Posted in horus, myth

Is Jesus a rehashed myth from the more ancient Horus?

Posted on by elizabethprata

This is going around Facebook. I saw it when a relative of mine posted it. (Yes, I grieve and pray)

Of course, the Horus information is false.

When the actual writings about Horus are competently examined, this is what we find:

• Horus was born to Isis; there is no mention in history of her being called “Mary.” Moreover, Mary is our anglicized form of her real name ‘Miryam’ or Miriam. “Mary” was not even used in the original texts of Scripture.
• Isis was not a virgin; she was the widow of Osiris and conceived Horus with Osiris.
• Horus was born during month of Khoiak (Oct/Nov), not December 25. Further, there is no mention in the Bible as to Christ’s actual birth date.
• There is no record of three kings visiting Horus at his birth. The Bible never states the actual number of magi that came to see Christ.
• Horus is not a “savior” in any shape or form; he did not die for anyone.
• There are no accounts of Horus being a teacher at the age of 12.
• Horus was not “baptized.” The only account of Horus that involves water is one story where Horus is torn to pieces, with Isis requesting the crocodile god to fish him out of the water he was placed into.
• Horus did not have a “ministry.”
• Horus did not have 12 disciples. According to the Horus accounts, Horus had four semi-gods that were followers and some indications of 16 human followers and an unknown number of blacksmiths that went into battle with him.
• There is no account of Horus being betrayed by a friend.
• Horus did not die by crucifixion. There are various accounts of Horus’ death, but none of them involve crucifixion.
• There is no account of Horus being buried for three days.
• Horus was not resurrected. There is no account of Horus coming out of the grave with the body he went in with. Some accounts have Horus/Osiris being brought back to life by Isis and going to be the lord of the underworld.

Much more at the source as to why this side-by-side comparison of Jesus and Horus is a fallacy of the false cause and a terminological fallacy: GotQuestions.

Meanwhile, GotQuestions reports on the integrity of the biblical record, 

“The last issue to examine on this subject is the truthfulness of the New Testament itself. While much has been written on this topic, no work from antiquity has more evidence with respect to historical veracity than the New Testament. The New Testament has more writers (nine), better writers, and earlier writers than any other document from that era. Further, history testifies to the fact that these writers went to their deaths for claiming that Jesus had risen from the dead. While some may die for a lie they think is true, no person dies for a lie they know to be false. Think about it—if someone was about to crucify you upside down, as happened to the Apostle Peter, and all you had to do to save your life was renounce a lie you had knowingly been living, what would you do?”

“In addition, history has shown that it takes at least two generations to pass before myth can enter into a historical account. Why? Because eyewitnesses can refute error put in print. Those living at the time could refute the errors of the author and expose the work as being false. All the Gospels of the New Testament were written during the lifetime of the eyewitnesses, with some of Paul’s epistles being written as early as 50 A.D. That early dating acts as a key protective mechanism against any falsehoods being accepted and circulated.”

“Finally, the New Testament attests to the fact that the portrayal of Jesus was not mistaken for that of any other god. When faced with Paul’s teaching, the elite thinkers of Athens said this: “He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities,”—because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is which you are proclaiming? For you are bringing some strange things to our ears; so we want to know what these things mean” (Acts 17:18-20). Clearly, if the accounts of Jesus were simply rehashing stories of other gods, the Athenians would not have referred to them as “new” teaching. If dying and rising gods were plentiful in the first century why, when the apostle Paul preached Jesus rising from the dead in Acts 17, did the Epicureans and Stoics not remark, “Ah, just like Horus and Mithras”? “

“In conclusion, the claims that Jesus is nothing more than a myth, a copy of mythological gods, originated from authors whose works have been discounted by academia, commit logical fallacies that undermine their veracity, and cannot compare to the New Testament Gospels which have withstood nearly 2,000 years of intense scrutiny.”

So when compared side by side, Jesus and Horus bear no resemblance to one another. And remember, only Jesus saves.

Posted in daniel, end time, future shock, many shall run to and fro, prophecy

Space jumping and Daniel’s prophecy

Posted on by elizabethprata

“But you, Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book, until the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.” (Daniel 12:4).

Does this prophecy, the famous one in Daniel, mean that technology and science and widespread travel are a sign of the end times? Yes and no.

First of all, the end time has been since Jesus ascended and will end when He returns. In that case, the advances of the Romans in installing indoor plumbing, aqueducts, hot and cold running water, as many roads as are equivalent with the United States Interstate system, and the Colosseum are indicators of the end time as much as our current Interstate, the Houston Superdome, and Kohler’s no-touch kitchen faucet are.

As a matter of fact, no one still knows the how the ancients came up with the technology behind the Great Pyramid at Giza, as mathematically, architecturally, and astronomically perfect as it is.

So what does the verse in Daniel mean? Barnes’ Notes proposes one interpretation:

“Many shall run to and fro – Shall pass up and down in the world, or shall go from place to place. The reference is clearly to those who should thus go to impart knowledge; to give information; to call the attention of men to great and important matters. The language is applicable to any methods of imparting important knowledge, and it refers to a time when this would be the characteristic of the age. There is nothing else to which it can be so well applied as to the labors of Christian missionaries, and ministers of the gospel, and others who, in the cause of Christian truth, go about to rouse the attention of men to the great subjects of religion; and the natural application of the language is to refer it to the times when the gospel would be preached to the world at large.”

