Jesus’ Olivet Discourse prophecies continue to come alive while today’s news flashes in lightning-like fashion across our television and computer monitor screens.

We most often consider the terrorism and pyrotechnics of Middle Eastern madness. We talk about Russia and Iran (Persia) preparing to fulfill the Gog-Magog prophecies as given in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39.

Our efforts are often spent concentrating on what is happening with regard to the building one-world order in the areas of finance, religion and the many other ways such movement is manifesting.

We think in terms of the proliferating things happening within Europe –about the upheaval that seems to be rearranging for the prophesied revived Roman Empire. We look at monetary economic dynamics that are driving the world toward a global fiscal order that will eventuate in the 666 marks and numbers system of Revelation 13: 16-18.

Sometimes the natural order seems so disturbed that geophysical activity, such as earthquakes occurring simultaneously, floods raging and other phenomena erupting across the planet draws the attention of prophecy watchers. But, it is the creation called man that at present seems on the front-burner of prophetic progression –at least to this observer.

The Lord gave, during His prophecies of things to come as the time of His return in the Second Advent nears, a quite interesting description of the human condition at the very end of the age. The description seems to have a dual reference or application.

The particular prophecy of which I write is a foretelling by the Lord I believe we see developing at this very moment in time. It is building hourly in its virulence –in its evil, end times impact upon cultures and societies around the world. Here is Christ’s prophecy.

“And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring.” (Lk 21: 25)

It is parts b and c of this prophecy that I wish us to examine. Jesus foretold that there will be “nations in distress with perplexity.” The “sea and waves” will be “roaring.”

We have looked a number of times in these commentaries at the fact that nations across the world are in distress with perplexity. The financial upheaval going on has Europe to the point of near-dissolution. The “Brexit” is one such manifestation. The great turmoil in Greece and other EU countries make it clear that the western world is suffering a nervous breakdown of sorts. Our own nation is hard on the heels of the schizophrenia developing over there.

The next part of Jesus’ prophecy foretells that the “sea and waves roaring” will be a prime marker of the last of the last days. By the time the Tribulation is full-blown the disturbances will bring planet earth to the point of total destruction. Only Christ’s return will quell the “roaring.”

“Sea and waves” can indicate the geophysical disturbances forecast for that era. But, it is the symbolic application that is much more the meaning in this case, I’m convinced.

“Sea and waves” in this case are symbolic of the peoples of earth. Jesus was saying they will, as a result of the “distress and perplexity” be “roaring.”

Jesus indicated as given in Luke 21:28 that He will return (in the Rapture) when this indicator –and the others He gave as signals for His Second Coming at Armageddon– “begin to come to pass.”

John the revelator gave in the very first verse of the thirteenth chapter of Revelation the view of the Antichrist beast regime arising out of the “sea” of people that would be in tumult. It is the observation of a growing number of seasoned prophetic observers that the United States is now showing signs of being a part of this tumultuous “sea” of unrest that might soon bring history’s most ferocious tyrant to power.

The “Black Lives Matter” protests are doing much to ratchet up civil unrest within the nation. The nucleus of that disruptive organization, many say, is made up of rabble rousers who are career thugs, paid by the likes of George Soros, who has openly said he favors upsetting the order of things that communist-style socialism might be brought forth in America.

Many more than just the “conspiracy nuts” are wondering  increasingly whether the current unrest being fomented might be the prelude to this president calling for martial law even before the November presidential elections.

The coup attempt in Turkey punctuates Jesus’ prophecy. That part of the world in particular is in great tumult, rearranging for fulfillment of things to come. The assaults on law and order –on the police in Baton Rouge that took the lives of officers and injured others is but the tip of the iceberg of the coming anarchy and chaos in our own nation as the end times play out.

Whatsoever is the outcome of this up heaving sea of human unrest we see heating up toward the boiling point, we can see Jesus’ prophecy for the end of days percolating in these troubled times. I believe that this means Christ’s Call “Come up here!” is very near indeed.

One of the literary descriptions of the Chinese people is often wrapped in one word–inscrutable. Among that word’s synonyms are the following: incomprehensible, unexplainable, unfathomable, impenetrable, inexplicable, ambiguous, and difficult. I think of the nation of China, in general terms, as two things more –extremely patient and schizophrenic.

