May 18, 2020

The Rapture Ready Virus

It is currently believed that the coronavirus started with a single person in the city of Wuhan, China. I find it amazing that one person’s interaction with a bat could trigger a cascade of tragedy that has now claimed the lives of 300,000 people and has cost the world $5 trillion in efforts to combat the virus.

I’ve watched several videos on how the virus takes over our cells to make endless copies of itself. Each time I’m stunned by how such a simple piece of genetic code can replicate itself and cause so much damage to its host.

The pandemic made me think of a positive outcome that is my hope for the Rapture Ready site. When the rapture finally takes place, a huge number of people will flock to the internet, looking for information on this stunning event. The main goal of the site is to be a resource to people who are interested in prophecy.

For people who find themselves on the wrong side of the rapture, we have very gripping content. Many years ago, Kurt Seland sent me the article “The Post-Rapture Survival Guide.” First, he warned about how everyone should be ready, and then made plain the reality that they will soon face:

First of all, it is to warn those who receive this manual prior to the rapture of the events that will take place in the last days as foretold in the Bible. Based on what the Bible has to say about future events, nobody in their right mind would want to live on earth after the rapture. Hopefully, many will read, believe, seek God, repent and be saved. Salvation is very simple, so simple to attain, in fact, that most people cannot accept its simplicity; thereby, they reject it completely.

Let me be really frank with you. If you are reading this manual and the rapture has already occurred, then you probably are not going to physically survive; you most likely will die sometime in the next few years. This manual is about the survival of your soul. You are going to go through terrible suffering. The only question that remains is whether you will go to Heaven or go to hell when you die.

When the rapture takes place, it will be a gut punch to the global media. When Project Veritas released secretly recorded video of Planned Parenthood executives discussing the harvesting and sale of fetal organs, it took the liberal media two or three days to think of a reason why the abortionists were the ones being wronged. It may take them a week or so to devise how the onset of the tribulation is nothing to fear.

During a brief window, I’m hopeful that millions of people will be able to read and save the content from RR. Because things are so crazy right now, I feel the day of the big download may be very near.

Several times in the past month, we had nearly 100,000 people visit RR in a single day. I know that there are many people in this group that have a general interest in prophecy, but they don’t consider themselves believers to any religion. When the rapture takes place, many of these people will be transformed into highly motivated missionaries.

Everyone who realizes they were left behind, they need to repent of their sins by placing their trust in Jesus Christ, and then they need to copy every resource they can find on the net because it won’t be there for very long.

It would only take a handful of people to make copies of RR or some other sites. It would be a huge blessing if someone like Bill Gates became saved and decided to transmit the content of RR in ways that I could never conceive. My technological capabilities are stuck in the world of HTML. I have Twitter and Facebook accounts, but I have no idea how to use them.

The site you are currently accessing is not designed to be a post-rapture resource. Because RR.com is based on a huge database that might need 100 files just to bring up one page, it would quickly crash once a million people try to access it at once. I just had them double the size of our server because of all the recent virus-related traffic.

I think the best way to transmit content is the flat files that make up our mirror sites. They can be found on our link page. They are old tech, but they are extremely rugged. Because most pages have a single article file and a graphic header, they never crash. Back in the day, we could have a quarter-million people visit the site in a single day on a Pentium-based server with no problems. These HTML sites can be loaded on thumb drives and still operate. If the internet police ban all sites related to prophecy, tribulation saints will need to pass Bible-related content by hand. The mirror sites are stripped to 60 MB, which allows for fast transfer.

There are very few books in print on the subject of the rapture. Most Christian bookstores have gone out of business over the past 20 years. Terry and I live in the central Arkansas area, and I don’t know of any such stores. There was a Lifeway book store in Little Rock, but it closed a couple of years ago. People can get books from Amazon, but that option can disappear with the click of a mouse.

This lack of end-time biblical information is another sign of how close we are to the tribulation hour. The prophecy in the book of Amos perfectly describes our current state of affairs:

“Behold, the days come, saith the Lord GOD, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD” (Amos 8:11).

— Todd


China’s Sudden Emergence

My title here might make one ask: “What do you mean, ‘sudden emergence?’” By this question—to carry the supposition further—the questioner might follow up with: “The Chinese have been front and center and a growing item in the news for decades.”

China has indeed been moving from its Far East shadows behind that long wall that can be seen from satellites in space. Their emergence continues on an hour-by-hour basis. All we have to do is to listen to any news report at the moment these days. China is at the center of controversy in the matter of the COVID-19 crisis.

Top administration officials who are charged with national security are looking with accusatory thoughts toward the communist government of China. Almost certainly, many are saying, China is guilty of releasing the virus once it escaped from one of their laboratories somewhere near Wuhan.