MacArthur explains it this way:
“At that time, many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased.” Now this is a most interesting phrase, been interpreted many ways. Let me give you what is the basic interpretation, the words, the context that I think makes real sense. It is not talking about the increase of scientific knowledge primarily, although that may be an allusion or an implication that could be drawn. What it is talking about is this, many people in the Tribulation, the time of the end, are going to run to and fro trying to find out answers to what’s going on. And they’re going to find the book of Daniel and at that point, their knowledge will be increased.”

So I don’t think we can be dogmatic that this or that is definitely what the verse means. After all, the Lord said to seal it up until the end. If we are still debating what it means then obviously He hasn’t unsealed the meaning to us yet, though we do have more of a clue today than in Daniel’s day, I believe, because we are so close to the end

Francis Bacon, English philosopher of the 1600s Restoration was influential in insisting that the advances in science currently underway should be for the betterment of man. He urged a more utilitarian approach instead of a contemplative one, and thus, he was a forerunner of the Industrial Revolution. However, just as ominously, Bacon said in his major work, “Novum Organum” (the second part of the Instauration), he stated his view that the restoration of science was part of the “partial returning of mankind to the state it lived before the fall”, restoring its dominion over creation, while religion and faith would partially restore mankind’s original state of innocence and purity.” (source)

In this way, Bacon kicked us into high gear in replacing God with science.

Bacon’s motto was “Multi pertransibunt & augebitur scientia” = “many will pass through and knowledge will be the greater”, as seen on the frontspiece of his major work. It is a direct reference to Daniel’s verse.

The title page of Novum Organum depicts a galleon passing between the mythical Pillars of Hercules that stand either side of the Strait of Gibraltar, marking the exit from the well-charted waters of the Mediterranean into the Atlantic Ocean. The Pillars, as the boundary of the Mediterranean, have been smashed through opening a new world to exploration. Men have been unleashed to sail new waters of thought, science, and technology. Bacon hoped that empirical investigation will, similarly, smash the old scientific ideas and lead to greater understanding of the world and heavens. The Latin tag across the bottom is taken from the Book of Daniel 12:4. Bacon is thought of as the father of empiricism.

So each age has been amazed by science and technological advances. However up above I said ‘yes and no’ to the question as to whether technological advances are a sign of the end time. I don’t think it can be related firmly to the Daniel verse but I also think it can be seen as a mirror of man’s status a la Tower of Babel.

As man’s achievements grow, his pride grows too. The prouder man gets of his works the more he says he doesn’t need God. I also believe this generation has seen the most growth in God-dishonoring science and technology than any generation before. “Safe abortions”? What an oxymoron. Safe for whom, exactly?? We go into space to prove God is not there. Though we have heeded Bacon’s plea to create things from science and technology for the betterment of man, we have also gone far away from God with it.

“Future Shock is a book written by the futurist Alvin Toffler in 1970. In the book, Toffler defines the term “future shock” as a certain psychological state of individuals and entire societies. His shortest definition for the term is a personal perception of “too much change in too short a period of time”. Toffler argued that society is undergoing an enormous structural change, a revolution from an industrial society to a “super-industrial society”. This change overwhelms people, he believed, the accelerated rate of technological and social change leaving people disconnected and suffering from “shattering stress and disorientation”—future shocked.” (Wiki)

I believe that we are in a state of future shock now.

Though things did change dramatically between 1950 and 1970 when Toffler observed and prompted him to write of the advances and their impacts in society, that change has accelerated even more dramatically from 1970 to now. This isn’t just a feeling. It is actually related to technological change, and has been observed in Moore’s Law.

Moore’s law is the observation that over the history of computing hardware, the number of transistors on integrated circuits doubles approximately every two years.

“The capabilities of many digital electronic devices are strongly linked to Moore’s law: processing speed, memory capacity, sensors and even the number and size of pixels in digital cameras. All of these are improving at (roughly) exponential rates as well. This exponential improvement has dramatically enhanced the impact of digital electronics in nearly every segment of the world economy. Moore’s law describes a driving force of technological and social change in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.” (source)

Vernor Vinge popularized his ideas about exponentially accelerating technological change in the SF novel Marooned in Realtime (1986), set in a world of rapidly accelerating progress leading to the emergence of more and more sophisticated technologies separated by shorter and shorter time intervals, until a point beyond human comprehension is reached.

This accelerating trend has continued for more than half a century.

My half a century.

When I was born, man had not gone into space yet. Now a man jumped from space to the earth. I believe this most rapid change in technology and science has been due to the birth of the modern computer age in 1970. The world’s first general microprocessor came out on Nov. 1971 and we have never been the same.

In this bewildering world of advanced quantum technology, iPhones, space jumping, Mars roving pace, please remember that the Lord never changes. He is steady constant, and eternal. His timing is perfect. At just the right moment He will call us home, and our joy will be complete. Personally, I’m looking forward to a world without cell phones 🙂

Posted in God, hosea, jeremiah, love

The everlasting love of God

Posted on by elizabethprata

Jeremiah 31:3-

“I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.”

