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Last-Days Sorceries
It’s almost like watching a war in much the same way people used to observe Civil War battles. The towns people would, in some cases–particularly early in the conflict–get their picnic goods together and sit in what they thought to be secure positions with their families to watch the blue and gray combatants go at it.
I feel sort of like that at the moment.
There is an end-times war going on–building toward Armageddon–and the individual battles are fascinating.
I’ve noted with amusement and a degree of schadenfreude the leftist, Hollywood types have their accusations against Donald Trump bounce off his administration and stick on them. The sexual harassment charges have made manifest their hypocrisy.
Satan has appeared to have been losing the battle as of late on several fronts. Of course, we know that neither he nor his minions, whether demonic or human, will ever give up their assaults until the war is over. They will seem to win many battles right up until the gathering at Armageddon.
Evidence of the battles Lucifer and his legions will continue to fight is observable in the conflict Attorney General Jeff Sessions has initiated regarding marijuana sales. It is a civil war in its own right.
The old devil never ceases to amaze in his ability to deceive and cajole. He not only has a majority of people clamoring to make “Mary Jane” accessible on a national scale, thus eventually making the nation unable to think clearly, he finessed the controversy into a political poison dart aimed at the president he is desperate to see removed from the reigns of power. The following hate-Trump news outlet piece illustrates my point, I hope.
As of late Friday, POLITICO Magazine could not find a single member of Congress who had issued a statement in support of Sessions’ actions. In the end, this is a self-inflicted pot crisis that could prove to be a critical test of Trump’s ability to maintain his base.
“There’s a lot of old white men who are marijuana users, and the marijuana is keeping them alive,” Segerblom said from his cell phone while driving around Las Vegas. “Trump is going to have fewer to vote for him if he doesn’t keep marijuana legal.”
Sessions’ antipathy for a drug that has lost much of its stigma among a wide cross section of Americans has only galvanized disparate factions in Congress to protect an industry that is expected to generate $2.3 billion in state tax revenue by 2020. (https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/01/06/jeff-sessions-marijuana-legalization-congress-216251)
I’m sure that among that 70 percent of Americans who are said to support legalizing marijuana for medicinal purposes are many who regularly read this column. There are those within my own family who think it is something that should be allowed without resistance.
I don’t.
It is the so-called recreational usage that is embedded within the satanic ploy that makes the battle plan an end-times issue in my view. It is the proverbial slippery slope to open more and more avenues to national inability to think rationally.
America already is plagued with that malady to an unacceptable degree. A glaring example is that at least half of the nation has been deluded into believing that supporting the murder of babies in their mothers’ womb and same gender partners engaging in sexual relations is natural and not abnormal.
The prophetic Word of God has things to say about this drug-induced delusion at the time of Christ’s Second Advent approaches.
John wrote about those rebellious earth dwellers who would populate the planet at the very end, as Armageddon nears:
“Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts” (Revelation 9:21).
Again, John, with dictation from Jesus Christ, writes the following: “And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived” (Revelation 18:23).
The word “sorceries” here is from the Greek pharmakeia (#5331 in Strong’s). There is some connection here to the word “pharmacy.”
The following is informative about the use of the Greek term chosen for use.
Okay. Now lets ensure that we correctly understand this:
The root meaning of this group of Greek words [magos, mageia, pharmakeia, pharmakeus] is “druggist,” “poisoner,” or, “giver of potions.” These particular “sorcerers” were persons able to prepare and dispense potions. But why did they dispense these potions? Was it in order to give relief from illness?
Absolutely not! It was in order to stimulate hallucinations or visions! We must understand that it was long part of pagan religious practice to administer potions, or drugs, which would encourage hallucinations! There is, of course, a direct parallel here to modern illicit drug taking. But these original “pharmacists” were involved in the black arts and in demonology; the basic idea was that taking certain potions could bring one into contact with the spirit world, and that this was to be desired. But the fact that the modern English word “pharmacy” happens to be derived from pharmakeia frankly proves absolutely nothing! Do people visit doctors in order to be given drugs which will bring them into contact with the spirit world? Of course not!! People visit medical practitioners in order to have an illness diagnosed, to be treated for sickness, or to gain relief from illness! Yet there are some extremist charismatic ministries around today which teach that we sin when we visit a doctor just because the word “pharmacy” happens to be related to these Greek words!
We must understand that on several occasions the Bible backs up the principle that sick people should look around for remedies for their sickness. This is a very clear biblical principle!…
While the English word “pharmacy” is indeed derived from a group of Greek words used to describe those pagans who used potions to encourage hallucinations in those who wanted to contact the spirit world, to suggest that modern medical pharmacists are in any way associated with the “black arts” is as ludicrous as to suggest that when my friend took penicillin for a very serious infection, he was really more interested in contacting spirits!!! (By the way, my friend was healed and gave the full glory to God who alone is our healer). (Robin A. Brace-2005, Sorcery in the Bible, Pharmakeia and Modern Medicine www.ukapologetics.net/pharmakeia.html)
The battle waged by Satanic forces to bring in last-days sorceries, according to Bible prophecy, will be a victory in their column. We are, in my opinion, witnessing the beginning of their winning that battle in our beloved nation. But, one battle won’t win this war. We have God’s Word on that truth!
Antichrist’s Incubator
Mulling over the astonishing end-times stage-setting we are witnessing for the coming Tribulation, I came to a realization that one of the most prominent signals given in Bible prophecy is strangely on the periphery at the moment. Every other signal God’s Word gives for the end of the dispensation of grace and the beginning of Daniel’s seventieth week (the Tribulation era) is front and center. But, the prophecy about the entity I call for purposes of this essay “Antichrist’s Incubator” is almost so low profile at present as to be virtually invisible.
