End-of-Days Scenarios Part 9

Continuing my series first posted in 2007:

Damascus lies in nuclear rubble, completely cut off from ever becoming a city again. The major jihadist terrorist heads were cut off in Israel’s preemptive strike. But the collective wrath of the rest of the world’s nations–led by the UN Israel-haters—surrounds the tiny Jewish state, figuratively, at least.

The Islamic hordes of every stripe are in full rage. The battle cries scream from every media and diplomatic venue, as well as in the streets of Europe and other nations where Islam’s populations have grown exponentially.

Israel’s leadership—particularly the military leadership—knows that it is fight or die as a nation, as a people.

But, just as the Samson Option is about to be invoked (bringing the house of Israel and all its enemies down with nuclear holocaust), a man from the EU steps from among his fellows, speaking great things of the diplomatic sort:

And of the ten horns that [were] in his head, and [of] the other which came up, and before whom three fell; even [of] that horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spake very great things, whose look [was] more stout than his fellows. (Daniel 7:20).

This European leader tells Israel he is their friend—almost the only friend they have among the voices of the UN and the newly developed superstate, thanks to the Rapture of the Church and America coming under the European umbrella, bringing with it the most powerful and sophisticated nuclear weapons arsenal on the planet.

He may be but one voice, but what a voice! No one would dare make war with this man, who commands such awesome might. As a matter of fact, this man will one day be worshipped as a god. But not quite yet.

And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who [is] like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him? (Revelation 13:4).

This leader promises Israel that he, personally, will guarantee they are not attacked, and that they’re accepted by other leaders of the nations now threatening an all-out assault on the Jewish state.

He will begin with his wondrous works of convincing all the mesmerized world that he is the man of the hour. He is the ultimate negotiator–the great, longed-for peacemaker.

He even promises Israel they can build a temple on the most sacred spot to religious Jews—atop Mount Moriah, the Temple Mount.

But, in exchange, Israel must agree to put down all its defense, especially its great nuclear arsenal. Israel must agree to rely totally on the leader to be their national protector, their savior. They once rejected their true Messiah but will readily accept this great leader’s overtures of peace. Jesus prophesied about this:

I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive. (John 5:43).

Although Israel and the world have been forewarned, this proud, arrogant, nefariously ambitious man will invoke his peace. It will–ultimately—produce catastrophic results.

However, he will appear at first to be a miracle worker of unprecedented magnitude:

And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify [himself] in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many. (Daniel 8:25).

He is called the “man of sin,” the “son of perdition,” “Antichrist,” the “Beast,” the “king of fierce countenance,” the “prince that shall come,” and other names. But interestingly, he is called “the Assyrian.”

I recommend that you get a book by my great friend, Phillip Goodman, The Assyrian Connection, to read about the Bible’s reference to this man. He and Antichrist seem to be one and the same in terms of considering the future tyrant referred to as “the Beast” most prominently in Revelation 13.

Antichrist, though coming out of the geographic area of the ancient Roman Empire, based upon Daniel 9:26–27, will nonetheless be of Middle Eastern extraction.

I will let you read Phillip’s much-studied thoughts on the whys and wherefores surrounding this postulation, but suffice it to say that the following prophecy seems to reference, to some extent, the Beast’s ethnic origin:

Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all. (Daniel 11:37)

Who is this “God of his fathers?” If this terrible tyrant is Assyrian, based upon ethnic and/or religious history considerations, the “god” referred to might be the “god” of Islam. However, the “God of his fathers” could refer to God Jehovah, Abraham, and Abraham’s predecessors. The God of Heaven. The use of the capital G in God makes it almost certain that this refers to the One, True God.

He rejects the true God of Heaven. (And I don’t mean that he will be a Jew. Abraham–and Abraham’s fathers before that great patriarch—sired many, many people who are not Jewish. The whole of the Arab nations, for example, have Abraham as their Gentile father-progenitor.)