Now keeping in mind His unfailing and everlasting love, compare the Jeremiah verse to this video which depicts the prostitute going away from her loving husband and the husband lovingly pursuing her, Part 3 of The Hosea Love Story

And that should remind us all of His perfect and everlasting love to men. I hope this brightened your day!

[TY to EBenz for helping me re-find the Hosea clip]

Posted in earthquakes, fiscal overlord, middle east, prophecy

EU goes for Fiscal Overlord, Tensions in Mid-East, earthwquakes in diverse places, more news

Posted on by elizabethprata

Here is some news I feel is of prophetic importance.

Yesterday I posted a piece about how the world is bent on uniting. The unification of world’s religions (ecumenism), and the unification of world economies rampant. The pace at which economies are melding into one is breathtaking. I had posted a quote from an article: “The competition Czar is the arch-enforcer of the EU machine, with powers to launch dawn raids, deploy SWAT teams, and block mergers on his own authority.”

Wow, that is a lot of power. But that wasn’t the point of the article. In addition to the Competition Czar, the call for a European Union Fiscal Overlord shocked many in Europe: “EU “currency commissioner” with sweeping powers to strike down national budgets; a “large step towards fiscal union.”

Well, today they decided to go for it. They are going to make one man be Europe’s Fiscal Overlord. UPI reports, “EU leaders agreed to create a single banking overseer for the eurozone that could aid ailing banks…” Germany and the UK hassled over some details, but it looks like it will be a done deal. The timeline is as follows: “The 27 EU heads of state and government agreed “on a political framework for the end of 2012 and a gradual implementation in 2013” of a new EU single supervisory mechanism

As I had mentioned in the previous blog about this topic, The Tower of Babel is an object lesson on how mans evil is magnified when man congregates. His pride and his rebellion always comes out when man unites. Further, there is a problem when one man wields tremendous power: there are fewer, if any, checks and balances.

Here is some more news:

WEATHER

Dust storm shuts down interstate in northern Okla.
“A massive dust storm swirling reddish-brown clouds over northern Oklahoma triggered a multi-vehicle accident along a major interstate Thursday, forcing police to shut down part of the heavily traveled roadway amid near blackout conditions. In a scene reminiscent of the Dust Bowl days, choking dust suspended on strong wind gusts shrouded Interstate 35, which links Dallas and Oklahoma City to Kansas City, Mo. Video from television station helicopters showed the four-lane highway virtually disappearing into billowing dust on the harsh landscape near Blackwell, plus dozens of vehicles scattered in the median and on the shoulders. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” said Jodi Palmer, a dispatcher with the Kay County Sheriff’s Office.”

Small earthquake rattles western Nebraska
” An earthquake has rattled western Nebraska, but local officials aren’t reporting any injuries or property damage.The U.S. Geological Survey says a magnitude 3.6 earthquake happened at 11:21 p.m. Wednesday. It was centered about 18 miles northwest of Hyannis.

Moderate earthquake rattles Egypt, felt in Israel
5.0-magnitude quake comes two days ahead of Israel’s large-scale preparedness drill
“A moderate earthquake rattled Egypt early Friday morning and was felt as far as Israel, two days before a scheduled nationwide earthquake-preparedness drill here.The tremor, measuring a magnitude of 5.0 on the Richter scale, occurred at approximately 5:30 a.m. local time. It did not cause any injuries or damage, according to initial reports.The epicenter of the quake was approximately 95 miles (150 kilometers) north of the Egyptian coastal city of Alexandria.”

Tornadoes, severe storms swat Southeast; 7 hurt
“At least four tornadoes were part of the storm system that raked northern and central Mississippi on Wednesday night and Thursday morning, injuring at least seven people, the National Weather Service said. … Radar weather maps overnight showed a huge, arcing front that swept across Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, and parts of states such as Louisiana and Alabama on its march eastward on a jagged slant.”

CULTURE

Feminist Agenda

A self-stated feminist Christian woman wrote this- which is an oxymoron. One cannot be a feminist AND a Christian.

Woman Lives Biblically: Feminist Calls Husband “Master”
“A woman who decided to live “biblically” for one year and wrote a book about her findings is garnering heaps of praise and criticism for her decision.

“Rachel Held Evans, who describes herself as a feminist Christian, says her end goal had everything to do with being a woman, despite what her critics are saying. “Evans says she wanted “To call into question that there is a single blueprint of how to be a woman. There’s no single model in the Bible – as soon as you think you have found it a woman comes along and breaks it. Everyone picks and chooses. There are verses that say ‘submit to your husband’, but also those that say ‘submit to one another’. The more women know about the bible the more they can respond when people try to silence them.”

“During what she calls “The Womanhood Project“, Evans made her own clothes, grew her hair out, lived outside her home in a tent when she was having her period, called her husband “Master”, and sat alone on the roof of her home as penance after deciding she had been gossiping or nagging, which comes from the Bible verse “it is better to live in a corner of a roof than in a house shared with a contentious woman”. In doing so, she hoped to gain a greater understanding of the Bible and a woman’s role according to it, which is sometimes presented as contradictory passages.”

For Denny Burk’s take on the book’s premise (he wrote it before the book was published) go here.