I’m referring to the entity we have long considered the reviving Roman Empire.
The European Union (EU) is at present not much written about as being the matrix out of which will come planet earth’s final diabolical dictator. However, the subject has previously long been at the heart of eschatological profferings. Dr. Dave Breese, for example, did a great deal of study, writing,and speaking on the subject of Antichrist and his origins as coming from the area that is now known as the EU.
About the only mention of that area of the world of consequence during these days of Mideast turmoil, Russia-Trump collusion fake news, and the North Korean nuclear threat is that More than 6,000 people joined members of the British parliament in demanding that American evangelist Franklin Graham be banned from the U.K. This demand is made over his views on homosexuality and Islam. And, of course, Britain is supposedly withdrawing from the EU, so even that news isn’t about the EU.
Back-burner status of the EU has opened up the study of things to come in a way I would have thought not possible just several years ago. Middle East machinations have simply overwhelmed the headlines, causing many prophecy observers to push all else from the headlines so far as consideration of traditional eschatological viewpoint about the first beast of Revelation is concerned. Antichrist’s point of origin has changed in the minds of these observers–at least in the viewpoints of a considerable number of those who didn’t have an alternative view all along.
To clarify, there are those who have believed all along that Antichrist will come from the Middle East–will be a Muslim. Others held to the view that Daniel 9:26-27 indicates that Antichrist will be a European–out of the revived Roman Empire— but now believe the son of perdition will be an Islamist. This change in viewpoint for these came because of the stunning movement of ISIS that, of course, has now been rolled back.
I have a degree of due respect for these alternate views to the traditional premillennial, pretrib model. Certainly, there is a strong case that Antichrist will spring from Middle Eastern roots. My close friend, Phillip Goodman, of Bible Prophecy as Written, for example, has a superb work on the subject –The Assyrian Connection (1993). He is one of the most excellent scholars of Bible prophecy on the scene today, and I heartily suggest you get the book and read it.
My own view continues to be that the first beast of Revelation 13 will emerge from the area surrounding Rome–from the European Union. I do believe he will be of Middle Eastern genetic extraction, however. Bible prophecy plainly teaches he will be “the Assyrian.”
However, I am equally convinced that this most horrific tyrant of human history will be born and raised in the area of Rome. There is no doubt in my mind that Bible prophecy also plainly teaches this regarding this man of sin. Further, the title of my essay, ” Incubator,” carries with it, in my prayerfully considered thinking, a more sinister possibility than his merely being born somewhere in the heart of Europe. It carries also the conjecture–and I’m about to get into trouble with some here—that his genetics will also include that which isn’t human at all.
Jesus said things will again be like they were in the days of Noah when he next catastrophically breaks into the affairs of fallen mankind (Matthew 24 and Luke 17). He spoke of the judgment of that time upon a world filled with iniquity when people were carrying on with business as usual despite the wickedness of the time.
The most pronounced wickedness, I believe, was that mentioned in Genesis 6 about the fact that the genetics of man were contaminated by fallen angels, who “married” human women. The results of this union were the Nephilim offspring, part human and part supernatural (demonic).
Jesus, remember, said things will again be like in those days. He was talking about at the time of Rapture, I’m convinced. Here’s the application I wish to make to my title: “Antichrist’s Incubator.”
The son of perdition–Antichrist—will, I’m contemplating, possibly be a Nephilim, a part-human, part-demonic entity. This won’t necessarily be by a “Rosemary’s Baby” sort of sexual union, but, perhaps, the result of genetic manipulations in man’s laboratory settings, under demonic “inspiration.”
Antichrist’s Incubator, in this sense, might well be considered in this, admittedly, strange manner.
I bring this conjecture forward because God’s character and justice demand that He allow every human being ever born to have his or her trial for their comportment in life conducted before His throne. The trial will either be a time of distribution of rewards at the Judgment Seat of Christ (Bema) or for eternal punishment and separation from God at the Great White Throne judgment.
However, the angels who rebelled are allowed no such trial, just as they have no chance for redemption. Thus, the “corrupted flesh”–the Nephilim offspring of fallen angels—had no chance for redemption, but was doomed without remedy in the Flood of Noah’s day.
The first and second beasts of Revelation 13 also have no trial. Antichrist and the false prophet are the first to be cast into the Lake of Fire. They do not stand before Christ at the Bema or before God at the Great White Throne. Their fate is sealed before these judgments.
It is theologically reasonable, therefore, to believe that these two individuals are not fully human, rather likely are Nephilim–the result of a union between the seed of mankind and the seed of the fallen ones, the angels who rebelled, just as happened in the days of Noah.
Today we are witnessing the incubation of Antichrist and his future partner in crime in the sense of the world being prepared for their appearance upon the world stage.
All of this said, take heart. If you know Christ for salvation, you won’t be here to see them emerge from their incubation chamber –where ever they are spawned. Christ is about to say, “Come up hither!” (Revelation 4:1). Even so, come Lord Jesus.
Prophetic Rumblings 2018
The Devil at 4 O’Clock is a 1961 movie starring Frank Sinatra and Spencer Tracy. It involves three prisoners who are brought to an island in the South Pacific. The prisoners are to help evacuate a colony of children with leprosy from the island, which is on the verge of exploding because it is one enormous volcano.
The ground quakes constantly. Ominous rumbling in the background makes clear the urgency to evacuate. All on the island are doomed who are not removed in time.
This is one of my favorite movies. I have thought about it over the years, have even included it in writing these commentaries and in books. The analogy can’t be missed. Planet earth is a volcanic island in the vast sea of the cosmos. Rumblings that are increasing and the quaking that is being felt makes the diligent student of Bible prophecy from the Pre-Trib perspective know that things are winding up for human history’s final cataclysm.
