What a day. There was a 7.9 earthquake at Costa Rica (later reduced to a 7.6) which sparked a Caribbean-wide tsunami warning for a while.
There is a report of propaganda artwork from street vendors at the Democratic National Convention directly likening Obama to Jesus.
There is the DNC’s floor fight using God as a political football to keep the term God-given in their party platform and to keep pro-Jerusalem language in it too.
There is a report of 100 Muslim delegates at the DNC, a quadrupling in number since 2004.
There is a video of a FL DNC Jewish Chairman who says any friendship with Christians is a false friendship, because the fundamentalist Christians only want Jews converted and slaughtered so the Second Coming can be ushered in.
I would include links but I really want to personally avoid this news and I don’t want to promote it. If you’re interested, google the terms and you’ll find plenty. These news items were from today.
I find this news sickening, upsetting, and an omen of how close we are to the rapture. So rather than go into detail about the news, which should be obvious in its import, I’ll go straight to the blessed Hope, which is Jesus, His Spirit who inspired the Word, and our Holy Father who providentially holds us in His hand.
‘Do not fear, for I am with you; do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, surely I will help you, surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’ (Isaiah 41:10).
Is there any better place to be than His righteous right hand?? No.
“for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” (2 Timothy 1:7)
Is there any better way to act than that? No. And the best part is that acting that way is not up to us, but we have the Spirit to help us in His power be loving and self-controlled!
“The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.” (Zephaniah 3:17)
If you are in Jesus, the Lord God loves you! Did your read that verse slowly? He is in our midst! He saves! He rejoices over His children! He calms and quiets us by His love! And He sings exultantly over His people. I have a hard time visualizing God singing loudly over His people but the bible says He does, so there ya go. This is not because we are so great, but before the foundation of the world He loves us whilst we were still sinners. His glory is shown through His salvation to sinners.
Be encouraged. God, Jesus, The Spirit who are our Triune God is at work in every corner of the earth and every point of heaven. And in that work, He is mindful of you and me, down to the hairs on our head and our innermost thoughts. His Day will right all wrongs. Meanwhile, all we have to do is love Him and walk in His ways, praying ceaselessly for strength and love, and He will give it.
There is a report from Drudge about more sky booms, but this time people hear them coming from the ground. Previously, people in other locations have reported them coming from the sky. There have been so many booms, from so many places around the globe, for so long, that the name “Sounds of the Apocalypse” is widely recognized as the name for this phenomenon. I have reported on these booms myself many times. Do a Google search for sky noises, or booms, and you’ll see how many times they have been heard around the world.
In one post, I explored that the noises could be leak-through spiritual warfare in the heavenlies ramping up and used the verses in 2 Kings for support text (here). I also wrote about the possibility that it was leak-through from the throne room, and used support text from Ezekiel 1:24a, here. Thirdly I mused that it could be a fulfillment of a Jeremiah verse, here, this being the verse from Jeremiah-
“A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth; for the LORD hath a controversy with the nations, he will plead with all flesh; he will give them that are wicked to the sword, saith the LORD.” (Jeremiah 25:31).
I’ll propose a fourth theory. Just as we do not know what is happening in the heavenly realms now, apart from what is written in the bible, we do not know what is happening in hell, or in Tartarus (the lowest gloomy dungeon where the fallen angels are being kept (Jude 1:6, 2 Peter 2:4). I wonder do the noises from hell leak-through to us here on earth? Are the fallen angels sensing the nearness of the day when they as the Revelation 9 locusts will be released and they make a great rushing sound?
“And the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth, and he was given the key to the shaft of the bottomless pit. He opened the shaft of the bottomless pit, and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft. Then from the smoke came locusts on the earth, and they were given power like the power of scorpions of the earth.” (Rev 9:1-3).
When that happens, and it has not happened yet, don’t you think it would make a great noise? Yes, it does, and the bible tells us how great a noise they make:
“In appearance the locusts were like horses prepared for battle: on their heads were what looked like crowns of gold; their faces were like human faces, their hair like women’s hair, and their teeth like lions’ teeth; they had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the noise of their wings was like the noise of many chariots with horses rushing into battle.” (Revelation 9:7-9).
When an orchestra warms up before the concert, they make a cacophonous sound as each individual musician tunes his instrument. Then the conductor raises his baton and at once, they perform in harmony and in like movements. It is the same with an army. As each soldier jockeys his armor into position, there is a rumble and a noise as the preparations go on, which gets louder and more cacophonous as the moment nears when the Commander raises his hand to begin.
Before a football game, don’t the fans, in their excitement, stomp their feet and pound the bleachers, making a great racket?
The “wondrous strange” thing about the coming of the prophesied locusts is that they have a king.
“They have as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit. His name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek he is called Apollyon.” (Revelation 9:11). Yet Proverbs 30:27 tells us locusts have no king. So the Revelation locusts are no ordinary locusts. Are they demons? Yes. They have a form and they have faces and they have armor and they have a sting of a scorpion even though they are called locusts.
John Phillips wrote, “Picture what the world would be like if we were to open the doors of all the penitentiaries of earth and set free the world’s most vicious and violent criminals, giving them full reign to practice their infamies upon mankind. Something worse than that lies in store for the world. Satan cast out of heaven is now permitted to summon to his aid the most diabolical fiends in the abyss to act as his agents in bringing mankind to the footstool of the beast.”
Are the locust-demons in the pit pounding their bleachers and rattling their chains and yelling as they sense the Day approaching where they will be let out to destroy the earth and its peoples? I don’t know. Only God knows. The possibility of it reminds me of the famous quote from Hamlet. Upon seeing a ghost (demon) Horatio said to Hamlet, “O day and night, but this is wondrous strange!”
