Most every Bible prophecy student is fairly certain that the number-one signal of where this generation stands on God’s prophetic timeline is centered within the modern nation of Israel. There can be no ending to this great, eternal drama if God’s chosen nation isn’t a major actor within the scenes to unfold as the play reaches its climax.

The proof of God being the play’s Author is His foreknowledge. He has said that Israel would be a nation again after its final diaspora (dispersion). As a matter of fact, His Word foretold that it would be reborn in a single day–which happened May 14, 1948.

God has put in writing that His people, the Jews, will yet have to go through the most terrible times of history. He laid it all out through the prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 30:7), Matthew the apostle (Matthew 24: 21), and John the Revelator (the book of Revelation from chapter 4 to the end.)

He further said Israel would be the greatest of all nations, ultimately. The Millennial Kingdom will have His chosen nation as its apex nation, ruled over by the resurrected King David under the kingship of the Lord of all lords and King of all kings–Jesus Christ—for one thousand years.

So, to the true prophecy student, there is no doubt. Israel is the number-one signal of where things stand when the Tribulation closes in and the triumphant return of Jesus Christ nears.

Now, there are differing opinions on what other signals might be next in line beneath Israel. Here are some of the signals I think we will next be seeing:

• Increase in wars and rumors of wars
• Nations in alignment, as given in God’s Word—i.e., the Gog-Magog nations (Russia, Iran, Turkey, etc.)
• Developments in the geopolitical world, such as the ten-kings developments found in Daniel, Luke, and other places; the EU as a reviving Roman Empire; and Daniel’s interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream image and the ten toes of iron mixed with miry clay
• Religious apostasy, with the ecumenical movements, an apostate pope, and strange winds of doctrines that continue to assault true Christianity
• Some are prone to count as signs some geophysical events such as storms, and other strange-weather events, and earthquake activity. I don’t discount these, but don’t see them as major signs at this point.
• The increase in Antichrist spirit evil with regard to occultic activities such as directing humanity toward Mother Earth worship (climate-change madness) and conjuring through demonic rituals, etc., as the cultures and societies of the world descend toward the abyss
• And, along this line, the Antichrist spirit and all wickedness attendant to it (In fact, I’ve about concluded this might be the number-two signal, right beneath Israel.) Within this satanic sin-infection of most all of humanity at this late hour of the age, I believe we can spotlight the manifestation of a particular evil. The specific evil that jumps out from the slide under God’s microscope–the Holy Bible—can be discerned, I believe, through reports like the following:

Eleven people have appeared in court accused of taking part in a child sex ring which also allegedly involves witchcraft, serious violence and neglect.

The sex ring mainly centres around two young girls and a boy between 2010 and 2020, all in Glasgow, a court heard.

According to prosecutors, the eleven suspects are said to have got the boy and the older girl to take part in ‘seances (and) use a Ouija board…to call on spirits and demons’ as part of the sex ring.

They also allegedly got the children involved in ‘witchcraft’ leading them to believe that they themselves had ‘metamorphosed into animals’.

The group, of seven men and four women, are also believed to have worn cloaks and devil horns as well as making the young boy stab a [indecipherable] to death.

It is also claimed the children were forced to take part in satanic ‘seances’ and made to kill animals – including dogs – as part of the ring that is thought to have spanned across a decade.

The accusations claim that the three young children were raped at different times while some of the group did ‘clap, cheer and verbally encourage’ and film a ten-year-old girl being sexually assaulted. (“Eleven people in court charged with child sex abuse ring allegedly involving ‘witchcraft’,” Daily Mail Online, Rapture Ready News, August 5, 2022)

As history will attest, most every civilization that has been on earth has perpetrated the worse kind of perverseness and wickedness against children in its final throes of its existence. Even in the case of Israel, we know they made their little ones to pass through the white-hot hands of the idol Moloch. The Greek and Roman Empires each had the grossest forms of pedophilia, even within the top levels of government, in days leading up to their demise.

Today, the murder of millions of babies in their mothers’ wombs makes our time like those days when the idol-god Moloch was used to burn children alive.

All of the other things mentioned above–the signals we have discussed in this forum over the years—now seem to have at this advanced date of the age coalesced. The luciferically-spawned wickedness has brought the world to the point of totally depraved activity against children. Like in the days of Noah, the minds of men are almost always on evil continually. There seems nothing left to be done by Heaven’s governance than to institute God’s judgment and wrath.

So I believe a case can be made that this worldwide movement to inflict Satan’s murderous intentions upon the most helpless among humankind–the children—constitutes the second greatest signal of how near is the Tribulation and God’s Wrath.

That means the Rapture of the Church is even nearer than that seven years of hell on earth. Here is how to escape the judgment and wrath that is coming, perhaps very soon.

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)

There is no dearth of information-evidence to address the prophecy by the Apostle Paul for the time so near the end of the Age of Grace.

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

We now have in our once biblically-influenced nation an entire public education system steeped in every sort of evil. And the evil begins at the most basic level.

Kindergarteners are now exposed to the likes of drag queens and their perversions. Grades above that level are routinely taught the anti-God lessons of transgender and CRT (Critical Race Theory) and are inculcated on a regular basis that America as founded and over the years has been a tyrannical, colonial master of peoples around the world.

History is revised–in many cases completely rewritten—to make textbooks present fabrications and outright lies. Marxist socialism and even worse are foisted upon the students of secondary education, and, particularly, those matriculating within colleges and universities.

Human life is counted by these anti-God educators as a problem. Mother Earth suffers because human beings are destroying her, thus abortion is preferred to bringing, in particular, the dark races to birth. (More than 40 percent of the millions of babies murdered in their mothers’ wombs by the likes of Planned Parenthood are African American.)

Abortion is closely allied to LBTQ etc…etc… Abortionists and LBTQ etc…etc…evil seducers help achieve the depopulation of “eaters” who are accused of destroying the planet.