This man, the son of perdition, who stands above all others of like mind–to rule the world, by hook or by crook—is out of the geographical area that comprised the old Roman Empire. While he is a prince who comes forth out of territories encompassed by the ancient Roman Empire, his ethnic origin is from people (his fathers) of Middle Eastern extraction.

He honors the “god of forces.” This is a most interesting proposition. And there are other fascinating factors and considerations in pursuing this line of conjecture.

But that will have to await next week’s space allowances.

***Terryjamesprophecyline.com contributions ***

Any contribution to our efforts in the Prophecyline blog will be greatly appreciated. Help is much needed. Monthly donations will be especially helpful to us in carrying forth the pre-Trib prophetic message during the lateness of this Age of Grace.

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Your fellow servant in these closing days of the Age,

Terry

End-of-Days Scenarios: Part 8

We continue with my series first posted in 2007. Understand that this is a scenario, thus is postulation, but that based upon Bible prophecy truth.

We live in the last time. This is undeniable, if we accept God’s Word. It is indisputable to anyone who holds the Bible as truth. Proof is found right here:

Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time. (1 John 2:18).

So, this is the end of days, for sure. At least, that’s how I read the apostle John’s words. It was already the end of days at the time he wrote his epistles and the Revelation. I’m aware some don’t believe the same John wrote both. I profoundly disagree. And there are those who believe the reference here is to the “spirit of Antichrist,” not to “Antichrist,” as the Beast of Revelation 13. I profoundly disagree with that assessment, too. John, here, is writing about BOTH the spirit of Antichrist and a specific man who will come on the scene at some point. He will both come posing as (the counterfeit of) Jesus Christ, and as against all that is Christian. He will be the worst man who has ever walked the surface of this fallen planet. We will begin to postulate how this Beast might come to power while we continue with our hypothetical, though well-studied and scripturally-based, consideration of things that will quite possibly happen from this point in time forward.

Following the rapture of all born-again believers, the leadership of Israel will look around to find its world support gone with the disappearance of millions of people. All who truly believe Israel has a God-given right to the land, based upon passages in Genesis, will be missing. America will be in total turmoil and desperately searching for ways to regain its national equilibrium. This can only be accomplished by reestablishing a government that will provide structure for restoring order. The European Union, somewhat shaken, nonetheless will remain solid. All civilized parts of the Western world will rush to the EU for help in trying to regain and/or preserve things lost in the greatest catastrophe in recorded human history.

The Islamics of the Middle East, who have for centuries held the people under their despotic thumbs, will not be cowered by the disappearances—even of all of their young children. Rather, they will be emboldened to look toward Israel and see an Allah-sent opportunity to once-and-for-all scour the Jew from the face of what they consider to be their land. This rumor of war will not escape Israel’s leadership.

While the Arab-Islamic forces gather in council of war, the military leadership of Israel will be given the top spot in doing whatever is necessary to ensure the nation’s continued existence. The liberals and woolly-minded who harbor delusional thoughts that peace is primary will be pushed to the margins. Israel must survive.

Gamel Abdel Nasser will be remembered in the councils of both Israel and its enemies who spawned that Egyptian warlord. Nasser gathered the combined forces of Arab nations and attacked Israel in 1956. He was in the process of again doing so in 1967, when the Israeli Defense Force pre-empted the Egyptian dictator’s plans and thoroughly defeated that collective foe. The people who declare they will never again sit still while forces gather to destroy the nation will now be in charge in Israel. Dramatic action is called for; it will be taken.

Leadership of the major Mideast terrorist organizations will gather at the one place they’re all headquartered—the oldest inhabited city on earth, Damascus, Syria. Their drumbeat of blood-vowed hatred will make the inevitable obvious to the Israeli hawks–most all within Israeli leadership. They will decide to cut off the heads of the hydra-headed serpent in one mighty blow. That blow will be delivered by the nuclear sword:

The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap. (Isaiah 17:1)

One Israeli jet with a fifteen-kiloton bomb will cut off the heads, bringing much of Islam into confusion and immense rage. Then, there will be jihad of the most nightmarish sort. But preparation for such jihad will take time. Much of the diabolical terrorists’ most proficient at planning such a holy war will have gone to their seventy-two virgins.