While we enter the year 2018, prophetic rumblings are consistent. The ground, symbolically speaking, is quaking. Despite the time when all seems calm and the rumblings seem to have subsided, a true, eschatological seismologist knows what is happening.
The biblically prophetic sensors cannot lie. The planet is doomed. There is need of an evacuation plan. There is one available, and we will look at that momentarily.
Getting back to the Pre-Trib prophetic sensors the student of eschatology possesses–the spiritual seismometer–I will look with you at three indicators I think it is good to watch as 2018 counts down.
First: Israel will come under greatly increased hatred.
Second: The threat of war will ratchet up dramatically.
Third: National and Western world economies will appear to be booming.
There are, of course, many more foreshocks to be examined, but these are the ones I think are most obviously in view. Like in The Devil at 4 O’Clock, this is an island in the sea of the cosmos that is about to be devastated. We must help as many to evacuate as possible before history’s most horrific time of cataclysm erupts.
1) Israel will come under greatly increased hatred.
Jesus, in the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21, tells His disciples to expect greatly increased hatred while the time of His Second Advent nears. He indicates in these prophetic words that He, Jesus, is the reason they will be hated.
This has certainly been the case in modern history. The Nazis, for example, stirred hatred for the Jews by claiming them to be “Christ killers.” Jews in many parts of the world are still accused in this way.
Mostly, though, they are hated because they are accused of being “occupiers” of land that doesn’t belong to them. They are considered intruders in the land that belongs to the so-called Palestinians.
Anti-Semitism, of course, is Satan’s tool to bring the entire world’s ire against the nation that is God’s chosen people. The devil is more than just a word used in the title of the movie I mention. He, Lucifer, now Satan, is working diligently to bring about the destruction of the Jewish people–the nation Israel. And, it is the “Jewish problem,” as Adolf Hitler and his beastly cohorts put it, that must be dealt with in the eyes of much of the diplomatic world today.
We saw this as the year 2017 came to a close. The matter of the U.S. president calling for the move of the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem brought squeals of outrage. These squeals came not only from the Arab Islamists, but from some of our supposed closest allies.
Although some nations now seem to be trying to climb back on the Trump bandwagon of support for Israel, the vast majority still is screaming hate-filled protests against the Jewish state and all it represents.
I believe this president has been brought forth at this point in history for the specific purpose of supplying American support to God’s chosen people. Far from this being a measure intended to bring peace, however, I think it is becoming obvious that the Lord is using American support to further enrage Israel’s blood-vowed enemies. Additionally, it is making manifest the anti-God, Antichrist global cabal that wants no deity to rule over them (Psalm 2).
The Lord of Heaven might just be stirring the end-times volcano, bringing it to an explosive head. All this might accomplish not only bringing into focus the Zechariah 12:1-3 prophecy, but the prophetic matter I wish to address next.
2) The threat of war will ratchet up dramatically.
We are, I believe, on the precipice of entering the time of the “cry for peace and safety” as given in the prophecy of Paul the apostle: “For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape” (1 Thessalonians 5:3).
This forewarning was issued for those indicated by the pronoun “they.” Paul was speaking of those who are not under the salvation protection of Heaven.
Paul says right after the “peace and safety” foretelling: “But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness.” (1 Thes 5: 4-5)
The people of earth–particularly the diplomatic world–will be crying “peace and safety.” But, those who are in God’s family—the “we” Paul mentions, indicating the pronoun for believers, should know the cry for peace and safety doesn’t apply to them.
The believer in Jesus Christ for salvation is under God’s protection. The rebellious earth and all of its dangers are not for them.
As stated above, I believe we are on the precipice of great, collective fear of war–nuclear conflict–exploding across the globe. This comes partly from the North Korean threat, with it becoming more apparent that China is backing North Korea, rather than trying to damper the North Korean dictator’s reckless behavior.
The sense of looming world war could also come from threats from a growingly hostile and Israel-hating Iran. That whole cauldron of boiling rage might be about to overflow.
Again, this president might be a catalyst to galvanize the developing situations. He is not one to take the path of least resistance as has been the tact of his most recent predecessors.
And, yet again, it is this president who is at the center of the last thing I will mention as possibly bringing the year 2018 to a prophetic tipping point.
3) National and Western world economies will appear to be booming.
I wrote last week, and a number of times before in this column, that I’m convinced Christ’s “days of Noah, days of Lot” prophecy is the most relevant for our time. I believe we are entering the time Jesus spoke of as I pointed out last week. That prophecy is found in the Matthew 24:36-42 and Luke 17:26-30 accounts of the Olivet Discourse. (At least many, including myself, believe the Luke portion was issued during the Olivet Discourse.)
Jesus said business will be going along at a brisk pace when He is next “revealed”–when He next catastrophically intervenes into the corrupt, wicked affairs of mankind.
I believe we have about reached that point.
The economy is, I’m convinced, about to take off in a big way. Like him or not, this president–as mentioned in points 1 and 2 above–is at the heart of that economic boom I believe is coming. I more and more suspect the coming boom Jesus indicated would be in progress when He next intervenes catastrophically might be the one we see developing at this time.
The “boom,” as I’ve written previously, will be, in many ways, based upon smoke and mirrors because of computer manipulations. However, it is manifesting as a genuine uptick for America and much of the world. This is because of the world’s nations being intricately linked to the U.S. economic engine.
How does this all come together into prophetic synchronization? My own thought is that Israel must again become the focus of God’s course of prophetic fulfillment. He will again begin dealing with His chosen people and nation. To me, it is observably manifest that He is beginning to more directly influence matters in that regard.
Secondly, the “cry for peace and safety” is beginning in earnest. The U.N. and the Western diplomatic world in particular are calling for a damping-down of the possibility of nuclear conflict.