Several generations within the nation have been seduced to believe that heterosexuality and homosexuality are equally acceptable within cultural and societal norms. As a matter of fact, anyone who adheres to those previous traditional views of the matters involved are now deemed to be at best homophobic bigots worthy of being publically ostracized at every turn, and at worst deemed to have mental illness. Homosexuality itself, of course, was a thing psychologists and psychiatrists, in more rational, past times, pointed to as aberrant behavior, or as mental instability in clinical terms. 

 Now evil men who propose creating transhumanism (superhuman/technology hybrids produced by science) have emerged and are in process of seducing all of humanity in anti-God ways that are even more egregious than those inflicted by anti-God, anti-American educators since the 1960s. These exhibit the earmarks of influence of the demonic realm. Ephesians 6:12 is in view as never before. Examples of this end times manifestation of evil men and seducers is illustrated through the following information.

One of the most enigmatic, sensational, and misguided thinkers of the last 10 years is Israeli historian and pop philosopher Yuval Noah Harari. His book Sapiens, published in English in 2015, sold over a million copies as it told the story of mankind’s evolution. His 2017 book Homo Deus predicts a transhumanist future, a world where technology fundamentally reshapes what kind of entity human beings are.  

“We humans should get used to the idea that we are no longer mysterious souls. We are now hackable animals,” he told attendees at the 2020 World Economic Forum annual meeting. “By hacking organisms, elites may gain the power to reengineer the power of life itself,” he said two years earlier. “This will be not just the greatest revolution in the history of humanity. This will be the greatest revolution in biology since the very beginning of life 4 billion years ago.” 

Harari’s prophecy doesn’t end there:  “Science is replacing evolution by natural selection by evolution via intelligent design,” he continued in 2018. “Not the intelligent design of some God above the clouds, but our intelligent design, and the intelligent design of our clouds: the IBM cloud, the Microsoft cloud … these are the new, driving forces of evolution.” (John Stonestreet and Kasey Leander, “Can We Hack Humans? Should We?” Christian World View, July 12, 2022)

Yubal Noah Harari often blasphemes in his pronouncements that man with his AI ventures is replacing man’s concept of the God of Heaven. Some even believe him to be Antichrist in the making. I don’t believe that is the case. But he exhibits the Antichrist spirit, to be sure.

His work with the likes of Klaus Schwab, Bill Gates, and others within the World Economic Forum does look to be a major platform that might produce the satanic regime headed by the man of sin, the son of perdition.

Paul’s prophecy is front and center as the world grows ever darker and evil men and seducers grow worse and worse. But this all means that we are to serve as God’s light for those who do not accept Heaven’s grace gift and who are doomed to suffer through man’s worst time of history.

If you haven’t accepted that gift, here is how to do so before it is too late.

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)

Author’s note: This essay was previously published. It has been somewhat updated and continues to, through the prism of God’s prophetic Word, give an overall look at the world today as it lurches toward Christ’s return. 

The term “birth pangs,” in terms of Bible prophecy, refers to certain convulsive geopolitical, geophysical, astrophysical, and worldwide socioeconomic events and issues scheduled to occur in the time leading up to Jesus Christ’s Second Advent (Second Coming). These are likened to the contractions experienced by a woman about to give birth, with those episodes increasing with frequency and intensity. Jesus’ foretelling of these birth pangs uses the word “sorrows” in His Olivet Discourse on end-time things to come.

And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, “Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?”

And Jesus answered and said unto them, “Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.” (Matthew 24:3–8)

Jesus’ prophecy is further expounded upon in another of the Gospels.

And he said, “Take heed that ye be not deceived: for many shall come in my name, saying, ‘I am Christ’; and the time draweth near: go ye not therefore after them. But when ye shall hear of wars and commotions, be not terrified: for these things must first come to pass; but the end is not by and by.”

Then said he unto them, “Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: And great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven…

And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;

Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.

And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.” (Luke 21:8–11, 25-28)

All of the birth pangs were given by Jesus and the Old and New Testament prophets in context of the Tribulation–Daniel’s Seventieth Week. This will be the last seven years of human history leading up to Christ’s Second Advent.

Scholars in Bible prophecy believe that although the world isn’t yet in that prophesied time of unprecedented horror, the stage is being set. The birth pangs are already being felt. Christians are commanded by Jesus to watch for the birth pang-like developments.

“What I say to one, I say to all; watch.” (Mark 13: 37)

Many who observe the times believe that God in His mercy and grace is allowing us to see foreshadows of the coming apocalyptic storm. One such observer likens the the birth-pang symptoms to a storm front: “The storm front is in view, the birth pangs are being felt.

Top 10 Birth Pangs: A Countdown

Birth pang 10: Signs in Sun, Moon, Stars

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

The present world earth dwellers has seen signs in the sun, moon, and stars that no other generation has seen. From looking into the universe with our powerful telescopes, to spacecraft traversing the black void beyond the farthest planet of our solar system, we have seen things through the prism of photographic science–something no other people in earth’s history have known.

Whether considering the solar flares that disrupt earth’s electromagnetic mechanics, looking with awe upon spectacular landings on the moon, or observing with horror the explosions of two shuttles, we have seen fearful signs. Who could but be mesmerized by watching the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet slam into Jupiter in July 1994?

UFO sightings around the globe are becoming almost routine fare. Pilots, prime ministers, presidents, and just plain people report seeing spectacular light shows, moving apparently with directed intelligence throughout the night skies.

We have seen the beginnings of this birth pang, scheduled to become much more intense when the Tribulation begins.

Birth Pang 9: Violence upon the Whole Earth

And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. (Luke 17:26)

The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. (Genesis 6:11)

And God said unto Noah, “The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.” (Genesis 6:13)

All we must do is to look at the headlines to know that the earth is filled with violence. Jesus’ words of the world being like in the time of Noah just before the Flood certainly is an apt description of this generation, no matter what society one cares to examine.

If we go to the darkest regions, there are tribal slaughters. If we look at the sophisticated societies of the Western world, there is violence among gangs; destructive, even deadly riots, among families; and one-on-one homicidal rage. Terrorism from the Middle East is indicative of violence that literally saturates the human condition.

Violence in this last time is a symptom of the beginning of sorrows.