Now, America will agree to agree with EU brainstorming. Something, all agree in the Western power sphere, must be done—immediately. World War III—that some have said has already begun with the War on Terrorism—will be about to get underway in full-blown fury. Israel will then sense the collective wrath not just of its Islamic neighbors, but of the entire world, including its former staunchest ally—the United States of America.

Israel, through its preemptive destruction of Damascus with a nuclear weapon, will have enraged everyone, who now looks at the tiny Jewish state as the number-one troublemaker on the planet:

The burden of the word of the LORD for Israel, saith the LORD, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him. 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 12:1–3)

Israel will be friendless. Most all Jews will know they are doomed. There will be no choice but to invoke the Samson Option. They will bring all who come against them down with their own deadly fall.

But there will be one man within the hierarchy of the EU who wants to try a diplomatic tact others haven’t considered.

Again, we are at the end of space limitations. We will hear this fellow out next time.

Any contribution to our efforts in the Prophecyline blog will be greatly appreciated. Help is much needed at this time. Monthly such donations will be especially helpful to us in carrying forth the preTrib prophetic Message during the  lateness of this Age of Grace.

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Terry James Prophecyline

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Please make checks to my name, Terry James, and put on the line below of your check the word: ProphecyLine.

Thanks so much for your help.

Your fellow servant in these closing days of the Age,

Terry

End-of-Days Scenarios: Part 7

People have vanished all over the world in less time than it takes for light to enter the eye and strike the retina. The chaos is worldwide, but nowhere so profound as within the United States of America. Just a matter of time, however, will prove that the ramifications are geopolitically staggering—for one nation in particular, in addition to America.

The American government, at every level, soon analyzes that every child below the teen years is gone. Every pregnant woman who was with child and who remains has suffered the loss of the baby in her womb. But some other things are discovered that are even more troubling to the officials, the politicos of the nation at every level.

Government is totally disrupted, and the powers-that-be quickly recognize that not even martial law is going to be able to reestablish the revenue basis for carrying on government as usual. A huge part of the tax base–a fatally proportionate one—is no longer here to provide the funds to carry on government as usual! Much of the workforce, particularly the most vital, skilled force that was the heart and soul of American industry and fidelity to the good work ethic, has disappeared in that stupefying moment.

Carnage alone, caused by the many accidents and other disappearance-engendered problems, will require massive manpower and, in many cases, extraordinary skills to begin restoring order. These people are gone in great numbers.

Europe, on the other hand—while dumbfounded, even extremely worried, over the vanishings—seems to have suffered little infrastructure damage. The economy, well-structured by the European Union Parliament, has only minimum glitches in keeping things running. Now, it is bidden by the upper echelon of the American government that is left to advise and assist in helping with things—especially with reestablishing America’s economic base on sound footing.

America’s particularly bad circumstances don’t go without notice by others within the nation-states of the world. Russia and China take special notice. They assess how America’s military complex has been affected.

Islamics who want their religion to rule the world are delighted. The great Satan has gotten its deserved punishment from Allah. Although Islamic children, too, have disappeared, the adults who remain in great numbers are still available to make war—and love, in order to replenish the children. The terrorist Islamic organizations are delighted and immediately see jihad against their enemies—particularly against the Jews of the world–and Israel.

Israel’s governmental leaders come to two stunning realizations:

1) Their only ally, with the greatest thermonuclear deterrent in the world, is in chaos. The US government officials who remain are doing all within their power just to make deals with the EU to–somehow—regain their own power. There is no time, or even facility, to see to Israel’s protection.

