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Posted on 07/25/2009 2:40:04 AM PDT by Quix
The Bible says we cannot know the time of the Lord's return (Matthew 25:13). But the Scriptures make it equally clear that we can know the season of the Lord's return (1 Thessalonians 5:2-6):
"You yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night... But you brethren, are not in darkness, that the day should overtake you like a thief; for you are all sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night or darkness; so then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober."
This passage asserts that Jesus is coming like "a thief in the night." But then it proceeds to make it clear that this will be true only for the pagan world and not for believers. His return should be no surprise to those who know Him and His Word, for they have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to give them understanding of the nature of the times.
Furthermore, the Scriptures give us signs to watch for — signs that will signal that Jesus is ready to return. The writer of the Hebrew letter referred to these signs when he proclaimed that believers should encourage one another when they see the day of judgment drawing near (Hebrews 10:25-27). Jesus also referred to the end time signs in His Olivet Discourse, given during the last week of His life (Matthew 24 and Luke 21). Speaking of a whole series of signs which He had given to His disciples, He said, "When you see all these things, recognize that He [the Son of Man — that is, Jesus] is near, right at the door" (Matthew 24:33).
A Personal Experience
Every time I think of "Signs of the Times," I am reminded of a great man of God named Elbert Peak. I had the privilege of participating with him in a Bible prophecy conference held in Orlando, Florida in the early 1990's. Mr. Peak was about 80 years old at the time.
He had been assigned the topic, "The Signs of the Times." He began his presentation by observing, "Sixty years ago when I first started preaching, you had to scratch around like a chicken to find one sign of the Lord's soon return."
He paused for a moment, and then added, "But today there are so many signs I'm no longer looking for them. Instead, I'm listening for a sound — the sound of a trumpet!"
The First Sign
One hundred years ago in 1907 there was not one single, tangible, measurable sign that indicated we were living in the season of the Lord's return. The first to appear was the Balfour Declaration which was issued by the British government on November 2, 1917.
This Declaration was prompted by the fact that during World War I the Turks sided with the Germans. Thus, when Germany lost the war, so did the Turks, and the victorious Allies decided to divide up both the German and Turkish empires.
The Turkish territories, called the Ottoman Empire, contained the ancient homeland of the Jewish people — an area the Romans had named Palestine after the last Jewish revolt in 132-135 AD.
In 1917 Palestine included all of modern day Israel and Jordan. In the scheme the Allies concocted for dividing up the German and Turkish territories, Britain was allotted Palestine, and this is what prompted the Balfour Declaration. In that document, Lord Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary, declared that it was the intention of the British government to establish in Palestine "a national home for the Jewish people."
The leading Evangelical in England at the time was F. B. Meyer. He immediately recognized the prophetic significance of the Declaration, for he was well aware that the Scriptures prophesy that the Jewish people will be regathered to their homeland in unbelief right before the return of the Messiah (Isaiah 11:11-12).
Meyer sent out a letter to the Evangelical leaders of England asking them to gather in London in December to discuss the prophetic implications of the Balfour Declaration. In that letter, he stated, "The signs of the times point toward the close of the time of the Gentiles... and the return of Jesus can be expected any moment."
Before Meyer's meeting could be convened, another momentous event occurred. On December 11, 1917 General Edmund Allenby liberated the city of Jerusalem from 400 years of Turkish rule.
There is no doubt that these events in 1917 marked the beginning of the end times because they led to the worldwide regathering of the Jewish people to their homeland and the reestablishment of their state.
Since 1917
Since the time of the Balfour Declaration, we have witnessed throughout the 20th Century the appearance of sign after sign pointing to the Lord's soon return. There are so many of these signs today, in fact, that one would have to be either biblically illiterate or spiritually blind not to realize that we are living on borrowed time.
I have personally been searching the Bible for years in an effort to identify all the signs, and it has not been an easy task to get a hold on them. That's because there are so many of them, both in the Old and New Testaments.
I have found that the best way to deal with them is to put them in categories, and in doing that, I have come up with six categories of end time signs. We will explore these catetories beginning in Part 2 of this series.
>>We’re talking about the actual building where you attend church, not the denomination.<<
Our church is not about a building. Our African mission’s Priest says Holy Mass under a tree.
The Latin Catholic Church is our church.
From the source you listed:
“From these western and smaller eastern rites the encyclopedia gets 242 “Roman Catholic denominations” (year 2000 numbers). The largest is by far the Latin-rite (commonly called “Roman Catholics” by non-Catholic Christians) with 976 million members of the 994 million total members (or 98% of the total, year 1995 numbers). However, since virtually all of these western and smaller eastern rites are in union with the Pope (I am not sure of some of them), there is actually one
Catholic Church, not 242 churches or denominations. Based on the encyclopedia’s own definition of “denomination” the editors appear to be separating and counting by country which is how you get to 242 (or 238 countries plus 4) “denominations” of Roman Catholics. The Catholic Church in Canada is not a different “denomination” from the Catholic Church in the U.S., which is not a different Catholic Church from the one in England, etc. If you search the available “World Christian Database” online, there is indeed one Catholic Church in the U.S.A., (see also Barrett, Encyclopedia, volume 1, page 783 for the U.S.A.) and in the world there are indeed 238 “Roman Catholic” denominations (for exactly 238 countries), i.e. one Catholic Church for each country. The same “counting by country” seems to be the case with some of the denominations in the other mega-blocs.