Hamlet replied, “… There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”
The thing to remember about these booms is that what we see is not real. The life we are living is not the full story. There is more, much more, in God’s realms than we see and experience. Paul said,
“as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.” (2 Corinthians 4:18).
Here is the report from Drudge. This time, the booms are coming from the ground, but they are not earthquakes. Or sonic booms. Or mining. They simply don’t know what they are.
Source Of Loud Boom In Foothills A Mystery EL DORADO COUNTY (CBS13) – People from all over El Dorado County say they’re hearing loud booms several times a week, but there are many theories on what is causing them. “I thought it was thunder,” said one person. “It’s definitely not thunder; too consistent. I thought it was just mining,” said another person. “I always considered them to be sonic booms from flying aircrafts for years,” said Loring Brunius, owner of Sierra Rock Diamond Quarry. People who live near Pleasant Valley say their days have been interrupted by loud booms, shaking the floor beneath them. “You can feel it in the ground, no question about it. But no one’s been able to figure out why,” said Pleasant Valley resident Peter O’Grady. “I tend to hear somewhere between four to six of these things during the weekdays usually between 11 p.m. and 2 p.m. “Boom, boom, boom, boom just like that,” said Lorren Gonzales, who lives near Pleasant Valley.”
I found a 12-minute Youtube compilation of natural disasters that are happening in the world. The disasters you are about to see all happened within the last month. There is nothing bloody or gory. Just a plethora of disasters that are coming upon the world like birthpangs. Note how often you hear comments in the audio from people who say things like “this is unprecedented” or “I’ve never seen this in all my life.”
I’ve reported on some of the disasters, like the Philippine floods or the Louisiana sinkhole. Below the video, is one news excerpt I expanded from the video that goes into more depth.
Here is a lengthier treatment of the moment in the video above where a sinkhole swallowed a man.
Sinkhole swallows man “As Typhoon Saola trounces Taiwan, surveillance camera footage showing an unidentified man being swallowed by a sinkhole in Sansia District, Taiwan, has surfaced. In the video, the man can be seen walking along the street until — within a split second — the ground gives way and he disappears. A rescue operation reportedly was attempted, but according to CNN the man later died of his injuries.”
I tried to screen cap it for those who can’t or don’t watch videos, but it really was a split second. On the video above, at second 7 he is walking jauntily along, and at second 8 on the video there is a gaping hole and a dead man under the rubble. Jonathan Edwards preached on this very thing in his famous sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.
“If God should withdraw his hand, by which they are restrained, they would in one moment fly upon their poor souls. The old serpent is gaping for them; hell opens its mouth wide to receive them; and if God should permit it, they would be hastily swallowed up and lost. … for awakening unconverted persons in this congregation. This that you have heard is the case of every one of you that are out of Christ. — That world of misery, that lake of burning brimstone, is extended abroad under you. There is the dreadful pit of the glowing flames of the wrath of God; there is hell’s wide gaping mouth open; and you have nothing to stand upon, nor any thing to take hold of; there is nothing between you and hell but the air; it is only the power and mere pleasure of God that holds you up. You probably are not sensible of this; you find you are kept out of hell, but do not see the hand of God in it; but look at other things, as the good state of your bodily constitution, your care of your own life, and the means you use for your own preservation. But indeed these things are nothing; if God should withdraw his hand, they would avail no more to keep you from falling, than the thin air to hold up a person that is suspended in it”.
Now …here is something else. I’ve posted very few posts lately on the prophetic indicators for the Mark of the Beast partly because it depresses me and partly because by the time the Mark comes both the saved and the unsaved are so far along in the Tribulation these pre-rapture signs will mean little to the Tribulation survivors. But this one struck me.
Robot learns to recognise itself in the mirror “NICO spends a lot of time looking in the mirror. But it’s not mere vanity – Nico is a humanoid robot that can recognise its reflection – a step on the path towards true self-awareness.”
Now if that doesn’t give you chills, I don’t know what will.
I am part of an interesting generation. I was born in 1960, before the space age. I remember the US astronauts on the moon in 1968. I lived most of my adult life before the internet, and personal computers only came along after college. I wrote my term papers on a typewriter and used a lot of white-out. Audio cassettes weren’t even invented until 1962 and my family didn’t use them until I was nearly in my teens. CD music, cellphones, cable television…all very new. I was 12 when Pong was invented and my dad brought it home. Now look where we are with computer games…
The ATM wasn’t invented until I was nine and their use didn’t become ubiquitous until I was a teenager. For most of my life, the notion of a one world payment system was simply unbelievable.
Now we are closing in on Artificial Intelligence. The major question in robotics and computering is “can machines ever become self-aware?” I propose that it is a moot question, because God would shut down the whole shebang before another “creation” with consciousness and intelligence appears on the scene. Once a robot is self-aware, would they then have to become cognizant of their own sin and then choose a savior? Of course not, the premise that God would allow man to create consciousness is ridiculous. But if a robot is that close to recognizing itself, how close are we to AI, and how close to the rapture? What will the Mark of the Beast look like…how will it work? The world doesn’t have long to find out, I think.
Fortunately those who have repented of their sin will be carried safely up to heaven before all this crashes down and man lives with his folly. We will be made fully perfect, and that includes an awareness of the entire body of the Church to a degree we know about now cognitively but don’t directly experience fully (due to our sin nature.) Best of all, we will see, know, and experience a life with Jesus the Savior clearly, and not dimly like we do now. (1 Corinthians 13:12-13).
Any person who repents will be in that blessed group of the Church Age believers who are raptured out. For those who fence-sit, or who outright refuse to believe, well, just think on this. If robots are becoming self aware, how long do you think it will take before kings, dictators, and evil men use them to hunt you down? (“Open the pod bay doors, HAL. … I’m sorry, Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that.”)