Birth Pang 8: Famines, Pestilence, Earthquakes

For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. (Matthew 24:7)

And great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven. (Luke 21:11)

It is an astounding paradox that there is at the same time plenty of every variety of life-sustaining foods and medicines in most of the Western world—particularly in America—yet there are deadly pestilences and famines in places such as Ethiopia, the Sudan, and many other regions. These are created in almost every case by ethnic cleansing ordered by dictators, just as Jesus foretold. COVID, many believe, is one such end times pestilence–and that created to achieve globalist evil.

“Nation shall rise against nation…” The word for “nation” is the Greek word ethnos,  from which our English word ”ethnic” is derived.

Earthquakes are being reported at an exponentially growing rate—not just quakes, but quakes of significant magnitude. The increase can be quantified and verified today, with the vast technological advances in monitoring.

Earthquakes, wars, and rumors of war are precursors to the impending emergence of a time of unprecedented sorrows.

Birth Pang 7: Nations in Distress with Perplexity

And there shall be signs… and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring. (Luke 21:25)

Planet earth and all of the nations during this last time are filled with perplexities when trying to fix the things that seem to be broken. Economies are in trouble; there is ethnic rage around the world; no one can live in peace; and terrorism threatens everyone, everywhere.

Yet, Jesus says these are just the beginning of sorrows–announcing the birth of a truly New World Order. It will be the birth not of the time of Antichrist’s regime, but, ultimately, of Jesus Christ’s Millennial Kingdom.

Birth Pang 6: False Prophets; False Teachers

And Jesus answered and said unto them, “Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.” (Matthew 24:4–5)

Jesus warned that there would be an assault on truth by false teachers. A couple of recent examples of this are the attacks on the deity of Jesus Christ. The secular entertainment and news industries–as well as some within “Christendom” are attempting to inculcate us with the message that Jesus didn’t really die on the cross—it was a faked death and resurrection. They say that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were actually lovers, who produced offspring that now make up a progeny that will one day rule in some nebulous way that is never explained.

Documentaries have been shown time and time again purporting that the bones of Jesus’ relatives–perhaps even of Jesus, Himself, have been found in ossuaries (bone boxes) in caves in and around Jerusalem. These are never backed by even the slightest of evidence–it is fiction of the worst order.

Jesus, however, said the generation that would begin seeing this type of false teaching would “believe it not.” He said they would come in His name, and would even claim to be Him. Recent news accounts tell of a man who claims just that, and he has received considerable news coverage.

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. (2 Timothy 4:3–4)

Most troubling of all are the false teachers within Christianity. These proclaim a “do-good” and “feel-good” gospel. They totally stay away from preaching and teaching that people are sinners, thus are separated from the God who created them. They don’t teach that a terrible price had to be paid to redeem us from our sins. “Jesus is love” is the only message they want to teach. But, they refuse to fully reveal the extent of that love–that God gave His Son, Jesus, as a sacrifice for the sins into which we are born since the Fall in Eden.

They fear–and their fears are well-grounded—that if they preach the rest of God’s love offering to mankind, they will lose their huge audiences, who want only to hear the fairytales they bring every Sunday in their gargantuan arenas, and through their multimillion dollar television forums.

The false teachers and itching ears of this last time are surely prime evidence that we are witnessing the birth pangs Jesus and the Apostle Paul prophesied.

Birth Pang 5: End-time Technology

But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased. (Daniel 12:4)

Daniel the prophet prophesied a time when transportation and knowledge would increase. The past century to the present date has produced an explosion of transportation and knowledge experienced by no other people of any time in human history.

Man could mount a horse and ride at no more than fifty miles an hour or so from the time of the Garden of Eden until the middle of the nineteenth century. Since then, man has progressed to the point of traveling at more than twenty thousand miles an hour in a spacecraft, and his communication at the speed of light over wires, fiber optics, and beams of electronic transmissions through space and earth’s atmosphere.

And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. (Revelation 13:16–17)

That explosion of knowledge has produced the technologies that can enslave the world. Antichrist will use satellite and computer technologies, no doubt, to put all earth-dwellers in electronic bondage. Electronic funds transfer methodologies and devices are now capable of bringing all people into a cashless society–one that can fit within the system foretold in Revelation 13:16–18. This represents a major birth pang.

Birth Pang 4: Nations Aligning for Prophetic Fulfillment

Psalms

Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying, “Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.” (Psalms 2:1–3)

Nations today are aligning against God just as prophesied in the verses above. The birth pang-like convulsions are coming in contractions, as nation after nation pulls farther from the prescription their Creator wrote for how life on earth must be conducted. Those nations specifically foretold to be end-time players can be found in the following Scriptures. They are in the news every day in our time.

Revived Roman Empire: Daniel chapters 2, 7, 8, 9, and 11

China and “Kings of the East”: Revelation chapters 9 and 16

Russia, Iran (Persia), Turkey (Togarmah), and many others: Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39

Birth Pang 3: Apostasy: One-World Church Forming

Revelation Chapter 13 prophesies that a False Prophet will point all earth-dwellers to Antichrist, who will, ultimately, demand worship. Second Thessalonians chapter 4 also speaks to this demand for the world to worship the “man of sin,” also known as “the son of perdition.”

There will develop an ecumenical amalgamation of many religions, leading to a one-world religious system, as outlined in Revelation chapter 17.

This syncretized apostate system will reign until Antichrist decides he wants all worship for himself. His regime will turn on all who run this one-world church, and destroy them.

There is a massive movement toward this system today. The cry is against true Christianity as being narrow-minded and bigoted. There are many ways to God, they cry. They proclaim that the only way to end the religious bickering is to meld all religious beliefs into one system.

The movement toward one-world religion is a major birth pang swelling and moving in our time.

Birth Pang 2: One-World Government and Economy Forming

The forming of a New World Order is underway at a phenomenal pace. The so-called international community has arisen in this last time to pressure less-powerful nations to conform to the developing one-world template, or remain forever in destitution.

The European Union is the reviving Roman Empire, many prophecy observers believe, and is on the ascent in a swiftness that amazes. Daniel chapters 2, 7, 8, 9, and 11, and Revelation chapters 13, 17, and 18 all foretell he rise of s one-world government.

