When you were a child, did you ever play “king of the hill”? That’s like what is being played out in the Middle East today. But it is not child’s play; it’s a deadly game with worldwide consequences.
War and peace, life and death hang in the balance of this contest for control of the Temple Mount. As we’ve seen, much blood has been shed in modern times over the Temple Mount feud. Things aren’t getting better, but worse, because neither the Islamics nor the Jews will follow what the true God said about the matter. All sides are determined to do what Psalms 2:1–3 says:
Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.
The United Nations, the European Union, the United States, the Palestinian Authority, Israel, and everybody else are all determined to do what is right in their own eyes. This has always been fallen man’s fatal flaw. From the people before the Flood of Noah’s time, to Nimrod and the tower of Babel, to Israel’s decision not to take the land from the inhabitants at the time God directed it to do so, to Ehud Barak offering the Temple Mount to Arafat for the sake of peace—everybody has wanted to do it his or her own way, not God’s way. The result is that rather than things getting better and better, as the evolutionists tell us, things are getting worse and worse, as the Bible says: “But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived” (2 Timothy 3:13). The Temple Mount in Jerusalem will continue to draw violence until Christ returns at the end of Armageddon.
War Workers
Looking at the issues of war and peace surrounding Jerusalem and Palestine in recent years, we notice an absence of all-out war. Some would call this a positive sign of improvement over the war woes of previous decades.
While there has been an absence of all-out war, however, no true observer of the Mideast situation can honestly proclaim that the region has had real peace. The fact is, the attempts to control the violence since the last major conflict—the Persian Gulf War—and the War on Terrorism following the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks of September 11, 2001 have acted like a pressure-cooker lid for the region. The Middle East is indeed a cauldron. Unfortunately, the false peace makers (the international community, including the U.S.) have been able to do nothing to do away with the causes of the trouble building between Israel and its aggressive Arab-Islamic radical neighbors. That’s because the problems are supernatural at their roots; they are satanic.
Threats of all-out war surrounding and involving Israel have been in the headlines for years. Most recently we think of Syria and the possibilities of war being ignited by the battle to oust Bashar Al Assad as the country’s dictator/president. Consider the tremendous dangers building within the Israeli/Iranian confrontation over Iran’s nuclear weapons program.
Added to this are the boiling anxieties and turmoil initiated when the Muslim Brotherhood, under the false promises of the Arab Spring eruptions, ousted Hosni Mubarak from Egyptian leadership. All the while, the many enemies surrounding the Jewish state remain resolute about erasing Israel from the map. As a matter of fact, maps used by many of the Arab nations have no references outlining or even mentioning Israel.
A time will come, the Bible says, when those who work to agitate for war will cause God’s anger to bring judgment: “God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth; the Lord revengeth, and is furious; the Lord will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserveth wrath for his enemies” (Nahum 1:2). He will take vengeance on those who come against His people, to whom He gave the land of promise—which includes the Temple Mount.
Stormy Islamics
The storm of rage has been building since Israel no longer seems willing to give away land and other concessions with nothing given by Palestinian adversaries in return. There seems little Israel’s Palestinian enemies can now achieve by continuing with a negotiating process for a peace they don’t want anyway.
Up until the year 2000, Arafat and company had reason to come to the peace table and at least pretend an interest in peace. A steady stream of concessions flowed to them with little effort on their part. They finally got an Israeli-free territory, being allowed to have a Palestinian armed police force of more than thirty thousand.
Things changed once this was achieved. Arafat refused Barak’s seemingly insane offer of the Temple Mount and many other concessions. If Arafat had accepted Barak’s offer, many observers believe the PLO chairman would have been assassinated by his own people, as was Anwar Sadat following his peace treaty with Menachem Begin.
Most observers believed, also, that once the PLO and the Islamic radicals got all they could at the peace table, the hardball issues would have to be addressed—issues like border determinations, water rights, bringing Palestinian refugees back to disputed territories, the ultimate status of Samaria and Judea, and, of course, the sovereignty over Jerusalem.
Sovereignty over Jerusalem includes control of the Temple Mount and the authority to make arrangements for access to it. Corridors for pilgrims to the holy sites must be maintained. These corridors must be arranged so as not to cross opposition territory. For Israel’s foes in the region to accept a final settlement would mean the Islamic radicals would have no further claims. This they will never agree to accept.