One of the most validating proofs of the patience of the Chinese is found in, I think, the matter of the debt it has purchased and maintained on its financial books–especially the debt of the United States of America. It is estimated that China holds U.S. Treasury bonds and other debts totaling approximately $1 trillion. The Chinese nation holds indebtedness of other nations, also, to the approximate tune of $2 trillion. It is a troubling matter that this is the case, when one considers that China has been, since the revolution that brought communism to power, America and the world’s most dangerous adversary. It is the most dangerous because of the synonyms above that define the Chinese communist leadership since, particularly, the time of Mao Zedong. They have been all of those things: incomprehensible, unexplainable, unfathomable, impenetrable, inexplicable, ambiguous, and difficult.

And now they hold the wealth of America and the world in the palms of their inscrutable hands. The question arises: Why do they keep purchasing debt, when they might never collect, seeing as how all nations are headed, obviously, toward the fiscal abyss?

Is it just that they, like most of the world’s economic gurus seem to think, believe that no matter how bad it gets, a solution will magically be found, and the indebted nations will make good on their restoration to financial health? They have been, since that communist revolution, the most bellicose of enemies in terms of threatening anyone who crosses them. Why the patience now, gladly holding the debt of their enemies, who by any stretch of the imagination have no hope of repaying the debt that is growing exponentially?

Now, I know the Chinese have made protests and even threats of fiscal action if their debtors don’t straighten up their economic acts. But, for the most part, the Chinese leadership’s patience is…well…inscrutable. Add to all of this perplexity another piece of the Chinese puzzle.

The U.S. Defense Department first reported in 2015 Chinese dredging vessels around Fiery Cross Reef in the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. They have since completed literal island building, upon which now resides major air strips.

Coinciding with this obvious aggression in claiming for itself portions of international territorial waters are acts of provocation against other nations’ vessels—including those of the United states. Chinese aircraft from these man-made islands almost routinely harass even American ships as they traverse these supposedly free, international waterways.

The following news excerpt further enlightens.

In its annual report to Congress on China’s military activities in 2015, the U.S. Defense Department estimated that China’s reclamation work had added more than 3,200 acres (1,300 hectares) of land on seven features it occupied in the Spratly Islands in the space of two years…

The report comes at a time of heightened tension over maritime territories claimed by China and disputed by several Asian nations. Washington has accused Beijing of militarizing the South China Sea while Beijing, in turn, has criticized increased U.S. naval patrols and exercises in Asia.

The Pentagon report said China was focusing on developing capabilities to counter outside intervention in any conflict…

(Reuters, www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-pentagon-idUSKCN0Y42J1)

This is the same China that threatened to bring its hordes into the Korean peninsula in support of the North Koreans during the Korean conflict. It was even willing to go to nuclear war with the West if the North Korean regime looked to be losing, according to reports back then. Now China is acting like the peacemaker, even set to discipline its rabid North Korean pet, if necessary to preserve world stability.

Why the present level of civil comportment, despite the tremendous military threat it is building to intimidate?

To my way of thinking, the answer to the schizophrenia that afflicts its leadership is that China is exerting extraordinary patience for very special reasons. We are paying to outfit the army of 200 million we read about in Bible prophecy and in accounts from news sources that tell us China and its Asian allies could easily outfit such a military juggernaut today.

A just released decision by a governing, international authority tells the current state of China’s attempt at regional hegemony.

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A tribunal ruled in a sweeping decision Tuesday that China has no legal basis for its vast claims in the South China Sea and had aggravated the seething regional dispute with its extensive construction of artificial islands that destroyed coral reefs and infringed on the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.

China immediately rejected the arbitration findings, and their impact remained unclear as there is no policing agency or mechanism to enforce them.

While the ruling cannot reverse China’s actions, it still constitutes a rebuke, carrying with it the force of the international community’s opinion.

Even so, they are confident–I believe their patience shows—that they will recoup their losses when they one day have enough, in terms of superior military assets, to become bill collectors on an unprecedented scale. We begin to see how even the kings of the East–as inscrutable as that part of the world is—fit into the end-times prophetic puzzle.

Antichrist, the coming beast of Revelation chapter 13, will be the most attractive, charismatic personality ever to step foot on the planet. He will have a following that defies imagination. His magnetic personality and, no doubt, striking appearance, will be the antithesis of Jesus Christ in every way when he “magnifies” himself, as the prophet Daniel foretold.