The disasters on the video, remember, occurred in just this last month. What does God have in store for the next month? We do know the near future holds wars and rumors of wars, pestilences, volcanic eruptions, floods, drought, hail, fires, pain, anguish and death. Doom and gloom? You betcha.
Jesus is HOPE and LIGHT! I prefer the hope and light to the doom and gloom. If you repent of your sins, and you are a sinner you know, and ask Jesus to forgive them, He will. He is a good savior. So when will the end come? Just because He hasn’t judged men in wrath does not mean He won’t. He has been patient up until now:
“The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9).
However that patience is coming to an end, and as a thief in the night, the end will come. The repentant will be given their reward and their relief, and the unrepentant will have given to them what they chose: the worst time the world has ever known or will ever know again. (Matthew 24:21). Like the Taiwanese man who was happily walking one moment and the next was dead under the rubble, Jesus will suddenly and without warning end His patience and begin His wrath. You really don’t want to be here for that.
On August 14, 2012, I’d posted a news article about the Mississippi River drying up. I’d reported that the marine traffic was having difficulty in places with navigating the low waters of the river, and noted how much food is transported along that vital artery of America.
Regarding how this meshes with the prophetic and the times in which we live, I’d written, “Food can become unavailable in many ways. It can be unavailable due to extended drought or heat. (Deuteronomy 28:22; Jeremiah 14:1-3; Haggai 1:11). It can be available but too expensive for most people to acquire. (Rev 6:6). Food can be eaten by locusts, worms, crickets. (Deuteronomy 28:38-29, 42). It can become unavailable due to difficulties of hostile armies surrounding the people and destroying the crops (Deut 28:48-51). Maybe the rivers dried up. “A drought on her waters! They will dry up. For it is a land of idols, idols that will go mad with terror.’ (Jer 50:38). There are lots of ways that food is kept from the people. But there is only one reason:”
“All these curses will come upon you. They will pursue you and overtake you until you are destroyed, because you did not obey the Lord your God and observe the commands and decrees He gave you.” (Deuteronomy 28:45)”
Well, it’s a week later, and the heat and drought continues unabated in the Midwest, and the river is even lower now. Today, the news is that the Mississippi River has been closed to marine traffic along an 11-mile stretch.
Fox News reports, “Low water levels close 11-mile stretch of Mississippi River “Nearly 100 boats and barges were waiting for passage Monday along an 11-mile stretch of the Mississippi River that has been closed due to low water levels, the U.S. Coast Guard said. New Orleans-based Coast Guard spokesman Ryan Tippets said the stretch of river near Greenville, Miss., has been closed intermittently since Aug. 11, when a vessel ran aground. Tippets said the area is currently being surveyed for dredging and a Coast Guard boat is replacing eight navigation markers. He says 40 northbound vessels and 57 southbound vessels were stranded and waiting for passage Monday afternoon. … Thousands of tons of material are shipped on the river each day. Shippers who move material up and down the river on a daily basis have complained that the shallow river is forcing them to lighten the loads on their barges to avoid hitting bottom. Lighter loads mean less revenue for the shippers, who still have to deal with costs such as labor and fuel.”
The barges are not the only marine interests to be impacted by the continuing drought and heat, as this article tells us, the “Mississippi River Too Low For American Queen Steamboat To Travel“ “The Mississippi River is just days away from reaching record low levels. River traffic is moving at a snail’s pace and some barge companies can no longer transport goods. Even the American Queen Steamboat can’t safely navigate the river. The huge vessel is tied up at the north end of Harbor Town, unable to finish a trip to Vicksburg.”
Passengers disembarked and were taken to Vicksburg by bus.
The river is so low in places that salt water is running UP the river and contaminating the fresh water supply in several towns. This news article quotes the Army Corps of Engineers, “The extreme drought in other areas has caused extra low river levels here and the saltwater intrusion. It’s a stark difference on the river compared to what we saw this time last year. “A year ago, we were looking at the flood of record, 17 feet on the Carrollton gauge, and here, we are now looking at drought conditions with below two feet on the Carrollton gauge. It’s amazing what the Mississippi River can do,” said Col. Ed Fleming with the Corps.”
Remember all that flooding last year? A distant memory now. Amazing is right.
The news report above said on August 10th that the river was “days away from record low.” How is the river level today, ten days after that statement? Pretty bad.
Army Corps: Low Mississippi River levels to continue into fall, water levels near record-low “Low water levels that are restricting shipping traffic, forcing harbor closures and causing barges to run aground on the economically vital Mississippi River are expected to continue into October, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers officials said Tuesday. Meanwhile, more than 100 tow boats and barges remain backed up near Greenville, Miss. due to the low river. The U.S. Coast Guard opened an 11-mile stretch of river that had been closed near Greenville, replacing it with a 5-mile zone where only lighter vessels can pass. Speaking at a meeting of Corps officials, water control managers and business people in Memphis, Major Gen. John W. Peabody said that five harbors — in Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas and Mississippi — are closed, and several others have limited access due to low water levels along the nation’s most important inland waterway.”
Barges and their towboats accumulate alongside the Mississippi banks of the Mississippi River near Greenville, Miss. ASSOCIATED PRESS
“Peabody said he receives reports of vessels running aground on a daily basis. He also says that river levels will likely remain low into October, which is typically when levels are the lowest each year. “The worst is ahead of us,” Peabody said.”
Major General Peabody said that the worst is ahead and he is right as far as the weather and engineering goes, but the worst is ahead also means spiritually. The river is not going to get better. The weather is not going to get better. Everything, including the sinner’s rebellious spirit, is going to get worse and worse, until Jesus comes. We Christians are on the downward slide, the home stretch.
