Nov 10
Fasten Your Seatbelts
The election of Barack Obama as the United States’ 44th President has generated a great deal of interest in what possible connections he may have to Bible prophecy. I can only recall 9/11/01 as the only other time when there was such a sudden rush of traffic to our site.
The number one question being asked: Is Barack Obama the antichrist? I've received dozens of emails pointing out the odd fact that the day after the election, the daily pick-three lottery number in Obama's home state of Illinois was "6-6-6."
At this point, I think it’s unlikely that Obama will be the antichrist. The beast of Revelation will come out Europe, and he will be a man of profound political skills.
What makes Obama potentially important to the end time is not the fact that he will be the most socially liberal president in our nation’s history; I think his prophetic significance will center on how he handles our relationship with the state of Israel.
The stability of our nation in part depends on our friendship with Israel. God said to Abraham, "I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee" (Gen. 12:3). I believe much of our current economic troubles can be traced to the pressure the Bush administration has placed on Israel. The coming Obama administration doesn’t look very promising.
The Bible warns us that the day will come when Israel is standing by itself against its enemies. For decades, prophecy scholars have wondered what will cause America to become isolated from Israel. Some have wondered if it will be a Russian nuclear attack, while others have thought it might be the impact of the rapture. We can now add the possibility of political change to the list.
With the election of Obama, we have reached a point where so many key players are active on the world stage, we could now see prophecy come together at an exponential rate. Because Obama will be taking the role of the leader of the free world, one should expect the prophetic time clock to tick away at a faster rate.
It’s also important to realize that prophecy is now moving on a multi-front. While the world was fixated on the U.S. elections, I was keeping an eye on events in Russia. Vladimir Putin is said to be working on a plan that would soon put him back in the Kremlin. Putin has already formed an alliance with Arab nations that is amazingly similar to what is described in Ezekiel 38 and 39.
The global financial crisis is rapidly pushing the world towards the one-world economic system the Bible predicts. Later this month, several key nations are going to come together for another strategy summit.
I don’t mean to pick on Obama before he has even taken office. I believe we are so close to the tribulation hour, there is a good reason to be apprehensive about policies he will seek to implement. During the campaign, I thought it was strange that one man could be friends with so many people with radical political views.
Prophetic events have progressed along so far, the only real choice we had between John McCain and Barack Obama in the election was the speed at which we would choose to move towards the end. Now that America has selected the more rapid option, it's time for prophecy-minded Christians to fasten their seat belts.
I don’t see anything shocking in last week’s election. I do believe strongly that a dark demonic cloud has swept over the land, but this is how we should expect the end times to play out. And, I foresee more negative events to come. The only thing that worries me is the Christians who fail to see the danger that comes from prophecy being fulfilled in our day.
I believe we are entering a time when Christians really need to set their priorities. Your last chance to do something for the kingdom of God may be sooner than you realize.
“And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be” (Rev. 22:12).
"So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled" (Mat. 24:33-34).
-- Todd
Next for America: Corrective Measures, or Accumulating Pleasures?
My research in writing my book scheduled for release February 1, 2009--The American Apocalypse: Is the United States in Bible Prophecy?--took me back to God’s harsh dealing with America in the 1930s. The things Americans suffered were considered by preachers and politicians alike to be God’s wrath and judgment. One well-known writer, John Steinbeck, even gave his famous novel on that depressed time in America the title of The Grapes of Wrath.
America had gone through a tremendous time of growth and relative prosperity during the “Gay 90s” (for the younger readers, it had nothing to do with the Clinton years, nor with homosexuality). It was the 1890s, and the term “gay” still enjoyed its proper definition.
Despite the early 1900s bringing about World War I, the nation leaped forward, and soon the “Roaring Twenties” brought forth the flappers and boisterous, even debauched, “good times.” Reformers tried to squash the hedonism, and with the passage of the 18th Amendment instituted prohibition against alcohol manufacture, sale, and transportation. The action only increased rebellion against morality. American gangsters took over, and illegal booze, gambling, and every other type of nefarious activity permeated culture and society.
