MORE ON THE COMING RAPTURE OF THE SAINTS

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The Book of Revelation clearly shows a chronological order to the Resurrection and Rapture. Who are the first and who are the last to be caught up? What criteria does Jesus use? Does the Rapture truly happen in the twinkling of an eye, or is that a myth? Watch Nelson Walters’s groundbreaking video and discover if the last are first and the first are last as Jesus says.

This video does not address the timing of the Rapture which Nelson and I would put at the opening of the seventh seal which is the PreWrath Rapture position. Christians will go through much of the tribulation even great tribulation but will not experience the wrath of God which is poured out on the unrepentant with the Trumpet and Bowl judgements. Note it is in Revelation 6, at the sixth seal, we see the celestial signs that precede Jesus’ return mentioned by Joel 2 in the O.T. and Jesus in the Olivet Discourse, Matthew 24. Also Isaiah 34:4.

“And I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood, fire, and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.” Joel 2:30-31

“Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” Matthew 24:29-30

“When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale. The sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?” Revelation 6:12-17

USA: A NATION IN RAPID DECLINE

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When Valerian became emperor in 253 AD, the Roman Empire was amid the ‘Crisis of the Third Century’— plagues, inflation, escalating conflicts, growing social tensions, rising crime, declining trade, and a struggling economy. It finally collapsed when its once-legendary military had a historic military recruitment crisis on its hands. Rome wasn’t just unable to attract the best and brightest to its ranks; it was practically unable to recruit anyone at all. Long gone were the days when a career in the Roman legions was considered an honorable profession. Roman citizens were simply no longer interested in serving. And Roman patriotism wasn’t just dead, it was laughed at.

To address these challenges, Valerian expanded the use of mercenaries. He essentially bribed new recruits, including and especially foreigners, offering money, citizenship, and land grants in exchange for serving in the military. This marked a clear and obvious turning point in Rome’s history: empires last because they sustain their strength— and that strength requires both a prosperous economy AND a powerful military. it’s incredibly difficult to have a powerful military when nobody wants to serve.

The US military finds itself in a similar position today. In fact, the US in general is going through a similar period as Rome’s “Crisis of the Third Century”, complete with political scandal and instability, inflation, massive deficits, border incursions, and even a pandemic.

And the parallels between Rome’s third-century military and the state of the US military today are strong.

Last year, the US military missed its recruitment goal by 41,000 troops, which is a staggering, record-high figure. The active-duty US military is now at its smallest size since 1940. As a result, mission readiness is down. Fitness standards are being abandoned. Recruiting bonuses have skyrocketed. Some politicians have even suggested offering citizenship to illegal immigrants in exchange for serving in the US military.

One of the biggest reasons for this recruitment crisis is that 77% of young people in America do not meet the basic standards to join the military, whether for physical, mental, or moral reasons.

And that last one— moral— is the fastest growing part: young people aren’t interested in serving because they are being indoctrinated to hate their country.

Teachers at Fort Lee High School in New Jersey and in Berkeley California, were recently caught, for example, teaching that Hamas is a peaceful resistance movement… while Israel is genocidal.

The teacher’s union covering school districts in Portland, Oregon recently published lesson plans which praised Hamas… yet completely failed to mention their October 7 terrorist attack murdering innocent Israelis.

By the time students make it to university, they are filled with hate for their country; it’s so palpable that the supreme leader of Iran, one of America’s biggest enemies, recently praised American university students. “You are currently part of the Resistance Front,” the Ayatollah told America’s youth, “and have waged an honorable battle despite the relentless pressure of your government.”

The kids in the street wearing their keffiyehs and screaming about their pronouns have no interest in serving.

Meanwhile, the patriotic Americans who filled the military’s ranks for decades have been maligned as “extremists”. These are the very people who love America so much that they were ready to die for their country— and kill the enemies of their country, which is no less consequential.

Yet instead of embracing the people the military so desperately needs, the government practically lampoons them and their core beliefs.

