The Answer - By Hal Lindsey - https://www.hallindsey.com/ww-6-10-2020/
Like most people, I was appalled when I saw video of George Floyd with his face down on the pavement, a police officer's knee in his neck. I couldn't believe the officers would have his hands cuffed behind his back, his chest constricted so that every breath was a struggle, and the knee in his neck restricting blood flow to his brain. I was simultaneously outraged and filled with sorrow as I heard him politely pleading for his life. "I can't breathe. Please, officer."
And I saw the officer with his hand in his pocket, almost nonchalantly killing the man beneath his knee. I heard the spectators begging the officers to let George up, and after he passed out, asking them to get off of him and take his pulse. I know that the law must see the officers as "innocent" until they are proven guilty in a court of law. But if I were the prosecutor, I would throw the book at them.
The spark of outrage from the video began a fire of racial turmoil that swept - not just the United States - but the whole world. In the last week, massive protests have been held in the United Kingdom, Germany, South Korea, Hong Kong, Israel, Italy, Spain, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, and elsewhere.
How should followers of Jesus respond to a world that for months has been locked down by a disease, and is now being ripped apart in a torrent of violence and accusation? We need to engage the culture, but we need to do it God's way. Proposing another political program will not be enough. Yelling "racist" on social media won't fix anything. Throwing money at problems will not solve them. Education alone is not the answer.
God's way means engaging the culture one person at a time - one soul at a time with love and care, not sarcasm or outrage. We need to present the Gospel of Jesus with clarity and passion. These are difficult and dangerous times, but in them, God is giving us an opportunity to reach people as perhaps never before.
Jesus is the Answer. Times of anger and strife don't change that. In fact, darkness makes light more obvious. In the late 1960s and early 70s, America experienced similar upheavals. Then something amazing happened. Voices were lowered and common sense rose to the fore. Those things allowed progress toward justice and a fairer society while at the same time strengthening the nation's unity and resolve.
It happened because God sent revival to His churches and a spiritual awakening in society. The message of Billy Graham and other evangelists of the day suddenly seemed to resonate. Campus Crusade for Christ took the word to our universities. The Jesus Movement swept through the nation's young. God even used people like me, explaining the miraculous accuracy of Bible prophecy.
Once again, we desperately need revival in the Church and an awakening across the land. And we don't just need it for America, but for the whole world. The problems go far deeper than politics. We need changed hearts. You and I can't give people new hearts, but we know Someone who can.
Soon, Jesus will take His ambassadors out of this world. But while we're still here, we have a job to do.
After He had been resurrected and just before He ascended into heaven, Jesus gave us our marching orders until He comes. In Matthew 28:1920, Jesus said, "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."
Riots and Rumors of Riots - By Daniel Payne - https://www.raptureready.com/2020/06/06/riots-and-rumors-of-riots-by-daniel-payne/
What we're currently witnessing in America is nothing short of lawlessness. It's quite obvious that the goal of the powers of darkness is to castrate the rule of law in America, through any and all of their willing puppets. It is only then that true lawlessness will follow.
Matthew 24:12, "And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold."
The liberal news media is either complicit or insane. They only seem to serve to exacerbate any crisis situation, like COVID-19, or now the current riots.
There is an order to everything in nature: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
There is an ebb and a flow. Think of the tides rolling in and out of a bay. The incoming tide flows in, followed by the outgoing tide flowing out. That's just the way of nature.
If there's bad news that points toward things against opening up our economy, there's also good news that points in favor of opening up our economy.
Why then does the liberal media always seem to only report "news" that leads against opening up the American economy? Why must they always dwell on the negative without dwelling on the positive?
The only thing positive they dwell on are COVID-19 test results. Even if they do happen to mention something that could be construed as a positive toward opening our economy, they always add an additional negative comment that extinguishes any hope.
Why? Do they not understand the natural order of things? It's not possible for every thing to be negative as it relates to people getting their freedom back.