Homosexual Agenda

Marriage Law likely headed to Supreme Court
A federal appeals court ruling on Thursday has catapulted a New York case to the head of the line, as the Supreme Court considers which of many cases it should use to decide whether the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is constitutional. For more than a year, the lower courts have been issuing decisions striking down DOMA, declaring the law’s provisions to be unconstitutional discrimination. The statute defines marriage as being only between a man and a woman, meaning that the federal government is barred from recognizing same-sex marriages even when they are legal and recognized by state law. So, if a same-sex couple is legally married in any of the six states where gay marriage is authorized, that marriage is not recognized by the federal government.”

Abortion Agenda

“Republican U.S. Rep. Joe Walsh backtracked slightly on his controversial remarks about abortion, saying today that there are “very rare circumstances” in which a pregnant woman may need to undergo an abortion to save her life. The comment stood in contrast to the tea party icon’s declaration following a Thursday night debate that medical advances had rendered it unnecessary to ever perform an abortion to save a mother’s life.”

Google “backlash,” “Walsh” and “abortion” and you will see the ruckus the abortion pushers made. It caused the staunch pro-life politician to “backtrack slightly” which really means he tucked tail and ran like a scalded dog.

MIDDLE EAST

Lebanon spy chief killed as Syria tensions spill over border
“A massive bomb ripped through a crowded Beirut street killed Lebanon’s most senior intelligence official and at least seven others as Lebanon divisions over Syria’s civil war spills over into factional conflict.”

Turkey fires on Syria in retaliation following shell launch
“Turkey’s army fired on Syria on Friday after two shells launched from Syria landed in Turkish territory, Turkish state broadcaster TRT reported, underlining how tension between the two neighbors remains dangerously high.”

Smoke is seen after a Syrian jet dropped a bomb in Idlib province, as seen from the Turkish border Friday.

Clashes erupt at Greek anti-austerity protests
“Greek police clashed with anti-austerity protesters hurling stones and petrol bombs on the day of a general strike that brought much of the near-bankrupt country to a standstill.In the second major walkout in three weeks on Thursday, almost 40,000 protesters marched in Athens in a bid to show EU leaders meeting in Brussels that new wage and pension cuts will only worsen their plight after five years of recession.Tensions mounted when a small group of protesters began throwing pieces of marble, bottles and petrol bombs at police barricading part of the square in front of parliament, prompting riot police to fire several rounds of teargas to disperse them.”

You see fires like that and read that it was caused by someone throwing a Molotov cocktail in Greece and you don’t gasp because people just don’t do that in the US. But when we read of a Molotov cocktail being thrown at a Virginia Mall, now we gasp.

Arson charge after Molotov cocktail
“The man accused of throwing a Molotov cocktail into the food court at a northern Virginia mail stood silently and refused to answer any questions at an initial court appearance Friday.Leon Alphans Traille Jr., 29, of no fixed address, was charged Friday in U.S. District Court in Alexandria with arson. … A court affidavit says that a man matching Traille’s description threw a Molotov cocktail — in this case a brown glass bottle holding at least 16 ounces of flammable liquid with matches taped to the bottle — into the mall’s food court shortly after noon Thursday. The device did not explode but produced a flame that was extinguished, according to the affidavit. Traille then went to second floor of the mall and left behind three similar bottles before leaving, according to the affidavit.”

That is just a bit of the news for you. I hope you have a wonderful weekend, and pray always. Jesus is our Savior and our Sustainer, Far from being disheartened by these things, we take comfort in knowing the things He told us would happen are happening, so His word is true. We love that He is coming soon. Be listening fo the Trumpet while always loving one another in spirit and in truth.

Till next time, if there is one…

Posted in bible, word

Verses that resonated with me this week. How about you?

Posted on by elizabethprata

I’m reading through Jeremiah right now. Well, ‘reading through’ is a bit of a misnomer. I intended to read through, but I can’t seem to get past Jeremiah 1 & 2 and I got stuck at one section in Jeremiah 23 for a bit. I keep getting stuck at the freshness of the verses and the application they make to my heart. I guess for a while I’ll be chewing on Jeremiah 1-2 as meat and not reading through in one swoop. I love meditating on Jeremiah as I ponder the truths there. The verses seem to applicable to today! There are three in particular that stopped me cold, and made me really think.

I don’t know if this happens to you, but I would be reading along and then I hit a brick wall at 60 mph. Even in trying to share how hard they hit me, words fail. The depth of spiritual application, the welling-up of personal emotion, and the hard mental stress I felt when the verses lit up my Spirit cannot be described. This is one verse that hit me:

#1– Thus says the Lord:

“What wrong did your fathers find in me
that they went far from me,
and went after worthlessness, and became worthless? (Jeremiah 2:5)

This verse is devastating when you think about it. God uses a rhetorical question to ask ‘what is the matter with me that you go after idols?’ It is rhetorical because, of course, there is nothing the matter with God. He is perfect. Therefore the answer should be clear. It is ridiculous to go away from God because there is no substitute. We know this in our heads, but the verse hit me in the heart. I prayed that I would not go away from Him in any way.

“for my people have committed two evils:
they have forsaken me,
the fountain of living waters,
and hewed out cisterns for themselves,
broken cisterns that can hold no water.” 
(Jer 2:13) (source).
 Trying to carry water in a sieve…how sad to think of all the effort and work a non-believer would go through to attain a semblance of religious favor is pointless. The water will always run out. It does nothing except fall on  the ground, void. The point is stark: Jesus is the Living Water and His water refreshes and never runs out.

