This is just some opinion-speculation. I’ve been thinking about Islam, the Tribulation, and Gnosticism.
I am about to conclude an 8-part series on Gnosticism past and present. I’ve been studying Colossians and Paul makes quite a refutation of it…without ever mentioning it by name, lol. That study, plus what I’ve been seeing happen to our precious Protestant church lately is what was the impetus for looking at what Gnosticism is and why it is returning so definitely in Protestant denominations.
What I see is a terrible carnality drenching the precious church. There’s the carnality of the wants and desires. The Prosperity Gosplite preachers are tickling those ears quite successfully. They preach higher church numbers, bigger churches, coffee bars. They preach the desire for more money, cars, clothes, and Mall of America consumables is what ‘God really wants’ for you, nay, must give you according to the Law of Attraction.
And there is the carnality of the body that is infiltrating church, too. There are many things that are all about the body. There is contemporary concert performance which passes for praise music that offer throbbing beats and incites a carnal reaction. The praise dance craze is simply a performance of maidens in tights- carnality of the body- which is not worship. There are clothing choices which are designed to show off the body and are worn in church. Modesty is out the window. Tattoos, nose rings, questionable art, sexual sin…carnality of the body drenches the church.
Taking a detour for a moment to today’s news of the Muslim uprising… Islam has grown incredibly in the last ten years. Terrorism by Muslims has risen too. In this week’s Hal Lindsey Report, Mr Lindsey said, “The majority of Muslims may not be terrorists, but the majority of terrorists disturbing the world today are Muslims.” This is for a sovereign reason-
God said, “I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that sends all the surrounding peoples reeling.” (Zechariah 12:2a). The NLT says, “I will make Jerusalem like an intoxicating drink that makes the nearby nations stagger …” What we see in the Muslim frenzy against Israel these days certainly looks like drunken craziness and demonic anger the LORD said He would send. It is sobering to think (pun intended) that this demonic anger is only a flicker compared to what will occur in the Tribulation.
It’s hard to deny that the people who think that Islam will take over the world as the one world religion prophesied to happen as per Revelation 13:15-17 may be right. However, I tend to think that will not be the case. I think that pagan religion has always been a problem. Though in a sense Islam is pagan because it is false, I think the Gnostic pagan religion will be the one world lie at the end.
The first false religion was self-oriented. Tower of Babel exemplified that. I think what we’re seeing with Gnosticism/Mysticism is the beginning of the final lie religion the world will embrace.
Why not Islam? Because I think that the prophesied events of Isaiah 17, Isaiah 19, Obadiah, Ezekiel 38-39, and Psalm 83 will vanquish it. All those prophecies involve Muslim nations, neighbors of Israel who claim Allah and have vowed to destroy her. Each time, Israel will win. Each time,she will claim the land of the vanquished one. I think Israel’s success, rather, the LORD showing Himself holy in those victories on behalf of His people, will either break Islam completely or reduce it so such a whimper that all Muslims will be able to do is lick their wounds and feebly clamber aboard the Pagan train when it comes by.
So I don’t think the Antichrist will be Muslim…I think he will be someone who is a secret pagan now and once the Holy Spirit ceases His restraining ministry, will emerge as a soft, emergent, pagan, Gnostic whose appeal to the masses will coalesce the groundwork of that global church that has already been laid by Prosperity Gospel, Word-Faith, Legalist, Mystical New Age, Emergent pop-psychology preachers and teachers these last 2 millennia.
What do you think?
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