As these news articles discussed the impacts of the events they reported on, did you notice how much of it is interrelated? The drought and heat causes crops to fail, which causes grass to wither, which causes the roots to dry up and the topsoil to be able to blow away. Dust storms start and bring more dust. Meanwhile the river levels are dropping, and shipping, labor, and food transport is affected. The laborers still have to be paid, even though the barges carry less, and that cost is passe down to the people, who cannot afford food as it is. Even the salt water problem of running upriver and contaminating fresh water supplies is an interrelated event from the high temperatures in places far away from the river. Someone has to pay for that water to be trucked in…with money that is becoming as scarce as food is getting. So it is all related.
With the record floods last year and the record drought his year, it just makes me wonder what Jesus will do next. I stand in awe of Him, and His ways. The bible forecasts much more in store for the world. I feel the pressure building. Do you?
Most of the world is rebelling, so the pressure of the Spirit who guides and nudges is being resisted in ever greater quantities by both the Spirit-filled Christian and the godless sinner. At the same time, “During the present age he and his demon host dominate, pressure, and control every person who is unsaved. He is the personification of spiritual death because he is the personification of rebellion against God—and so is the system he designed.” (source).
This pressure we feel from the satanic system is going to be crushed.
Jesus prayed for us, “When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” (John 17:1-5).
While on earth, Jesus sought the mind of Christ every moment and lived a perfect, sinless life. He did this out of love for His Father, obedience to Him, and to be prepared as the sacrifice for sin. When He was glorified, He would send the Holy Spirit to us so that we could be act in a manner bringing glory to Jesus, who by then was in heaven. When we reach heaven and the rapture happens we will be glorified too, with a sinless body and the mind of Christ. (1 Corinthians 15:53-54; 1 Corinthians 13:12).
Jesus continued, “For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.” (John 17:9).
He has given us His words, straight from heaven, lived out in perfect truth from a sinless life, and verified as truth through His resurrection. His word, now our bible, is absolutely true from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22.
It always starts and ends with Jesus, who is the Word.
“I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.” (John 17:14-18).
If you are going through trouble due to the world hating you because Jesus is in you, take heart! He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world! (1 John 4:4). Jesus is praying to God as our High Priest even though His trial, death, and resurrection was still in the near future. He was headed to the garden of Gethsemane, and His entire body would be wracked with tension so great that drops of His precious, heavenly blood would fall on the dirty ground as He prepared himself for the torture. He pleaded with the Father for us! He is still interceding. (Romans 8:34).
Look what He gave us! His mind, His life, His sacrifice, His body, His blood, Himself.
Jesus prays, Johann Christoph Weigel, 1695
“The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one.” (John 17:22.)
I find this entire chapter so moving. Submit your mind to the Spirit so that we can be ever closer as one to Jesus, and that even more glory can be given to Him! Perform honorable actions in the world so He may be glorified by others seeing His light in us. Honor Him on this Lord’s day, and every day. He is worthy to be praised!
Martyn Lloyd-Jones, 30 years’ minister of Westminster Chapel in London, fervent opposer of liberal Christianity, sound expositor of biblical doctrine with fire and passion in his delivery:
“When the church is absolutely different from the world, she invariably attracts it. It is then that the world is made to listen to her message.”
Or, Rick Warren, Purpose Driven Church: Founder of Saddleback Church, currently the eighth-largest church in the US, father of the manual of how to redesign both churches and services in an effort to bring more “seekers” through their doors, using worldly allurements to attract the multitudes:
“Figure out what mood you want your service to project, and then create it. (p. 264); We start positive and end positive. (p. 271); We use humor in our services … it is not a sin to help people feel good. (p. 272); Cultivate an informal, relaxed, and friendly atmosphere. (p. 272); We made a strategic decision to stop singing hymns in our seeker services. (p. 285); We have attracted thousands more because of our music. (p. 285); Saddleback now has a complete pop/rock orchestra. (p. 290); Use more performed music than congregational singing … (p. 291) (emphasis on entertainment); The ground we have in common with unbelievers is not the Bible, but our common needs, hurts, and interests as human beings. You cannot start with a text … (p. 295); Make your members feel special … they need to feel special. (p. 320,323)”
“The goal of The Purpose Driven Life is to help people develop a heart for the world.”
As poet Robert Frost wrote so famously, “two roads diverged in a yellow wood” … In this case, the road that Lloyd-Jones was on, the one that walks closely with Jesus, is measured and sober, one that is straight and leads to wisdom and understanding of His word.
Lloyd-Jones & Westminster Chapel
The other road leads to…well…none of the above. This is what happens “when a pastor chooses to entertain goats rather than feed Christ’s sheep.” (quote source). It leads to this:
John MacArthur said of the seeker driven movement of Rick Warren and his ilk, “They have figured out how to get a crowd and call it church. There’s a big difference between a crowd and a church…big difference.”
You decide which of the above is church…and which is a crowd. Then decide where you want to be when Jesus returns, with the crowd? Or with the church?
Updated to include identity of and comments from law-breaker who defaced Chick-Fil-A restaurant in Torrance, California. See below.
—————— When Jesus said in Matthew 24:6 that one of the signs of His soon coming would be wars and rumors of wars, automatically we think of military wars. And indeed it means that. Military war is not only what He meant, in my opinion. He didn’t use the word strateuo: “to make war” (from stratos, “an encamped army”). He used the word polemos which means war but it also means battle, strife, quarrels.
