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Locked on 10/27/2009 12:40:43 PM PDT by Admin Moderator, reason:
Childish behavior. |
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.
I'm curious, would portraying the website of a Jewish psychic who communicates with an entity she calls "Z" as an authority of the Blessed Virgin Mary be appalling to the Blessed Mother or pleasing to her?
I don’t know how good my virus filters are here. I think though, that I have a fairly good grasp of what the site is all about.
We DO join ourselves, by exercising our free will by deciding to take part.
No one joins in the work of salvation.
Someone who has been convinced by liars that man has no free will might be inclined to say such a thing.
There is nothing in the Bible mandating sola Scriptura.
Poor Perry Mason. LOL
The kind of mind that has been convinced God sent Hitler to conduct the Holocaust is not exactly wedded to the truth, so to speak.
Actually, Christ did tell us not to store up treasures on earth, where moth and rust do corrupt and thieves break in and steal, but to store up treasure in heaven. That could be clearly understood as “adding to the treasury of grace,” in my opinion.
I’m going back to find that poster who mentioned adding to the treasury of Grace, and thank him/her.
This is very wise. Clearly you have not been beguiled by the volumes of lies pouring from Machen's storefront Catholic-hating cult.
Just wanted to thank you for your post, and mention the Gospel I remembered, when I read it:
Christ told us “Store not up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust do corrupt, and thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven.”
If He told us to do that, and then gave us His neverending grace, then your posts make perfect sense, and I thank you for participating in this discussion.
The problem with that, mom, is that when Catholics listen to him and admire him, they believe what he has to say. It’s that way with any one like him, no matter what religion he espouses. People hear it and believe it.
She's middle-aged Jewish woman from Brooklyn who thinks she's a psychic and communicates every day with an entity she affectionately refers to as "Z". ANY stereotype you want to apply based on this description would probably apply.
She sounds mentally ill.
And yet she is touted by anti-Catholic bigots as representing the Catholic faith.
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Yes, well, I think we can all draw our own conclusions about that.
The Machenite belief isn’t just that God sent Hitler to conduct the Holocaust, but that God actually MADE Hitler do it. However, Machenites believe that Hitler’s works have nothing to do with the state of his soul; if Hitler’s name was chosen in the cosmic lottery Hitler then is in Heaven. Is it any wonder that Machenism can’t attract enough members to fill a small football stadium?
I would need to staff a back office of accountants and clerks just to begin keeping up with all the lies pouring out of Orthodox Presbyterian Calvinism.
Have you ever written down what you’ve found in the Bibles? I know that would be appreciated by future generations. I’m writing my family history for that reason. It’s very interesting.
>>The problem with that, mom, is that when Catholics listen to him and admire him, they believe what he has to say. It’s that way with any one like him, no matter what religion he espouses. People hear it and believe it.<<
However, even if Padre Pio is listened to that is not the Catholic Church.
Lots of Americans listen to what Michael Moore says. Lots of Americans listen to Al Sharpton. For right now, neither’s ideas are the policy nor teachings of the Catholic Church.
Rush was not the originator of that. He was just copying and making fun of what someone else had said. No one has ever proven that Rush is a racist or said the things others have said he did. They talked about that on BOR the other day.
God also made Mao starve or slaughter seventy million Chinese for the greater good of godless communism.
Well, not God per se. More like Calvin's posable Little Pocket Deity action figure.
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