Life Has Become a Parody of Itself
The world we currently live in is becoming increasingly illogical with each passing day. It seems that life has become a huge parody, with a host of actors deliberately performing exaggerations for comic effect. There is no laughing because this form of parody is no joke.
The hijinks of actor Jussie Smollett are a prime example. He manufactured this crazy caper that he was attacked by Trump-loving racists. Smollett alleged his assailants yelled, “This is MAGA country,” while attacking him in sub-zero temperatures at two in the morning on the streets of Chicago. Yeah, in Chicago, which happened in one of the most “progressive” places on earth.
The most ridiculous part is that he paid his phony attackers with a check. The second most insane moment was that he walked home with the noose they supposedly put around his neck, and kept it on until police arrived.
On Inside the NBA, Charles Barkley did a hilarious two-minute roast session of Smollett. Barkley didn’t have 20 comedy writers supplying him with material. Smollett made it too easy for him to say “America, do not write checks when you are about to do illegal activity.”
The ability of the Barkley video to go viral without any competition asks the question, “Where were all the late-night comedians? The hosts of The Tonight Show, The Late Show, and The Late Late Show should have been asking if the Smollett check was made out to “The Muggers.” They are too focused on attacking Trump to take advantage of an opportunity that was one of the reasons why these shows were created.
Another thing that has become a massive parody of itself is the Academy Awards. You don’t need to guess which movie has the greatest amount of acting to be chosen as best picture. The Oscars are political preaching disguised as an award show.
If you have a black guy who is gay, he will win out over another movie about heterosexual blacks. As a result of agenda-driven voting, Green Book won the top honor for 2019. Hollywood was able to pat itself on the back for show diversity, and then five white guys got up and accepted the award for Green Book.
Spike Lee is the biggest racist on planet Earth. He earned that title from years of griping about the constant oppression he received from this “white-dominated nation.” Lee’s film, BlacKkKlansman, was given an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. A film about a black guy who outsmarts the KKK was sure to win some award.
The lucky director was not happy with his single honor. As far as I know, he was the first Academy Award loser ever to throw a public tantrum right there in the auditorium. After Best Picture was predictably awarded to Green Book instead of Lee’s film, BlacKkKlansman, Lee had a fit. Deadline noted that a “furious” Lee left his seat and stalked back toward the rear of the theater. Then he feigned outrage by pacing in the aisle and headed for the back of the theater again. When he got back to his seat, he pointedly turned his back to the stage as Green Book producer-director Peter Farrelly gave an acceptance speech.
Lee is such a disgusting clown of bigotry that a normal person would not want to have him around them. Because no one wants to be labeled a racist, they tolerate Lee’s movies that make a mockery of racial harmony.
Life has become such a parody of common sense that the makers of actual parody are frequently mistaken for honest reporting. The supposed regulator of fake news, Snopes, embarrassed itself when the company dedicated precious resources to literally fact-checking the deliberately unapologetic satirical fake news Christian site, The Babylon Bee.
The Babylon Bee took aim at the Smollett fiasco with an article headlined, “Jussie Smollett Offered Job at CNN after Fabricating News Story out of Thin Air.” From The Babylon Bee:
“While Empire actor Jussie Smollett has been having a tough week so far, there appears to be a silver lining: cable news channel CNN has offered Smollett a job as an investigative reporter and on-air anchor after witnessing his skills at fabricating a story entirely out of thin air,” the article cheekily said. “CNN producers were reportedly impressed throughout the ongoing saga of Smollett’s apparent hoax attack on himself. They realized early on the facts didn’t add up but were fascinated with how well the actor kept the narrative going. An HR rep quickly reached out to Smollett to see if he’d be interested in taking on a position at the news organization after news broke that the entire thing was probably fabricated.”
The site’s footer gives away The Babylon Bee’s nature by describing it as “Your Trusted Source for Christian News Satire.” Snopes missed the satirical angle of the article because it’s run by people with a deep-seated liberal nature. The leftist cause takes priority in all matters of life.
