Is God's Judgment Upon America?

All that follows I will preface with, “I believe.” I am not attempting to establish theology for anyone or to declare that anyone who does not agree with me is a heretic. I am merely sharing my beliefs, grounded on study and prayer, since my opinion has been solicited on this topic more than once.

Many Christians today bring every conversation back to, “Do you think these are the last days?”

This may be based on a personal reading of the Book of Revelation in the Bible. It could be based on the broadcast sermons and teachings of any number of professional End Times preachers who have built careers on pointing to an apocalypse around the corner.

The signs of the times are always easy to read they just aren’t so easy to interpret. Nero was the Antichrist as was Diocletian, King James II, Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao. False Prophets have equally abounded from the Pope to Martin Luther, from Henry VIII to Rasputin to Jim Jones.

Read more here.

Psalm 12:8 Illustrated Yet Once Again

11/08/2012 - James White

The light Tuesday's election cast on the degradation of Western culture's expression in the United States should not have surprised us. But we still hope for some restraint, some sign that God will restrain the madness of men rushing to destroy everything that is good and holy and just. But what did we see? An open lesbian elected to the United States Senate. A trans-sexual elected to office in the Northeast. A bisexual here in my own state of Arizona. The profaning of marriage in multiple states, for the first time by popular vote. It was truly an amazing revelation.

I have avoided watching much media since Tuesday evening. I know too well that Psalm 12:8 is being played out repeatedly:

The wicked freely strut about when what is vile is honored among men.

Yesterday I was thinking about how quickly things have changed in the United States. There has literally been a revolution in worldview, a degradation of ethics and morals that is stunning in its openness and bravado. But I think my generation has trouble with this kind of change. We want to hold on to how things have been. We still see signs of stability from the past and so we struggle to realize how much the ground is shifting under our feet.

I was riding along a trail I ride all the time when I noticed something that struck me as an illustration of how some of us middle-aged/older folks are feeling. I have ridden this section hundreds of times. But I happened to notice something I had not noticed before. I stopped and took a picture. Notice the sign. It is warning about the severe dip ahead. But, if you look past it...well, they have put in a bridge. Now, I rode that section before they put in the bridge, and yep, it was a pretty severe dip. You had to get out of the saddle just to navigate it. It was a bit of a challenge. But, last year they closed the route for a while and put in a bridge. It's been there quite a while now, in fact. But, for some reason, they forgot about this sign. Well, there's one on the other side, too. They just left them there. I have no idea why. Maybe it wasn't on the work order, I don't know. But there stands the sign, pointing to a reality that is now in the past. The sign is now a lie.

There are many artifacts left in our society of how things used to be, echoes of a day when openly immoral men and women knew the meaning of the word "shame." But those signs are pointing to a reality that does not exist anymore. Someday someone will come along and remove those signs along the pathway. And someday, unless God grants repentance, they will come along and banish the last vestiges of our past when God's hand of restraint held back the public display of man's depravity. Till then, they still stand there, reminding some of us of the world we once knew, but pointing to nothing anymore. 

And, of course, I wonder what folks think who come upon that sign for the first time today. Do they stand there and wonder what it is talking about? Wonder if maybe some confused government worker put it in the wrong place? Are they as bemused as many young people today when they encounter Christian morality and ethics (over against the materialistic worldview they have been spoon fed by government indoctrination)? I can only wonder...and keep pedaling. 

Day 183-11

A few verses that caught my attention and my ponderings:

Amo 4:6  And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD.

Want of bread = famine?

Gill:  and want of bread in all your places: this is the same with the former clause, and explains it, and still makes the famine more general, not only in their cities, but in all their places of abode, their towns and villages:

Amo 4:7  And also I have withholden the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest: and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city: one piece was rained upon, and the piece whereupon it rained not withered. 

Withholden rain?  Drought?

Gill:  And also I have withholden the rain from you,.... As he did for the space of three years successively in the days of Ahab, as predicted by Elijah, 1Ki_17:1; the consequences of which are very bad to men and beast, and bring on a scarcity of food for both, and a famine if long withheld: 

Amo 4:8  So two or three cities wandered unto one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD. 

Wandered?  Does that mean they consolidated?

Gill:  So two or three cities wandered unto one city, to drink water,.... Two or three cities, that is, the inhabitants of them, being without water, went up and down in quest of any city or place where they could find water for themselves and cattle to drink: 

Amo 4:9  I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmerworm devoured them: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD. 

Pestilence?  

Gill:  I have smitten you with blasting and mildew,.... "Blasting" is what we commonly call "blights", generally occasioned by an east wind; and so Kimchi interprets the word here used; and the Vulgate Latin version renders it, "a burning wind"; which causes the buds and leaves of trees to shrivel up as if they were burnt with fire. "Mildew" is a kind of clammy dew, which falling upon corn, &c. corrupts and destroys by its moisture; and is a kind of jaundice to the fruits of the earth; and has its name as that, from yellowness, in the Hebrew language: when the Lord is said to smite them with these the sense is, that he sent these upon the fruits of their gardens, fields and vineyards, which consumed them: 

Palmerworm?  Is that some type of vermin?

when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmer worm devoured them; just when they were budding and blossoming, and bringing forth fruit; and so what the blasting and mildew did not consume, that the palmer worm, a kind of locust, did; which has its name from its biting and cutting off the leaves and branches of trees, as of those mentioned vines, olives and fig trees, with which the land of Canaan abounded, the cutting off which was a great calamity. The Targum is,

Amo 4:10  I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have taken away your horses; and I have made the stink of your camps to come up unto your nostrils: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD. 

Death.  Young men slain in battle, war.

Amo 4:11  I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD. 

Fire, consuming fire.

Amo 4:12  Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel. 

Prepare to meet thy God.  Reading those passages above, all I could think about was America and how she stands in the cross hairs of God's judgment.  She has forsaken the God of her youth, the precepts and wisdom upon which she was providentially built.  We are suffering great calamaties because we refuse to acknowledge our sin and wickedness.  We have:

• famine
• drought
• unsettled populations
• pestilence
• vermin
• death
• fire

Yet, we see not our need to be humble and contrite before God.  O Lord, this nation deserves nothing less than to be completely wiped off the face of the earth.  We deserve not the least of Thy mercies.  God, You righteousness could consume us instantly.  Pour out, I pray, Your mercy.  Open our eyes and ears to hear and see our wickedness.  Give us the ability, as a nation, to repent and turn from our wickedness and seek Thee.

Lest it be said of us as it was of Israel:

Amo 6:14  But, behold, I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel, saith the LORD the God of hosts; and they shall afflict you from the entering in of Hemath unto the river of the wilderness.