The word ‘polemos’ that He used in English is ‘polemic.’ A polemic is “a contentious argument that is intended to establish the truth of a specific belief and the falsity of the contrary belief. Polemics are mostly seen in arguments about very controversial topics.” Polemics address important issues in religion, philosophy, politics, or science. The word is derived from the Greek meaning “warlike, hostile” which comes from polemos, “war”. (Wiki)
What we have in the Chick-Fil-A controversy is a very open war- a culture war with polemical battle lines drawn on one side and the other. This week America was engaged in a national convulsion in polemics, AKA culture war, strife, battle, and quarrel. Christians brought biblical light to a Godly value (heterosexual marriage) and focused it in such a way as to shine it directly into the eyes of those who are yet in darkness. My own opinion is that this is also what Jesus meant when He said ‘you will see wars and rumors of wars.’
Now for the relevant application. I’ll boil the culture war down to two people, Adam Smith and Rachel.
Distribution of Chick-Fil-A restaurants in the US. Wiki commons
The background to this war is that in an interview with the Baptist Press, Chick-Fil-A chain restaurant owner Dan Cathy responded to a question about the company’s support for traditional marriage, saying:
“Well, guilty as charged. We are very much supportive of the family – the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that. We operate as a family business … our restaurants are typically led by families – some are single. We want to do anything we possibly can to strengthen families. We are very much committed to that … We intend to stay the course. We know that it might not be popular with everyone, but thank the Lord, we live in a country where we can share our values and operate on biblical principles.” Source
His mild and gentle but clear statement caused a firestorm of protest. The usual protests came from the homosexual segment of the population, but this time the politicians and Mayors of major cities, particularly Boston and Chicago, stated that they would do everything in their power to stop Chick-Fil-A from operating as a company in their city.
The usual argument in culture is one thing, but the US is founded on principles of freedom of speech and religion, and this not-so-veiled attack on those principles ignited a peaceful protest by the conservative segment of the population. They decided to go and buy Chick-Fil-A food as a sign of support. On August 1, 2012, Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day happened. Boy, did people turn out for this!
My Christian brother in Norway tweeted, “Why is everyone from america talking about this chick-fil a or something??” I told him that the national convulsion we’re experiencing here is simply the latest iteration of an age-old battle. This week it burst into open warfare in such vitriolic proportions that the culture war spilled overseas to the notice of other nations.
You might ask, the homosexual agenda has been visible for a long time, this isn’t the first time it has burst open in America. Remember Stonewall? How about all those Pride Days, Gay Parades, and legislative rallies and protests for homosexual marriage?” Yes, that is true, that is part of the culture war. It’s been one-sided so far. But this week was the first time in my memory that the initiative was taken by Christians, in a well-planned and organized push-back.
People who are not in Christ are in satan. There is no in-between. Satan deludes the unsaved into thinking that there aren’t that many Christians. They think we are kooks, living exclusively in the south, and that we have no power. Christians are no-account in an unsaved person’s life, because they simply don’t see us. We are invisible to them because satan has blinded them to the Light of Jesus that is in us. I cannot stress this enough.
I can say these things because I wasn’t saved until I was 43 years old. Until then I was a New England liberal elite who thought Christians numbered in the dozens, maybe hundreds, living Deliverance style in the woods of Mississippi. Or maybe all in one subdivision. They were easy to avoid and had no impact to my life. When I did get saved and moved to the south I was shocked, shocked I tell you, at the sheer number of Christians. Before, they were invisible to me. And that is because satan has blinded their minds.
In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. (2 Corinthians 4:4)
I have four points I’d like to finish with.
On Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day, Adam Smith, an executive at an Arizona company named Vante, sat for a looooong time in the drive-thru. He was there to buy some water and to tell the employee serving him that she worked for a horrible company that denies homosexuals their rights. He said he felt good, purposeful and jazzed to be doing it. We know all this because he filmed his encounter and posted it on Youtube. The next day his company fired him.
A day or so after that, Smith posted an 8-minute video apologizing for his actions and stated he wasn’t just saying this because he was fired and he has a lot of time on his hands to reflect on his actions. His video is below. You can watch for yourself. First I’ll post some of his comments and embed them in the context of the (culture) wars and polemical arguments bursting out all over.
“You should know I never planned to say the things I said that day…and how I said them. I planned to peacefully participate in the Youtube post where Jackson Pearce asked people to order a large water as a sign of support for the gay community. But when I got to your window, after seeing all of the people in and outside the restaurant, that came to support Chick-Fil-A, I lost it. I just lost it. I couldn’t believe the number of people that came out to support a corporation…”
1. What he really means there is he couldn’t believe how many people came out to support a corporation that openly embraces a Christian value. Because, of course, liberals and homosexuals and the unsaved come out in force and in numbers all the time to support or oppose corporations. Look at the Occupy Wall Street protests. They oppose Bank of America or other banks. Last time I looked, those were corporations.
2. I can just see how sitting in that long line for all that time roiled Mr Smith. He got madder, madder and madder. Satan opposes God. When someone is deeply reprobate, they will be angry when confronted with truth. Smith had buckets of time in line to watch truth in action. Romans 1 says that all have seen God because He has revealed His invisible qualities to us through the creation. In this case the truth hit him on the nose and he couldn’t help but see the numbers of people who support corporations with Godly values. Those who deliberately suppress this truth descend on a path that gets darker and darker. Confronted with truth, they get angry. They will become the things they claim to hate!
“And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.” (Romans 1:28-30).
Smith could not believe the number of people who love God and who support Godly principles. Smith was confronted with visible, tangible proof of the fact that God exists in many people and he shrank like a vampire from holy water, screaming ‘noooo noooo nooo’. OK maybe not literally, but pretty close, seeing his own words above! “I just lost it.” So he lashed out:
“For me, the main goal of supporting the gay community outweighed any collateral damage that Rachel became. … I just literally saw Rachel as collateral damage.”