The so-called Middle East peace process between Israel and the Muslim forces of the nations surrounding the tiny Jewish state has been ongoing for decades. These are Arab nations, and all contain fiery Islamist fanaticism that openly declares that Israel must be destroyed. John Loeffler, an observer/commentator of that peace process, frames, in an all-encompassing thought, the seeming hopelessness of the situation:
Everyone also realized that once the peace process played out, the Arabs would have no further incentive to remain at the negotiating table and behave themselves, leaving a new round of war(s) as the only remaining option. The act of accepting a final agreement would force the Arabs to relinquish any future claims on the Israeli state, its people, and the very existence of Israel itself. It would be final; the events begun in 1947–48 would be over. In the world’s eyes, the Arabs would lose all “legitimacy” for further struggle.[i]
Israeli Retaliations
No matter how vicious the attacks by the terrorists against the people of Israel, when that nation responds with force, the world news organizations and world community declare the response to be overreaction.
There are almost always sympathetic voices for the Palestinian aggressors who throw stones and Molotov cocktails, and even for those who fire with heavy-caliber weapons upon Israeli forces. It is amazing to watch as a bully attacks someone who is trying to live in peace, then hear an entirely different report on what you are witnessing. Instead of reporting that the fighting has been started by the Palestinian troublemakers, the world news reports invariably imply that Israeli forces brutalize their victims with overwhelming military power.
For example, on Sunday, May 30, 2010, a fleet of six flotillas set sail from Cyprus for the Gaza strip, carrying pro-Palestinian activists and humanitarian aid to the area. Included in that fleet was the Mavi Mara, a Turkish cruise liner chartered by IHH, a group that, in addition to performing humanitarian efforts, also supports radical Islamic terrorist networks, including Hamas.[ii] Israel and the Israeli navy gave numerous warnings to the fleet prior to setting sail, as well as during the journey. They also offered an alternative plan for the fleet to dock at Ashod, where cargo could be inspected and then transferred by land. The fleet defied these warnings and instead attempted to break the Israeli naval blockade.
The next day, the Israel Defense Force (IDF) decided to board the flotillas and force them to redirect to Ashod. Five were boarded without incident; however, when IDF soldiers attempted to board the Mavi Mara, they were met with violent attacks by Palestinian activists wielding clubs, knives, and a gun—with all of the activity supported by video evidence. IDF soldiers returned fire, killing nine activists. Seven IDF soldiers were also wounded.[iii]
The incident was characterized in nearly every major news network as a brutal attack on humanitarian aid workers by Israeli forces, provoking international condemnation. In September 2011, the United Nations published a report of its findings about the incident. The report exonerated Israel, but not without characterizing the incident as “excessive and unreasonable.”[iv] Again, nearly every major news headline emphasized the description “excessive and unreasonable” rather than highlighting the exoneration.
Israel is not without fault, of course. The Israeli military has no doubt been brutal at times in use of force. But, only in cases of defensive-oriented, preemptive action has Israel struck at its neighbors first.
Israel might be back in the land of promise in unbelief, but it seems to take the Lord at His word in the matter of self-defense. Considering the history of the nation’s hostile neighbors, heeding God’s advice has been very wise indeed!
New World Order Builders
The prophet Nahum’s words more and more seem written to describe our time:
The good man is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brother with a net.
That they may do evil with both hands earnestly. (Micah 7:2–3a)
It does appear from events in our nation and around the world that there aren’t many good people left. The brutality people inflict upon each other is widespread and extremely troubling. This is one of the excuses those who want to build a new world order use to justify their desire to control all people. The one-world builders say they have answers to all the violence and brutality.
If everyone could become equal in every way, then jealousies, envies, hatreds, and all the other factors that cause trouble would be eliminated. In this way, mankind would again achieve a degree of goodness that has been lost, they apparently believe. Fighting at every level, robberies, murders, and all the rest would be eliminated in their perfect world order. Everyone would have the same status in life, thus everybody would be content.
Of course, the one-world-order builders would have a higher position than the rest of us, as they govern their better world. This means they would not be subject to the same limitations as we worker bees. They would have the Rolls Royces and the private jets, etc.