Jesus was meek. He came as a lamb. The Bible tells us that He had no outstanding physical features or characteristics that would set Him apart from the rest of humanity. The exceptions were when He was on the Mount of Transfiguration when He was said to shine like the sun, and when He was said to be the most “marred” of all men at the time of His crucifixion.

Antichrist, that man of sin, will have, literally, a worldwide, totally devoted following.

I’m a “back number,” as Dr. Vernon McGee used to say, referring to his own naïveté when it came to keeping up with the pop culture of his time. But it was brought to my attention the meteoric career of a singer who started out as Katy Hudson and now entertains under the stage name Katy Perry.

She went from singing as a Christian recording artist to becoming a secular, recording/entertaining phenomenon. Her Christian album under Katy Hudson sold only 2000 copies or so. She switched to secular recording and soared to the top of the charts. According to Wikipedia: She became the first artist with multiple videos to reach 1 billion views on Vevo with the videos for the songs “Roar” and “Dark Horse.”

Her following on Twitter and other social media forums indicates that she has at least 90 million fans.

Those numbers are stratospheric. Neither ol’ Elvis nor the Beatles ever reached those heights–although they had their share of groupies, to be sure.

Antichrist, according to Revelation chapter 13, will be literally worshiped by the whole world. Those who don’t worship him will have their heads lopped off and worse. His numbers of followers will put Miss Katy’s numbers in the category of the infinitesimal by comparison.

We know of the Democrat Party’s incessant coming under pressure to remove any reference to God from their party platform. When the convention began for the 2012 presidential nominating process, we remember that the no’s were much louder than the yeas when the question was put up for keeping God’s name being used in official language of the party’s doings.

Just over a week ago, there was a report of an entertainer demanding that the song “God Bless America” be no longer sung at half times or at the beginnings of sporting events. He wants that offensive anthem, as he characterized it, forever discarded. Even in the Congress of the United States, there is a constant drumbeat from some of the “progressive” quarters to do away with prayer to open sessions and to remove “In God we trust” from coinage and other governmental officialdom. There has been much progress, as they would have it, in getting vestiges of God, such as the Ten Commandments, removed from public places. Prayer and Bible reading have long since been forbidden in public schools and other public places, as we know.

The perverting of human sexuality at every level and the slaughter of countless millions of babies assault our senses daily.

There is an ongoing effort to rewrite America’s founding history. The champions of godlessness revisionists insist that the founding fathers wanted a totally secular nation–one devoid of any moralistic governance. When confronted with the facts of those founders’ own words in this regard, they, in effect, put the palms of their hands over their ears, close their eyes, and start humming one or the other of this debauched culture’s musical atrocities.

While engaged in research for my book, Rapture Ready…Or Not: 15 Reasons This Is the Generation That Will Be Left Behind, I looked into what the founders of America spoke and wrote on the matter of God’s influence in their nation-creating efforts. I included many of their quotes in the book and could have put in hundreds more. Here are a few.

John Adams, second president of the United States, said:

“The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity. I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God.”

“I have examined all religions, and the result is that the Bible is the best book in the world.”

John Quincy Adams, 6th president of the United States, said:

“In the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior. The Declaration of Independence laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity.”

Samuel Adams, Governor of Massachusetts, Signer of the Declaration of Independence, Ratifier of the U.S. Constitution, said:

“I conceive we cannot better express ourselves than by humbly supplicating the Supreme Ruler of the world . . . that the confusions that are and have been among the nations may be overruled by the promoting and speedily bringing in the holy and happy period when the kingdoms of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ may be everywhere established, and the people willingly bow to the scepter of Him who is the Prince of Peace.”

Benjamin Franklin, Signer of the Declaration of Independence, Diplomat, printer, scientist, said:

“As to Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the system of morals and His religion as He left them to us, the best the world ever saw, or is likely to see.”

Thomas Jefferson, Signer of the Declaration of Independence; Diplomat, Governor of Virginia; Secretary of State; third President of the United States, said:

“The practice of morality being necessary for the well being of society, He [God] has taken care to impress its precepts so indelibly on our hearts that they shall not be effaced by the subtleties of our brain. We all agree in the obligation of the moral principles of Jesus and nowhere will they be found delivered in greater purity than in His discourses.”

George Washington, Judge: Member of the Continental Congress; Commander-In-Chief of the Continental Army; President of the Constitutional Convention; First President of the United States; “Father of his Country,” said:

“While we are zealously performing the duties of good citizens and soldiers, we certainly ought not to be inattentive to the higher duties of religion. To the distinguished character of Patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian.”

