Pythons and Rats

OK...these article's don't have a lot to do with watching and waiting, but they are just pretty darn interesting...even for the pictures alone.

This one has a picture of a huge python that ate an alligator in Florida and ultimately died trying to swallow it's victim. These pythons are taking over in the American South as they have no natural predators and can travel very fast. The guy interviewed said that the python invasion could have "dire consequences" for our southern neighbors. So maybe it is sign?? :>

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1968287/Giant-pythons-taking-over-American-south.html

The next article has a picture of a giant rat caught in China. It has nothing to do with Jesus' return...but who doesn't enjoy getting the heebies from seeing a huge rat and imagining that thing crawling around in your barn?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/4688453/Giant-rat-caught-in-China.html

Continuous World War

Climate change is in the headlines daily. The article below talks about the ice melting and raising sea levels. As we already know, a huge percentage of the earth's population live on the coasts of all the continents. If the sea rises as fast as some say it could, all those people would have to move further inland. Whenever people are forced to move it leads to war.

It would "transform where people can live," Stern said. "People would move on a massive scale. Hundreds of millions, probably billions of people would have to move if you talk about 4-, 5-, 6-degree increases" — 7 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit. And that would mean extended global conflict, "because there's no way the world can handle that kind of population move in the time period in which it would take place."

Obviously, the poorer nations who already have millions of people living in boxes and mud huts, would be most severely impacted. And to this fact came this quote;

In the face of such threats, "the rich countries have to give us a helping hand," the African minister said.

That sure sounds logical that the rich nations will have to help the poor nations...but what if the rich nations are broke? I guess that will just add to the continuous world war that appears headed for planet earth.

Come Lord Jesus.

Read article here; http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090221/ap_on_sc/af_climate_stranded

Financial Collapse

World famous investor George Soros has some very severe opinions about the current financial crisis;

Soros said the turbulence is actually more severe than during the Great Depression, comparing the current situation to the demise of the Soviet Union.

Fed Chairman Volcker echoed his setiments;

"I don't remember any time, maybe even in the Great Depression, when things went down quite so fast, quite so uniformly around the world," Volcker said.

Read full article here; http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE51K0A920090221

If this is the case and we truly are seeing God wipe out the Age of Enlightenment...then truly this is one more sign that our Savior is very close. In fact he may already have his Bridegroom clothes on and is be sitting at his Father's door...waiting for the order to go and fetch his bride.

As the world mourns the demise of it's wealth-god, Mammon...we should light up even more with excitement and anticipation and thereby be a light unto the world.

Obama's Spending

As we all now know, President Obama is going to attack this country's economic sickness (caused my massive overspending, greed and corruption) with a dose of massive spending which will be ripe with greed and corruption. It may be that's the only answer, but I guess we will never know since no one was allowed to read and debate the 1,100 page spending bill before our reps were all asked to approve it.

Check out these poll numbers that American Family Assoc. put out, asking it's members if they agree with the spending plan;

President Obama's $3 trillion spending proposals

President Obama is right on track. His spending proposals will help turn our economy around.
1,175

President Obama is off track. His spending proposals will simply make a bad situation worse.
53,439

We can be certain that Reuters and/or The AP WILL NOT use this poll as it truly is not a fair representation of the general public. However, it probably is a fair representation of what bible reading Americans believe.

Top Headline...Israel

If you turn on Google News today you will see that the number one story at the very top of the page is Israel and Netanyahu. Again I ask, how is it possible that the world is so engrossed in this tiny country with a few million people? Why is that most of the world can name Israel's leaders, but few of us can name the Prime Minister of Canada? Who can name the President of South Africa? Who can name the leadership of Mexico?

In my thinking, this is just one more clue to the supernatural nature of Israel and the Jews.

And today, the news is about Netanyahu;

President Shimon Peres on Friday handed him a mandate to form Israel's next government, and the right-wing Likud leader now has 42 days to put together a coalition. He should manage that with like-minded allies, even if his appeal to centrist and left-wing rivals for a unity government falls on deaf ears.

So for the next 42 days the eyes of the world will stay focused on Israel to see if this hawk can put together a coalition.

Continue to pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

Israeli Politics

Things don't seem much different in Israel than they do here in the U.S. Politicians promise things to get elected but quickly find out that those promises are much harder to fulfill once you are the one with your finger on the trigger. Also, Israel has hardliners and also has elements that are very pacifist. One big difference is that Israeli's don't vote for a particular candidate, but instead vote for a political party.