This next verse which gets me at the core of my Spirit is this one: the hammer–

“Is not my word like fire, declares the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?” (Jeremiah 23:29).

The Word has the power to shatter a hard heart. This truth both pierces me and sustains me. I hope that you have moments when you are reading the Word you come across a verse that really brings fresh illumination to its truths.

What has stopped you in your tracks lately?

Posted in prayer, ravenhill, revival

Why we need revival, according to Leonard Ravenhill

Posted on by elizabethprata

In a Revival conference from 1989, Leonard Ravenhill was asked what is the greatest need in the church in America today?

“for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.” (Jeremiah 2:13)

“No matter how big your church is, the Sunday Morning attendance doesn’t matter… everyone goes to church on Sunday morning. Instead, Ravenhill asked, “How many have you got in your prayer meeting? The prayer meeting is almost dead. “I believe the spiritual condition in America at this moment lower than it was during the revival 1700s revival with Jonathan Edwards. We have forsaken God, in particular we have forsaken the prayer meeting.”

Pray!

“Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.” (Philippians 4:6)

Prayer offers access by one Spirit unto the Father through Christ. (Ephesians 2:18)

God hears prayer. He hears it, He will not forsake you!

–“O thou that hearest prayer, unto thee shall all flesh come.” (Psalms 65:2)
–“And when he had taken the book, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints. (Revelation 5:8)

Prayer brings revival. Pray!

Posted in fiscal overlord, one world government, one world religion, tower of babel

Germany wants a fiscal overlord

Posted on by elizabethprata

The Tower of Babel

“Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. And the Lord said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth.” (Genesis 10:1-9).”

Is God one big party pooper? Not allowing the men of the earth to have some fun, to build a tower to worship Him?

Nope, that’s not it. That is not why He stopped the tower building, confused the languages, and dispersed the people.

He did it because He knows that humans collecting together under the rule of one man (in that case, Nimrod) is bad for us. If one man runs everything, there are no checks and balances, and our evil ways will emerge very quickly to the detriment of all humankind.

Did He not say to Adam and Eve, be fruitful and multiply and fill the whole earth? (Genesis 1:28). But they didn’t.

And after the Flood, did God not say to Noah and his sons, “As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it” ? (Genesis 9:1). But they didn’t.

And in no more than 100 years after the flood, Nimrod had set himself up as dictator, founded the Babylonian Kingdom, and began worshiping idols by building this tower for worship of the false gods. The did the opposite of filling the earth. The gathered, huddled, collected. It was rebellion. And worse, the tower was a monument to their pride. It wasn’t built to worship God, it was intended for worship of idols.

They said:
“Come let us…make a name for ourselves“.

So God said,
“Come let us…disperse them”

We know that the Tribulation, AKA The Time of Jacob’s Trouble, will be a time of 7 years when sin will be allowed to course unrestrained through the world. (2 Thessalonians 2:6). Sin will reach its full course, its full measure. Without a restraint, the full impact of man’s evil will come out. The most evil man who ever lived will be allowed to create his own Tower of Babel so to speak. The antichrist will run the economy, the military and the religion of the world. It will be a one world government and there will be no checks and balances. What God stopped at the Tower of Babel will become all too real in the Day of the LORD.

We already have a dilution of the world’s languages. This article in How Stuff Works, The Future of Language has some interesting facts. They wrote-

“It’s difficult for linguists to know how many languages exist in the world at any given time, mainly because the point at which a dialect becomes a separate language is hard to pin down. Best estimates put the current total at 6,909 distinct languages. Despite the difficulties of counting languages, most experts agree on one thing: There are fewer languages around today than yesterday. That’s because languages are disappearing at an alarming rate – some experts predict that half of the current languages will be gone by the year 2100.”

“Imagine losing the languages of the world to a dominant global one. According to Dan Fitzgerald, a Washington, D.C.-based French instructor, the costs to humanity would be huge. “Much of the culture that goes along with each of those languages would also disappear,” he explains. … Some might say that we already have a world language: English. English is spoken in more than 100 countries, making it by far the most global language on earth. There are certainly other languages that are spoken by more of the world’s people, such as Mandarin Chinese and Hindi. However, Mandarin Chinese and Hindi are spoken in only 16 and 17 countries, respectively.”

In a sense, we already have a one world language, almost. At the United Nations you can put on headphones and listen to simultaneous translation. It is really amazing. Slate explains:

“The United Nations uses simultaneous interpretation, which means translating on the fly without breaks (as opposed to consecutive interpretation, in which the speaker and translator alternate). At any given moment, the U.N. Interpretation Service has a dozen interpreters working six booths—one for every official language. The pair of interpreters in the English booth translates into English, the French booth translates into French, and so on. Attendees can then listen to the interpretations on headphones, clicking across channels for different languages. The job is exhausting, so interpreters will usually switch off every 20 minutes or so. They can also take breaks when the speech is in their language, since no translation is necessary.”

Online, google translate will instantly translate any language on a web page to any other language, even Esperanto or Latin. So in some respects, a one world language is already here.