The Army used to have slogans like “Be all you can be,” and “Army Strong”. Those have been replaced by recruiting ads about soldiers with lesbian moms. Even the CIA recruits by catering to the woke, Diversity & Inclusion crowd. It’s bizarre to see recruiting ads tailored to radicals who hate their country and have no interest in serving. And gee what a surprise— the woke recruiting campaigns have failed.

Now the Defense Department has resorted to bribing people. Of course, the military has long offered recruitment bonuses and college tuition in exchange for service. But it was typically one of the reasons to join, not THE reason. That’s no longer the case. Just ask the soldiers who make TikTok videos about why they joined: “For a Camaro”, “To pay my bills”, “For the money”,

Need more evidence? An online recruiting advertisement for the US Coast Guard that I recently saw: “Think you’re too old or out of shape for the U.S. Coast Guard? Think again.” Bribing people to join only got them so far, and now they are begging people to serve who are too fat and old.

Strong nations need both a robust economy AND a powerful military.

Robust economy: America is facing a future economic tsunami; the government itself forecasts the national debt to grow beyond $55 trillion over the next decade. Social Security will run out of money in 9 years. The US dollar is on the road to losing its global reserve status soon.

Powerful military: Unable to recruit period, let alone the right people. Most major weapons systems, from fighter jets to naval warships, are rapidly becoming obsolete… yet there is no money to replace them.

Apostate Church: Most of the Institutional churches have compromised with the world. They no longer uphold Biblical inerrancy and permit gay marriage, homosexual pastors, and transgenderism.

We are living in the time of the end. There are 2000 Biblical prophecies of Jesus’ second coming to Earth. Jesus tells us it will be a time of lawlessness, like in the days of Noah when God judged the Earth with a worldwide flood.

“For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.” Matthew 24:37-39

America does not feature in Biblical end-times prophecy. The Antichrist who rises from the Middle East reigns supreme perhaps as the head of the United Nations. China and Russia have a military presence but the USA is no longer a military power.

WHY YOU SHOULD BELIEVE THE BIBLE

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All of the Old Testament prophets were given the end of the story for the nation God established for His purposes: ISRAEL. Even before Jesus first came to Earth as the “suffering servant” to provide the way of salvation:

“But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” Isaiah 53:5-6

Isaiah, Daniel, and Ezekiel, these three prophets in particular were given a lot of detail on Israel’s prophesied Messiah, Jesus’ return to establish a Millennial Kingdom on this Earth before it would be destroyed and God created a new heaven and new Earth where only the righteous dwell.

Daniel chapter 12 is entirely on the time of the end. We are told that the Archangel Michael is the angel assigned to protect the nation Israel. The nation Israel has been subjected to much persecution down through the ages and at AD 70 it ceased to exist, and yet Daniel is told (600 BC) that it will exist at the time of the end when it will be subjected to great tribulation before God delivers the nation. The first of the major end-times prophecies were fulfilled in 1948 when Israel was miraculously re-established as a nation. As well, we are seeing the prophesied persecution increasing, with antisemitism rife across most Western nations. This is only the beginning of tribulation it will escalate to the prophesied invasion (Ezekiel 38 & 39). Back to Daniel chapter 12; read this Scripture written 600 BC, if you are not already convinced that the Bible is the inspired Word of God I hope this will make you reconsider it and where you stand before your Creator God.

The Time of the End

​ “At that time shall arise Michael, the great prince who has charge of your people. And there shall be a time of trouble, such as never has been since there was a nation till that time. But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone whose name shall be found written in the book. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above; and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever. But you, Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book, until the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.”
Then I, Daniel, looked, and behold, two others stood, one on this bank of the stream and one on that bank of the stream. And someone said to the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream, “How long shall it be till the end of these wonders?” And I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream; he raised his right hand and his left hand toward heaven and swore by him who lives forever that it would be for a time, times, and half a time, and that when the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end all these things would be finished. I heard, but I did not understand. Then I said, “O my lord, what shall be the outcome of these things?” He said, “Go your way, Daniel, for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end. Many shall purify themselves and make themselves white and be refined, but the wicked shall act wickedly. And none of the wicked shall understand, but those who are wise shall understand. And from the time that the regular burnt offering is taken away and the abomination that makes desolate is set up, there shall be 1,290 days. Blessed is he who waits and arrives at the 1,335 days. But go your way till the end. And you shall rest and shall stand in your allotted place at the end of the days.” Daniel 12:1-13