It's as if they're not letting the incoming tide follow the natural flow back into the bay. They're like a giant face continuously blowing their enormous breath of putrid wind against the ocean, in order to keep the bay and inland waters from being refreshed by its plentiful waters.
To a reasonable person, it's as if they're trying to ensure that the COVID-19 crisis lasts as long as possible. How can that be? Is the media responsible for how many people get sick?
Of course not, and that's the point. People are gonna get sick, most people are gonna get better, and some people will not. That's just the way of things.
However, the media can and does control the response to the crisis, and they certainly know that. Nothing will stop them from laying out the red carpet for the man of sin.
Jesus warned us of these exact days that we're currently living in:
Matthew 24:6-8, "And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows."
The same Greek word translated as "wars" above is also used by James to describe quarrels:
James 4:1, "Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members?"
It's as if Jesus was warning us of the mobs and riots we're seeing more and more now around the world. The word Jesus used for "wars" can also mean "battles," and no one can deny that what we're currently seeing around American cities today is nothing short of battles.
Then, in the next verse, Jesus described nations rising against nations. The Greek word that Jesus used for "nation" means "nationality," "ethnicity," or "race."
In other words, the warning given by Jesus as to what the last generation would witness right before the Tribulation "could" rightly be translated as:
And you will hear of riots and rumors of riots. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For race will rise against race, and country against country. And there will be famines, viruses, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.
With social media, information spreads at light speed, both true and false information. What's really happening, and what's rumored to happen.
With mobs tearing down statues, stores, monuments, police stations, and anything they can get their hands on, the words "wars" and "battles" seem very appropriate. It's obvious that the raging lunatics have no real cause except to hate all righteous authority.
Psalm 2:1-2, "Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against His Anointed."
Based upon Christ's warnings, it seems very likely that we'll be witnessing wars between countries very soon. Of course, earthquakes can strike at any place, anytime; but with the fear of COVID-19, a brand-new Ebola virus outbreak in the Congo, and the pestilences of locusts and other factors causing severe famine in certain parts of the world already happening, military warfare seems next on the horizon.
Not to mention, this hurricane season is forecast to be yet another one for the record books.
Exactly when the true, faithful, watching, waiting, and warning church will be caught up to meet Jesus, will determine just how much more trouble we are going to witness.
However, nothing that is happening is outside God's knowledge, power, and ability to protect His own. He has an exact date picked out already when we will be brought to stand before Jesus while the rest of the world stands before Antichrist.
Luke 21:36, "Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man."
A Nation Divided... - By Terry James -
Never have the words spoken by Jesus been more relevant than at this moment in the history of America:
And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. (Mark 3: 24-25)
We watched this past week policemen and even members of the National Guard kneeling before the protesters in cities they were supposed to protect and govern.
Amongst the protesters were the vilest of people determined to tear America down. The police and military governing officials actually were kneeling before these people as well as before the peaceful, lawful protesters.
Such entities as Black Lives Matter, supposedly an organization to champion the rights of African-Americans in particular, were, meantime, joining with the communist-backed thugs called Antifa in destroying infrastructure of cities and injuring police officers sent to assure the safety of citizens.
Still, the police and even some National Guard members knelt in "solidarity" with those who perpetrated outrageous, unlawful acts of violence.
This, Jesus said, is what happens when a nation or a household is divided in loyalty and purpose.
America certainly is divided. It is divided at its very core. It is divided along a number of lines-politically, ideologically, racially, and one other, the most important divide of all, spiritually.
The political-ideological divide is so obvious as to need no explanation. However, mention it I will.
We have witnessed the assaults from the politically leaning left ramp up hatred against the current president. It is joined by mainstream news and entertainment media in its hatred for the president and his determination to rebuild America toward its former, founding structure-based upon constitutional authority steeped in Judeo-Christian principles.
Most all of social media join in the effort to further divide America, censoring conservative thought, which wants an America as founded. More and more, only "progressive" thinking that declares there is no desire for governance that includes godly morality dominates the likes of Twitter, Facebook, and others.