We are seeing the development of world trading blocs on the order of the EU. One such trading bloc is taking place in North America, and includes Canada, the US, and Mexico—with smaller nations in the hemisphere most likely scheduled to be a part of the mix.

This union was dissolved for the most part during the Donald J. Trump administration, but has since been put back into the thinking of those who want to be part of a new globalist order. These world economic blocs look to be, if brought to fruition, what will eventuate in the ten-kings prophecy of Revelation chapter 17.

The economic convulsions taking place represent birth pangs that portend the coming Tribulation.

Birth Pang 1: Israel 

A voice of noise from the city, a voice from the temple, a voice of the LORD that rendereth recompence to his enemies. Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child.

Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children.

“Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth?” saith the LORD: “shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb?” saith thy God. (Isaiah 66:6–9)

Israel is without question the single most profound signal that we are on the edge of entering the Tribulation.

Key among factors surrounding Israel as the number-ne birth pang is that nation being at the heart of the cry for peace and safety. As a matter of fact, Antichrist confirming of a covenant of peace is the act that will usher in the Tribulation, it is foretold in Daniel 9: 27.

With the proposed dividing of land by almost every peace effort involving God’s chosen nation, Israel, there is an increasing cry from the world of diplomacy today for peace and safety. This is not without good reason. The threat of thermonuclear war is unthinkable, so deadly would be the results.

The Apostle Paul prophesied this would be the case for the last time, and what the final result of that cry would be.

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)

There is great worldwide clamor for peace today. Whether considering the area surrounding the tiny Jewish state of Israel, the entire Mideast region, or other less biblical geographic areas of the world, people are grasping for peace and safety.

Specifically, there is a great cry for safety today, seeking security from the threat of global terrorism. This terrorism is, for the most part, wrapped around the existence of Israel in the area known as the Holy Land. Added to the volatility and tension is the matter of oil, which likely will be the catalyst–in the geopolitical sense—for bringing all nations to Armageddon. Israel is increasingly being seen by the world diplomatic community as the holdup to establishing peace. “Land for peace” is the deluded mantra. If Israel will give up more territory, the Islamic terrorists will cease their murderous rage.

The prophet Zechariah foretold that the whole world will turn against Israel, and that this will bring on the worst time of war-making in world history (read Zechariah 12:1–3).

The cry for peace and safety will be answered by the end-time world leader, but the people of the world will get more than they bargained for.

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: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand. (Daniel 8:25)

Israel—and its threat to world peace because of satanic rage against God’s chosen people—is the number-one birth pang that indicates where this generation stands on God’s prophetic timeline.

The book of final prophecies that Daniel was told to “shut up…and seal.. even to the time of the end” seems to now be open, its contents spilling across our newspapers’ front pages and our television and computer screens (see Daniel 12:4).

No previous generation has experienced the number, frequency, and intensity of signals so similar to things prophesied to be witnessed by the generation alive at the consummation of human history. Daniel’s last-days’ floodgate indeed seems now open and the foretold torrent of evil seems to be deluging the planet, while the prophet’s words in Daniel 12 resound hourly.

Knowledge now increases in geometric progression. With the advent of the Internet and other communication technologies, that pace continues to increase at a rate impossible to comprehend or harness. We run to and fro at breakneck speed.

We do so literally through travel that enables us to cover millions of miles of space in just a matter of days. We do so electronically, our communications running like lightning in a fraction of a second to every point on earth-and even to distant worlds.

Jesus’ words about the signs of the times just before His return at the time of Armageddon are becoming reality before our eyes as we move through our daily lives.

False christs, false prophets, wars and rumors of wars, and all the other signals our Lord said will be happening concurrently in birth-pang fashion convulse our world with continuing regularity.

• Israel is being pressured from all sides to accept absurd demands in a satanically inspired pseudo-peace process.
• Russia and its neighbors are positioned precisely as Ezekiel 38 and 39 prophesy.
• China is gaining strength and exerting increasing hegemony over the Rising Sun regions from which the “kings of the east” will come.
• The European Union is in powerful flux in preparation to become the colossus that will produce the “ten-kings” power base of Revelation 17:12–13, from which the Antichrist will launch his drive for world conquest

The nations of prophecy appear ready to play out the final, violent scenes of this Earth Age.

Mankind grows worse and worse, just as the Apostle Paul prophesied. Perilous times are here as the fierce, heady, high-minded lovers of pleasure more and more dominate societies and cultures. Current ecumenical movements to bring all religious systems together into one configuration prove Paul’s prediction that end-time man will have a “form of godliness, but [deny] the power thereof” (2 Timothy 3:5). Human intellect continues to produce technology that Antichrist will no doubt use to subdue, control, and ultimately force all people to worship him or be killed.

Last-Days Deluge

No matter which way we look on earth’s horizon, we see thunderheads of the approaching end-time storm. Despite rosy predictions by politicians, scientists, religionists, and philosophers that earth’s Golden Age lies just over the next hill or just around the next bend, we hear rumblings and see the lightning that signal ominous things to come. While it is true that an infinitely magnificent golden future lies just beyond earth’s stormy horizon, such a future will not be produced by fallen mankind, but by Jesus Christ upon His return to put down satanic rebellion and establish His Kingdom.

No matter what the people of the World Economic Forum or any of the New World Order builders believe, human beings will never produce Heaven on earth.

A brief examination of the direction the humanistic flood is sweeping this generation documents that we are gushing down a sin-darkened ravine toward apocalypse.

Wars and Rumors of Wars

War has been a continuing plague within human interaction since the day Cain slew Abel. Rumors of wars are always with us, because, as James wrote, “From whence come wars and fightings among you? Come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?” (James 4: 1).

The world’s concept of peace is never true peace, but merely a lull between episodes of warfare. When so-called peace is enforced, threats of wars and murmurings of hostilities bubble just below the surface of civility. Jesus, in His Olivet Discourse on final prophecies, however, was talking about warfare that will come with greater frequency and ferocity the closer the end of this earth age comes. Wars, followed by rumors of wars, will come much like contractions increase for a woman who is about to give birth.

