Endtime Prophecy
The Downside of Democracy
Throughout the history of man there have been two basic forms of public government: 1. Rule by the elite (monarchy, aristocracy, oligarchy) and 2. Rule by the people (democracy). The three basic forms of democracy are:
- Direct democracy where the general public vote on every issue of law and governance,
- Representative democracy (also known as Parliamentary democracy) where representatives are elected by the public and in turn vote on every issue of law and governance, and
- Presidential democracy (also known as Authoritarian democracy) where an individual is elected by the public and in turn establishes every law and issues of governance.
The Doctrine of Democracy
At the heart of the idea of democracy is the doctrine of popular sovereignty. Popular sovereignty simply means that the majority of the voting public knows what is best for everyone else. But, as the saying goes, “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to eat for lunch.” In other words, democracy is great as long as you share the same sentiment as the majority.
The Dream of Democracy
Upon exiting the United States of America Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin was approached by a group of citizens asking what sort of government the delegates had created. His answer was: “A republic, if you can keep it.” A republic simply means a form of government in which the country is considered a public matter. Therefore, the framers of the American system of federal government were elevating the role of public participation by implementing a representative form of democracy with checks and balances.
The founding fathers of this fledgling form of federal administration knew that allowing the general public to direct the creation of the laws that would govern them was a risky business. Therefore, they provided a set of foundational principles known as the Constitution that gave a framework for public lawmaking with the hope that this new experimental process would ultimately be governed by people who were themselves governed by Biblical absolutes. In reality, the process of democracy is only played out on the surface of society while the brute forces of dirty politics form the undercurrent that ultimately make laws and provide governance.
The Deception of Democracy
Today it is very popular for various groups to vehemently express their views in an attempt to gain public acceptance and eventually be presented as the majority view. In some cases, a majority in volume can constitute a majority of opinion as the screams of the minority drown out their opposition.
We see that the expression of the “popular will” can create a cacophony of discordant voices, leaving many baffled about the true meaning of majority rule. In far too many places around the world today, the expression of the “popular will” is nothing more than the unleashing of personal passions that have little, if any, concern for the good of the whole society. It can even create and promote genocidal policies toward those without a voice in the democratic process. The sad end of democracy is anarchy where rival factions splinter the fabric of society in order to gain their own selfish means. Ultimately the democratic process turns into nothing but a horrible form of tyranny that is initiated and enforced by the majority.
The Media and Democracy
In order for democracy to work, you must have a minimum of three key ingredients:
- A willingness to do what is right;
- A resignation to the final outcome of the democratic process; and
- A wide public access to unbiased knowledge of the related facts and circumstances about which the democratic process is going to consider.
Sadly, today we live in a world filled with toxic news agencies who serve up their opinion as a replacement for information. Rather than informing the public they seem totally focused on shaping public opinion.
Consequently, the modern public is caught in a quagmire of fake news, doctored photos/videos, and conspiracy mania. In this world of information overload, sound bites replace sound logic and screaming slogans replace open dialogue and meaningful debate. In the midst of all this confusion people seem to be quite happy to make resolute decisions based on nothing more that a cartoon character representation of some very complicated issues.
The Darwinian effect on Democracy
Recently there has emerged a third form of social government: 3. Rule by the individual. Evolving from the parent thought of “popular will,” it is built on the foundational principles of personal sovereignty and personal truth. Although it spreads fastest in the futile soil of the anarchistic movement, it is finding root within mainstream society.
In this hostile world of violently competing agendas, common courtesy is trampled under the feet of contending opponents. This is where the creed of “survival of the fittest” is the guiding motivation that enables social Darwinism. Therefore, this type of Darwinian-style democracy paves a slippery slope for society to plunge ever downward. The Bible tells us that ultimately democracy (self-determination) is the agent of societal and personal destruction.1
The Disaster of Democracy
On a placard outside of Auschwitz, George Santayana’s famous quote is a powerful reminder that “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
The Biblical narrative of the nation of Israel is a great place to start when it comes to gaining both a historic perspective and prophetic insight for the times in which we live.
The nation of Israel was founded on a new type of public government that was based on the Law of God. This allowed each person to rule their own life according to one divine standard. The unifying fact was not the people, but the laws God had given them to follow. The Book of Joshua closes with this final exhortation,
“Now therefore fear the LORD, and serve him in sincerity and in truth: and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; and serve ye the LORD. And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”
Joshua 24:14,15
The chapter then closes by stating,
“And Israel served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that overlived Joshua, and which had known all the works of the LORD, that he had done for Israel.”
Joshua 24:31
Unfortunately, without the guiding hands of these godly leaders the nation of Israel soon drifted away and became like the nations around them.
“And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the LORD, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel. And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim:”
Judges 2:10,11
Basically, Israel ignored the God who had rescued them from bondage in Egypt and became servants themselves of the gods of the Canaanites.
As you review the Book of Judges you are constantly struck with the images of people who are so bent on following after their own desires that they repeatedly find themselves ensnared by their appetites and subsequently enslaved by their enemies. By chapter 17 we are told, “In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.”2 Thus, for the remainder of the Book of Judges you read of the increasing depravity of a nation that has no room for the counsel or correction of God. Here, I believe, we have a perfect picture of the disaster of democracy when the people have lost their moral compass.
A Prophetic Parallel
We now live in an age when universally it can be said, without fear of contradiction, that there “arose another generation after them, which knew not the LORD (The God of the Bible)” and “every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” Therefore, we now see the distress, disease, demise and destruction of modern society that was promised by God for Israel IF they were not faithful to follow His commandments.3
But let’s be fair; rebellion against God is an endemic problem that has existed throughout the history of mankind. Before the first global judgement by God, the condition of the world at that time sounds a lot like it could be describing today.
“The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.”
Genesis 6:11-13
Jesus gave us an important end-times prophetic insight when He said, “And as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man.”4 Jesus goes on to say,
“And shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them? I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?”
Luke 18:7,8
Clearly Jesus was predicting a predominantly corrupt world that would be hostile to the Gospel. Sounds like today, doesn’t it?
The Action Plan for the Church
If we track back to the seminal moment of the nation of Israel and their subsequent decent into their destructive behavior, we can see an important preceding influence.
“And Israel served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that overlived Joshua, and which had known all the works of the LORD, that he had done for Israel.”
Joshua 24:31
These early elders of Israel were a constant source of instruction and correction which served to guide the people into the ways of God’s will.
Simply put, the heart of man’s problem is in the heart of man. If man’s heart is turned toward God then righteousness reigns, but if man’s heart turns away from God then the wages of sin are paid in full.5 To counterbalance a world gone mad, Jesus told His disciples,
“Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt has lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.”
Matthew 5:13
Jesus went on to say,
“Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.”
Matthew 5:14
The prevention of putrefaction is purification. Darkness cannot survive where light exists. Providing these purifying influences should be the primary function of the Church today.
The first-century followers of Jesus faced a predominately hedonistic society which was not too dissimilar to what we see today. Confronted by many different pagan cultures, Greek philosophies, political corruption, and Roman excess, the early church was focused on its prime objective which was to “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.”6 The early church did not form an army, promote a political party, or in any way dilute their efforts to fully carry out their great commission. If you want to see change in the world around you, start with Good News that goes straight to the heart.
An Apostolic Epilog
At the end of the apostle Paul’s life, he was in prison where he was surrounded with the reality of his own impending death. Injustice, social chaos, and political corruption were everywhere. Yet in the midst of these terrible times he penned his last letter to Timothy in which he states,
“I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry.”
2 Timothy 4:1-5
In the mainline media, those who adhere to the position that there is some kind of “conspiracy” pushing us towards a world government are virulently ridiculed. The standard attack maintains that the so-called “New World Order” is the product of turn-of-the-century, right-wing, bigoted, anti-semitic racists acting in the tradition of the long-debunked Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, now promulgated by some Militias and other right-wing hate groups.
The historical record does not support that position to any large degree but it has become the mantra of the socialist left and their cronies, the media.
The term “New World Order” has been used thousands of times in this century by proponents in high places of federalized world government. Some of those involved in this collaboration to achieve world order have been Jewish. The preponderance are not, so it most definitely is not a Jewish agenda.
For years, leaders in education, industry, the media, banking, etc., have promoted those with the same Weltanschauung (world view) as theirs. Of course, someone might say that just because individuals promote their friends doesn’t constitute a conspiracy. That’s true in the usual sense. However, it does represent an “open conspiracy,” as described by noted Fabian Socialist H.G. Wells in The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution (1928).
In 1913, prior to the passage of the Federal Reserve Act President Wilson’s The New Freedom was published, in which he revealed:
“Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the U. S., in the field of commerce and manufacturing, are afraid of somebody, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.”
On November 21, 1933, President Franklin Roosevelt wrote a letter to Col. Edward Mandell House, President Woodrow Wilson’s close advisor:
“The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the larger centers has owned the Government every since the days of Andrew Jackson…”
That there is such a thing as a cabal of power brokers who control government behind the scenes has been detailed several times in this century by credible sources. Professor Carroll Quigley was Bill Clinton’s mentor at Georgetown University. President Clinton has publicly paid homage to the influence Professor Quigley had on his life. In Quigley’s magnum opus Tragedy and Hope (1966), he states:
“There does exist and has existed for a generation, an international…network which operates, to some extent, in the way the radical right believes the Communists act. In fact, this network, which we may identify as the Round Table Groups, has no aversion to cooperating with the Communists, or any other groups and frequently does so. I know of the operations of this network because I have studied it for twenty years and was permitted for two years, in the early 1960s, to examine its papers and secret records. I have no aversion to it or to most of its aims and have, for much of my life, been close to it and to many of its instruments. I have objected, both in the past and recently, to a few of its policies…but in general my chief difference of opinion is that it wishes to remain unknown, and I believe its role in history is significant enough to be known.”
Even talk show host Rush Limbaugh, an outspoken critic of anyone claiming a push for global government, said on his February 7, 1995 program:
“You see, if you amount to anything in Washington these days, it is because you have been plucked or handpicked from an Ivy League school — Harvard, Yale, Kennedy School of Government — you’ve shown an aptitude to be a good Ivy League type, and so you’re plucked so-to-speak, and you are assigned success. You are assigned a certain role in government somewhere, and then your success is monitored and tracked, and you go where the pluckers and the handpickers can put you.”
On May 4, 1993, Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) president Leslie Gelb said on The Charlie Rose Show that:
“…you [Charlie Rose] had me on [before] to talk about the New World Order! I talk about it all the time. It’s one world now. The Council [CFR] can find, nurture, and begin to put people in the kinds of jobs this country needs. And that’s going to be one of the major enterprises of the Council under me.”
Previous CFR chairman, John J. McCloy (1953-70), actually said they have been doing this since the 1940s (and before).
The thrust towards global government can be well-documented but at the end of the twentieth century it does not look like a traditional conspiracy in the usual sense of a secret cabal of evil men meeting clandestinely behind closed doors. Rather, it is a “networking” of like-minded individuals in high places to achieve a common goal, as described in Marilyn Ferguson’s 1980 insider classic, The Aquarian Conspiracy.
Perhaps the best way to relate this would be a brief history of the New World Order, not in our words but in the words of those who have been striving to make it real.
1912 — Colonel Edward M. House, a close advisor of President Woodrow Wilson, publishes Phillip Dru: Administrator in which he promotes “socialism as dreamed of by Karl Marx.”
1913 — The Federal Reserve (neither federal nor a reserve) is created. It was planned at a secret meeting in 1910 on Jekyl Island, Georgia by a group of bankers and politicians, including Col. House. This transferred the power to create money from the American government to a private group of bankers. It is probably the largest generator of debt in the world.
May 30, 1919 — Prominent British and American personalities establish the Royal Institute of International Affairs in England and the Institute of International Affairs in the U.S. at a meeting arranged by Col. House attended by various Fabian socialists, including noted economist John Maynard Keynes. Two years later, Col. House reorganizes the Institute of International Affairs into the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).