Israel, of course, is seen by these as the reason that such conflict might begin in the Middle East. Israel must give in to its enemies so peace can prevail. (And this is what will cause the Lord to bring all anti-God perpetrators to Armageddon–Joel 3:2.)
Again, Donald J. Trump doesn’t see things that way. He is fouling globalist plans to bring in the new world order they seek to construct.
Third, Jesus said it would be at “a time ye think not” when He next makes His presence known to the world. This is not the time of the Second Advent (Revelation 19:11), but the time when everything, economically speaking, seems to be humming along nicely.
We are hearing that hum even now as 2018 gets underway!
It is at such a time of business as usual–or even better than usual–when He will call those of us who Paul said are not “children of the night, but of the day” to be with Him in the clouds of glory. Let us work to see that as many as possible are evacuated from this satanically volcanic planet when the Rapture occur
Unheralded Prophecy in View
We’ve been over it before in this column. However, things are shaping so rapidly it again needs our attention. Prophecy watchmen on the wall should pay close attention.
The seminaries consistently ignore this prophetic indicator altogether. Or they steadfastly say it is to be applied to Jews alive during the Tribulation. It is not for the Church.
I say–and have done so for years–that the prophecy is specifically for our time–that is, the Age of Grace. I’m referring to Jesus’ foretelling of the time of His next intervention into the affairs of mankind. He described those days being like the days of Noah and the days of Lot.
‘m convinced the prophecy involved is so important for us to consider as this new year begins that we will include it here it in its entirety.
In the Matthew Olivet Discourse account, the Lord says that no one can know the day or hour of His coming. He next informs of what this time will be like and what to look for in being watchmen.
But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left.
Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. (Matthew 24:36-42)
Jesus further expands in the Luke account:
And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all.Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. (Luke 17:26-30)
We have looked numerous times at these words of Christ. We have noted that the time of which He spoke in prophesying these matters could not be the time of His Second Advent. The world will be almost totally destroyed when Armageddon is raging. perhaps as much as three-fourths of the earth’s population will have died as a result of God’s wrath and Satan’s evil through the Antichrist’s reign. it will not be business as usual.
This prophecy about Christ’s “revealing” indicates plainly that it will be a time of buying, selling, marrying, planting–all of the activities that indicate business as usual. I maintain that because Christ doesn’t emphasize things that are mundane; he was talking here about a time when business was much better than usual.
As long as five years ago, we expressed in this Nearing Midnight column our belief that it would be a time of economic boom, not bust, that would mark when the Rapture of the Church would occur. It would be the think not time because the world, economically speaking, would be doing quite well.
Of course, not all the world is doing well at present, economically or in any other way. This has always been the case. The poor will always be with us, the Lord, Himself, told us.
However, for the part of the world where economies have the capability to thrive, the world, Jesus said in this prophecy, will be doing quite well at the time He is next “revealed.”
Almost every economic indicator is moving upward in America at this moment. This nation is the economic engine for the rest of the world. The better the U.S. does, economically speaking, the better the other nations who have the capability to thrive will do.
I’m dumbfounded at the fact that the true, Bible-teaching seminaries of America see this prophecy as being only for the Jews of the Tribulation. It seems to be a blindness they suffer.
However, I do know why the tremendous economic potential that has burst onto the scene is unheralded by the mainstream news media. They hate Donald Trump, plain and simple.
Now, I’m not so foolish as to think that the economic upswing is one built on sound economic principles. We are in a tremendous financial bubble that continues to grow by the hour. At some point it is going to burst. It simply defies the fiscal laws for it to continue without imploding.
However, it will not come to that point of implosion, I’m of the belief, until the Lord Says so. He is allowing it to move exactly toward the prophetic point the Lord Jesus foretold in the above scriptural accounts.
As I’ve expressed many times, this president is God’s chosen man for this hour, a builder, an entrepreneur extraordinaire. But, the mainstream news prevaricators refuse to report the tremendous economic growth the nation is experiencing. To do so would move in the opposite direction of trying to bring America down so that the globalists can usurp its wealth and power to construct the world order they wish to establish. They want desperately to destroy this president’s efforts to restore the United States to its former, leading status.
Antichrist’s global platform will be constructed, I believe, when the Rapture occurs and this phenomenal economic bubble explodes and comes down around the ears of an unsuspecting world.
The year 2018 could be the time. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
Happy Holidays!?
The secularists, those who demand that we not be exclusive at this time of year, have done all they can do to replace the greeting “Merry Christmas” with “Happy Holidays.” These don’t want us to hurt the feelings or offend the sensibilities of people by using the name of the person for whom we celebrate the season.
The politically correct insist that we all use the term “Happy Holidays”as we send out greetings in whatever form. They cringe at the sight of nativity scenes and become disturbed at the sounds of songs that name the one whose birthday we celebrate on December 25.
While it is true that the larger portion of American citizenry thinks it not wrong to proclaim “Merry Christmas,” the politically correct Nazis, many of whom speak loudly through their social activist, bully pulpits, try to make it miserable for those of us who use the greeting we cannot and will never abandon.
These of the “Happy Holiday”-only crowd–and I mean the militant types who genuinely hate the moral authority that Christianity represents–see “Merry Christmas” as equivalent of the evil that they, themselves, most often champion. They accuse, for example, in many cases, that Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime celebrated Christmas, many during those horrific years in Germany saying “Merry Christmas” right after saying “Hile Hitler.”
They, themselves, act like Nazi thugs in many cases. They are the types who demand that Christians who own bakeries be forced to bake cakes for same-sex couples or lose their businesses through fines and court costs. They demand that taxpayers, in a nation that claims to be more than 70 percent Christian in population, subsidize the arts, which often display most salacious, even anti-God, presentations. They expect Christian taxpayers to subsidize abortion through support of organizations like Planned Parenthood.