Then in 1929 came the stock market crash in the United States, and worldwide depression quickly followed. The wrath of God had fallen!
Or had it?
No, it had not. Neither had His judgment against America’s sin fallen upon the nation, thus affecting the world–not in the sense of God’s great judgment that came upon the antediluvians, the wicked, violent, even genetically corrupted earth dwellers of Noah’s day.
But God’s mighty hand of correction through the Great Depression and the horrendous “Dust Bowl” era came down hard on the backside of this nation He so manifestly chose to accomplish great things for His great purposes. Those things would include, in particular: 1) developing the technologies that would spread the gospel around the entire world, and 2) to act as midwife for the birth of modern Israel on May 14, 1948, and to become that Jewish peoples’ closest ally--an ally which just happened to soon become the most materially blessed, most powerful, and most influential nation the world has ever known.
America has, despite recession, economic downturns, and wars that took thousands of young American lives, known a standard of living and pleasures–both unsullied and debauched—like no generation of any people in history. The profoundly disturbing questions to ponder are: Will God choose to again correct this special nation called America? Or, will He take His hand off to an extent, allowing the U.S. to find its own way, which is what the majority of the electorate seems to want?
Daily I get email from people who fear this nation will now feel the Lord’s hand of wrath. The die is cast, as one of Shakespeare’s characters said. I don’t necessarily subscribe to that “judgment and wrath is about to fall” opinion. At least not in the immediate near term way many who send the fear-filled emails believe.
God’s wrath is building. It will be unleashed when the “prince that shall come” confirms the covenant with Israel and Israel’s antagonists (Daniel 9:26-27). That pouring out of God’s anger won’t happen until the Church is removed. However, there is almost certainly a heavenly decision that has already been made, and is even now in the process of implementation. It is likely the decision to either take corrective measures as in God’s past dealings with America in order to get this nation back on the moral course, to complete its work in His grand prophetic design, or to give rebellious masses what they more and more demonstrate they demand. They demand freedom to choose what is right in their own eyes.
God’s decision to take His hand off to some extent would be far more fearful than His again taking corrective action like world economic depression. To let the rebels do what is right in their own eyes, thus casting God away from any semblance of divine guidance, means America’s work is done. That is indeed a frightening thing to contemplate.
I must say that I, with reverential consideration, don’t expect immediate meltdown and correction from Almighty God. I believe with all that is within me that He has been demonstrating corrective movements over the past years and months–movements that have gone unheeded by even the majority of His people. These have chosen, it is obvious to me, at least, to bury their heads in the sands of watered-down messages that have practically no relevance to God’s message of doctrinal truth. Rather than revival, there have been false, emotional outbursts that have done disservice to the Lord who purchased each and every one who has been born again. It seems to me that the Church's work, like that of America, has almost run its course.
Dave Hunt once wrote a book called Peace, Prosperity, and the Coming Holocaust. His basic premise was that this fallen world system, and particularly the United States and even the Church, would be drawn ever deeper into believing in humanistic salvation by seeming peace and prosperity. He demonstrated, then, through historical precedent and Bible prophecy both past and yet to come that the world of fallen man will at a future time of unprecedented evil activity on earth endure a holocaust far worse than that perpetrated by Adolf Hitler. The end will bring, he concluded, God’s wrath and judgment on an incorrigibly wicked world.
I believe America and the world might yet have another burst of so-called peace and prosperity. But the “change” the country and the world is clamoring for through trust in human governmental entities rather than God’s moral governance will, as my friend Dave Hunt wrote, swiftly bring the holocaust of the tribulation.
Let us pray for the new president, and for all governmental leaders, so that we might lead peaceful lives. This is commanded of us by the Lord. But, let us work to complete whatever He puts in front of us to do for the Kingdom. Let us, as Oswald Chambers entitled his book of devotions, do "Our utmost for His highest" while our fleeting time remains upon this fallen sphere.
--Terry
No comments:
Post a Comment