Proponents who embrace tearing America down and making it an internationalist rather than national entity, through open borders and every other globalist-engendered way, kneel before the god of this world. That god of this world is Satan, the father of lies, who knows that the way to achieve his own determination to produce his Antichrist regime is to remove the roadblock of nationalism. Particularly, he wants such a powerful roadblock to his goal as the United States removed as quickly as possible and in whatever way necessary.
The devil seems to be having his way lately. The media does its bidding in reporting the dividing of America-or seemingly so. Every night, the cameras and media voices portray this nation as tearing itself apart.
The division, they imply, is rightfully destroying America's unfair structure of law and order. Current structures of law and order, they want us to infer, needs defunding or whatsoever else necessary in order to show how much we agree with the likes of Black Lives Matter. Media relish the scenes of some among that law-and-order establishment kneeling before the protesters who have been taken over by the violent, anti-American anarchists.
Satan, too, relishes the scenes, no doubt. He knows Jesus' words are true: "A kingdom or house divided against itself cannot stand."
The devil has half the country agreeing with having those assigned to protect us against the deadly destructiveness of anarchy kneeling before the anarchists.
The divide is there at every juncture of American life. We are divided right down the middle politically, ideologically, and racially, it seems. But it is the spiritual divide that's most virulent.
It seems that fully half the nation, including most of the Millennials, has been deluded through decades of anti-American, anti-God inculcation. The education system has been corrupted so that most every higher educational administration has avowed communist or atheist teachers and professors at its core. This is considered a good thing by those on the left, because Thomas Jefferson said there must be separation of church and state. Only Jefferson meant no such thing, as anyone who sincerely examines his statement to the minister in his letter will conclude.
So much of America today, rather than standing, is kneeling before the anti-God forces of Satan's planning for the globalist regime to come.
There is a remedy. God always provides a way out of a sin-strapped predicament. Let's look at Jesus' words in totality in the matter of a house divided.
And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. And if Satan rise up against himself, and be divided, he cannot stand, but hath an end. No man can enter into a strong man's house, and spoil his goods, except he will first bind the strong man; and then he will spoil his house. (Mark 3: 24-27)
America is in a state of division. Satan has all of his agencies, both human and demonic, working in one direction to bring the nation down so he can complete his one-world order. He must disarm the nation by defunding the protective services through doing away with the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms.
Half the nation, it seems, is kneeling before these forces of evil. The answer to our dire predicament is to do the same. We, who call upon the name of Jesus Christ, must kneel also. We must kneel before our Lord and invoke again the prayer as instructed by the Heavenly Father. As we approach election this November, it is imperative that we heed and do as instructed.
If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. (2 Chronicles 7:14)
We are not na�ve. Our beloved nation and the world of nations will eventually fall to the global scheme Satan and his minions are working day and night to bring into being. The satanic, global order is there in Bible prophecy. But our prayers and efforts at the voting booth and in other ways can delay the devil's implementation of his hellish scheme.
When the Church is called by Christ (Revelation 4:1) in the Rapture (1 Corinthians 15:51-55 and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18), the world of rebels, sadly, will get their abominable New World Order. Let us be salt and light to the world until that glorious moment.
A Brief History of Antifa: Part I - by Soeren Kern -
U.S. Attorney General William Barr has blamed Antifa - a militant "anti-fascist" movement - for the violence that has erupted at George Floyd protests across the United States. "The violence instigated and carried out by Antifa and other similar groups in connection with the rioting is domestic terrorism and will be treated accordingly," he said.
Barr also said that the federal government has evidence that Antifa "hijacked" legitimate protests around the country to "engage in lawlessness, violent rioting, arson, looting of businesses, and public property assaults on law enforcement officers and innocent people, and even the murder of a federal agent." Earlier, U.S. President Donald J. Trump had instructed the U.S. Justice Department to designate Antifa as a terrorist organization.
