Never Recognize Israel

The leader of Hezbollah, Nasrallah, has been giving more fiery talk. He spoke in Lebanon yesterday in celebration for Muhammad's birthday. Again, he used talk that Israel can be made to disappear;

Nasrallah stressed that the Lebanese people are "capable of defeating this entity (Israel) and can make it disappear," and therefore, Hizbullah will not recognize Israel "not today, not tomorrow, not even in 1,000 years."

Read the full article here; http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1236764180823&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

So how can The West force Israel to negotiate with a group when that group doesn't even believe the Israel is an official entitity? It's 100% illogical...which means that when it happens...the pressure will be supernatural in origin.

Global Currency

We have been watching the trend for currencies to consolidate. We all know about the Euro. I posted an article about Africa talking about making an African currency. And now, the icing on the cake;

Nobel-prize winner backs world currency

Read full article here; http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25173126-12377,00.html

Remember, if the anti-christ is going to put a sytem in place that requires the mark of the beast in order to buy or sell, it would be crucial that we all have the same currency. And if we all have the same global currency...it would stand to reason that we would all need the same global government.

Also recall that Iceland's currency collapsed and became worthless last fall. They will be moving to the Euro shortly. As other currencies collapse (and they will) the movement towards consolidation will be forced on some countries and asked for by others.

Can anyone hear the trumpet yet??

No Problem Too Big For Us

If we asked most bible readers to give us a few sentences describing what they know about the the anti-christ and the world system in the last days...we most certainly would hear something about "666", and "one world government" and "cashless society" or "unified currency". And they would all be correct when describing some of the attributes that God's word has to say on the topic.

As Christians, we cling to the blessed hope that we will not have to actually deal with the anti-christ because of the clear passage in 2 Thessalonians 2:7-9, "For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back (the Holy Spirit) will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of this mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming." Amen!

Let's remember that the Holy Spirit is a deposit given to indwell in all born-again believers by God the Father himself...promising that we will dwell with Him in the house of the Lord forever. Amen. So when the Rapture happens and the Holy Spirit is pulled from this earth, there will be nothing left to restrain the lawless work of Satan. Furthermore, Satan will then have free reign to work nastiness, deciet and destruction on all those left behind on planet earth.

Jesus told us to watch. First off we are supposed to watch for His return but we can also watch for the foreshadowing of events that will happen on planet earth during the tribulation. I once read that large things of God always cast shadows forward...meaning that God always tips off his followers.

With that in mind, I am constantly amazed at the articles that are coming out talking about the global trend towards a one world government. For the history of mankind, that would have never been possible, but today with technology, air travel, video conferencing, etc...we are the first generation that could see this prophecy fulfilled...and the global financial crisis could be a catalyst that pushes us towards this inevitability.

Check out these comments by Alistair Darling in today's Wall Street Journal;

We face the most difficult economic conditions in generations. The international community must unite to tackle the downturn and set the path toward a sustainable future. We must do three things: Boost demand, reform the global system of financial regulation, and increase the resources of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Only by working together can we meet the challenge -- and that is why this weekend's meeting of G-20 finance ministers in the United Kingdom matters. Together we represent more than 80% of the global economy. No problem should ever be too great or too difficult for us to deal with.

It sometimes takes a crisis of this magnitude to bring countries together. We must seize the moment and act together, urgently and with determination.

Read the full article here; http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123690430171914125.html

So let me paraphrase...the 20 largest countries/economies on earth currently represent 80% of the global economy. So the economy is already very consolidated in the hands of 20, but we need to consolidate it even more...and if we do, there is no problem that we can't solve. Did the builders of the Tower of Babel also believe this?