The day will soon come when there is no room for parody. After the rapture, the world will suddenly wake up to a nightmare of endless calamity. For those of us who have faith in Christ, we have the promise of being rescued just ahead of that dark hour.
“In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” (John 14:2-3).
–Todd
Your Only Way Out
Critics of the pre-Trib Rapture continue to send email. Every week I get a number of messages telling me we are teaching error. Well…some accuse of much more damage done than simply teaching error. We are sometimes charged with leading people to accept the lie of 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. This, of course, is the great delusion Antichrist will foist upon mankind when the Tribulation is in effect.
By teaching that Rapture will occur before the seven years of Tribulation begins, we are, these in opposition to the pre-Trib Rapture accuse, likely causing people to not recognize Antichrist when he one day soon comes on the scene. These who are so duped, the critics say, might well take the “666” mark of the beast of Revelation 13:16-18 because they will be thinking the Rapture must occur first and not realize that they must endure all or at least part of the Tribulation era.
If they take the mark, they will be doomed forever, according to Revelation chapter 14.
I must say that I have to believe that anyone who views the Rapture as mid-Trib or post-Trib cannot believe in eternal security of the believer. They cannot believe in “once saved, always saved.”
Those who enter the seven years of Tribulation will have to make the choice of whether to take Antichrist’s mark of worship. If they take the mark in order to receive sustenance so as to not starve, or to avoid beheading, they are, God’s Word says, lost forever, with no chance for redemption. So, they will have lost their salvation.
In such case, the Age of Grace–in which one can be saved for all eternity–can’t be a dispensational fact. There is no separation of the Church Age from the Tribulation era within this view.
This is a double-jeopardy belief system. There is no comfort to be found within it. And yet, God’s Word says the following:
For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:15-18)
Accompanying the charge that we are leading people to not recognize Antichrist, thus endangering them of taking the mark of the beast, is the accusation that we are practicing the false teaching of escapism.
This is the accusation, often charged in anger, that we are telling Christians they can escape the coming time of God’s judgment and wrath. These who charge such most often teach that Christians must go through the time of Tribulation to prove their worthiness to inherit the eternal kingdom. They don’t explain why millions of believers who have lived and died since the Church was born won’t have to do the same.
I remember well the words of Thru the Bible Radio teacher and famous pastor of the Church of the Open Door, Dr. J. Vernon McGee . He once said that people accused him of being an escapist theologian–of teaching falsely the escaping from that horrendous time of God’s judgment and wrath. Ol’ Dr. McGee said that he wholeheartedly agreed. He was a believer in the escapist theology. He said something like: “If the building is on fire and I’m about to be burned up, I will go out the door, the window, up the chimney–I’ll go through any opening to escape the horror of that threat.”
And the Tribulation will certainly be seven years of unspeakable horror. It will make the Holocaust of Hitler’s day look like a Sunday school picnic, McGee went on to say.
Jesus said of that time: “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be” (Matthew 24:21).
So, I, like Dr. McGee, will gladly take that open door into Heaven that the Lord will provide when this dispensation, the Church Age or Age of Grace ends and that time of horror, the Tribulation, begins. Short of death, it is my only way out of the most terrible time of all human history, according to the lord Jesus’ own words.
It is also your only way, other than death, to get out of the horrors of that time–a time that the signs proliferating all around this generation tells the observer of God’s prophetic Word must surely be near.
This is not a forewarning of gloom and doom for the believer in Jesus Christ for salvation. The glory that awaits the believer who is alive at this exciting yet troubling hour in human history is stupendous–spectacular beyond our wildest imagination!
Don’t fear things to come. Just believe and take comfort. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved (Acts 16:31)!
Even beyond that, whether through death or the Rapture before this era of horror begins, you and I will instantaneously be in the presence of our Lord and Savior. We will inherit the entirety of Heaven’s unfathomable splendor!
–Terry