Billy Graham went to be with the Lord Wednesday, February 21, 2018. Since then, he has been quoted a number of times commenting about his own passing from this life. He made the declaration in one of his crusade sermons many years ago:

“One of these days you’re going to hear that Billy Graham has died. Don’t you believe a word of it…I will be more alive at that time than I am right now… I will be with the Lord in my home in Heaven. I will have just simply changed addresses.”

I heard Dallas First Baptist Church pastor, Dr. Robert Jeffress, say of Billy Graham upon hearing of the evangelist’s death, “He is hearing the Lord say to him ‘Well done, good, faithful servant.'”

These quotes are reflective of absolute Bible truth. The very Word of God tells us that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We are advised that every believer should want to hear his Lord say to him or her, “Well done, good, faithful servant…Enter into the glory of your new dwelling place.”

One day each of us will come face to face with the Lord Jesus Christ, if we have accepted His death, burial, and resurrection as the only way to redemption and to God the Father. Sadly, tragically, those who have rejected God’s salvation plan will come face to face with Him as judge of their unredeemed souls.

So only the saved of the ages can look forward to having the Lord Jesus say to them, “Well done…”.

Billy Graham, as Dr. Jeffress pointed out the other day, surely has now heard those wonderful words from the One whose Holy Name the evangelist spoke in hundreds of crusades across America and the world. His homecoming must  continue to be glorious indeed.

As we think on Billy Graham’s departure for his new address in Heaven, it is apropos, I should think, to consider our own time of coming face to face with our Savior and Lord. What should we be doing to strive toward one day, perhaps soon, hearing Jesus say, “Well done, good, faithful, servant”?

Each of us who name the name of Christ must work in His great cause in the way He directs. That is, we must do our best to do His will in serving the purpose He has chosen for our time on earth. This service is individual, of course. But, it can also be done in a collective way.

And, this is the reason for this particular approach to our Rapture Ready donation drive for this quarter. This ministry–designed to lift the name of Jesus so that many will be drawn to Him, and to proclaim His soon return–provides a opportunity for all of us, together, to serve our lord in a powerful way. Those who contribute financially to our effort to alert many around the world to God’s salvation message and to the prophetic truth of Christ’s soon return are performing service that will one day bring forth the words we all want to hear from our Lord: “Well done, good, faithful servant!”

The challenges are great, and are growing more so while we move deeply into the very end of the age. Our financial needs have expanded with increased efforts to give the website a more powerful and effective outreach. As example, it was necessary to spend  three months on updating the board. Since the software was old, it took endless hours for two design teams to update the software from version 4 to version 5. Todd says that if he had known it was going to be such a costly and time-consuming affair, he would have started over with a whole new website model.

As Dr. J Vernon McGee would say, I’m a back number, and understand none of the technological aspects with which Todd has to deal. However, I have listened to him as he has worked to make Rapture Ready everything the Lord wants it to be. He continues to work diligently. The effort and financial expense, likewise,  continue to be considerable.

So, thanks for joining us in this most worthy endeavor while the coming of our Lord nears.

Time is short to work toward pleasing our Lord and Savior, who gave His all for us. What an experience it will be one day to–like no doubt Billy Graham has just done–look into Jesus’ loving, omniscient eyes and hear Him say, “Well done, good, faithful servant. Welcome into the magnificent abode of your eternal joy.”

As we get closer to the Tribulation hour, it is important for every Christian to have an end-time mindset. Prayer is essential at this crucial time. We appreciate those prayers more than we can express. If you truly believe the Rapture is drawing near, you should be more focused on endeavors that will contribute to the Kingdom of God.

Please consider becoming a monthly subscriber. This has been our best form of support. And, it is needed as never before.

An easy way to support RR is with an automatic monthly donation. The PayPal subscription service and allotments set up through a bank are convenient ways to send funds to the site. We hope you will sign up as soon as possible. You can find the link on the Donation Depot page. Donations can also be sent to our PO Box at:

Rapture Ready

P.O. Box 969

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As Billy Graham used to say: “May the lord Bless you real good!”

The shooting down of an Israeli military jet over Syria as it apparently attacked an Iranian military site seems to have exposed a long-held fear of Israel’s enemies of the region.

Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, following a statement by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, chided that the shooting down of the fighter jet on February 10  had shattered the myth of Israel’s “so-called invincibility.” It is thought to be the first loss of an Israeli military plane to hostile fire since 2006.