December 15, 1922 — The CFR endorses World Government in its magazine Foreign Affairs. Author Philip Kerr, states:
“Obviously there is going to be no peace or prosperity for mankind as long as [the earth] remains divided into 50 or 60 independent states until some kind of international system is created…The real problem today is that of the world government.”
1928 — The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution by H.G. Well is published. A former Fabian Socialist, Wells writes:
“The political world of the into a Open Conspiracy must weaken, efface, incorporate and supersede existing governments…The Open Conspiracy is the natural inheritor of socialist and communist enthusiasms; it may be in control of Moscow before it is in control of New York…The character of the Open Conspiracy will now be plainly displayed…It w
1931 — Students at the Lenin School of Political Warfare in Moscow are taught:
“One day we shall start to spread the most theatrical peace movement the world has ever seen. The capitalist countries, stupid and decadent…will fall into the trap offered by the possibility of making new friends. Our day will come in 30 years or so…The bourgeoisie must be lulled into a false sense of security.
1932 — New books are published urging World Order:
Toward Soviet America by William Z. Foster. Head of the Communist Party USA, Foster indicates that a National Department of Education would be one of the means used to develop a new socialist society in the U.S.
The New World Order by F.S. Marvin, describing the League of Nations as the first attempt at a New World Order. Marvin says, “nationality must rank below the claims of mankind as a whole.”
Dare the School Build a New Social Order? is published. Educator author George Counts asserts that:
“…the teachers should deliberately reach for power and then make the most of their conquest” in order to “influence the social attitudes, ideals and behavior of the coming generation…The growth of science and technology has carried us into a new age where ignorance must be replaced by knowledge, competition by cooperation, trust in Providence by careful planning and private capitalism by some form of social economy.”
1933 — The first Humanist Manifesto is published. Co-author John Dewey, the noted philosopher and educator, calls for a synthesizing of all religions and “a socialized and cooperative economic order.”
Co-signer C.F. Potter said in 1930:
“Education is thus a most powerful ally of humanism, and every American public school is a school of humanism. What can the theistic Sunday schools, meeting for an hour once a week, teaching only a fraction of the children, do to stem the tide of a five-day program of humanistic teaching?
1933 — The Shape of Things to Come by H.G. Wells is published. Wells predicts a second world war around 1940, originating from a German-Polish dispute. After 1945 there would be an increasing lack of public safety in “criminally infected” areas. The plan for the “Modern World-State” would succeed on its third attempt (about 1980), and come out of something that occurred in Basra, Iraq.
The book also states,
“Although world government had been plainly coming for some years, although it had been endlessly feared and murmured against, it found no opposition prepared anywhere.”
1934 — The Externalization of the Hierarchy by Alice A. Bailey is published. Bailey is an occultist, whose works are channeled from a spirit guide, the Tibetan Master [demon spirit] Djwahl Kuhl. Bailey uses the phrase “points of light” in connection with a “New Group of World Servers” and claims that 1934 marks the beginning of “the organizing of the men and women…group work of a new order…[with] progress defined by service…the world of the Brotherhood…the Forces of Light…[and] out of the spoliation of all existing culture and civilization, the new world order must be built.”
The book is published by the Lucis Trust, incorporated originally in New York as the Lucifer Publishing Company. Lucis Trust is a United Nations NGO and has been a major player at the recent U.N. summits. Later Assistant Secretary General of the U.N. Robert Mueller would credit the creation of his World Core Curriculum for education to the underlying teachings of Djwahl Kuhl via Alice Bailey’s writings on the subject.
1932 — Plan for Peace by American Birth Control League founder Margaret Sanger (1921) is published. She calls for coercive sterilization, mandatory segregation, and rehabilitative concentration camps for all “dysgenic stocks” including Blacks, Hispanics, American Indians and Catholics.
October 28, 1939 — In an address by John Foster Dulles, later U.S. Secretary of State, he proposes that America lead the transition to a new order of less independent, semi-sovereign states bound together by a league or federal union.
1939 — New World Order by H. G. Wells proposes a collectivist one-world state”‘ or “new world order” comprised of “socialist democracies.” He advocates “universal conscription for service” and declares that “nationalist individualism…is the world’s disease.” He continues:
“The manifest necessity for some collective world control to eliminate warfare and the less generally admitted necessity for a collective control of the economic and biological life of mankind, are aspects of one and the same process.” He proposes that this be accomplished through “universal law” and propaganda (or education).”
1940 — The New World Order is published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and contains a select list of references on regional and world federation, together with some special plans for world order after the war.
December 12, 1940 — In The Congressional Record an article entitled A New World Order John G. Alexander calls for a world federation.
1942 — The leftist Institute of Pacific Relations publishes Post War Worlds by P.E. Corbett:
“World government is the ultimate aim…It must be recognized that the law of nations takes precedence over national law…The process will have to be assisted by the deletion of the nationalistic material employed in educational textbooks and its replacement by material explaining the benefits of wiser association.”
June 28, 1945 — President Truman endorses world government in a speech:
“It will be just as easy for nations to get along in a republic of the world as it is for us to get along in a republic of the United States.”
October 24, 1945 — The United Nations Charter becomes effective. Also on October 24, Senator Glen Taylor (D-Idaho) introduces Senate Resolution 183 calling upon the U.S. Senate to go on record as favoring creation of a world republic including an international police force.
1946 — Alger Hiss is elected President of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Hiss holds this office until 1949. Early in 1950, he is convicted of perjury and sentenced to prison after a sensational trial and Congressional hearing in which Whittaker Chambers, a former senior editor of Time, testifies that Hiss was a member of his Communist Party cell.
1946 — The Teacher and World Government by former editor of the NEA Journal (National Education Association) Joy Elmer Morgan is published. He says:
“In the struggle to establish an adequate world government, the teacher…can do much to prepare the hearts and minds of children for global understanding and cooperation…At the very heart of all the agencies which will assure the coming of world government must stand the school, the teacher, and the organized profession.”
1947 — The American Education Fellowship, formerly the Progressive Education Association, organized by John Dewey, calls for the:
“…establishment of a genuine world order, an order in which national sovereignty is subordinate to world authority…”
October, 1947 — NEA Associate Secretary William Carr writes in the NEA Journal that teachers should:
“…teach about the various proposals that have been made for the strengthening of the United Nations and the establishment of a world citizenship and world government.”
1948 — Walden II by behavioral psychologist B.F. Skinner proposes “a perfect society or new and more perfect order” in which children are reared by the State, rather than by their parents and are trained from birth to demonstrate only desirable behavior and characteristics. Skinner’s ideas would be widely implemented by educators in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s as Values Clarification and Outcome Based Education.
July, 1948 — Britain’s Sir Harold Butler, in the CFR’s Foreign Affairs, sees “a New World Order” taking shape:
“How far can the life of nations, which for centuries have thought of themselves as distinct and unique, be merged with the life of other nations? How far are they prepared to sacrifice a part of their sovereignty without which there can be no effective economic or political union?…Out of the prevailing confusion a new world is taking shape… which may point the way toward the new order…That will be the beginning of a real United Nations, no longer crippled by a split personality, but held together by a common faith.”
1948 — UNESCO president and Fabian Socialist, Sir Julian Huxley, calls for a radical eugenic policy in UNESCO: Its Purpose and Its Philosophy. He states:
“Thus, even though it is quite true that any radical eugenic policy of controlled human breeding will be for many years politically and psychologically impossible, it will be important for UNESCO to see that the eugenic problem is examined with the greatest care and that the public mind is informed of the issues at stake that much that is now unthinkable may at least become thinkable.”
1948 — The preliminary draft of a World Constitution is published by U.S. educators advocating regional federation on the way toward world federation or government with England incorporated into a European federation.
The Constitution provides for a “World Council” along with a “Chamber of Guardians” to enforce world law. Also included is a “Preamble” calling upon nations to surrender their arms to the world government, and includes the right of this “Federal Republic of the World” to seize private property for federal use.
February 9, 1950 — The Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee introduces Senate Concurrent Resolution 66 which begins:
“Whereas, in order to achieve universal peace and justice, the present Charter of the United Nations should be changed to provide a true world government constitution.”
The resolution was first introduced in the Senate on September 13, 1949 by Senator Glen Taylor (D-Idaho). Senator Alexander Wiley (R-Wisconsin) called it “a consummation devoutly to be wished for” and said, “I understand your proposition is either change the United Nations, or change or create, by a separate convention, a world order.” Senator Taylor later stated:
“We would have to sacrifice considerable sovereignty to the world organization to enable them to levy taxes in their own right to support themselves.”
April 12, 1952 — John Foster Dulles, later to become Secretary of State, says in a speech to the American Bar Association in Louisville, Kentucky, that “treaty laws can override the Constitution.” He says treaties can take power away from Congress and give them to the President. They can take powers from the States and give them to the Federal Government or to some international body and they can cut across the rights given to the people by their constitutional Bill of Rights.
A Senate amendment, proposed by GOP Senator John Bricker, would have provided that no treaty could supersede the Constitution, but it fails to pass by one vote.
1954 — Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands establishes the Bilderbergers, international politicians and bankers who meet secretly on an annual basis.
1958 — World Peace through World Law is published, where authors Grenville Clark and Louis Sohn advocate using the U.N. as a governing body for the world, world disarmament, a world police force and legislature.
1959 — The Council on Foreign Relations calls for a New International Order. Study Number 7, issued on November 25, advocated:
“…new international order [which] must be responsive to world aspirations for peace, for social and economic change…an international order…including states labeling themselves as ‘socialist’ [communist].”
1959 — The World Constitution and Parliament Association is founded which later develops a Diagram of World Government under the Constitution for the Federation of Earth.
1959 — The Mid-Century Challenge to U.S. Foreign Policy is published, sponsored by the Rockefeller Brothers’ Fund. It explains that the U.S.:
“…cannot escape, and indeed should welcome…the task which history has imposed on us. This is the task of helping to shape a new world order in all its dimensions — spiritual, economic, political, social.”
September 9, 1960 — President Eisenhower signs Senate Joint Resolution 170, promoting the concept of a federal Atlantic Union. Pollster and Atlantic Union Committee treasurer, Elmo Roper, later delivers an address titled, The Goal Is Government of All the World, in which he states:
“For it becomes clear that the first step toward World Government cannot be completed until we have advanced on the four fronts: the economic, the military, the political and the social.”
1961 — The U.S. State Department issues a plan to disarm all nations and arm the United Nations. State Department Document Number 7277 is entitled Freedom From War: The U.S. Program for General and Complete Disarmament in a Peaceful World. It details a three-stage plan to disarm all nations and arm the U.N. with the final stage in which “no state would have the military power to challenge the progressively strengthened U.N. Peace Force.”
1962 — New Calls for World Federalism. In a study titled, A World Effectively Controlled by the United Nations, CFR member Lincoln Bloomfield states:
“…if the communist dynamic was greatly abated, the West might lose whatever incentive it has for world government.”
The Future of Federalism by author Nelson Rockefeller is published. The one-time Governor of New York, claims that current events compellingly demand a “new world order,” as the old order is crumbling, and there is “a new and free order struggling to be born.” Rockefeller says there is:
“a fever of nationalism…[but] the nation-state is becoming less and less competent to perform its international political tasks….These are some of the reasons pressing us to lead vigorously toward the true building of a new world order…[with] voluntary service…and our dedicated faith in the brotherhood of all mankind….Sooner perhaps than we may realize…there will evolve the bases for a federal structure of the free world.”
1963 — J. William Fulbright, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee speaks at a symposium sponsored by the Fund for the Republic, a left-wing project of the Ford Foundation:
“The case for government by elites is irrefutable…government by the people is possible but highly improbable.”
1964 — Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, Handbook II is published. Author Benjamin Bloom states:
“…a large part of what we call ‘good teaching’ is the teacher’s ability to attain affective objectives through challenging the students’ fixed beliefs.”
His Outcome-Based Education (OBE) method of teaching would first be tried as Mastery Learning in Chicago schools. After five years, Chicago students’ test scores had plummeted causing outrage among parents. OBE would leave a trail of wreckage wherever it would be tried and under whatever name it would be used. At the same time, it would become crucial to globalists for overhauling the education system to promote attitude changes among school students.