Friends....the stage is being set for the anti-christ's arrival into the final scenes of this spiritual, epic drama. Many are convinced he has been on earth for sometime and is just waiting to be put on the global throne. I agree with them. How then shall we live? We should feel the same excitement and anticipation as we watch for our Lord as we do when we count down the days to a beach vacation from January in Minnesota. Every day should be exciting! We should be at the top of our game every day! We should be a joy to be around! People should be attracted to our peace and happiness. They should wonder what we are so excited about when everyone else seems so down. The King is coming and we are about to soon leave on the biggest and best vacation that your mind cannot even imagine!

Journey to Destruction

Many of you know the name of Cal Thomas. He is a conservative syndicated columnist that appears in many papers around the country. Today he seems to be echoing a lot of the same sentiments that we have been repeating around here.

In regards to Obama's seemingly endless approval of abortion and now research on embryos, Mr. Thomas had this warning;

Removing restraints on stem cell research is another step on a journey leading us to a distant somewhere. Does anyone know the destination? Do enough people care that it might just be leading us not only to the destruction of more pre-born human life, but also ultimately to our own end?

He also recalls the scripture that tells us that God knew us before we were even in the womb and certainly knew us while we were in the womb.

Yet, David wrote of God in Psalm 139, "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb ... I am fearfully and wonderfully made." And again in Jeremiah 1:5, the prophet quotes God, "Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you." Those and other verses would seem to trump not only science, but whatever "faith" the president has in such matters.

Read the full article here; http://townhall.com/columnists/CalThomas/2009/03/12/journey_to_destruction

So who do we think we are to destroy God's creation simply for research, science, profit or to "improve" our lives? "Pride always comes before the fall"....says God.

Emergent Church

Many of you know that we had a speaker at adult ed a few weeks ago who gave us his views on the Emergent Church. That gentleman also happened to be on Jan Markell's board of directors.

Today, Jan Markell posted an article titled THE EMERGENT CHURCH COULD SUBMERGE YOURS.

You can access that article here; http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs019/1101818841456/archive/1102501164660.html

I believe Jan's comments are helpful in understanding the issues of "What is the Emergent Church" and "Why is this dangerous or why should we care?"

The bible is very clear that there will be a great falling away from the Christian faith in the last days. Again, just because we know it's coming doesn't mean we have to be a part of it. "As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord".

Lunatic or Prophet?

A friend of mine sent me this video of a recent interview with Alan Keyes. I don't know much about Mr. Keyes except he was running as a Republican in the presidential primary. The reason the video caught my attention was because of the passion Mr. Keyes displayed. He is convinced that President Obama is going to lead the U.S. into collapse because of his infanticide/abortion positions, his inability to prove his U.S. birth, and his insistence on throwing $2 Trillion dollars of additional debt on top of an already unpayable pile.

Watch the 3 minute video here; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aaj9ECfIodo&feature=related

I am pretty certain about one thing; If Mr. Obama is found to be Kenyan born (as his Grandmother has claimed) and forced to step down from office for constitutional reasons....anarchy and chaos would be a absolute certainty in various parts of the country. Would it spread?.... and if so how far and how wide?

As we have said in the past...the USA is nowhere to be found in biblical prophecy. Are we witnessing the stage being set for our own downward spiral? Could our idolotry have brought God to the breaking point where our punishment has started and is irrevocable?

Of course the media believe Mr. Keyes to be a lunatic as do a large percentage of the U.S. population. But I will remind you that many people who have spoken the truth in history past were also regarded as lunatics...including Jeremiah, Noah, Ezekiel, John the Baptist and just about everyone else who shows up in the bible.

Unholy Meeting

As I mentioned in an earlier posting, President al-Bashir from Sudan has an outstanding arrest warrant issued by the world court. It seems that even the world finds it hard to tolerate the rape, mutilation and murder of hundreds of thousands of people in Darfur.

But lest he feel bad that no one likes him...Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, and Hamas sent some delegates to comfort Mr. al-Bashir in his difficult time.

This meeting also produced some rhetoric for all of us in the world who believe mass murderers should be brought to justice and of course they believe it is an insult to Islam. (What doesn't offend Islam?)

