Muslims are deaf, dumb and blind, they are like strayed animals.... They are like donkeys, dogs, despised apes.... No, they are the vilest of animals ... Muslims are the worst of beasts.
Do you think these descriptions are shocking? Unacceptable? Respectless? Discriminating? Do you think this is despicable KuKluxKlan talk? Hatemongering? Do you think this is sickening Nazi babble? Do you think these texts are supremacist, maybe even fascistoid, but in any case deeply offensive?
I truely hope your answer on all of these questions is a sincere 'Yes!' I truely hope that any compasionate, rational thinking person finds these descriptions totally disgusting, because a whole segment of the human population is being portrayed here as some sort of 'untermensch'.
However, there is one problem.... The texts above are almost directly quoted from a so called divine book.... 'almost' i say, because in this so called divine book these descriptions aren't referring to muslims.... in the so called divine book these offensive, respectless words are being used to describe NON-muslims...
You probably would have guessed by now... it's the Quran I'm talking about.... the book that is highest praised by our islamic brethren, the book that they consider the Absolute Truth - raised above any human law or opinion.
Our muslim brothers and sisters, who demand that we, non-muslims, respect their religion and their 'Holy' Quran, who get angry when we, non-muslims, criticize their divine teachings of islamic 'love' and 'tolerance'. Our muslim brothers and sisters who talk big about 'insults', 'discrimination' and 'islamophobia'...
Our islamic co-humans who just don't want to understand that it's the Quran, and thus their Islam as religion, that is insulting, discriminating and that shows a staggering phobia.... a deeply rooted offensive and supremacist phobia for non-muslims.... and it's been going on for the last 1400 years.
------------------------------------------------------ 8 online translations of the muslim Holy Book: http://quranbrowser.com Quran 002:171 The likeness of those who disbelieve is as the likeness of one who shouts to that which hears nothing, save a call and a cry; deaf, dumb, blind -- they do not understand.
Quran 025:044 Or thinkest thou that most of them listen or understand? They are only like cattle; - nay, they are worse astray in Path.
Quran 062:005 The similitude of those who were charged with the (obligations of the) Mosaic Law, but who subsequently failed in those (obligations), is that of a donkey which carries huge tomes (but understands them not). Evil is the similitude of people who falsify the Signs of God: and God guides not people who do wrong.
Quran 007:176 If it had been Our will, We should have elevated him with Our signs; but he inclined to the earth, and followed his own vain desires. His similitude is that of a dog: if you attack him, he lolls out his tongue, or if you leave him alone, he (still) lolls out his tongue. That is the similitude of those who reject Our signs; So relate the story; perchance they may reflect.
Quran 002:065 And well ye knew those amongst you who transgressed in the matter of the Sabbath: We said to them: "Be ye apes, despised and rejected."
Quran 007:166 When in their insolence they transgressed (all) prohibitions, We said to them: "Be ye apes, despised and rejected."
Quran 008:022 For the vilest beasts in God's sight, are the deaf, the dumb, who understand not.
Quran 008:055 For the worst of beasts in the sight of God are those who reject Him: They will not believe.
Quran 098:006 Verily those who believe not, among those who have received the scriptures, and among the idolaters, [shall be cast] into the fire of hell, to remain therein [for ever]. These are the worst of creatures.
_________________ quotes from islamic websites: Islam started with killing, genocide, ethnic cleansing
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Jesus REALLY is coming soon. BE READY!!! by William D. Brehm Copyright 1996 Bread of Life Book 1
1. WHY SHOULD YOU LISTEN TO ME ?
In this booklet, and the ones that follow, I’m going to say some things about the doctrine of the Second Coming of Christ and the Christian faith in general that you probably haven’t heard before. As other Christian writers have said, you can't really be a Christian and not in some way believe in the Second Coming of Christ. The Bible says too much about it, and if you don't believe the Bible, you are not really a Christian, even if you consider yourself such. Implicit to believing in the Second Coming of Christ is believing that it could happen at any time. The application of this is that Christian should live their lives as if they expect Him to come at any moment, and therefore be continuously ready. But in our time there has been a big movement away from believing in the imminence of the Second Coming. This has been accompanied by a change in the goals of Christian life from pleasing God and winning souls to Christ to having a better quality of life in the here and now. The result is that too many Christians are not ready. Yet there is ample reason to believe that Jesus will come soon. And I am not saying this rhetorically, but as a matter of near-future historical fact.
It is the mission of this Bread Upon The Waters Ministry to alert Christians worldwide, and anyone else who will listen, to the reasons why we should expect Jesus to really come soon. It is the further mission of this ministry to inform them about what the Bible shows is required of Christians who really want to be ready, and warn them of the terrible consequences of not being ready. Furthermore, it is the mission of this ministry to give them a Scripturally accurate expectation of what is going to happen before the actual Second Coming of Christ; that is to say, what will really happen during the Great Tribulation .
It is my position that most of what has been previously taught about this is wrong (note that I don't say it is all wrong). Actually (and I will repeat this later in this series) there has been so much disagreement about the meaning of the prophecies that you have to realize that this has to be true. Of course, I believe that I'm right in what I'm going to say, or I wouldn't say it. Yet I'm teachable, and willing to listen to and consider the arguments (if they really have any) of those who disagree with me. But you can't just dogmatically say I am wrong and expect me to accept it. You must show me in a logical, factual, and Scriptural manner why I am wrong. I have done my homework, so to speak, on this, and I continue to do it.
For all of that, the reader is not asked to blindly accept what follows in this booklet and the other three that make up this series. Just read it and remember it. You are encouraged to look up the many Scripture references that are quoted and consider whether they are faithfully understood and applied. In fact, I recommend that you become familiar with as many different view on the Second Coming as possible, but don't make any interpretation of prophecy before the fact a matter of faith. The reason is simple. The Bible shows that to interpret prophecy correctly before the fulfillment, you have to be a prophet of God yourself.
For all that, since I’m going to say some very unusual things, and in some cases things that will upset some people, I guess I better try to qualify myself as someone you should listen to. After all, there are many cranks and crackpots out there making all kinds of outrageous claims. Some of them, unfortunately, actually have people who believe them. Believe me, it has occurred to my mind that I could just be another one. I’m painfully aware of that possibility. I am intellectually honest enough to question what I’m doing and saying and I admit that I could be wrong. One thing I’ve learned, though, from the field of psychology, is that a person who is willing to admit that he could be wrong is more likely to be right than a person who won’t admit to fallibility. It’s the one who won’t admit it who is probably deluded. The person who will admit it is more likely to have come to his conclusions by sound reasoning from real knowledge of the facts. I know that I have solid grounds for everything I say. More solid grounds, I’m sure, than some people have who would disagree with me. But if you can show me from Scripture, with sound reasoning, and with reliable information otherwise, that I’m wrong, then I would stand corrected. I know I’m in good company taking this kind of position. Martin Luther said basically the same thing when ordered to recant his 95 Theses.
Let me tell you, and here I’m really baring my soul, that there’s a big part of me that would very much like to have my ideas about the Second Coming and the Christian Faith proven wrong. Although it would be a bitter pill to swallow, in a way, at the same time it would be liberation in another way. You see, I feel driven to do the ministry I’m doing, and as long as I believe in what I’m saying, I can have no peace about doing anything but pursuing this ministry. I feel like Jeremiah in chapter 20:9; "Then I said, ‘I will not make mention of Him, Nor speak any more in His Name. But His word was in my heart like a burning fire Shut up in my bones; I was weary of holding it back’". The way I feel isn’t quite that extreme, but I repeat, I can have no peace about doing anything but pursuing this ministry as long as I believe what I believe. I consider what I’m saying to be a prophetic warning and I believe I have a Scriptural obligation to get that warning out to anyone who will listen. See Ezekiel 33: 1-7.
But as I said, there’s a part of me that wishes I could be really proven wrong. I’m a very creative person. I’ve had a measure of success (though not what I wanted) in the past both as an artist, in the sense of fine art painting, and as a photographer. Frankly, being an artist and photographer gratifies my ego far more than doing this does. At one time I was invited to join the Board of Directors of a small art museum, in recognition of my artistic achievements. I’ve sold paintings in art galleries. At this time, I’ve long since given up doing oil paintings to follow the Lord, and I’ve had to pretty much let go of the photography. Yet just a few feet from where I’m sitting writing this, there is a small closet and in the closet is a Nikon F3HP, a professional 35mm SLR camera, considered by many photographers to be the all-around best camera ever made. It’s expensive, too. Brand new, it would cost over $1000 just for the camera body alone (no lens, flash, etc.). And I’m good with it. I can take spectacular photos. I’ve sold enlarged, framed photos as art, and many of my photos have been published. But the demands of this ministry, in time and money, leave me with very little of either to give to photography. And if you think I’m happy about that situation, guess again. Yet as long as I believe what I believe, there’s no way I’m going to drop this ministry and go back to oil painting or photography. If you think I’m on an ego trip with this ministry, think again.
Again, if you think I’m doing this seeking fame and fortune, guess again. Frankly, I don’t really want fame. I know enough about fame to know it’s something I don’t want. At least not in the sense of being a celebrity. But if this ministry has any kind of success, a certain amount of fame is likely to come with it. Or maybe I should say, notoriety. I don’t want that. Now wealth is something I would want. But I surely don’t expect to make much from this. My message is a warning, and warnings are never popular, regardless of how timely or well presented they may be. So far, all my efforts in the ministry of the Word of God (going back to just after I got saved 29 years ago) have mainly cost me money. I did get paid well (relatively speaking) for the menial chores that I used to do for a living at The Lamb’s in New York City. But again, the money I’ve received for the ministry of the Word, which I consider the more important work [1] (wouldn’t you?) has been rather less than 5% of what it has cost me. But, as stated, I would like to be wealthy, and there is a way that I think I could get wealth, legitimately and fairly easily, without getting too much fame.
You’ll notice that I’m a writer. So far, most of my writing, and all that has been published, has been for ministry. But that’s not all I can do. I have an aptitude for writing science fiction and fantasy novels. Right now, such novels are selling very well, and I know that I can write better than some of the writers whose books I’ve read. I know enough about the publishing business to be fairly confident that if I dropped all my ministry efforts right now and turned my attention to cranking out fantasy novels, I’d be a millionaire inside of three years. I already have fairly well thought-through concepts in my mind for three novels, and the initial ideas for over a dozen more. I also know that writing a successful novel can result in even more money for movie rights, if the novel is made into a film. There have already been two movies made that incorporated original, though separately conceived, ideas of mine as major aspects of the plots (Gymkata and Dragonslayer). Furthermore, it’s now possible for even more money to be made from a science fiction or fantasy novel if it’s made into a computer game. I could do that myself! Instruction books and software for the purpose are easily obtainable. The great thing about being a successful writer is that you can get rich doing it without becoming a media personality. I used to know the late, great science and science fiction writer, Isaac Asimov. He was one of the most successful writers in history. He was famous, but not in the way that results in being harassed by the paparazzi. That’s how I would like to be, and honestly believe I could be, but I have a ministry to do. So if you think I am doing this for fame and fortune, think again.
I am doing this because I believe that what I am saying is true and I believe that God has called me to communicate this message to the whole Christian world and anyone else who will listen. I believe that those who will not listen and/or who do not take this message seriously are in for an awful surprise. In Luke 21:35, Jesus said, referring to His Coming, "it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth" [2] . I believe, in all sincerity, that I have been given special understanding of what He meant, and I believe it’s my God-given job to tell the Christian world about it. See Amos 3:7.
I do have some unofficial credentials that I believe qualify what I say to be taken seriously. Of course, I’m tooting my own horn, but someone has to do it, and I don’t have a PR man working for me. I have to start with a disclaimer, and admit that I don’t have any seminary or Bible college training, and have very little else in the way of formal Bible training. Also, I’m not a college grad, period. (I went to college for one semester.) But I do have some grounds for claiming to know something about the Word of God.
1. I have a very high I.Q., about 165. I used to be a member of the High I.Q. society, Mensa. My reading comprehension and verbal reasoning ability have tested so high that they were given a percentile ranking in the upper 90’s when measured against other people in my age group in High School. My SAT scores were so high that I was put into a special class for advanced students in college.[3] 2. I have been recognized as having a lot of knowledge about many subjects. Browsing in book stores, libraries, and newsstands (and lately on the Internet) is one of my favorite pastimes, and I tend to suck up information like a vacuum cleaner. I’ve often been told that I should try to become a contestant on the quiz show "Jeopardy" because I have so much knowledge. 3. I’m a minister’s son. My dad, the late Rev. Joseph H. Brehm Sr., was a seminary graduate and an ordained Baptist minister. I grew up in Church (more than I liked), and had to go to every Church service, Sunday School class, Prayer meeting, etc. there was to go to. More than that, we had family devotions (read "Bible study and prayer meeting") every day and there was no getting out of it. The result was that the day I got saved I knew more about the Bible than some Christians ever know. 4. I’ve been a Born Again Christian for 29 years at this writing. I’ve spent better than twenty of those years involved in some form or other of full-time ministry. You don’t spend that much time in ministry without learning anything. 5. I’m a Bible teacher. I’ve had about 17 years experience in teaching adult Bible classes. In that time, I never simply parroted material that other people had prepared. Rather, I studied the Scriptures for myself, to find out what the Bible really says. It has been like handing in a research paper and then facing an oral quiz on some Bible topic or passage nearly every week (sometimes twice a week) for 17 years. In the mean time, I’ve long been in the habit of reading a minimum of two chapters of the Bible nearly every day. I’ve read the whole Bible through again and again. You don’t do these things without learning anything. 6. It has been affirmed by a number of Christians, including several ordained ministers, that I know the Bible very well and that in terms of ordinary Biblical matters, what I teach is sound doctrine. It therefore should follow that what I say about the Second Coming is also sound doctrine. 7. As a Christian writer, I’ve published many articles and tracts that have been well received. The same is true of the tapes I’ve recorded for this ministry. When the President of the American Education Association heard my "Babel Rising!" tape he sent me a check for $500.00.
In view of all this, I think it’s just possible that I might have something valid and significant to say about the Second Coming of Christ. I realize that what I’m going to say in this booklet, and the others that will follow, is of a seriously radical and unpopular nature as Christian teachings go. It just so happens that on several occasions in the past I’ve had radical and unpopular opinions about other subjects and have been proven right by history. I’ve had at least a half a dozen such experiences. I believe the Lord gave me these experiences to show me that I can trust my radical ideas. If I hadn’t had them, I probably would not be doing this ministry.
The one I most like to tell about happened when I was only in my early teens. I was doing a lot of talking about space travel, artificial satellites, and sending spaceships to the Moon. There would be nothing radical about that now, but that was the mid 50’s and anyone who took such subjects seriously then was considered more than a little off. I was! I was the class nerd and then some! But then, on October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched the first Sputnik. For which the USSR will always have a special place of gratitude in my heart. Because the situation changed overnight. I was suddenly the "brightest" and most popular kid in my school. I was elected president of my Junior High class. The following spring, at my 8th grade graduation, I was given a small medal (which I still have) for my achievements in science. Which were mainly that I knew more about space travel than even the science teachers did.