Academics and media outlets sympathetic to Antifa have argued that the group cannot be classified as a terrorist organization because, they claim, it is a vaguely-defined protest movement that lacks a centralized structure. Mark Bray, a vocal apologist for Antifa in America and author of the book "Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook," asserts that Antifa "is not an overarching organization with a chain of command."
Empirical and anecdotal evidence shows that Antifa is, in fact, highly networked, well-funded and has a global presence. It has a flat organizational structure with dozens and possibly hundreds of local groups. Not surprisingly, the U.S. Department of Justice is currently investigating individuals linked to Antifa as a step to unmasking the broader organization.
In the United States, Antifa's ideology, tactics and goals, far from being novel, are borrowed almost entirely from Antifa groups in Europe, where so-called anti-fascist groups, in one form or another, have been active, almost without interruption, for a century.
What is Antifa?
Antifa can be described as a transnational insurgency movement that endeavors, often with extreme violence, to subvert liberal democracy, with the aim of replacing global capitalism with communism. Antifa's stated long-term objective, both in America and abroad, is to establish a communist world order. In the United States, Antifa's immediate aim is to bring about the demise of the Trump administration.
Antifa's nemeses include law enforcement, which is viewed as enforcing the established order. A common tactic used by Antifa in the United States and Europe is to employ extreme violence and destruction of public and private property to goad the police into a reaction, which then "proves" Antifa's claim that the government is "fascist."
Antifa claims to oppose "fascism," a term it often uses as a broad-brush pejorative to discredit those who hold opposing political beliefs. The traditional meaning of "fascism" as defined by Webster's Dictionary is "a totalitarian governmental system led by a dictator and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism, militarism, and often racism."
Antifa holds the Marxist-Leninist definition of fascism which equates it with capitalism. "The fight against fascism is only won when the capitalist system has been shattered and a classless society has been achieved," according to the German Antifa group, Antifaschistischer Aufbau M�nchen.
Germany's BfV domestic intelligence agency, in a special report on left-wing extremism, noted:
"Antifa's fight against right-wing extremists is a smokescreen. The real goal remains the 'bourgeois-democratic state,' which, in the reading of left-wing extremists, accepts and promotes 'fascism' as a possible form of rule and therefore does not fight it sufficiently. Ultimately, it is argued, 'fascism' is rooted in the social and political structures of 'capitalism.' Accordingly, left-wing extremists, in their 'antifascist' activities, focus above all on the elimination of the 'capitalist system.'"
Matthew Knouff, author of An Outsider's Guide to Antifa: Volume II, explained Antifa's ideology this way:
"The basic philosophy of Antifa focuses on the battle between three basic forces: fascism, racism and capitalism - all three of which are interrelated according to Antifa.... with fascism being considered the final expression or stage of capitalism, capitalism being a means to oppress, and racism being an oppressive mechanism related to fascism."
In an essay, "What Antifa and the Original Fascists Have In Common," Antony Mueller, a German professor of economics who currently teaches in Brazil, described how Antifa's militant anti-capitalism masquerading as anti-fascism reveals its own fascism:
"After the left has pocketed the concept of liberalism and turned the word into the opposite of its original meaning, the Antifa-movement uses a false terminology to hide its true agenda. While calling themselves 'antifascist' and declaring fascism the enemy, the Antifa itself is a foremost fascist movement.
"The members of Antifa are not opponents to fascism but themselves its genuine representatives. Communism, Socialism and Fascism are united by the common band of anti-capitalism and anti-liberalism.
"The Antifa movement is a fascist movement. The enemy of this movement is not fascism but liberty, peace and prosperity."
Antifa's Ideological Origins
The ideological origins of Antifa can be traced back to the Soviet Union roughly a century ago. In 1921 and 1922, the Communist International (Comintern) developed the so-called united front tactic to "unify the working masses through agitation and organization" ... "at the international level and in each individual country" against "capitalism" and "fascism" - two terms that often were used interchangeably.