SATAN’S END TIMES STRATEGY

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This is the fifth and final post on knowing our enemy: the first was entitled SATAN – PRINCE OF THIS WORLD: WHO HE WAS AND NOW IS (26/05/2024). The second was WHEN DID SATAN REBEL AGAINST GOD? (27/05/2024) The third was ANCIENT SUMERIANS RECORDED THE DIVIDE OF HEAVEN AND EARTH IN ACCORD WITH THE BIBLE (03/06/2024). The fourth post was KNOWING HOW YOUR REAL ENEMY OPERATES (07/06/2024). If you have not read these I suggest you do. It is important we know our enemy.

God has revealed all we need to know in His Word, the Bible. Much is given about Satan’s last desperate efforts to maintain control of the Earth before Jesus returns to defeat him and his Antichrist in the battle of Armageddon. This post is about Satan’s end-times strategy. Doug Hamp’s latest book, Corrupting the Image, Vol. 3, Singularity, Superhumans and the Second Coming of Jesus brings our understanding of events in the days of the Beast leading up to the return of Jesus into focus. Doug carefully lays out a theological roadmap for understanding the heavenly and earthly battles yet to take place in the future.

 Mike Spaulding is pastor of Calvary Chapel of Lima and he hosts the Soaring Eagle Radio show. He sums up the end times scenario playing out in our time. “While the modern American church leads the way into global apostasy, Satan, the enemy of God, of His creation, and of His people, is gaining strength and assembling his forces for the coming great conflict. Satan is staging his assets for a blitzkrieg of shock and awe evil that will overwhelm the earth. UFO disclosure, Artificial Intelligence, genetic engineering, transhumanism, and the mad rush toward singularity are not disparate endeavours but are all part of the devil’s strategy of casting a dragnet to ensnare all of humanity in a great deception of faux hope and faux salvation“. This is part of Mike’s Foreword for Doug’s latest book.

Are you living your life knowing Jesus’ return is near and that God’s wrath is going to be poured out on an unrepentant world? God gives us a great deal of information about the Trumpet and Bowl judgements so we need to warn our unsaved family and friends of what is coming (Revelation 8-9 and 16).

WHAT IS NEXT-GEN MARXISM?

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In the USA, a highly influential movement within the Left is an organized, international, and well-funded Marxist movement that has been on the rise for years.

It started to become mainstream in American universities in 1989 and now runs rampant in US culture through the implementation of critical race theory (CRT) and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies. Authors Mike Gonzalez and Katharine Gorka thoroughly researched and exposed the history and organization of the Left in their new, eye-opening book, “NextGen Marxism.”

Not only do Gonzalez and Gorka reveal how organized, international, and powerful the Left is, but they also show how powerful and effective passionate citizens — especially parents — have been at stopping it in recent years. They provide straightforward action steps for those who love America and its freedoms and want to continue fighting for them on behalf of freedom-loving people worldwide. The message is equally applicable to the situation in most of the Western world.

What Is NextGen Marxism?

NextGen Marxism (or cultural Marxism) is a philosophy implemented by “social justice” warriors (led by Black Lives Matter) through DEI policies that — over the last four years especially — companies and schools are expected to implement. If they don’t, they are labeled as heteronormative, sexist, white supremacist oppressors, and are likely to be canceled.

Gonzalez and Gorka explain:

“This book makes the case that the social upheaval we are experiencing in the United States today is the result of a zero-sum view of the world, a world of irreconcilable antagonisms, one in which the open exchange of ideas is replaced by a rigid orthodoxy, in which there is no room for dissent, in which people are reduced to their skin color or sexual orientation. It is a worldview that sees the United States as fundamentally flawed and for which the sole antidote is its destruction and rebuilding.