In that case, and in all such cases that have happened since, I believe that what made the difference was that I had the real facts and understood what they meant while most other people had erroneous preconceptions.[4] That is to say, they had formed opinions without having enough real knowledge of the relevant subjects to be able to form intelligent opinions. I believe that what was true of my opinions in all those cases will prove true of my opinions concerning the Second Coming of Christ. I am, as I’ve said, intellectually honest enough to question my own ideas, and I will always admit that I could be wrong, which isn’t true of many people who teach on the Second Coming. However, I believe that I’ve shown that my ideas concerning the Second Coming are worth taking seriously.
I hope that what I’m going to say about the Great Tribulation frightens you. It frightens me! I am sufficiently egotistic that I would like to see the Tribulation happen the way I say it will happen just to see myself proven right again. In fact, I’d like to be one of the ones who live right through to the Rapture. (I’m a Post-Tribber, as you will see.) But at the same time, I believe that the Tribulation will be so terrible that I don’t think I want to live to see it. I know how Jeremiah must have felt, prophesying the destruction of Jerusalem, a city he loved. What he knew was coming was the very thing he must deeply and sincerely did not want. (See Jeremiah 28:1-9) I think the world as we know it is about to be destroyed, and I surely don’t want that. In fact, thinking about what I believe will happen to the world has moved me to tears, and I don’t cry easily. But Jesus said, in so many words, in Matthew 24:21, that the Great Tribulation will be the worst thing that will ever happen to the human race. I think I know what is going to happen. And it scares me! It doesn’t make me happy. Again, it actually makes me cry! I wouldn’t mind one bit if history proves me wrong. But, unfortunately, I am literally afraid that I’m right.
So take the time and effort to read and learn.
2. WHAT DO YOU MEAN, THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST?
Since in this booklet, I’m going to be talking about the Second Coming of Christ and the other events related to it, it makes sense that I should take the time and space to make it perfectly clear what I’m talking about. From my reading generally and things I’ve heard people say, I’ve gotten the that impression, that many people don’t really understand this concept. This is particularly true of non-Christians who might happen to read this, but it’s also true of new Christians, especially those with a New Age Movement background, and even long term Christians who have never really studied or have never really been taught about the subject. So, it makes sense to include a basic explanation of what the term means. If you’re already a Christian who is fairly knowledgeable about this, you can skip to the next chapter. But it might be worth reading even for you, because it might expose some erroneous ideas you may have. Believe me. Many Christians have erroneous ideas about the Second Coming.
There are many different views on the Second Coming among Christians. There are even those who regard themselves as Christians who do not believe in a literal Second Coming of Christ. Again, it has been noted by a number of theologians and Bible scholars that you can’t really be a true Christian without in some way believing in the Second Coming. The Bible contains too many references to this event for any Bible believer not to believe in it. And if you don’t believe in the Bible, you aren’t really a Christian, regardless of what you may think.
As I will show later in this booklet, anything we believe as Christians must be based on the Bible. It must be noted that some non-Christians, particularly, but not exclusively, New Agers, have formed ideas about Biblical subjects that have nothing whatsoever to do with what the Bible really says. These ideas range in significance from sheer nonsense to subtle but serious lies of the devil. The erroneous ideas about the Second Coming cover the whole spectrum. As I said in the first chapter, what I teach is sound doctrine and that means it’s all based on the Bible. Even if I use outside sources, particularly science, to interpret the Bible, it’s still the Bible I’m interpreting. Again, some ideas about the Second Coming that I’ve heard have nothing whatsoever to do with what the Bible says. And that includes things said by reputable Christian leaders.
When a New Ager, or a Christian with a New Age background, thinks about the Second Coming of Christ, he usually thinks of another Jesus of Nazareth going around healing people and teaching love and enlightenment. I’m not imagining this idea; I’ve seen it in print. They think he’ll come again by "reincarnation" and/or "enlightment", and see Him as just being something like a Hindu "avatar". Which term, however much some people have understood it that way, has nothing in common with the Judeo-Christian; Biblical concept of the Messiah. Again, I’ve seen someone saying something in print about "Jesus rising from the dead and coming again". Which means that the writer, who probably thought of himself as being educated, didn’t even know the most elementary concepts of Christian doctrine.
Jesus will not come again by rising from the dead. He already did that, on what Christians usually refer to as the first Easter. That’s why we celebrate the Holiday (which word originated as a contraction of "holy day"). Belief in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is one of the most basic theological pillars of Christianity: "For I delivered unto you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised the third day, in accordance with the Scriptures" (I Corinthians 15:3 & 4; Revised Standard Version [5] ). If there is one thing you have to believe to be a Christian, it’s that Jesus arose from the dead: "…if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." (Romans 10:9, New King James Version). Anyone who doesn’t know that Christians believe that Jesus arose from the dead doesn’t know anything about the Second Coming either. Jesus will not return by rising from the dead. You may call yourself a Christian, but if you don’t believe in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ (some so-called Christians don’t), you’re not a Christian by Biblical standards!
He will not come again by reincarnation either. Although there are two references in the Bible that hint at the idea of reincarnation, the idea is not in accord with what the Bible says about either the Second Coming of Christ or human destiny generally: "And it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment"[6] (Hebrew 9:27, New King James Version). This passage may have been included, among other things, to refute the idea of reincarnation. The dialogue between Jesus and His disciples in John 9:2 & 3 also hints at the idea of reincarnation and refutes it. Another of the theological pillars of Biblical Christianity is the belief that every person lives and dies exactly once, with only 3 possible exceptions in the Bible: Enoch, Elijah, and Jesus Christ. As far as we know, Enoch didn’t die. Elijah may have lived twice and died only once [7]. Jesus died and lived again. Of course, Christians also believe that everyone will eventually arise from the dead. But Christians do not believe in reincarnation as a normal rule of our destiny. To put it bluntly, anyone who calls himself (or herself) a Christian and yet believes in reincarnation is theologically off the wall.
Jesus will not come by "enlightment" either. The New Age-Eastern Religion concept of spiritual enlightment has no place in Christian doctrine, contrary to what some people ignorantly believe. Fundamental to the idea of "enlightment" is the idea that all people have God within them. This is not what the Bible teaches. The Bible teaches that people are as fundamentally separate from God as a painting is separate from the painter. The painting may be a self-portrait of the painter, but it resembles the painter only in appearance. Humans are created in God’s image, but until we become Born Again we do not have God within us. On the contrary, we are separated from God by sin. "Enlightment" is about supposedly acquiring direct awareness of God within yourself. By strict Christian theology, this must be considered a delusion and/or deception. It is where Eastern religions end. The New Birth is about having your sins forgiven, and receiving the presence of Christ within you by the Holy Spirit. It is where the Christian life begins. Again, Enlightment is something that usually (there are exceptions) is achieved as a result of a long period of self discipline (yoga or something equivalent). The New Birth is a gift from God, received by faith.[8] Moreover, New Age-Eastern religion thinking defines Christ as a "spirit" or "nature" that everyone already has within them. "Enlightment" includes discovering that "Christ" within yourself (again, this experience is a delusion). Incidentally, the mere use of the term "Christ nature" (I’m not making this up, either. Again, I’ve seen it in print.) shows that the person who uses it doesn’t know what the word "Christ" means. True Christian thinking sees Christ as a specific person, the Lord Jesus Christ [8]. By Christian doctrine, the only people with a "Christ nature" are people who have been Born Again. Jesus will not come again by "enlightenment".
So how will Jesus come again? He will come again from Heaven, as Himself. But for any reader who isn’t familiar with the doctrines of Biblical Christianity to fully understand this, we must back away from that question and ask another one: Where is Jesus now? We’ve already said that Jesus arose from the dead on the first Easter Sunday. One of the basic beliefs of true Christianity is, and always has been, that Jesus is alive right now. So where is He?
The Bible says that after Jesus arose from the dead, He stayed on earth for 40 days (Acts 1:3). Then He ascended into Heaven. That is to say, using modern terminology, He literally levitated up into the sky until a cloud hid Him from the sight of His disciples (Acts 1:9). And thus He disappeared. But where did He go?
To answer that, in concrete modern terms, let us begin by saying that the Bible affirms the reality of the material world. This is another point on which the Judeo-Christian theological tradition differs from Eastern religions, which see the material world as an illusion (maya). But the Bible also affirms the reality of another realm or we might say, plane or dimension of existence. It is what we call the spirit world. Heaven, hell, God, the angels, Satan, and the demons all exist in the spirit world. And that’s where Jesus is now. He is seated, the Bible says, at the right hand of God the Father in Heaven. Whether His being seated on the right hand of God is metaphorical or literal or both we cannot absolutely say. But understand that He is reigning in Heaven. As Christians often say, Jesus Christ is Lord. Which means that at the present time He is effectively reigning in Heaven as the "Mighty God" and "Everlasting Father". See Isaiah 9:6.
The strange thing the Bible shows about the relationship of the material world and the spirit world is that things from the material world can’t exist in the spirit world but things from the spirit world can exist in the material world. See I Corinthians 15:50. When Jesus walked the earth before the Crucifixion, He was a flesh-and-blood human being. But after the Resurrection, He had a different kind of body which could function both as a material body and a spiritual body. He is now able to exist completely in both worlds. After the Resurrection, He showed His Disciples that He could eat like a normal human. But He could also walk through a locked door without bothering to open it, neither Him nor the door being any the worse for wear. [9] Christians believe that following the Second Coming of Christ we will all have bodies of this kind.
So what do we mean by the Second Coming of Christ? We will now start to answer that, but first we must again step back a bit, to the last things Jesus told His disciples before He ascended into Heaven. There are three different renditions of this final bit of instruction, (Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:15-18; & Acts 1:8). They all add up to a single message: the disciples were supposed to go out and preach the Gospel to the whole world. It was understood even then that this would take some time, though the disciples had no idea how much time. But combining that with Matthew 24:14, we conclude that the day will come when God the Father will consider the job done, and when He does, Jesus will return. He will return as Himself, the same person who ascended into Heaven, in His Resurrection Body. He will, to again use modern terminology, levitate down from the sky in the same manner as which he levitated up (Acts 1:11). But there will be some serious differences from the way He ascended.
For one thing, He won’t come back alone. He’s going to have an army of angels with Him. And He’s coming to take over. Revelation 1:7 speaks of Jesus coming with the clouds. This does not mean literal clouds. The word "clouds" is used in the Bible to mean large numbers of saints or angels (see Hebrews 12:1). We might say this about the angels: There has been a lot of interest in, and many things published about angels recently. I haven’t read enough of this to really know all of what is being said, but I suspect that much of it is of a fantastic and unscriptural nature. There are angels. They’re real. I know this from first-hand experience. Angels are described in the Bible as ministering spirits which are of great might, that is, they’re very powerful. Real angels aren’t wimpy little cherubs. They’re more like supermen. But at the same time, they have an attitude of absolute reverence to God, and whatever they do is done in absolute obedience to God. They’ll help you, but only in response to divine permission or command. They won’t respond to your requests on their own initiative. While they are not to be worshipped, neither are they something to be trifled with. An angel could knock you flat with a flick of his hand. (I know of a case where an angel obviously did just that - to save a man from being crushed to death.) An army of angels is something that no human army could stand against.
Again, when Jesus comes back, He’s coming to take over. He’s coming as a king and a judge. To use a modern expression, no more Mister Nice Guy! The Bible says that He will rule the world with a rod of iron. I understand this to mean that He’ll rule the world with such absolute authority that it will be impossible to disobey Him without immediate, shattering consequences. There’s a mocking vulgar statement about the Second Coming that some of you may have heard or seen that has more truth in it than the people who have used it know: "Jesus is coming , and, boy, is He bleep (=angry)". Sad to say, this isn’t any joke. The people who’ve promoted this vulgarity are going to find out the hard way that what they were saying as a dirty joke is all too true. For sinners, His coming will be the worst thing that could ever happen.
It is also true that He will come to bring final, complete salvation to those who believe in Him; that is to say, to all true Christians. He will be coming to finally defeat the forces of evil and to glorify the saints. He will institute the everlasting Kingdom of God in visible form, and those who believed in Him and served him in this life will reign with Him as kings and priests in that Kingdom. At His coming, those Christians who are still living will be instantly transformed and caught up into the sky to meet Him. This event is known to Christians as "The Rapture". It is something that believers are told to look forward to. The Bible also promises resurrection to believers who die before the Second Coming.[11]
The doctrine of the Resurrection of the Saints is another pillar of the Christian faith that sets it apart from all other religions. As we’ve said, reincarnation is not part of Christian belief. Also, although the Bible does indicate that Christians who die go to Heaven, it also indicates that whatever their status in Heaven is, they’re in a state of rest that is compared to sleep (note: this matter has been at topic of hot doctrinal dispute. I’m not taking a hard line on anything, but rather summing up what I understand the Bible to say. See Acts 7:60 and Revelation 14:13.) What the Bible really promises is resurrection. And this is better than either of the two most popular ideas about the afterlife outside of Christianity, namely that either you get reincarnated or that you’re simply dead (that is, you cease to exist) when you’re dead. [12]
One of the most basic ideas behind most religions is that there is, or ought to be, justice in life. It can be simply argued that if you’re just dead when you’re dead, there is no final justice. If a person lives a life of selfless service to others, like Mother Teresa, or on the other hand is a monster who commits enormous atrocities, like Hitler, and you’re simply dead when you’re dead, there is no final justice. Many people would find that hard to accept. The Bible says, in so many words, that there is final justice. Death leads to eternal rewards for the righteous, and eternal torment for the wicked.
Reincarnation presents justice problems too. It’s generally understood that reincarnation involves something called karma. This is a principle similar to the Biblical principle of sowing and reaping (see Galatians 6: 7-10). It’s the idea that you get what you deserve in life, whether good or evil. The difference is that whereas sowing and reaping applies to the present life and eternity, karma applies to successive reincarnations. A person who lived a good life in the present will be reincarnated to a better life in the future, and of course a person who lives a bad life will be reincarnated to a worse life. But is this justice?
One of the basic principles that makes the idea of justice valid is that when a person gets what he deserves, be it good or evil, he knows why. This idea is implicit to the universal question of those who are suffering: "Why me?" The trouble with this, as it applies to reincarnation, is that the reincarnated person doesn’t usually remember the life he or she lived before. (By the way, in those rare cases I’ve heard of where individuals did seem to spontaneously remember past lives, the people who did weren’t happy about it. Frankly, I believe this is a form of demonic deception.) If, then, a person finds himself living in a life when it seems that everything goes super well for him, and he doesn’t remember his past life, how then has he been rewarded? Again, if a person has a life that seems characterized by chronic misfortune, but he doesn’t remember the evil he did in a past life, how then has he been punished? See John 9: 1-3. If reincarnation is real, and involves karma, it’s worse than just being dead when you’re dead. To reward, and especially to punish, without the recipient knowing why, is not justice, but rather, enormous injustice. The Resurrection that the Bible promises is real final justice. The righteous will be rewarded, the wicked will be punished, and they’ll know why. Whether you find yourself in Heaven or Hell, you’ll know why.