The world's first anti-fascist group, Arditi del Popolo (People's Courageous Militia), was founded in Italy in June 1921 to resist the rise of Benito Mussolini's National Fascist Party, which itself was established to prevent the possibility of a Bolshevik revolution on the Italian Peninsula. Many of the group's 20,000 members, consisting of communists and anarchists, later joined the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War (1936-39).
In Germany, the Communist Party of Germany established the paramilitary group Roter Frontk�mpferbund (Red Front Fighters League) in July 1924. The group was banned due to its extreme violence. Many of its 130,000 members continued their activities underground or in local successor organizations such as the Kampfbund gegen den Faschismus (Fighting-Alliance Against Fascism).
In Slovenia, the militant anti-fascist movement TIGR was established in 1927 to oppose the Italianization of Slovene ethnic areas after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The group, which was disbanded in 1941, specialized in assassinating Italian police and military personnel.
In Spain, the Communist Party established the Milicias Antifascistas Obreras y Campesinas (Antifascist Worker and Peasant Militias), which were active in the 1930s.
The modern Antifa movement derives its name from a group called Antifaschistische Aktion, founded in May 1932 by Stalinist leaders of the Communist Party of Germany. The group was established to fight fascists, a term the party used to describe all of the other pro-capitalist political parties in Germany. The primary objective of Antifaschistische Aktion was to abolish capitalism, according to a detailed history of the group. The group, which had more than 1,500 founding members, went underground after Nazis seized power in 1933.
A German-language pamphlet - "80 Years of Anti-Fascist Actions" (80 Jahre Antifaschistische Aktion)" - describes in minute detail the continuous historical thread of the Antifa movement from its ideological origins in the 1920s to the present day. The document states:
"Antifascism has always fundamentally been an anti-capitalist strategy. This is why the symbol of the Antifaschistische Aktion has never lost its inspirational power.... Anti-fascism is more of a strategy than an ideology."
During the post-war period, Germany's Antifa movement reappeared in various manifestations, including the radical student protest movement of the 1960s, and the leftist insurgency groups that were active throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.
The Red Army Faction (RAF), also known as the Baader-Meinhof Gang, was a Marxist urban guerrilla group that carried out assassinations, bombings and kidnappings aimed at bringing revolution to West Germany, which the group characterized as a fascist holdover of the Nazi era. Over the course of three decades, the RAF murdered more than 30 people and injured over 200.
After the collapse of the communist government in East Germany in 1989-90, it was discovered that the RAF had been given training, shelter, and supplies by the Stasi, the secret police of the former communist regime.
John Philip Jenkins, Distinguished Professor of History at Baylor University, described the group's tactics, which are similar to those used by Antifa today:
"The goal of their terrorist campaign was to trigger an aggressive response from the government, which group members believed would spark a broader revolutionary movement."
RAF founder Ulrike Meinhof explained the relationship between violent left-wing extremism and the police: "The guy in uniform is a pig, not a human being. That means we don't have to talk to him and it is wrong to talk to these people at all. And of course, you can shoot."
Bettina R�hl, a German journalist and daughter of Meinhof, argues that the modern Antifa movement is a continuation of the Red Army Faction. The main difference is that, unlike the RAF, Antifa's members are afraid to reveal their identities. In a June 2020 essay published by the Swiss newspaper Neue Z�rcher Zeitung, R�hl also drew attention to the fact that Antifa is not only officially tolerated, but is being paid by the German government to fight the far right:
"The RAF idolized the communist dictatorships in China, North Korea, North Vietnam, in Cuba, which were transfigured by the New Left as better countries on the right path to the best communism....
"The flourishing left-wing radicalism in the West, which brutally strikes at the opening of the European Central Bank headquarters in Frankfurt, at every G-20 summit or every year on May 1 in Berlin, has achieved the highest level of establishment in the state, not least thanks to the support by quite a few MPs from political parties, journalists and relevant experts.