“The [Black Lives Matter] leaders who shared this view well before they founded BLM made use of [George] Floyd’s tragedy to try to deliver a knockout blow against the US constitutional order in 2020 and were able to convince the managers and leaders of all our top institutions to buy in to the idea that the United States is systematically racist and oppressive, and thus in need of total transformation. It is this phenomenon that accounts for what has happened to American society.”

In The Heritage Foundation’s online forum, “NextGen Marxism: What It Is and How to Combat It,” Gonzalez and Gorka discuss how they discovered that in 1989 (when the Berlin Wall came down and many thought that Marxism and communism were dying), in reality, Marxism became mainstream in American universities’ humanities and law departments, CRT was created, and Eric Mann formed his Marxist Labor/Community Strategy Center in Los Angeles. (Several years later, Mann recruited Patrisse Cullors, co-founder of Black Lives Matter.)

Who Are “The Oppressors” and “The Oppressed,” according to Next Gen Marxists?

Today “the oppressors” are the “privileged”: whites, Americans, Israelis, Christians, Jews, heterosexuals, and males, according to NextGen Marxists. “The oppressed” is everyone else: those in the minority, based on race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and those who were once colonized. They claim that Americans cannot work together to solve the supposed fundamental/systemic problems in our country, so they have to fight. They want to bring down the oppressors because they’re the “victimizers.”

From Economic Marxism to Cultural Marxism: “Abolish the Family”

Marxists believe that humankind can be perfected and that utopia can be attained here on earth (whereas Christians know that humans have been sinful since the fall and will only experience paradise in the new heaven and new earth. For Marxists to attain utopia, they believe they must tear down norms and traditions, the “trinity of the most monstrous evils”: private property, religion, and marriage. Gonzalez and Gorka write: “One can draw a straight line from the anti-family, anti-morality position of [Robert] Owen and other utopians and socialists of the 1800s to BLM in 2020, which posted on its website (and subsequently removed following heavy criticism) the goal of destroying the nuclear family: “[W]e disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear-family-structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and ‘villages’ that collectively care for one another.”

In the late 1980s, a group of writers, including Judith Butler, Gail Rubin, Sandy Stone, and Susan Stryker established the disciplines of queer theory and transgender studies. They argued that gender was a social construct, used to oppress racial and sexual minorities. They denounced the categories of man and woman as false binary that upholds a system of hetero-normativity, the white male heterosexual power structure. These writers made the case that these systems must be ruthlessly deconstructed and turned to dust, and the most visceral, dramatic way to achieve this is transgenderism. If a man can become a woman, if a woman can become a man, they believed the entire structure of creation could be toppled.”

These views espoused by the leftist elite influence America’s schools and culture. The nonprofit Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) writes in its guidelines on comprehensive sex education for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), “Sex education has the power to spark large-scale social change. SIECUS is not a single-issue organization because sex ed, as SIECUS envisions it, connects and addresses a variety of social issues. Sex ed sits at the nexus of many social justice movements — from LGBTQ rights and reproductive justice to the #MeToo movement and urgent conversations around consent and healthy relationships.” They add, “Controlling the formation of sexual identities through racialized stereotypes and the reproduction of racial and ethnic minority groups is central to effective population controls.”

Over the last 10 years, the Marxist Left has been successful at influencing schools, businesses, and the entertainment industry by making catchphrases such as “racial reckoning,” “marginalized groups,” and “heteronormative” a part of America’s everyday vocabulary. The New York Times columnist Bret Stephens described this as the “great American cultural revolution of the 2010s, in which traditional practices and beliefs — regarding same-sex marriage, sex-segregated bathrooms, personal pronouns, meritocratic ideals, race-blind rules, reverence for patriotic symbols, the rules of romance, the presumption of innocence and the distinction between equality of opportunity and outcome — became, more and more, not just passe, but taboo.”

Based on where we are according to end times Biblical prophecies the US, and for that matter the rest of the Western world, will not stop casting off God and His commandments. Gen Z and Gen Alpha have been raised with an evolutionary mindset so do not have a Biblical worldview. In the “American Worldview Inventory 2024” (AWVI), George Barna, the director of Research at Arizona Christian University’s Cultural Research Center, explained the country’s “40-year drop in biblical worldview to only 4% holding a Biblical worldview.”