Another undesirable aspect of reincarnation is that, again, you don’t remember your past life. If all your memories are gone, what’s the effective difference between reincarnation and being dead when you’re dead? The Bible promises that in the Resurrection you will be you. If you’re saved, you’ll have a new body that’s immortal and incorruptible (that is, it can’t get sick or injured, and it will never grow old[13]). There are also passages in the Bible that suggest that in the Resurrection you will be reunited with your loved ones from this life. [14] (If they are saved. If not, there’s a passage that suggests that either they’ll be totally forgotten or their memory won’t be painful [15].) This joyful expectation has the Bible as it’s only concrete source. And here is something about this that Christians should believe but be careful not to take the wrong way. The Bible says that Christians are sons (that is, children) of God. However, it indicates that our status as God’s children won’t be complete until the Resurrection, that is to say, the Second Coming. The Bible says we will be like Jesus in His glorified state (See Revelation 1:13-16). Now consider this: A son of a man is a man. A son of a dog is a dog, And a son of God is a…..god?! You may have never thought of it before, but that is what the Bible really promises. And I mean the Lord, not the devil. See John 10:34 & 35. The great Christian hope, the thing that all Christians can look forward to, is the Resurrection.
One thing the Bible prophetically warns about, which has come true many times [16], is that many false Christs would appear. Most of them don’t last long. We had a dramatic case of this with David Koresh and his Branch Davidian cult in the horrible incident in Waco, Texas early in 1993. But in most cases, unless something terrible like the Waco incident or the Jonestown massacre happens, relatively few people know about the false Christ. The Bible tells us that when the real Jesus returns, it will happen in such way that it will be impossible for anyone not to know what has happened: "For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also shall the coming of the Son of Man be"[17]. It is impossible to say how much of what the Bible says about this event is symbolic and how much is literal, but know this: If there is ever a literal fulfillment of the prophecies of the Second Coming that at all resembles Christian expectations, it will happen in such way that the whole world will know about it the moment it happens. It won’t be a case of some ordinary person promoting himself as the Christ of the Second Advent, as a number of people have done, and a few are still doing, in our time. It will be the most spectacular event in history.
But unfortunately, and I mean very unfortunately for the human race, that isn’t all there is to it. The Bible makes it perfectly clear that before the Second Coming of Christ; that is to say, before His actual appearance, there will be a period when God will, to use the Biblical terminology, "pour out His wrath on the earth". Which is to say, He’ll make some terrible things happen to the entire world. The Bible gives the impression that this period will last for seven years. But there are also things in the Bible that give reason to believe that it will be shorter, say about five years. Regardless of how long it lasts, Jesus made it clear in Matthew 24:21 & 22 that it will be the worst thing that will ever happen to the human race. Again, this is what people really need to be ready for. It is the purpose of the is ministry to help Christians to be ready in one way or another. In one way, to be really ready spiritually. In another way, to know what to expect, and in yet another way, to know what to do if the Tribulation starts and they aren’t ready spiritually.
I well understand that there are several large groups (in terms of beliefs, not organizations) of Christians who don’t expect to ever go through a "Great Tribulation", and of course non-Christians would tend to dismiss the whole idea as so much bleep (=garbage). But there is good reason to believe that there will be a Great Tribulation. Everyone living at the time will see the start of it, and many will die in it. All, or at least almost all will suffer in it, some terribly. Why should you believe this? Read on!
3. WHY DO YOU BELIEVE IN "THE GREAT TRIBULATION"?
We’ve all heard the term "Judgment Day". We all heard of "prophets of doom" predicting the "End of the World." It has only been within this century that scientific discoveries and world events have given us a realistic idea of the various ways in which such an event could really happen. There are many possibilities; nuclear holocaust being the one that has received the biggest media attention. We’ve also conjured the nightmare of a runaway epidemic wiping us out. Lately, the possibility of a comet or asteroid collision that destroys the world has been added to the list. There is also the science fiction cum UFO phenomenon idea of hostile space aliens attacking the earth, at least doing a lot of damage, and perhaps wiping us out. There’s the possibility of a runaway "Greenhouse Effect" annihilating us. At the extreme end of the range of possibilities is the concept of the Sun "going nova" and burning up the entire earth. We know such a thing could really happen, but scientists don’t expect it anytime in the foreseeable future [18]. The truth is, most people, and that includes many Christians, aren’t really expecting anything that really constitutes the end of the world. But what if something actually happened that to some extent included all of these nightmarish possibilities? As a matter of fact, the Bible predicts just such an event (more precisely, a series of events). It’s called the Great Tribulation.
The term "Great Tribulation" is taken from the words of Jesus in Matthew 24:21: "For then shall be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be". From other things He said, we understand that this period will happen just before the actual Second Coming (or we might say, second appearance) of Christ: "Immediately after the tribulation of those days…the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven…" (Matthew 24:29 & 39).The Great Tribulation will be the worst thing that will ever happen to the human race, worse even, in the quantity and severity of the suffering it will cause, than Noah’s Flood. In fact, Jesus used the Flood as an analog of the Tribulation (Luke 17:26 & 27), but in Matthew 24:21, quoted above, He implied that the Tribulation will be worse. There are so many other references to this period in the Bible, direct and indirect, that although I consider myself a Bible scholar, I couldn’t begin to list them all. There is however only one Book in the Bible that gives a complete prophetic overview of this period: The Book of Revelation.
The only comprehensive presentation of the Great Tribulation is found in the Book of Revelation, starting with chapter 6, verse 12, and running through to chapter 20, verse 6. There are, as stated, many other references to the Tribulation scattered throughout the Bible, but they’re all in bits and pieces. Some are general and vague. Others use such symbolic terms that the connection isn’t obvious. Only the Book of Revelation shows the totality of what will happen in anything that resembles a complete and coherent manner. And even that takes some serious study to understand it. But everything else in the Bible that is about the Tribulation must be understood in the light of the Book of Revelation and not the other way around. That is to say, we must not try to understand the Book of Revelation by other passages. We must rather understand other passages by the Book of Revelation. This is because the other passages, as stated, are bits and pieces of the Tribulation. The context of a given passage may obscure the true meaning as applied to the Tribulation. What seems to be figurative by the context may have a dead literal fulfillment in the Tribulation.
You may never have considered this, but the Book of Revelation stands out from the other Books of the Bible, and from the New Testament in particular, as a unique document. It is the only Book that was delivered directly to the writer from Jesus Himself. It is the only one that specifically promises blessings to those who read and keep (believe, remember, and act on) it. It is the only Book that contains a specific warning to anyone who tampers with it. It is also the only Book in the New Testament in which visions constitute the majority of the Book. And although there are many visions recorded in the Old Testament, especially in prophetic books like Ezekiel, a larger percentage of the Book of Revelation is a record of visions than any other Book in the Bible. In fact, only a few verses in chapters 1 & 22 aren’t descriptions of visions. Therefore, it logically follows that the Book of Revelation has more importance than and preeminent authority over any other Book of the Bible
The Book of Revelation has long been an enigma among Bible scholars and theologians, not to mention the Christian world in general. Many have been the hours that students of the Scriptures have puzzled over it trying to figure out what it means. Some students of the Word have refused to even try to understand it. My own father, an ordained minister, believed in the Second Coming of Christ, but to my recollection he never preached on it. He made no claim to understanding the Book of Revelation, and he used this little parable to describe his opinion about trying to understand it: A soldier far from home in the army got a letter from his father that seemed to be very important. But his father had so filled it with metaphors and figures of speech that the soldier couldn’t make any sense out of what his father was saying. So after pondering it a while, he gave up, put it in his duffel bag and said to himself, "I’ll just have to wait until I get home and ask my father what he meant". This was my Dad’s attitude toward the Book of Revelation. I’ve come to the conclusion that this has been the correct, and safest, point of view. Until quite recently!
Some Bible scholars have so totally despaired of understanding it that they have chosen to dismiss it as so much eschatological [19] nonsense and have claimed that it doesn’t belong in the Bible. It has been included due to the unanimity among the Early Church Fathers [20] in attributing its authorship to St. John. He is believed (by the largest consensus) to have written the Book circa 95 AD on the Island of Patmos [21]. He had been sent into exile there by the Roman Emperor Domitian. The Book, at the time, was specifically addressed to seven churches in the Roman province of Asia, now western Turkey. It is believed that prior to that time John had been a sort of circuit preacher between the churches he names. While in exile, John received either one very long vision, or a series of shorter ones (the more likely of the two possibilities) which he recorded in a book. Copies of the Book were sent to the pastors of those churches. But as I will show in this series of booklets, they weren’t meant just for those specific churches.
The visions he received seem to describe things so fantastic that it has long been believed that they are all symbolic in meaning. The funny thing is that few scholars have been able to agree about what some of those visions mean; especially the ones about things that happen on earth. I’ve seen writers saying that a certain passage symbolizes a certain thing, but I’ve seldom seen them explain why, or document the claim. This doesn’t surprise me, because I’ve come to the conclusion that much of what has been treated as symbolic in the past is in fact meant dead literal! And the fact that I think I know what those sections of the Book mean is one of my main motivations for doing this ministry. As I’ve said in other places, I believe I have an Ezekiel 33:1-7 obligation to warn the whole Christian world, and anyone else who will listen, about what I am sure I know! As I said in the Introduction, I’m going to tell you what I think will happen in the "Three Great Woes" section of "The Great Tribulation" booklet.[22] What I want to go into now is the "why" of the Tribulation.
As was said in the last chapter, before the actual Second Coming of Christ, God will make a lot of horrible things happen. Implicit to belief in this period, is belief in the wrath of God. In other words, belief in a God who punishes sin. The normal tendency of modern Christianity is to focus on God as the "God of Love", the God of mercy and forgiveness. But there is what might be called a "dark side" to God. Not that God sins. That’s the one thing He can’t do. But His standards of what is right and what is wrong can be quite different from ours (See Isaiah 55:8 & 9). Therefore, what He does in some circumstances can be what we would consider evil. This idea is expressed in the Scriptures when God says, "I form the light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil. I the Lord do these things". (Isaiah 45:7). It must be noted that there are two ways of defining the word "evil": one is evil in the sense of sin, any kind of disobedience to God. The other is bad things, especially very bad things, happening. Things like earthquakes, floods, famines and tornadoes. The latter definition is what God was referring to. Modern translations of the Bible bear witness to this view by rendering the Hebrew word "ra", translated "evil" in the passage above, with words like "calamity" or "disaster". God sometimes makes terrible things happen, and by His standards is perfectly just and righteous in doing so. God will make the Great Tribulation happen. By studying what the Bible says about it, we can discern several reasons why He will do this.
The first, and the best known, is to punish the human race as a whole for its sins. The Bible suggests that in the years immediately preceding the Great Tribulation, sin will be at its all-time worst. This idea is found, for example, in Matthew 24:12, "And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold". Another reference to this idea is in II Thessalonians 2:3, "Let no one deceive you by any means; for that day will not come unless the great falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the man of lawlessness". I am not alone, by the way, in thinking that the general moral decline that is affecting the whole world right now, combined with growing apostasy [23] in the Church, constitutes the "great falling away". The evangelist Billy Graham has long since said publicly that if God doesn’t punish the United States for it’s sins, He’s going to have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah. Actually, the moral situation in the U.S. has gotten much worse since he said that. Furthermore, the
moral decay isn’t limited to the United States. It’s world wide. When God does bring about the Tribulation, it will be to punish the whole human race. Most Christians who are familiar with the doctrine of the Great Tribulation are aware of this.
The second reason, not so well known, is to chastise Christians for their failure to live the kind of lives they should live in the years preceding the Tribulation. To chastise them for, among other things, the kind of tolerance mentioned in footnote 20. In the first section of the booklet entitled "The Great Tribulation", much more will be said about this failure. But it must be said that this ungodly tolerance is just the tip of the iceberg. As will be shown, Christians are failing in far more subtle but pervasive ways than that. There are many Christians who would flat out denounce such tolerance as evil who are nonetheless being seriously disobedient to God in other ways. Much of that disobedience occurs in what Christians don’t do, as much as in what they do. According to the Microsoft Encarta 97 Encyclopedia, there may be as many as 1.7 billion (thousand million to the British) Christians in this world. If these Christians were truly obedient to God and acted in unity, they could take spiritual and political control of the world in a generation without a shot being fired. They could put an end to most of the world’s troubles, at least on the international level. When Jesus gave the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20), He was in effect telling His disciples to do just that. Take over the world. The famous words, "make disciples of all the nations", contrary to popular opinion among Christians, doesn’t mean to make a few disciples here and a few there. If understood correctly from the original Greek, it means "disciple all the nations". No "of". That is, it says, "disciple everybody". One of the main reasons for the Tribulation is the failure of the Church to get the job done. Instead of teaching the world to conform to Christ, the Church is conforming to the world (see Romans 12:1 & 2). During the Tribulation, Christians will wake up to their failure and repent.
A third reason for the Tribulation, also not well known, is to break the power of the nations. If Jesus came back right now, in the way the Bible describes, and said in essence, "I’ve come to take over", the nations probably wouldn’t submit. The nations of the world have too much "independence" and "national sovereignty" on their minds. So however one-sided it might be, Jesus would have a war on His hands. But for the most part, God will take care of the problem during the Tribulation. In the Bible it is prophesied that "the earth shall fall and not rise again" [24] and God says, "I will destroy the strength of the gentile kingdoms" [25] Even so, the Bible suggests that the Battle of Armageddon, which occurs at the end of the Tribulation, will be a last-ditch effort by the Two Beasts and their followers to overthrow the Kingdom of God with military force [26]. It appears that God allows this to isolate the last of Christ’s real enemies from the rest of surviving humanity (yes, there will be survivors) and destroy them. [27] What remains afterward of the flesh and blood human race will be so beaten up that they’ll gladly accept the absolute authority of Jesus just to survive. This will result in the blessed period of history that we call the Millenium. [28]
And it must be said again, God does destroy. Modern "evangelical" Bible teaching and preaching presents an inaccurate, unbalanced concept of God, focusing too much on His love, mercy and grace, but largely ignoring all the references to His wrath and the multiple Old Testament references to His "dark", which is to say, His destructive side. In a little known Bible verse, Isaiah 54:16, God says (NIV), "See, it is I who created the blacksmith who…forges a weapon fit for its work. And it is I who have created the destroyer to work havoc". Hardly the sweet, gentle God of modern theology. During the Great Tribulation, the world is going to have a reunion with the God of the Old Testament..
