magdalene is referring to is verse 20, which reads as follows in the King James Version (which is the only translation the Pearls recognize as legitimate):<\/p>\n There shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an old man that hath not filled his days: for the child shall die an hundred years old; but the sinner being an hundred years old shall be accursed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Here\u2019s how Michael Pearl explains this bit elsewhere:<\/p>\n That\u2019s a riddle, that a class of people still called \u201cchild\u201d at a hundred years of age, if found to be a sinner, will be cursed and damned.<\/p>\n Based on the Scripture, what I think is going to happen is that the children who come back in the Millennium, people who died as children, that died prematurely or aborted babies, will come back in the Millennium and grow up and have until the age of 100 to repent and be obedient to God. If they do not, at a hundred years that individual who came into the Millennium as a child will be executed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Wait what now?<\/p>\n Here\u2019s the thing: there\u2019s absolutely no way Magdalene would have come up with this on her own. And yet she claims when she asked Malachi about what Cheyenne said, he told her to go read the Bible herself, and Hope told her to start with Isaiah 65, and that on her own,<\/em> she came up with this interpretation. No way in heck<\/em>. This came from Michael \u2026 I mean, Malachi.<\/p>\n But also, Michael\u2019s interpretation doesn\u2019t even make sense!<\/p>\n Here, let\u2019s reread the verse:<\/p>\n There shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an old man that hath not filled his days: for the child shall die an hundred years old; but the sinner being an hundred years old shall be accursed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Is the passage confusing? Yes. Does it suggest that another class of children from some other time will grow up during the Millennium? No!<\/p>\n What Does This Verse Actually Say?<\/strong><\/p>\n This passage is confusing for two reasons. First, it\u2019s in the KJV. Second,\u00a0this whole passage is written in couplets, and in many cases the couplets are repetitions (i.e., state one thing, then restate it the same way). That\u2019s pretty standard for Hebrew poetry (as I understand, at least), but it\u2019s not something we\u2019re super used to. Nor were the writers of the New Testament, by the way\u2014this is why Matthew has Jesus ride into Jerusalem straddling a donkey\u00a0and its foal,\u00a0<\/em>because the Old Testament passage he\u2019s replicating (so that Jesus fulfills prophesy) includes a couplet\u2014an ass; the foal of a donkey\u2014and he thought it was additive.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s how the verse reads in the NIV:<\/p>\n \u201cNever again will there be in it<\/span> Can you see the couplets I was talking about?<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The only other evidence Magdalene offers for her belief that the Bible says those who die as children will grow up in the Millennium is that several passages say \u201cthe streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing,\u201d and that there will be some who rise up against Jesus at the end of the Millennium. But this is super easy to answer: that Isaiah passage makes clear that babies\u00a0will be born\u00a0<\/em>during the Millennium. You don\u2019t need to transplant extra babies in for it to work.<\/p>\n This all goes to back up my assertion that much of fundamentalist Christianity is little different from nerds arguing over a fandom (and I say that affectionately!).<\/p>\n Oh, and I\u2019m pretty sure this isn\u2019t awesome:<\/p>\n \u201cWhat else is there for the little ones who die? The Millennium will be an opportunity for all those children, and the mentally handicapped as well, to grow up naturally and make their own decision to love God or not.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Cool. Cool cool cool.<\/p>\n Magdalene Gets\u00a0Weird<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n So then Magdalene tells Bobbie Jo that she had a dream that she was running in a meadow with a little girl, and then she realized it was\u00a0her\u00a0<\/em>little girl, Starlight. She tells Bobbie Jo that she believes this dream\u2014which she spends several pages explaining, and included Magdalene giving Starlight a lecture about herbs and their healing properties\u2014is God giving her a promise that she will get to raise Starlight in the Millennium.<\/p>\n And then we get this weird bit:<\/p>\n Magdalene cupped her tiny hand and held it out. With a gentle touch she seemed to place something invisible into Bobbie Jo\u2019s palm. Then she carefully folded the larger hand and held it closed with both her small white hands. Both girls stared at Bobbie Jo\u2019s closed hand.<\/p>\n Magdalene spoke quietly and reverently. \u201cBobbie Jo, I have given you a jewel of my future. Keep it safe and fresh until the time that others need to know.\u201d<\/p>\n Crusty Bobbie Jo dissolved into unabashed tears, falling in great drops from her big brown eyes. Something eternal had just happened.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n And then there\u2019s a recipe for Amish spice cookies.<\/p>\n No, really<\/em>.<\/p>\n But that whole bit there? There\u2019s no context I\u2019m leaving out. Magdalene goes all weird on Bobbie Jo and gives her an invisible \u201cjewel\u201d of her future to \u201ckeep safe and fresh\u201d until others need to know. That\u2019s\u00a0weird,\u00a0<\/em>right?<\/p>\n I\u2019ll give you a spoiler. The time\u00a0will\u00a0<\/em>come when the others need to know. Because Magdalene will be dead. And it\u2019ll be up to Bobbie Jo to tell everyone that Magdalene was perfectly ready to die, because she has gone to raise Starlight in the Millennium, so actually, her death is a beautiful, miraculous thing.<\/p>\n I only wish I was joking.<\/p>\n Magdalene will die trying to save Omar and Tess\u2019 kids from the house fire set while they\u2019re sleeping by local white supremacists who are in league with her father, who has come to retrieve her because Omar and Tess finally talked her into calling her father, and then when he said he was coming right away to get her all she could figure out to say was \u201cokay,\u201d and then everyone else on the TLP compound said \u201csounds about right, he\u2019s her dad anyway,\u201d and told her to pack her bags. Which is when her father went to the TLP website and saw Omar and flipped. But her father will convert on her deathbed, so of course it\u2019s all for the good!<\/p>\n
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>an infant who lives but a few days,<\/span><\/span>
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>or an old man who does not live out his years;
\nthe one who dies at a hundred
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>will be thought a mere child;
\nthe one who fails to reach\u00a0a hundred
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>will be considered accursed.<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n