The fact is, there is little “happy” within the ranks of those who want to do away with the term “Merry Christmas.”
These are in constant turmoil. They are often found among those who foment rioting and claim it to be in the name of social justice. They form, in my opinion, the nucleus of the Apostle Paul’s perilous-times characteristic, “false accusers” (2 Timothy 3:3).
Those with the no-more-“Merry Christmas” rant fall in line with every effort to remove God from every public venue. It is just a matter of time, it is obvious to anyone with the ability to observe, that when they come to full power they will demand that Christ be taken out of our private lives as well.
Let’s look for a moment at the mindset that wants to break the bonds–the contact–of mankind with the Creator, a thing that will bring severe ramifications and wrath from Heaven, according to God’s Word. (Read Psalms 2:1-9).
Beginning with our government allowing Madelyn Murray O’Hair to achieve her enraged, singular purpose–to get God out of public schools–we have witnessed a rush to national insanity. We have watched entire generations be subjected to revisionist history and inculcated by anti-God education. The results have, in these days of bizarre behavior and brainwashing by anti-God forces–primarily through social media–brought this nation to the brink of change that cannot be reversed.
I believe it took the God of Heaven, Himself, intervening in the 2016 presidential election, to stop the shoving of America into the godless, grasping arms of the globalists.
The rage that intervention produced is self-evident. We have witnessed those who have been raised through O’Hair’s insane achievement go completely out of their minds. They believe the lies that the mainstream media, the entertainment world, and the social media liars have told them. They are miserable, and even when they get what they want, it just throws fuel on the fires of their anger against an America that, under God’s gracious hand, has allowed them to live better than any people on earth.
There is nothing “happy” about the mindset that demands we say “Happy Holidays” rather than “Merry Christmas.” This fallen mindset has made this the most unhappy generation in American history.
Satan is at the core of the movement to push God out of this magnificent desire by true Christians to honor their Lord’s incarnation. The secularists’ “Happy Holidays” offers nothing but misery in a future apart from God and Heaven’s influence.
Bible prophecy foretells of a time that is coming that will be as far from happiness as can be imagined. Apart from God, Planet Earth is destined to become hell on earth.
Jesus Christ, the reason for our celebration, on the other hand, promises to save mankind–individually and collectively (as the human race)–so that they may live for eternity in the most blissful conditions beyond imagination. This is why we don’t say “Happy Holidays” rather proclaim “Merry Christmas!”
Trump Prophetically Enlightened?
Presidents of the recent past have made statements that I recall as having Bible prophecy in view. I haven’t researched to find these statements in their exact verbiage, but they were made and could be rather easily found with today’s search engines.
I remember that Jimmy Carter referred to the Holy Land as having biblical and historical importance according to Israel’s prophets. Ronald Reagan sometimes would refer to the Second Coming of Christ and the reality of Armageddon. Bill Clinton once said that his pastor, Dr. W. O. Vaught, told him when Clinton was governor of Arkansas that if Bill ever became president, he had better treat Israel according to Genesis 12. –This, regarding the blessings or cursing to be given by the Lord, Himself, depending upon whether one blessed or cursed Israel.
President Donald Trump, in talking about his decision declaring Jerusalem as Israel’s eternal capital, and announcing he will move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, said something of profound significance, in my view. He announced a number of important reasons for his decision. Then he said: “…It is reality, And, its the right thing to do.”
One must wonder how much of this president’s declaring Israel’s eternal capital and moving the embassy there is based upon true understanding of why it’s “the right thing to do.”
A considerable amount of the criticism I’ve heard about Trump’s decision comes from a specific, leftist diatribe. These say it’s the crazy evangelical Zionists who base Israel’s right to the land they “occupy” upon the Bible. The word “Bible” is dripping with vitriol, even when read rather than heard. It’s like they are saying”…the Bible!…Ugh!”
Trump is listening to the Bible thumpers and doing it for their votes. That is the rant. Yet, the following Bible truth is exactly what makes Mr. Trump’s decision to declare Israel’s capital Jerusalem and move the American Embassy there the “right thing to do.”
Jerusalem, is, in fact, chosen by the Lord of Heaven to be at the center of His chosen land for His chosen people:
But I have chosen Jerusalem, that my name might be there; and have chosen David to be over my people Israel. Now it was in the heart of David my father to build an house for the name of the LORD God of Israel. But the LORD said to David my father, Forasmuch as it was in thine heart to build an house for my name, thou didst well in that it was in thine heart: Notwithstanding thou shalt not build the house; but thy son which shall come forth out of thy loins, he shall build the house for my name. The LORD therefore hath performed his word that he hath spoken: for I am risen up in the room of David my father, and am set on the throne of Israel, as the LORD promised, and have built the house for the name of the LORD God of Israel. And in it have I put the ark, wherein is the covenant of the LORD, that he made with the children of Israel. (2 Chronicles 6:6-11)
Almost every leader on the world stage at present is against the decision. Even our closest allies, like British Prime Minister Theresa May, are adamantly against the declaration and the move. Yet this president is unmoved. He seems determined to carry out the promise that presidents preceding him didn’t have the political will or courage to honor. –That of proving America’s commitment to declaring Jerusalem Israel’s capital by moving the embassy there from Tel Aviv.
Trump is one who has proven that he keeps promises, even bucking the heavy resistance of opposition from outside his own political party and from within. He forges ahead, despite the world’s opposition to this decision. He doesn’t wither under the fire of the fanaticism of the Islamic world that rages with hatred for Israel.
It is not possible for me to know for certain, but I strongly suspect that Christian counsel from people such as Dr. Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas, have made it known to the president the truth about Israel from God’s perspective. Thankfully, Mr. Trump has wisely listened to such counsel, it appears. America stands in much better stead with the Almighty with this fulfilled, presidential promise.