Israel also has some conservative newspapers and some liberal ones. That being said, Haaretz News to Israel is like the New York Times is to us. This article from Haaretz seems to be pretty critical of Mr. Netanyahu and all the tough talk that he did during the election. Saying that he will deny Iran's nuclear capabilites vs. actually doing something about it with planes and bombs may put him to the test.

"Bomb Iran, Netanyahu, because sanctions aren't enough for you, you don't believe in diplomatic negotiations with Iran and you pledged that you, Mr. Iran, would prevent Tehran from obtaining nuclear arms at any cost. Let's see you get Barack Obama's permission for the most dangerous escapade of all. Bombard and let's see what happens."

Whatever happens in Israel, it is obvious that President Obama will be right smack in the middle of it...and he won't simply be able to vote "present".

Read Haaretz opinion here; http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1065367.html

Turkey and Iran

As the Magog players continue to come on stage, we see from this article concerning Turkey and Iran, that these countries seem to be uniting. We know that Turkey's president was given a heroe's welcome in the muslim world after he walked off stage during a meeting with Israel. We also know that Turkey's relationship with Israel has soured very quickly after Israel invaded Gaza.

"In the new circumstances [that have emerged], the expansion of relations between Iran and Turkey is a necessity... As the two great powers [in the region], the two countries have a broad common denominator, and by deepening the cooperation between them, they could play a decisive role in [shaping] the regional and international balances [of power]... The support of the Turkish government and people for the oppressed people of Gaza showed that [Turkey] was taking an independent stance."

Read full article here; http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD224809

Syria and Chemicals

As we just mentioned on Sunday, the warning to Syria from an Israeli General sticks in my mind..."If we even find one dead dog in Tiberius that was killed by gas, you will be finished."

In this report in the JP, it certainly seems that Syria is forging ahead with plans for chemical and gas warfare...and they may be walking right into the fulfillment of Isaiah 17.

Read it here; http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1233304811448&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

California Almost Broke

Most of you know why miners used to have a canary in the mine shift with them...because the bird would die from poison gas and when the miners saw the bird die, they knew they had but a few minutes to exit the mine before they also died.

This article about California on the brink of financial meltdown makes me wonder if the state is the U.S's canary in the mine shaft. If that state falls, it makes me wonder if we will only have a short time before we all succumb to the financial poison we have all been breathing.

During a news conference with reporters, the president pro tempore of the State Senate, Darrell Steinberg, said he would once again order lawmakers to stay in the capitol Tuesday until a deal was hammered out. Failure to reach agreement, he said, would be "catastophic."

Read the full article here; http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/18/us/18calif.html?ref=us

Also, have you noticed that California and New York are the states being mentioned to have the most catastrophic financial situations?? Have you further noticed that they are two of the most liberal states in the union? I would also be curious to know what percentage of each state's population would claim to be born again and indwelt with the Holy Spirit. It would be interesting to watch and see if there is a correlation between state's problems vs. the percentage of Christ followers. We will need to put up our antenae on that question.

Thessalonians clearly tells us that the Holy Spirit is currently restraining evil, chaos and mayhem on earth. It may stand to reason that the chaos and mayhem may first manifest itself where the Holy Spirit has the least amount of presence. What do you think?

FDIC

FDIC stands for Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and it insures all the money that we have in our banks. Obviously, if the Federal Government runs out of money, then the FDIC will also be out of money...so there truly is no 100% safe place to "guarantee" your money while you are a member of planet earth.

That being said, I plucked these facts from Chuck Missler's site;

Many naïve investors take comfort in the fact that their bank deposits are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). The FDIC is the insurer of $13.3 trillion in U.S. bank deposits in 8,451 U.S. Banks. However, it had less than $35 billion in insurance funds at the end of the 3rd Quarter 2008 (down 24%). That amounts to only 76 cents for every $100 of insured deposits; less than 1%.

Maybe this is why the bible tells us to lay up our treasures in heaven where moth and rust will not destroy....plus you get to spend it for all eternity, rather than just a few more years.

Revival or Rapture?

The guys at Rapture Ready have been following prophetic events for 30 some years. In regards to the financial calamity that the world currently finds itself in, they think one of two scenario's are possible, but the rapture scenario seems more likely. Read an excerpt here;

Revival or Rapture

It is becoming very clear that the world is facing a time of economic peril that has not been seen in two generations. In all my years of watching current events, I've never seen headlines warning about the possibility of the whole financial system disintegrating into chaos. These dire reports are not from a supermarket tabloid. They are from some of the most respected news organizations in the land.
I firmly believe that God is in control of all events. Governments around the world have pledged $2 trillion dollars to try to stabilize the global economic meltdown, and still it continues to slide. The stakes have become so desperately grim, I see only two possible outcomes from the viewpoint of a believer: God is either using the economic crisis to bring about a great revival, or He is soon going to rapture the Church home and begin the tribulation countdown.
It is my view that we are headed for the second option. I would love to see revival break out, but I don't believe it is possible at this stage. Some of my friends hold to the view that the Lord is going to pour out a “latter rain” revival. Some other folks believe the Church is going to take over this world for Christ. I just don't see the Bible pointing to such a positive outcome.