2) The greatest supporters of Israel and the Jews, in terms of people who supported Israel’s right to exist –their best friends on the planet—are no longer on the planet!

While America’s top leaders who are still around are coming to understand there must be a complete rearrangement of economy and monetary matters, Israel is getting reports of plans for attack by the Arabs, Persians, and other Islamics, who understand what has happened as an opportunity provided them by Allah—an opportunity to once and for all eradicate the hated Jew and the impostor state of Israel.

The Jewish leadership is intact, and the Jews—even those of the Labor Party and the most liberal—know the tiny nation stands alone. Even Mideast oil exigencies are for the moment off the table for the powers of the West, the industrial nations that must reorganize, not send their troops on ventures into the sands of the Middle East.

What Israel determines to do, it must do quickly. Very quickly. The Israeli leadership realizes one thing beyond all others. They know their blood-vowed enemies will do everything within their power to wipe them–including the Labor Party and other liberal Jews—off planet Earth. But there is the Samson Option, even the liberal Jews agree. The tiny state that is now in the crosshairs of practically every Arab state still has perhaps the third or fourth most lethal nuclear weapons force in the world. The Islamic fanatics–the entire world—must be shown that their vow “Never again!” is as strongly in the collective determination of the Jew as in the years immediately following Hitler’s Holocaust.

Next week, God willing, we will unfold the scenario further, with the thought toward setting geopolitical things up for the rise of earth’s last and most terrible tyrant.

End-of-Days Scenarios: Part 6

Author’s note: We continue with the series first posted in 2007.

Believers are translated, changed in an atomos of time–in a fraction of an element of time that cannot be divided. They now look into the holy, omniscient eyes of their Lord that are fathomless in the depths of God’s love. He leads them through the portals of glory, to the city called Heaven.

On earth, millions have vanished into nothingness before the stupefied eyes of billions of others. All earthly things that belonged to the departed ones remain behind, including clothing, jewelry, and prosthetics of every description.

I once heard a nationally known reverend–so-called—(I don’t like the word “reverend” in reference to anyone on this fallen planet, because there is only one Reverend, and He has just whisked all who are His into Heaven for their eternal rewards) say something like this: “A rapture—if it were to be something that really happens—would mean that there would be unbelievable carnage upon the earth. God won’t let that happen.”

Hello, reverend, but what about the judgments for the end of days given by the Old and New Testaments? What about the Book of Revelation? The seals, trumpets, and vials don’t exactly give us the warm, fuzzy feeling that the era of apocalypse will be a tiptoe through the tulips.

The Kingdom-Now folks, with their replacement theology, however, see these things written in the areas of biblical judgments and God’s wrath as allegory or symbolism. They spiritualize these prophecies or treat them as already fulfilled. They preach and teach that the Church (Christians) will make this earth a better and better place until Christ can safely return to occupy His earthly throne. My dear Rapture Ready visitors and family—they are simply not looking at the same headlines as yours truly. And the headlines I’m hearing every day coincide precisely with what God’s holy, inerrant Word has to say about the end of days–again—as the secular media like to call the end time.

“But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived” (2 Timothy 3:13).

Jesus Himself prophesied for the very end of the Tribulation: “And except that the Lord had shortened those days, no flesh should be saved: but for the elect’s sake, whom he hath chosen, he hath shortened the days” (Mark 13:20).

This world is in for a very rough ride, and the reverend was and is wrong in pronouncing that God would not allow carnage, thus a Rapture is not in the future of humankind. Nothing could be more ludicrous.

The “thief in the night” prophecy is aimed particularly at the people who will be left behind after the Rapture. That great event will certainly take most willfully ignorant Christians by total surprise, but it will not be like a “thief in the night” experience to them. We can know this from Paul the apostle’s words, when he writes to the Thessalonians–to all Christians of the Church Age (Age of Grace): “For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. 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. 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 Thessalonians 5:2–5).