“I now make it my earnest prayer that God would… most graciously be pleased to dispose us all to do justice, to love mercy, and to demean ourselves with that charity, humility, and pacific temper of the mind which were the characteristics of the Divine Author of our blessed religion.”

(Source: WallBuilders – Issues and Articles – The Founding Fathers on Jesus, Christianity and the Bible, David Barton, www.wallbuilders.com)

How far we as a people have strayed by allowing the groupies of godlessness to determine that Jesus Christ is anathema, but that the gods of entertainment in this world are to be glorified and followed into the abyss of national destruction. There is time to turn things around if the people who truly name the name of Christ will follow the godly directive of 2 Chronicles 7:14. Sad to say—to put it in terms the groupies of godlessness will understand–the trending is in the opposite direction.

Let’s continue to do our Christian duty in carrying out the Great Commission. Let us also vote the right way to the best of our ability. But, at the same time, let’s keep looking for the glorious appearing of our “blessed hope” (Titus 2:13).

Rapture Ready…or Not? Part I

Rapture Ready…or Not? Part 2

You see it in the teen-world. At least that was my first real introduction to the disturbing cultural transformation.

While sitting at a restaurant in Tulsa, I was aware that a large group was being seated near our booth.

I’m blind now, so was wondering what was going on. There was hardly a voice to be heard as the group gathered and settled into their seats.

A person next to me in the booth—not much older than a millennial herself—whispered to me that the group was a big party of high school prom diners obviously coming to the restaurant right after the big event.

“They are all looking at their devices and texting, then sometimes whispering to those next to them and showing them their devices,” my fellow diner said.

It was eerie. A large contingent of teenagers sitting in almost complete silence! A post-prom event—or any other cause for gathering—would have in my generation been noisy to the point of annoyance. Keeping a throng of teenagers quiet, I had thought, was impossible, to be sure.

Today, America’s millennial generation seeks a way out of the dark world they sense gathering around them. Facebook, Twitter, the blogosphere (all social media) is their shoal of safety. Therein they create their own cocoons of security cyberspace shelters where they can sequester in virtual worlds that insulate against the ominous, darkening environ that reality has become.

They look at the political and social worlds of deceit. They observe the cesspool of control and greed about them. They opt to withdraw from the reality that exposes them to the hurtful, adult world into which they seek to avoid being dragged.

America’s public educational system has ill prepared that generation to face competition, to resist taking the path of least resistance. They have been shown by an increasingly godless, self-serving hierarchy of elders in many cases, that worshiping at the altar of convenience is the path to utopia. Sexual desires and self-pleasuring proclivities take first place over all else—including them.

Religious leanings of any sort are to be assiduously avoided at all costs. Whether discarding human babies like refuse to be flushed, or bed-hopping without morality’s condemning restraint the millennials have learned well the pathway trail-blazed by those who begat them.

Rather than contemporary hedonism acting as a refreshing, cathartic freeing up to live a lifestyle of fulfillment and joy, however, the opposite has been the result. The youth—at least a considerable portion of America’s millennial generation, have immersed within the cyber existence, as if that electronic ether is a nurturing womb.

News and entertainment media pound the millennials—and the rest of us as well—with the “progressive” sermons that proclaim it is the central government that can and should provide everything needed for everyone from cradle to grave. Incentive to emerge from their cyber-incubators of safety is thus suppressed. Globalism’s burgeoning expansion has siphoned the jobs that would otherwise be available to the budding, millennial, work-force in this nation.

Force-feeding the young the constant diatribe that American greed makes ours an evil empire that is out to abuse those less fortunate—particularly the darker races—has made its impact. The founding fathers, a bunch of transplanted, white, European men, so the incentive-dashing, progressive, sermons go, were slave-owning capitalists who decimated indigenous people while sweeping all before them toward the Pacific with the pleasure-destroying, condemning rants of Christianity.

The millennials, from their cyber-world, see themselves in many cases as victims. Many of these infer that they spring from the very race that did the founding, the enslaving, the conquering, the decimation. The very privilege they enjoy—of being highly educated through the financing by Caucasian parents—imprint upon their liberally-acculturated psyches that they are guilty by association. Thus they are, themselves, victims. They must therefore join in the constant diatribe against the founding of the nation—against the white, conservative-powers that be who lord their pseudo-morality over the whole of society.