Read the full article here; http://raptureready.com/rap16.html

Let's be about the Master's work while we have some time remaining.

Methodist Follow Up

Yesterday in adult ed, we talked briefly about the headline concerning the Methodist Church. The headline talked about how the Methodists were going to devote considerable time and effort to communicating their belief that the formation of modern day Israel is a "catasrophe".

This is sad when you consider this quote from John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church;

"You have nothing to do but to save souls. Therefore spend and be spent in this work. And go always, not only to those that want you, but to those that want you most. Observe: It is not your business to preach so many times, and to take care of this or that society; but to save as many souls as you can; to bring them to repentance, and with all your power to build them up in holiness without which they cannot see the Lord."

It would seem the Mr. Wesley was adamant about snatching souls from the fire. I'm sure he would be saddened to see how far his church has fallen into the lukewarm soup.

$10,000 Billion

That's a hard number to comprehend, but that's what the U.S. Government has put out there in an attempt to "solve" the financial crisis. As we talked about in adult ed this morning, this will ultimately put pressure on the demand of the world to have one currency...exactly as the bible prophesies. Here's what Hal Lindsey had to say;

I'll also ask the question: "How much is enough?" Bloomberg.net estimates that with Senate approval of President Obama's "stimulus package," the government's total committment to solving the financial crisis has now risen to almost $10 trillion. That's ten TRILLION -- or 10,000 BILLIONS! Yet no one really knows if the effort will have any substantial effect. I can answer that question right now. It will have an effect, but it won't solve the problem. Here's the 'effect': we're headed -- with increasing speed -- toward a global money system. This worldwide crisis is rapidly laying the foundation for that system. To much of the world, it's becoming "apparent" that some sort of centralized control is needed to avert a global depression or catastrophe (a description that President Obama invokes often). For the first time, world leaders are openly and publicly discussing the need for such a system. That's a major -- and necessary -- step toward giving that global authority the power to decide who "buys or sells."

I do know one effect this will have...INFLATION. You can't print that much paper money without having all the money outstanding become more and more worthless. The Fed has no choice but to try and ramp up inflation since then they believe they will get their only tool back (interest rate adjustments) to try and jigger the speed of the economy.

It's a dangerous gamble since it could lead to the default of the U.S. Government.

Global Warming Even Worse

Now we find out that man-made-global-warming is even worse than scientists first thought.

Without decisive action to slow global warming, higher temperatures could ignite tropical forests and thaw the Arctic tundra, potentially releasing billions of tons of carbon dioxide that has been stored for thousands of years.
That could raise temperatures even more and create "a vicious cycle that could spiral out of control by the end of the century."

So if the tundra thaws and starts to decompose, the carbon that would be released could put the world climate out of control.

Read it here; http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090214/sc_afp/usclimatewarming_20090214150716

Sounds like it is almost making men faint with fear....which is also a fulfillment of prophecy.

Clash Coming

U.S. intel has reported to Congress that a clash is liable to happen in 2009 between Israel and Iran.

Israel and Iran are liable to enter into a confrontation or a crisis sometime this year due to Tehran's progress in its nuclear weapons program and Jerusalem's determination to thwart it, the head of U.S. intelligence told lawmakers on Thursday.

As faithful readers, you know that the terrorist group Hezbollah, is an outpost of Iran and has pretty much taken over Lebanon. Also Hamas in Gaza and West Bank and also Syria. They are all getting their marching orders, military and financial aid, from Iran. So the clash that is ongoing in Gaza is really a tiny proxy war with Iran.

The intel chief went on to say what the Obama administration should attempt in order to bring peace.

So long as Hamas rules Gaza and Hezbollah solidifies its hold on southern Lebanon, an Israel-Palestinian agreement becomes more difficult to reach, Blair said. Nonetheless, the former admiral recommended that the U.S. invest greater effort in advancing the peace process so as to create opportunities for the U.S. to engage in dialogue with wide swaths of the Arab public, particularly those with nationalistic and Islamic tendencies.

Put another way, he is saying that the U.S. should engage with the very people who deny Israel's right to exist and believe that Islamic rule and law should be imposed over the entire earth. Certainly this will not be a good path for the U.S. to take.

Read full article here; http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1063991.html