This proposition is preposterous! God’s Word says: “And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is, God” (Luke 18:19). Until Christ changes a person from within, that person’s sin nature remains unchanged. People never can be transformed by mankind’s institutions and social architecture. Still, the one-worlders dream and plan and plot, determined to bring us to a time like it was at the tower of Babel (se Genesis 11).
“Global governance” is a term put into our language by the new-world-order crowd meaning that it is not one world government they seek, but authority over all national governments. They want to operate, at least at first, like the U.S. government. A “federal” system of government is what they want at first. The global governance would have top priority over any decision, law, or regulation of any nation. There would be a judicial or legal system that could override any nation’s court.
The one-worlders want a controlling authority over every aspect of life, including economic, judicial, social, technological, ecological, and military matters. No doubt, they want to control religion also. And they especially want to appease the most vicious elements of those who hate Israel. Despite agitations by Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, and other terrorist groups stirring the Palestinian people to violence, the UN and the would-be, one-world controllers demand that Israel not retaliate. The—supposedly—most intelligent, best-informed globalist leaders make these demands, yet it is plain to most everyone else that the radical Islamics have no interest in reasoning together. They can be appeased only if Israel is driven into the Mediterranean Sea.
Nonetheless, Jerusalem and the Temple Mount are seen as the trigger to nuclear Armageddon. The fanatics must be appeased at all costs. Unfortunately, President Barack Obama has proved to be caught up in the appeasement as of this writing.
Peace Perpetrators
The globalists want peace at any price—that is, as long as it doesn’t cut into their perks or benefits. The one-world architects are like the people in high authority described in the book of Micah:
The prince asketh, and the judge asketh for a reward; and the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire: so they wrap it up.
The best of them is as a brier: the most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge. (Micah 7:3b–4a)
Everyone will have to make sacrifices for the cause of world peace—everyone, that is, except them. Israel is under terrific pressure to yield to the demands of the international community. The internationalists want peace at all costs in the Middle East so that the oil will continue to flow freely to the Western industrialized governments, which fund their big plans.
Undoubtedly, some within the globalist movement want genuine peace—for genuinely compassionate reasons. But the movement itself is geared toward achieving power by stepping on the backs, heads, and bodies of anyone who gets in their way.
The ultimate globalist will be Antichrist. The Bible says “by peace [he will] destroy many” (Daniel 8:25). The world’s last dictator will gather to himself all the power he can in order to enforce global peace. But, it will not be true peace; it will be the ultimate war on individual freedoms—and it will result in the greatest world war in history: Armageddon.
Energy Villains
Technology has forged ahead dramatically in most every field except one. The world still depends upon petroleum to produce the fuel that runs industry and transportation.
Have you wondered why, despite all the progress in other areas, we still have the internal combustion engine that burns fossil fuels at a tremendous rate? Why has a practical solar-battery-powered engine not been produced? Or why don’t we have a safe, efficient, nuclear-powered car that runs every bit as well as the internal combustion motor?
The “green energy,” liberal-minded environmentalists have managed to siphon billions of dollars of U.S. taxpayer funding into their useless machinery. The Obama administration has channeled funding into these totally failed efforts, only to turn around and channel more funds into more failed green energy debacles. It’s as if an insanity has set in at the highest governmental levels. These “public servants” spend our hard-earned greenbacks, but produce no-yield, green-energy alternatives.
There is no answer that I or others have been able to determine except this: The powers that be have so much invested in the internal combustion engine that they are not willing to abandon it or even phase it out.
The money powers also have great economic interests tied up in oil around the world. Weaning people from the gas guzzlers would be cutting the money powers’ economic throats.
There are answers beyond that, however—supernatural ones. Satan, the prince of the power of the air, this earthly realm, knew from the beginning that the shortage of fossil fuels would eventually bring the showdown in the Middle East. The serpent still has his cunning ways. He appeals to the minds of men, tempting them with the world’s riches the Lord Jesus Christ refused on the Mount of Temptation.
The top money powers of the world will not cut into their profits and develop new fuels and engines to power the industrialized world. That is, they will not do so until the petroleum reserves are so low that they must do so in order to continue their profitable ways. By the time the reserves are that low, however, it might be too late. Every petroleum interest will be looking for the same, dwindling source. Because of the great reserves from the time after the Fall in the Garden of Eden, the place of that dwindling source will be the Middle East.