We do not have to go back very far in the historical record to document that we live in an age of such convulsive activity. Wars on a global scale are the ultimate manifestations of man’s fallen nature, which cannot find peace apart from Christ’s atonement. Natural man harbors violence capable of producing great destruction. One-on-one violence, families warring against each other, gang warfare in our cities, ethnic group against ethnic group—all these confirm that ours is a generation witnessing one of the key final prophecies foretold by Jesus Christ.

The frightening fact that mankind now possesses, through nuclear weaponry, the capability to destroy all life on earth is proof that God’s prophetic Word is truth (see Mark 13:20).

We are currently witnessing the floodgate of Daniel’s prophecy being opened as the book that the prophet was long ago told to “shut up” until “the end” is seemingly now wide open.

This generation watches while peace talks between Israel and her hate-filled enemies are in the news hourly. At the center of those talks is pressure by the nations making up the New World Order efforts that demand Israel give up God’s land for a promised peace.

But it is a demand that, when met, will bring destruction, according to Joel 3:2. The Lord will not abide this taking place without great, catastrophic response. He will bring all nations of the world to the killing field called Armageddon.

All this means that Jesus Christ is, perhaps very soon, going to step out upon the clouds of glory and shout with the voice of the archangel and the trump of God, calling all believers to Himself. You don’t want to be left behind on this judgment-bound planet when He takes believers out of harm’s way. Here is how to be part of that blessed rescue:

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 the Georgia Guidestones structure exploded this past week, the blast set in motion more than just the bringing down of the strange monument. There erupted many theories of possible purposes for the stone marker and why it was brought down.

Before getting into some of the theories and suppositions surrounding this marker, let’s look at a brief description and history.

Sometimes called the “American Stonehenge,” the Georgia Guidestones constitute a granite monument believed installed by globalists in their quest for a one-world order.

It was erected in Elbert County, Georgia, and unveiled on March 22, 1980. From its inception and placement, it was mired in controversy because ten “guidelines” are inscribed on the structure, and the first is a call for earth’s population to be reduced to no more than five hundred million people.

The Guidestones’ declarations are written in eight languages, their calls in compliance with the depopulation agenda set by globalists and globalist organizations.

In November 2020, Coach Dave Daubemire led a group of approximately one hundred Christians in a “Jericho march” near the structure. Following that march, Pastor Clint Harper called upon Elbert County officials to remove the Guidestones, which they referred to as a globalist religious monument.

At approximately 4 a.m. local time on July 7, an explosion of undetermined origin rocked the structure, destroying at least one column and other parts of the structure.

Here are the ten demands of the globalists’ agenda chiseled in granite.

1. Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.
2. Guide reproduction wisely — improving fitness and diversity.
3. Unite humanity with a living new language.
4. Rule passion — faith — tradition — and all things with tempered reason.
5. Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.
6. Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.
7. Avoid petty laws and useless officials.
8. Balance personal rights with social duties.
9. Prize truth — beauty — love — seeking harmony with the infinite.
10. Be not a cancer on the Earth — Leave room for nature — Leave room for nature.

Some believe the demands to be a satanic mockery of the Ten Commandments given Moses and the Israelites. Thus, it is conjectured, it was destroyed by God’s own hand.

Cameras, apparently on the structure 24/7, failed to capture who was responsible for the destruction and exactly what happened, at least to this point.

Theories of the damage run the gamut—from a man-made explosion to a lightning strike and beyond.

The structure, it is said, was in the shape of a Nazi swastika. It projected from a platform at different angles, each of the stones from a different base. The shape, if all connections were made one to another, would be configured like the symbol designed by Hitler’s evil regime.

A strange thing that some conclude–including yours truly—is the way the entire monument was quickly knocked down following the explosion. It was then cleared totally in a day, without apparent investigation by authorities of any kind.

Another thing a friend and I discussed was that the Guidestones were apparently upon a large stone base, under which there was a time capsule. On the base, no date was given as to when the time capsule was to be opened.

What does it mean? I haven’t a clue. But considering all the strange things going on, with the globalists on a rampage to bring in their new world order, there should be considerable wonder about the destruction of this tremendously controversial monument to their desire to get rid of so much of humanity.

That desire, in itself, smacks of luciferian ambitions, doesn’t? The devil hates humanity and is doing all he can to destroy the souls–and bodies—of God’s creation called man.

Some believe World War III is now about to be unleashed that could do just as the globalists and their leader, Satan, want done. These seem to want to provoke Russia to act militarily in responding to the Western powers backing areas bumping up against Russian spheres of influence, and even up against her borders.

This entire campaign to increase the prospects of world war has at its center this presidential regime and all of the administrative state’s agencies involved in clandestine activities. This all means that the Rapture must be on the very brink of taking place.

There will be no massive unleashing of nuclear war this side of the Rapture of the Church. We have Jesus’ Word on it, as I’ve tried to point out many times. The Lord said plainly that the time –the very day—that He next is revealed, it will be life going along pretty much as normal.

Yet, at the same time, there will be immorality rivaling that of Lot’s time in Sodom. Lot was removed, and destruction came that very day. Jesus promised it will be just like that when He will intervene and begin judging this wickedness and evil.

God the Holy Spirit, resident within the Church, will restrain Satan’s blueprint implementation until that catastrophic moment–catastrophic for the world of left-behind people, but glorious indeed for the Christian of this Age of Grace.

We don’t want anyone left behind to face World War III and all the other horrors of the coming Tribulation. This is how you can go to be with Jesus when He calls, either in the Rapture or when your life is over.

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)

Having just finished a novel, the third of a series, I have a somewhat deeper understanding of things involving Israel’s Messiah. It’s probably just enough knowledge to get me in trouble with scholars on the subject. But anytime you write fiction, you, if you are wise, will dig into the known facts before beginning and while writing.

Thus it was in writing MESSIAH: The Prince That Shall Come. It is the third of the trilogy I call REVELATIONS, the first of the series being REVELATIONS and the second being MICHAEL: Last-Days Lightning.

