Houston’s Third Occurrence a of 500-Year-Flood

Hurricane Harvey has been the fiercest hurricane to strike Texas since Hurricane Carla in 1961—the most powerful Texas hurricane on record. What Harvey lacked in intensity, it more than made up for in rainfall. If you add up the highest rainfall for Hurricanes Katrina (16.33 inches); Andrew (13.9 inches); and Sandy (12.55 inches), they would not equal the over 50 inches of rainfall from Hurricane Harvey.

This storm has dropped more than 27 trillion gallons of water on Texas, triggering catastrophic, unprecedented flooding in the Houston area. The rains have broken numerous all-time records. There has simply never been a storm in U.S. history that has dropped so much rain over such a vast area of land.

The Weather Service office in Houston reported just over two feet of rain in 24 hours between 7 a.m. Saturday and 7 a.m. Sunday morning—making August the wettest month on record. Hurricane Harvey continued to be a named storm four days after making landfall. Prior to Harvey, there has never been a named storm that has managed to last even three days, according to Colorado State University tropical scientist Dr. Phil Klotzbach.

The record of records was the 51.88 inches measured at the Cedar Bayou weather station in southeast Houston. This is the highest storm total ever in the continental U.S. The previous record was 48 inches in 1978 by Cyclone Amelia, in Medina, Texas.

The eventual insured losses from this Category 4 hurricane will likely be well over $40 billion. Hurricane Ike in 2008 was only a Category 2 storm and resulted in $13 billion of insurance losses. Since only one in six residents have insurance, there’s 100 percent chance of Congress passing a huge government assistance package.

It is going to take a long time for aid agencies to help get eastern Texas back on its feet. The director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Brock Long, predicted that the aftermath of the storm would require FEMA’s involvement for years. “This disaster’s going to be a landmark event,” Long said.

The climate change lobby is already claiming that Hurricane Harvey is the result of global warming. The Gulf of Mexico, where warm water fuels hurricanes, had temperatures just under 90 °F.  Most of the water in the Northern Hemisphere has been warmer than normal for the past year. For the first time in recorded history, the daily average surface temperature of the Gulf of Mexico never fell below 73 °F during last winter.

The frequency of hurricanes has been down over the past several years. We just ended a record 13-year-drought for not seeing a category three hurricane strike the continental U.S. The vast majority the of destruction from Hurricane Harvey is the result of it being penned in by two high pressure areas. The rain kept coming down in the same location because the upper air steering currents were in neutral.

I read a 2008 article that predicted warmer Gulf of Mexico water would result in more tornadoes. Yet we’ve had three recent years with record low numbers of twisters.

The flood that hit Houston is being called a 500-year-event. The thinking is that if you live in a flood plain, there is a 0.2 percent chance each year that your property could be overrun by water. The entire concept of a 500-year-flood desperately needs to be reevaluated.

In 2015, Houston was hit on May 26 (Memorial Day) by heavy rains that flooded 6,500 homes. It was called a 500-year-flood. Again, in 2016, Houston was hit on April 18 (tax day) by massive rains that flooded 9,800 homes.

Houston isn’t the only city to get hit by “historic” floods with rapid frequency. Cedar Rapids, Iowa, was hit with a 500-year flood in 2008, followed by a 100-year flood in 2016.

The people who manage flood planning may try to fix matters by calling Hurricane Harvey the 1000-year-flood. However, this flawed interpretation gives little comfort to people who have had to gut and rebuild their homes three years in a row.

The logical explanation for why Houston has had three so-called 500 year floods in a row may be the result of Bible prophecy. As we draw closer to the last days, calamities like Hurricane Harvey are going to occur with greater frequency.

Jesus said the arrival of the Tribulation hour can be likened to the contractions experienced by a woman about to give birth, as they increase with frequency and intensity. We can see these dynamics taking place worldwide  affecting nearly every aspect of life. When Jesus foretold of these birth pangs He used the word “sorrows,” in His Olivet Discourse in reference to  end-time things to come.

“And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? And what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world? 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 ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.” (Matthew 24:3-8)

–Todd

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Prelude to Planetary Madness

News reports forewarn a nation descending toward chaos. Forces have obviously been set in motion that threaten to tear America apart. This instigation is purposeful, I have no doubt, and is spawned by Satan.

Saul Alinsky’s blueprint to bring about chaos so the one-world-order builders’ perfect, utopian plan can eventually rise from the ashes of this republic is well underway. George Soros and all the other globalists elite have little trouble finding minions of the human source to carry out the carnage. Lucifer’s demonic minions throw fuel of hatred on the fires of anarchy, and we see the incendiary results in our hourly headlines.

A 1979 Hollywood production, remade in 1980, 1985, and 2015, I believe, gives a fictionalized look at the real world to come when God the Holy Spirit removes from acting as restrainer on the already half-crazed minds of earth dwellers.

Mad Max is the disturbing foreshadowing of things to come when the Body of Christ—the Church—is removed in the Rapture.

