The Great Awakening? :: By Terry James

Recently, a well-known evangelist was saying on the TV program he and his wife host that a Great Awakening is comingThis is what I’ve heard over the months since the time the 2020 presidential election approached. “The Great Awakening is on its way” continues to be the declaration by many of the conservative ilk in the arena of government, politics, and the ideological arena of societal and cultural thought.

By this, these proponents of that belief, I infer, mean that the people of the world—particularly those of the United States—will awaken en masse to the evil the radical leftists of the world and nation are perpetrating.

This was the first time, however, that I heard a person I considered to be a truly believing Christian leader of his spiritual magnitude say that a Great Awakening is on the way. I must be fair and tell you that I didn’t listen to the program, so can’t say for certain what he meant by the term; I can only say that he and his wife had as their guest that morning Dr. Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas. They were going to talk about Dr. Jeffress book involving Bible prophecy, so I presume the term the host used in his promotion means the same Great Awakening in general, as predicted by the secular proponents of the matters involved in that term. Whether the TV show host was referring to a geopolitical/cultural/societal awakening or one of a spiritual nature, I don’t know.

The fact is, though, that the term “the Great Awakening” is used more and more often in venues outside of mainstream media. The people favoring things proposed by the term look for there to be an uprising by the vast majority. These will, it is believed, grow in such resistance and opposition to the so-called “woke” movement and all attendant to that insanity that the evil it all represents will be forced back into the proverbial box that restrains such deviation from normalcy.

In the world of those who are Bible believers, I perceive a mindset that equates the term “Great Awakening” with the matter many believe is a coming, worldwide revival. These declare that before Christ’s return at Armageddon there will be a tremendous turning to God. In some cases, they declare that a great multitude of souls will be saved in this predicted revival movement.

Many among those who believe that we are seeing a “Great Awakening” in the spiritual sense thought that Donald Trump’s election and subsequent support for faith-based causes was the onset of this “revival.” The economy and many social and cultural changes were, it seemed, poised for things improving to the point that America would be made great again in the sense the Founding Fathers intended. We were to again become a “Christian” nation, as in America’s founding. We wanted to get back to thinking more of the good of everyone rather than the uplifting of the few who rule rather than govern.

That altruistic outlook was a noble one. That was something worthy of longing for, even though the nation has never been truly a “Christian” nation in the purest sense. There have always been the bad and ugly to go along with the good. But the Make America Great Again movement came to a jolting halt with the sudden appearance of COVID-19.

Suddenly, the globalist agenda continues to be on the rise. The insanity represented by the proposals and demands the radical left envisioned for America—which we thought could never be accepted by normal people—became the track the nation seems be following to its perhaps fatal detriment.

So it seems that whether considering the term “the Great Awakening” or the term “great end-times revival,” either’s trajectory is on track to eventuate as thought. The movement is in the opposite direction.

The way things are tracking, however, is in sync with Bible prophecy for the end of the age.

Again, for those who are new as readers of our commentaries, the pre-Trib view of Bible prophecy is that before the Tribulation (the last seven years of this Age of Grace, or Church Age) arrives, Jesus Christ will call all believers to Himself in what is called the Rapture.  Paul the great apostle foretells this in 1 Corinthians 4:51–55 and 1 Thessalonians 4:13–18. Jesus first gave indication of this great event in John 14:1–3, and later gave the promise to us through John in Revelation 3:10.

Jesus, while on the Mount of Olives, just before His crucifixion, answered His disciples as to when He would return and the signs of His return. He gave a number of signals to look for, which we have covered many times.

He said that when we see these things (stage-setting signs) begin to come to pass we are to look up and lift up our heads for our redemption is drawing near.

We’ve given details over and over about the Tribulation (Daniel’s seventieth week). It will be a terrible time, Jesus forewarned, such as never was before, nor will ever be again.

These issues and events are literally in every direction and are proliferating exponentially. We are not witnessing things that look as if we can anticipate a “Great Awakening.” Things don’t in any way appear that people, either the lost or believers in Christ, are turning en masse to God in complete repentance, obedience, or worship.

I wish I could report that I observe otherwise, but I cannot. Just as Paul foretold, evil men and seducers are getting worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. The reprobate mindset prophesied by Paul in Romans 1:28 is front and center through our headlines.

All that said, there is good news, however. God the Father in Heaven and God the Holy Spirit, who is everywhere all the time, is at work restraining wickedness at every level throughout this evil sphere.  As bad as it seems, all is being prepared for God the Son—the Lord Jesus Christ—to make His appearance and put an end to the madness into which the world is devolving.

Heaven’s Great Awakening is just around the corner of Bible prophecy. For believers in Christ, that much-wished-for end-times revival is but one twinkling-of-an-eye moment away. The Rapture will bring for each and every child of God an awakening the likes of which is beyond fully knowing at this darkening, earthly moment.

Every believer of this Church Age who has died will, in that glorious moment, awaken to new life that is everlasting. Those who are alive at that instant will have all senses awaken to fantastic vistas that were beyond comprehension while in these earth-bound bodies.

But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. (1 Corinthians 2:9)

Golden Cup or Cankering Ccesspool? :: By Terry James

Disturbing statistics about the nation I love bring again to mind the question: Why is America not mentioned in Bible prophecy?

It is the apex nation of history so far as concerns achieving material wealth and moving forward technology that defines the term “modernity.” America has been, as we’ve noticed on many occasions, among history’s most spiritually blessed and God-centered nation-states. Of course, we’re quick to recognize and state the obvious. That seems now a thing—for recent generations, at least—of the distant past.