When dividing these “denominations” by country as they do, there are definitely some problems in figuring out the true total
“denominations” since many of them are being counted more than once — and in fact 241 times too much in the case of “Roman Catholic” denominations. Barrett’s Encyclopedia states this explicitly:
“As a statistical unit in this Encyclopedia, a ‘denomination’ always refers to one single country. Thus the Roman Catholic Church, although a single organization, is described here as consisting of 236 denominations in the world’s 238 countries”
Whoa! That’s gonna leave a mark!
....you're just reinforcing my original post on the matter....
What results is hundred of pages of utterly confusing statistics, some highly suspect, culturally biased, and anthropologically useless (such as categorizing people by using moribund race-defining terms as Australoid, Negroid, and Mongoloid and further subdividing those into "stylized colors" such as black, grey, brown, red, tan, white, and yellow). There is a need for a comparative survey of world Christian churches and other religions. This is not it. Not recommended.
And if you look up the work Denomination in the Etymology Dictionary, it says this.
“a naming,” from L. denominationem (nom. denominatio) “a calling by anything other than the proper name, metonymy,” from denominare “to name,” from de- “completely” + nominare “to name.” Monetary sense is 1660;
meaning “religious sect” is 1716.”
Understanding that the word in usage for “religious sect” started in 1716, it’s only understandable the we use the word “rite” and “denomination” is not correct for Catholics.
And several of them even have their own Popes.
>>And several of them even have their own Popes. <<
Actually, any “Catholic” group that has their own Pope are “Protest”ants.
Those are rites, not "contradictory denominations."
The anti-Catholic fetish just gets more and more idiotic.
While the basis of the original remark is true, it is quite reasonable to say that among Pentecostal structures (as much as such can be measured), the great majority of modalist doctrines spring from the Oneness branch, or are forks thereof.
Modalism is common amongst all Protestant denominations, and not just the Pentecostals. That is why I said that either a large minority or a small majority do not hold the Christian beliefs on the Trinity. Ask around and you may be surprised even amongst your peers.
It was my impression, from your comments, that the observation was being settled against Pentecostals specifically, or at least by insinuation. If that is not the case, then I am glad you have reiterated your position.
However, I still believe that the case cannot be made. Far and away, all of Protestantism (as it is loosely defined) is trinitarian.
Christianity is a belief set, not knowledge. Therefore there is no PROOF. There is the definition of Christianity set by the Church. If you deviate from that, it is by definition, non Christian.
What a pompous, ill-conceived idea.
The individual does not have the authority to do so and still call it Christian.
It is not an "individual". It is not even a single chapel. It is a whole fork... some 24 million adherents, and that is just in the Pentecostal Oneness movement.
No, to not define Christianity is what breeds confusion.
I will agree, but only partially. Christianity is best defined by what we all agree upon... If one thoughtfully considers our factional arguments, one will find they never center on the Gospel... We ALL know the truth... It is the doctrines of men, on ALL sides, which keep us apart... What we DON'T KNOW, but think we know, is what we argue over.
That is the opposite of both my experience and the testimonials of many Pentecostals. It has been explained to me thusly: the Holy Spirit comes upon one and leads one down the individual road and the Pentecostal will go this way or that depending upon how they perceive the Holy Spirit leading them.
That is true, in the personal sense. But that does not mean that one is not without foundations. Especially the Pentecostals, who grow up in it, and are defined by it.
Charismatics, OTOH, who are more likely to stay where they were planted, are often fighting against the doctrines they were raised in, as the Spirit leads them to be different from what the narrow confines of man-made doctrines allow.
I am one of these. In some ways, since I have no defined means of dealing with the Holy Spirit through my formal Christian education, I am far more of a loose cannon that any Pentecostal, because I have no training from my youth.
In my case, I have fallen away from the Lord twice, very far away - far enough that I felt the Spirit leave me. In those cases, God has placed men of God in my path, Pentecostals, each time, to lead me back.
Catholicism is not a denomination. It is Christianity; everything else is a man made copy or imitation. And the Catechism of the Church is very explicit. There is no deviation permitted in the doctrine of the Faith.
Nonsense.
That is not my experience. I have not encountered preachers dressed like Elvis.
LOL! Well, perhaps I did exaggerate a touch. :D
Well, which is it? Quiet? Or rock da’ house? I have been to a handful of Pentecostal services which got quite out of hand and were less worship than mob emotion.
It is BOTH. And emotion does play a part. I cannot imagine being plugged into the Great Creator of all things without it being an emotional experience! But that is not to say that there are not a great many impersonators, as there are in any aspect of the Body. To determine the authentic experience, one must first understand the Spirit in one's self, I think.
Are you contending that there are not many Protestant denominations?
Wow, more false information about the Catholic Church from Gamecock.
Shocker...
It's mostly an effort to change the subject from a lost argument.
Just like the church ladies in The Music Man:
***I just am amazed that a non Christian bothers to read John at all.
The YOPIOS crowd prefer to go straight to the epistles of Saint Paul.***
Some of them, anyway. There is much redacted from the YOPIOS rendition of Paul, not as much as they redact the Gospels, but there is still significant elimination of verse.
***Saint Peter explicitely warned that this would happen:***
Since there is only an empty space in the YOPIOS Bibles between Hebrews and Revelation, this cannot be considered Scripture.
It has been my understanding that there are essentially three different rites, each more or less distinguished by their Pope, with some minor variances in beliefs and traditions, many of which are superficial. All share the belief in certain fundamental truths, however.
Don’t the Russian and Eastern Orthodox have their own “Pope”?
“Brazen!”
I think that they did “Protest” the Latin Pope.
Otherwise they would be with us under B16.
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