1964 — Visions of Order by Richard Weaver is published. He describes:
“progressive educators as a ‘revolutionary cabal’ engaged in ‘a systematic attempt to undermine society’s traditions and beliefs.'”
1967 — Richard Nixon calls for New World Order. In Asia after Vietnam, in the October issue of Foreign Affairs, Nixon writes of nations’ dispositions to evolve regional approaches to development needs and to the evolution of a “new world order.”
1968 — Joy Elmer Morgan, former editor of the NEA Journal publishes The American Citizens Handbook in which he says:
“the coming of the United Nations and the urgent necessity that it evolve into a more comprehensive form of world government places upon the citizens of the United States an increased obligation to make the most of their citizenship which now widens into active world citizenship.”
July 26, 1968 — Nelson Rockefeller pledges support of the New World Order. In an Associated Press report, Rockefeller pledges that, “as President, he would work toward international creation of a new world order.”
1970 — Education and the mass media promote world order. In Thinking About A New World Order for the Decade 1990, author Ian Baldwin, Jr. asserts that:
“…the World Law Fund has begun a worldwide research and educational program that will introduce a new, emerging discipline — world order — into educational curricula throughout the world…and to concentrate some of its energies on bringing basic world order concepts into the mass media again on a worldwide level.”
1972 — President Nixon visits China. In his toast to Chinese Premier Chou En-lai, former CFR member and now President, Richard Nixon, expresses “the hope that each of us has to build a new world order.”
May 18, 1972 — In speaking of the coming of world government, Roy M. Ash, director of the Office of Management and Budget, declares that:
“within two decades the institutional framework for a world economic community will be in place…[and] aspects of individual sovereignty will be given over to a supernational authority.”
1973 — The Trilateral Commission is established. Banker David Rockefeller organizes this new private body and chooses Zbigniew Brzezinski, later National Security Advisor to President Carter, as the Commission’s first director and invites Jimmy Carter to become a founding member.
1973 — Humanist Manifesto II is published:
“The next century can be and should be the humanistic century…we stand at the dawn of a new age…a secular society on a planetary scale….As non-theists we begin with humans not God, nature not deity…we deplore the division of humankind on nationalistic grounds….Thus we look to the development of a system of world law and a world order based upon transnational federal government….The true revolution is occurring.”
April, 1974 — Former U. S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Trilateralist and CFR member Richard Gardner’s article The Hard Road to World Order is published in the CFR’s Foreign Affairs where he states that:
“the ‘house of world order’ will have to be built from the bottom up rather than from the top down…but an end run around national sovereignty, eroding it piece by piece, will accomplish much more than the old-fashioned frontal assault.”
1974 — The World Conference of Religion for Peace, held in Louvain, Belgium is held. Douglas Roche presents a report entitled We Can Achieve a New World Order.
The U.N. calls for wealth redistribution: In a report entitled New International Economic Order, the U.N. General Assembly outlines a plan to redistribute the wealth from the rich to the poor nations.
1975 — A study titled, A New World Order, is published by the Center of International Studies, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Studies, Princeton University.
1975 — In Congress, 32 Senators and 92 Representatives sign A Declaration of Interdependence, written by historian Henry Steele Commager. The Declaration states that:
“we must join with others to bring forth a new world order…Narrow notions of national sovereignty must not be permitted to curtail that obligation.”
Congresswoman Marjorie Holt refuses to sign the Declaration saying:
“It calls for the surrender of our national sovereignty to international organizations. It declares that our economy should be regulated by international authorities. It proposes that we enter a ‘new world order’ that would redistribute the wealth created by the American people.”
1975 — Retired Navy Admiral Chester Ward, former Judge Advocate General of the U.S. Navy and former CFR member, writes in a critique that the goal of the CFR is the “submergence of U. S. sovereignty and national independence into an all powerful one-world government…”
1975 — Kissinger on the Couch is published. Authors Phyllis Schlafly and former CFR member Chester Ward state:
“Once the ruling members of the CFR have decided that the U.S. government should espouse a particular policy, the very substantial research facilities of the CFR are put to work to develop arguments, intellectual and emotional, to support the new policy and to confound, discredit, intellectually and politically, any opposition…”
1976 — RIO: Reshaping the International Order is published by the globalist Club of Rome, calling for a new international order, including an economic redistribution of wealth.
1977 — The Third Try at World Order is published. Author Harlan Cleveland of the Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies calls for:
“changing Americans’ attitudes and institutions” for “complete disarmament (except for international soldiers)” and “for individual entitlement to food, health and education.”
1977 — Imperial Brain Trust by Laurence Shoup and William Minter is published. The book takes a critical look at the Council on Foreign Relations with chapters such as: Shaping a New World Order: The Council’s Blueprint for Global Hegemony, 1939-1944 and Toward the 1980’s: The Council’s Plans for a New World Order.
1977 — The Trilateral Connection appears in the July edition of Atlantic Monthly. Written by Jeremiah Novak, it says:
“For the third time in this century, a group of American schools, businessmen, and government officials is planning to fashion a New World Order…”
1977 — Leading educator Mortimer Adler publishes Philosopher at Large in which he says:
“…if local civil government is necessary for local civil peace, then world civil government is necessary for world peace.”
1979 — Barry Goldwater, retiring Republican Senator from Arizona, publishes his autobiography With No Apologies. He writes:
“In my view The Trilateral Commission represents a skillful, coordinated effort to seize control and consolidate the four centers of power — political, monetary, intellectual, and ecclesiastical. All this is to be done in the interest of creating a more peaceful, more productive world community. What the Trilateralists truly intend is the creation of a worldwide economic power superior to the political governments of the nation-states involved. They believe the abundant materialism they propose to create will overwhelm existing differences. As managers and creators of the system they will rule the future.”
1984 — The Power to Lead is published. Author James McGregor Burns admits:
“The framers of the U.S. constitution have simply been too shrewd for us. The have outwitted us. They designed separate institutions that cannot be unified by mechanical linkages, frail bridges, tinkering. If we are to ‘turn the Founders upside down’ — we must directly confront the constitutional structure they erected.”
1985 — Norman Cousins, the honorary chairman of Planetary Citizens for the World We Chose, is quoted in Human Events:
“World government is coming, in fact, it is inevitable. No arguments for or against it can change that fact.”
Cousins was also president of the World Federalist Association, an affiliate of the World Association for World Federation (WAWF), headquartered in Amsterdam. WAWF is a leading force for world federal government and is accredited by the U.N. as a Non-Governmental Organization.
1987 — The Secret Constitution and the Need for Constitutional Change is sponsored in part by the Rockefeller Foundation. Some thoughts of author Arthur S. Miller are:
“…a pervasive system of thought control exists in the United States…the citizenry is indoctrinated by employment of the mass media and the system of public education…people are told what to think about…the old order is crumbling…Nationalism should be seen as a dangerous social disease…A new vision is required to plan and manage the future, a global vision that will transcend national boundaries and eliminate the poison of nationalistic solutions…a new Constitution is necessary.”
1988 — Former Under-secretary of State and CFR member George Ball in a January 24 interview in the New York Times says:
“The Cold War should no longer be the kind of obsessive concern that it is. Neither side is going to attack the other deliberately…If we could internationalize by using the U.N. in conjunction with the Soviet Union, because we now no longer have to fear, in most cases, a Soviet veto, then we could begin to transform the shape of the world and might get the U.N. back to doing something useful…Sooner or later we are going to have to face restructuring our institutions so that they are not confined merely to the nation-states. Start first on a regional and ultimately you could move to a world basis.”
December 7, 1988 — In an address to the U.N., Mikhail Gorbachev calls for mutual consensus
“World progress is only possible through a search for universal human consensus as we move forward to a new world order.”
May 12, 1989 –President Bush invites the Soviets to join World Order. Speaking to the graduating class at Texas A&M University, Mr. Bush states that the United States is ready to welcome the Soviet Union “back into the world order.”
1989 — Carl Bernstein’s (Woodward and Bernstein of Watergate fame) book Loyalties: A Son’s Memoir is published. His father and mother had been members of the Communist party. Bernstein’s father tells his son about the book:
“You’re going to prove [Sen. Joseph] McCarthy was right, because all he was saying is that the system was loaded with Communists. And he was right…I’m worried about the kind of book you’re going to write and about cleaning up McCarthy. The problem is that everybody said he was a liar; you’re saying he was right…I agree that the Party was a force in the country.”
1990 — The World Federalist Association faults the American press. Writing in their Summer/Fall newsletter, Deputy Director Eric Cox describes world events over the past year or two and declares:
“It’s sad but true that the slow-witted American press has not grasped the significance of most of these developments. But most federalists know what is happening…And they are not frightened by the old bug-a-boo of sovereignty.”
September 11, 1990 — President Bush calls the Gulf War an opportunity for the New World Order. In an address to Congress entitled Toward a New World Order, Mr. Bush says:
“The crisis in the Persian Gulf offers a rare opportunity to move toward an historic period of cooperation. Out of these troubled times…a new world order can emerge in which the nations of the world, east and west, north and south, can prosper and live in harmony….Today the new world is struggling to be born.”
September 25, 1990 — In an address to the U.N., Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze describes Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait as “an act of terrorism [that] has been perpetrated against the emerging New World Order.” On December 31, Gorbachev declares that the New World Order would be ushered in by the Gulf Crisis.
October 1, 1990 — In a U.N. address, President Bush speaks of the:
“…collective strength of the world community expressed by the U.N…an historic movement towards a new world order…a new partnership of nations…a time when humankind came into its own…to bring about a revolution of the spirit and the mind and begin a journey into a…new age.”
1991 — Author Linda MacRae-Campbell publishes How to Start a Revolution at Your School in In Context. She promotes the use of “change agents” as “self-acknowledged revolutionaries” and “co-conspirators.”
1991 — President Bush praises the New World Order in a State of Union Message:
“What is at stake is more than one small country, it is a big idea — a new world order…to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind…based on shared principles and the rule of law….The illumination of a thousand points of light….The winds of change are with us now.”
February 6, 1991 — President Bush tells the Economic Club of New York:
“My vision of a new world order foresees a United Nations with a revitalized peacekeeping function.”
June, 1991 — The Council on Foreign Relations co-sponsors an assembly Rethinking America’s Security: Beyond Cold War to New World Order which is attended by 65 prestigious members of government, labor, academia, the media, military, and the professions from nine countries. Later, several of the conference participants joined some 100 other world leaders for another closed door meeting of the Bilderberg Society in Baden Baden, Germany. The Bilderbergers also exert considerable clout in determining the foreign policies of their respective governments.
July, 1991 — The Southeastern World Affairs Institute discusses the New World Order. In a program, topics include, Legal Structures for a New World Order and The United Nations: From its Conception to a New World Order. Participants include a former director of the U.N.’s General Legal Division, and a former Secretary General of International Planned Parenthood.
Late July, 1991 — On a Cable News Network program, CFR member and former CIA director Stansfield Turner (Rhodes scholar), when asked about Iraq, responded:
“We have a much bigger objective. We’ve got to look at the long run here. This is an example — the situation between the United Nations and Iraq — where the United Nations is deliberately intruding into the sovereignty of a sovereign nation…Now this is a marvelous precedent (to be used in) all countries of the world…”
October 29, 1991 — David Funderburk, former U. S. Ambassador to Romania, tells a North Carolina audience:
“George Bush has been surrounding himself with people who believe in one-world government. They believe that the Soviet system and the American system are converging.”
The vehicle to bring this about, said Funderburk, is the United Nations, “the majority of whose 166 member states are socialist, atheist, and anti-American.” Funderburk served as ambassador in Bucharest from 1981 to 1985, when he resigned in frustration over U.S. support of the oppressive regime of the late Rumanian dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu.
October 30, 1991: — President Gorbachev at the Middle East Peace Talks in Madrid states:
“We are beginning to see practical support. And this is a very significant sign of the movement towards a new era, a new age…We see both in our country and elsewhere…ghosts of the old thinking…When we rid ourselves of their presence, we will be better able to move toward a new world order…relying on the relevant mechanisms of the United Nations.”