Note Paul’s use of the pronouns “they” and “them” versus “you,” “ye,” and “we.” He is differentiating between unbelievers and believers during this Church Age. The Rapture, for all Christians who are alive at the time, will be an entirely different experience than the “thief in the night” experience of those left behind. We see this in John 14:1–3, and in Paul’s following comforting prophecy: “Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13).

So, getting back to our earth-bound scenarios that we speculate will immediately follow the Rapture, let us look at some dark probabilities.

The most immediate things that assault the senses, while people look around them, are the clothing and other things that fall to the ground, the pavement, the floors. The only evidence that those who suddenly vanished were ever on earth are the clothing and other personal items they no longer need. The prosthetic devices, too, of every sort, give the news pundits something to talk about on the programs that are dominated by one subject: the disappearance of millions.

But, in my speculative view, the most frightening, then, as the knowledge sets in, the most agonizing thing that will grip the world will be the fact that every single child who hasn’t reached the age of accountability for his or her soul will be gone from the planet in that millisecond of time. Every womb of every left-behind woman who was with child at the time of the disappearances will be instantaneously empty. God, in that astonishing moment, will make a monumental and unmistakable statement about His opinion of when life begins in the conception process!

Can we even begin to imagine the excruciating emotional explosion that will take place all over the world?

With the intimately personal cataclysms still raging, other just as staggering considerations flood the fear-filled thoughts of men and women left behind.

Again, in America, martial law is immediately invoked. But, before the much-denuded military and law enforcement personnel can regroup to enforce martial law, looters of every sort move freely throughout decimated society, pillaging, destroying, and raping whatever and whomever they find in their rampaging paths.

The consciences of man are no longer under the governance of the Holy Spirit, as in time just before the disappearances occurred. Homes, empty of their vanished occupants, are open game, and the looters don’t stop to give a second thought to the horrendous future mankind now faces. They think, as I heard Dr. Charles Stanley say, they have died and gone to their warped picture of Heaven.

Well, we are again at the limits of our space allotment for the Nearing Midnight section. And, we’ve only begun to explore, through our Bible prophecy postulations, what the left-behind world will be like, and the likely dynamics that will rearrange planet earth for Antichrist’s appearance.

Author’s note: We continue with the series first posted in 2007.

We’ve seen that Jesus warned that the time of His coming again to planet earth will be “as it was in the days of Noah.” That is, the characteristics of the end-time generation will be like they were in the days presented in Genesis chapter 6. When we look at that chapter, we conclude that it was surely a terrifying time. This must have been true especially for Noah and his seven family members while the time just before the Flood surrounded them. But the whole generation of earth-dwellers lived under threat of violence; violence filled the whole earth, God’s Word reports (Genesis 6: 11, 13). Even though business was moving along at a good, even accelerated pace, violence–terroristic activity—filled the earth.

Does this sound familiar? What did the president call the war declared upon an almost unidentifiable enemy following the 9/11 attacks? That’s correct, he called it “the war on terrorism.” And now the whole international community is uptight about the possibility of ramifications of the terror–the violence—that threatens to ignite war in the Middle East.

Every time such sparks begin to fly, members of the media begin to contact Todd and me, as well as others who have studied and expounded upon Armageddon and the “end of days,” as media like to frame the end time. Violence of the deadliest sort fills the world with terror, and the cry for peace and safety from media and government diplomatic types proves it.

Jesus also said in His Luke 17 prophecies that things of society and economy would be pretty much business as usual at the time of His return at the end of days. People will be eating and drinking. Men and women will be marrying and divorcing, just like nothing fearful was going on in their world. Daniel the prophet said that great progress would be made in technology, travel, and communications at the time of the end (Daniel 12).

Again, does any of this sound familiar? As we can see from the strength of the American economy, things are booming, despite that we are now a debtor nation at an unprecedented level. The United States is inarguably the most materially blessed nation-state in the history of the world. The greatest king of Bible times lived nowhere near the level of luxury and comfort even lower middle-class Americans do today.