Zarif, in his glee over the shoot-down, said, “Israel uses aggression as a policy against its neighbors,” accusing Israel of “mass reprisals against its neighbors and daily incursions into Syria, Lebanon.” He added, “Once the Syrians have the guts to down one of its planes it’s as if a disaster has happened.”

His caustic remarks came following Netanyahu’s holding up a piece of what he called an Iranian drone and accusing Iran of desiring to impose an empire across the Middle East.

The Israeli engagement with Syrian and Iranian military as of late has some quite astute prophecy watchers speculating that the Isaiah 17 destruction of Damascus, the Psalm 83 war, or even the Gog-Magog war of Ezekiel 38 might be in the making.

Bill Salus of Prophecy Depot Ministry, for example asks: “an Israeli F-16 was shot down by the Syrian Air Defense Force after conducting an air raid on Iranian-backed positions inside Syria. Does this set the stage for the fulfillment of the Isaiah and Jeremiah prophecies concerning the doom of Damascus?”

Many who write are concerned about Israel and its precarious position amongst the Mid-East haters. Particularly, there are concerns about Benjamin Netanyahu and the political intrigues by which he is surrounded.

Not unlike in the case of our own president, it seems the enemies of sound thinking, democracy, and sanity are assaulting Netanyahu at every turn. So far, the globalists and all the others who come against these men are failing in their attempts to bring them–and their nations as democracies–down so that the world order can become reality in order to achieve their evil desires.

The Iranian’s snarky remark about the myth of Israel’s invincibility having been shattered betrays a deeper-seated anger. It involves the same sort of resentment the so-called “deep state”  and Swamp “establishment” harbors for Donald Trump and Bibi’s hate-filled enemies have for him.

The resentment and hatred seems to me to marinate in anti-God vitriol. Satanic fury is at the bottom of the rage.

It’s as if Iranian Foreign Minister  Zarif knows–or at the very least strongly suspects–that God has provided Israel with some degree of invincibility. The loss of a single plane to anti-Israeli, military fire in 12 years is reason to jubilantly proclaim Israel’s invincibility is smashed. They mockingly call that invincibility “myth.” But you have to know that down deep in the Arab-Islamist psyche, they sense that it’s not a myth.

The devastating Arab forces losses of the 1948 war at Israel’s rebirth into modernity, the 1956 war and 1967 wars led by Gamul Nasser, and the 1973 Yom Kipper war led by Anwar Sadat amount to strong evidence. Israel’s seeming invulnerability to defeat must make invincibility seem far more to them than “myth.”

I’m convinced that Egypt’s Sadat came to the conclusion that Israel’s God indeed assures Israel’s invincibility. He thus wisely made peace with Israel’s Prime Minister Menachem Begin while President Jimmy Carter looked on all those years ago.

God does assure that Israel will be a nation forever. But, at the moment, the Jewish state is not God’s nation in the sense of being the eternal Israel, as promised. Israel is the Lord’s chosen nation–chosen to one day be His people and His nation. This will happen when the remnant of surviving, believing Jews at Christ’s return look upon their Messiah.

There is coming a time before then when they will seem anything but invincible. The Tribulation –the time of Jacob’s trouble (Jeremiah 30:7)–will be the worst time ever for Israel. Satan, through his tyrant Antichrist, will wreak more devastation on the Jewish race and the nation Israel than have all the tyrants down through human history.

But, in the truest sense of the word invincible, the Jewish race–the nation Israel–is the one national entity God-guaranteed to never perish from the earth.

“This is what the Lord says, ‘He who appoints the sun to shine by day, Who decrees the moon and stars to shine by night, Who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar — the Lord Almighty is His Name; Only if these ordinances vanish from My sight,’ declares the Lord, ‘will the descendants of Israel ever cease to be a nation before Me.’” (Jeremiah 31:35-36)

All the beautiful pageantry was there. Excitement and joy were on the faces of the colorfully clad athletes from around the globe. Attention of the world’s media focused on how wonderful was the fact that the two Korean youths were marching together and getting along as if peace and love had overruled hatred and division–all in all, a kumbaya moment in the 2018 Winter Olympic Games.