Elsewhere, in Alexandria, Virginia, Elena Lenskaya, Counsellor to the Minister of Education of Russia, delivers the keynote address for a program titled, Education for a New World Order.
1992 — The Twilight of Sovereignty by CFR member (and former Citicorp Chairman) Walter Wriston is published, in which he claims:
“A truly global economy will require …compromises of national sovereignty…There is no escaping the system.”
1992 — The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) Earth Summit takes place in Rio de Janeiro this year, headed by Conference Secretary-General Maurice Strong. The main products of this summit are the Biodiversity Treaty and Agenda 21, which the U.S. hesitates to sign because of opposition at home due to the threat to sovereignty and economics. The summit says the first world’s wealth must be transferred to the third world.
July 20, 1992 — TIME magazine publishes The Birth of the Global Nation by Strobe Talbott, Rhodes Scholar, roommate of Bill Clinton at Oxford University, CFR Director, and Trilateralist, in which he writes:
“All countries are basically social arrangements…No matter how permanent or even sacred they may seem at any one time, in fact they are all artificial and temporary…Perhaps national sovereignty wasn’t such a great idea after all…But it has taken the events in our own wondrous and terrible century to clinch the case for world government.”
As an editor of Time, Talbott defended Clinton during his presidential campaign. He was appointed by President Clinton as the number two person at the State Department behind Secretary of State Warren Christopher, former Trilateralist and former CFR Vice-Chairman and Director. Talbott was confirmed by about two-thirds of the U.S. Senate despite his statement about the unimportance of national sovereignty.
September 29, 1992 — At a town hall meeting in Los Angeles, Trilateralist and former CFR president Winston Lord delivers a speech titled Changing Our Ways: America and the New World, in which he remarks:
“To a certain extent, we are going to have to yield some of our sovereignty, which will be controversial at home…[Under] the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)…some Americans are going to be hurt as low-wage jobs are taken away.”
Lord became an Assistant Secretary of State in the Clinton administration.
Winter, 1992-93 — The CFR’s Foreign Affairs publishes Empowering the United Nations by U.N. Secretary General Boutros-Boutros Ghali, who asserts:
“It is undeniable that the centuries-old doctrine of absolute and exclusive sovereignty no longer stands…Underlying the rights of the individual and the rights of peoples is a dimension of universal sovereignty that resides in all humanity…It is a sense that increasingly finds expression in the gradual expansion of international law…In this setting the significance of the United Nations should be evident and accepted.”
1993 — Strobe Talbott receives the Norman Cousins Global Governance Award for his 1992 TIME article, The Birth of the Global Nation and in appreciation for what he has done “for the cause of global governance.” President Clinton writes a letter of congratulation which states:
“Norman Cousins worked for world peace and world government…Strobe Talbott’s lifetime achievements as a voice for global harmony have earned him this recognition…He will be a worthy recipient of the Norman Cousins Global Governance Award. Best wishes…for future success.”
Not only does President Clinton use the specific term, “world government,” but he also expressly wishes the WFA “future success” in pursuing world federal government. Talbott proudly accepts the award, but says the WFA should have given it to the other nominee, Mikhail Gorbachev.
July 18, 1993 — CFR member and Trilateralist Henry Kissinger writes in the Los Angeles Times concerning NAFTA:
“What Congress will have before it is not a conventional trade agreement but the architecture of a new international system…a first step toward a new world order.”
August 23, 1993 — Christopher Hitchens, Socialist friend of Bill Clinton when he was at Oxford University, says in a C-Span interview:
“…it is, of course the case that there is a ruling class in this country, and that it has allies internationally.”
October 30, 1993 — Washington Post ombudsman Richard Harwood does an op-ed piece about the role of the CFR’s media members:
“Their membership is an acknowledgment of their ascension into the American ruling class [where] they do not merely analyze and interpret foreign policy for the United States; they help make it.”
January/February, 1994 — The CFR’s Foreign Affairs prints an opening article by CFR Senior Fellow Michael Clough in which he writes that the “Wise Men” (e.g. Paul Nitze, Dean Acheson, George Kennan, and John J. McCloy) have:
“assiduously guarded it [American foreign policy] for the past 50 years…They ascended to power during World War II…This was as it should be. National security and the national interest, they argued must transcend the special interests and passions of the people who make up America…How was this small band of Atlantic-minded internationalists able to triumph?…Eastern internationalists were able to shape and staff the burgeoning foreign policy institutions…As long as the Cold War endured and nuclear Armageddon seemed only a missile away, the public was willing to tolerate such an undemocratic foreign policy making system.”
1995 — The State of the World Forum took place in the fall of this year, sponsored by the Gorbachev Foundation located at the Presidio in San Francisco. Foundation President Jim Garrison chairs the meeting of who’s-whos from around the world including Margaret Thatcher, Maurice Strong, George Bush, Mikhail Gorbachev and others. Conversation centers around the oneness of mankind and the coming global government. However, the term “global governance” is now used in place of “new world order” since the latter has become a political liability, being a lightning rod for opponents of global government.
1996 — The United Nations 420-page report Our Global Neighborhood is published. It outlines a plan for “global governance,” calling for an international Conference on Global Governance in 1998 for the purpose of submitting to the world the necessary treaties and agreements for ratification by the year 2000.
1996 — State of the World Forum II will take place again this fall in San Francisco. This time, many of the sessions are closed to the press.
There are hundreds more articles and speeches by those actively working to make global government a reality. We could not fit them all in here.
~KHOUSE Ministry
To the Church at Laodiceaby Chuck Missler |
And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God;
Revelation 3:14
- Name Meaning
- Laodicea means “rule of the people.”
- Historical Church Identity
- Laodicea is the wealthy, self-absorbed church of compromise.
About 40 miles southeast of Philadelphia, and just a few miles north of Colossae, stood the large and prosperous city of Laodicea. It rested luxuriously on the banks of the river Lycus, a tributary of the Meander. Laodicea didn’t have a good location for military defense, so it survived by compromise. It was an old city, dating to 2000 B.C. Its name was changed from Diospolis to Rhoas by the Lydians, and when Antiochus II captured and rebuilt the town in 250 B.C., he named it after his wife Laodice.
Laodicea was a successful commercial and financial center in central Asia Minor, and the remains of its theater, aqueducts, baths, gymnasium and stadium all testify to the wealth it enjoyed in its heyday. According to the Roman historian Tacitus, Laodicea was able to restore itself after a major earthquake without aid from Rome.1 Cicero held court in Laodicea and did his banking there. Laodicea was known for producing textiles made from high quality black wool and for its famous school of medicine which produced a particular eye salve called “collyrium.”
Six miles east of Laodicea stood the city of Hierapolis, which was renowned for its hot springs. Though Laodicea was built on the Lycus, it depended on water piped in from nearby cities Hierapolis and Colossae. The hot springs water from Hierapolis had cooled to a tepid temperature by the time it reached Laodicea, and the cold water from Colossae had warmed to a tepid temperature as it traveled through the aqueduct in the sun, so Laodicea was a city that truly understood lukewarm water.
The church of Laodicea was likely founded by Paul’s friend and coworker Epaphras, who also ministered to the people of Colossae.2 Colossians 2:1 indicates that neither Colossae nor Laodicea were visited by Paul himself, although he certainly joined Epaphras in his zealous prayers for Colossae and Laodicea and Hierapolis.3
Paul also wrote Laodicea an epistle, which the people of Colossae were instructed to read, even as the people of Laodicea were to read Paul’s epistle to the Colossians.4 Thirty years before Revelation, Paul warned Archippus in Colossians 4:17 to be diligent in the work of the ministry that God had given him to do. There is a tradition that Archippus became the bishop of Laodicea. It may have been his weakness which contributed to the poor spiritual condition of the church there.
And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God;
Revelation 3:14
He is the Amen, the solid and trustworthy One, perfect and perfected, faithful and true.
The phrase “beginning of the creation of God” can be confusing terminology, as though Christ is merely a created being. That’s clearly not His intention, because we know from several verses that Jesus was in the beginning with God the Father and that the worlds were created through Him.5 When Paul uses the same kind of terminology in Colossians 1:15-16, he refers to Christ as “…the firstborn of every creature,” in one breath while declaring in the next, “For by him were all things created…” We need to understand that the word translated “beginning” is arche from which we get words like archangel and archenemy. It means “highest” or “chief” or “ruler.” Jesus is the chief or ruler of the creation of God. His role as the firstborn also places Him in the highest position. He’s the one with the authority.
I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.
Revelation 3:15-16
The Laodiceans were tepid, just like their water. It’s natural to enjoy a drink of chilled water, especially on a hot day. These days we have the convenience of water sanitation and freezers full of ice, but in the ancient days, cold water meant safe water. Icy water from a deep well-meant water more likely to be clean and safe to drink. The warm water in Laodicea had traveled through aqueducts, but in that day warm water often meant standing water that had the opportunity to bear bacterial cultures and amoebas and insect larvae. Hot water is good and cold water is good, but lukewarm water at just the right temperature can be used to induce vomiting.
Jesus does not want us lukewarm. He does not want us half-hearted about our faith or our walk with Him. If we’re spiritually cold, there’s a remedy. If we’re spiritually hot, then praise God. However, if we’re lukewarm, then we think we’re all right, but we’re really in a bad place.
When sharp evangelists go onto college campuses, they work to convert the radicals first. Why? Because when radicals come to recognize who Jesus really is, then they fire up the whole campus. Closet nerds need to be saved too, but the passionate radical will quickly reach more people than the shy souls who hide in their rooms. We should all be full of the fire of God, passionate about loving this world in Christ’s name.
Laodicea was named after the wife of Syria’s Antiochus II, but the name has a meaning of its own: “rule of the people.” In other words, this particular church is not looking to Jesus Christ as its leader. It’s ruled by popular opinion. This is the user friendly church that compromised to please the culture.
Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked:
Revelation 3:17
The church in Laodicea thought they were doing okay, because they had money. They were wealthy, and we humans easily make the mistake of assuming that having money means having the blessing of God on our lives. Al Capone had money too, remember. The Pharisees and Sadducees had money. It’s great that certain churches are wealthy and able to develop a wide range of church programs. That’s great. But, money doesn’t represent God’s stamp of approval. The church of Laodicea felt at ease because they had their physical needs met, not realizing that they were spiritually wretched. They weren’t dead like the church of Sardis, but they were doing badly enough.
Every one of the seven churches had a surprising report card, but probably none greater than the Laodiceans. They thought they had it made. They were the social church, and their membership included all the top executives of the community. Senators and congressmen attended. The heads of corporations provided large tax deductible donations. They didn’t understand that Jesus looked at them through a completely different lens.
I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see.
Revelation 3:18
Jesus offers hope to the Laodiceans. It’s not over. They have a chance to fix this thing. It’s interesting that Jesus consistently uses metaphors that these churches understand. The Laodiceans knew all about gold and rich raiment and eye salve. These were strengths they had; textile manufacture and banking made the city prosperous. Their doctors had developed a renowned eye ointment. Jesus contrasts their versions with His own, however. They specialized in black woolens, and Jesus offers them pure white spiritual raiment. They produced ointment, but He offers them something better than physical sight – He offers the ability to see the truth.
As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.
Revelation 3:19-20
Jesus doesn’t hate the Laodiceans. He loves them, and that’s why He’s sending them this letter to rebuke them. He’s giving them a chance to change before it’s too late. After His rebuke, He gives them this beautiful picture. He’s standing at the door and knocking! He’s not hiding from them or driving them like cattle. He offers them this kind and personal promise. If they just open the door to Him, He will come in and enjoy a meal with them. For a lukewarm church, that’s a warm and intimate offer from the King of Creation.
Notice something, however. Jesus is not already inside the church of the Laodiceans. He’s standing outside, knocking on the door, waiting to be let in. They need to open the door so that He can join them. It’s certain that He was once a part of their congregation, but over the years they must have shut Him out – as they chose instead to be ruled by the opinions of the people.