Although made in Australia, the movie was Americanized in that the Aussie accents were dubbed over in the American-English accent in order to give the sense of the carnage taking place in the U.S. The storyline, set in the near future, portrayed a world gone mad with evil. The dystopian film presented in graphic terms people’s unrestrained actions against their fellow human beings.

Of course, the creators of the film had no idea that Bible prophecy presents just such a scenario—at least, I don’t think that entered their thinking.

We find the real story of things to come in this regard in the following Scripture.

And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now [restrains] will [restrain], until he be taken out of the way. And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming. (2 Thessalonians 6–8)

When God the Holy Spirit withdraws from restraining wickedness perpetrated by fallen mankind, the world will become instantly worse than the fictional world of Mad Max. The present hostilities and chaos being churned by the would-be masters—both human and demonic—will swiftly result in destructiveness beyond description. We are indeed currently enduring a prelude to planetary madness.

But the Creator has not left us in a state of hopelessness despite the rioting and insanity going on in our nation and world. The Lord has provided a way to escape the carnage so vividly described in Revelation by John the apostle while exiled on Patmos two thousand years ago.

I wrote the following for our book, The Departure: God’s Next Catastrophic Intervention Into Earth’s History:

First, the Departure 

Before God’s wrath falls, in the twinkling of an eye (an atomos of time), millions of Christians—those born again by believing in the shed blood of Christ on the cross two millennia ago for salvation—will vanish from the earth’s surface. The departure—the Rapture—will bring planet-rending disturbances to an already reeling world of nonbelievers.

God has been patient in allowing the world to see the Tribulation storm alerts. He has shown mercy and grace, as there is no prophecy given that must be fulfilled in order for the Rapture to happen. The departure can take place at any moment.

Getting out the warnings is the duty of spiritual meteorologists. This is a commission each author in The Departure: God’s Next Catastrophic Intervention into Earth’s History takes most seriously. We prayerfully hope many, upon reading the book, will take to heart the call of the only Lord and God of all Creation, who prompted the apostle Peter to write: “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

This is the only way to be saved from the sin that separates the sinner from the Heavenly Father. This is the only way to be secure from the approaching Tribulation storm.

If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10: 9–10)

We join with the prophet John, who wrote, “He which testifieth these things saith, ‘Surely I come quickly.’ Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus” (Revelation 22:20).

 

–Terry

Afghanistan: Our Most Costly War Goes On

The liberal media have trained themselves to exploit any misstep or inconsistency that President Trump makes. When he announced his plan to continue the Afghanistan war, it’s very strange and ominous that the press gave little coverage to President Trump’s previous twitter comments on the subject:

“It is time to get out of Afghanistan. We are building roads and schools for people that hate us. It is not in our national interests.” (February 27, 2012)

“Afghanistan is a total disaster. We don’t know what we are doing. They are, in addition to everything else, robbing us blind.”  (March 12, 2012)

“We should leave Afghanistan immediately. No more wasted lives. If we have to go back in, we go in hard and quick. Rebuild the U.S. first.” (March 1, 2013)

President Trump freely admitted that he has changed his mind about our involvement in Afghanistan. The war will go on, but our focus will be on killing terrorists and not nation building. He promised to pressure Pakistan to crack down on terrorist cells along its border with Afghanistan. He called on the Afghan government to rein in corruption. President Trump also wants India to become more involved in the situation.

The war in Afghanistan is America’s longest military conflict. Unlike earlier wars, most American families don’t feel impacted by the Afghanistan War. Unlike the Vietnam War and World War II, there has not been a draft, and no ration cards have been issued for goods and services. There has not been a special tax imposed to pay for the war.

The 2,400 death toll from the Afghanistan  War is very low. In the Civil War and World War II we lost half million people in each conflict. Our losses in Afghanistan are so light, every time a soldier dies his or her name is reported in the national news.

The problem I have with Afghanistan war is this: money. War is an expensive endeavor, and a military campaign cannot be sustained without bleeding a nation dry. The Cost of Wars Project at Brown University has estimated that total war spending in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan since 2001 is approaching $5 trillion. Of that, roughly $2 trillion is attributable to Afghanistan. This massive price tag will only keep rising, as President Trump has now vowed to increase troop levels in Afghanistan.

The cost of this Afghanistan War doesn’t include future spending that will be needed for the Department of Veterans Affairs. Because of the advances in medical science, we have been able to save soldiers who lost their limbs or have suffered profound brain injuries. The cost related to Iraq and Afghanistan veterans over the next 40 years will be more than $1 trillion.

The government can only think in the short term, so budget planners have no grasp of the long term cost of an endless war. Linda Bilmes, a senior lecturer in public finance at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government said, “The cost of caring for war veterans typically peaks 30 to 40 years or more after a conflict.” But we are already at the point where we face a financial crisis every three or four months—which shows how much financial peril we are in.