Not far into the ceremony, a familiar anthem to the brotherhood of man swept everyone involved into a euphoric high. The music invited us all to Imagine all the world as one…

Neo-Babel builders construct even their music in a way that clearly demonstrates the luciferian desire to usurp God’s throne. John Lennon’s universally popular song could easily be mistaken as portraying the biblically prophesied millennial reign of Jesus Christ. But Lennon, like Lenin, preached man-made heaven on earth–an imitative mockery of the true Messiah’s coming kingdom. The words and melody are infectious.

Imagine there’s no heaven
It’s easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today…

Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace…

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one…

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world…

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will live as one.

Lennon, who once assured us that the Beatles were “bigger than Jesus Christ,” is a bit off in his assessment given through his lyrics. He says “no religion too.” He wanted us to “imagine” a world without religious restraint. Only then could we all “be as one.”

That particular sentiment–“no religion too”–will have to be rewritten if it is to fit what is coming when the first beast of Revelation chapter 13 and the second beast bring their version of heaven on earth to the planet.

It will be a religious system of the most intrusive sort. Here is a brief look from Scripture about that system:

So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet colored beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration. (Revelation 17:3-6)

The angel who showed John the Revelator these things told him–and us–that this whorish woman who rides the beast sits upon seven mountains or hills. The beast she rides is a composite of world kingdoms of the past and one that is yet to come. The last kingdom and the one who rules it will be Antichrist.

We know from Revelation 13 that his sidekick will be a false prophet–a religious leader–who will orchestrate the worship by everyone on earth of this eighth king who will come up from the bottomless pit.

My friend Dave Hunt wrote all about this eventuality in “A Woman Rides the Beast.”

All of this said, it is more than interesting that the world’s most lauded religious leader in Christendom has waded in on how America needs to be brought under the world community’s control if there is to be heaven on earth at any time in the future.

Pope Francis told the Italian newspaper La Repubblica that the United States of America has “a distorted vision of the world” and Americans must be ruled by a world government, as soon as possible, “for their own good.”

The Pope made the observation in an interview with La Repubblica reporter Eugenio Scalfari.

“Last Thursday, I got a call from Pope Francis,” Scalfari reported. “It was about noon, and I was at the newspaper when my phone rang.”

He said Pope Francis had been watching Putin and Trump at the G20 and had become agitated. The Pope demanded to see him at four that afternoon, according to a Google translation of the Italian report.

“Pope Francis told me to be very concerned about the meeting of the G20,” Scalfari wrote.

As translated into English by Agence France Presse, which picked up the story, the Pope said “I am afraid there are very dangerous alliances between powers who have a distorted view of the world: America and Russia, China and North Korea, Russia and Assad in the war in Syria.”

“The danger concerns immigration,” the Pope continued to La Repubblica. “Our main and unfortunately growing problem in the world today is that of the poor, the weak, the excluded, which includes migrants.”

“This is why the G20 worries me: It mainly hits immigrants,” Pope Francis said, according to AFP.

Pope Francis’s idea that Americans would be better off under a world government doesn’t stop there. The radical leftist pontiff also went on record stating that Europe should become one country under one government. (“Pope Francis: World Government Must Rule U.S. ‘For Their Own Good,’” JEWSNEWS, Rapture Ready News, Feb. 11, 2018)

As we near the midnight of world history on God’s prophetic clock, we see the four horsemen of Apocalypse getting set to ride. Might we be seeing the woman that rides the beast of Revelation chapter 17 getting ready to sit upon its back?

There is increasing talk lately of fears of nuclear exchange. Critics of increase in nuclear armaments are also ramping up their rhetoric.

Russia has been found to have violated several elements of various nuclear anti-proliferation treaties and agreements. The latest is development of a nuclear-tipped torpedo weapon that can be launched into the shores of a country. North Korea is known to be acquiring  technology that will speed up and greatly enhance their nuclear weapons capability. They are being aided and abetted by the likes of Russia and China, who have promised to act in concert with the international community to prevent  Kim Jong-un from obtaining such technology and material.

Yet with all the illegal weapons procurement by America’s antagonists and enemies, the criticism is of the Trump administration. The diatribe is aimed at the president because he has determined the U.S. must play catch-up in the arena of weapons development. This is because the previous president was on an eight-year-long campaign to decrease America’s nuclear armaments–thus to, it was supposed, lessen the chances of a future nuclear conflict.

While America decreased in nuclear capability, the other side went on a tremendous building program, increasing their stockpiles and technological capabilities–even while having entered into agreements and treaties that were supposed to bind them to cutbacks in line with America’s decreases and those of other Western nations.