So, assuming you accept the idea that there will be a Great Tribulation, you might ask, "Why so soon?" There are multiple reasons for believing that the Second Coming of Christ, and with it the Great Tribulation, must occur in the near future if it is ever going to happen at all. In the booklet entitled "BABEL RISING!", I will set forth an argument based on the story of the Tower of Babel, to the point that we are violating a major prohibition that God has placed on the human race. This prohibition was intended by God to be absolute. We are also working toward the violation of two others. Violation of these prohibitions can interfere with God’s plan of salvation. But the whole world is involved in the violation. God has to step into history in a big way soon and stop it. If He doesn’t do so within no more than another half century, it appears to me that history will go past the point where the prophecies of the Book of Revelation can be fulfilled in any way that resembles Christian expectations. The Great Tribulation is the only event prophesied in the Bible that will do what (from God’s point of view) needs to be done. If it doesn’t happen, it would then be safe to say, at least as far as the Second Coming prophecies are concerned, that either the Bible isn’t true or our understanding of the prophecies is very wrong. Either of these propositions, especially the former, would be very difficult for many Christians to accept.
As I will show in the next chapter, there is massive reason to believe that the Bible is true. And if it is, then the Tribulation absolutely will happen and that, in terms of history, very soon. I am well aware that many people have attempted to set a date on the Second Coming and have been proven wrong by history. I’m not trying to set a specific date. Rather, I’m setting a general deadline. This deadline is based on circumstances and trends, as they relate to the three prohibitions mentioned above. And in the time that I’m allowing, I believe that I’m being generous timewise. I really think it will be rather less than half a century.
As I’ve said, everyone, or at least almost everyone, will suffer, and suffer terribly, during the Tribulation. There may just be a few wealthy and powerful people who won’t suffer much. But if they’re not saved, even they will be destroyed in the end. The people who as a group will suffer the least will be the Christians who are spiritually ready. The Book of Revelation, as well as other passages, notably Psalm 91, shows that they will receive divine protection during the Tribulation. Unfortunately, as will be shown in the first section of the "Great Tribulation" booklet, they will constitute a very small percentage of the people who consider themselves Christians. Unfortunately, the people whom the Bible suggests will suffer the worst, at least in the first two "Woes", will be the Christians who aren’t spiritually ready. They’re going to be subject to both the wrath of God and the wrath of the Two Beasts. You’ll read more detail about what will happen to them in the section of the "Great Tribulation" booklet called "The Three Great Woes" and in the section of the "Strangers and Pilgrims" booklet called "Going Through The Fire"
Just know and understand this: there will be a Great Tribulation. Unless you are more than 60 years old, I think the odds are excellent that you’ll at least live to see it start. You would do well to take this warning seriously and be diligent about being ready for it. This warning may be the most important religious message you will ever hear. It’s meant to give you time to be ready.
4. WHY SHOULD YOU BELIEVE THE BIBLE?
The Bible is considered the greatest best-seller of all time. It has been translated into over 1200 languages and is probably the best known book in the world. It is certainly the most widely distributed book of all time. In western civilization, at least, there are probably very few people who haven’t heard of it. Yet it can also be said that it is at the same time the least known book in the world, in terms of people really knowing what it says. It is also the least believed. Even among those who consider themselves Bible scholars and theologians there are many who don’t really believe it, and some of them are very open about that. There have been many things written and said about the Bible which deny the truth of it. These things are often accepted without question by ignorant people, but they can often be easily shown to be either impossible to prove or clearly untrue.
For example, have you ever heard it said, "The Bible has been so tampered with"? [29] I’m sure you have heard that. I have been able to silence people who said that by simply asking, "When, where, and by whom?" The answer I have received was usually something like, ‘uh, duh….". The truth is, no one can tell you what I asked, because, historically, the allegation isn’t true. I can quote several encyclopedias [30] as my authorities for saying that throughout the history of the Bible the most diligent and conscientious efforts have been made by reputable and highly qualified scholars to preserve the authenticity and if anything improve on the accuracy of the translations of the Bible. In fact, the only real tampering that has been done has happened quite recently. The publication, for example, of editions of the Bibles that eliminate the male pronouns that apply to God is in fact a case of tampering with the Bible. But this kind of thing has rarely if ever happened before, as far as I know. In the major translations that are used in the Churches, you can be confident that the text accurately reflects the original writings [31].
Another form of tacit support for the accuracy of our translations comes, believe it or not, from the Jews. If you know anything about Orthodox Judaism, you know that the Rabbis are, if anything, more exacting in their demands for the accuracy of their texts than Christians are. For example, when a Torah is being made, if the scribe who is making it makes just one error, he has to throw the whole thing away and start over. Well, in the United States there are many Orthodox Jews who can’t read Hebrew very well. So there are English editions of the "Holy Scriptures", as they call the Old Testament, published for them. Although the Books are arranged differently from our Old Testaments, if you got a copy of one, opened it, for example, to Psalm 23, and laid a King James Version Bible along side it, also opened to Psalm 23, you’d make an amazing discovery. (At least in the copy I’ve had in my possession) you’d find that the texts were identical. The Jews have used at least the King James Version of the Old Testament as their English translation of their "Holy Scriptures". If it’s good enough for the Rabbis, it’s good enough for us!
Again, some modern scholars have tried to say that the Books of the Bible were written centuries later than when they are traditionally believed to have been written. These people, who present themselves as Bible scholars and theologians, are in fact showing ignorance of their own subject. Take the Five Books of Moses. There have been scholars who have tried to date the writing of these books as late as the Second Century BC. What they don’t know, or are ignoring, is that the Hebrew language is the oldest written phonetic language on earth. The Phoenician alphabet, from which many modern alphabets are derived, contrary to what even some serious Bible scholars believe, was actually itself derived from the Hebrew alphabet. And the Hebrew alphabet dates to further back than the earliest believed date for the Exodus, 1500 BC. In fact, there have been Hebrew inscriptions found in the Sinai desert that date from around that time. And that is before there was a Phoenician alphabet. Furthermore, although modern scholars have alleged that the Books of Moses were the work of several writers, a computer analysis of the Books done a few years ago showed that they were all written by exactly one person. It is possible that in writing the Book of Genesis, Moses had access to earlier records. Written language in one form or other has been around since circa 3500 BC in the Middle East. Therefore, the idea that the Book of Genesis is based on verbal tradition is really based on ignorance. It is known that information in some Books of the Old Testament was drawn from earlier records. In fact one of them, "The Book of Jasher" ("Jasher" may mean "the godly"), is named as a source twice in the Old Testament. [32] But that doesn’t take away from the Divine Inspiration of the Bible at all. Some of those earlier books may have been divinely inspired too, but they came to the end of their usefulness and God allowed them to be lost. That will probably happen to the Bible after the Final Judgment, if not after the Second Coming. See I Corinthians 13:10.
For the Books of the New Testament, there is plenty of support from the writings of the Early Church Fathers for believing that they were all written by the people to whom they’re attributed within the 1st Century. (The Gospel of John may have been written as late as 110 AD, but John was the author. He was the only Apostle to die a natural death, and he is known to have been very long-lived.) The critics of the New Testament don’t know it, (or maybe they’re ignoring it) but there are two nearly complete Bibles in existence that date from circa 220 AD. One is the Codex Vaticanus, which is in the Vatican Library. The other is the Codex Sinaiticus, so called because it was found in an old monastery in the Sinai Desert. It is now in a museum in Moscow. These two books are basically identical in their content. Consider that the Books of the Bible had to have been assembled into one document long before these copies were created, since they existed over 1500 miles apart centuries before the rise of modern transportation. There is no doubt that all the Books of the New Testament were in circulation no later than the early part of the Second Century, and most were probably written much earlier. In fact, there’s good reason to believe that they were all written (except for the Books written by John) prior to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. It’s probable for example, that the Gospel of Luke was written circa 57-60 AD while Luke was staying with the imprisoned St. Paul in Ceasaria. The Book of Acts was written while Luke was with Paul during the house imprisonment in Rome mentioned in Acts 28:30. The "parchments" St. Paul refers to in II Timothy 4:13 were probably copies of the Gospels of Matthew and Mark.
Critics of the Bible have also tried to deny its authenticity by saying that it isn’t valid in the historic sense. But it has been well said that the Bible isn’t intended to be a history book. The Bible is best viewed as a revelation of God’s plan for the salvation of mankind. Of course there is some history necessarily involved in that. I have heard an atheist, a member of Mensa at that, admit that the Bible is the only religious scripture that shows a real God stepping into real history. That is to say that the difference between the Bible and the Scriptures of other religions is the difference between fact and fantasy. Although it can’t be proven that every historical detail of the Bible is true, there is plenty of evidence from archeology and secular ancient history to show that it is at the very worst right far more often then it is wrong. There isn’t space in this booklet to adequately treat the topic of the historical authenticity of the Bible, but I might point out the following items:
In the Book of Jeremiah, a man is mentioned named Baruch, son of Neriah, who actually wrote down what Jeremiah said. Archeologists working in Jerusalem recently found a signet ring dating from the time of Jeremiah bearing Baruch’s name. There has been question as to whether King David ever really existed, and whether there was really a royal House of David. Archeological evidence has recently been found that confirms irrefutably that there was indeed a King, and a Royal House of, David. In II Kings 3, a war is described that was fought by the King of Israel (the northern kingdom), allied with the King of Judah (the southern kingdom), against the king of Moab. There is an ancient carved stone in the British Museum in London called the Moabite Stone. It is inscribed with the story of that war from the viewpoint of the King of Moab. These are just a tiny fraction of the number of archeological discoveries that have been made that show that the Bible is generally reliable as a historic document.
Other critics of the Bible have rejected its authenticity on the grounds that it is contrary to science. Most people have heard of the conflict that rages between proponents of the theory of evolution and those who advocate taking the Biblical story of creation literally. It is a fact that many people have rejected belief in the authority of the Bible because of the seemingly overwhelming evidence on the side of the theory of evolution. Before I got saved, in my teens and early 20’s, I was one of them.
There is no room here for a complete discussion of this issue. Even a full booklet wouldn’t do it justice. But understand this: The Bible was, if anything, even less meant to be a science book in the sense in which we mean the term than it was meant to be a history book. Frankly, if what is now scientifically known about the earth, life and the universe, had been put in the Bible, the readers couldn’t have understood it until quite recently. For all that, there are things in the Bible that presage modern scientific discoveries by thousands of years. Some of these are mind boggling. If you’d really like to know about these things, I refer you to a book entitled "Show Me God", by Fred Heeren, Searchlight Publications, Wheeling, IL, 1995. It can be found in the religion sections of secular bookstores. However, I will mention 3 things that have been said by scientists who weren’t Christians that support belief in Creation:
Albert Einstein, although not orthodox even as a Jew, was not an atheist. He went on record making this statement: "….the harmony of natural law….reveals an intelligence of such superiority that compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection". Stephen Hawking, the heir-apparent to Einstein’s throne as the greatest living scientist, and an agnostic, has said that the universe appears to be "very finely adjusted (at the subatomic level) to make possible the development of life". The late scientist and science writer Carl Sagan, an atheist and major proponent of the theory of evolution, said in his book "The Cosmic Connection" that "the probability of life as we know it evolving by chance is smaller than the number 1 divided by the number of atoms in the universe". Which is to say that it is best expressed as zero. Sagan refused to believe the evidence of his own reasoning. When critics of the Bible are finished "refuting" the Creation story, their next major target for attack on scientific and historical grounds is the story of the Flood. Orthodox science and history both say that no such thing ever happened. And this in spite of the fact that almost every major culture in the world has some kind of Flood legend. They can dismiss that if they want to, but there is a piece of hard evidence that has recently come to light that is already starting to give critics of the Flood story grounds for second thoughts.
If there was no flood, it logically follows that there was no Ark. Well, it just so happens that the Ark has been found. I’ve been aware of this for some time, but by some "coincidence" I obtained hard copy information on it for the first time as I was writing this booklet. [33] I am not referring to the claims that have been made for the supposed discovery of the Ark on the top of Mt. Ararat. To my knowledge, what has been found or at least seen within this century on Mt. Ararat are the remains of a monastery that was built there, in the form of an "Ark", in the 13th Century, and soon abandoned. The weather on the top of Mt. Ararat is so bad, and the air so thin (17,000 ft. elevation) that even monks couldn’t take it for long.
The real Ark is in a valley about 20 miles southeast of Mt. Ararat. This actually creates no contradiction with the Bible. Contrary to popular opinion, the Bible does not specifically say that the Ark came to rest on Mt. Ararat. Rather, it says that in came to rest "upon the mountains of Ararat", or something similar. See Genesis 8:4 in any translation. The word "mountains" is always plural.
Therefore, it could be anywhere in the Ararat region and still be in accord with the Bible. In fact, its not being found exactly on Ararat is more in accord with what the Bible actually says than if it were up there. What has been found is actually just a buried and severely deteriorated framework. But it has been studied with ground-penetrating radar and no one could honestly deny that it is a ship, and a large one at that. In fact, the shape of the ship can be clearly seen if it is viewed from the air or higher ground. The size and overall proportions match the Biblical description of the Ark. The amazing thing is that the only body of water anywhere near it is a small stream that runs past the site. There are some large lakes big enough to float it within a 100 mile radius, but there are also some rugged mountains between the ship and the lakes. It didn’t float to the site on any ordinary body of water.
The existence of the ship forces two conclusions on anyone who considers its implications: First, there had to be an event involving the movement of water on a cataclysmic scale to move the ship to that spot. It would have taken something bigger than any such event that is known in recorded history but which would have been massive enough to qualify as the Flood of Genesis 7 & 8. Second, it means that there once existed a civilization that had the capability of producing a ship bigger than anything that was regularly built in recorded history prior to the late 19th Century, but that is unknown to modern archeology. In fact, we know of only three other ancient ships, a Roman pleasure barge, an Egyptian warship, and a Greek freighter, that even approached it in overall size. Furthermore, what has been found indicates that whoever actually built the ship knew what they were doing. The design indicates advanced knowledge of shipbuilding. The civilization had to be the Antediluvian civilization described in Genesis 5. As the head of the geology department of Turkey’s Ataturk University has said, [34] "It (the ship) is Noah’s Ark for sure!" [35]
But there is more in the Bible that has serious relevance to science than that: There are two significant passages in the Book of Revelation, relevant to the Great Tribulation, which describe things that can be understood only by recent scientific discoveries. I have the support of three well known scientists in the relevant field for saying that one of these passages means exactly what I say it means. You will read about this passage and what it means in the second section of the "Great Tribulation" booklet, in the chapter entitled "A Mountain Burning With Fire". For the second passage, I have rather less support at this time, but the overall idea was in the "Science" section of the New York Times on September 20, 1994. The passages in question describe disasters that appear to be astronomical in both origin and scale. These disasters will constitute major portions of the outpourings of God’ wrath during the Tribulation. Science also sheds light on what happens at the Battle of Armageddon. The fact that these disasters are described with the detail and accuracy which I will show is, quite simply, scary. There is just no way that St. John could have known naturally about these things. In fact, except for a handful of scientists who knew of it as theory, no one knew until within this century. Most people didn’t know until less than 15 years ago. The fact that these things can now be understood is one of the reasons why I believe that the Second Coming is near. The point is that these two passages accurately describe things that even scientists in the relevant fields have known about as fact for less than a century, and the Bible gives us reason to believe that the prophecies of the Second Coming won’t be able to be understood until they’re about to be fulfilled.
