April 11, 2005

Clearing the Way of All Opposition

The moral health of a nation is largely reflected by the number of people who are willing to stand for righteousness. Without strong ethical leadership, society tends to drift into moral decay.

Because moral leaders have always been few in number, counting them is an easy task. In recent years, I’ve noticed very few public figures have a reputation for upholding Judeo-Christian values.

The world is full of people who preach a religious "love" message that teaches people how to feel good about themselves. It is rare to find a minister of the gospel, or anyone for that matter, who is willing to mention sin as the source of people’s personal problems.

We seem to have reached the point that anyone who seeks to critique the moral state of our nation is automatically labeled a "holier-than-thou" hypocrite. Making matters worse, few people are able to withstand any type of personal scrutiny.

In the past couple of years, I’ve noticed three leaders who have lost their moral authority because of personal problems. Two of them are conservative commentators and the other is a leader in the black community.

Rush Limbaugh - He was forced to admit to an addiction to prescription drugs. Florida state authorities have been investigating whether he is guilty of “doctor shopping,” which is the practice of going from one doctor to another to obtain large quantities of pills, or by finding doctors willing to prescribe drugs illegally.

Bill O'Reilly – The king of Fox News was sued by a former worker who claimed he sexually harassed her. She claimed that O'Reilly talked to her about performing various sex acts. For his part, Mr. O'Reilly said the conversations were consensual. He later made some type of an arrangement with the woman that was likely a financial payoff.

Bill Cosby – Andrea Constand said that Cosby sexually assaulted her after giving her drugs. She filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court, claiming Cosby assaulted her in January 2004 and then defamed her when she came forward with her charges. After the allegation became public in the fall of the same year, another woman claimed that Cosby molested her 30 years ago. Prosecutors said they had insufficient evidence to go ahead with any legal action.

Death has also claimed its share of moral leaders. In recent years, I’ve witnessed a number of champions of decency succumb to old age, and very few are being replaced with people of equal convictions. Where are the John Walvoords, the J. Vernon McGees, the Mother Teresas, or the Dave Breese’s of today?

It’s too early to know what type of man the new pope will be, but I doubt the next pontiff will share John Paul’s fixation on sin issues. I see a generation in which role models have become so few that morality has come to be based on those who can find the compromise that will please everyone. Having lost our ability to know right from wrong, it's easy to see how men like Bill Clinton or Jesse Jackson could find roles as our moral counselors.

When we reach the point where no one is willing to stand up for moral values, the way will be clear for Antichrist to be revealed. In the past, Christians have viewed the end times as the point when Satan takes over the world by achieving some type of victory over the forces of good. According to the trend I’m seeing, this strategy of conquest may be based on a series of defaults rather than on hard-fought battles.

“And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him? And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Rev. 13: 4-8).

“And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men, And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live” (Rev. 13:11-14).

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Popes and Prophecy

Twenty four/seven coverage of the death of Pope John Paul II might make this commentary unwelcome by some. I know I tired of the coverage, wanting my favorite news channels to just get on to something else for awhile. Now I find myself needing to reflect a bit on what it all means, prophetically.

The world certainly revered this pope; on that I think we can agree. His prolific “accomplishments” were rolled out for us to see many times during the course of the week-long observation leading to his burial. And, I must confess–a good Catholic word—that I, too, kind of liked the man himself. He had a strong moral disposition that bucked the trends of an increasingly pagan planet. He was “conservative” in his theology, among a Catholic clergy that finds itself under attack by the liberal--“progressive,” if you prefer—element. Acknowledging all of the accolades and aggrandizement as the collective adoring worldview of John Paul II, and confessing my own nod of agreement in the matter of the likeability of the man, I now must get to the bottom line about popes and prophecy. I must remain true to what God’s Word has to say about all matters, and this is especially imperative in the question of how the popes fit within Bible prophecy, past, present, and future.

At least a dozen e-mail messages have crossed my "In Box" this past week asking basically the same question: Do the prophecies of St. Malachi and Nostradamus about the last pope being Antichrist now mean those prophecies involving popes are about to come to pass?