Moreover, most of the denominational/institutional churches have compromised with the world and its values. It is like the days after Joshua died the next generation did not know God.

“And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of 110 years. And they buried him within the boundaries of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of the mountain of Gaash And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel.” Judges 2:8-10

I believe we are fast approaching the Bibical prophesied last seven years before Jesus returns first to rescue the Saints and then to pour out His wrath upon an unrepentant world. The seven Trumpet judgements come first followed by the seven Bowl judgements. If your unsaved family and friends knew what God’s coming judgements would be like perhaps they would be prepared to repent and submit to Jesus lordship over their lives. I have shown the first three Bowl judgement below they are terrible. I would not want to be on Earth during the coming Trumpet and Bowl judgements of God. We need to get our family and friends to read the Trumpet and Bowl judgements Scriptures so at least we have warned them. Bear in mind they can still turn to God during the time God pours out His wrathupon the Earth.

The Seven Bowls of God’s Wrath

​”Then I heard a loud voice from the temple telling the seven angels, “Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God.”
So the first angel went and poured out his bowl on the earth, and harmful and painful sores came upon the people who bore the mark of the beast and worshiped its image.
The second angel poured out his bowl into the sea, and it became like the blood of a corpse, and every living thing died that was in the sea.
The third angel poured out his bowl into the rivers and the springs of water, and they became blood. And I heard the angel in charge of the waters say,
“Just are you, O Holy One, who is and who was,for you brought these judgments. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. It is what they deserve!” And I heard the altar saying, “Yes, Lord God the Almighty, true and just are your judgments!” Revelation 16:1-7

THE WORLD IS ON AN UNSUSTAINABLE PATH

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The world is on an unsustainable path,  Dr. Voddie Baucham, pastor and best-selling author points out. “People are at war with the God of the universe, and they will face his wrath. [They’re] running headlong toward a cliff, and the loving thing to do is to shout as loud as we can, put up as many signs and warnings as we can, and if necessary, grab people you know before they go over the cliff. That’s the loving thing to do, even when it doesn’t feel like it’s loving. … We’ve got to show people the car that’s about to run them over.”

When Family Research Council’s, Joseph Backholm asked Baucham how this movie ends, he shook his head. “It ends badly. We’ve seen this before [when] empires fall. And this culture is devolving.” But there’s still hope that the Lord will intervene, that there’s revival and awakening. “And that’s my prayer,” he said. “I’m not praying for the destruction of the West. I’m praying for revival.”

Christians have seen the impact they can have when they refuse to embrace the agenda that’s saturating our education system, marketplace, government, sports, entertainment, and so many other areas. We’ve watched the entire script flip on LGBT activism in board rooms we never thought would change just because we were determined to make our voices heard.

So what’s the mindset we should have now? “Two things,” Baucham insisted. “One, the Kingdom of God is undefeated. It has never lost, and it never will lose. And the second thing is that we have dual citizenship and that our heavenly citizenship trumps whatever other citizenship we hold. If we hold on to those two truths, we will take heart and we will be encouraged even during dark days.”

No matter what, we’re still in the world, he wanted people to know. “But not of the world.” In other words, “You can’t hide — so stop trying. Besides that, some people desperately need what we have — and we can’t give it to them if we run away from them.”

This article is taken from an article in The Washington Stand – A Christian Response to Pride Month, June 5th, 2024.  Family Research Council’s Joseph Backholm interviews Dr. Voddie Baucham.

Fortunately, we know how the story ends. God has given us in His Word, the BIBLE, the entire story from start to end. We can use the end times prophecies to get people into the Kingdom. They prove the Bible is true and the loving but righteous God it portrays exists. If you would like to learn how to use apocalyptic evangelism can I suggest you go to Reggie Kelly’s website http://www.mysteryofisrael.org where you can join others to develop your skills to evangelise using end times Scriptures. The following quote is taken from his website.