Trump’s decision to go in the opposite direction of Obama in the arena of nuclear development has, of course, evoked resistance just as has everything else he has done since the 2016 election.

President Trump’s Deputy Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette explained at a Pentagon news conference why the United States is changing course.

“Over the past decade, while the United States has led the world in these reductions, every one of our potential nuclear adversaries has been pursuing the exact opposite strategy…. These powers are increasing the numbers and types of nuclear weapons in their arsenal.

“The president, during the State of the Union address Tuesday, February 30, declared that the U.S. will build a deterrent force “so strong and powerful that it will deter any acts of aggression.””

Mainstream news media are accusing the president’s actions–increasing the nations’ nuclear forces–as reckless. They say, in addition to other things, that he is deliberately bringing the prospect of nuclear war back into the American psyche for the first time since the Cold War.

Those mainstream outlets are almost as one in declaring that it is dangerous for this particular president to have the sole authority to launch nuclear war. But, thankfully, Mr. Trump forges ahead, assuring that America’s security, with strength through deterrence capability, is sufficient.

All that said, this is a dangerous world–as our current president recognizes. It is more than prudent to maintain such strength. It is absolutely crucial.

But, in the final analysis, it is the God of Heaven who continues to hold the key to the lock on the trigger to nuclear Armageddon. The Lord of all creation has determined that the most horrific of all weaponry hasn’t been unleashed. If one studies the many near-accidents involving nuclear weapons, it is astounding that catastrophe hasn’t resulted. Only God’s staying hand has spared us.

In 1980, for example, a missile in a silo in northern Arkansas exploded because a wrench was dropped and ruptured the missile’s thin metal skin. If the weapon at its tip had been armed, yours truly might not be here to write this piece.

There are still unexploded nuclear bombs off the eastern coast of America. Some were never found. These were deposited there because of accidental drops or aircraft accidents.

There have been false missile launches indicated on America’s NORAD radar screens. Those with the launch codes had less than 10 minutes to decide whether to launch a retaliatory attack.

A Russian crew once came within minutes of launching a nuclear strike based upon a false command accidentally issued.

The Lord is still in control. He will be right up until all of the weapons in the nuclear stockpiles are released. Yes. I do believe they will be used–practically every one of them.

Descriptions within the Revelation and the Old Testament books of prophecy indicate death on a sudden and massive scale. The effects of nuclear horror on the human body, some scientists believe, is graphically given by Zechariah: “And this shall be the plague wherewith the LORD will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth” (Zechariah 14:12).

The kings of the east as given in Revelation chapters 9 and 16 will kill one-third of all people living on the planet. This can be done only by employing nuclear weaponry.

Jesus said that if He doesn’t return when He does, “there will no flesh be saved.”

Further indication that the nuclear stockpiles will be used is something I heard Hal Lindsey say. It makes sense, although it could result from a supernatural rather than a nuclear event.

Hal said that during the Bikini tests in the 1950s, they put in the test areas old navy ships to be sunk because of their obsolescence. The military and scientists wanted to see the effects of an H-bomb on these vessels. In addition to the devastating explosion causing massive damage, huge chunks of ice, like hailstones, fell from the tremendous heights the nuclear cloud reached. These weighed 100 pounds and more, falling into the ocean and denting the solid, steel hulls of the ships.

Hal then reminded that the last great judgment of the twenty-one given in Revelation will be 100-pound hailstones falling upon mankind.

He believes–and I concur–that these falling on the millions of military personnel at Armageddon could well be the reason blood will flow to the height of bridle reins and for so many miles. The melting hailstones, having fallen from the sky because of nuclear explosions, mixed with the pulverized human carnage, could make such a “winepress event” exactly like God’s Word describes the Lord’s punishment for rebellious earth dwellers at that time as being.

Planet earth is destined for nuclear devastation, I have no doubt. But there is no need for anyone alive to have to endure that hell-on-earth experience.

Again, here is the divine formula for protection against such a destiny: “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” (Romans 10:9-10).

God’s Word lays out, in detail in many instances, how things will be as the time of Christ’s Second Advent (Revelation 19:11) nears. We are given specific characteristics of the human condition leading up to the time of Tribulation. This is the time in which this present generation finds itself. We call it the Pre-Tribulation era. We also know it as the Age of Grace, or the Church Age.

As a slight preview of things to come from the James quarter, I’ll announce here my next book, presently scheduled to be released March of this year. I say “my” book, but it is  also “our” book.