God will gather these money powers to Armageddon. It is likely He will use their greed and the oil fields of the Middle East to bring them together for the feast He is going to provide for the scavenging birds and beasts to enjoy. Bringing them to the valley of Megiddo will not be an act of cruelty on God’s part; it will be His righteous judgment on a wicked people like those described in Micah 6:10–12:
Are there yet the treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, and the scant measure that is abominable?
Shall I count them pure with the wicked balances, and with the bag of deceitful weights?
For the rich men thereof are full of violence, and the inhabitants thereof have spoken lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth.
The globalists will have worked their lies and appeasing ways to the harm of God’s chosen people, Israel. Vengeance is the Lord’s! (See Romans 12:19.)
American Apathy
With the tremendous upheavals taking place around the world, America’s people as a whole seemed not to notice at all—that is, not until September 11, 2001. That was indeed a 911 call to us all. When those gleaming, towering buildings collapsed and the huge Pentagon complex was struck a devastating blow, our attention instantaneously turned to the reality all around us. Suddenly, our luxurious, unmatched way of life was threatened.
Our richly blessed culture exceeds that of any that has ever existed. Do you have trouble believing that? Did Alexander the Great have a TV set? Did Cleopatra have central heat and air? Did Julius Caesar have a microwave oven, a refrigerator, or a laptop? Considering even just the technological blessings of this generation of Americans, ours is the most blessed ever.
So…what’s the point?
The point is that the very blessings we enjoy today make American people the most pampered. History has shown that pampered people are headed down a one-way path to decline and fall. Historian Edward Gibbons in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire recounts precisely the point that ease of life brings about the death of a culture.
The Romans, from the time of Christ’s birth until the empire ceased to be in the AD 400s, went deeper and deeper into self-serving pleasures. Their leisure time greatly increased, and they filled it with every form of entertainment their wicked minds could imagine. Such has been the fate of every culture that achieved leisurely contentment.
Even the hard-working men and women of America can come home and throw their feet up on their recliners’ footrests and get lost in nightly TV entertainment of every sort. (My apologies to the wonderful mothers of America, whose work never seems to allow such leisure.)
So, again, what’s the point? Such leisure is a mighty tool in Satan’s hand. We are examining here the cauldron of war and peace. Appeasement of the American people comes in the form of tremendous blocks of leisure time. Apathy, or the “who cares?” attitude, is the result of self-absorbed living.
Americans today are appeased, as far as attitudes about issues of war and peace are concerned. We choose leaders who promise to make our lives of leisure better. Voters simply don’t care about the other issues very much. They often choose leaders whose characters and activities are very bad indeed. Character, as we’ve been told time and time again, just doesn’t matter. But, God’s Word says otherwise. Leaders with upside-down thinking can lead a people down the path to decline and fall. Hitler is one such leader who comes to mind.
The point is, then: America’s apathy has led to choosing bad leaders in the past. Other nations at other times have chosen leaders of terribly flawed character. The results have been, in many cases, that those nations turned against God’s chosen people, the Jews, to one degree or the other. No matter how haughty, high-minded, or technologically sophisticated a nation becomes, God says He will bring such a people down.
It is reasonable to wonder: Has the Lord, because of the way Israel is being treated internationally and because of the anti-God attitude prevalent today, begun to deal in judgment with America and the more financially privileged nations of the world?
Financial crisis exploded in 2008 with the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the banking problems that followed. Since that time, America has seen its national debt climb into the trillions of dollars, some believing that we are as of this writing headed toward more than $140 trillion in debt. This means that there is no hope for America to survive as the nation we have known it to be, if the figure is correct. As a matter of fact, the entire world of finance will have to be completely changed at some point to reconstruct any semblance of economic sanity.
Such apathy and disregard for godly direction one day, perhaps soon, will lead to America and the rest of the world turning to the ultimate Jew-hater, Antichrist. He will seek to get rid of everyone who dares to oppose his devilish plans to make all people worship him as God. Antichrist’s regime will be a completely dominating economic order. (Read 2 Thessalonians 2 and Revelation 13.
TO BE CONTINUED
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