A one world religion is clicking along to close to fulfillment. Calls for ecumenism, tolerance, and an interfaith church based on  religious elements of faith that we share and not the differences are getting louder. Ecumenism according to Walter A. Elwell, in The Concise Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, is “The organized attempt to bring about the cooperation and unity among Christians.” To this end, the Catholic Church and its practices are increasingly accepted in evangelical circles. Labyrinth walking, lectio divina, contemplative prayer, saintly visions, works/word-based faith, and direct revelation had all been part of the Catholic Church for many years but is now permeating the conservative Southern Baptist congregations like gangrene in a Civil War soldier.

Which is funny because the more that the conservative Protestant Churches accept Catholic ecumenism, the more they die an agonizing spiritual death, because Catholicism teaches that no salvation is available to anyone not a Catholic. So there’s their ecumenism for you. It is a classic bait-and-switch

[Proof-text: “For it is through Christ’s Catholic Church alone, which is the universal help toward salvation, that the fullness of the means of salvation can be obtained. It was to the apostolic college alone, of which Peter is the head, that we believe that our Lord entrusted all the blessings of the New Covenant, in order to establish on earth the one Body of Christ into which all those should be fully incorporated who belong in any way to the People of God.” (CCC 816). ‘

That desire to congregate is reaching a height these days. The religious conglomeration that will be fulfilled in the Tribulation in a one world religion is ramping up now with demands for ecumenism and with the active push of the Roman Catholic Church to overturn the Reformation (and the more gullible Conservative Evangelicals accept the push).

Gathering together is a bad thing for humanity, not the least of which is because of the evil the prophesied overlord will perpetrate. And what’s worse, is the leaders of the world are clamoring for it. Read this headline from two days ago:

Germany shocks EU with fiscal overlord demand
“There must be an EU “currency commissioner” with sweeping powers to strike down national budgets; a “large step towards fiscal union”; and yet another EU treaty. Finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble dropped his bombshell in talks with German journalists on a flight from Asia, and apparently had the blessing of Angela Merkel, the chancellor. “When I put forward such proposals, you can take it as a given that the chancellor agrees,” he said.” … Mr Schaeuble said the currency chief should have powers similar to those of the EU’s competition commissioner, a man “feared around the world”. The competition Czar is the arch-enforcer of the EU machine, with powers to launch dawn raids, deploy SWAT teams, and block mergers on his own authority.”

Did you even know there was such a thing as a Competition Czar? I didn’t. And now the EU official wants a fiscal overlord? Wow.

In my opinion, one of the scariest things God said is in the opening verse above, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.” (Genesis 11:6). But THE scariest is that in the tribulation, He will allow it.

While you still can,
COME TO CHRIST, HE IS MIGHTY TO SAVE!

Watch the 3 minutes that may change your life-

Posted in paul washer, regeneration

"How Did Lazarus hear Jesus? He was dead."

Posted on by elizabethprata

In 8 minutes, Paul Washer explains the Doctrine of Election, the goodness of God, and the evilness of man. He does so in a loving and beautiful way. A student had approached Pastor Washer at the Deeper Conference, asking him to explain the doctrine of Election. The link to the sermon that Paul Washer recommended can be found here: http://www.anchoredintruth.org/sermonplayer#!/swx/pp/media_archives/106081/episode/22276

Posted in false teachers, merchandise, priscilla shirer, prophecy, rob bell

Peter’s prophecy fulfilled: False teachers who make merchandise of you

Posted on by elizabethprata

Here is a prophecy in 2 Peter 2:3 that has recently come to my attention. Read it in different translations:

“In their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has not been sleeping.” (NIV)

“And in their greed they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.” (ESV)

And my favorite translation of the verse;

“And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not.” (KJV)

Looking at the verse in context, Peter is warning about false teachers to come. The ESV’s heading for the entire chapter is called “False Prophets and Teachers” and the chapter goes on to describe all the qualities of false teachers and prophets who are prophesied to come. Peter opens with chapter 1 in reminding the brethren that our salvation is sure, and that Christ’s word in the prophetic is glorious. He tells us in chapter 2 about those prophecies, namely focusing on the false teachers and prophets, and then continues the thought in chapter 3, reminding the brethren to think on these things and be duly warned. He then reassures the church that the Day of the Lord will come, and all the false teachers and prophets will be dealt with in due time.

We are told in His word that what will happen is that false teachers will make the Word a merchandise and they will exploit the believers. They do this because they are greedy. When it happens it will not be because they made a mistake, or briefly had a period of a wayward interpretations, or due to Christian immaturity. The bible says they do it on purpose and they do because they want money.

So back to the verse. Are the brethren exploited? Is the word being merchandised? Yes.

The consumerism in current Christianity bothered me when I attended the Beth Moore live weekend “bible study” at the Time Warner Arena. The slickness of the extravaganza was shocking, and the prices of food the vendors were charging really made me think of the moneylenders in the temple.

When the Fireproof movie came out I was struck by the push to buy the DVD, the books, the “Love Dare” diary. I mentioned that in another blog post, that fads in Christianity seem to come with their own cottage industry or marketing and merchandising of trinkets.

Same with the Courageous merchandise. You can buy a pack, complete with The Resolution For Men Book, the Resolution Certificate print (as seen in the movie) and the FREE Bonus I Resolve/I Will wristband. Hurry while supplies last.