I also submit to you that much of the criticism that has been laid against the Bible originates not from the fact that intelligent men cannot believe the Bible, but from the fact that they don’t want to believe it. To believe the Bible is to believe in the God of the Bible. Believing in the God of the Bible means accepting accountability to God for one’s sins. As the Bible says, "For all have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God" (Romans 3:23). All men are sinners. Both the Old and New Testaments agree to this belief. But many humans will not accept it, and many of those who do in a way accept it want to believe that the good they do will outweigh their sins, [36] or believe that they can earn their own salvation. [37] As Jesus said, "This is the condemnation, that light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather light, because their deeds were evil" (John 3:19). Furthermore, much of what men consider good is evil in the sight of God. Unbelief, especially among educated people, is more often the result of not wanting to believe than the result of not being intellectually able to believe.
The Bible never debates the existence of God. His existence is assumed from the very first words of Genesis: "In the beginning God…." For all that, the Bible recognizes unbelief as a major problem. Throughout the Bible, there are a number of references to God’s intention to prove His own existence. One of the primary ways in which He proposes to do this is through the fulfillment of prophecy. The most obvious passage that illustrates this is Isaiah 44:6-8, and especially verse 7. God throws down the gauntlet, so to speak, to the false gods worshipped by the Israelites and their neighbors. He challenges them, in so many words, to make prophecies that will come true. Similarly, as shown in a well known passage in Deuteronomy, chapter 18 verse 22 and in Jeremiah 28:9, the test of a true prophet of God is decreed as his being 100% accurate about what he prophesies. One of the things that sets the Judeo-Christian religious tradition, and the Bible, apart from all other religions is the fact that so many of the prophecies have been fulfilled. And many of the Old Testament prophecies had their fulfillment in, or in events related to, the life of Jesus Christ. If you read modern fantasy literature, you have probably read about "ancient prophecies being fulfilled" as parts of these stories. This literary device originally was taken from the Bible by J.R.R. Tolkien, (he was a Christian and a close friend of C. S. Lewis) in his famous "Lord of the Rings" novels. But only in connection with the Bible does it really happen.
One of my favorite cases that illustrates fulfilled prophecy has to do with one of the gates of the Old City of Jerusalem. The relevant prophecy is found in the Book of Ezekiel, chapter 44, verses 1 & 2. The chapter is part of a passage that tells of the prophet being given a vision-tour of a rebuilt Jerusalem by an angel (Jerusalem was in ruins at the time the Book of Ezekiel was written, during the Babylonian captivity. It had been destroyed by the Babylonians.). He was taken to the east side of the city and saw the Eastern Gate, which in ancient times led from outside the walls directly into the Temple. It was walled up. The angel explained the reason for it being walled up as follows: "…because the Lord God of Israel has entered by it, therefore it shall be shut".
Now, you can go to Jerusalem today and visit the Old City. You can walk around the walls and see that of the seven original gates, all but one are still in use. The Eastern Gate is walled up. It has been, I understand, since just after the Muslims took control. I have heard that several attempts have been made to reopen it, but something always happens to prevent it. There is now a Muslim cemetery outside the Gate, which makes it highly unlikely that it ever will be opened in the foreseeable future. That part of the prophecy has been fulfilled. But what about the "Lord God of Israel"?
There has been one notable incident where someone who laid claim to being the "Lord God of Israel" did enter Jerusalem through that gate. His name is the Lord Jesus Christ. The incident was what Christians call the Triumphal Entry, on the day we call the first Palm Sunday. The one day when Jesus was openly hailed as Messiah. It happened one week before the Resurrection. On that day, in fulfillment of another prophecy in Zechariah 9:9, Jesus rode from the Mount of Olives into Jerusalem on a donkey while the crowd hailed Him as King and Messiah. He went in through the Eastern Gate. The Lord God of Israel has entered by it. Therefore it is shut.
The Bible, if understood to mean what it says, tells us that God is really the author of the Book. One of the more common, and intellectually shallow, objections frequently made to believing the Bible is saying that it was written by men. The Bible, however, claims that "all scripture is inspired by God" (literally, "God-breathed", Greek Qeopneuma ) [38] Most Christians know about that passage, But there is another one, in II Peter 1:21, that says something far stronger about this. It suggests that God breaths very hard. Unfortunately, most people who read the passage miss the real point, because just about every modern translation renders the key word in a way that softens the meaning. [39] The verse says, "holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit". The key word here is "moved". It is the Greek word fero, transliterated "phero". It is linguistically related to our words "fierce" and "ferocious". It’s normal English translation in the passive is the word "driven". In the Book of Acts 27: 17 & 27, it is translated that way twice. It describes what was happening to a sailing ship out of control in a severe storm. II Peter 1:21 should say. "holy men of God spoke as they were driven by the Holy Spirit". The writers of the Bible were just so many pens in God’s hand. This is illustrated in the statement by Jeremiah quoted on page 1. He had no choice about what he said. God gave him the words to both speak and write, and he was driven to do it.
This truth is also illustrated in the obvious fact that the prophets often didn’t understand what they wrote. A good example of this is in the Book of Micah, chapter 5, verses 1-4. This passage contains a number of individual prophetic statements all of which were fulfilled in, or in connection with, the first coming of Christ. Verse 2 is the best known, because it is the famous passage that prophesies the Birth of Christ in Bethlehem, and which is quoted with that meaning in Matthew 2: 6; "But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, are not least to be among the clans of Judah, for out of you shall come forth to Me the One to be Ruler in Israel; whose goings forth are from of old, from the days of eternity". The fact that Micah didn’t understand what he wrote is illustrated by the last part of verse 1, "They will strike the judge of Israel with a rod on the cheek". This was fulfilled when the soldiers were mocking and tormenting Jesus just prior to the Crucifixion. All of the prophecies in this passage came true, but they aren’t given in any particular order nor are they particularly relevant to each other. We can assume they would be if Micah himself had understood them. The fact that he obviously didn’t, but his prophecies came true, is evidence that someone else was really the source of those statements. Namely God Himself.
It follows from this that since God is the author of the Book, everything we teach and believe about the Christian faith must be based on the Bible. This is true even if we use knowledge from various other disciplines of study, such as the physical sciences, history, sociology and psychology, as tools to help us understand it. In relation to all these things, we must either accept the Bible as authoritative or we are intellectually rebelling against God. In I Corinthians 1:18-25, St. Paul addresses the issue of human knowledge versus the Word of God, and says "the foolishness of God (looking at the Word of God from a human perspective) is greater than the wisdom of men…" Anyone who dares to set human knowledge and wisdom above the Scriptures is setting a spiritual trap for himself. As St. Paul also said in Romans 1:22, "professing themselves to be wise, they became fools". This is in fact the case with anyone who attacks the Bible with human knowledge, but attack they do.
When people attack the Christian faith, the other primary target beside the authenticity and reliability of the Bible is the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. As said in the second chapter, Jesus arose from the dead following the Crucifixion, on the day that Christians call the first Easter. As shown from the Scripture quote on page 4, this is one of the most basic beliefs of the Christian Faith. And it is a belief that has been relentlessly attacked by those who don’t want to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. I am not going to bother trying to directly refute most of their arguments. Rather, I am going to set forth a simple but serious argument for why Jesus must have risen from the dead: Basically, if He didn’t rise from the dead, there would never have been a Christian religion. [40]
The basis of this is right in the New Testament, but has support, some of it unintentional, from other sources. We begin by looking at what St. Peter did during the trial of Jesus: He cursed and swore and violently denied even knowing Jesus. But six weeks later he preached the Pentecost sermon that really started the Church. What changed him? The Gospel of Mark mentions a man from among the Disciples who fled naked (a very shameful thing at the time) from the scene of Jesus’ arrest. It shows just how scared the Disciples were. Some scholars think that the man was Mark himself. Yet that man, if it was Mark, went on to write what is regarded as the first of the Gospels. [41] If so, why does he make this humiliating offhand admission about himself? Is it, perhaps, a tacit testimony to how much he had been changed? Finally, the Bible makes it plain that when the Resurrection was first reported to the Disciples by the women who went to the Tomb with spices, and found it empty, the Disciple didn’t believe it. They were mostly in hiding. And they were starting to slip out of Jerusalem in small groups [42]. Yet these men went on to change the world. What changed them?
What changed them was the fact that they had seen Jesus alive after He died on the Cross. A theory was put forward by Hugh Schonfield in his best-selling book, "The Passover Plot" to explain this. In the book, while denying the Resurrection, he admitted that there wouldn’t have been a Christian religion if the Disciples hadn’t really believed that Jesus had risen from the dead. The theory that he expounded in the book is in my opinion at least as hard to believe as, if not harder than, the Resurrection. He said that someone else impersonated Jesus and convinced the disciples that He had risen from the dead. It sounded a like a good idea, but to begin with it was pure speculation and any reader of that book should realize that. More than that, it is not as plausible as it sounds. It isn’t easy for an impersonator to fool a person who really knows the person being impersonated. Schonfield probably didn’t know this. Let me relate a true story to show you what I mean.
As you may know, prior to the D-Day Invasion in June, 1944, the Allies went to great lengths with counter-intelligence efforts (successfully) to deceive the Nazis about when and where the Invasion would take place. Part of the strategy was doing things to make Nazi intelligence think the invasion would take place on the southern coast of France. They carried out a number of ingenious and carefully executed hoaxes to accomplish this. One of them involved the impersonation of Field Marshall Bernard Law Montgomery. "Monty" was the most popular officer in the British Army, and had a big role in planning the invasion. The British wanted the Nazis to think he was planning an invasion of southern France. But he was too busy with preparations for the real invasion to take part in the hoax.
So what they did was find a professional actor who closely resembled "Monty". They had him follow "Monty" around for several weeks, observing everything about how he behaved, even to the point of watching how he shaved, and how he talked and learning to impersonate him. Now understand that this was a professional actor. A professional actor knows how to study a real person if he’s going to portray that person on stage or screen. He can also apply makeup to enhance his resemblance to the person he’s portraying. He can change his voice to make himself sound more like the person he’s portraying. So this guy’s impersonation of "Monty" would have been good! Well, having completed his training, the bogus "Monty" was sent on a tour of Allied military bases in the Mediterranean region. He inspected installations and stockpiles of weapons and supplies. He reviewed troops and gave speeches. And then one day, he gave a speech to a group of officers, one of whom had served with the real "Monty". After the meeting, that officer took the bogus "Monty" aside and said, "That was a great speech, sir. Now would you tell me one thing? Who the bleep are you?" The officer who knew the real "Monty" saw right through the impersonation. [42]
Now someone is going to tell me that a person who probably didn’t even know Jesus could fool a group of men who had walked with Jesus for over three years? You see, to be able to impersonate Jesus with any chance of success, he’d have to have been close enough to Jesus for the Disciples to get to know him, too. No way that would have worked. No! The Disciples may not have been educated by our standards, but they weren’t stupid. Common sense says that if all the Disciples believed that Jesus had risen from the dead, then they must have seen Him alive after the Crucifixion. Exactly as the Bible says. No other explanation.
It’s worth noting just how much they believed it. Of the eleven disciples who remained faithful to Jesus, all but one died violent martyr’s deaths (the exception being John). Of those ten, nine (the exception being James the Elder) died with no other Apostles being anywhere near. St. Thomas died with no other Apostles within 2000 miles of him (in India). Yet for all that horrible things that were done to them, no Apostle ever renounced belief in Jesus Christ and the Resurrection. They all stayed faithful unto death. By the way, this is also true of St. Paul, who met Jesus through a vision on the road to Damascus. [44] No imposter fooled him!
I have been challenged, on numerous occasions while witnessing, to prove the existence of God, the truth of the Bible, the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, etc. My usual response has been to refuse to try. I can argue it, but I can’t prove it. My position is that, in the final analysis, God doesn’t need me or anyone else to prove His own existence, etc. He’s quite capable of doing that for Himself. And He means to. If you aren’t a Christian, and you really want to know, God has ways of letting you know. As He says in Jeremiah 29:13, "And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart". His use of the phrase, "with all your heart", refers to a hard truth that I have observed over the years. Most of the people who ask for proof don’t really want it. And they probably won’t accept any argument offered as proof. But the Bible makes it clear that everyone will believe sooner or later. Unfortunately, like the demons who "believe… and tremble!", when they finally believe, it may be too late. "I have sworn by Myself (God) …that to me every knee shall bow" (Isaiah 45:23). You’ll bow in voluntary worship in this life, or you’ll bow in involuntary submission on Judgment Day.
But be assured of this: If you aren’t a believer, but sincerely want to know, God will let you know. But before you go seeking, ask yourself this: If you really know that the God of the Bible is real, what will you do with that knowledge? The Bible makes it clear that to know and not respond with obedient faith is worse than not knowing. [45] I have known specific cases of people who were convinced that the Bible is true and yet who refused to obey. I feel sorry for those people. Although all the unsaved will wind up in Hell, they won’t all suffer to the same degree. Those who knew the truth in this life but didn’t obey it will be among those who suffer the worst in eternity. God demands repentance in response to the Gospel. To believe it and not obey it is to be doubly damned.
The truth is that many of the objections to belief in the Christian Faith that are raised by enemies of Christianity are not valid. They are accepted by unbelievers simply because they want to believe them. I’ve been at meetings of the American Humanist Society which is a very intellectual organization. In the discussions that take place, people are usually very careful about what they say in the way of intellectual argument. They know they may be embarrassingly refuted if they’re careless and say something stupid. But let the subject of Christianity come up, and they start saying things against Christianity that are total nonsense. They know that nearly everyone in that organization is hostile to Christianity, and they won’t get refuted when they argue against it. So they really "stick their necks out". They practically try to outdo each other in saying vicious untruths about Christianity. What they say frequently gives away the fact that they don’t really know anything about it. And this is a general truth. Even the average Christian doesn’t know as much about his religion as he should. The average non-Christian knows absolutely nothing about the Christian Faith or the Bible, though such people often erroneously think they do have such knowledge.
I also know that much that is said against Christianity by unbelievers is true but irrelevant. Like saying that no Christian really lives the Christian life. Valid criticism. But it doesn’t mean the Bible isn’t true. Or like saying that Christians are fanatics. There are "Christians" who are nuts, let’s not try to deny it. But that doesn’t mean the Bible isn’t true. Sometimes, what people think is evidence against the Christian Faith is actually evidence for it. Like saying that the Christian Faith can’t be true because of people like Jim Jones and David Koresh. Actually, the fact that there have been people like that is evidence that the Bible is true, because it says that there will be people like that. See II Peter chapter 2.