So, in that sense, business is going along, in this country at least, better than merely business as usual. It is just at such time as described that Jesus will step out on the clouds of glory and shout “Come up hither!”

Bible prophecy tells us that the day of the Lord will come (will begin) as a thief in the night. A thief suddenly breaks in. He doesn’t say, “Hey! I’m coming to break in!” That’s how we can know that the thief-in-the-night analogy is for another coming, not for the Second Advent–the time when Jesus’ foot will touch down on the Mount of Olives, which will then cleave in half and create a rift all the way to the Mediterranean. Nearly two-thirds of the world’s population will have perished in God’s full-blown wrath by the time of that Revelation 19:11 return to earth. Everyone on the planet still alive will see Christ coming.

The coming as a thief reference is to the Rapture. It will be sudden, it will be stunning, and it will be catastrophic.

Let’s look at the potential calamitous things that will likely immediately follow the twinkling-of-an-eye intervention into this humanistic, last-days world of earth-dwellers.

In the United States, a young mother pregnant with her second child and with a small daughter riding in the basket, will be walking down an aisle in a supermarket.

A truck driver will be steering a semi-tractor/trailer rig onto a superhighway to merge with the heavy traffic flow.

A 757 captain will push the throttles to full power, headed down a runway at JFK in New York.

A surgeon at a major hospital in Minnesota will begin to make the initial scalpel cut that will open a heart patient’s chest for a bypass procedure.

A funeral director will straighten the collar of a starched white shirt worn by a corpse, whose funeral is next on the services schedule.

In less than the time it takes for a neuroelectric synapse firing in the brain to take place, the young mother’s womb is empty. She sees her little girl vanish as she, herself, starts her fall to the floor from the shock of the physiological changes taking place in her body.

The 18-wheeler is careening into the traffic, driverless, out of control, crushing and demolishing vehicles and their passengers while raging ahead in its ungoverned course.

The 757 on the JFK runway is at full take-off speed, but the pilot and copilot are not at the controls, while the right wingtip dips toward the runway and catastrophe.

The surgeon in Minnesota finds the scalpel cutting air, rather than flesh, because the patient is gone.

The funeral director staggers backwards, astonished because the burial apparel he has been making just right for presentation has collapsed, and the corpse is no longer in the casket.

We will have to leave, until next time, those scenario snippets as still-frame snapshots of the paradigm-changing dynamics of the Rapture. Those will geometrically burgeon from the instant this stunning event takes place. It will be the most powerful occurrence of human history since Christ’s First Advent intervened into the affairs of humankind.

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Once again, this series was initially posted in 2007. I believe developments since show that it is still relevant today. 

We will have a look at how the end-time stage is set for the scenarios we will explore.

America is at the top of the food chain, so far as nations of the earth are concerned. It is the richest, most materially blessed nation-state ever to exist. Its achievements in almost every facet of human endeavor are without peer in the annals of the ages.

The European Union is developing rapidly into a colossus that will challenge the US for the title of world champ, so far as superpowers are concerned. But Europe lacks one ingredient in order to achieve America’s superpower status, no matter how economically strong the EU becomes. That one missing element is the military might—particularly the high-tech military complex—firmly entrenched and fortified by (likely) the most horrific thermonuclear capability and the most sophisticated means to deliver total devastation to any other nation foolish enough to initiate such conflagration.

Russia is again beginning to show signs of beefing up for superpower military status. It, too, however, lags far behind in high-tech matters—things that prevent it from achieving the degree of hegemony over parts of the world formerly under the dictatorial eyes of the USSR. The Russian economy continues to be in shambles, and achieving the high-tech needed is thus impeded.

China is biding its time, building a strong economic base for one purpose: to attain a level of fiscal power that can buy and/or develop the high-tech sophistication essential to superpower status. The Chinese raw manpower capabilities unquestionably present potentially the greatest threat, in terms of sheer numbers, of any military force in human history.