To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.
Revelation 3:21-22
We have a great High Priest who passed through the heavens and dwelt with us, taking on the form of a human and living life here with us. He was tempted in all ways just as we are, yet without sin. This gives us great freedom to fall boldly at His throne to seek help in times of need, because He understands exactly what we’re going through.6 He knows. He’s been there Himself. He overcame, and that’s the greatest news of eternity. Jesus Christ overcame. He conquered!
As we read through these promises to the overcomer, we remember how it is we overcome. We are overcomers through His victory – and His victory in our lives.
And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.
Revelation 12:11
There is an inscription on a cathedral in Lubeck, Germany that I’d like to present here. As we read these letters, we remember that they are written to churches that existed nearly two millennia ago, but they apply to every one of us. We can agree the churches are historical and we can see their prophetic links to churches of the Church Age, but these churches also represent us personally.
- Thus speaketh Christ our Lord to us:
- Ye call Me Master and obey Me not.
- Ye call Me Light and see Me not.
- Ye call Me Way and walk Me not.
- Ye call Me Life and choose Me not.
- Ye call Me Wise and follow Me not.
- Ye call Me Fair and love Me not.
- Ye call Me Rich and ask Me not.
- Ye call Me Eternal and seek Me not.
- Ye call Me Noble and serve Me not.
- Ye call Me Gracious and trust Me not.
- Ye call Me Might and honor Me not.
- Ye call Me Just and fear Me not.
- If I condemn you, blame Me not.
That gets the point across.
We believe in liberty in our culture, but it’s gotten out of control. There’s a point at which we need to agree with God, “No. That’s wrong. We don’t do that.” The world will do what the world does. However, in our churches do we let the culture tell us what to think, or do we follow the Word of God?
Sin is an uncomfortable subject in our times. Our culture no longer believes in sin. Yet, without a recognition of our own personal failure, a recognition that we deserve to be punished, there’s no reason for us to seek a Savior. Jesus did not come to condemn us, but to save us. However, without the conviction of our sin, we have no understanding that we need to be saved. We think we can get to Heaven by being “good,” and we don’t think anybody really goes to Hell – except maybe Hitler and Stalin. We fail to recognize that we are all lost, every one of us, until Jesus Christ’s blood washes us clean.
One of the questions we might want to ask is whether our churches have fallen into a worldly mentality toward sin. Do our churches recognize the world is filled with lost people destined for Hell without Jesus Christ? Do our churches offer us salvation through Jesus Christ alone – the good news that God loves us and sent Christ to die for us? We need to speak the truth in love, or people will die with no appreciation for their true predicament. We cannot preach the user friendly message of “You’re okay. I’m okay.” We need to say, “Hey! We’re all in trouble! The earth is falling out from under us and we’re all going to die! But good news! God has made a bridge to the other side of the canyon! Take it!”
We are a lukewarm culture, and for too long we’ve allowed the world to tell us what to think. We need to be fire-hot Christians, filled with true, longsuffering and devoted love for our fellow humans. If we open ourselves to the guidance of His Word and His love through His Spirit, I think we’ll be astounded where the Lord takes us.
By: J. Lee Grady
I’ve never believed the Antichrist is just one man. That’s partly because I know from history that Christians have suffered under evil dictators since the first century. In fact, early Christians believed the Roman emperor Nero was the Antichrist.
It’s no surprise that Nero still wins in the “beast” category. He had his own mother killed; he beheaded his first wife and murdered his stepbrother. He kicked his second wife to death while she was pregnant, and then he married a boy. And in his infamous efforts to wipe out all Christianity, he covered Christians in wax and lit them on fire to provide torches during his parties.
But one verse in the Bible gives us a clue that the Antichrist shouldn’t be viewed as one individual. The apostle John wrote: “Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour” (1 John 2:18, NASB).
This verse indicates there is a spirit of antichrist that has been working in the world from the beginning, manifesting in various eras. And throughout the book of Revelation we see that this Antichrist figure works in tandem with the devil and the false prophet to wage war on God and His people. The Antichrist is part of a demonic trinity—a counterfeit of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The spirit of antichrist works inside certain people to carry out Satan’s mission.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve never been more aware of this spirit operating in our nation than I have today. The devil is working overtime because he’s furious that his days are numbered. He is mustering all his forces because he knows heaven is about to unleash the greatest outpouring of the Holy Spirit in all of history.
We shouldn’t focus our attention on the devil, but the Bible says clearly that we should not be ignorant of his crafty schemes (see 2 Cor. 2:11). The fingerprints of the Antichrist are everywhere around us today, and if you aren’t aware of his strategies, you could come under his influence. Here are six ways to identify the antichrist spirit:
- The antichrist spirit hates God. The devil wants the attention that only God deserves. He hates all righteousness and goodness. He wants evil to triumph. This is why people who hate God celebrate sin. And this is why we see in our own educational system a systematic attempt to replace Christian values with atheism.
- The antichrist spirit hates life. The devil doesn’t have the power to create because he himself was created. Jesus called Satan a “thief,” and He said his goal is “to steal, kill and destroy” (John 10:10b). No wonder the devil loves it when people abuse alcohol and drugs; he fuels hatred in people so they will kill others. The devil is the author of racism. And isn’t it obvious that only Satan would convince people that killing an unborn child, even up until the moment of birth, is acceptable?
- The antichrist spirit hates the family. Not long ago, secular psychologists would have all agreed that children thrive when they have a mother and a father. You can’t suggest that these days without being scorned or even “canceled” by social media censors. Our universities have become breeding grounds for hostility to anything traditional, including the simple scientific fact that there are only two genders. The antichrist spirit twists and perverts what is normal.
- The antichrist spirit hates authority. In Romans 1:30 the apostle Paul refers to hardened sinners as “insolent”—which means, “showing a rude or arrogant lack of respect.” In Paul’s description of the deeds of the flesh, he also mentions “revilers” (1 Cor. 6:10). A reviler is “one who uses abusive or contemptuous speech.” I’ve heard people use crude language all my life, but never to such an extent as we hear today. When you see hordes of people marching through our streets vandalizing property, spray-painting crude words on walls and screaming curse words, you can be sure the antichrist spirit is near.
- The antichrist spirit hates the prophetic word of God. When Elijah called down fire from heaven, and God proved He was real to the whole nation of Israel, Jezebel got very angry. She was hell-bent on killing the prophet before he could preach again. This is why we must pray for all ministers in this challenging hour. We need the courage to speak, especially when God asks us to step on toes and break the rules of political correctness.
- The antichrist spirit hates the church. Americans have enjoyed more than two centuries of religious freedom. But I have friends overseas who live in fear, either because their own government is closing churches or terrorists are killing Christians. Just this week I heard from a man in Nigeria whose wife and two children were killed by Muslim militants. I pray we never see such violence in the United States, but the spirit that is slaughtering Christians in Africa is already lurking in our midst.
I’m not saying these things to scare anybody. I’m not afraid. I’ve read the book of Revelation, and I know how it ends. The beast and the false prophet will be thrown “into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone” (Rev. 19:20c), and the devil will follow them—”and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever” (Rev. 20:10b).
Jesus will rule forever as King of all kings. But until that time, we have some praying and preaching to do. We can’t sit back and let the spirit of antichrist gain ground. Let’s get serious about pushing back the darkness.
Racism, Diversity, Or Identity?
Reprinted from a previous copy of The Evangelist by John Rosenstern
Mark 3:24 – “And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.”
GOD DID NOT FORESTALL the political birth of the United States of America due to slavery. The scourge of slavery was predominantly opposed by American Christian missionaries acting as poseurs for abolition against slavery. Warnings pertaining to slavery resounded from our missionaries in the Middle East. In the case of Harriet Livermore, spoken from Mount Zion, she prophesied, “Great national calamities are awaiting the United States as punishment for its permissiveness toward slavery.” Nearly 20 years later, the dawn of the Civil War bore witness to the outcome of God’s warning. Abraham Lincoln accredited three books that shaped his life and thinking: the Bible, Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan, and Sufferings in Africa by James Riley. Riley had been captured by Arabs after being shipwrecked off the coast of the Spanish Sahara and was driven across the desert. He was flogged, beaten, and reduced to just 90 pounds until he was ransomed by the British Consul at the port city of Mogadore. His book became a national sensation, selling 1 million copies over the next 40 years. He urged Americans to cut down “the cursed tree of slavery and to shiver in pieces the rod of oppression.” Many other well-knowns, such as the father of our educational system, Horace Mann, were outspoken opponents to slavery.
TO FORGET IS FOOLISHNESS
To forget slavery would be as foolish as trying to forget the Holocaust. It must serve as a reminder of the cruelty of man to force man to serve man. African Americans of the Civil War era did not liken slavery to the plight of American slaves in Algiers, but to ancient Jews in Egypt. One such preeminent leader, Frederick Douglas, recalled, “We meant to reach the North, and the North was Canaan.”
Many in my family, on my father’s side, were exterminated in the Holocaust. I often remind myself of the horror they must have felt when the sound of the boots from German Gestapo soldiers marched down the streets of Germany in rhythmic patterns, and then, the blunt knocking on doors. Their hearts pounded within their chests with anxiety in anticipation of being taken away from home and family. Stricken people were torn from each other and sentenced to death for simply being Jewish. We must never forget slavery and the plight of those before us who suffered its torment. It is an ever constant reminder of how each of us should look upon one another with love and respect.
A NEW IDENTITY
The result of the Gospel message is so strong that it changes the heart and life — as a result, being born again – for all who embrace Jesus Christ and Him crucified. It gives the believer a new identity. This is essential for us to understand. The fact that old things are passed away and all things become new (II Cor. 5:17) removes the believer’s past and changes his identity. Christian believers “have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him who created him: where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all” (Col. 3:10-11). The Christian believer now can live identified to a new race. Paul would say to the church of Galatia, “For you are all children of God by faith in Christ Jesus … There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:26, 28).
The sullen stains of racism still brood in the hearts of many today. The idea of one race being better than another has hurt America, notwithstanding Jews and others around the world. This kind of thinking ultimately created an Adolph Hitler. The belief is that a master race exists and by the extermination of an inferior race, this will enable the new superior race to manifest(?), or, as with slavery, the inferior race is to serve the superior race. For example, Islam makes this very clear by claiming all who are not believers of Allah and his prophet are classified as dihimmi, a second class or sub-class of people. They must pay jitzia, a poll tax, and are subject to minimal rights, unlike other Muslims.
A principle has emerged that our commitment to diversity has redefined the opposition to discrimination as the appreciation, rather than the elimination, of difference when it comes to equality and recognition. We have also come to think of disagreement as a form of prejudice. If we fail as believers to approach the heartbeat of our social issues with a truly biblical approach, then we will fall prey to believing that skin color is a culture, sexual preference is a culture, religion is a culture, etc. Therefore, if we do not accept someone’s culture, we are being intolerant and even racist or bigoted. May we see each other as our Lord and Saviour sees us — saved or unsaved. Those of us who are saved must work together as one to bring the message that will bring true unity to man – at the meeting place of God and man – in Christ Jesus.
THE NEW CULTURAL WARS
Our society’s new modus vivendi (way of life) toward universal tolerance is to champion diversity. Earlier I mentioned that our commitment to diversity has redefined the opposition to discrimination as the appreciation, rather than the elimination, of difference when it comes to equality and recognition.
God visited His people with a marvelous outpouring of His Holy Spirit at the turn of the 20th century. In 1905, a young black Louisiana man, who attended a Bible school founded by Charles Parham in Houston, Texas, was used by God to usher in modern Pentecostalism. William J. Seymour, at this Azusa Street Mission in Los Angeles, California, rejected racial barriers in favor of unity in Christ. “The color line as was washed away by the blood,” said writer Frank Bartleman, testifying of his experience at Azusa Street. Sadly, within only a decade, the great Pentecostal Movement slowly began to splinter, and a racial divide was formed. Instead of the pulpit addressing the racial issue biblically by preaching messages of true Christian unity through faith, the division identified with culture. Instead of interracial comity (civility, courtesy), segregation took its ugly shape, and doubly worse, doctrinal separation gave validity to division and solidified the racial divide as well. Because the pulpit did not spiritually address racism, it became a social issue.