Then I read of all these mega-church pastors who quit their post at a church to go on book tours.

There is nothing wrong with a pastor writing a book. Nothing. What the prophecy says is that they will be false, they will write false things, and make merchandise out of the false words and they will exploit the people who support them. And that, my brethren, is exactly what is happening today.

Rob Bell, founder of Mars Hill Bible Church in MI, recently released the heretical book, Love Wins. Love Wins impugns the character of God by saying that hell is not real.

After the book was a runaway success, Bell resigned the ministry and went on a tour. An article in Crosswalk noted, “Bell’s resignation makes him the latest in a string a celebrity pastors who have said goodbye to weekly sermons, potluck dinners and other staples of church life. “A New Kind of Christianity” author Brian McLaren, “Crazy Love” author Francis Chan, “Deep Church” author Jim Belcher and the popular British Bible scholar N.T. Wright have all left their church leadership positions in recent years.”

Bell left his church “to pursue a growing number of strategic opportunities.”

The article states, “For pastors with ambitions to reach huge audiences, there’s often no better platform than the megachurch, which has given rise to powerhouse media empires from T.D. Jakes to Max Lucado to Joel Osteen and many others. But some high-profile pastors are opting to leave congregational ministry altogether to pursue publishing and other media ventures full time.”

Media empires is right. And the article correctly noted that the mega-church has become a ‘platform’ from which to launch that media empire, make a lot of money, and go on tour, leaving the picked-over flock behind.

Speaking of cottage industry, never mind the packets, kits, trinkets, and books, there are new businesses springing up to support the business of Christianity. For example, Alive Communications is a Colorado Springs, Colo., literary agency that represents megachurch pastors. Now pastors need agents? Apparently so.

Even the woman are getting in on it. Priscilla Shirer, daughter of popular preacher Tony Evans, is also her own cottage industry. “Conservative Bible teachers like Shirer have built a new paradigm for feminine preaching, an ingenious blend of traditional revivalism, modern therapeutic culture and the gabby intimacy of Oprah. … This theology has spawned a subculture of Bible studies, conferences, ministries, religious retreats and literature ranging from Christian fitness books to Christian romance novels, all produced by and for evangelical women.” (source)

Above, Priscilla Shirer, source

For the women who go on tour, this cottage industry is at the expense of biblical womanhood. The article notes that Mr Shirer spends much of the day negotiating Priscilla’s speaking invitations and her book contracts. In the afternoon it’s often Mr Shirer who collects the boys from school. Back home, Priscilla and Jerry divide chores and child care equally. “Jerry quit his job to run his wife’s ministry. Priscilla now accepts about 20 out of some 300 speaking invitations each year, and she publishes a stream of Bible studies, workbooks and corresponding DVDs intended for women to read and watch with their girlfriends from church. Jerry does his share of housework and child care so that Priscilla can study and write. He travels with his wife everywhere. Whenever possible, they take their sons along on her speaking trips, but they often deposit the boys with Jerry’s mother.”

And don’t forget to pick up your Shirer “I Am Resolved” tee shirt on your way out.

After Rob Bell left in a cloud of dust for his book and speaking tour, the remaining pastor at Mars Hill shortly decided to leave also. Shane Hipps said he enjoys “serving the broader church” by speaking and writing. The ‘broader church’ is code for, well, the world. Hipps worried that if he accepted the new role as main teacher after Rob Bell’s departure to serve the world, (they don’t call them preachers at Mars Hill), “I would have to dramatically reduce my service to the broader church which is an integral part of my sense of call.” Translation: I will have to be accountable to the elders and I’d have to curtail my book tours. Ix-nay on the teaching-ay. Who wants to be stuck at a podium preaching week after week when you can be a media darling and start an empire? Good bye Mars Hill, hello new book, “Selling Water by the River: A book about the Life Jesus Promised and the Religion that Gets in the Way.”

This writer below in the next article asks a good question, many good questions as a matter of fact. Who decided that these particular teachers speak for the local church?

None dare Call It Marketing: Lifeway, Beth Moore and the conspiracy to take over your church

“The idea of a celebrity Bible teacher, a teacher who teaches thousands and thousands of people through media, isn’t antithetical to the Bible’s presentation of discipleship, but it certainly isn’t normative. It’s not what the Bible has in mind. And one of the reasons is this: The ministry of the “celebrity” Bible teacher tends to undermine the ministry of the local church pastor.” … “What I will ask, however, is whether my fellow Christians have the courage to admit that Beth Moore and Rick Warren and the next publishing superstars are, in large part, promoted by Lifeway for profits? Not chosen by God, but chosen by Lifeway and other publishers for potential book sales? Lifeway would say chosen and promoted for the good of my church. Well, if it’s profitable. If you can’t see that, you’re naive.” … I’m distressed that Christian media’s capitalistic agenda has become the source of an unquestioned spiritual authority in so many churches.”

Me too.