World War II, in inflation-adjusted dollars cost $4.1 trillion. In the 1940s people were willing to pay that high price tag because they deemed it necessary to save the world from the likes of Hitler, Mussolini, and Tojo. I don’t think our investment in Iraq and Afghanistan has been worth $5 trillion. After we pulled out of Iraq, the military that we had painstakingly built-up collapsed in spectacular fashion, and ISIS used “our weapons” to completely destroy dozens of cities.

Afghanistan has been a hopeless cause for any empire trying to colonize or tame it. The British and the Soviet Union tried and failed to subjugate that land of warring tribes. Our wishful goal of just making Afghanistan a peaceful place is delusional.

Our relationship with Afghanistan is so disorganized; we don’t even have an ambassador to Kabul. A good reason why that post is empty is because every single year there has been at least one major attack against a Western embassy. Our troops operate from behind fortified compounds because the natives hate us.

I have to wonder if the reason why America is not clearly mentioned in Bible prophecy is because we will implode under the financial weight of our vast military complex. It might not be Afghanistan that breaks us, but someday the dollar is going to collapse and the reformed Roman Empire may just step in to take our place.

“After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns. I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things” (Daniel 7:7-8).

–Todd

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Bannon vs Globalists and Bible Prophecy

Observers of end-times events who believe there is an advancing power grab by the globalists elite look with interest at Steve Bannon’s exit as President Trump’s chief strategist. National politics that make up part of the intrigues going on in the White House are secondary at most, so the thinking goes. Matters involving the long-sought changed world order is all-important in considering the most recent developments in Washington, D.C.

On the secular side, many–perhaps most–media pundits speculate that the Republican establishment types have succeeded in convincing Trump to get rid of the ultranationalist Bannon (as they view him), so Congress will work with Trump in achieving a more rational legislative agenda. These, of course, have no concept that there is a much deeper meaning to all of this.

I take that back to some extent. They do have a strangely twisted thought process that touches on Bible prophecy yet to unfold.

Bannon, it seems, according to a number of these pundits, has an apocalyptic view of the world. He believes that Trump and America somehow are destined to be involved in world history as it winds up.

The media types who purport this to be the case don’t go far into this accusation. That is, they don’t give us details about how Mr. Bannon’s end-times view might possibly have affected any outcome he personally desired to achieve while advising the president.

It is indeed strange…the secular media types sensing and commenting that there is some weird connection to apocalyptic matters in all of these goings-on.

There is such visceral hatred for this president that when anything bad happens, his enemies in media and everyone else find ways to link Trump to the evil involved. For example, this was the case in the recent white supremacist activities and the clashes over confederate statues in Charlottesville. Trump’s statements on the matters involved were made to look by mainstream news types like the president took the side of the KKK and the neo Nazis. Anyone who actually heard the president’s remarks knows the opposite is true. He plainly called out the evil. But, he made the mistake of saying there was evil on both sides. That gave the haters all the fodder needed to link him directly to the skinheads and all the rest.

In the same sense, Steve Bannon is linked by the mainstream news types to a mindset like the Ayatollahs who want to bring on their version of the apocalypse. That is as deeply into Bannon’s “apocalyptic” worldview of geopolitics as they wish to delve. If they can make that linkage in the mind of the American voters–the evil of Steve Bannon to the Iranian religious madmen–their mission is achieved.

Evil that lurks within the mainstream media as it currently exist, in my view, is the real linkage to the chaos now being perpetrated. It is luciferian. It is part of the Saul Alinsky blueprint–being utilized by the George Soros-globalist types–to bring America down so her power to influence is diminished. So her wealth can be redistributed to the have-nots in order to secure power bases for the globalists constructing the changed world order they desire.

There seems to me something boiling beneath the obvious–Bannon’s being dismissed from Trump’s advisory team in the White House. I have no idea of what that might be. Steve Bannon made the following statement shortly after leaving his post: “The Trump presidency that we fought for, and won, is over.” Bannon said further, “We still have a huge movement, and we will make something of this Trump presidency. But that presidency is over. It’ll be something else. And there’ll be all kinds of fights, and there’ll be good days and bad days, but that presidency is over.”

He said also, his statement unfortunately laced with profanity, that he was going to fight the globalists every step of the way. Well, you had better have the Lord at your side in that effort, Mr. Bannon. The globalists–knowingly or unknowingly–have the most powerful being ever to be created as their leader. Lucifer the fallen is determined to prepare the planet for the coming of his man of sin. There is no political strategy–even by a top strategist like yourself–that can alter Satan’s plan for his Antichrist regime.

But the Lord did so–and with ease–in this last presidential election. He is still in complete control. Trump is God’s man for this troubled hour as we move swiftly toward the Rapture of the church.

Meantime, it is much prayer by God’s people that is the primary Tool that must lead the fight against the globalists. Prophetically speaking, the battle is already won!

“He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure. Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” (Psalms 2:4-9)

–Terry