Blood Siren
An oppressive angst pervades many within the Body of Christ today. I must admit falling victim to that spiritual darkness on occasion while overlooking the societal landscape across the global horizon. There is much over which to be, for lack of a better term, anxious. Part of the oppressiveness is wrapped up in the fact that the world at large–in the U.S. in particular– seems to not notice. Much more troubling is the impression that most within Christianity are observably in denial that there is anything amiss on planet earth.
Rarely is heard from the pulpits of America mention of social ills, like the murder of babies in the womb, the abominable sexual perversions taking place and glorified on the entertainment venues of the nation, the increasing intrusion of anti-Christian thought and activity into the American culture.
There is still little push-back against an ever-spreading tyrannical movement to eradicate constitutional safeguards. There is increased effort to instead shackle freedom the Founding Fathers sought to give us at every level. In spite of the tremendous efforts of President Donald J. Trump to deal with the so-called “swamp,” despotic change agents at work in our nation are doing all within the power they are constantly usurping from constitutional law to open our borders to some of the most dangerous elements on earth. They still strive to invite, for political votes to be gained, the vicious, drug cartel debris mixed amongst whom is almost certainly the likes of the agents of ISIS and others of Islamist fanaticism. Border patrol enforcement was, before Mr. Trump’s election, hamstrung with a presidential administration-implemented reduction in services and mandated that officers act as babysitters for illegals who streamed by the thousands across our southern borders. Thankfully, we have seen improvement, but severe problems still persist, with many in Congress refusing to make necessary changes to protect our borders.
Again, despite President Trump’s continuing best efforts, America’s infrastructure of domestic tranquility, of civility, is crumbling because of contrived agitation and deep-state governmental overstepping, as racial strife ramps up and we are more divided than ever in our recent history. The federal judiciary in particular seems to have lost its collective mind as decision after decision comes down on the side of perversions and anti-godly causes. We are a nation that has, as the apostle Paul put it under divine inspiration, been turned over to vile affections, and to reprobate minds (Romans1: 26, 28).
For a time there was a certain fear, it seems to me, of an impending financial disaster. There is always concern among the American populace when they believe their pocketbooks are about to be affected. This administration has put into place significant executive orders to improve the economy.
I, personally, believe that we might be about to see an economic boom, not bust, in alignment with Jesus’ days of Noah, days of Lot prophecy of Matthew 24: 36-42 and Luke 26-30. People will be buying, selling, planting, marrying, etc., at the time Christ next catastrophically Intervenes into the affairs of mankind, according to Christ’s own words.
The reckoning is coming, however, make no mistake. The Lord, Himself, I believe, is holding up the total plunge into the abyss of Tribulation. He is not willing that anyone should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But, His patience is not infinite. Judgment and wrath are building. They will come when the Church–some amongst that body kicking and screaming, perhaps—will be called into Christ’s Presence.
This is a message the world doesn’t want to hear. Sadly, neither do many among the Body of Christ. Tragically, neither do the majority of Christian preachers want to mention these things. Nonetheless, it is a message we are commanded to declare. God is causing at this moment the siren of eternal warming to wail more surely than did the sirens of warning during the Blitzkrieg in London during World War II. They scream of the blood that will flow once judgment and wrath must finally fall.
If we, who are God’s prophetic sirens, don’t shout out the message that the end is coming and that God wants all to come to repentance, God’s Word says the blood will be on the prophets’ head. It is a most serious commission, and we intend to continue to project God’s call.
Ezekiel the prophet was a siren during his time, and told of the seriousness of the matters involved.
“Again the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, speak to the children of thy people, and say unto them, When I bring the sword upon a land, if the people of the land take a man of their coasts, and set him for their watchman: If when he seeth the sword come upon the land, he blow the trumpet, and warn the people; Then whosoever heareth the sound of the trumpet, and taketh not warning; if the sword come, and take him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet, and took not warning; his blood shall be upon him. But he that taketh warning shall deliver his soul. But if the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come, and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at the watchman’s hand.” (Ezekiel 33:1-6)
Drunken World about to Sip
To my way of thinking, things going on at present regarding Israel are most significant in light of Bible prophecy. Intrigues involving the status of Jerusalem are profound beyond any entered into in recent times. A strange setting of the prophetic stage is in process, with Saudi and Israel engaging in unprecedented overtures to each other. A key prophetic player is the chief cause of the strange bedfellows climbing between the geopolitical, diplomatic sheets. We get a flavor of the Bible prophecy stage-setting from the following news excerpt.
Imagine an Israeli taking a direct flight on El Al airlines to Riyadh, or the House of Saud establishing an embassy in Jerusalem. Previously unthinkable, rumors abound of a desire by Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman (MBS) to normalize ties between the two countries…
Israel’s relationship with the Saudis appears to be warming, with the countries allied in the struggle against a common enemy, Iran…
There are a number of reasons Riyadh and Jerusalem may be cozying up, outside of the desire to stop Iran’s expansionism. Both countries agree, for example, that the “Arab Spring” revolutions were destabilizing and unleashed dangerous forces. They likewise believe that a reduction in American influence in the Middle East left a power vacuum that risks being filled by enemies. (Inside the Prospective Israel-Saudi Arabia Rapprochement, Israel News, Jerusalem Post, By Ian May/ The Media Line)
Many prophetic observers–including yours truly–believe that Sheba and Dedan of Ezekiel 38:13 likely refers to the area possessed by present-day Saudi and surrounding territory. These will not be part of the Gog-Magog assault against Israel given by the prophet Ezekiel.
Instead they will apparently stand on the sideline and issue a note of diplomatic protest, along with others. Certainly recent developments, with Iran (ancient Persia) being the chief nemesis of both Israel and Saudi, have the Jews and Arabs coming together. They are doing so, at least, in their desire to promote their common defense.