John MacArthur exposits the Peter verse, “The operating motive, the underlying cause. Verse 3, “And in greed they will exploit you with false words.” Here’s another component that you need to know about. What drives them on the inside to do what they do? Listen very carefully. They’re not driven by immorality. They’re not driven by aselgeia, sexual immorality. You can do that by yourself. That’s not going to make you a false teacher. You can be immoral all alone in your own little world with just the people you choose to be immoral with, you don’t need to be a false teacher to be immoral. And if all they wanted to do was fulfill their sensual desire, they wouldn’t need to be a false teacher. But there’s another component. What is it? Greed…greed.”

“The driving force of their enterprise to be teachers is not the love of the truth, it’s not submission to the Lord, it’s not even sexual immorality, they can do that in the pew. The driving force is money. The word pleonexiameans uncontrolled greed. They’re expert at it. They’re in it to accumulate money. And watch them, they do. Verse 14 of the same chapter, “Their eyes are full of adultery…obviously…they never cease from sin, they never submit to lordship, they entice unstable souls…why do they do that?…because their hearts…boy, this is really graphic..are trained in…what?…greed.” They’re experts at it. They can con money out of anybody. They want money. They want money. They want your money. They want anybody’s money.’ … “They exploit you, they get rich off you with false words.”

Now you might deduce that I am offended at Christian merchandising of God’s word. That I am concerned with women who have their own cottage industries of tours of ‘bible studies” and products at the expense of their children, their husbands and their husbands’ jobs. But this next bit really gets me.

“Bell’s 2009 project, Drops Like Stars, explores the links between creativity and suffering. Drops Like Stars was an international tour and a book, initially handwritten by Bell, with photographs. The title of the project comes from a young child’s view of raindrops on a window at night. Rather than focusing on the conundrum of why an all-powerful God would allow suffering, Bell instead looks at the creativity, empathy, new connections, and growth that can spring from suffering. When asked in an interview how he had become interested in suffering, Bell replied that as a pastor he had been given a front row seat in the most poignant moment’s of people’s lives. At the same time he was doing lectures on creativity and realized, “There was a connection between these two halves of my life – all these connections between suffering and art-making.” (source)

He had a ‘front row seat’ to people’s spiritual and emotional pain, and decided to make money off it. This right there is a fulfillment of the worst kind of the prophecy Peter warned us about.

Though Bell’s book is a sad instance of the merchandising of God’s word and exploitation of His people, this one is just plain silly and ridiculous:

Pastors, at a loss for how to lead your church? Call Will Mancini, Clarity Evangelist. He will help you discover a unique vision for your church, and sell you a Unique Vision Kit, to boot.

Your church’s Unique Vision Kit
CHURCH UNIQUE BOOK: (1) Written to help you find your Church Unique and live a vision that creates a stunningly unique, movement-oriented church. (The Church Unique Vision Kit includes one copy of the book.)
LEADERS GUIDE: (1) Step by step instructions for the leader of the Church Unique Vision Pathway process. Everything you need to lead 8 vision clarifying team sessions.
DVD: (1) Video teaching from Will Mancini provides insight, encouragement, and inspiration.
PARTICIPANT GUIDE: (9) Map, journal, and sketch book to help each team member participate effectively in the vision clarification process. (Pick up your own 3 ring binders at your favorite office supply retailer.)
VISION DECK: (1) 52 optional exercises to inspire visionary teams.
JOE GROW: (9) Bendable figure empowers teams to explore the impact of vision on real people.
COMPASS KEY CHAIN: (9) Take home object lesson for team members.
COLLABORATION CUBES: (9) Table top team interaction style reminders for team members.
VISION FRAMES: (9) Customizable frame for team participants to record the vision outcomes.
ALIGNMENT RING: (1) Illustrates the power of a unified vision and momentum.
ROLE CARDS: (9) One laminated role card with key responsibilities for each team member.
MISSION CARDS: (9) One wallet sized card for each person to record your unique mission.
WALL CHARTS: (18) Posters that illustrate key concepts in the Vision Pathway Process as well as charts to capture your unique vision. (Pick up additional flip charts or blank sheets of newsprint to record ideas at your favorite office supply retailer.)

The 2 Peter 2:3 verse says “they will exploit you” or “they will make merchandise of you” and the Greek word for exploit is emporeusontai, from which we get the English word emporium. Emporium is a term used for a store selling a wide variety of goods, and for marketplaces or trading centers.

Making money is no problem. Writing a book is no problem. Having money is no problem. Being a megachurch pastor is not a problem (usually). But false teachers will come in, and not sparing the flock, they will exploit the Word and the people for their greedy purposes. I believe it is clear that it is happening to a high degree today. All I can say is,

“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” (Mark 1:15)

Posted in maine

4.6 quake in (UPDATED with raw video)

Posted on by elizabethprata

USGS stats: epicenter in Lake Arrowhead, SW Maine.

Update, raw video has surfaced from the Waterboro Selectmen meeting:

New Haven Register:
A magnitude 4.6 earthquake centered in southern Maine was felt throughout New England, including here in Connecticut.

People in RI said their fridge and TV shook.

Boston Herald: An earthquake based in Maine sent tremors through the region prompting the phones to “ring off the hook” at the National Weather Service. The quake — registering 4.6 on Richter scale — was centered southwest of Lake Arrowhead in Maine west of Portland, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The news blasted out on social media just as quickly, with some saying “Earthquake in Brookline. Building just shook like mad!” and “Did You Feel an Earthquake?”

It was a quake felt throughout New England. Interesting!