The title, MESSIAH: The Prince That Shall Come, is, of course, oxymoronic. Messiah is Jesus Christ, and the prince that shall come is the one who will be Antichrist. One could not put together terms more contradictory!

However, I sensed that presenting the title in such a way might bring the two terms together in a way that would pique the prospective reader’s curiosity. You want folks to want to read your stuff, so must employ literary strategy and so forth at every opportunity.

We know from Bible truth that Israel’s Messiah won’t return until a certain point to rescue the remnant of Israel. We see that in the following passage:

And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn. (Zechariah 12:10)

This recognition of their Messiah, their Mashiach, won’t take place until the end of the Tribulation–Daniel’s seventieth week—at the time of Armageddon. Until then, we are told that Israel, as a people, is unable to see who is their true Messiah or Mashiach. Paul writes about this:

For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. (Romans 11:25)

This blindness has been evident since the time much of Israel thought Jesus would be the Messiah, considering His miracles and other things while he ministered as the God-Man. When He didn’t deliver them from the oppressors—the Roman government—the Jews, except for a very few, rejected Him. The Lord then, of course, was crucified, becoming the sacrifice that provided redemption once and for all, for all the sin of mankind—past, present, and future.

Jesus said that the Jews would reject Him, but another would come, one whom they would accept. And this is where the prince that shall come steps into the prophetic picture for the wrap-up of things leading to Christ’s Second Advent.

It is more than interesting—and I had a good time playing with the whole matter—that there are two people in Scripture that have been given the title “the son of perdition.”

I know that many of you who study Bible prophecy have wondered about this anomaly (if that’s the appropriate term).

The first usage is, of course, for Judas Iscariot. We find that here:

While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled. (John 17:12)   

The second usage is in reference to the Antichrist.

Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposed and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God. (2 Thessalonians 2:3–4)

The interesting thing is that the Word of God doesn’t say these two entities are “a” son of perdition. It says each is “the” son of perdition.

And, I believe in some sense that the use of the word “entities” here is proper. These two people, Judas Iscariot and the one who will be Antichrist (if you want to learn his name, you will have to read the novel) are enigmatic, to be sure. Judas is said to have gone “to his own place,” and the Antichrist is said to have come out of the bottomless pit (Revelation 17:8).

Interestingly, it is provocative, as my friend Chuck Missler would have said, that Antichrist and his associate, the False Prophet, are thrown into the lake of fire without going before the Great White Throne to receive their judgment and sentence. They were summarily cast into that final place of eternal torment, and were the first to go there.

There is room in this fact to consider whether the Antichrist and False Prophet will be other than human –that is, to speculate whether they might be Nephilim. All other human beings, so far as we know of Scripture, are given judgment before either the Bema (Judgment Seat of Christ) or the Great White Throne. The first and second beasts of Revelation chapter 13 are afforded no such judgment.

Another fascinating point about Judas is that Jesus indicated Judas, “the son of perdition,” was lost from the beginning (John 6:70–71; 17: 12).

There will no doubt be corrective measures sent my way with the thought toward changing my meanderings here. But these are just fodder for exploring the strange things we have in Scripture about Antichrist and Judas with regard to Israel’s Messiah and the prince that shall come.

And, exploration is what fiction allows to some extent. You will surely want to explore MESSIAH: The Prince That Shall Come!  

These times bring with them great anxieties. Everyday pressures probe into our lives with problems we neither solicit nor can avoid. We need to grab on to the peace our Lord Provides in these trying moments while we  proceed through our given weeks, months and years on this planet. We can find those moments of time out from  life through outstanding Christian fiction. The Lord has given some writers the ability to produce those stories that fulfill while at the same time entertain us.  

Jenna Hendricks is such a writer. She has woven a tale of life on a ranch along with clean romance and a message of forgiveness from the Bible. Her contemporary romance, Second Chance Ranch, is the first in a series of six books about life in Montana on a large ranch run by a family. Each book is the story of one of the Manning children and how God reminds them to forgive, but also how to serve Him in their everyday life.

The story is one that brings the reader fully into today’s world of dynamic cultural interaction. Yet it at the same time hearkens back to when things slowed at just the right moments in order to savor life at its most enjoyable.

This is a novel that you will enjoy yourself, or will be an excellent gift to help a friend relax and be captured by a totally entertaining story of many moments  away from life’s aggravations.

The book starts out with Elizabeth Manning on a date but quickly moves to a moving scene where she, as the local veterinarian, delivers twin foals for a neighboring ranch.

“It’s starting. If you want Becky to watch, you better get her quickly.” Elizabeth knew that Mr. Picket wanted his fourteen-year-old daughter to see her horse give birth. Becky had been very excited to take part in this, and had even said she was thinking about becoming a veterinarian…

“Will this be your first set of twins?” Elizabeth’s voice was calm, like she was asking a normal question and had no worries in the world, even though she was worried. Although, she remembered her training and knew there was nothing to worry about. The foal was in the correct position, and she only had to wait. Normally it would be less than twenty minutes once the water broke, but with twins, things were always different.

Later in the story, Elizabeth stumbles onto a new opportunity to share God’s love with people, and ends up getting into a little trouble. But with some direction from above, and help from a few friends, she learns the need to forgive. Not only to forgive others, but eventually to forgive herself.

This is a novel that when given to a family member or friend, will bring thanks for the reminder of a softer, gentler America that still exists. The recipient will wrap themselves in a story of love, although a powerfully moving look into life’s blessings when lived  under and within spiritual influence from above.

I can highly recommend Jenna’s fascinating tale that takes us away and refreshes our spirits in these  days that are sometimes quite trying.

Second Hand Ranch

Jenna Hendricks

 

Cat Ballou, a 1965 movie, sparked my thinking on this commentary. Although I didn’t spend much time watching them, back when I could see to watch movies, it was one of my favorites.

It is a Western comedy, and rated as one of the best ever. I certainly agree, in that it was hilarious throughout.