I once heard a women tell an ordained minister who was preaching to her on the street that what he was saying about the Gospel was "just your interpretation". When he questioned her about her knowledge of the New Testament, she admitted that she’d never read it. If a licensed doctor told you that you had terminal cancer, would you tell him that "that’s just your opinion"? You would be wise to seek a second opinion, but you’d take what he said very seriously, just the same. This is a perfect parallel with the preaching of the Gospel. You and I have (and everyone else has) a terminal illness called sin. The Christian Faith offers the correct diagnosis and the cure. From the standpoint of common sense, we’re taking as big risk if we ignore the Gospel as you’d take if you ignored what the doctor told you.
I believe that I should conclude this chapter with a personal testimony. I must say that although I can’t prove the existence of God and the truth of the Bible to you, God has proved it to me. I question everything. And I come up with some tough questions. I can answer most of the questions that unbelievers have thrown at me (which doesn’t mean that they always accept my answers). It is well known among those Christians who have been seriously involved in personal evangelism that there are seven basic questions that get regularly thrown at Christians by unbelievers. They all just happen to be about theological issues that the Bible doesn’t speak to directly. [46] Which causes one to wonder if all those questions have the same basic source, i.e. Satan. There are Biblical answers though, but a baby (newly converted) Christian probably wouldn’t be able to answer them. I can. But I know some questions that can be brought against the Christian Faith that are tougher than anything I’ve ever heard come out of the mouth of an unbeliever that I was witnessing to. You have to really know a subject to be able to intelligently question it. I seriously believe that if I chose to be a "devil’s advocate" and threw those questions at a weak Christian, I’d destroy his faith. Yet I can answer even those questions in favor of the Christian Faith.
What I know, above all arguments and questions, is that in the 29 years that I have been a Christian, I have observed the presence of a guiding and helping power in my life that I know isn’t me. There have been too many "coincidences" for them to be coincidences. There were two minor miracles that happened as I was in the process of obtaining the computer with which I created this booklet. One had to do with obtaining the computer desk on which it sits, and the other getting the computer itself. There would have been at the very least serious difficulty involved, or I might not have been able to get the computer at all, if those miracles hadn’t happened. For my life as a whole, I can even look back to the years before I became Born Again and see the presence of the Lord’s guiding, protecting hand in my life before I knew Him. Therefore, even if I couldn’t answer an intellectual argument brought against the Christian Faith, all such arguments would be to me so many empty words.
Christians are often accused of having blind faith. For anyone who really knows the Lord, nothing could be further from the truth. Blind faith belongs to atheists [47] and liberal, apostate Christians. But to anyone who really lives a life of obedient faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, it isn’t long after he or she becomes Born Again that, because of the Christian’s awareness of the presence of God in his or her life, believing begins to give way to knowing. That’s why the question is asked, "Do you know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour?" By the way, Do you?
5. WHAT’S WORTH ARGUING ABOUT?
If there’s one thing that characterizes the Christian world as we know it, it’s differences of opinion. As I will have more to say about, in further detail, in the "Great Tribulation" booklet, there are over 800 distinct forms of Christianity in the United States alone. According to one source I have, there may be as many as 25,000 different denominations in the world as a whole. [48] The basis for the distinction is usually one of two things, or both: manner of worship and/or doctrinal opinions. However, especially among Protestant churches, the main problem is doctrinal differences. It should occur to Christians, but apparently seldom or ever has, that with all the disagreement, most of them have to be wrong on at least some points of doctrine. [49] What has occurred to some Christians, but in our time has never been given the general consideration it deserves, is the fact that all of this division in the Church constitutes a serious sin condition. In the chapter on the Great Tribulation, I said that one of the reasons for it is to chastise the Christians for their failure to live the kind of lives they should be living in this world. The fact that Christians allow all this division is one of the main reasons for the chastisement. This is a subtle but pervasive failure to obey God.
Christians, for all their differences of opinion about doctrine, tend to be quite sensitive about the issue of "heresy"; that is, the teaching of false doctrine. Or so they understand the word "heresy". And of course, if you come down, as the saying goes, "to the nitty gritty", a "heretic" is anyone who dares to disagree with the person using the term. If you’re an average Christian, you may be surprised to know that the Greek word ‘airesiV, from which we get the word "heresy", basically means, "a choice of a course of thought or action", rather than "a false doctrine". By the context of its use in the New Testament, it implies a doctrine or practice that causes division as opposed to meaning a false teaching. Therefore, a person may be teaching something that is perfectly correct or at least totally permissible by Biblical standards, but if he’s causing division in the Church by doing so, he’s a heretic by Biblical definition. So we can truly say of the Christian world as a whole, that we have a Church full of heretics. Even me!
In John 17:21, Jesus asked the Father for unity in the Church so that the world would believe that the Father sent Him. It can be argued that the one of the basic reasons why so many people don’t believe in Jesus is the lack of unity. Again, in John 13: 34 & 35, Jesus told the Disciples to love on another so that the world would know that they were His disciples. The degree of division in the Church is a manifestation of the failure of the Christians of our time to practice the love that Jesus commanded. Division in the Church had already begun to manifest itself when Paul was still preaching, and his First Epistle to the Corinthians opens with a denunciation of it. The Bible tells us not to accept people who are "disputers of doctrine". When an individual in a specific church takes a stand for an unpopular doctrinal position, Christian’s don’t seem to have a problem recognizing that as wrong. But when a whole denomination takes a stand on something that sets it apart from other churches, few people ever openly say they’re doing something wrong. It reminds me of what I believe is a quote from Shakespeare:
Traitors never prosper. What’s the reason?
If traitors prosper, none dare call it treason.
Christians who hold doctrines that needlessly set themselves and their followers apart from other Christians are committing treason against the Church as a whole, and against Christ. Again, it’s tough for an individual to get away with this. But if that individual gets a following and starts an independent congregation or even a new denomination, there will be few Christians who will dare to tell him openly that he’s doing something wrong.
I want to say right here that although I’m teaching something that is at odds with most of what has been taught on the Second Coming, I don’t wish to cause division and I’m not trying to start a new church or denomination. My purpose is purely to publish a warning and bring it to the attention of as many Christians as possible. The only following I want is people who believe my message and/or take it seriously, and who will help to pass it on. I don’t desire to get into an argument with anybody, though I will defend my position if called upon to do so. I just want to present my message, or, as I might say, "cast my bread upon the waters", and leave it at that.
Unfortunately, when truth collides with error, it does cause division, and there’s no avoiding it. Not all division is evil. But anyone who teaches something that causes division had better be very sure of the truth and importance of what he’s saying. And he better watch the attitude with which he teaches it.
The attitude taken by many Christians is something that I’ve coined a term for: "doctrinal legalism" (I don’t know if anyone else has ever used this term). Doctrinal legalism is the attitude that says, "If you don’t believe exactly as I do, you’re not a Christian", or at least, "If you don’t believe as I do, I can’t accept you and have fellowship with you as a Christian". Or it may say, "If you don’t believe exactly as I do, I’m a better Christian than you are". I think you should be able to see that all these variations on the same theme have one basic sin at their root: pride. It’s the "I’m (or "we are") right and everyone else is wrong" ego trip. Too many Christians are on it, both as individuals and as groups. Yes, Christians can be on collective ego trips. I’ve personally seen several specific cases of it, in what were otherwise good groups. I’ve seen two really good fellowship groups fall apart because of it.
Most "doctrinal legalists" have the idea that you have to have an elaborate belief structure with every doctrine right if you are going to be saved. My own Dad was that way, and it was observing his attitude, and the kind of response it generated, that taught me not to be that way. Actually, it should be obvious to anyone who really knows the Bible that there is very little that you have to believe in terms of concrete doctrinal concepts in order to be saved. In fact, they could all be typed in very little space. I’m just going to list what I believe they are:
The God of the Bible exists: Hebrews 11:6, "…He whom comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him." This, of course, implies believing that the Bible is the Word of God: II Timothy 3:16 & 17, "All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work." You are a sinner: Romans 3:23 "…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God". Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died for your sins and arose from the dead: I Corinthians 15: 3 & 4, "For I delivered unto you, first of all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day, according to the Scriptures". You must repent and be Born Again: John 3:3, "Most assuredly, I say unto you, unless one is Born Again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God"; Acts 2:38: "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." That’s it in a nutshell. That’s all you have to know and believe to become a Christian. (And you can write those five points without quoting the relevant Scriptures, just write the references. This can be done on one side of a 3½" x 5" file card.) We shouldn’t even take legalistic issue with the matter of baptism. If you think that believing anything more is necessary to becoming a Christian, you’re a doctrinal legalist. Of course, there’s much more you have to learn to be an effective, mature Christian. But few of these matters are critical to salvation. It can be said, though, that wrong learning, or failure to learn, can make a disaster of your Christian life. But most of what Christians differ about are secondary issues. If everyone has to have all his doctrines right to be saved, there would be very few people in Heaven. The Bible indicates that there will be many. So what’s to argue about? Actually, there are some grounds for argument that are acceptable causes.
Again, it’s true that believing the wrong things could mess up your Christian life. I’m not including any teaching on it in this booklet (see "Strangers and Pilgrims") but there is too much error taught these days on the subject of prayer, and it could cause a Christian to have a worthless prayer life. And that in turn means a fruitless Christian life period. It is right to take a stand against error of any kind that will cause Christians to be ineffective, or worse, in life and ministry. But there are many issues that are grounds for heated arguments that just aren’t worth arguing about.
Let’s look at the topic of "speaking in tongues". This is a hot topic. It’s my understanding that congregations have been split in two by this one. Is speaking in tongues a legitimate gift of the Holy Spirit or isn’t it? If it is, is every Christian supposed to speak in tongues? Is it true, as I’ve heard some teach, that you’re not saved if you don’t? Or is it true, on the other hand, as I’ve also heard taught, that you’re demon possessed if you do? The only part of this that’s worth bothering with is the teaching that you’re not saved if you don’t. I’m sure it’s wrong, but I can even see how a person might get that out of the Bible. However, the speaking in tongues issue does tend to be an ego-trip problem, especially among those who do. I once heard an otherwise very good Pentecostal pastor say from the pulpit, "I thank God that we’re different (from other Christians)". It was obvious from the way he said it that by different he meant better. Having an attitude like that is nothing but pride and the Bible actually says that pride causes strife. [50]
Concerning gifts of the Holy Spirit generally, I believe that every gift shown in the Bible is available to Christians today. I don’t, however, believe that’s it’s wise for Christians to focus on sign gifts. There are two distinct classes of gifts of the Holy Spirit: Sign gifts, which include tongues, miracles, healing etc., and service gifts, which include teaching, evangelism, prophesy [51] administration, pastoring, etc. The ones to focus on are the service gifts. The signs are supposed to follow Christians.[52] Christians are not to follow the signs, as many do. I do believe that tongues are sometimes a legitimate gift of the Holy Spirit. I have both spoken in and interpreted tongues. But I believe that quite a bit of what I’ve heard in churches that was called speaking in tongues was nothing but emotional gibberish. And I also know for a fact that the devil can and does counterfeit the gift of tongues. It is a one-sided perception of this that probably has caused some Christians to see tongues as a symptom of demon possession. I know a case in point. My recommendation is for the whole church to "chill out" on the whole issue. The "best gifts" that St. Paul referred to in I Corinthians 12:31 are service gifts, not signs.
Then there’s the big dispute between Calvinism vs. Arminianism. That is to say, between the "predestination; once saved-always saved; eternal security" crowd against those who, emphasizing free will, believe that salvation is entirely your decision and that you can easily lose your salvation. Frankly, I don’t believe in either extreme. I mean to say, you can lose your salvation but it won’t be easy, you won’t enjoy doing it and relatively few Christians will. I don’t believe that God predestines anyone to go to Hell [53]. On the other hand, I do believe though, that there is a very small group of Christians, probably less than 1/10 of 1%, that God has special plans for and who are predestined to be saved. However, the Bible, shows that the Holy Spirit works to draw many people to Jesus, especially in response to the prayers of Christians. But I think that for the majority, in the final analysis, salvation is up to them, before and after they get Born Again. Let’s put it this way: after you’re Born Again, you’re eternally secure as long as you want to be. I don’t worry about losing my salvation, and I’m no Calvinist.
For some Christians, especially those who are struggling in their efforts to remain faithful, belief in eternal security can probably help them. But there’s no question in my mind; I’ve known cases of this type, that there are people who have used that belief as license to go out and indulge in all kinds of willful sin while continuing to profess belief in Christ. Like a girl I knew who was sleeping with a different guy every month. You want to tell me she wouldn’t lose her salvation? Or maybe she was never really saved? Maybe you’re right about that. But like the girl in those old hair dye ads whose hairdresser only knew for sure, only God knows for sure. One thing I can tell you is that if you name serious a sin, I can tell you about a Christian who committed it. There’s a Christian saying to the effect that being saved doesn’t stop you from sinning, it only takes the fun out of it. Unfortunately, I can tell you by way of personal confession that being saved doesn’t necessarily even take the fun out of it. But there’s only one person I’ve known in my nearly 29 years of being a Christian that I’m sure was a Born Again Christian (better than me at one time) whom I’m sure lost his salvation.
I’ll call him K.L. During the height of the Jesus Movement in the New York area, K.L. was an on-fire Christian. And a very effective one. To my knowledge, four men that he led to Christ went on to become ordained ministers. One of them is currently one of the best known pastors in the Greater New York area. If we are to know true Christians by their fruit, he certainly passed the test. But unless something has happened that I don’t know about, I’m sure that K.L. is either in Hell or well on his way there. (I think I’d have heard from him if he’d changed.) To make a long story short, (this is information gained first hand), K.L. committed a serious sin, and, because of the circumstances, refused to admit that it was a sin. God’s chastisement fell on him because of it, and his Christian life began to come apart. Instead of repenting and getting right with God, he blamed God for his troubles, and fell away completely. The last I knew of him, he was a homeless alcoholic and drug addict on the streets of downtown Brooklyn. No drunkard or drug user inherits the Kingdom of God. I might add that after he fell away, he was offered a golden opportunity to repent and get his life together. He refused, persisting in blaming God for his problems, which by the way is the sin of blasphemy. Far from thanking them, he abused the people who tried to help him. I was one of them. See Hebrews 6:4-8 and 10:26-31. I might add that when I last knew him, he was in much worse condition overall than before he became a Christian. See II Peter 2:20. All these Scriptures were being fulfilled in K. L.’s life.
The point is, it may be possible for you to lose your salvation. But if you are saved and you are careful and persistent in living a life of obedient faith, (as the Bible frequently tells us to do) what does it matter whether or not you can lose your salvation? If you do what the Bible says and keep up the good work, you’re saved no matter what the truth is about this issue. So what’s to argue about? And more than that, why make a big issue out of it and cause division in the Church? I submit to you that if I wonder about anyone’s salvation, it’s the Christian who does just that.