At the same time, the Arab/Muslim world as a conglomerate body is making sounds of war. The reason: the rumors that American President Donald J. Trump will move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Another news excerpt frames the situation.
The Trump administration has notified U.S. embassies around the world that it plans to formally recognize Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel, according to a report published Thursday by The Wall Street Journal. The plan includes the future relocation of the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
According to the report, the plan has not been finalized, but envoys were being notified so that they can inform their host governments and prepare for possible protests…
“The president has always said it is a matter of when, not if, [the embassy will relocate to Jerusalem],” a White House spokesperson said. (White House Notifies US Embassies Around the World of Plan to Recognize Jerusalem as Capital of Israel, The Jewish Press, JewishPress.com, Hana Levi Julian, December 1, 2017, JewishPress.com)
It seems to this observer that we are about to witness the world’s geopolitical players take a sip from that cup prophesied by Zechariah:
Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem.
And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it. (Zechariah 12:3)
Giving Jerusalem validation as the rightful capital of Israel is a thing that should be done. The president is right to do so, if he does move the American embassy to God’s touchstone city of the world.
But, doing so would almost without a doubt bring consequences–consequences which no American president has been willing to risk since Congress declared Jerusalem the capital of Israel with The Jerusalem Embassy and Recognition Act of 1995.
God said He will, Himself, make Jerusalem a cup of trembling to those who deal treacherously with His chosen city and people. The world today is drunk with hatred for God and for the nation of Israel. Perhaps it is this American president who is chosen to be God’s instrument for leading the world to take a sip from that prophesied, deadly, cup.
Church vs. Evil
This week for our blog commentary , I’ve chosen to use a small portion of a chapter I wrote for a book of chapters with colleagues. It is from the book: Blood on the Altar: The Coming War between Christian Vs. Christian (Defender Publishing, 2014).
I believe this is a message the body of Christ–the true church—needs to understand in these ominous times.
The latter part of the twentieth century brought profound changes to this once more morally anchored nation. Regardless of some of the less savory facts that have been brought out in recent times concerning America’s founding, this nation has truly been an experiment in principle based upon biblical precepts.
The year 1963, with Supreme Court decisions determined to try to remove God from public schools, proved to be a pivotal point in the slide toward oblivion that is even now picking up speed. Let’s have a brief review of the early part of that stunning century.
My research in writing the book The American Apocalypse: Is the United States in Bible Prophecy? (Harvest House, 2009) took me back to God’s harsh dealing with America in the 1930s. The things Americans suffered were considered by preachers and politicians alike to be God’s wrath and judgment.
One well-known writer, John Steinbeck, even gave his famous novel on that depressed time in America the title The Grapes of Wrath. America had gone through a tremendous time of growth and relative prosperity during the “Gay Nineties.” (For the younger readers, it had nothing to do with the Clinton years, nor with homosexuality. It was the 1890s, and the term “gay” still enjoyed its proper definition.)
Despite the early 1900s bringing about World War I, the nation leaped forward, and soon the “Roaring Twenties” brought forth the flappers and boisterous, even debauched, “good times.” Reformers tried to squash the hedonism, and with the passage of the 18th Amendment instituted prohibition against alcohol manufacture, sale, and transportation. The action only increased rebellion against morality. American gangsters took over, and illegal booze, gambling, and every other type of nefarious activity permeated culture and society.
Then in 1929 came the stock market crash in the United States, and worldwide depression quickly followed. The wrath of God had fallen!
Or had it?
No, it had not. Neither had His judgment against America’s sin fallen upon the nation, thus affecting the world—not in the sense of God’s great judgment that came upon the antediluvians, the wicked, violent, even genetically corrupted earth dwellers of Noah’s day. But God’s mighty hand of correction through the Great Depression and the horrendous “Dust Bowl” era came down hard on the backside of this nation He so manifestly chose to accomplish great things for His great purposes. Those things would include, in particular: 1) developing the technologies that would spread the gospel around the entire world; and 2) acting as midwife for the birth of modern Israel on May 14, 1948, and to become the Jewish peoples’ closest ally—an ally that just happened to soon become the most materially blessed, most powerful, and most influential nation the world has ever known.
America, despite the Great Depression and war that took thousands of young American lives, came to know a standard of living and pleasures—both unsullied and debauched—like no generation of any people in history. The thing to keep in mind is that during all of that degeneration of America and the corrective measures the Lord was employing, Christianity stood firm. The church—the “born again”—faced up to those efforts to totally debauch this United States of America. The Billy Sundays—the great evangelists—were anchors in the pulpits of the nation, as were a vast number of genuine Christians in the pews across the land. Even a casual perusal of the national landscape of morality today evokes the question: Is there such resistance to evil in these troubling days?
Today, other profoundly disturbing questions to ponder are: Will God choose to again correct this special nation called America? Or, will He take His hand off to an extent, allowing the U.S. to find its own way, which is what the majority of the electorate seems to want?
I get email daily from people who fear this nation will now feel the Lord’s hand of wrath. The die is cast, as one of Shakespeare’s characters said. I don’t necessarily subscribe to that “judgment-and-wrath-are-about-to-fall” opinion, at least not in the immediate near term the way many who send the fear-filled emails believe. Nonetheless, God’s wrath is building. It will be unleashed when the “prince that shall come” confirms the covenant with Israel and Israel’s antagonists (Daniel 9:26–27).
That pouring out of God’s anger won’t happen until the church is removed. However, there is almost certainly a heavenly decision that has already been made, and is even now in the process of implementation. It is likely the decision to either take corrective measures as in God’s past dealings with America in order to get this nation back on the moral course to complete its work in His grand prophetic design, or to give rebellious masses what they more and more demonstrate they demand. They demand freedom to choose what is right in their own eyes.