Now some will probably castigate my thinking for finding Lee Marvin in the part of Kid Shelleen hilarious because the character is a drunken, over-the-hill-gunfighter. Nonetheless, I will use Shelleen, hopefully, to offer something of value in thinking on God’s great promise.

Cat Ballou, as many will remember, is the sweet, easy-going young woman played by Jane Fonda. The character’s father has been shot and killed by a gunfighter, leaving poor Cat to fend for herself.

So, she and several of her friends decide to hire a gunfighter to come and help her fend off the evil rich rancher who wants her father’s land (now hers).

Enter Kid Shelleen. When he arrives on the afternoon stage, a man dressed in all black, with a coat with long tails, and guns on either side of his hips steps from the coach. But a family quickly joins that gentleman, little kids, wife, and all. It isn’t the hired gun.

The driver of the stage comes around to the back of the coach, undoes a rope or something, and a man falls out of the compartment. It is none other than Kid Shelleen, the infamous gunfighter they had sent for some time earlier.

He is inebriated–totally snockered.

The funniest scene, in my opinion, is when the drunken Shelleen walks in on the funeral service for Cat Ballou’s father.

The first thing he sees is a blaze of candles everywhere. He immediately takes off his cowboy hat and places it on his chest, then starts bellowing out, “Happy birthday to you”!

I’m sorry, but that is hilarious.

Let me see, now…how in the world am I going to use this bit of nonsense to not only not offend, but to make a salient point?

When we lose those we love to that horrible, sin-engendered thing that came upon the world with Adam’s Fall in the garden, death, there is nothing funny about it in any way. We grieve, and rightfully so. Jesus, Himself, did so at his friend Lazareth’s death.

I, myself, have grieved within recent years and months over those taken in death whom we loved and miss terribly. But, at the same time, there is great salving of that grief with knowledge given us in God’s Word. Paul the apostle wrote the following to grieving Thessalonians. It is a passage we’re quite familiar with.

But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. (1 Thessalonians 4:13)

Paul told us that he would prefer to be with the Lord, but that it was better for him, in order to do God’s work, to remain with the Christians he was assigned by God to address. Paul was always pointing back to Christ’s resurrection and its unsearchable wonders. He was often, I think, almost frustrated because, in human terms, he couldn’t communicate the full power and glory of what the Lord Jesus’ resurrection meant to him and the whole world. For example, he wrote the following as reflection on Old Testament Scripture.

But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. (1 Corinthians 2:9)

Over many years, I’ve been at funerals of family and friends. My experience has been–and I hear the same experiences told by Christians who have attended believers’ funerals—not of a dark mood of mourning, but of tears, governed by heavenly assurance. There are often smiles and interactions filled with joy in knowing all is well with our temporarily departed loved ones.

I remember, at the funerals of my dad in 1992 and my mother in 2020, that same sense of grief, yes, but mostly of joy over knowing that they were instantaneously in the loving presence of the Lord at their passing.

That is where I can come off claiming their deaths were—and yours and mine will be—a HAPPY REBIRTHDAY! – That is, of course, unless the Rapture happens first, which seems like an almost certainty at any moment, considering the prophetic signals we are witnessing. At that time, it will be a much more magnificent celebration than even a REBIRTHDAY!

If you are wondering how you could ever consider the death of someone you love as a thing to be joyous about, and haven’t accepted the One who makes such a promise of future joy possible, here is God’s formula you must follow:

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)

Listening to a man who was obviously a pastor this morning, I was thinking how clearly he was laying out the pre-Trib view of the Age of Grace and the Rapture.

I’ve never heard it presented more clearly than he was teaching it. I can’t see the screen and they didn’t announce his name. (And I probably wouldn’t mention it if I did know his name and program, because this commentary gives only partial kudos to the gentleman.)

As I was saying, the sermon was about as clearly delivered as I’ve heard. It was very simple, and right on the money, from my understanding of what God’s Word has to say about the Rapture.

The man said that, at an unknown time, Christ will call the Church into the air, where believers will forever be with our Lord. Antichrist will arise, and all will be turned into the worst times in human history back on earth, according to Jesus as recorded in the Olivet Discourse.

He then launched into thoughts based upon three questions. I don’t remember the other two because the third was the one he dwelt on—and his take on things from that point definitely piqued my discernment radar system. The question was something like: “Who goes in the Rapture?” –Meaning who will leave this planet when Jesus calls, “come up here?”

He started by saying some disagree with him—including his wife. She believes, he said, that all Christians will go to be with the Lord when the Rapture occurs. The man then said that he believes Christians who don’t believe in the pre-Trib Rapture are likely to stay while those who do believe in the pre-Trib Rapture will go when Christ calls.

To restate, he said those who believe in the pre-Trib view are the ones who go to Christ at that great event, and Christians who don’t believe will be left behind. He muddled it all by saying only believers will go, and indicated that he believes all others who are Christians will be left behind with the lost of the world to go through the Tribulation.

This, of course, is all part of what is called the “partial Rapture”  theory. He was not preaching the pre-Trib position, although he evidently thought he was.

I was taken aback that, after laying out such a clear position on the pre-Trib Rapture, he veered so dramatically by saying something the Bible doesn’t teach.

The Rapture is a powerful and absolute doctrine taught in God’s Holy Word. But belief in the Rapture is not, I repeat not, the prerequisite for what it takes to be part of the millions of Christians who will be lifted in a millisecond of time when Christ says: “Come up here!”

I can’t remember the preacher’s Scripture to back up that some Christians will be left behind because of not believing in the pre-Trib Rapture, because I wasn’t taking notes. But the Scripture, I do remember, was taken out of context and used in his mistaken view.

The way he explained his view, it’s what a Christian believes that matters. That is, the person must believe in the pre-Trib Rapture. He never mentioned, that I heard, that it’s whom they believe in that matters. It is in whom the person believes—period—that makes the person part of those who will instantaneously evacuate this doomed planet at the Lord’s call.

Didn’t Jesus tell us, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the father but by me”?  I hear nothing in that statement other than “Jesus is the only way.”

Belief in anything other is a false concept—even a deadly one. It is the blood of Jesus Christ that covers our sin—past, present, and future.