Another doctrine that I’ve heard Christians arguing about, especially in print, is whether or not there’s going to be a Millennium. That is to say, whether there’s going to be a 1000 year reign of Christ on earth after the Tribulation. Frankly, I do believe in it, but I refuse to argue the point. Why? Because it’s not important. The reason the Book of Revelation says so little about it is because it isn’t necessary for us to know about it. As I’ve said in other words earlier in this booklet, the Book of Revelation says a lot about the Great Tribulation. I believe that it is important for us to know about that because we’re going through it. Those of us who survive the beginning of it, that is. But concerning what happens after the Tribulation, the Bible makes it clear that after Christ returns, we’ll always be with Him, [54] regardless of what happens or where. No matter what happens, it will be good. So what’s to argue about? Why make a big issue of it? I’m sure it’s usually just the old "I’m right and everybody else is wrong" ego trip. However, in the case of one man who teaches against it, I’m convinced that his reason is rooted in anti-Semitism. Either way, it’s sin to argue about it.
We must recognize that all this arguing about secondary matters of doctrine is serious disobedience to God. We must remember what Paul said in I Corinthians 1: 10-17, and especially verse 13, "Is Christ divided…?" No, but I’m afraid the Church is, and to a catastrophic degree. I remember that as a child my parents, in the process of telling me about pagan religions, said that Hinduism wasn’t one religion, but many, and telling me that as a criticism of Hinduism. Well, for a contemporary Christian to say that as a criticism of Hinduism is a flagrant case, to use an old metaphor, of "the pot calling the kettle black" . Not that I’m at all sympathetic to Hinduism. But from the standpoint of the present condition of the Church (even when my parents told me that) the criticism isn’t valid. The same criticism can be made against Christianity. One of the priorities of the Christian life, and this goes for both groups and individuals, is that we should be "endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace".[55]
Of all the major religions, the one that has historically had the most unity is Islam, which as a religion is the most dangerous foe of Christianity. Not that the unity has been perfect. There has been plenty of Muslim blood spilled by Muslims. But on the whole, they have kept together to an amazing degree. There are fewer than ten distinct forms of Islam of any importance in the world. Compare that with the hundreds of forms of Christianity in the U.S.A. alone. Part of this is because of a doctrine of Islam that says, in essence, "there is no disagreement in Allah". Frankly, the Bible says almost the same thing in reference to Christ. We should "be of the same mind toward one another" [56]. But Christians have largely ignored this. There’s so much disagreement, so much difference of opinion, that obeying this admonition universally is a practical impossibility. Historically, when Muslims have seen anyone teaching or practicing what they consider to be a serious departure from the truth, if at all possible, they’ve launched a "jihad" and put a stop to it. Actually, the Roman Catholic Church has fought wars [57] against what they considered heretical groups, and they used to burn heretics at the stake. Most people today would condemn them for that, but they weren’t always wrong. Let me give you an example of what I mean.
Back in the mid 16th Century, John Calvin was running his "Geneva Commune", a combined church and state, in Switzerland. One day a man came to him from Italy, asking for religious asylum. He said that he’d been sentenced to burn as a heretic in Italy, but had escaped with the help of some rich friends. Something about what he gave as the reasons for the sentence made Calvin suspicious. So he sent some spies to Italy to investigate the matter and find out exactly why the man had been sentenced to death. When his spies reported back the real reason, John Calvin finished the Roman Catholic Church’s work for them. Which is to say, he had the man burned at the stake. Why? The man had published an anonymous booklet in which he had denied the deity of Jesus Christ. That is to say, he denied that Jesus is the Son of God. But the Church had investigated and found out who the author was. That man was the spiritual equivalent of an Old Testament false prophet (the same is true of modern theologians who don’t believe the Bible.) By the Bible, he deserved to die. As long as the Church and the State were one, Calvin did the right thing executing him. And this is sound doctrine, regardless of how much apostate Christians might disagree. There are many areas of belief wherein Christians today disagree with Christians wherein they are also disagreeing with the Bible, both in the position they’re taking (like opposition to capital punishment - God decreed it both long before and long after Moses [58]) and in the very fact that they are arguing. Christians should be able have the unity without any "jihad". But I believe that it is to some extent fortunate that the Church as a whole doesn’t have the authority to enforce unity today. We don’t need another edition of the Holy Roman Empire. We’ve already seen what happens when error is entrenched at the top.
There is just one thing in terms of doctrine that I think is worth arguing about, and that is the issue of what’s going to happen to Christians before the Second Coming. But only because I believe that we’re going through the Tribulation, and there have been so many different things taught and believed. I’m writing this series of booklets and doing this whole ministry, in a sense, to argue about it. The reason is this, and I can’t stress how much I believe this or how serious I think it is. Much of what has been taught previously about the Second Coming is wholly or partially wrong. (Note: I don’t say that it’s all wrong.) Some, in fact, is sheer nonsense, and some is giving Christians dangerously false expectations. I am convinced that any Christians who hasn’t heard what I consider to be the truth is at the very least in for a terrible surprise.
I’m talking about a series of catastrophes in which over two thirds of the human race will be wiped out. I’m talking about a period of from 5 to 7 years in which the survivors of the initial catastrophes will experience suffering that in most places will be equivalent to the suffering of the Jews during the Holocaust. I’m talking about a period of time in which a series of awesome events will bring an end to history as we’ve known it. Every Christian needs to know about it. Again, that’s why the Book of Revelation in particular, and the Bible as a whole, says so much about it. And it doesn’t matter who a Christian hears it from. I’m not even trying to monopolize the message. I’ll be thanking God for everyone who picks up on it and repeats it. One of the Scripture verses that I consider a doctrinal pillar of this ministry is Luke 21:35, where Jesus says, "For it (by my understanding , the Great Tribulation) will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth". That includes Christians. There’s nothing in the passage to suggest that it doesn’t. I’m trying to make the surprise a little less terrible for those who will listen. Christians don’t need to believe what I say right now. If I’m right, they’ll believe it well enough when they see it happen. If I’m wrong, hearing it but not believing won’t hurt them a bit. To my way of thinking, it’s their knowing about it that’s important. The only part of my message that Christians should, in my estimation, take seriously in the here and now (and most won’t) is what I say in the "Strangers and Pilgrims" section. They’ll take it seriously then. Especially the "Going Through The Fire" part. Because they’ll be in the fire. See Zechariah 13:9.
6. SO WHAT ABOUT BEING READY?
At the start of this booklet, I said that most Christians won’t be ready when the Great Tribulation begins. The bitter truth is, just being a Born Again Christian isn’t enough to make you ready. There’s Scriptural reason to believe that you can even be convinced that you’re a "Spirit-filled" Christians, speaking in tongues and all, and yet not be ready. That’s an idea that I know some Christians find offensive. I’ve seen one Christian get red-faced angry about it. But when you consider that Jesus gave His warnings about being ready directly to His disciples, you have to see that it’s true. Actually, there has to be some kind of consciousness about this among Christians. If you’ve been a Christian anything close to as long as I have, you may remember that there was a big contemporary Christian music hit back around 1970, recorded by Larry Norman, entitled "I Wish We’d All Been Ready". The song was about how bad things will be (viewed, for artistic purposes, in the past tense) during the Tribulation and recognizing that some Christians do go through it. Again, just within this past year, I was in a Christian meeting where the speaker was telling his audience that they had to be ready for Christ’s Coming. But he didn’t say a word about what to do. I don’t think he really knew. I don’t believe that the guy who wrote and sang the song knew either. I don’t think most Christians know. But I think I do know. And this is supplemented by my knowing what Christian’s should do after the Tribulation starts.
Beyond all my writing about the Great Tribulation and related subjects, I’m a Bible Teacher. And bringing my exceptional intelligence to that ministry, in the course of my years of teaching and writing I’ve come up with many significant insights that I’ve either never heard anyone else teach, or that I never heard taught by anyone else until after I’d taught them. For example, over 15 years ago, as a result of Bible Study and Christian experience, I concluded that practicing forgiveness toward our fellow man is one of the most important aspects of the Christian life. And that to the point that failure to practice unconditional, from-the-heart forgiveness can make a disaster of your Christian life. I’d been teaching about that for several years without having heard anyone else teach it, when I happened to read Pat Robertson’s book, "The Secret Kingdom". In that book, he said exactly what I’d been teaching,. He said that he thought it was very important and that he was surprised that other pastors weren’t teaching it more often. And that’s not the only time that I’ve heard someone else teach some significant truth that I’d been teaching after having discovered it through my own study of the Bible.
One thing I teach is not to be concerned with material preparations. There are several reasons why not. First of all, the Tribulation is going to last at least, I believe, 5 years. (Because of what Jesus said in Matthew 24:22, among other reasons, I’m sure it won’t actually last a full seven years.) Whatever material preparations the average person might be able to make won’t, even under "ideal" conditions last for more than a few months. There have been a number of science fiction-type stories written about people who made similar material preparations, not for the Tribulation, but for nuclear war, which would be somewhat equivalent. Those stories, however fictitious, have done a good job of illustrating just how futile such preparations can be. By the way, although I think that there will be nuclear weapons used later on in the Tribulation, nuclear holocaust will not be a major feature of the Tribulation. [59] But what will happen will be in some ways worse. Then again, even if it would help, suppose you made material preparations, stockpiled food, water, clothing, medical supplies, etc. and then Jesus tarried. Frankly this has happened to people I’ve known who were sure the Tribulation was about to start. They made fools of themselves. Actually, things like this have happened many times. And I think it’s a very bad testimony. (See my essay, "Report on the Stupider Effect".) I have a book in my possession by a Christian who believes in the Post-Tribulation Rapture. But his idea of helping Christians to be ready is to give them a bunch of survival tips that sound like they came right out of the "Whole Earth Catalogue". If that guy really thinks that knowing all that stuff is being ready, I feel sorry for him. The Bible makes it very clear that only spiritual preparation will help in the long run.
The key passage for this, amazingly, is not in the Book of Revelation, but rather in the Book of Psalms. Psalm 91, to be precise. The opening words of the Psalm present the concept of the benefits of spiritual preparedness: "He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide (read, "survive") under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord; He is my refuge and fortress". The psalmist is saying that it is through the Lord’s protection, obtained by staying close to Him, that he will survive the Tribulation. He’s declaring his intention to depend on the Lord for protection. Period! Further down in the Psalm is a prophecy that I believe most Christians consider to be a metaphor for being under God’s general protection: "A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand , but it shall not come near you. Only with your eyes shall you look and see the reward of the wicked" (verses 7 & 8). I believe that during the Tribulation this prophecy will be fulfilled dead literal! The Bible shows that within the first year of the Tribulation about 2/3 of the human race will be wiped out. That’s over 4 billion casualties (4 thousand million to the British). But there are going to be Christians within the areas of otherwise total annihilation who won’t even be scratched. They won’t be scratched because they will be ready and God will protect them. Although this Psalm has a specific interpretation as a prophecy of the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ, it is equally, if not more so, a prophecy about what happens during the Tribulation to the Christians who are ready.
So the question is, first of all, are you ready? Let me give you a check list relevant to what I think it takes to be ready. I’m going to ask a few questions for you to answer for yourself. If you can’t answers "yes" to most of these questions, you can bet your salvation that you aren’t ready.
1. Do you usually spend a minimum of one hour (total-not all at once) a day in prayer?
2. If the answer to the first question is yes, is the majority of your prayer time spent interceding for others?
3. Do you also usually spend a minimum of one hour a day reading, studying, and meditating on the Scriptures (and I mean the Scriptures, directly, as opposed to other "inspirational literature")?
4. Do you give time on a regular basis to doing something that involves being a servant to your fellow Christians? (And I didn’t say or mean being a servant to the unsaved, I said and meant being a servant to your fellow Christians.)
5. Do you avoid any regular reading of fiction of any kind (including so-called Christian fiction)? [60]
6. Do you avoid regularly listening to any kind of popular, secular music?
7. Do you avoid watching anything but the news and educational or Christian programs on TV?
8. Do you tithe and then some?
9 Do you, from your heart, automatically forgive anyone who does anything wrong to you?
10. Do you avoid regularly indulging in secular entertainment, sports or "the arts" generally?
As stated, if you can’t answer "yes" to at least most of these questions, you can bet that you aren’t ready. Now I’m sure that many people who read this are thinking at this point that I’m being legalistic. If you are, then in my opinion that shows how lawless you are, and you should realize that the Bible associates lawlessness with the spirit of Antichrist. The Bible shows that Jesus Christ didn’t set us free to indulge in sin. He set us free to be righteous. [61] He set us free to be separate from the world. [62] Any Christian who doesn’t take these truths seriously, and act on them, isn’t going to be ready, no matter how "Spirit-filled" he thinks he is. If you think these questions are too legalistic, you almost certainly aren’t ready. You need to repent and get your Christian life together.
There are concrete Scriptural grounds for everything in that list. Again, anybody who thinks I’m going too far with that is showing me that he is seriously lacking in wisdom and understanding in the knowledge of God. But then, that’s all too common among Christians today. That’s part of the reason why I don’t expect this message to ever be popular, nor do I ever expect to make any money with it. Believe me, it is possible to preach a message that’s very popular. All you have to do is learn the art of telling people what they want to hear. It’s also possible to write "Christian" books and make big bucks. I’m sure that Robert Schuller has made a fortune with his books. But then I think he’s the number 1 "ear tickler" in the United States today. [63] And by the way, if you’re one of the many Christians today that think that he (and/or his predecessor, the late Dr. Norman Vincent Peale), is a great man of God, you’re really in trouble. "Possibility thinking" and "positive thinking" are both sorcery dressed up in Christian terminology. I’m confident that Dr. Peale is very hot right now, and not in terms of popularity either. And unless Schuller repents, he will be hot that way, too. [64] If you want a chance to be ready for the Tribulation, and you are among their followers, you must renounce their teaching right now, and set yourself to learn the true Gospel. But then again, their followers are among the "Christians" who don’t really expect the Second Coming anyway. So if you are one of them reading this, you probably think I’m off the deep end.
But if you want to have a prayer of really being ready for the Great Tribulation, you better search the Scriptures for yourself to find out just what the Lord really demands ( and I mean demands) of you. You may not realize this, but the Bible shows that God has planned for Christians to do good works, and the Scriptures contain warnings of dire consequences to those Christians who don’t. And I do mean search the Scriptures for yourself. There are some good books out there, and there are some good teachers. But there is also so much error and out-and-out falsehood being taught these days that the only way you can be sure you’re getting the truth is to go straight to the source. Even "devotional booklets" can be dangerous. The people who edit those books sometimes don’t have the theological background to know what is and isn’t sound doctrine, and from time to time even the good ones have something in them that’s really evil. The same thing is true of many "inspirational books". And the more recently they were written, the more likely this is to be true. It’s also true of some contemporary Christian music.