God’s decision to take His hand off to some extent would be far more fearful than His again taking corrective action like world economic depression. To let the rebels do what is right in their own eyes, thus casting God away from any semblance of divine guidance, means America’s work is done. That is indeed a frightening thing to contemplate.
Much of what happens next is dependent upon the true Christian church—born-again believers. How we choose to confront evil might well determine our nation’s—even the world’s—immediate fate.
I must say that I, with reverential consideration, don’t expect immediate meltdown and correction from Almighty God. I believe with all that is within me that He has been demonstrating corrective movements over the past years and months—movements that have gone unheeded by even the majority of His people. These have chosen to bury their heads in the sands of watered-down messages that have practically no relevance to God’s message of doctrinal truth. Rather than revival, there have been false, emotional outbursts that have done disservice to the Lord who purchased each and every one who has been born again. It seems to me that the church’s work, like that of America, has almost run its course.
Dave Hunt once wrote a book called Peace, Prosperity, and the Coming Holocaust. His basic premise was that this fallen world system, and particularly the United States and even the church, would be drawn ever deeper into believing in humanistic salvation by seeming peace and prosperity. He demonstrated, then, through historical precedent and Bible prophecy both past and yet to come, that the world of fallen man will at a future time of unprecedented evil activity on earth endure a holocaust far worse than that perpetrated by Adolf Hitler. The end will bring, he concluded, God’s wrath and judgment on an incorrigibly wicked world.
I believe America and the world can yet have another burst of so-called peace and prosperity—although I see it as highly unlikely. The “change” the country and the world are clamoring for through trust in human governmental entities rather than God’s moral governance will certainly, if not rejected, as my friend Dave Hunt wrote, swiftly bring the holocaust of the Tribulation.
Let us, the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, pray for the president—even when it seems to do no good—and for all governmental leaders, so that we might lead peaceful lives. This is commanded of us by the Lord. But, let us work to complete whatever He puts in front of us to do for the kingdom. Let us, as Oswald Chambers entitled his book of devotions, do “our utmost for His highest” while our fleeting time remains upon this fallen sphere.
God Declared Out of Order
Anti-God forces are still on the move, forging ahead with even increased intensity in their madness. We read about it every day or see it on our television and/or computer monitors. Anti-God forces’ determination to unseat the Creator of all things has not abated. It is, as said, intensifying.
We can go back much farther. But a modern starting point to see this intensification involves the 1962–63 decisions by the Supreme Court to attempt to kick God out of classrooms by banning Bible reading and prayer from public schools. Then, we consider most often the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 that gave us not only the right, but the commission, to allow the murder of babies in their mothers’ wombs.
God was, in these cases, ruled out of order by the Supreme Court justices. They, we can infer, believe they know better than did the Founding Fathers of America—and, better than God, as well.
The humanists continue in their incessant drive to remove all influence by the One who gives and allows each heartbeat, each breath for every living being upon the planet.
As example, it is interesting that while Sweden has allowed so many Muslims into their country that they are taking over, the most prominent Christian body in that nation, at the same time, seeks to rule God out of order. Many among the Lutheran Church—more than six million membership among ten million citizens of that country—are declaring, in effect, that the order God established is wrong and they are out to rectify the situation.
The following news excerpt explains.
The Church of Sweden is encouraging its clergy to use the gender-neutral term “God” instead of referring to the deity as “he” or “the Lord”.
The decision was made on Thursday, wrapping up an eight-day meeting of the church’s 251-member decision-making body. The decision will take effect on May 20 during Pentecost.
It is the latest move by the national Evangelical Lutheran church to modernise its 31-year-old handbook setting out how services should be conducted.
The decision to update the book of worship gives priests new options on how to refer to God during their services.
Priests can now open their services by referring to the traditional “Father, son and Holy Ghost” or the gender-neutral phrase “in the name of God and the Holy Trinity”. Other gender-neutral options are available for other parts of the Church of Sweden liturgy. (Church of Sweden to stop clergy calling God ‘he’ or ‘the Lord’ in bid to crack down on gendered language, The Telegraph, November 26, 2017)
God is thereby ruled out of order by the high, ecclesiastical body in the nation that seems to have developed spiritual dementia. God’s Holy Scripture refers to Him as “He.” But, Sweden’s Lutheran top echelon, now led by Archbishop Antje Jackelen, who was elected Sweden’s first female archbishop in 2013, says it is wrong to refer to the Lord in the masculine gender.
Obviously, the radical feminist agenda is on track and growing in Europe. That agenda, instigated and fueled by the same creature who first beguiled the first woman, continues to seduce and deceive. God is out of order, is Satan’s number-one accusation.
He told Eve “Yea, hath God said?” He continues to whisper, even shout, the same question. He thus declares on every continent, at every opportunity: God is out of order!”
Again, in Sweden, Muslims are taking over. Swedish women, I’ve read reports, are dyeing their hair black in many instances, and even wearing berkas, to keep radical Muslim men from raping them—thus, because blonde hair and blue eyes, to these radicals, gives license to rape, since the women are obviously, in their view, infidels.
That mankind has come to such a reprobate mindset should not surprise. Insanity has set in on a planetary scale. The lines between truth and lie, between good and evil, have become so blurred as to make God, Himself, almost unrecognizable. Paul, the great apostle, wrote the following prophetic Truth, which we’ve looked at a number of times.
And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, Without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them. (Romans 1:28–32)
The reprobate (upside-down) thinking has set in across the globe. The radical, feminist, mindset is one proof that it has done so. They who hold to such upside-down thinking have ruled God out of order.
Paul writes concerning those who rule God out of order, and who, instead do things which are right in their own eyes: “But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things” (Romans 2:2).