All other nations are bit players in the scenarios we will examine. But, combined, they present massive—even insurmountable—problems for the prophesied frightening world of the perhaps not-too-distant future.

Israel is smack in the center of all this global chemistry. That nation will be–according to the very Word of the Creator of all things—the catalyst that will galvanize earth-dwellers into rebellion against Him, thus, will bring all armies of the world to Armageddon. Here is what the One who knows the end from the beginning has to say about Israel and all other nations at the time of the end of days:

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).

So, with the world stage set as far as geopolitical matters are concerned, let’s begin to try to look into the future, again with the crucial caveat that this is all speculation, though well-studied and prayed over by yours truly. Daniel the prophet gave the end-time wrap up in one concise prophetic passage:

And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate. (Daniel

9:27)

Will the consummation as described in that passage begin to rumble upon this judgment-bound earth something like this? Business will be going along at a dynamic clip, despite occasional blips, flare-ups, and glitches. Jesus tells us that in Luke 17:26–29. The rich will be getting richer, and the poor will be going further into poverty–despite the socialists-elite’s promises to the contrary. Terrorism will be pervasive, and increasingly so, just as Paul the apostle stated when he said men and seducers would grow worse and worse, and just as Jesus prophesied when He said things would be just they were like in Noah’s day, a time when violence filled the whole world (Genesis 6:11, 13).

The Arab Islamic states, wanting—as they have for millennia—to erase the Jews from the earth, will be looking for ways to penetrate Israel’s protective shell, fearful of direct assault because of Israel’s lethal nuclear arsenal. The world of diplomats—the so-called international community—will, led by the American State Department, be looking for a way to placate the hostile Islamics. Israel’s territory, as always, will be the offering on the altar of Mideast peacemaking. This, while giving Israel little or no say in the offering.

Every major Mideast terrorist organization, with headquarters in Damascus, Syria, will beat the drums of hatred against Israel as never before. Concern that Israel will take preemptive action will trouble the Jim Bakers of the times in this scenario. Even some who call themselves evangelical Christians will join with other religious entities to point a finger at Israel as the obstinate party in the growing threat to regional, maybe even world, peace.

Well, better stop there for now. If the Rapture doesn’t occur between now and next week, I can promise it will occur then–in this scenario, at least.

A Special Thank You!

The donation request for the Pakistani ministry was very successful, thanks to you wonderful brothers and sisters who so generously opened up your hearts to this effort.

Soon our Pakistani Pastor Anil will send for posting his personal note of gratitude to you and thanks to our Lord.

The printing and distribution of my two little books, Prophecy Power: Strength from God to Face Your Future and HeavenVision: Glimpses into Glory are now in process there in Pakistan. Let us pray together that many souls come to Christ in this mission effort!

For those of you who wish to contribute to this important gospel mission in Pakistan, please send a check to the address below.

Please make checks payable to my name—Terry James—and send to the following address:

Terry James Prophecyline

PO Box 38

Benton, AR 72018

Again, may our Lord bless each of you in every way!

—Terry 

Author’s note: Again, this series was first posted in 2007. The dated news, however, reminds that things of prophetic import are becoming ever more swiftly into view in 2026.

The rebelliousness of the creature called man is, in my view, manifest blatantly for the student of God’s truth to discern in a particular news story that occurred this past week. The media and politically correct crowd’s uproar over the US chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff making the comment—when asked his personal opinion—that he thought members of the same sex in the military who engage in sex with each other are committing immoral acts was quite telling. The voracious feeding frenzy to start the drumbeat for having Gen. Peter Pace removed from his position in the Pentagon has fueled new vitriolic invective against those who hold to such “unenlightened” prejudices.

God, incidentally, is obviously included in our ranks. His Word, the Bible—the instruction manual for the creature, mankind, whom he made from the dirt upon which we stand—says about homosexuality:

For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was [fitting]. (Romans 1:26–27).