So, to believe in anyone or anything besides Jesus for salvation misses the mark and dooms one to Hell, apart from God forever.

Paul the apostle makes it very clear about in whom people must believe to be saved. We use this passage, as you know, quite frequently. I don’t want people to miss what is required to go to the Father, rather than to the other place.

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)

The same Paul tells about the Rapture of the Church. He lays out very clearly exactly who will go to Christ when He calls us.

Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. (1 Corinthians 15:51–52)

Paul further says the following:

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:16–18)

Paul did not write that “some” will go when Christ calls. He said “all” (believers) will go in that glorious moment to be with their Lord. And we are to “comfort” ourselves with that assurance.

If you truly believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are saved. Nothing and nobody can ever take you out of God’s mighty hand (read Romans 8:38-39 for proof from God’s Word).

The greatest question for you, personally, is: Will you be one who goes to Jesus when He calls all Christians into the air? Only you can answer. We prayerfully hope you can answer a resounding “yes!” Believe me, everything happening points to the reality that his call will happen at any moment!

And when you see all these things begin to come to pass, then look up and lift up your head; for your redemption draweth nigh. (Luke 21:28)

Probably the most near-term prophecy scheduled for fulfillment besides the Isaiah 17 predicted destruction of Damascus is the Gog-Magog assault on Israel.

The Rapture of the church, of course, continues to be in the mix of all the prophetic stage-setting on the horizon of these last days. It has always been an event that is without a specific prophetic signal that precedes its occurrence. However, the Rapture is not without signs that it could happen at any moment.

Despite some seminary declarations that Luke 21:28 is not a Rapture signal, I disagree.

And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.

To any student of Bible prophecy from the pre-Trib view, the evidence is overwhelming. We see all the signs for the Tribulation beginning to come to pass. And God’s Word says that when we see this very thing happening–all these things beginning to come to pass—we are to look up, for Jesus is coming to save us out of that terrible time to come (read Revelation 3: 10).

We see the wickedness in the world that makes this generation like that of the days of Lot. We have violence and evil like in the days of Noah. Evil men and seducers are growing worse and worse. There is a globalist onslaught that is setting the stage for Antichrist and his regime of terror. There is apostasy, even in the formerly conservative, evangelical churches, with the leadership of those bodies embracing things we would never have thought they would accept.

To sum it up: In every direction we look, all is set for the next phase of Christ’s Second Coming and the Tribulation that will precede that magnificent event.

Israel is front and center, and is hated by the vast majority of the world’s countries, as witnessed by UN votes involving God’s chosen nation.

So with all this as a prologue, we can now look at a specific prophecy that is in view, based upon accumulating evidence. That is the coming Gog-Magog assault on Israel.

The stage is being set for that catastrophic attack. It’s catastrophic not for God’s chosen nation, but for the attackers—and for the rest of the world.

God, through Ezekiel the prophet, tells of the coalition that will invade Israel to take “great spoil.” We have determined after much study by prophecy scholars that the chief nations that will coalesce to attack Israel—by today’s names—will be Russia, Iran, Turkey, and others. But, God, according to the prophecy in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39, will hold the world in general responsible as well. At least He will seemingly punish other nations as well as the one he will almost totally decimate when they attack.

Thou salt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God. And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the Lord. (Ezekiel 39:5–6)

So what evidence is there that this most profound prophecy is in view for fulfillment, perhaps in the very near future? It involves the term “great spoil” in the Ezekiel prophecy.

When the attack takes place, the leaders of the nations watching apparently will only send a weak diplomatic note of protest. It sounds very much like the weakness we see now in the American government and in that of the EU and others.

Sheba, and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish, with all the young lions thereof, shall say unto thee, Art thou come to take a spoil? hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey? to carry away silver and gold, to take away cattle and goods, to take a great spoil? (Ezekiel 38: 13)

At the moment, because of the Biden administration going into green insanity by shutting down America’s oil-producing industry, Russia has gained greatly in the producing and selling of petroleum and natural gas. Nations of Europe, in particular, are in a critical juncture regarding having natural gas to fuel its needs. Russia is providing the natural gas needed to supply needs in the UK and other nations.

But now, the little Jewish state, Israel, doesn’t look so diminutive in terms of nation-states. They have found and harnessed massive gas reserves and petroleum reserves. The following story gives some details.

Today, Israel’s gas reserves are so rich that they can supply not only Israel, but Europe as well. And that’s precisely what happened on Wednesday when Israel, and the European Union signed a natural gas agreement. The agreement was forged in Cairo as Egypt as the gas will flow via Egypt’s pipelines. Signing this trilateral agreement is Europe’s solution for replacing the Russian gas imports it has relied on for decades.

Western Europe is trying to distance itself from Russia including economic boycotts. This phenomenon provided Israel with a rare opportunity to provide natural gas once provided by the Kremlin.

Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission said in a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett in Jerusalem on Tuesday: “With the beginning of this war and the attempt of Russia to blackmail us through energy, by deliberately cutting off the energy supplies, we decided to cut off and to get rid of the dependency on Russian fossil fuels, and to move away from Russia and diversify to trustworthy suppliers,” adding that “It is an outstanding step bringing our energy cooperation to the next level.” (“Israel to supply natural gas to Europe and its connection to a blessing from Deuteronomy,” by David Sidman, Israel 365news 2021 June 16, 2022)

They give the Scripture in Deuteronomy is as follows.

For Hashem your God will bless you as He has promised you: you will extend loans to many nations, but require none yourself; you will dominate many nations, but they will not dominate you. (Deuteronomy 15:6)

God’s Word says He will put hooks in the jaws of the leader of the attacking coalition. It is more than proper, I think, to wonder if Israel’s great oil and gas reserves might be the bait the Lord will use in hooking this evil leader in, bringing Gog’s forces down to be all but totally destroyed on the mountains of Israel.

All of this means the Rapture must be very near occurring, as I and many others believe the Gog-Magog attack will take place after the Rapture of the Church.

Here is how to be ready for going to be with Jesus in that glorious call He makes to the Church He loves and died for on the cross at Calvary.

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)