The city—larger in population than New York City—was shut down for some time right at the beginning of the virus’ release, experts are saying. Somehow, I can’t remember exactly how, according to the report, the intelligence from the area showed that many roads for heavy traffic were completely closed for more than a week at one point. It was something that had never been done. There was no explanation for the shutdown, the report I heard said.

The inference the experts in national security made, according to the news report I heard, was that the streets and roads were completely shut down, disallowing the city’s millions of people to traverse them. This means, they believe, that something of a highly dangerous nature caused the dictator, Xii Ping, to disrupt life totally in the area.

Shortly after the shutdown, U S intelligence agencies reported, according to what I heard that Chinese military removed hundreds, if not thousands, from their apartments. These same people haven’t been heard from since. The thinking, among the people who gather intelligence, is that these were taken and killed in some manner, and attempts were made to erase that they ever existed.

Why? Apparently those removed were sick with the virus. They were removed, the thinking goes, so that the Chinese government could hide that the virus broke out in Wuhan and vicinity.

This “theory” is based in fact, in that US intelligence authorities have made no effort to discount this report. Apparently, electronic devices that monitor the area of Wuhan and the military weapons laboratory picked up on all these doings in and around the area.

The reports discount the “theory” that the virus spread from the so called wet markets of the area. These are the places where meats are bought by grocery shoppers. They apparently choose live animals—and exotic animals, at that, in some cases. Bats were thought to be the “meat” from which the virus came in this regard.

Now the question is whether the virus escaped the labs accidentally or was deliberately released. The former thinking seems to be what most of the intelligence people I’ve heard talk about the matters involved have concluded.

Now the accusations are that Xii Ping and his cadre of underlings decided that the accidental release was not going to bring only China’s economic circumstance to a standstill. They wanted and continue to want all economies to suffer so China can maintain its relatively close number-one economic position as it comes out of the crisis. The virus, the thinking goes, was put on planes by the Chinese government, with people carrying it to major cities around the world.

This certainly seems to be the plausible explanation for what has happened.

It is much more than just doubtful that this could have been contrived totally as part of a plan to do the damage it has done. The Chinese have simply—and maybe not so simply—taken advantage of the virus’ accidental release. Their strategy, if so, is brilliantly evil.

As stated in previous commentaries, I believe it was planned by the greatest schemer there is—Lucifer, the fallen one. He, I conjecture, started it from the beginning and continues to carry out the devilish plan.

So the American administration is casting a suspicious glare at the Chinese communist regime and pointing an accusatory finger, based on electronic and on-the-ground intelligence.

What does this all mean, prophetically speaking? My own thought is that while Satan has planned it all from its inception, it is, of course, under the complete control of God, whose omniscience nothing and no one escapes. I believe it is yet another signal of stage-setting for the Tribulation era and the ultimate return of His Son, the Lord Jesus, to clean up the planet of all sin and rebellion.

It is almost a certainty that China will be a primary player in the Tribulation era. The virus and China’s part in the release of its deadly and destructive effects could well be the Lord grabbing the old Chinese dragon by its neck and pulling it to the surface of earth’s bubbling cauldron of rebellion against God to make known its evil intentions.

China, as we’ve looked at many times, is showing itself to be the hegemonic force that consistently proves it wants to dominate not only the South China Sea and its sphere of influence, but wants to become the world’s number-one economic and military superpower.

The coronavirus might be a pandemic—a much-overblown one in terms of its potential deadly effects, in my estimation. It is likely Satan, however, who has brought it about to the degree that it has inflicted its havoc upon the world. But the God of Heaven controls it, like He controls everything in the ultimate sense.

Could China now have been “outed” in alerting all observers to its genocidal evil? Could the Lord be seeing to it that the Chinese dragon is shown to be in cahoots with the old red dragon, Satan so that there can be no excuse that the world hasn’t been warned?

That Chinese dragon will be the king of the kings of the east, I really have little doubt. They and their Near-East and Far-East Asian cohorts will be responsible for killing fully one-third of earth’s inhabitants at the later stages of the movement of nations toward the killing fields of Armageddon.

And the sixth angel poured out his bowl upon the great river, the Euphrates; and its water was dried up, that the way might be prepared for the kings from the east. (Revelation 16:12)     

–Terry

May 11, 2020

There Is No Justice in This World

There is no point in holding out hope that the justice system will set the world right by going after the bad guys. The justice system has become the enemies of true justice, so it’s foolish to place any hope in them.

For years I heard conservative voices predicting Hillary Clinton is going to jail someday for all her crimes. It doesn’t matter if she smashed her illegal private server right in front of the FBI headquarters. She will never spend a day in court because there is an army of leftist soldiers that will fight any effort to bring her to justice.