The Creator’s Word against homosexuality is even more powerful in an Old Testament prescription for those who engage in that activity. (If it makes you angry, get mad at God, not me. I don’t make the rules. He does.)

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood [shall be] upon them. (Leviticus 20:13).

I know what will be one of the objections: This was for the Israelites, not today’s people. Really? Well, in giving the prescription for living, God hasn’t changed for any people at any time. Jesus, we have established, is Creator of all things, and by His power holds all things together. This, God’s Word says about the Lord of all creation:

Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever. (Hebrews 13:8).

The problem is, as we’ve seen this week with this one issue, fallen mankind will not have the God of Heaven rule on Planet Earth. Since the Fall, man has determined to do what is right in his own eyes. This is an attitude for catastrophe. Human government is fatally flawed. These have tried to create a utopian earth for millennia. All efforts to do it their way—apart from God—have met with abject failure.

The earliest attempt of human government, which followed the Flood of Noah’s antediluvian era, was Nimrod’s attempt to build the tower to Heaven (read Genesis chapter 11). The Lord knew this would end in disaster for mankind, so He came down and separated the one-world builders by giving multiple languages, thus driving them to diverse places around the globe. But man has spent the millennia since that time circumventing God’s intervention. The one-world drive is again being pursued in a concerted effort by the powers elite. When things reach a certain point of depravity, God always has intervened. A prime example was when He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. (Read Genesis, chapter 19, to learn about both the depravity and the Lord’s intervention.) Which gets us to the thing about end-of-days scenarios I would like to explore.

Jesus Himself set the prophetic stage for a future time when He will again intervene—catastrophically—into depraved man’s playhouse of lasciviousness. He said:

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. (Luke 17:28–29)

This is a description of a society, a culture, a generation going forward with business as usual. Jesus prophesied that it would be just like this, when judgment from Heaven would fall, at the time of His end-of-days intervention. It is not, however, a description of the Tribulation era when Jesus comes physically to earth, as foretold in Revelation 19:11. At that time, as many as two-thirds of the earth’s population will have died in the apocalyptic judgments. It will not be business as usual, like the Lord describes here. The things that transpire here, though not as disastrous as things will get later in man’s last grasp to rule himself, will still be calamitous. And the possible scenarios presented are mesmerizing. Let us look at my postulations, based upon the pre-Trib view of the Rapture, which, of course, we at Rapture Ready are convinced is the correct view, from God’s perspective.

Jesus’ description of Lot’s being removed from that condemned city is almost certainly a picture of the Rapture of the only good God sees on this earth—born-again Christians—the Church Jesus began building, and which was born at Pentecost (in Acts, Ccapter 2). Lot, Abraham’s nephew, although not a perfect example of living a godly life, was nonetheless considered a “just” man in God’s eyes. That is, the Lord saw Lot as righteous, a believer–one who accepted God’s governance over his life, accepted God’s salvation plan. Lot and his family lived in a society that was, well, much like ours. It was wicked to its black core. Incidentally, homosexuality had, in that society, become accepted as—even expected to be—part of life in Sodom.

God removed Lot and His wrath began to fall upon that wicked, ungovernable people. Jesus indicated that this is exactly what will happen near the time of His coming again. It will happen at the Rapture—at least seven years before He comes back and touches down on the Mount of Olives. The first part of God’s wrath, I’m convinced, will be His removal from the consciences of earth-dwellers. The people left behind will have rejected God’s governance.

Now, raptured saints will perhaps, from the balcony of Heaven, be given a God’s-eye view of whether the rebels’ claim that they don’t need God to govern them is true.

Millions will vanish in a millisecond—an atomos of time—the prophecy tells us. This nation, the United States of America, which had at the same time more gospel light than any other nation of history and access to more filth and depravity than even ancient Rome at its decadent, orgiastic worst, will experience an implosion that, upon its contemplation, staggers the imagination.

We will look at my scenarios, in this regard, next week.