THE BIBLE
The Bible gives us a clear understanding of the function of the five-fold ministry gifts and the result that follows in Ephesians 4:11-13: “And He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”
TRUE BIBLE UNITY
True biblical unity has to do with our proper object of faith. God made the Cross His object of acceptance. He looks at our faith by the finished work of the Cross, His perfect expression of grace, and accepts us in the beloved (Eph. 1:6). It is there at the Cross that we’re all reconciled unto God, and the enmity is abolished – man toward God and man toward man. Christ is all and in all who are His! Glory to God! The bloodline settles it all! He is our peace.
Now that we are in Christ, we are a new creature with old things passed away (II Cor. 5:17). We are then given a ministry of reconciliation. In II Corinthians 5:18, the Bible says, “And all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ, and has given to us the ministry of reconciliation.”
RACISM
If the true church of Christ doesn’t operate and function as a New Testament church with proper unity, can we expect the world to accomplish eliminating racism? Here’s our problem: We have allowed other voices to rise up and address the outward issues; issues that are really the symptoms of the inner problem. Fortunately, Jesus Christ heals the heart and, “He delivers the poor in his affliction, and opens their ears in oppression” (Job 36:15).
Racism has greatly oppressed our country for years. It is still a festering sore. We must listen to what the Spirit is saying to the church in this hour. I believe a time of healing has begun. I believe it can also be a time of greater divide if we do not approach racism biblically and with love and patience. Jesus Christ has “ … redeemed us to God by Your blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation” (Rev. 5:9). The word nation in the Greek is ethnos and means “race.” Therefore, God is color-blind to race when it comes to salvation and equality. Should we be any different?
F. Swaggart
“For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.” –II Corinthians 7:10
SOMETIMES, WHEN A famous person dies, we learn from the family bits of their final conversations. A son says of his father, “He had no regrets,” and the world is a little less sad and somewhat relieved to know that nothing would have been changed in the course of that life.
But to say that you lived with no regret also means that you were never sorry about anything—never mourned a loss, suffered a disappointment, or missed an opportunity. How many in the human race can honestly say that? The answer is none. Experts say all of us have things we regret from our decisions around education and career choices to romance, parenting, and finances—usually in that order.
If we allow it, regret can touch every area of our lives. And, if we allow Satan, he will point his accusatory finger toward something behind us until we find ourselves saying, “I should have.” I should have been there when my parent died. I should have had the courage to speak up when I was being abused. I should have stayed in school and applied myself more. I should have risked rejection and told that person how much I loved him. I should have been braver and unafraid of failure.
Notice all of the I’s in that list? That’s because regret is about blaming self, which affects our emotions. We feel sorry for the ways we hurt people. When it’s clear we’ve made a bad decision, we get sad. When it’s realized that the opportunity we just missed will not come our way again, there is disappointment. The Bible calls these sorrows of the world, and they work death.
The bad thing about regret is that it takes us a while to realize it’s been sown. Years pass between the time the seed of regret—the doing or not doing—and its bitter fruit blooms in the heart of the saved and the unsaved.
Every day that we live in this world, we buy and sell with decisions we make, and, in the process, our hearts are revealed.
Esau made a bad decision when he sold his birthright to Jacob for a meal. The Bible says Esau “did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way: thus Esau despised his birthright” (Gen. 25:34).
Bible commentator Matthew Henry said, “Esau ate and drank, pleased his palate, satisfied his appetite, and then carelessly rose up and went his way, without any serious thought, or any regret, about the bad bargain he had made.”
But years later, when Isaac was old and ready to bless, Esau realized the high cost of his mistake: “And when Esau heard the words of his father, he cried with a great and exceeding bitter cry, and said unto his father, Bless me, even me also, O my father” (Gen. 27:34).
Esau did receive a blessing, but it was common. Henry notes, “There is nothing in Esau’s blessing which points at Christ, and without that, the fatness of the earth and the plunder of the field will stand in little stead.”
Out of regret, Esau lifted up his voice and wept, but he did not repent. Let’s look at Judas. In the end, he betrayed the Lord Jesus Christ with 30 pieces of silver and a kiss. But in the beginning of the Lord’s ministry, Judas was there, one of the Twelve. He saw the miracles—all manner of sickness and disease healed, demoniacs delivered, the dead raised, and multitudes miraculously fed. Judas, however, valued none of it, demonstrated so clearly in John 12, when Mary anoints the feet of Jesus. As soon as Judas saw the expensive ointment spent on Jesus, he demanded to know why it hadn’t been sold to benefit the poor. “This he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein” (Jn. 12:6).
Likewise, Judas went about caring nothing for the Lord—from the anointing of His feet to the kiss of betrayal on His face.
And then, realization. When Judas saw what the religious leaders had done to Jesus, he confessed—to them—that he had sinned, and he threw down their silver on the temple floor. The Bible says Judas “repented himself,” but the Greek word for this phrase, according to Ellicott’s commentary, is “not that commonly used for ‘repentance,’ as involving a change of mind and heart, but is rather ‘regret,’ a simple change of feeling.”
After leaving the Sanhedrin, theologian John Gill points out that Judas went out of the temple, “not to God, nor to the throne of His grace, nor to his Master to ask pardon of Him, but to some secret solitary place, to cherish his grief and black despair.”
Judas sided with the sorrows of the world, and they worked death in him until he hanged himself—some say he strangled himself—but either way, Judas died violently. Luke tells us,“falling headlong, he burst asunder the midst, and all his bowels gushed out” (Acts 1:18). Out of regret, Judas confessed his sin to sinful men, but he did not repent. So what is the difference between regret and repentance?
If we gave them voice, regret would repeat itself again and again: “If only I had it to do over, I would have done it differently. I would have done it right.”
Regret, energized by guilt, is a replay of what was done, or not done, and the pain associated with that decision. As with Esau and Judas, regret may cause us to shed some bitter tears, and maybe even confess to others what we did, but that’s as far as it goes. Regret stops short of repentance.
Repentance, on the other hand, acknowledges from the heart, “I see what I have done and I am so sorry. I realize that I have no way to help myself. I need God and His forgiveness. Only God can help me.”
Repentance is to understand the root cause of our sadness, fear, or disappointment—sin. It’s a spiritual reaction to Holy Spirit conviction and revelation—a reaction that helps turn the human heart toward God and ask Him for His mercy and forgiveness.
It’s been said that few have sinned as David sinned, but fewer still have repented as he repented. David, the boy shepherd and psalmist. Slayer of the lion, the bear, and Goliath. David, the man after God’s own heart. Yet at the time when kings went to battle, David stayed behind. He sinned with Bathsheba, and when he learned that she was carrying his child, David ordered her husband Uriah to be “in the forefront of the hottest battle” ensuring his death and hiding David’s sin. But God saw, and “the thing that David had done displeased the LORD” (II Sam. 11:27).
The prophet Nathan was sent by God to let David know that what he had attempted to hide, the Lord would openly and fully reveal.
Unlike regret, where only the mind and emotions are affected, repentance involves the heart—the spirit of man—which is susceptible to the conviction and revelation of the Holy Spirit.
“And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the LORD.” My husband notes, “David had a true knowledge of God and, therefore, when charged with his sin, his first thought was not the punishment that would surely follow, but the injury done to God.”
All sins boil down to one. The displeasing thing that King David did was to despise the commandment of the Lord to do evil in His sight. David knew this, which is why he would later write Psalm 51, the truest prayer of repentance ever prayed. It begins:
“Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me.”
Regret is behind us, but repentance is before us. “Mock penitents confess their sins and straightway forget them,” Pulpit says. “Real genuine ones find it impossible to forget.”
Out of repentance, David confessed his sin and need for God’s mercy, and he received forgiveness. And then there’s Peter, who denied even knowing the Lord. Before any of us get too judgmental of the great fisherman, we should examine our own hearts and remember that Peter loved the Lord. Peter believed Him. It was Peter who walked on the water to Jesus:
“And Peter answered him and said, Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water. And he said, Come. And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus” (Matthew 14:28-29).
At the close of the Lord’s earthly ministry, in the hours between the Last Supper and the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus told His disciples what was about to happen to Him and how His disciples would be scattered.
“But Peter said unto him, Although all shall be offended, yet will not I. And Jesus saith unto him, Verily I say unto thee, That this day, even in this night, before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny me thrice. But he spake the more vehemently, If I should die with thee, I will not deny thee in any wise. Likewise also said they all” (Mk. 14:29-31).
The Lord listened, but He knew how Peter would react that night, the same way He knew how Peter, while walking on the water, would suddenly see the wind boisterous, become afraid, and begin to sink.
Just as the Lord had said, when confronted that night, Peter denied Him three times, with oaths and cursings: “I know not the man!” Then, the painful realization: “And Peter remembered the word of Jesus, which said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And he went out, and wept bitterly” (Mat. 26:75).
Like Judas and Esau, Peter also went out and wept bitterly. The difference with Peter was the trigger of emotion. Like David, Peter remembered the word of the Lord. He remembered some of the first words he heard Him say, “Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught.” There was the revelation he received from God about who Jesus was. Surely Peter heard the echo of his own words, “Thou art the Christ.” He remembered that day on the water, when he cried out, “Lord, save me,” and Jesus immediately stretched forth His hand, caught him, and asked, “Why did you doubt?” And the most painful memory of all, after that third denial, “the Lord turned, and looked upon Peter.”
Pulpit says Peter “rushed from that evil company into the night, a brokenhearted man, that no human eye might witness his anguish, that alone with his conscience and God he might wrestle out repentance. Tradition asserts that all his life long Peter hereafter never could hear a cock crow without falling on his knees and weeping.”
Out of repentance, Peter realized that he was helpless without Christ, and he allowed godly sorrow to work repentance to salvation. And this work takes time.
When Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James, went to the sepulcher to anoint the body of Jesus, they found the stone rolled away, and an angel who said, “Be not affrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him. But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you” (Mark 16:6-7).
Henry points out, “Peter is particularly named. Tell Peter—it will be most welcome to him, for he is in sorrow for sin. A sight of Christ will be very welcome to a true penitent, and a true penitent is very welcome to a sight of Christ.”
In the book of John, we read of the reunion:
“Then Jesus saith unto them, Children, have ye any meat? They answered him, No. And he said unto them, Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes. Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, It is the Lord. Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fisher’s coat unto him, (for he was naked,) and did cast himself into the sea”(Jn. 21:5-7).
Upon hearing that it was Jesus, Peter jumped without pride or hesitation. He wanted to be the first one to reach the Lord, who was waiting to restore him. Later, Jesus would ask Peter three times, “Do you love Me?” and, in new humility, he answered, “You know that I love you.” Then, in a show of complete confidence in Peter, the Lord tells him, “Feed my sheep.”
Whether you’ve filled your life with regrets or separated yourself from God through sin, the Lord of Glory has one word for you today: Come. “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool” (Isa. 1:18).
Come if you’re thirsty or weary. Come if you’re heavy-laden. Look ahead to the shore, like Peter did, and see the risen Lord. He’s waiting for you—the fish are laid on the fire of coals with bread, and He’s saying to you, “Come and dine.”
By John Rosenstern
JSM
When establishing the Illuminati, Adam Weshaupt revealed the long-term goals of his secret society. He wrote: “The true purpose of the Order was to rule the world. To achieve this it was necessary for the Order to destroy all religions, overthrow all governments and abolish private property.”
GOALS
History supplies us the necessary evidence that Weishaupt’s goals were in operation after his death by his faithful followers. In the late 19th century, Henry Edward Manning, archbishop of Westminster, England, wrote that the Communist International was, “The work of secret, political societies, which from 1789 to this day (1886) have been perfecting their formation … is now a power in the midst of the Christian and civilized world, pledged to the destruction of Christianity and the old civilization of Europe.”