I and my colleague/friends have put together a volume of fourteen chapters by some of the most outstanding writers, broadcasters, speakers and prophecy experts from the Pre-Trib viewpoint. These are colleagues and friends of many years who have combined their Holy Spirit-inspired  thoughts and analyses on a most important topic.

It is the first prophetic indicator Jesus, Himself, gave as He sat answering His disciples’ question: “What will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?”

Jesus, of course, told them–and us by extension–to not be deceived. He went on to say that great deception and many deceivers will mark the very end of the age.

Our book’s title is, therefore, Deceivers: Exposing Evil Seducers and Their Last-Days Deception.

Authors such as Dr. David Reagan, Jan Markell, Dr. Gary Frazier, Gary Stearman, and ten others have combined their talents and insights. They present a truly important work on what is possibly the most discernible signal in view today that we are on the precipice of Christ catching up believers in the Rapture.

Jesus began by forewarning of deceivers. He went through a litany of other signs that would be appearing as the wind-up of the age drew to a close. He then went into what the Tribulation itself would be like, explaining in considerable detail in some parts of the Olivet Discourse. A little later, He folded back into the mix things to come. He gave how prophecy would shape up and lead to that exact moment when He would say to the Church, “Come up here!”

That moment of Rapture will happen, I’m convinced–as I have alluded to on many occasions–when things become like they were in the days of Noah and of Lot (Matthew 24:36-42, Luke 17:26-30). The Lord included in all of this that there will be wars and rumors of war. The nations will be in distress with perplexity. The seas of people will be in a state of constant unrest.

Yet, this greatest of all prophets–because He is the very Creator of all that is–said that at the same time things are building toward the climax of the age, people will be conducting life in an economical uptick. They will be buying, selling, planting, building–doing all the things that are indicative of prosperity.

Folks, with the advent of the Trump presidency, we are, it seems to me, at the very point Jesus said the generation will be that will experience His next catastrophic intervention into the affairs of fallen mankind. The national and world economies are poised for boom, according to most every indicator. Even the mainstream media is beginning to very reluctantly concede this fact. It wants to give credit for it starting with President Obama, not with the actions of Donald Trump. Regardless, the media is reluctantly beginning to admit that America and much of the world are headed into an unexpected boom. This is exactly the condition the Lord prophesied will be prevalent at the time of Rapture, the way yours truly reads it.

The fact that deception is at the forefront of practically every facet of life today adds fuel to the fires of approaching apocalypse. The apostle Paul’s foretelling of how end-times human beings will comport themselves is all the proof we need to point to the deception saturating this generation.

Paul said men (human beings) will be “lovers of themselves.”

There are a number of ways deception can be seen in this end-times characteristic. I point to only one. Forgive me, Facebook fans, but a vast number who use the various social media spend time lying about who they are, their achievements, etc.–so much so, that some psychological studies indicate troubling cultural ramifications from the deceiving going on.

Many take “selfies” to add to self-aggrandized perceptions they wish others to form about them. These can be considered “lovers of self” and deceivers.

Paul prophesied that  mankind will be “without natural affection.”

I’ve often dissected this characteristic of end-times man as being involved in both homosexuality and abortion. Neither of these characteristics, championed by the progressives of our time, are “normal.” Or, I should say these used to be considered abnormal.

We remember the deceivers within this end-times characteristic. The doctors and technicians within Planned Parenthood secretly were shown on hidden cameras to be harvesting organs from these tiny, helpless human beings. They were doing so, in some cases, while the hearts of the unborn were still beating. These are deceivers of first order!

Paul foretold that end-times man will be traitors, heady, and high-minded.

To me, all of this can be seen as wrapped up in these thousands and thousands of emails that are electronic conversations within government agencies talking about trying to disrupt the Trump campaign and the Trump presidency. Those responsible then tried to deceive Congress by telling congressional oversight people that  the emails couldn’t be found. A deception and a lie.

The 50,000-plus emails have since been found, but not without deep, technological probing and congressional threatening.

One man involved in all of  the email intrigue wrote, or was heard saying, that they shouldn’t be released because the American people wouldn’t understand. This is heady high-mindedness and deception of unbelievable magnitude. These deceivers believe they are far above the average American citizen in knowledge and intelligence as to  say what’s best and what is not in keeping us ignorant. They are traitorous, heady, and high-minded.