Satanic influence, it is obvious to me, has inculcated and holds sway over the progressive minds who man the cyberspace blogosphere posts. These are gurus to the millennials who live within this audibly silent world. The bloggers and “news” disseminators in that environment constantly pound out the message that the white, conservative males who have always controlled western—particularly American culture, wants to prevent anyone and everyone from enjoying life at its fullest.

Thus, the young must support the progressive viewpoints that are steeped in the mantra that moralistic, religious governance must give way to liberation from such tyranny. The movement of the 1960s has now fully infected our way of life in most every aspect. The young of that era that sought to throw off all moral restrictions—to push God out of culture and society—are now in control of some of the highest offices of the land. They rule over all three branches of government nationally to one degree or the other. These products of the 60s, although representing a minority view on the moral issues, rule by fiat—by executive orders and by judicial rubber-stamping rather than by the will of the people through the constitutionally mandated voting process.

Luciferian influence is readily visible through media that spew anti-God progressivism through specious shaping of the news and blatant orchestration of entertainment presentations. Again, cyberspace is like the vascular system of culture that carries the infection to every societal nerve and cell throughout the nation.

Utopia is promised if the youth will but throw off the shackles of this liberty-dampening, Christianity-based oppression. The millennials who feed off of this vile, cyberspace nutrition, spooned to them while they sit before their computer screens in their pajamas, often in the basements of their parents’ houses because they haven’t the jobs to support repaying their student loans, much less to support their own independent living space, cannot recognize that it is dystopia, not utopia that their progressive plantation masters are creating.

This is not to be seen as a blanket indictment of the entirety of the millennial generation. There are many within my extended family I hold extremely close to my grand-fatherly heart who are of this age group. That heart goes out to that generation, with the prayer that many, many will begin to recognize that it is the embracing of the God of Heaven—of Jesus Christ—that is the key to their achieving the utopia for which the human spirit longs. It is the precepts for living found in the Word of God—the Bible—that constitute the prescription that is the antidote to the venom Satan injects through the cyber-world of deception.

Bible prophecy tells exactly what is happening at this present hour and has been taking place particularly since the 1960s when the “progressives” were allowed to begin removing God from our national conscience.

Paul the apostle foretold the following: “But evil men and seducers shall [become] worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.” (2 Ti 3: 13)

All of the prophecies given in God’s Word for the very end of this present age are crushing this generation within a tsunami of convergence. The Lord Jesus, the greatest of all prophets, promised, speaking of this convergence of prophetic signals: “And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.” (Lk 21: 28)

That will be the Rapture of all born again believers—when Christ calls “come up here!” (Rev. 4: 1).

Daniel the prophet said of these times so near the end of this Age of Grace (Church Age,): “and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.” (Dan 9: 26b)

That is what the observer of world news sees happening each and every day. We are seeing a flood of events—a convergence of the many prophetic signals that portend the soon coming war of Armageddon and Christ’s Second Advent. The Rapture will take place at least 7 years prior to that great event when Christ comes to planet earth the second time (Rev 19: 11).

This generation is submerged in the darkness deliberately perpetrated by the father of lies—Satan. That is the primary problem I deal with in my new book, “Rapture Ready…Or Not: 15 Reasons Why This Is the Generation That Will Be Left Behind.”

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The book’s purpose is intended to convince everyone, particularly those of this deluded, millennial generation, to be aware that Heaven is readying to, in one electrifying millisecond, stupendously transform this world into a time of God’s judgment and wrath.

He will use the Rapture to instantaneously make that transformation. We want as many as possible to escape that time of horror Jesus said will be the very worst of all human history (Matthew 24: 21).

God’s process of making sure you are not left behind to suffer the consequences of man’s rebellion against Him is made simple by the Lord who loves you so much that He sent His Son, Jesus the Christ to die for you (John 3: 16).

The Bible says: “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” (Rom. 10: 9-10)

Do this right now and become Rapture Ready this very moment!

To get a copy of Rapture Ready…Or Not: 15 Reasons This Is the Generation That Will Be Left Behind, for yourself, or those you love who are of the millennial generation, click on the following.

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“Prophetic progression,” as my partner in raptureready.com, Todd Strandberg, terms it, continues at a pace that is astonishing. Prophecy might not be being “fulfilled” as most seminary-trained students of eschatology would have it. None who understand Bible prophecy from the premillennial, pretribulational view, however, deny that things foretold by Jesus and the prophets are being set up on the end-times stage for what looks to be not-too-distant fulfillment.