"Compared to the RAF, the militant Antifa only lacks prominent faces. Out of cowardice, its members cover their faces and keep their names secret. Antifa constantly threatens violence and attacks against politicians and police officers. It promotes senseless damage to property amounting to vast sums. Nevertheless, MP Renate K�nast (Greens) recently complained in the Bundestag that Antifa groups had not been adequately funded by the state in recent decades. She was concerned that 'NGOs and Antifa groups do not always have to struggle to raise money and can only conclude short-term employment contracts from year to year.' There was applause for this from Alliance 90 / The Greens, from the left and from SPD deputies.
"One may ask the question of whether Antifa is something like an official RAF, a terrorist group with money from the state under the guise of 'fighting against the right.'"
Germany's BfV domestic intelligence agency explains Antifa's glorification of violence:
"For left-wing extremists, 'Capitalism' is interpreted as triggering wars, racism, ecological disasters, social inequality and gentrification. 'Capitalism' is therefore more than just a mere economic order. In left-wing extremist discourse, it determines the social and political form as well as the vision of a radical social and political reorganization. Whether anarchist or communist: Parliamentary democracy as a so-called bourgeois form of rule should be 'overcome' in any case.
"For this reason, left-wing extremists usually ignore or legitimize human rights violations in socialist or communist dictatorships or in states that they allegedly see threatened by the 'West.' To this day, both orthodox communists and autonomous activists justify, praise and celebrate the left-wing terrorist Red Army Faction or foreign left-wing terrorists as alleged 'liberation movements' or even 'resistance fighters.'"
Meanwhile, in Britain, Anti-Fascist Action (AFA), a militant anti-fascist group founded in 1985, gave birth to the Antifa movement in the United States. In Germany, the Antifaschistische Aktion-Bundesweite Organisation (AABO) was founded in 1992 to combine the efforts of smaller Antifa groups scattered around the country.
In Sweden, Antifascistisk Aktion (AFA), a militant Antifa group founded in 1993, established a three-decade track record for using extreme violence against its opponents. In France, the Antifa group L'Action antifasciste, is known for its fierce opposition to the State of Israel.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the collapse of communism in 1990, the Antifa movement opened a new front against neoliberal globalization.
Attac, established in France in 1989 to promote a global tax on financial transactions, now leads the so-called alter-globalization movement, which, like the Global Justice Movement, is opposed to capitalism. In 1999, Attac was present in Seattle during violent demonstrations that led to the failure of WTO negotiations. Attac also participated in anti-capitalist demonstrations against the G7, the G20, the WTO, and the war in Iraq. Today, the association is active in 40 countries, with more than a thousand local groups and hundreds of organizations supporting the network. Attac's decentralized and non-hierarchical organizational structure appears to be the model being used by Antifa.
In February 2016, the International Committee of the Fourth International advanced the political foundations of the global anti-war movement, which, like Antifa, blames capitalism and neoliberal globalism for the existence of military conflict:
"The new anti-war movement must be anti-capitalist and socialist, since there can be no serious struggle against war except in the fight to end the dictatorship of finance capital and the economic system that is the fundamental cause of militarism and war."
In July 2017, more than 100,000 anti-globalization and Antifa protesters converged on the German city of Hamburg to protest the G20 summit. Leftist mobs laid waste to the city center. An Antifa group called "G20 Welcome to Hell" bragged about how it was able to mobilize Antifa groups from across the world:
"The summit mobilizations have been precious moments of meeting and co-operation of left-wing and anti-capitalist groups and networks from all over Europe and world-wide. We have been sharing experiences and fighting together, attending international meetings, being attacked by cops supported by the military, re-organizing our forces and fighting back. Anti-globalization movement has changed, but our networks endure. We are active locally in our regions, cities, villages and forests. But we are also fighting trans-nationally."
Germany's domestic security service, in an annual report, added:
"Left-wing extremist structures tried to shift the public debate about the violent G20 summit protests in their favor. With the distribution of photos and reports of allegedly disproportionate police measures during the summit protests, they promoted an image of a state that denounced legitimate protests and put them down with police violence. Against such a state, they said, 'militant resistance' is not only legitimate, but also necessary."
Part II of this series will examine the activities of Antifa in Germany and the United States.
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