3. In other words the war in the reprobate to win at all costs no matter who gets hurt in the process is clearly unveiled. This is because in suppressing the truth, they are filled with all manner of unrighteousness as described above. Their unreasoning, satanic hatred of all things Godly will darken them to the point that they rise up in violence. This is a war. When presented with the truth become so blinded with rage they lash out and as in any war, there is ‘collateral damage.’
Like this:
Huffington Post reports, Homosexual “Manny Castro has stepped forward to claim responsibility for the “Tastes Like Hate” message painted on the side of a Chick-fil-A restaurant Friday morning in Torrance, Calif.” Castro claims that he, as a homosexual man has few rights and that the people at Chick-Fil-A were trying to take away what few rights he has left. “When Castro saw news photos of thousands of Americans lined up around the block to buy a sandwich in support of the company on “Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day,” his heart sank even more.” Castro says Americans eating chicken sandwiches to support their preferred restaurant is the “same thing” as when 40 years ago Christians protested whites marrying blacks. Therefore, he reasoned, his defacement of local property is “not that much of a crime.”
You notice that it was when Castro “saw” the photos of lines upon lines of people at Chick-Fil-A that the polemical issue really affected him. “His heart sank.” It was when he was confronted with the truth that he was angered into negative action, that is.
They will never see the irony in that a hate filled heart will, under cover of darkness plot an evil plan, buy paint, gather together in unrighteousness, and in their foolish battle, they break the law in order to claim that others hate. Breaking the law is the most hateful incivility in the highest degree. But their reprobate minds just lose it and in the ensuing war, there is collateral damage. In this case, an innocent restaurant manager who had then to deal with the aftermath of reprobate hate plastered on his building.
Smith goes on to say that the reaction against him subsequent to his video posting and then his firing was discouraging. He has received threats against himself, his family and his co-workers. This is unfortunate and is not a Christian value. People who do those things, no matter what side of the culture war they say they are on, are reprobate with a foolish heart and a darkened mind.
However Smith also says that on the other hand it is encouraging. Because, he says, “If people can get this passionate about a guy being rude to a girl in the drive-thru, how much more passion can we have for our fellow human beings have whose basic rights are being threatened by a corporation like Chick-Fil-A?”
4. So you can see that he is not really sorry. His heart is still darkened. He recognized the light inside of Rachel the woman he berated, but he wants to harness that light for satan’s purposes.
This “war” will continue and even deepen. The lines are drawn so clearly now.
The chasm between the Light-filled Christian and the Dark-Hearted Reprobate will shrink, and shrink and shrink, until one day Christians will be raptured and we will study war no more! The Dark-Hearted Reprobate will have no one left to battle with…so he will turn against the next guy whose heart is even darker than his. Because their war is really against God. They will continue, because Romans 1:32 closes out with:
Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
May God have mercy upon them…but His wrath is building.
————————————— Original video of Smith going through drive-thru on Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day. It is a little over 2 minutes.:
Adam Smith’s apologetic video, it is about 8 minutes
Colosseum in Rome is leaning, officials say “Experts say ancient building has started to tilt, with south side 40cm [15inches] lower than north, and may need urgent repairs. The ancient Colosseum in Rome is slanting about 40cm lower on the south side than on the north, and authorities are investigating whether it needs urgent repairs. Experts first noticed the incline about a year ago and have been monitoring it for the past few months, Rossella Rea, director at the 2,000-year-old monument, said in the Italian daily Corriere della Sera.”
Before I was saved, I went to Italy. One of those times I visited the Colosseum. I wrote about that visit here. For a short while immediately after I was saved, in reading the passages in Revelation and Peter and Isaiah where the earth will be completely deconstructed and remade, I was sad that all the pretty things would be swept away too. All the “great art”, all the “monuments to man” like the Colosseum or Pyramids. But of course all those were made by sinful man’s hands and many of them, particularly in art, are odes to false gods. (Botticelli’s Primavera for example). As I matured I began to see man’s works for what they were, symbols of debauchery against a holy God amid our history across human epochs. The Colosseum will fall. Now or later, it is guaranteed to be swept away in the calamity of judgment imminently bearing down on us. Let’s start seeing these cracked and tottering monuments of rebellion for what they are- and get used to thinking about the glories ahead made by Jesus’s hands. (John 14:3).
600 million without power as massive blackout plagues India “India’s northern and eastern power grids have failed, plunging half the country into darkness. It is the second consecutive day in which blackouts struck India. … Hundreds of miners are reported to have been trapped in Burdwan, North of Kolkata following the outages. “We are trying to rescue the coal miners. All efforts are on to resume power supplies. You need power supplies to run the lifts in the underground mines,” Mamata Banerjee told reporters in the state capital Kolkata. … Power is also being channeled into the subway to help get stranded passengers to the nearest station. The subway has been partially restored after coming to a grinding halt when the power cut struck. … A grid failure in Delhi and much of northern India left more than 300 million without electricity on Monday. This was one of the worst power outages to hit the country in more than a decade.”
600 million is twice the population of the entire US. Those in the dark today represent about 60% of the entire nation of India, which has 1.2 billion people. Wow.
The spiritual metaphor that sprang to my mind was the light versus the dark. India is the birthplace of four of the world’s major religious traditions; namely Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism. According to 2001 census as Wikipedia reports, 80% of those 1.2 billion people in India are Hindu. Again according to Wiki, only 2% of those in India are Christian. Now they are in the dark physically. The nation is in the dark, spiritually. Even if the Electrical Power Minister organizes the crews to get the lights back on, those people will still be in the dark.