"This group today indicates a readiness, a will and a unified position to support Sudan, its government and people," Larijani said at a news conference following the talks.
He said nations who support al-Bashir's prosecution "miscalculated" by thinking they "can sit and issue orders to have others behave as they wish".

"This has changed," Larijani said. "They have to play with a new chessboard.""

Read it here; http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2009/03/200937132946576390.html

So what do the players of this unholy alliance all have in common?? They all hate Jews and believe that Israel should be destroyed. Pray that Jesus shows up at this meeting and starts to change their hearts and reveal Truth to them.

Prove It

This article appeared in the Wall Street Journal yesterday. It talks about how Islam claims to be a religion of peace yet many clerics advocate stoning people for adultery and continue teaching their followers that Jews are pigs and monkeys. Also they believe that Islam should be spread by the sword. Mr. Hamid has some good suggestions for Islamic leaders.

So, Islamic scholars and clerics, it is up to you to produce a Shariah book that will be accepted in the Islamic world and that teaches that Jews are not pigs and monkeys, that declaring war to spread Islam is unacceptable, and that killing apostates is a crime. Such a book would prove that Islam is a religion of peace.

Mr. Hamid, a former member of an Egyptian Islamist terrorist group, is an Islamic reformer and senior fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies.

Read it here; http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123655519762565889.html

Church Goers and Porn

We all know that human beings are hypocrites. It doesn't matter what affiliations they have...humans just have a tendency to say one thing but do another. The secular media love stories when preachers get caught having affairs with prostitutes and gay men because it's just so fun to catch people being hypocrites.

The article below talks about Christians and porn. If the research is correct, it appears that proclaiming Christians consume as much on-line porn as non Christians.

An interesting (or depressing) wrinkle is that, in regions of higher church attendance, a smaller proportion of porn subscriptions begin on Sundays. "This analysis suggests that, on the whole, those who attend religious services shift their consumption of adult entertainment to other days of the week, despite on average consuming the same amount of adult entertainment as others," says Edelman.

Read it here; http://blog.buildingchurchleaders.com/2009/03/porn_okay_except_on_sundays.html

It should break our hearts to imagine our Bridegroom, Jesus, who has been working on our mansions and the wedding feast for 2000 years, after paying the bride-price with his very life...that when he comes for us, he will find us wrapped up in porn, loose living, worshiping idols, giving barely 2% of our income for salvation work....finding us totally conformed to the patterns of this world... Exactly what he told us NOT to do.

Hatred of Israel

I was on a conference call this afternoon with a economist/analyst from London. He believes that we won't sink to the same depths as we did during the depression of the 1930's. He had all sorts of graphs and charts showing us why he believes this...and for the most part, I believe he may be right.

The wild card he didn't discuss is the political unrest that is usually an outcome of steep unemployement and discontent. Another wild card would be a massive terrorist attack carried out againt The West.

After I hung up from him, I started thinking about how fragile this global economy is. And how it may not take too many more serious stomach-blows before it falls to it's knees. Then I started to read an article about Israel, Iran and nukes and thinking about various prophecies concerning Israel and how the world will hate her in the last days.

Imagine this scenario; what if Israel has no choice but to go into Iran and start flinging bombs to disrupt it's nuclear ambitions? The result would certainly be spiking oil prices around the world. Subsequently, we could see gas prices go from $1.85/gal up to $5.50/gal pretty fast. That just may be enough of a shock to our financial system to make our economic problems significantly worse. If that happened, the world would be enraged against Israel and they may be blamed for sinking the global economy...and few would come to her aid as the Ezekiel coalition marches.

What do you think?

God's Wrath Predicted

Many of you know that David Wilerson is the founder of Teen Challenge and a best-selling author of The Cross and the Switchblade. Mr. Wilkerson has come out with a rather severe warning about God's wrath...and he says it's coming soon.

"An earth-shattering calamity is about to happen," he writes. "It is going to be so frightening, we are all going to tremble – even the godliest among us."

