Monday, October 6, 2014

Wars and Rumors of Wars


Wars and Rumors of Wars

“And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.”     Matthew 24:6
           With so many are asking “What’s Next”, I decided to write a 3-part series about wars of the future; “Rumors of Wars”, “The Battle of Gog and Magog” and “The Battle of Armageddon”.  We will begin with rumors of wars.

There are wars going on across the world, but for some reason or other, we do not call them ‘wars’.  One right now is the ‘conflict’ of Russia and the Ukraine.  Russia says it is not a war, but just taking back what belongs to them.  There are the ongoing attacks with al Qaeda, a global terrorist group that is responsible for the 9-11 attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. Now we are involved in a conflict with ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria).  The President call it ‘ISIL’ which stands for (The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant which includes (Cyprus, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine and southern Turkey)).
             In this day and age it is difficult to understand why such care is taken to not call an act of terrorism what it is.  Major Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood army base, shot and killed several US soldiers and wounded many others while shouting, "Allahu Akbar", or "Allah is greatest”.  He was not called a “Terrorist”.  The man in Oklahoma had recently converted to Islam when he beheaded one woman and stabbed another was not called a terrorist.  Why are we afraid to call it what it is?  Who is it we may offend in our country of the United States of America?  Regardless of the fact the President of the United States say we are no longer a Christian country.  We surely aren’t an Islamic country!  Their Allah is not our God.

This country was founded on the Christian belief in an Almighty God and whether you believe it or not, the Almighty God is still our foundation.  You better pray that God does not take His hand off this country or you will see and experience things you don’t even want to think about. God still hears our prayers and we need to be praying more than we ever have before.  
Wars and rumors of wars are all around us like never before.  Yes, there have always been wars in this world, but in order to believe this scripture is for us today, we need to look at the whole scripture. Continuing on in Matthew 24, the disciples asked Jesus to tell them about the end times and these are the words he spoke to them.  Verse 7-8, For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.” Take a look around you and you will see how this fits in the picture of today’s times. 
Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, Angola, Mozambique, among several others are having famine’s effecting from 2.3 million to 6 million starving people per country.  Never in history have there been this many people in the world who have almost no food. No one country in the world can produce the food needed to help feed them.  Millions will die of starvation in these last days.  As for pestilences, new viruses are appearing around the world and the threat of Ebola will no doubt reach plague numbers.  Did you think it wouldn’t happen in America?  Now it has.  One man has infected over a hundred people that they know of.  Thousands in Africa have already died of Ebola and there seems to be no way to stop it from spreading to other countries.
Most of us don’t realize the increase of earthquakes over the last 50 years.  Did you know that there are were over 500,000 earthquakes over the last year around the world?  Many aren’t even felt but they show up on the Richter scale.  Many of them we don’t even hear about, but there is such an increase that many place are getting concerned.  Just think – California had 10,000 recorded quakes in a year’s time. 
Did Jesus know what he was talking about when he spoke these verses in Matthew 24?  I’m sure he did and what he said 2000 years ago is happening today.  Wars and rumors of wars?  We might not call them wars, but our country alone is fighting on several different fronts.  We hear rumors of what might take place shortly and most don’t even think about it.  We never thought our country would be attacked, but it happened.  We never thought the scripture in Revelation 20:4 would really happen in our country or to our Americans.  Well, it happened.  Two Americans were beheaded by ISIS in Syria and one woman here in Oklahoma.  Who is next?
If you think this is bad, Jesus said in verse 7, “the end is not yet”.  No, this is not the end; there are other battles to be fought and things will get worse.  Next week we will talk about the Battle of Gog and Magog and when it may occur. 
In the meanwhile, Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption (Jesus Christ) draws near.”  [Luke 21:28]  He is coming one of these days and we don’t know when, but He is coming for us. This is not the time to be afraid; it is the time to make a stand for Jesus Christ and trust Him.
Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal comfort and a wonderful hope,  comfort you and strengthen you in every good thing you do and say.  2 Thessalonians 2:16-17 (NLT)
 
 
 

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