Mark Levin rightly said that “Barack Obama is one of the most corrupt presidents in history, certainly in modern history.” It was the Obama FBI that was spying on the Trump campaign. It was the Obama FBI that was spying on Carter page. It was the Obama FBI that went after Michael Flynn. We now even have handwritten notes on how the FBI agents were planning to entrap Flynn. This is not a couple of renegades. This is just how things are done by the government.  When FBI suddenly dropped all charges against him, the media ran the story like he was still guilty.

A few weeks ago, I read that PG&E will plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter in the Camp Fire. Victims of wildfires blamed on PG&E’s equipment are concerned the sell-off on Wall Street could hobble stock payments that make up half of a $13.5 billion settlement over claims from the blazes, said Robert Julian, an attorney for the victims. I understand how cash can resolve damages, but I don’t comprehend the guilty plea on the part of the firm itself.

If someone runs a big company, and they make decisions that directly cause people to die, they should go to jail. This general rule that companies are at fault is how big banks can steal $20 billion and pay a $5 billion fine. That is a 75% profit on criminal activity. The reason why 5,000 bankers went to jail in the Saving and Loan crisis of the 90’s, and zero went to jail in the Great Recession of 2008 & 2009, is because corporations learned to pay money to write the rules that regulate them.

I was dumbfounded when convicted celebrity lawyer Michael Avenatti was granted temporary freedom from a New York City jail by a California federal judge who said the spread of the coronavirus was a compelling reason to release him.

In an order, U.S. District Judge James Selna said Avenatti, who represented adult film actress Stormy Daniels in lawsuits against U.S. President Donald Trump, may stay at a friend’s home during the 90-day release period. Avenatti, 49, will be moving to the home of Jay Manheimer in Venice, California.

He was convicted in February of trying to extort up to $25 million from the athletic wear company Nike Inc. Avenatti, who is scheduled to be sentenced on June 17, could face more than 40 years in prison in the case. He still faces trial in two other criminal cases. It would seem that, at this point, getting released from confinement would only require a note from your mother stating your dislike for prison food.

In a recent 5-4 vote, the state Supreme Court of Washington rejected a lawsuit calling for the release of thousands of inmates to help stem the spread of the coronavirus. Those narrowly missing a shot at freedom included Gary Ridgway, the so-called “Green River Killer,” who in 2003 was sentenced to life in prison after confessing to killing as many as 49 women in the 1980s, Seattle’s KIRO radio reported.

It is unlikely that a high-profile man like Mr. Ridgway would go free, but 12,000 other dangerous criminals would be allowed to walk the streets. One other reason why I have long soured on true crime shows is because a murder getting a death or a life sentence doesn’t mean all that much with our liberal justice system. If you are double ax murder, just tell the judge you have asthma, and he’ll send you home.

The meltdown of the justice system is because all of mankind shares the same capacity for evil. One person shows their fallen nature by killing someone, and another person shows their depravity by letting the killer go free. It is very unlikely that we will see a return to true justice in America until Jesus comes and establishes His righteous rule over the whole earth.

“This is what the LORD Almighty said: ‘Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another'” (Zechariah 7:9).

— Todd


Still Not Yet

Some weeks ago I wrote in my blog a commentary I called “The End Is Not Yet.” It began as follows:

Even those who operate issues and events from Christian and even prophetic perspectives are painting a picture that the world is now almost certainly already in an era not unlike that described as the biblical apocalypse.

Aside from the fears about the millions who might die from coronavirus are the just-as-feared economic ramifications of the now officially declared pandemic.

As the weeks progress, I continue to get many emails that want me to reconsider my pre-Trib position regarding the Rapture.

Realizing most who come to Rapture Ready comprehend the term, to make sure everyone fully understands what is meant by the term “pre-Trib Rapture,” I’ll try to make it clear.

The Rapture is the instant (in the twinkling of an eye—that is, a time that cannot be measured) when Jesus Christ will call all believers of the Church Age (Age of Grace) to Himself. Paul the apostle prophesies that stunning event:

Behold, I shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep [die], but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. (1 Corinthians 15:51–52)

Paul further explains:

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. (1 Thessalonians 4:16–17)

This promise from God of deliverance from history’s most terrible time (Revelation 3:10) is for all who believe in Jesus Christ for their salvation (Romans 10:9–10). Those who have trusted Christ for salvation of their souls and who have died during the Church Age and all who are alive when the great event of Rapture takes place will go instantaneously to be with Jesus when He shouts “Come up here!” (Revelation 4:1).

In that second of time, all of these saints will be lifted into the clouds and will return with their Lord Jesus to the Father’s House, where He has been preparing “dwelling places” for us (John 14:1–3).