We want to state, firstly, that you will not be regarded so much as students as “participants” in our mutual engagement and interaction over the material. You, the participant, will play a formative and influential role in the content and direction of the course. Your response and feedback is critical towards the final product that will take its character from the many. We desire to approximate as much as possible that organic and corporate involvement that so uniquely characterizes the body of Christ, hearing the Lord in one another, the supply that every member supplies, co-contributors towards that sacred last day’s prophetic task to make the vision “plain upon tables” that to read (with understanding) is to run (compare Hab 2:2-3; Dan 12:4,9).

HOW FOOLISH IT IS TO CURSE ISRAEL?

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More powerful revelations from Jonathan Cahn – behind the world events of our time – The recent striking down of the Iranian President: could this be related to ancient prophecies? Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi died in a helicopter crash just one month after he sent missiles into Israel. We know that God said that He will curse those who curse Israel. Are we seeing that happen in our time? What about the Turkish lawmaker who declared that Israel “will suffer the wrath of Allah” went into cardiac arrest and collapsed on the floor of Parliament mere moments after delivering the curse.

Jonathan Cahn is God’s prophet in our time. What he reveals in this video is Biblical end-times prophecy unfolding in our time. We are getting closer to the Jesus return. How exciting it is to live at this time.

“I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Genesis 12:3

“Let peoples serve you, and nations bow down to you. Be lord over your brothers, and may your mother’s sons bow down to you. Cursed be everyone who curses you, and blessed be everyone who blesses you!” Genesis 27:29

“And on that day I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.” Zechariah 12;9

BIBLICAL PROPHESIED END TIMES SIGNS

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Watching the anti-Israel protests raging on campuses across the country reveals the demonic nature of the hatred of the Jewish people and their control of the land that God has given them. It also shows how easily the entire world under the influence of Satan can believe a lie, and then turn on any group and hate them. Jesus reminds us that we are destined to face this before His return. Regardless, the gospel will be preached worldwide, and the end will only come then.

“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.” Matthew 24:9-14

THE BIBLE PROPHESIES PERSECUTION OF CHRISTIANS ESCALATES BEFORE JESUS RETURNS

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Progressive Crusade to Bend Arc of History by Chris Uhlmann in The Weekend Australian 11th May, 2024

Uhlmann contends that what is at stake is whether the ascendant state morality will drive deeper into the ancient institutions of faith and force believers to submit to its temporal commandments. Nationally, the Australian Law Reform Commission’s final report on religious exemptions from anti-discrimination law is just another sortie in a long campaign over what the state will allow you to believe and how far it is prepared to go to force apostates to heel.

Queensland’s proposed anti-discrimination bill seeks to narrow the rights of the faithful. Alex Deagon, from the Queensland University of Technology, argues it will “significantly undermine the ability of religious organisations to employ persons following their faith”.

The ALRC admits one of its recommendations may limit “the freedom to manifest religion or belief in community with others, and the associated parental liberty to ensure the religious and moral education of one’s children in conformity with one’s own convictions”. This, it says, is balanced by the overall effect, which “would be to maximise the realisation of human rights”.

The ALRC wants section 38 of the Sex Discrimination Act, which allows religious schools to hire those whose lives and ideas accord “with the doctrines, tenets, beliefs or teachings of a particular religion or creed”, to be abolished.

When you lose the freedom to manifest your faith, abide by your beliefs and the liberty to ensure your children are educated in your creed, what is left? The commission is erasing the right of a religious school to organise around its own ethos.

This is an extreme form of laicism, driven by a fierce “progressive” crusade against Christianity. In a multifaith society that means all believers are on this battlefield, as the institutions of government are mobilised against them. Like many things dubbed progressive, it is the latest incarnation of the despotic tendencies of the Bureautoracy (n): the ubiquitous, unelected technocratic blob bent on imposing its notion of utopia on the mob. Its relentlessly mutating dogma has spread like Paterson’s curse through all the institutions.

In a profound irony, we are witnessing the final metamorphosis of Christianity as zealots torch the last idol: belief in a power that transcends the state.