I warn you: even ordained ministers can be seriously deficient in their knowledge of the Bible and may be, as Jesus said of the Pharisees, "teaching as doctrine the commandments of men". [65] Let me give you a real story to show you what I mean. Not many years ago I knew a guy I’ll call C. E. He was a seminary honor student. At the time I knew him he was between his junior and senior year. That means that by normal routine, he was about two years from his ordination. C. E. was reading the works of several major, heavy theologians; writers that only serious students of theology would normally read: Karl Barth, Jurgan Moultman, Deitrich Bonhoeffer, etc. One day I got into a dispute with him about prayer. He said that he didn’t believe that you could make a specific petition to God in prayer and expect Him to grant it. I told him that what he was saying wasn’t in accordance with the Bible [66]. His reply shocked me. He told me that he had never read the Bible. This seminary honor student, soon to be an ordained minister, had literally never opened a Bible and read it. He differs from many ordained ministers in degree, but not in kind. It is possible, yes, easy, for a person to become an ordained minister with very little knowledge of the Scriptures. You can also become an ordained minister without even believing the Bible. That’s why you must go directly to the Bible for yourself if you really want the Truth.
On the other hand, avoid reading fiction of any kind. Fiction" is nothing but a euphemism for "falsehood". Even reading Christian fiction can be dangerous. In fact, it can be more dangerous spiritually than secular fiction. Writers of "Christian" fiction can be theological babies, and they can innocently slip serious doctrinal error into their fiction. C. S. Lewis wrote some of the best Christian fiction that has ever been published. Furthermore, he wrote most of it to express theological ideas that he thought wouldn’t be well received as non-fiction. Some of it is well worth reading and you can learn a lot from it. [67] But in the second and third books of his "Perelandra" science fiction series, he was on the brink of damnable heresy ( See II Peter 2: 1; in this case I mean "heresy" in the normal sense of false doctrine) and slipping over the edge with some of the things he said. (I might note that in saying this I have the affirmation of the Rev. Dr. Michael J. Christensen, who is much more of a scholar than I am, yet who is theologically more liberal than I am, and who is the author of the book, "C. S. Lewis On Scripture".) Lewis’s life ended in sorrow, and I seriously wonder if the reason why was the fact that he wrote those two books. When you do something that’s disobedient, you give the devil a handle on your life. As Lewis said himself, there are sins of the intellect as well as sins of the flesh. In those two novels, I think he unwittingly committed some whoppers. Fiction of any kind is morally and spiritually dangerous to read - or write. I’ve perused some of the current spate of Christian novels, and frankly I consider them garbage both from a spiritual and a literary standpoint. It gives me a chill to see that so many Christians are reading that junk. No, if you really want truth, and you really want to be ready for the Tribulation, get your head into the Bible. And that to the exclusion of anything that you have no practical need to read. And get into prayer.
Having a good prayer life is one of main pillars of the Christian Life. The trouble is, although Christians today do a lot of talking about prayer, it’s my observation, with much support from other sources, that they do relatively little of it. As if that isn’t bad enough, much of what is taught about prayer these days is error. (Remember what my seminary honor student friend said.) I’m going to tell you something about prayer in the "Laodecia Revisited" section of the "Strangers And Pilgrims" booklet. Then, Lord willing, after I’ve completed the four booklets of the basic series, I’m going to write an entire booklet on prayer. I’m a topical teacher, and after the Second Coming, prayer is the topic to which I given the most time in study and teaching. But understand this: Contrary to what is often taught, prayer is basically about asking God for things and expecting to receive what you ask for. [68] Furthermore, your prayer life will be most effective if you make your main concern praying for the needs of others. I am absolutely convinced that anyone who doesn’t make a constant practice of intercessory prayer [69] will not be ready, no matter how much he’s doing right otherwise. More than that, such a person does not have the fullness of the Holy Spirit, no matter how much he "speaks in tongues". As stated previously, although it can be real and I believe that it should be allowed in all churches, [70] a lot of "speaking in tongues" is just emotional gibberish.
By this time, you should have a fairly good idea of where I’m coming from and where I’m going with what I’m saying. But I want you to hear or read it all. So be sure to read all three of the basic booklets of this series, or order the tapes and listen to them. Either way, take it seriously and act on what I say. I’m doing this to warn you, and I seriously believe that you’ll ignore this to your own hurt!!! Remember, I’ve been proven right by history before and I’m confident I will be again - when the Tribulation begins the way I say it will. Jesus REALLY is coming soon. BE READY!!!
The Apostles would have agreed. See Acts 6: 2 Fools who think that the Great Tribulation only affects Israel, or who think that this chapter and the two others like it were fulfilled in 70 AD should think about this verse. Israel can hardly be called "the whole earth". This might lead you to ask why I didn’t graduate from college. That’s a long story, but let me simply say that I don’t think it was the Lord’s will. I have observed, and I have seen another writer ( a very well educated Christian ) saying in so many words, that people who go to college tend to get brainwashed. I’ve had the experience of seeing Bible college graduates who disagreed with me about ordinary doctrinal issues (gifts of the Holy Spirit, in that case) belittle my opinion because I wasn’t a college grad. They totally ignored what I said when I confronted them with the argument that there are graduates of other Bible colleges that hold different doctrinal positions who would agree with me. They were brainwashed. They were also on an ego trip about their education that blinded them to opposing points of view. I believe, as I have said, that the Lord has a special purpose for me - this ministry - and I don’t think He wanted me to get brainwashed. If I’d gotten brainwashed, I might have never come up with the ideas in this message. So He arranged for me to be a drastic failure in college. One of the less fortunate results of our having so much freedom of speech is that people have come to believe that their opinions have value and validity simply because they are their opinions. This is especially true where matters of religion are concerned. Christians are just as guilty of this as anyone else. Most Christians form their doctrinal opinions, especially their opinions about the Second Coming, before they know enough about the Bible to do so intelligently. When they study the Bible (if they ever really do), they are usually just looking for confirmation of and/or more information about what they already believe, and of course they find what they’re looking for. Forming a truly educated opinion about anything in the Bible requires more really open minded study of the Bible than most Christians ever do. An uninformed opinion isn’t worth the breath to express it. It might even be sin. See Isaiah 8: 20. I am eclectic in my use of different translations, and I don’t consider any one of the valid translations necessarily superior to any other. I find that one passage may be better translated in one version, and another passage may be better translated in a different version. In this case, I think the RSV says it best. By the term "valid translation" I mean one that doesn’t play games with the meaning of the original language, as does the one that eliminates the masculine pronouns that apply to God. That is not a valid translation. This is one of the many Scripture passages that is so clear in the original language that no valid translation renders the meaning differently. If John the Baptist was in fact Elijah reincarnated, as some people understand Jesus to have implied in Matthew 17:12. The Bible and Christian theology allow for exceptions to rules. It is a basic belief of the Christian Faith that you cannot achieve the New Birth by your own works. See Ephesians 2:8 & 9. The word "Christ" is transliterated from the Greek kristoV , and is identical in meaning to the Judeo-Christian word "Messiah". The literal meaning is "the anointed one", a reference to the ritual anointing with oil of prophets, priests and kings in the Old Testament. We believe that Jesus was all three. This anointing symbolized a spiritual "anointing" with the Holy Spirit, that is to say, the person anointed receiving the power and presence of God within himself. Used as a proper noun, the term is a title implying a specific mission, that of bringing salvation to Israel. That is why the term is not equivalent to "avatar". Luke 24:41-43, John 20:19. If any Christian reader is having a problem with the way I’m presenting this, please bear with me. I’m being deliberately very general about how I’m saying these things at this point in my writing. I will get far more specific and detailed later on in this series of booklets. There is a third idea about life after death, namely spiritual evolution beyond death, which to my knowledge has no basis in any major religion (except maybe some form of Hinduism), but probably has modern spiritism as its sole source. Since spiritism is full of fraud, this is an exceptionally shaky source. It’s not worth refuting. I Corinthians 15:35-44 Genesis 49:33, etc. Revelation 21:4 There is probably no other Bible prophecy that has had so much obvious fulfillment. It must be noted that God, in so many words, declares the fulfillment of prophecy to be the most significant proof of His own existence. See Isaiah 44: 6-8. Consider also the repeated use of phrases like "Then shall they know that I am the Lord their God" following prophetic statements in the Book of Ezekiel. Matthew 24:27 Actually, they don’t expect it for billions of years. Definition: Referring to last or final things. There were a number of eschatological books (also called "apocalypses") written around the time of Christ, most of which are regarded by scholars as nothing but folklore. These were a group of Church leaders beginning with immediate successors to the Apostles in Christian leadership, such as Polycarp, who was a disciple of St. John, down to St. Augustine of Hippo. Their writings tell us much about the early history of Christianity and also helped (and still do) to shape the theology of the Christian Faith. Off the southwestern coast of Turkey, north of the island of Rhodes in the Aegean Sea. It presently belongs to Greece, and a Greek Orthodox monastery now stands on the site of the grotto where John is believed to have received the Revelation. Frankly, I don’t claim by any means to know what all of the Book of Revelation means. But I’m absolutely certain that I know the true meaning of what I claim to understand. I’ll trust the Lord for the rest. Def. Abandonment of the basic doctrines of the Christian faith. This is very widespread in the Church today. A specific example is the tolerance of homosexuality in the Church, even to the point of allowing "gays" to be ordained as clergy. This kind of tolerance may seem good in the sight of men, but it is an abominable sin in the sight of God. See Leviticus 20:13. See Isaiah 24:19-23. The entire passage supports this idea. Haggai 2:22 Psalm 2:1-6. This is not directly stated in the Bible but can be inferred from passages that refer to the Battle of Armageddon. See Joel 3: 9-13. For the record: Although there has been much use of the term "Millenium" outside the Biblical context in recent years, the concept comes from the original prediction of Christ’s 1000 year earthly reign in Revelation 20:1-7. There is no Millenium apart from the reign of Christ.
Note: There has been much argument about whether or not there really will be a Millenium. For more information on this, see chapter 5.
I have heard that this allegation was originally made by the "prophet" Mohammed. Such was his background that he couldn’t have known much about the Bible. See "The Great Arab Conquests", by John Baggot Glubb, Quartet Books, 1980. Encyclopedia Britannica (see the article on the Bible, "Textual Criticism" section), Microsoft Encarta 97, The Catholic Encyclopedia, etc. The one major exception I know of is the New World Translation used by the Watchtower Society, a.k.a. The Jehovah’s Witnesses. It’s not a valid translation. See Joshua 10 :13 & II Samuel 1: 17 & 18. Popular Mechanics magazine, December 1996, page 40. http://popularmechanics .com op. Cit. For those not familiar with the location of Mt. Ararat, the mountain, and region, are located in eastern Turkey. See Isaiah 64:6 See Ephesians 2: 8 & 9. II Timothy 3:16 I’ve found in my study of the Bible that this kind of error is all too common. The Bible sometimes does lose something in translation. That’s why anyone who is going to teach or preach should have some knowledge of the original languages. Some of my Christian readers may dislike the fact that I refer to the Christian Faith as a religion. It is popular, and not altogether wrong, among Evangelicals especially, to deny that Christianity is a religion. While I understand their feelings, and I know there is good reason for it, at the same time it is well-meant but foolish Christian double talk to deny that Christianity is a religion, and serves little purpose. It would be better to say that the Christian Faith is more than a religion. True Christianity is a personal relationship with God. Probably under the guidance of St. Peter. Luke 24:13. The "road to Emmaus" was also the road to the seaport of Joppa (now called Jaffa). Slipping out in two’s and three’s is a time-honored tactic for groups of people to secretly escape from a dangerous situation. I believe that I read about this some years ago in a Reader’s Digest article, written by the actor. The title of the article may have been something like, "I was Monty". Acts 9: 1-8 Luke 12:47 & 48. Like what happens in eternity to people who have never heard about Jesus. It is impossible to disprove the existence of God by argument. No one can know enough to be able to say from empirical knowledge that God doesn’t exist. On the other hand, although it can be said that testimonies don’t constitute proof of the existence of God, they certainly constitute evidence. And there are tens of millions of people who can sincerely testify to actually knowing Jesus. More than you would expect can honestly claim to have actually seen Him! Others, including yours truly, can honestly claim visions and/or prophetic dreams, miraculous healings, and all kinds of miracles otherwise. Beyond that, many can simply claim inner peace, strength, and joy that defies explanation. By all honest standards of argument, the weight of evidence is on our side. Microsoft Encarta 97 Encyclopedia. See article on Christianity. This disagreement is particularly obvious in, but by no means limited to, beliefs about the Second Coming of Christ. Proverbs 13:10. And therefore, division. Yes, prophecy is a service gift, but true prophecy is inspired teaching more than foretelling the future. Again, many who call themselves prophets are nothing but fortune tellers. Avoid them. Mark 16:17 Hell wasn’t created for humans. See Matthew 25:41. I Thessalonians 4:17 & 18. Ephesians 4:3 Romans 12:16. The biggest of these were the Crusades. Although they are widely condemned by both Christian and secular writers and teachers, it can be shown from history that the Crusades as a whole were a massively provoked counterattack. Although I don’t justify the way they were conducted, I believe that launching the Crusades was totally justified and in fact had to be done. Islam has historically been the most belligerent religion that has ever existed. But this is one aspect of history that most Christians know nothing about. I honestly believe that the Battle of Armageddon will be between Christ and the Muslims. See Genesis 9: 6 & 7, and Ezekiel 13:19 As I said in my original "BABEL RISING!" tape, a nuclear war would leave the earth so contaminated with radioactivity that it would be uninhabitable. Since there will be, I believe, flesh and blood life on earth during the Millennium, God will not allow that to happen. Notice that I used the word "avoid", not "totally abstain." I giving you some space to let your conscience and the Holy Spirit guide you. But I honestly think that Jesus would be stricter. See Matthew 5: 17-20. That passage isn’t about righteousness by faith. See Romans chapter 6. See II Corinthians 6:14-18. See II Timothy 4: 3 & 4. See James 3:1. Matthew 15:9. Matthew 7: 7 & 8, John 16:24, Hebrews 4:16, James 5: 17 & 18, etc. Especially "The Screwtape Letters" , "Pilgrims Regress", and "The Great Divorce". John 16:24, Matthew 7: 7 & 8. There’s a false teaching I’ve heard that says you aren’t praying intercessory prayer unless you’re speaking in tongues. It’s a silly error, derived from some very sloppy Bible scholarship. The key Scripture for this is Romans 8: 26 & 27. This verse, however, is an encouraging revelation of the work of the Holy Spirit; not a teaching on prayer. This can be seen by correctly interpreting the Greek word alaletos translated, "cannot be uttered" (NKJV). This word means that the groanings cannot be spoken in any language, period! Intercessory prayer is going to the Lord in prayer on behalf of another person. Period. It has nothing in particular to do with tongues. I Corinthians 14:39. Additional copies of this booklet, plus additional booklets, essays and tapes can be obtained from the address below:
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My reply for you morgan, would be: And you ARE ?
Simply I won't complete to the answer because most of the people knows who you are, some facist fanatic. sorry to say so but your post is totally racist
Posts: 1022 | From: cairo | Registered: Oct 2005
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