Back on planet earth, terrible things will be taking place. Ultimately, history’s last and most terrible dictator will arise and implement his rule of terror upon most all of earth’s inhabitants. This will be the Tribulation.

So, Christians will be removed, as we have seen, before that Tribulation takes place. Thus we term it the “pre-Trib Rapture.”

This is why Paul writes just after telling of this glorious going home: Wherefore comfort one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4:18).

So the emails continue to indicate that some are now beginning to doubt this rescue. More are trying to get me to read theories that the Rapture is delayed until sometime into the Tribulation—which these contend we’ve now entered.

One such email begins: “I know many have been soured on the subject of what is known as ‘the rapture,’ but 1 Corinthians 15:52 makes this a biblical event, despite the confusion around the subject. In this message, I have included a link to the book, in magazine format, that I wrote after God showed me how 1 Corinthians 15:52 would actually occur. This is worth your reading, because it will shake and wake the Church!”

Not to be rude or pompous, but the title of his book, Delayed Rapture, told me all I needed to know. I have long ago ceased to chase after these alternate theories or debate them. There simply isn’t enough time to devote to things contrary to what the Scripture plainly teaches. It is so important at this late date at the end of the age to just plainly teach and believe what God’s Word says on this most important matter.

While we are not in that dreaded Tribulation era, as many believe, issues and events coming at us minute by minute in the news show how close we must be to that moment of Rapture and the beginning of that era of horror which will certainly follow.

One such indicator in the news of where we stand that isn’t talked a lot about today was sent to me by a friend who helps keep me up to date on breaking news.

The Tribulation, in large part, will come upon the earth because of God’s desire to bring about a remnant of believers from the House of Israel—His chosen people.

They are “chosen” because He brought into the world through them the Savior—Jesus Christ—in order to be the slain Lamb who takes away the sins of the world.

God has promised to save one-third of the Jewish race as a remnant to be His chosen nation, Israel, during the millennial reign of Jesus on the throne of David.

That one-third will come from the Lord bringing Jewish believers through the time of Jacob’s trouble (Jeremiah 30: 7). This will be the last half of the seven-year Tribulation era.

So the article my friend sent is an important one dealing with the Jews, as God begins preparing that people for this horrific time to come.

Brooklyn, NY: Rabbi Chaim Yaakov Frankel, also known as the Rime over Rebbe, issued an unequivocal order last week for Jews in the diaspora to leave their homes and immigrate to Israel before a civil war breaks out in the United States reports Bhadrei Haharedim.

Rabbi Frankel is an heir of Menachem Mendel of Rimanov—who was among the early promoters of the Hasidic movement in Poland.

He has been active recently years on social media, especially with his lectures on YouTube, which are usually on the subject of the coming of Moshiach.

But while on a visit to South-American and French Jews who have moved to Florida, Rabbi Frankel was unusually specific about the urgent need to return to Israel and aliyah now: “Leave while it’s possible. Things will get worse and it will be difficult to move from one country to another” the rabbi said.

“After World War II, the survivors came and asked why the Gedolim and the Rebbes (rabbis) did not order European Jews to leave while there was still time and emigrate to Israel or the United States before the war broke out,” Rabbi Frankel told the audience attending his lecture. “Truth be told, they (the rabbis) said and then some, they begged the Jews to flee the scorched earth, but part of the decree was that the Jews didn’t listen.”

“Today,” he continued “Listen to me well, dear Jews, whoever can afford to rise and ascend to the Holy Land should it as soon as possible, and this includes large parts of South America and most of Europe. The US will also become a dangerous place mired in war, and it is still too early to tell which US state will survive, but many parts will be destroyed and poisoned, and a civil war will break out within the US. And states will secede from the federal government. (David Sidman, “Fearing Civil War, Prominent NY Rabbi Suddenly Urges American Jews to Leave for Israel,” Breaking Israel News, April 29, 2020)

Most who study Israel and its end-times juxtaposition within the nations of the world believe God will move most into Israel for the coming Tribulation. The prophecy seems wrapped up in the following.

Thus saith the Lord; Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears: for thy work shall be rewarded, saith the Lord; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy. And there is hope in thine end, saith the Lord, that thy children shall come again to their own border. (Jeremiah 31:16–17)

There can be little doubt that God’s hand is moving, especially upon His chosen people of the House of Israel. But, the end still is not yet.

We are witnessing spectacular stage-setting for that time of Tribulation and Jacob’s trouble. But the apocalyptic play has not yet begun. It won’t begin until God first raises the curtain with the Rapture of His other chosen people—all believers of the Age of Grace.

And when you see all these things begin to come to pass, then look up and lift up your head; for your redemption draweth nigh. (Luke 21:28)

—Terry

–Terry