Man Hospitalized After Shark Attack Near Cape Cod “The man bitten by a shark as he body-surfed with his teenage son off the coast of Ballston Beach near Cape Cod, [Truro] Mass., is expected to live, officials said. The attack happened around 3:30 p.m. Monday when Chris Myers, a father of two, was pulled under the water by a shark. Police say the shark bit Myers in both legs below the knees in possibly one single, crushing blow. “They dragged him out and they had to carry him up here and they had to wrap it around his legs and he was bleeding through the gauzes,” a witness said. “It was bad. Both his legs were pretty bad.””
Shark attacks this time of year in Massachusetts are not unusual. Seals come to feed, and they come pretty close to shore. Sharks prey on seals so it’s natural they would be close to shore as well.
I visited Martha’s Vineyard in 1975, crossing from RI to the Island on a friend’s trawler. That is where Jaws was filmed. Some of the filming apparatus was still around. The movie was just out but the kids I was traveling with nor the parents seemed concerned about swimming in the harbor. I remember the older teenage boys jumping from the flybridge into the sea, plunging down deep under the slate gray surface. Shudder. Not me. Too spooky
I have mentioned before that I also lived on a sailboat for a while. On our first day in the blue Bahamian waters, just after crossing from Florida, we swam and swam, delighting in the fact that we could see the bottom. The water was that clear. In the Atlantic you never see the bottom unless you snorkel close to shore. “What’s under there?” was a question that had held endless fascination for us and now we could actually see! We swam further and further, trailing along the anchor line that extended far in front of the yacht. Finally as the sun set we called it quits and climbed back aboard. Our VHF radio crackled on and the buddy boat we had crossed the Gulf Stream with told us some important information. “Never swim at dusk. The sharks come out to feed. In the ocean, you are at the bottom of the food chain.”
The ocean can be, and often is, a hostile environment even for man who has been given to reign supreme over the animals. On dry land, we are on hostile territory too- spiritually. Satan is the god of this world, according to 2 Corinthians 4:4. When Satan tempted Jesus, he offered Jesus all the kingdoms of the world if Jesus would just worship Satan. (Matthew 4:8-9). Jesus did not refute that satan had the ability to make the offer. Though under God’s sovereign control, satan has been given latitude on this earth to roam freely and to devour whom he will. (John 10:10; 1 Peter 5:8).
If you are not saved, you are at the bottom of the food chain. Satan comes at you sneakily. Satan will chomp your legs just as fast as that shark did to that man in Cape Cod. If you are saved, Jesus has lifted you from the bottom of the food chain to the top! However, satan will still try to come at you, like Chihuahua nipping at your heels. If you do not resist him, he brings other Chihuahua dogs to harass you, or God may even cause him to dog you (2 Corinthians 12:7) for your own good. Always remember we’re on hostile territory- enemy territory. It is what is going to make reaching heaven through death or rapture such a relief. We’ll finally be in friendly lands, not a stranger any more but home with the Father and our spiritual family.
My dear friends, internet acquaintances, and family,
One of these days soon I am going to be whisked to heaven alive, transformed from corruptible flesh into glorified, eternally pure flesh, to live with Jesus forever in heaven. My pleasure and treasure will be that I dwell with Him who sacrificed Himself for me in the universe’s ultimate and most majestic act of love ever. His name is Jesus. Everyone who ever lived for Jesus through repentance and claiming His Lordly blood as the covering for their sins will be there too.
I’m looking forward to talking with Deborah, Rahab, Jael, Huldah, David, Abraham, the Ethiopian Eunuch who won’t be a eunuch any more so we can’t call him that (Sir, what is your name? Nice to meet you!). Philip, Stephen, Paul, Jeremiah…all the ones known and unknown to me will be there. (1 Corinthians 13:12).
I shall see His truths plainly and with no distortion of flesh or depraved mind. I will get to meet you my readers and friends, who I only know through a keyboard. I’ll speak to pastors who have gone on already Charles Spurgeon, John Owen, John Huss, Martin Luther, Tyndale, Whitefield… I can say thank you to the pastors I listen to today, Pastor John MacArthur, Steve Hadley, Paul Washer, Steve Lawson, Phil Johnson, JD Farag, Don Green.
I will be able to rest.
I will have eternal relief from sinning against Jesus.
This event which all born again believers are looking forward to is the rapture. It could happen at any moment. It has always been imminent, so how much more imminent is it today than 2000 years ago? I truly believe with all my heart that we are on the cusp of it happening any day. Any day. I really believe that.
So dear friend, one day, this blog will become stale. You will hear no more from me. My facebook page will have that last update..and that will be it. I could be taken from the shower, with the water permanently running. It could happen when I am cooking, and the burned food starts a fire in my apartment. It could be at midnight, and the bed clothes will be in the last position I had slept in. It could happen at school, with the unsaved and deluded who thought they were saved running up and down the hallways looking for all the children and many of the staff.
When it happens, and you come to this blog that I have faithfully updated each day for 1,340 days in a row for a total of 1,665 times, and it has not been updated, you will know I was part of that group of people across the world who disappeared.
Do not be fooled by the government’s excuses for where we all went. We were not the troublemakers taken away so the rest of humanity could improve. We were not removed by aliens into their spaceships. A radon electro wave did not overpower us. Do not believe the lie! It will be God who will take us thereby proving once again that everything in the bible is true. Any explanation besides that will be a lie.
You will know that I am in heaven with a multitude of other believers rejoicing along with the holy angels of Jesus and praising His perfect love for humanity. We will be singing accolades of worship for our Holy God who created us. We will be praising the Holy Spirit who enabled the power of salvation. Do not worry for me nor wonder. I will be more than all right for all eternity.