In order to rule the world, one of the long-term goals of the Illuminati was to eliminate Christianity. Weshaupt knew he could not discredit Christianity, so he set out to dismantle the effects of the Christian lifestyle in society by gradually removing its moral constraints. The attack on the economy, family, personal property, nationalism, and education became possible through the strategies of gradualism and revolution. As a philosophy, gradualism is defined as a theory maintaining that two seemingly conflicting notions are not radically opposed, but are related by others partaking in varying degrees of the character of both. Gradualism is the doctrine that social change should be brought about within the framework of existing law. In other words, long-term goals can best be achieved by pursuing incremental steps rather than triggering instability that accompanies abrupt change. Karl Marx argued against gradualism, but called for the working class to violently overthrow the existing social structure. Marx did not believe that the road to socialism would be accessible by following existing laws. Lenin embraced Marx’s ideas and became the winner in the Russian Revolution as the head of the new Russian Communist government.
PROCESS
Weishaupt knew that in order to rule the world: “It is necessary to establish a universal regime and empire over the whole world.”
How could a New World Order arise? What would be necessary for mankind to adopt and then adapt to the necessary changes Weshaupt and his secret society desired? Judeo Christianity and Islam have shaped a large population of the world he intended to dominate. To reach the mass population of people and address their struggles Weishaupt would initially imbed his mysteries into Freemasonry. The objective was to portray the “old theology” as insufficient and hopeless. Manly P. Hall, a well-known 33rd Degree Mason, wrote in his book, “Lectures on Ancient Philosophy”: “A new day is dawning for Freemasonry, from the insufficiency of theology and the hopelessness of materialism, men are turning to seek the god of philosophy.”
Hall would encourage the faithful followers where and when a new day was coming: “A new light is breaking in the east; a more glorious day is at hand. The rule of the philosophic elect-the dream of the ages-will yet be realized and is not too far distant.”
Has the time that Hall spoke of begun? Modern New Age teacher and author Benjamin Creme wrote this in his book, “The Reappearance of the Christ and the Masters of Wisdom”: “The new religion will manifest, for instance, through organizations like Masonry. In Freemasonry is imbedded the core of the secret of the occult mysteries.”
NEW AGE RE-VEILED
The means of communication by Illuminati devotees is through secret codes and symbolism. They are hidden throughout society in plain sight. In the book, “The Spirit of Freemasonry,” it says, “A symbol veils or hides a secret, and is that which veils certain mysterious forces. These energies when released can have a potent effect.”
Satanist Alice Bailey said: “The hour of mysteries has arrived … These ancient mysteries were hidden in numbers, in ritual, in words, and in symbology; these veil the secret.”
In Freemasonry, the extensive symbolism, rituals and secrets are not fully comprehended by initiates and outsiders. The explanations given to appease any curiosity are feigned by the architects to conceal their hidden meanings. The concealed language of Freemasons was once given by a former Sovereign Commander: “The word reveal means to ‘re-veil,’ that is, to give one explanation and yet continue to maintain the mystery of the symbol by not explaining it in full and complete manner.” There are many interconnected organizations that cooperate together to address the ills of mankind. At their meetings they discuss various good works and ways to improve human life on earth. Although they appear as champions of social justice and human rights, they are the ones who control and cause much of the suffering in the world. We are distracted by their talk and isolated outward good works, but blinded to their long-term objective. Their objective is to foster the dawn of a New Age with a New World Order.
COOPERATION
From its beginning, a variety of people and organizations saw the value of having a One World Order. The Illuminati story begins with an agreement between Amschel Mayor James Rothschild and Adam Weishaupt. Rothschild was said to have gathered 12 influential friends to pool their resources together so they could rule the world. Weishaupt was selected by Rothschild to lead the project. Soon after the plan was set in place, John Robison, a professor at Edinburgh University in Scotland, published a book entitled “Proofs of a Conspiracy” in which he reveals that Weishaupt had attempted to recruit him. Approximately 20 years later, George W. F. Hegel formulates his Hegelian Dialectic. Advocates to the Illuminati storyline believe the Hegelian Dialectic is the process by which Illuminati objectives are met. The process of thesis plus antithesis equals synthesis. In other words, first you incite a crisis. The public outcry to resolve the problem is followed by a predetermined solution that the public would not have initially accepted without the crisis. For example, for Americans to give up their Second Amendment rights, a tragic shooting occurs and the public outcry is the need for more gun control. The goal from the beginning was to have gun control. Justifying the goal first requires public acceptance to occur. Another recent example may be 9/11 and Islam? The list is long and wide of examples that could be used.
MONEY
Although the various players, and their organizations, cooperated on policy and process, they still lacked the mechanism that could affect people in every area of life on a practical basis. What was the missing ingredient that had to be included to guarantee their success? Money! Rothschild, who sought to control the International banking system, said: “Allow me to issue and control the money of a nation, and I care not who writes the laws.” The central banking system would present the most ambitious means to control the money of the world. Europe, especially England, was already using a centralized banking system. In the U.S., the young nation debated this idea. The debate ended with a split decision. The split decision created the two-party system we now have today. In the United States under President Washington, Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton wanted to establish a national bank fashioned after the Bank of England. Acting secretary of state under Washington was Thomas Jefferson. He opposed Hamilton’s idea of a centralized bank for a strong federal government. Jefferson’s group called themselves Democratic Republicans. Hamilton and his group called themselves the Federalists. The Federalists sought to protect the country’s infant industries. The Democratic Republican party drew its followers from planters and small farmers. The Federalists of old are known to us today as Republicans, and the Democratic Republicans as Democrats.
Satan is known as the god of the world system. His workers of iniquity are not easily identified because they appear as angels of light. Only the light of the Gospel can correctly examine their works to see if they are of God. The Illuminati and Secret Societies use a name that speaks of light but is nothing less than darkness. We can expose their evil works with the light of the Gospel:
And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.” (John 3:19-21) Paul gives us instruction to avoid and not partake of those who operate in darkness and secrecy:
And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret. But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light: for what doth make manifest is light.” (Ephesians 5:11-13)
.Signs of the Times
Jesus said that just as the sky gives signs of inclement or fair weather (Mat. 16:2-4), just as nature gives evidence of something to come (Lk. 21:30), so the Endtime will be marked by signs of the coming storm. Although some of these events ultimately will take place before the Second Coming of Christ, that many are already occurring reveals the nearness of the Rapture. Some of the signs we are told to look for are as follows:
1. WARS AND RUMORS OF WARS (Dan. 9:26; Mat. 24:6).
2. RESTORATION OF ISRAEL AS A NATION (Ezek., Chapt. 37). Since 1948 the world has been closely observing the miraculous preservation of the tiny Nation of Israel from their sworn enemies who had vowed to exterminate them. God had already given them tremendous victories against astounding odds in the 1948 and 1956 wars. But in 1967 with Russian-trained and Russian-supplied armies, the Arabs once again were sent to annihilate Israel. In June, 1967, outnumbered forty to one, the small ill-equipped Israeli army totally defeated the combined armies of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. In less than three hours of the first day of the war, Israeli fighter planes destroyed 300 of Egypt’s 340 planes—a Miracle of Miracles! Can it not be obvious to anyone that God has miraculously preserved the Nation of Israel since her restoration in 1948?
3. MATERIAL AFFLUENCE (Lk. 17:27-30; II Pet. 2:6-7).
4. SPIRITUAL APOSTASY (II Jn. Vss. 7-11).
5. OVERPOPULATION (Gen. 6:11-13; Mat. 24:36-44). Already the world is bulging with over 6.4 billion people, and there is speculation about how many people the Earth can support. Within a decade that figure could be near 7.0 billion. Such numbers pose real problems for the Earth’s natural resources.
6. INCREASED KNOWLEDGE AND TRAVEL (Dan.12:4). No age has seen the speed with which man currently travels and communicates. One of two families changes residence every five years. Telephones and telexes and satellites carry instant communication. Rockets travel to outer space. The speed of this age is unparalleled.
7. NATURAL DISASTERS (Mat. 24:7). Every week, it seems, we hear of earthquakes, storms, tidal waves, or some other calamity occurring somewhere on the globe. Who has ever known of so many volcanic eruptions or so many ecological problems? Truly ours is a unique age.
8. PERILOUS TIMES (II Tim. 3:1-5). Our nation was stunned when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated November 22, 1963, followed by the assassination of Civil Rights leader, Martin Luther King Jr., April 4, 1968, and then the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy by Sirhan Sirhan on June 5 of the same year. Fear, a sense of peril, it seems, came upon the American people. Things were not safe anymore. Even though we were not at war, we were scared. And now we have experienced September 11, 2001, and the ensuing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
9. LAWLESSNESS (Jude, Vss. 17-19). And added to that has been the more recent scourge of terrorism worldwide. We cannot walk our streets at night; we cannot leave our doors unlocked; we cannot board an airplane without wondering if some mad gunman might be aboard. We fear for the safety of our home and family. Is it any wonder if we are more uptight than our forefathers, more restless, less at peace? No age has experienced the insecurity and turmoil we are facing today.
10. FALSE PROPHETS (Mat. 24:11-12, 24). Recent best sellers on this subject have made us aware of the subtle deception of so-called Christian prophets. Many have been deceived and will continue to be led astray.
11. ANTICHRISTS (Mat. 24:5). Many false messiahs have appeared, claiming to be Christ; but we know there is only One, and this same Jesus is coming again (Acts 1:11).
12. WICKEDNESS (Mat. 24:12). During the 1960’s people began to turn their attention to the fact that we may be living in the Last Days—and indeed we are! Civil disobedience and riots were the order of the day. It seemed that a moral dam had broken loose. Overnight, it seemed, there was a total collapse of morals. There was a flood of legalized pornography, nude obscene performances on stage and movies, wife-swapping, topless entertainers, coed dormitories, skyrocketing divorce rates, sexual promiscuity and introduction of the pill, rock festivals accompanied by all kinds of open sexual immorality and drugs, communal living, rampant venereal disease, the burning of draft cards and the American flag, the popularity of anti-war songs, wholesale deserters from the armed forces … and all this with the endorsement of the liberal clergy. The liberal clergy believed that God was acting in all this. Radicals who should have been tried for treason became our national heroes.
13. DEMONIC ACTIVITY (I Tim. 4:1-3). When the Bible speaks of the fierceness of the Wrath of God or His fierce Anger, it uses a word meaning “burning.” But when it speaks of the fierceness of the demonic activity or wickedness, it uses words characterizing “vehemence, harshness, danger, and savagery.” This will be the spirit of this age.
14. PERSECUTION OF THE SAINTS (Mat. 24:9). Believers dying as a testimony for their Faith is nothing new in this world. Every age has had its martyrs. It is estimated that millions of martyrs are buried in the Catacombs … that in 1900, approximately 36,000 people laid down their life for Christ … that in 1970, approximately 230,000 people died for their Faith in Christ … that in 1986, approximately 330,000 followed Christ in martyrdom. How many since then?
15. DRUGS (Rev. 9:21; 18:23). Many people are surprised to learn that drug abuse is mentioned in the Bible. No, the word “drug” is not used, but another word meaning “drug” is used; that is, the Greek pharmakeia, translated “sorcery.” When the word is used, it means “magic.” But when it applies to drugs, drug use, and the druggist, a form of pharmakeia is used. The Bible says that in the Endtime men will give themselves to drug abuse. Has any age ever witnessed such a fulfillment of this as we are seeing today?
16. SPREAD OF THE GOSPEL (Mat. 24:14). Through literature and telecommunications the Name of Jesus Christ is going forth into all the world.
“But I say, HAVE THEY NOT HEARD? YES VERILY, THEIR SOUND WENT INTO ALL THE EARTH, and their words unto the ends of the world” (Rom. 10:18).
What nation in the world, at some point, in its history, has not heard the Gospel? Jesus said:
“So likewise you, when you shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors” (Mat. 24:33).
That word “near” does not mean “soon” or even “immediately.” It is the Greek word eggus, meaning “at hand, nigh unto, ready.” The verb form means “to draw nigh or to come nigh.” It means “imminent” or the next thing on the agenda. All these things either are being fulfilled or have been fulfilled. All things are “ready.” We believe, then, that Christ could return for His People at any moment.