Every day and in most every way it can be said that the US as currently constituted has turned our back on God and most things of the Heaven-directed sort. We watch on an hourly news-cycle basis while the political power wielders who committed electoral larceny work incessantly at trying to take apart this nation one constitutional safeguard after another. And they do so without seemingly significant push-back from all but a very few.

Sadly, it appears that a majority of we the people, rather than oppose things going on to destroy this once-great republic, just fall in line like proverbial lemmings. Evidence of this acquiescence is the very large number of people who accept an almost totally unproven and non-FDA approved vaccine. With government-engineered, fear-engendered COVID-19 at the center of the coercion, they are willing to give in to government directives to comply, if they want to be able to be American citizens in the same sense as before the so-called pandemic. Only, there is little chance of that ever being allowed to happen. Implied in this government demand that all be vaccinated with an unproven injection is that a vaccine passport is forthcoming. All will have to have it—or else stay sequestered within the confines of one’s home, I presume. 

I don’t intend by this rant to advise in any way that one should or should not take the vaccine. That is a personal decision (at this point at least.) I’m more than implying, however, that I object strenuously to government, by proxy, forcing us to be jabbed, as it is termed by some.

I say “by proxy” because the politicians, very wise in their end-times deceit and treachery, are in league with big-business interests. They will, no doubt, let the business entities take the blame for requiring the vaccine passports that are undoubtedly on the way.

This is to say that in the near future you might not be allowed to go to Walmart or any other place to shop, or ride in public conveyance without your papers—yes, much like Nazi Germany began the Reign of Terror during der Führer’s rise to dictatorship.

The papers of vaccination are the new normal  the powers that be want us to accept. And this while Dr. Anthony Fauci says we need to keep the masks on in public and avoid gathering.

All this, in my view of Bible prophecy, demonstrates the terrible effects of turning one’s back on God, which we mentioned at the beginning.

Is America the Babylon of Revelation 18? This is a query we’ve been over many times here, and others have explored on many occasions in Bible prophecy studies. I’ve indicated that I believe there are parallels that are hard to dismiss between that doomed, future city-state that will be destroyed in one hour and our beloved America. Time factors show, in my view, that it would be hard for another all-dominating empire-type state such as America has been to develop in the area of ancient Babylon—if Christ’s return is close.

I don’t hold that America and the prophesied Babylon are one and the same. I simply weasel out by saying it looks to me like there is a possibility that they are.

And when I see the description in Revelation chapter 18—“has been a golden cup in God’s hand”—I think of this Heaven-blessed nation.

As stated many times, we have spread the Gospel—carried out the Great Commission—as no other nation to ever exist. We have been blessed with the technology and travel capability to do so.

America has blessed God’s chosen nation Israel as no other nation has blessed that people. The US was instrumental in bringing about Israel’s rebirth in 1948 and has stood as a sort of big brother to protect the Jewish state since.

This blessing of Israel, too, is now on the dangerous side of down-trending with the Biden administration and a seeming increasing hostility toward Benjamin Netanyahu and the Jewish state.

The “golden cup” nation called America, it seems, is now cankering—rusting and deteriorating by the day. As a matter of fact, it has become rather a cesspool of Sodom-like activity in a significant way.

The following somewhat frames this truth.

There are a lot of things that we want America to be great at, but spreading sexually-transmitted diseases is not one of them.

And the numbers tell us that cases have been rising at a particularly frightening pace since 2015

For 2019, health departments across the U.S. reported 1.8 million cases of Chlamydia, an almost 20% increase since 2015; 616,392 cases of gonorrhea, more than 50% higher than 2015, and 129,813 cases of all stages of syphilis, a whopping 70% increase, the CDC said.

So why is this happening?

Well, an NPR article on this subject is pointing out that dating apps have made finding casual sex easier than ordering a pizza

There are many factors that contribute to the rise of STDs, and syphilis in particular.

In the gay community in San Francisco, for example, the rise of mobile dating apps like Grindr and Tinder made finding a date “faster than getting pizza delivered to your home,” says Dan Wohlfeiler, an STD prevention specialist and co-founder of Building Healthy Online Communities, which uses these apps to improve gay men’s health.

These dating apps are particularly popular among young people and in the gay community, and this is clearly showing up in the case numbers

Additionally, gay and bisexual men and younger people also faced an increased burden. According to the report, gay and bisexual men made up nearly half of all 2019 primary and secondary syphilis cases and had gonorrhea rates that were 42 times higher than heterosexual men in some areas, whereas people aged 15 to 24 years accounted for 61% of chlamydia cases and 42% of gonorrhea cases.

It is important to keep in mind that chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis are just three pieces of a much larger puzzle.

According to the CDC, there are dozens of STDs currently spreading in the United States.  Approximately 20 million new STD infections occur in the U.S. every single year, and at any moment in time approximately 110 million Americans are dealing with a sexually-transmitted disease. (“We’re #1”: Yet Another Ignominious All-Time Record High Is Established In The Late, Great United States,” by Tyler Durden (article by Michael Snyder), ZeroHedge, April 15, 2021)

America, in significant, wicked ways, has now become like the sexually debauched days of Sodom of Lot’s day. There seems no turning back, although we should pray and work toward that changed trajectory.

This all means that Jesus, and His time for stepping out on the clouds of Glory to call His Church to be with Him, might be even at the door of Heaven. We who are called by His Holy Name can take comfort from His own Words. We can take comfort because all we are seeing might mean that things are now like they were in Lot’s day when God intervened. The next Intervention, I believe Jesus is saying, will be the Rapture!

Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. (Luke 17:28–29)