But you won’t be. And that is my worry and fear. I claimed the blood of Jesus through repentance to obtain the prize. You will be shedding your own blood when a horrific series of judgments rains down upon your sinful self.
You can be in heaven with Jesus! I hope you are! You must recognize that your sins are a rejection of a Holy God who created you. Your sins prevent you from being with Him and has earned you His eternal wrath. Hell is not just a place separate from God, it is the place where He rains down His eternal anger on you because of your sins. But if you are sorry, and ask Jesus to forgive you, recognizing He laid down His life to take God’s eternal wrath and that His resurrection satisfied God as the sacrifice for your sins, you can be in the group that is bodily lifted into heaven.
Paul wrote in the bible: “Now I want to make clear for you, brothers and sisters, the gospel that I preached to you, that you received and on which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold firmly to the message I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I passed on to you as of first importance what I also received—that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve…” (1 Corinthians 15:1-8).
I have just shared the Gospel with you. It is of first importance. It is Good News! You do not have to stay on earth during the wrathful judgments to come and you do not have to spend eternity in hell in agony of the fiery flames! Isn’t that good news?! You can be with Jesus and with us, His Bride.
“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” (Mark 1:15)
I’m reading through the book of Acts. What an incredible first few years our forefathers in the faith had! What an amazing ministry of the Holy Spirit! I’m so humbled by the mighty acts, the Holy Spirit’s wisdom and purity, and the consistency with which they always proclaimed Christ crucified as the Good News to all the world. What a foundation we have in Him!
Of course, I have rapture on my mind every second, lol. I’m reading about Philip, the first missionary and evangelist. He was raptured. Not snatched up to heaven, but snatched away to another city by supernatural means. In the verse below, we see him in the city of Samaria.
“Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ. And the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip when they heard him and saw the signs that he did. For unclean spirits, crying out with a loud voice, came out of many who had them, and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed. So there was much joy in that city.” (Acts 8:4-8)
A few verses later, we read,
“Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, “Rise and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” This is a desert place.” (Acts 8:26).
Gaza was far. I haven’t been able to get miles or kilometer directions specifically. In using the scale, it seems to be about 60 miles as an estimate. A long walk. While at Gaza, Philip met the Ethiopian eunuch. Philip began to preach the Good News to him–
“And as they were going along the road they came to some water, and the eunuch said, “See, here is water! What prevents me from being baptized?” And he commanded the chariot to stop, and they both went down into the water, Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him. And when they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord carried Philip away, and the eunuch saw him no more, and went on his way rejoicing. But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he passed through he preached the gospel to all the towns until he came to Caesarea.” (Acts 8: 36-40). Above, Alexandre-Denis Abel de Pujol: “Philip baptising the Eunuch of the Queen of Ethiopia on the road from Jerusalem to Gaza,” 1848
I love how the Spirit phrased that, “Philip found himself…”
Can you imagine Philip’s surprise? Here he is talking with the Eunuch, dipped him in the water, and as they arise before the drops were off them both, Philip vanished! And I am sure it was the blink of an eye and he found himself in a totally different city! Azotus, I believe, is today’s Ashdod, about 20 miles north of Gaza.
Were his clothes still wet? Did he say, “Hey! What happened? Where am I?” Was he deposited along the side of the road and had to ask a passerby, maybe a guy with his goats or his burro, “Excuse me sir, can you tell me where I am?” LOL, how disorienting.
Remember all these bible guys were real men and women. The ‘greats’ like Abraham and Moses, to the barely mentioned like the Eunuch, had supernatural things happen. How difficult it must have been to process it all.
People tend to think that in the New Testament times that supernatural things happened constantly. They didn’t. Not even in the Old Testament times did supernatural things happen constantly. Until Jesus came, no miracle, sign, or supernatural event had occurred for at least 400 years. Many, many generations. Even John the Baptist, as fierce as he was, never did a miracle. When Jesus began his miracles people were astonished partly because His miracles were such standout events. No one had seen the likes of it ever before. The learned few had only read about them in the ancient scrolls.
So Philip is suddenly whisked away to a new city. Was he thinking, “Gee, if the Spirit could whisk me 20 miles from Gaza to Ashdod, why did I have to walk the 120 from Samaria to Gaza in the first place?’ I don’t mean to be flip about it, but I am always remembering these were regular guys, so they thought regular thoughts. Left, Philip taken away, Johann Christoph Weigel, 1695
Did the person Philip asked where he was think Philip was a nut? Did Philip even ask? Maybe he recognized the place. What did he do then? The bible says he went on his way to Caesarea, preaching all the way. MacArthur’s commentary says Caesarea is probably where Philip lived. It is 60 miles from Ashdod.
In just a very few verses the Spirit reveals:
–supernatural powers to work God’s plan at will –rejoicing in receiving the Good News –obedience from both the Eunuch and Philip to the Spirit’s prompting –the joy of reading the word and the necessity for teachers to explain it –an angel –another soul whom we will meet in heaven: the Eunuch. We will finally learn his name. –God’s mercy in convicting those who love Him to receive His Spirit unto salvation –the importance of prompt obedience in evangelism and missions
I’m sure you can find much more than I can in those verses too. His treasures are inexhaustible.
When we are raptured I know we will not have any questions. He will call for us with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and suddenly our minds will be glorified and we will know exactly where we are going and where we are, and why. We will be part of that group whisked away to heaven because of our repentance we stand on the holy and blood soaked ground of Jesus that He shed to be the atoning propitiation for our sins. He is the only reason we will be part of that group.
Jesus saves! Read the bible, it is worth looking at every jot and tittle. Have a blessed day in the Lord, and if you’re not in the Lord, why not? It’s great!
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