{"id":12764,"date":"2018-02-22T11:53:06","date_gmt":"2018-02-22T16:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=12764"},"modified":"2018-02-22T11:53:06","modified_gmt":"2018-02-22T16:53:06","slug":"jim-bakker-says-apocalypse-coming-proof","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2018\/02\/jim-bakker-says-apocalypse-coming-proof","title":{"rendered":"Jim Bakker Says the Apocalypse is Coming and He Has Proof"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2018\/02\/apocalyptic-374208_960_720.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-12765\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2018\/02\/apocalyptic-374208_960_720.jpg\" alt=\"apocalyptic-374208_960_720\" width=\"960\" height=\"501\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Jim Bakker is making headlines again three years after his \u201cPraise the Lord\u201d (PTL) empire near Charlotte collapsed amid financial corruption and sexual scandal. Now, instead of rebuilding his 2,300 acre Christian theme park and resort, Heritage USA, Bakker is selling supplies for the coming apocalypse. \u201cWe are in the final days,\u201d Bakker says.<\/p>\n<p>While Bakker claims that he has abandoned his previous lifestyle in favor of coming to a truer understanding of Christ, plenty of people remember that his theme park and TV show funded an opulent lifestyle filled with vacation homes, expensive cars and an air-conditioned doghouse. There are questions about whether Bakker truly repented after serving five years in prison for fraud or if he is merely capitalizing on 21<sup>st<\/sup> century fears such as terrorism and climate change. His new TV show, \u201cThe Jim Bakker Show,\u201d certainly works hard to sell fuel-less generators, doomsday guidebooks and freeze-dried food with a shelf life of up to 30 years. Bakker, however, insists that the twin disasters of Hurricane Harvey and Maria and concerns of nuclear war with North Korea are signs that the end times are on the horizon, and that Christians ignore the warnings at their own risk. \u201cOne day,\u201d Bakker says, \u201cyou\u2019re going to shake your fist in God\u2019s face and you\u2019re going to say, \u2018God, why didn\u2019t you warn me?\u2019 He\u2019s going to say, \u2018You sat there and you made fun of Jim Bakker all those years. I warned you. But you didn\u2019t listen.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n<p>Some people believe that Bakker really has turned over a new leaf. \u201cJim lost everything, and then he came back,\u201d says Bakker\u2019s brother-in-law Mark Graham. \u201cAll he wants to do is get the message of salvation out there. And keep people alive.\u201d Graham further claims that Bakker has disowned the Prosperity Gospel, the idea that God rewards faith with blessings such as wealth. Others, however, are skeptical. John Wigger, a professor of history at the University of Missouri and author of \u201cPTL: The Rise and Fall of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker\u2019s Evangelical Empire,\u201d claims that Bakker is simply tapping into new opportunities to make money. \u201cThe Prosperity Gospel, with all its glitz and money, fit the culture of the 1980s and Jim found that was a very successful component of his message,\u201d Wigger says. \u201cIn this post-9\/11 era, he\u2019s found that the Apocalypse and survivalism make for a very compelling message that will also gain him an audience.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Whether or not the Bakkers are once again getting rich off their TV show is difficult to say. There are no Nielsen ratings for Christian television and because Morningside, Bakker\u2019s ministry and broadcast station, is registered as a church, it does not have to file financial information with the IRS. Unlike most faith-based organizations, Bakker\u2019s ministry also refuses to post financial details on their website. Bakker and Graham insist that they have \u201cnothing to hide&#8230;We\u2019re transparent with the IRS and the government,\u201d Graham says. \u201cOur partners trust that their money is going to be used for what they designated it for.\u201d Charles Shepard, the former investigative report who anchored the Observer\u2019s Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the fall of PTL, believes that Bakker is up to his old tricks. \u201cIf he were someone who had really seen the light,\u201d Shepard says, \u201che would be forthcoming about\u2026revenues and his compensation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Whether Bakker really has turned over a new leaf or is capitalizing on current tensions is currently unclear. Only time will tell where he really stands and if his dire predictions of a rapidly approaching Armageddon come true.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jim Bakker is making headlines again three years after his \u201cPraise the Lord\u201d (PTL) empire near Charlotte collapsed amid financial corruption and sexual scandal. Now, instead of rebuilding his 2,300 acre Christian theme park and resort, Heritage USA, Bakker is selling supplies for the coming apocalypse. \u201cWe are in the final days,\u201d Bakker says. While&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":616,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[534,4],"tags":[2331,2229],"class_list":["post-12764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-end-of-the-world","category-faith","tag-apocalypse","tag-end-of-the-world"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Jim Bakker Says the Apocalypse is Coming and He Has Proof<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Jim Bakker lost everything amid corruption and sexual scandal in the 1980s, but now, he is making headlines again with claims that the end is nigh.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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