The never-ending Russian-Trump collusion story has been proven a false accusation. The lie–the deception–that generated the special counsel investigation is based upon the so-called Russian dossier that was purely fiction. It was prepared and presented to and by American governmental services like FBI in order to begin the probe. Trump’s political opponents were at the core of the lie. These were and are false accusers. 

All of the above proves, to me at least, that we are at the very end of this Church Age. Jesus’ words are appropriate here, like when we’ve used them over and over many times: “And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh” (Luke 21:28).

Most of the world, it can be said, is not prepared for the wrap-up of human history as prophesied in the Bible. This is especially true of the apex nation of world history in which we are privileged to live.

America is afflicted by great turmoil in the political sense. We are divided almost down the middle, so far as our choices for social and political directions are concerned. As a matter of fact, I’ve used the word “schizophrenia”–correctly, I think–to describe the nation’s malady.

One side seems to want freedom from moral constraint and government that is like a rich uncle who provides everything. The other wants morality more sensibly controlled and a return to government founded under constitutional restraint as put in place by the Founding Fathers.

Like the rest of the world, however, neither side of the political divide–or I should say none in America, of most social and political stripes–is prepared for the wrap-up of human history as given in God’s Word.

I continue to perhaps bore you with my belief that America has reached the “think-not” time expressed by Jesus as recorded in Matthew 24:44: “Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.”

I have observed nothing in these times to indicate my sense of direction is amiss about how things are going, prophetically speaking. This is in no way neither to claim infallibility in the area of diagnosing our times, nor to claim perfect prognostication for the future. I’m just saying that things continue to move in direction exactly as I have thus far thought they would, if we are at the end of the age, as I believe this generation to be.

The Trump presidency has seemed to me to accelerate this movement into position for the prophesied end of this Church Age. We are entering a time of economic boom despite all of the minions of global order and anti-God forces coming against Him.

The latest assault, of course, is the forcing of the government shutdown by a 100 percent vote against a proposed alternative by the so-called opposition party, the political party that admits to be the party of absolute resistance.

That party, the Democrat Party, quickly backed down from their resist-at-any-cost stance when they realized the voting public across the nation saw them as placing taking care of illegal aliens above taking care of the military and the American people.

While many economists have been claiming the nation and the world were on the verge of entering a depression worse than in the 1930s, Trump’s innovations, regulation rollbacks and the tax cutting has every economic indicator imaginable looking as if a true boom is beginning. This, despite the mainstream media refusing to present almost any news whatsoever about the economic uptick.

Again, I believe all this will come crashing down at the time of Rapture, when Christ next catastrophically intervenes into the affairs of wicked, rebellious, mankind.

Jesus told us how it will be when He does so. He said it will be like in the days of Noah and the days of Lot. The people of those days were enjoying prosperity, not abject poverty and hard times. This, despite the world wagging on as usual with wars and immorality that invited God’s judgment and wrath.

Jesus said of those days: “ For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah 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” (Matthew 24:38-39).

Jesus forewarned that this time of apparent prosperity would come like a snare upon the whole world: “And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth” (Luke 21:34-35).

The Lord was, in my opinion, talking here about the Rapture, not, as some claim, about the Second Advent (Revelation 19:11.) Thus because this will be an any-moment, unknown microsecond of time, whereas the Second Advent is calculable to the very day as given by Scripture: “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only” (Matthew 24:36).

Jesus gave instructions for the believer alive at the time of this break-in on a world of unaware, uncaring earth dwellers: “Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come” (Matthew 24:42).

Everything looks to be in preparation for that great snare to be activated by the very Creator of all that is. He will shout “Come up here!” to those who have spiritual ears to hear His command. All others will be left behind to suffer seven years of horror, the likes of which the world has never experienced.

Here is how to avoid being left behind to face Antichrist and his regime of evil: “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” (Romans 10:9-10).

When that funny, irritating noise coming from your TV set goes off, what is your reaction? I’m talking about that grating   OINK!…OINK!…OINK! sound that disrupts whatever program you are watching or happen to have the television on while you do other things.

The noise is followed by an announcement: This is a test. This is only a test. If this had been an actual emergency… Well, you know what I’m talking about.

When that goes off, what is your reaction? I must admit that my first, instantaneous, thought is still: Could it be a nuclear attack?