Even the most reserved among the pre-Trib seminary scholars sometimes admit that Israel being back in the promised land and at the center of worldwide controversy might just possibly be prophecy in the process of being fulfilled. Only slightly less profound than Israel’s being at stage center are developments afoot with regard to the area of ancient Persia, now called Iran. Hard on the prophetic coattail of those developments are the tremendous changes that have taken place in Russia and the coming to power of a “really spooky dude,” as I’ve heard him called in one form or the other over recent months and years. I refer, of course, to Vladimir Putin –the macho, president of Russia.

Putin, when he was prime minister, made the following statement about Israel’s feared military action against Iran’s nuclear development facilities. “Without a doubt, Russia is concerned about the growing threat of a military strike on this country. If this happens the fallout would be truly catastrophic.”

The statement actually seems tempered by diplomatic buffering, considering some of the more bellicose rhetoric coming from the Russian strongman in his ongoing career engineering over the years as he has grabbed for absolute control. Putin’s voracious hunger for power on the world stage is seen in his overshadowing then- President Dmitry Medvedev’s presence as Russian leader. Just days before winning his second term, after the constitutionally mandated non-sequential holding of the office of president, Putin set future Russian policy in hardened rhetoric, making it clear who was and is boss.

He used a bit of cold war-type bluster–but with nuance that veiled the threat–in flexing his pre-election muscles, as illustrated in this excerpt of his words from an article at the time.

In the article, Putin again criticized the U.S.-led plans for a NATO missile defense system in Europe, saying it’s aimed against Russian nuclear forces. “The Americans are obsessed with the idea of ensuring absolute invulnerability for themselves, which is utopian and unfeasible from both technological and geopolitical points of view,” he said. “An absolute invulnerability for one means an absolute vulnerability for all the others. It’s impossible to accept such a prospect.” (Vladimir Isachenkov, “Putin Warns West over Syria, Iran, Moscow,” Associated Press, 2/28/12).

Putin has spoken angrily against American diplomatic involvement in matters of becoming involved with forces intent on taking Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad out of power.

Russia first strategically placed missile-carrying ships in waters near Syrian territory, backing with military threat Putin’s tough talk about securing the Assad regime. The Russian presence now is solidly entrenched in the areas to Israel’s immediate north.

When surveying the overall actions and interactions undertaken by this unusual man who is uncontested in ruling Russia one who studies Bible prophecy from a futurist perspective must raise an eyebrow of realization–or at least of suspicion. Ezekiel, chapters 38 and 39, of course, come to the forefront of supposition and postulation. Vladimir Putin’s future role in Mideast and world politics must by the very weight and volume of its probabilities be a matter of extreme fascination, not mere curiosity.

The great prophetic book of Revelation presents a hellish angel–a spirit—that will, during the Tribulation, ascend from the bottomless pit. His name is Abaddon, as given in Hebrew, and Apollyon in the Greek language. Daniel the prophet mentioned a powerful angel called “the Prince of Persia” who caused all sorts of troubles to be inflicted upon Daniel’s people, the Israelites who were in Babylonian captivity. Ezekiel foretold an evil spirit of the ancient region that is present-day Russia that will at a time near Christ’s return inhabit a leader who will lead a coalition of armies against God’s chosen nation. That evil one is called “Gog.”

With so many signals on the prophetic horizon indicating the Church Age is in the process of being brought to a wind-up, it isn’t unreasonable to surmise that the evil being held back by the hand of God might be very near the time of release. Certainly the one called Gog must not be too far below the surface in these troubling, although exciting, days.

By Sarah Burlingame from The Herald of Hope 

Rapture Ready… Or Not?  Written by Terry James, Copyright 2016

I am an avid reader of end times, last days books, magazines and articles. I have lost count of the huge volume of writings I have consumed not only in the field of research based eschatology, but also in Christian end times fiction as well as secular dystopian books. Needless to say that the end of days has been a fascination of mine for as long as I can remember. Eschatology is the theology concerned with the final events of history, or the ultimate destiny of humanity. Christian Eschatology is a ‘science’ in every sense of the word. It should be logical, understandable through a biblical worldview, verifiable through scripture and reasonable to an open minded secular mentality.