“Watch therefore: for you know not what hour your Lord does come.
“Therefore BE YOU ALSO READY: FOR IN SUCH AN HOUR AS YOU THINK NOT THE SON OF MAN COMES” (Mat. 24:42, 44).
“Be you therefore ready also: for the Son of Man comes at an hour when you think not” (Lk. 12:40
Swaggart, J. (1986). A Study in Bible Prophecy (pp. 17–20). Baton Rouge, LA: World Evangelism Press.
By John Rosenstern
J. Swaggart Ministry
2017 developed into an exciting year for Bible prophecy enthusiasts. 2017 represented several milestone anniversaries for the nation of Israel. God promised He would regather the nation of Israel in the last days. The First Zionist Council convened in Basel Switzerland 120 years ago in 1897. Zionism seeks to establish a home for the Jewish people in Eretz Yisrael—the Land of Israel—secured under public law. Theodore Herzl sought to prepare the Jewish people to fulfill what was in their hearts for nearly 2,000 years—their return to Israel, their chosen land. In Isaiah 11:1-12, Isaiah speaks to us that the second regathering of Israel out of the four corners of the earth will be an “ensign.” This word indicates it will be a signal of what God is doing at a particular time. Never before in history have Jews been regathered out of the four corners of the earth. We have seen the Hebrews taken out of Egypt in Moses’s time and the regathering of Jews from Babylon after 70 years of captivity. However, the Roman Empire’s dispersion of Jews in AD 70, and then in AD 135, scattered Jews throughout the world.
Balfour Declaration, November 2, 1917
World War I brought devastation to Europe, but it also changed the map of the Middle East. Many nations in the Middle East were part of the Muslim Ottoman Empire that had reigned for over 600 years. The tiny spit of land known today as Israel was part of the land governed by the Ottomans. Since the time of Jewish diaspora, Jerusalem suffered 44 besieges and multiple foreigner occupations. Although some Jews had always lived in the land, they lived under difficult conditions. The Balfour Declaration was named after British Foreign Secretary Arthur J. Balfour. He submitted a declaration of intent to establish a Jewish homeland in Israel (Palestine). In 1919, the Treaty of Versailles entrusted the British with the administration of Palestine through a system called the “Mandate.” For various reasons the recognition of the Jewish homeland in Israel was delayed. The promise was made but not fulfilled by the British.
Resolution 181, November 29, 1947
The name “United Nations,” coined by United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt, was first used in the Declaration by the United Nations on Jan. 1, 1942, during the Second World War, when representatives of 26 nations pledged their governments to continue fighting together against the Axis powers. On Oct. 24, 1945, 51 nations joined together to create the United Nations. The purpose of the UN is to maintain international peace and security, foster cooperation in solving international economic, social, cultural, and humanitarian problems; and promote respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. Woodrow Wilson’s concept and idea of creating a League of Nations—an organization conceived in similar circumstances during the First World War and established in 1919 under the Treaty of Versailles “to promote international cooperation and to achieve peace and security”—would now be a reality.
The realization of 6 million Jews destroyed in the Holocaust fostered a need to resolve the conflict in the Middle East that was left unresolved by the British during the Mandate years. The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was a proposal by the United Nations, which recommended a partition of Mandatory Palestine (Israel) at the end of the British Mandate. On Nov. 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted the plan as Resolution 181(II). Harry Truman threw the weight of the United States behind the plan by voting in favor of it. With passage by the UN, Israel was soon set to establish her reborn independence. Under great opposition by the Muslim Arabs to annihilate her, Israel would fight the birth pangs and declare her independence on May 14, 1948.
The Six-Day War, June 5-10, 1967
Ever dissatisfied with the United Nations resolution that created a Jewish state, the Pan-Arab Muslim nations never accepted Israel and sought to destroy her, as they tried in 1948. Israel’s triumphant victory enabled her to take possession of Jerusalem. From 1948 until the Six-Day War, the country of Jordan illegally occupied Jerusalem and the West Bank, known in the Bible as Judea. During Jordan’s occupation there were no dissenting voices in the world of its illegal occupation. The Arab Islamic nations failed in war to retake the land. After the 1967 war, they would adopt a new strategy. They would use propaganda and make the Arab Palestinians appear to be victims and gain world sympathy by their obstinate occupying landlords—Israel.
Psalm 83
The United Nations passed Resolution 242 after the Six-Day War in an effort to establish a just and lasting peace between Israel and the nations of Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and later, Syria. On Oct. 6, 1973, hoping to win back territory lost to Israel during the third Arab-Israeli war, in 1967, Egyptian and Syrian forces launched a coordinated attack against Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Taking the Israeli Defense Forces by surprise, Egyptian troops swept deep into the Sinai Peninsula, while Syria struggled to throw occupying Israeli troops out of the Golan Heights. Israel counterattacked and recaptured the Golan Heights. A cease-fire went into effect on Oct. 25, 1973. Another United Nations resolution was passed—Resolution 338. I used to think that Psalm 83 was a specific war to occur in the future. I am now persuaded that it is a time frame that began from the independence of Israel until now. The nations of the world that have sought to cut Israel off from being a nation by military power, but since their failures, they have endeavored to cut Israel off from being a nation through peace, with nearly two-thirds of the United Nations resolutions being against Israel. It is as though the very creation of this organization and existence have been about the Israeli and Palestinian issue.
Jerusalem
President Donald Trump recognized the capital of Israel as Jerusalem on Dec. 6, 2017! The year of Israel’s convergence of anniversaries! Immediately after his decision, the Islamic Arab nations of the world expressed their dissatisfaction. Their “confederate” efforts to cut Israel off from being a nation were now diminishing. The Islamic Arab majority UN Security Council cast a vote to condemn Trump’s decision. Subsequently, after a veto from the United States, the General Assembly of the UN voted 128-to-9 against Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital city. The majority of the world stands in opposition to Israel. Only a few nations stand by her. I am proud of President Trump’s decision to stand for God. Because it is only those who hate God that seek to cut Israel off from being a nation. God bless America!
Watchfulness
The second condition that will result in the Christian’s worthiness to be included in the Rapture is that of watchfulness. The Apostle Paul said:
“Let us WATCH” (I Thess. 5:6).
There are four words used in the New Testament for “watch” that are used in relation to Christ’s return. Incidentally, these four words are used also in Passages dealing with moral and ethical conduct.
Two of these words—gregoreo and agrupneo—mean “to be on the alert, to be wide awake spiritually.” The force of these words is to point up the urgency of the situation.
If we do not set an eternal vigilance on the Return of Christ, we are in danger of missing out. The Apostle Peter’s thinking went along the same lines as the Apostle Paul’s when he warned:
“Be sober, be VIGILANT [gregoreo]; because your adversary the Devil, as a roaring lion, walks about, seeking whom he may devour” (I Pet. 5:8).
Let us turn to the Gospel of Mark to illustrate the use of these two most significant words of warning to the Christians concerning watchfulness.
“But of that day and that hour knows no man, no, not the Angels which are in Heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.
“TAKE YOU HEED, WATCH AND PRAY: FOR YOU KNOW NOT WHEN THE TIME IS.
“For the Son of Man is as a man taking a far journey, Who left His House, and gave authority to His Servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the porter to WATCH.
“WATCH you therefore: for you know not when the Master of the house comes, at evening, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning:
“LEST COMING SUDDENLY HE FIND YOU SLEEPING.
“And what I say unto you I say unto all, WATCH” (Mk. 13:32-37).
This Parable illustrates the necessity of watchfulness. The word “watch” is used in this Parable four times. Let us look at each use of this word “watch.”
In Verse 33 Jesus said:
“Take you heed, WATCH.”
The word here means “to chase sleep, to be sleepless,” and expresses not mere wakefulness but a watchfulness of those who are intent upon doing anything.
In Verse 34 He commanded the porter to watch. The word here is sometimes translated “vigilant alertness,” not as the same word in Verse 33.
Verse 35 begins with “watch” and again the urgency of watching is emphasized.
“You know not when the Master of the house comes”
… so be watching. Again, the warning in Verse 36:
“Lest coming suddenly He find you sleeping.”
In Verse 37 the last use of the word is capitalized emphasizing the force of the word—the urgency of the hour.
“For the Son of Man is as a man taking a far journey, Who left His House” (Vs. 34)
… and does not say when He will return. But He said, considering the urgency of it:
“What I say unto you I say unto all, WATCH.”
When a person is going on a long-sought-after vacation, he usually spends a restless, uncomfortable night in anticipation of the upcoming departure. For the true Christian it is hard to rest comfortably in the world when he is anticipating something so much better.
We have often seen the picture of the restless, sleepless mother and father, looking down the trail waiting for the long-lost prodigal to return.
The helmsman of a ship fights back sleep to maintain his bearing, knowing that the mightiest wave will slide under the heel if the prow of the ship meets it head-on. Our Captain says, “Take heed, be watchful,” just as a sea captain says, “Mind your helm.”
Notice again in the Parable that the Son of Man …
“commanded the porter to WATCH” (Vs. 34).
Here, as in Verse 35, the Apostles are compared to doorkeepers (porters); as the captain of the guard made his rounds at night through the Temple, the guards were to rise and salute him. Any guard found asleep on duty was beaten or his garments set on fire.
It is self-evident that under that severe penalty not many guards would drowse off to sleep. This use of the word was mentioned again by Jesus as He spoke to the Apostle John:
“Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he who WATCHES, and KEEPS HIS GARMENTS, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame” (Rev 16:15).
What a warning! What an incentive to alertness!
One lexicon says that the word gregoreo comes from a root word meaning “collecting our faculties.” In the light of the soon Return of the Lord Jesus Christ, we should be “collecting our faculties,” lest we lose our garments and “walk naked” and ashamed.
The Christian who drowses away at his Christianity is imperiling his Salvation. All too many Christians count on God to keep them alert. They feel it is God’s duty to warn them as each new wave approaches. Unfortunately, it is not the duty of the captain of the ship to stand the wheel watch; it is the person at the helm who must maintain constant vigilance if he is to see the voyage to a successful conclusion. The helmsman who falls asleep and endangers the ship is eligible for grave and disciplinary action. Christians who fail to maintain their vigilance can expect no better. There are consequences for our every action. Spiritual consequences are no less real than worldly ones.
This is the reason the Apostle Paul said:
“I die daily” (I Cor. 15:31).
The great Apostle of Christ brought his body …
“into subjection”
… every waking day …
“lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway” (I Cor. 9:27).
And if such a magnificent man of God found it necessary to remain ever vigilant (lest he fall by the wayside), who are we to become overconfident?
Yet Christians are becoming smug. Christian attention is wandering. Clergy and laity are becoming immersed in this world. It is a new day in which we live. The old Scriptures no longer count. Practices that would have been denounced a short time ago are accepted now. Everyone is doing it. It is a new day.…
But is it?
King Solomon wrote:
“There is no new thing under the sun” (Eccl. 1:9).
Satan knows there is nothing new under the sun. The modern morals and the new permissiveness are nothing new to him. He has promoted the same things in Greece, in Rome, in Sodom and Gomorrah, and in Babylon.
“Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it has been already of old time, which was before us” (Eccl. 1:10).
The new morality is new to us only because we were not alive in ancient days to see the old morality. And if we fall for the new morality now, the same consequences that befell Greece, Rome, Sodom and Gomorrah, and Babylon will befall our civilization.
Satan is breaking through the doors of our once moral and Spiritual Strongholds. Today he is bombarding our mind through pornographic movies which come right into our living rooms, billboards, magazines, indecent dress, public scenes that once would have caused people to blush. Many Christians sit through these movies, laugh at the openly obscene jokes, and then wonder why their relationship with God is not what it used to be.
These Christians have been lulled to sleep. They have been put under a hypnotic trance by Satan because they have not watched. They do not WATCH what they see, where they go, and what they say—and all of this despite the fact that the Holy Spirit has enjoined them to WATCH. Not to watch and pray is to prove oneself unworthy to be included in the Rapture.