In Memoriam “Irreplaceable” Rachel Marie Powers Duck

In Memoriam

“Irreplaceable” Rachel Marie Powers Duck

On August 16, 2020, Daymond Duck’s beloved wife for nearly thirty-four years, Rachel Marie Powers Duck, went to Heaven.

The daughter of Tavy and Willie Powers, Rachel was the seventh of ten children, three of whom became Baptist pastors like their father, Tavy, a pastor and a farmer.

Rachel, valedictorian of her high school graduation class, earned a scholarship to Union University in Jackson, Tennessee, where she studied to be a registered nurse.

She loved Jesus and was an outstanding wife, mother, church member, and more. All who knew her recognized her as one of the most selfless, beautiful, honest, compassionate human beings to ever grace this planet. She took an interest in all people, caring for them and loving everyone she encountered unconditionally.

Rachel was the ideal pastor’s wife to Daymond, who served in ministry until he retired in 2006. She urged her husband to write his first book, she served and taught in the churches he pastored, went with him everywhere he went, and took two grandchildren with her to church every Sunday. It was like Daymond and Rachel were joined at the hip. (If you saw Daymond, you were sure to see Rachel as well.)

An avid Bible student, Rachel studied her Bible constantly, with her number-one priority in life being to learn as much as she could from the Lord and to serve Him both in her church and community.

At church, she taught Sunday school for most of her life; led numerous Bible studies; worked with children on Bible drills; served in the nursery; was involved with the women’s mission group; regularly participated in visitation and outreach; and met with other women at church almost every week to pray for her pastor and others.

In her community, Rachel volunteered to answer phones and pray with those who called into a TV station, where she got Daymond involved in a program called Ask the Pastor. She also for many years led Bible studies for a group of folks who gathered at a local restaurant.

Rachel loved to go on mission trips and joined as many as she could, despite the fact that she had knee and hip replacements. Other church members sometimes pushed her in a wheelchair, etc., but Rachel was determined to go and minister for long hours even though she was not well. On two different occasions, Rachel had to be hospitalized when she returned from a mission trip.

On the inside cover of her Bible were Rachel’s handwritten words: “Make yourself irreplaceable.” That is exactly what she did. At her funeral, her pastor said, “It will take three or four people to replace Rachel at church.”

It is difficult to understand why God took Rachel with this world being in the mess it’s in, but Daymond believes with all his heart that he will see Rachel in the Rapture very soon.

Crossing The Rubicon :: By Alice Childs

For anyone who ever sat through history classes in Western Civilization or who read Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in an English literature class, the term “crossing the Rubicon” will be familiar.

Before Julius Caesar became Emperor of Rome (thus becoming the first Caesar), he was a brilliant general. In his military campaigns against the Gauls, the man who would become the first Roman emperor was appointed governor of the region of southern Gaul and northern Italy. After his hugely successful military campaigns in Gaul, the Roman Senate ordered Julius Caesar to disband his army and return alone to Rome (where the Senate could better control their brilliant but highly ambitious general). Julius Caesar was ordered by the Senate to disband his armies and leave them in Northern Italy. He was explicitly ordered not to bring his army across the Rubicon River.

In the sight of the Senate, crossing the Rubicon River with his army would be viewed as an act of treason – an insurrection, and according to Roman law, an act of war. The Rubicon River was the northern boundary of Italy. However, in 49 BC, in defiance of the Roman Senate, Caesar brought his army across the Rubicon River headed towards Rome as he had ordered; but instead of returning alone, he brought with him his thirteenth legion – in complete defiance of the Senate’s orders.

Caesar’s response to their order to disband his army and return to Rome alone was “Alea iacta est” which means, “the die is cast.” This action was considered by the Senate to be a landmark defiance. Ever afterward, the phrase “crossing the Rubicon” became a metaphor that is synonymous with any action that once made, signifies a point of no return.