Written by acclaimed author, Terry James, Rapture Ready… Or Not?  just may be the culmination of all modern end times books. It is Christian Theology at its best. Factual, doctrinally accurate, up to date, easy to understand and persuasive. James has laid everything on the line concerning what will happen to the world, including the church, in the final days of history as we know it….. and he gives us 15 in-depth reasons which prove just how very close to that end we truly are! Terry James is partner and general editor in the www.raptureready.com website which was recently rated as the #1 Bible prophecy website on the Internet. Once your interest has been totally piqued by Rapture Ready…Or Not? you will definitely want visit that site. Be prepared to be amazed by the wealth of information concerning Bible prophecy in these last days.

One of the things I was most impressed about James’ book was the way he finally convinced me that the Rapture of the Church will be a pre-Tribulation event. I say finally because over the years my thoughts concerning the timing of the Rapture have at first flip-flopped, then later evolved in a more mature fashion. Rapture Ready…Or Not? was the icing on the cake for me to stabilize and solidify my belief in a pre-Tribulation Rapture. You see, I grew up in the United Methodist Church where questions about how would Jesus return were typically not tolerated. I came to the conclusion that most of the clergy must not believe in a Rapture of the church at all due to their reluctance to discuss the issue. Terry James was able to share Jesus’ words in Matthew 24:38 “For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark,”with such conviction and clarity of understanding that I am now also convinced (no flip-flopping anymore) that the Rapture of the church will be a pre-Tribulation event…. and it will occur in this generation. James further explains why it is imperative to be ready for the return of Jesus so when He calls out, “Come up here” you won’t be left behind. I must warn you though, this book is not for the faint of heart. James deals with the sobering reality of what life on this planet will be like for those who chose not to heed Jesus’ words to watch for Him and to be ready for His return. In an effort to drive home the concept of the horrors that must take place after the Rapture of the church as illustrated in Matthew 24:21 “For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be,”James lists in great detail some of the horrors that man has perpetrated upon man. Yes, the Tribulation period will be even worse.

It is time to wake up folks. If you have a voice in your head telling you “No, this is disturbing stuff. You don’t want to know about the end of the world as we know it.” I urge you to tell that voice to shut up! Jesus loves us so much that He has made a way for us. We have HOPE in His return because He has promised us to be spared from God’s wrath upon an unbelieving and wicked world, IF we believe what He has said is true and IF we are ready. Are you ready to be caught up into the glorious reality Jesus has waiting for us or will you be left behind?

There is a sense among many at this moment in history that impending disaster presses against the fabric of life on planet earth from every side. This is not mere paranoia pushing against the collective anxiety-ridden psyche of a world uncertain about its future. The threat is real, and it is in Bible prophecy. A quick scan of issues, events, and anticipated actions testify to the reality of the threat and validates the angst.

Israel is ground zero for much of the fear pressing upon a world full of dread. The Jewish state is considered the trigger point for possible nuclear conflict in the Middle East–conflict that is sure to spread globally once unleashed. Iran is the antagonist that is the cause of the most immediate threat to regional and world peace–although the world diplomatic community seems intent on making Israel responsible for keeping war from erupting. This is the way it is, despite the fact that the Iranian regime’s leaders threaten to wipe Israel off the map.

Is puzzling to many as to why there hasn’t been an uncontrollable explosion there in the ancient Bible land. Israel’s restraint has been remarkable, considering the threat from its neighbors, particularly from Iran and its developing nuclear program. Rumors continue to fly of war-making against that program, thus to eliminate atomic weapons that will almost certainly be unleashed against Israel if allowed to come to fruition.

The world is in absolute economic chaos. Everywhere one looks, there are untenable fiscal circumstances that threaten not only national, but continental and even planetary economic implosion. Greece is the most pronounced of notable nations to require a $170 billion bail-out–done, incidentally, with money that doesn’t really exist. Debt forgiveness and other sleight-of-hand chicanery are at the root of the “fix”–a trick similar to the trillions-of-dollars, smoke-and-mirrors maneuvering employed to keep America’s financial ship afloat for these years since the current administration began to wrestle with the controls of power.

Like in the case of the Israeli/Iranian threat to world peace, it is dumbfounding to many as to why these economic pressures, pressing in upon the fabric of world stability, hasn’t ruptured the building bubble and collapsed the global monetary structure. The worldwide terrorism factor–wrapped up in militant, fanatic Islam and the ongoing jihad declared against anyone and everyone who refuses to bow to Allah–amazingly hasn’t broken through the fabric of the world’s relative stability. Tremendous pressure from that quarter is on the rise in a mighty way, however.