Wilkerson's vision is of fires raging through New York City.

"It will engulf the whole megaplex, including areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. Major cities all across America will experience riots and blazing fires – such as we saw in Watts, Los Angeles, years ago," he explains. "There will be riots and fires in cities worldwide. There will be looting – including Times Square, New York City. What we are experiencing now is not a recession, not even a depression. We are under God’s wrath. In Psalm 11 it is written, "If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?"

Read the article here; http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=91097

I am glad that God has the whole world in his hands. I will also cling to the blessed hope that The Groom is soon coming for His Bride.

What Does This Mean?

As I turned on my computer this morning, it flooded with headlines about turmoil, church shootings, financial market woes, etc... It seems that massive insurance giant, AIG, is asking for another infusion of $$ Billions.

In the AIG report prepared for federal and state legislators, AIG warned of a "casatrophic" collapse that could occur if they don't get another government bailout and are left to fail. This paragraph makes you sit up a bit;

AIG warned of turmoil around the globe if the government allowed the insurer to fail, adding “it is questionable whether the economy could tolerate another shock to the system that a failure of AIG would produce.” The value of the U.S. dollar might fall, Treasury borrowing costs could rise and the agency would face “doubts about the ability of the U.S. to support its banking system,” according to the presentation, parts of which were reported earlier by the New York Times.

So what does "collapse" even mean? What kind of turmoil around the globe? What would happen if the economy couldn't tolerate another shock?

Read Bloomberg article here; http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&refer=us&sid=av8IskE9DZ4A

In what may prove to be foreshadowing of these answers, the TODAY SHOW this morning, had a story on the "tent cities" that are springing up in major cities all over the U.S. They opened the story with a clip from Sacramento showing hundreds of people living in tents in a field along the railroad tracks. The reporter said the last time this happened was during the Great Depression.

I don't know what "collapse" means, but I have a sore suspicion that most Americans have grown too soft to handle much of one.

Varous Places

The earthquakes that are rattling around the globe have been happening so frequently that I have not bothered posting about them as of late. However, these quakes that struck Australia caught my attention because of their location and also from some of the quotes in the article.

"Jeez, it came as a bit of a surprise. We were just sitting around when all of a sudden the place starts vibrating," he said.

"But it is quite remarkable that we get three of roughly the same size in the one day."

Read the article here; http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25152129-29277,00.html

Yes, there are remarkable events happening around the world...and they are becoming more frequent every day. At some point in the future (hopefully the near future), the rapture of the church is going to happen and billions of people on earth will be left saying, "Jeez, it came as a big surprise. We were just sitting around when all of a sudden...."

Worshiping the Wrong God

The bible makes reference to a god with the name of Mammon. Mammon is the god of money, wealth and luxury. Many of you have heard me refer to him in adult-ed because it seems so obvious that America has been worshiping this god for quite some time...and in the process have lost our fear of God and love for Christ.

As I was reading devotions this morning I came across this passage from Isaiah 57:11-13;

11 Whom did you dread and fear, so that you lied,and did not remember me, did not lay it to heart?
Have I not held my peace, even for a long time, and you do not fear me?
12I will declare your righteousness and your deeds, but they will not profit you.
13 When you cry out, let your collection of idols deliver you! The wind will carry them off, a breath will take them away.
But he who takes refuge in me shall possess the land and shall inherit my holy mountain.

As I reflect on the last months of the falling stock market and the potential collapse of our financial system, I see verse 11. Who have we dreaded and feared??

As a country, who are we crying out to for deliverance?? It would appear we are crying out for our financial markets to "recover" (Mammon! Please come back!)....to come back and give us that "security" we had when our houses were worth $600,000, our 401(k)'s were worth twice as much, and the stock market just kept going up for almost 25 years with just some minor hiccups. Will our financial system deliver us?? Or will the wind simply carry it off?

As a nation, our only long term hope is that we will repent and turn from our wicked ways...only then will God heal our land.