Prophetically speaking, this world which includes the nation of America has finally “crossed the Rubicon” with regard to events that are even now preparing the world for the final seven years of human history – events that will result in the culmination of the millennia-long Great Conflict of the Ages between Creator God and the rebel cherub, Lucifer, who became Satan, the Adversary – a conflict that has lasted from the time of Satan’s rebellion until this very moment.

All of the world’s nations (kingdoms) that will soon comprise the final form of the revived Roman Empire (Daniel’s “ten toes” of Daniel 9), are even now being maneuvered into place. The shuffling and arranging of what will eventually become the final ten kingdoms of both the Western and Eastern revived Roman Empire are in motion now. The nations that will comprise the Kings of the East, South, and North are also arranging themselves into their prophetic places. Sadly, as well, the destruction and fall of the United States as a global super power is almost complete. As hard as it is to face and accept, the United States of America is not even a casual player in end-time events.

It is my personal conviction that we are already well into a state of national collapse from which we cannot and will not return, but furthermore that the rapture of the Church will be THE event that will totally and finally decimate the nation of America, thus leaving Europe (both West and East) to rise to global prominence just as scripture shows that it will.

All prophecy is Israel-centric as Daniel, Ezekiel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Amos, Zechariah, and so many other yet-to-be-fulfilled OT prophesies make clear.

We are within mere months or weeks from an election; regardless of who “wins,” it will almost certainly result in complete chaos and full-blown anarchy in the streets of America. The final demise of America is at hand. It gives me absolutely NO pleasure to say these things except for the fact that Jesus Himself has already told us that these things (these set prophetic events) MUST happen before His return at the end of the coming Tribulation to set up His Millennial kingdom.

It is patently clear that God is giving the lost world a series of increasingly severe final warnings before His final judgment begins. To the Church, He is using these prophetic foreshocks to wake up a sleeping Church so that we will turn our hearts back towards Him alone, and to pry our hands off of the doorframe of this world that we, like tantrum-throwing toddlers not wanting to leave the playroom, have latched onto and to which we are grasping fiercely, so to speak.

Sadly, the majority of the Remnant Church, in America at least, continues to desire more to restore a dying nation that cannot and will not be reformed because it is completely wicked, than we desire to leave this judgment-bound place to be with our Savior in Glory. Sadly, the Remnant Church does not appear to know or want to admit that this world is not our home, neither is this nation our nation. We are citizens of Heaven. The body of Christ is an eternal nation whose home is not and never has been here in this temporal world, but rather our citizenship is in the New Jerusalem which Jesus has been preparing for us ever since His death, burial, resurrection and ascension back to “the Father’s house.”

Evil, debauchery, demonic wickedness of the most hellacious order, and utter vileness have completely metastasized throughout this fallen world in every single nation on every single continent. The world, including America herself, is eaten clean through with a demonic wickedness that grows deeper, more vile, and increasingly violent and God-hating by the minute. There can be no further reprieves, no further delays. We have crossed the Rubicon of God’s great mercy and forbearance.

Only judgment is left for this God-rejecting nation and world. Judgment and destruction MUST come so that Jesus can return to earth to restore and renovate this fallen world. He returns first in the air to catch away His body/bride via the resurrection/rapture, and afterwards follows the wrath of the Lamb which will have been poured out and God’s righteous judgment meted during Daniel’s 70th Week.

As His body, we who are the Remnant Church should be longing with all that is in us for His coming to deliver us, to take us to our real home, far more than we should be longing to repair and restore that which is already doomed and overripe for judgment.

The deepest cry of our hearts should not be to make America great again because that is not going to happen (even though we love our nation and have the right pray that IF the Lord permits it, we might remain a free nation until we are raptured).

As a nation and world on the brink of the Tribulation, we have already crossed the Rubicon – “Alea iacta est” – the die is cast. There will be no going back; the line of no return has already been crossed. We need to accept this truth, as difficult and heartbreaking as it may be to face. Instead of trying to revive that which God has foreordained that He is going to absolutely judge, the real longing of our hearts, the cry of our souls should be, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus”!