No matter at which of Israel’s enemy neighbors one looks, there is seen the arising of Islamist insurgency. The Muslim Brotherhood–which was viewed by mainstream news and the Obama administration as a benign embryo of democracy on the ascent— spread its malignant tentacles through the Arab Spring assaults on governments in the region. They sought to replace present dictatorships with other dictatorships, controlled by an oligarchy-like rulership. Somewhere along the way, however, ISIS (or ISIL as Barack Obama terms it) hijacked the militant Islamic drive toward Caliphate.

Why, many puzzle, has that incendiary movement not torched the combustible Mideast situation, igniting the conflagration the world’s diplomatic community fears?

I wrote at the beginning of this commentary that these pressures that represent a cataclysmic threat are in Bible prophecy. The end-of-the-age combination of absolute evil will, God’s prophetic Word says, comes much like the antediluvian age of Noah’s day, which ended with a great, destructive deluge.

Daniel the prophet put it this way: “And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined” (Daniel 9:26).

Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection would, the prophet foretold, set in motion events that will culminate with mankind’s final war that will be fought this side of Christ’s return. The desolations of that era will be like a flood–i.e., the war of good versus evil will include many troubles, which God’s Word outlines for anyone who truly is a watchman in the last days.

Jesus told those watchmen (mentioned in Mark 13: 37) that when we see all of these things, including great wars and rumors of war, that we are to know that the end “is not yet” (Matthew 24:6). But we are to be looking up, because He is very near to His time of return (Luke 21:28).

When is the end coming, then? We know from Daniel’s prophecy that a flood of issues and events with evil at their core will mark the end. Jesus Himself prophesied that the time of His coming will be like it was in the times of Noah’s day and like Lot’s day in Sodom (read Luke 17:26-30 and Matthew 24:36-42). Things will be moving along relatively as usual for those times.

We must remember that those times were filled with godlessness and great evil, even though people were buying, selling, marrying, planting, etc. Jesus then said that the same day Noah went into the ark, and the same day that Lot was taken from Sodom, God’s judgment fell. He said it will be exactly like in those days at the time He returns.

That first phase of His return will be at the Rapture of His church–not at His Second Advent (Revelation 19:11). We can know that is true, because at the time of His Second Coming at Armageddon, it will not be business as usual. The earth will be almost completely destroyed, and nearly three-fourths of mankind will have been killed by that time.

Prophetic observers of God’s Word are witnessing that end-times onslaught of pressures from evil that Daniel called a flood. But, that flood hasn’t broken the dam holding it back. This is amazing even to many who watch and believe in prophetic stage-setting. Why hasn’t the Middle East completely exploded in war? Why hasn’t the world economy imploded, bringing about worldwide financial collapse? Why have the Muslims been allowed to continue to set up their long-desired, worldwide caliphate, while Israel more and more is viewed as the troublemaker that might be the instigator of war?

Paul the apostle, through inspiration of the Holy Spirit, told us the reason things haven’t yet completely come apart–why evil hasn’t yet taken over: And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. And then shall that wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. (2 Thessalonians 2:7-10)

The KJV word “withholdeth” in the Greek language is katecho. It means to “restrain.” So, this prophecy by Paul is about the one who will “restrain” evil, until He is taken out of the way. The Restrainer is God the Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Holy Trinity. God Himself is restraining the evil, which can’t take over the world and be ruled by Antichrist.

How can God be “taken out of the way” so evil and Antichrist can take over for a time? This will happen only when the church–all believers in Christ (the born again) are taken to Heaven in the Rapture. The Holy Spirit indwells each and every Christian at present. When the Church is raptured from the earth, the Holy Spirit will serve a different purpose in God’s plan for the consummation of human history. He will no longer restrain the evil thoughts of mankind. He will no longer govern the consciences of those left behind to endure the Tribulation–the final seven years of history before Christ’s Second Coming. It is no wonder that Jesus said that time will be the worst that has ever been, or ever will be (Matthew 24:21).

It will be hell on earth when the Restrainer no longer restrains evil as He does in this present hour. Jesus says that at the time the Holy Spirit leaves His restraining office, judgment will fall that very day (again, reread Luke 17: 26-30 and Matthew 24:36-42).

That stupendous change for all of mankind can take place at any moment. Here is what Jesus told us further: “Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh” (Matthew 24:44).