The child has turned on a parent it does not recognise because the source code of this secular faith is the notion of universal human rights. That idea was born with the belief that each individual is valued by God, an avowedly Christian concept and part of a set of revolutionary beliefs that the early faithful simply called “The Way”.

Universal equality is captured in Paul’s letter to the Galatians: “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Another epoch-changing idea rings from the first sentences of John’s Gospel: “In the beginning was the word (logos). And the word was with God. And the word was God.”

The New Testament was written in Greek and logos means both word and reason. So, in the Christian tradition, God is reason itself. Christianity is the singular encounter between Greek philosophy and Jewish mysticism, the marriage of reason and faith. The theology that evolved was a thoroughly different way of thinking. Let’s call it wisdom.

This wisdom elevated the poor, the meek, the righteous, the merciful, and peacemakers. Faith in God demands you “treat others as you would like them to treat you”, and not to act with reason is contrary to the nature of God.

Christianity was born in the East, informed by the West, and takes on its historically decisive character in Europe. Europe is defined by its faith and its faith is defined by reason. Faith and reason set Europe on the road to liberal democracy.

Through all its failures, and its many crimes, reason pushes the West forward and demands that it learn and evolve. And the excesses of both church and state always had to contend with its Christian conscience.

The savage colonisation of the Americas was fiercely denounced by Dominican friar Bartolome de Las Casas, and the evil of slavery collapsed when it confronted the faith of William Wilberforce. Despite often spectacularly failing to abide by its ideals, Christianity demanded the West slowly bend towards realising the radical demand of the central tenet of its faith. The new commandment to “love one another” excludes no one.

As historian Tom Holland demonstrates in his epic work Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind, “To live in a Western country is to live in a society that is utterly saturated by Christian concepts and assumptions.”

It is, of course, a heritage that the zealots of the New Way deny. To them, their belief system is self-evident because it just is. It is neutral. It is agnostic. That is a delusion. The New Way exhibits some of the best and all the worst features of a proselytising religion. It looks to uplift, to guide, to build a better, more just world. It is also deeply intolerant of dissent and has established the institutions of inquisition to police heresy, in state and federal human rights commissions.

It’s hard to criticise anti-discrimination laws but the growth of objective penalties for subjective crimes should trouble those who care about liberal democracy. Such penalties are how American journalist Robert Wargas defines totalitarianism.

What standards will be applied? The notion of transgender identity, for example, is a rapidly moving target. Even the Australian Human Rights Commission’s website admits the “terminology is strongly contested”.

So, this latest assault by the state on the faithful is a battle of competing theologies, as the disciples of Caesar seek to mount his image in every temple. And the insurgents know nothing of faith because, as anyone who has any dealings with religious schools knows, most have no desire to discriminate and are far more tolerant of difference than “progressives”.

What religious institutions don’t want is to be forced to submit to state diktats that deliberately undermine the ethos of their institution. Here let’s recall that the Labor Party pledge demands its members not be a part of any other organisation that is inimical to its ideals. Why shouldn’t religious schools enjoy the same rights?

The arc of history has bent out of shape. Those who claim the heritage of reason have discounted the role of faith in their enlightenment. They discriminate and call it equality. They unreasonably seek to force the faithful to heel. This is foolishness. Fortunately, Biblical prophecy reveals that this godless persecution of Christians precedes Jesus’ return to Earth first to rapture the Saints and then to pour out His wrath upon an unrepentant rebellious world. Christians need to heed Jesus warning that it will even get much worse.

“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.” Matthew 24:9-14

BIBLICAL PROPHECIES BEING FULFILLED IN OUR DAY

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With monumental events unfolding before our eyes and the attack of Iran on Israel, are we watching ancient prophecies being fulfilled? Are these part of God’s end-time purposes and the next prophetic event? In this video, Jonathan Cahn opens up the prophecies, the mysteries, and the answers!

This is the first time Iran made a direct act on Israel. Does this fit end times Biblical prophecies. Jonathan says it does and quotes many of the prophecies on a coming invasion of Israel with Middle East Muslim nations. The Ezekiel prophecy names the nations that will be involved in this invasion.