This automatic reaction comes, I have little doubt, from the time of “duck and cover!”–the warning/instruction that dominated my days as a kid. We were told to get under our desks if at school, should the sirens sound announcing nuclear attack. We were told to jump off our bikes and try to get under something, get flat into a ditch, or  hide behind anything available if we were out and about.

I’ve mentioned before in this column that when I was a sophomore in high school, the rumor had it that atomic war with the Soviets would happen on a certain Friday. It was cause of angst for some, but not all paid any attention to the rumor–or to the warnings to “duck and cover,” for that matter. I guess I’ve always been a bit geopolitically sensitive…

So it was that I tried to imagine what the people of Hawaii must have experienced when their devices and televisions announced there were incoming nuclear missiles. The announcement said this wasn’t a test–everyone should seek immediate shelter.

There was crying and gnashing of teeth, if I might use biblical language. People got under mattresses with their families or boarded themselves in garages. One grandfather herded his grandchildren into a sewer manhole. It was a time of anxiety far beyond anything I experienced as a child or have experienced since.

We think of how, if it had been an actual nuke headed to the beautiful islands of Hawaii, there would be no beauty remaining following the impact. It is almost unimaginable as to what that part of the islands would have looked like. But, it isn’t beyond our imaginations, because we have the films of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs to graphically remind us of the results of such weaponry. We have the films of the Bikini tests in the 1950s that demonstrated the horrific destructiveness of nuclear devices far more powerful than the bombs used on Japan to end the war.

Thankfully, the feared attack on Hawaii was a false alarm. The  people between the mattresses, in their garages, and in the manholes could emerge to consider how things could have ended so differently. We can hope that the accidental siren alert will serve as a wake-up call to everyone of just how short a time (less than twelve minutes from time of the alert) such devastation can come upon us.

There is devastation coming that has a much, much shorter time of arrival than 10-12 minutes upon a totally unsuspecting people. There will be no alert to forewarn those under this incoming destruction. That is, no OINK!…OINK!…OINK! will disrupt TV programs or announce on various devices what is about to occur.

However, the siren is blaring, warning that the catastrophic impact is about to take place. The siren has been sounding for some time. As a matter of fact, this column and a number of others have been sounding the siren alarm.

The devastation will far surpass what that nuclear-tipped missile would have caused, had it been an actual attack. The sirens of Bible prophecy have been sounding–especially in these end of days the secularists call the end times. The devastation, following this imminent, catastrophic event, will result in as much as three-fourths of people on earth perishing over a period of seven years.

Those upon whom this calamity is about to fall are oblivious to the sirens of warning. It’s sad to say that many who should know about the coming time of destruction and should be issuing the warning refuse to do so. Not only that, they refuse to believe the impending disaster is a prophetic fact. They even make fun of the notion.

I’m referring, of course, to the preachers who claim to name the name of Jesus Christ, but who don’t believe He is returning in a catastrophic way to planet earth.

These, if they have any opinion or care one way or the other, believe Christ will return and take over from the Church. The Church, they believe, will have made worthy His Kingdom, over which He will then reign.

Only, that’s not what the Bible says. That Revelation 19:11 return is to a war-torn planet where most of its inhabitants have died in the violence and wrath of seven years of Tribulation.   

Many of these type theologians will tell you they don’t believe the book of Revelation even belongs in the canon of Scripture. There is, they will say, no Rapture–no time of great trouble ruled over by somebody known as Antichrist. That stuff is all to somehow be taken in a spiritual way, not literally.

Jesus will indeed come back to rule and reign over a planet that is much like it was in the time of Eden before the fall of man. But, He–not the theologians who think they will prepare the way for Heaven on earth–will do the restoration. When Christ calls all believers to Himself at the Rapture, that very moment devastation will begin to fall. It will be just like in the time of Lot, when he was removed from Sodom. (Read Jesus’ words in Luke 17:26-30).

So, the siren of Bible prophecy goes unsounded, unheard by the vast majority of humanity. But, that siren is sounding more loudly every day in the Christ-sensitive ears of those spiritually attuned. That’s why we present these commentaries. We want to sound the siren a devastating time is coming–and it could come at any moment.

One siren-signal is most prominent. Israel is being forced by Satan’s globalist minions to give in to demands to divide God’s land further. The Lord is on the cusp of taking the Church Home with Him. He will then again begin dealing with His beloved Israel. It will be a time of His wrath, while He purges those who are rebellious earth-dwellers and rescues for Himself a people to populate the millennial earth.

The sirens are sounding!

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!

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

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!