First of all, I’m always reluctant to put the designation of "saint" in front of any person’s name. Every individual who belongs to Jesus Christ through belief in Him for salvation is a “saint” at the moment that person believes. It is pretentious to designate any individual as "St. Whomever." I believe it best to just let the Lord do that sort of thing as He enters our names into the Lamb’s Book of Life at salvation.

Second, I give no credence whatever to any extrabiblical “revelation” such as the additions some have illegitimately made to God’s Word. By adding writers who shouldn’t be included, error infects truth, because these men weren’t inspired by the Holy Spirit.

Third, Nostradamus and all other such seers are not of God, but are of, at best, their own delusional egotism. At worst, they are of the devil himself. Only God can tell the end from the beginning.

At no place in the Bible do I find any prophecy that says the pope –any pope—of the Catholic Church will be the Antichrist. Nowhere do I find that a pope will be the false prophet. However –and I know that I’m asking for some attacks here—both the papal system and the Catholic Church it serves, I believe, in the biblical view, are Antichrist and false prophecy at their collective core.

The very heart of the papal system is abominable. It takes away the glory of Christ at its historical inception. We can see this by a quick look at where Catholicism gets the heresy that a man has been given the “keys to the Kingdom.”

“And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matt.16:16-18).

The Lord wanted to know what people were saying about Him in relation to God. He then wanted to know the disciples’ answer to the question. Peter had the answer Jesus knew Peter had been given by God. Peter said that Jesus was the Son of God–making Jesus deity. Jesus said then that the truth Peter was given by the father in Heaven was the nucleus principle upon which Jesus would build His Church, and that not even Hell itself could stop that building.

From that encounter, later “theologians” –some considered the early fathers of the Church--twisted the meaning to say that Jesus said Peter was the rock upon which He, Jesus, would build the Church. The chief Catholic doctrine was thus built upon a lie from the very beginning. Making Peter the first pope, they determined that he was given the “keys to the Kingdom of God,” based upon the following Scripture: “And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven” (Matt. 16:19).

Jesus, of course, gave Peter, personally, no such commission, as the subsequent Catholic dogma granted him. Jesus gave all of His disciples who surrounded Him that commission and that charge. We who have followed Christ through the ages since that time are given the same basic orders. Jesus left us with the Great Commission at His ascension to the throne of God. Of course, Peter and the earliest disciples had special jobs to do, and God, the Holy Spirit, manifested himself through special infusion of powers that we don’t see manifested today. But, Peter –special to the Lord though he was—was not chosen to be the vicar of Christ on earth.

We remember Peter’s many failures –his brashness, his miserable failures, then his greater exploits of faith after being picked up by the Lord. It was all Christ, not Peter; to give Peter –or anyone else—such elevation while still in the flesh is both ludicrous and abhorrent.

Here’s where false teaching and false prophecy collide. This is where the papal system and the Catholic Church fit –along with many other false teachers and false prophets--into Bible prophecy yet future. The teaching that Peter was the first pope, and that he was given the keys to the Kingdom of God, are false teachings that have led as many as 1.6 billion people to believe wrongly in our day, not to mention the millions down through the ages. This leads to the Catholic false prophecy that the Church now has been given the blessings that would have been given to the Jew and to Israel, had that people and that nation recognized Jesus as Messiah at His riding into Jerusalem on that little donkey a short time before they cried “Crucify Him!” God is not through with the Jew or with the nation Israel. News headlines every day of our lives lately point to that fact. The drive for peace between Israel and its enemies couldn’t be more pronounced. The covenant of Daniel 9:27 that Antichrist will confirm looks to be in the making as I write, and as you read this. Any Christian who desires truth can see that Israel is a nation of destiny, still under God’s mighty hand.

Replacement theology –that Catholicism has replaced Israel, or that any other system has replaced Israel as God’s chosen people-- is a lie from the pit. It is false teaching and false prophecy. As a matter of fact, I believe it is the primary lie from Satan that is at the heart of the prophecy Jesus, himself, gave on Mt.Olivet that day overlooking the Temple on Mt. Moriah. “And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many… And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.” (Matt. 24:3-5, 11).

We must look to only one Man to lift to the highest pedestal of God’s glory. We must lift Jesus Christ –alone—so that the lost will be drawn to Him for salvation.

He is coming again –perhaps very soon. It will be Jesus, not a pope, riding on that magnificent white steed of Revelation 19: 11. --Terry