A Beastly Triumphal Entry?

 A Beastly Triumphal Entry? - By Stephen Meehan - https://www.raptureready.com/2024/09/07/a-beastly-triumphal-entry-by-stephen-meehan/ “And when He was come nigh, even now at the descent of the mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty worksthat they had seen; Saying, Blessed be the King that comes in the name of the Lord: peace in Heaven, and glory in the highest” (Luke 19:37-38). Most Christians are aware of the Biblical account of Jesus riding on the foal of a donkey into the city of Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, almost 2,000 years ago. He was presenting Himself to theJewish citizenry as the Lamb of God, to be inspected by them for the soon-coming Passover celebration. They should have seen that He was without blemish – sinless – and that as the Son of God, the second Person of the Holy Trinity, was the only One qualifiedto be God’s perfect sacrifice for the atonement of man’s sins. Sadly, most missed the significance of Jesus presenting Himself to them and that He was God’s Messiah prophesied long ago to come to them. Will this event be mimicked in the near future by another coming in his own name? I want to relate to you an event that I witnessed about 5 years ago while I was visiting the state of Israel after flying a trip into the Ben Gurion airport in Israel. Hopefully, you willfind the story interesting and thought-provoking at the end of this account. It certainly caught my attention after witnessing such a spectacle in the city of Jerusalem, a scenario that I had not considered before. Up until a few years ago, I was a commercial cargo pilot flying worldwide to various destinations globally, in both the civilian and the military spheres of aviation. It was extremely interestingflying, and I saw a lot of the world. The unique aspect of the type of flying that I was involved in was that we never knew at the beginning of our rotations exactly where we would wind up traveling to during our 18 days on (with 12 days off after our seriesof flights had concluded). The schedule always changed, as trips were either dropped or new ones added on. It made for a lot of last-minute schedule hiccups, but at the same time, it allowed for some very interestingflying that a regular airline pilot would not be exposed to. I enjoyed that work immensely. One such series of flights led me to the Middle East to drop off military freight at a remote Jordanian airport along the Dead Sea and then to make the short flight over to Tel Aviv, wherefrom there, I was supposed to travel home via a commercial airline to begin my 12 days off for the month. No way was I going home this time after ending in Israel! If the Lord dropped into my lap a second opportunity to tour the Holy Land for a week or so, I was taking advantage of it! It is notevery day that someone gets a free ride into the Jewish State; has the first night in a hotel in Tel Aviv paid for by the company; can use Reward Nights to cover the cost of the next 6 nights of hotels in Israel – including the free breakfasts and eveningsnacks at the hotels – and then only has to pay for a rental car and gasoline. I was totally on board with staying there! Thank you, Lord, for this special surprise! I was like a kid going back to Disney World! I loved touring Israel the first time! All the biblical accounts of the land, the places where Jesus walked and taught, the history of the place,the Bible characters who lived there, the foretold events that will occur there, the whole experience! Where else in the world can a person get such a sensory overload? My wife and I had visited the Holy Land in 1988, while I was a contract pilot with Lufthansa Airlines. How is that for a bit of irony? A German airline – with their history with the Jews 40or so years earlier – was the means for me to get to the Holy Land to enjoy the sights, sounds, and interactions with the Chosen People in their re-birthed ancient land. 1988 was the 40-year anniversary of the State of Israel getting re-born in a single day. During that first visit to Israel, we did all our touring via arranged bus tour groups. This time around, I wanted to venture out on my own – going to places that the tour groups would notventure to. At least not in the whirlwind fashion that I would be exploring the country. The only kicker was that I could not get 6 straight nights in a hotel in Jerusalem like I would have hoped for. I had to spend the first two nights in Haifa, then only two nights in Jerusalem,then back to Haifa for the final two nights. Using Reward points, there are some limitations on room availability. And since I had no prior knowledge of me even stepping foot back into the Land as quickly as it happened, I could not make advanced reservations. But it was still awesome being there, and the slight inconvenience was not a problem. I just planned my touring around the country on where I started out from – either the Haifa area or fromJerusalem. From Haifa, I went as far north as I could possibly drive, right up along the border with Lebanon. I was feeling quite adventurous and wanted to see everything. I saw IDF patrol boats rightup along the northern border, keeping a watch on the activities of any undesirables within the Hezbollah region, that, like always, were planning for some future actions against the Jews. From there, I hugged the border as close as possible to get up close to Syria, then made my way into the Golan Heights. Extremely interesting relics are out among the Golan Heights area: damagedtanks – from Israel and Syria – where they stopped operating back in the 1973 Yom Kippur War and other war materials purposely left where they saw action. What a scene! Plaques, statues, all kinds of memorabilia set up to commemorate the soldiers and equipment that fought along that strip during that war. Very interesting to see all of it strewn about theentire Golan Heights and how the existence of the Jewish State was threatened back then – not unlike how they are continually threatened every single day now by the Iranian proxies, as well as Iran, who want to vanquish the Chosen People. Some things neverchange, and never will, until the return of the Prince of Peace. What a time that will be when Israel will be the preeminent nation! I toured all over the Sea of Galilee, Capernaum, Nazareth, the Mount of Transfiguration, Megiddo, then eventually ventured down to the Gaza region, close to the Rafah gate leading into Egypt.I wanted to see it all! Get as close as I could to where the action was, and now is. Good thing that I was not there on Oct. 7th of last year! I am not that adventurous…or crazy. I also drove down along the Dead Sea area. I passed a road sign that read “Lot’s Wife but kept driving, as I figured that it was just some touristy thing. Perhaps I should have stopped andtaken a look. It probably was some weathered pillar of salt, but the real thing!?? Highly unlikely, but it could have been interesting to see it nonetheless. The hike in the area and the view of the Dead Sea from there could have been worth it. Sodom and Gomorrahdisappeared from view nearby. I drove by the Dimona area, hoping to see something of their nuclear sites. Nothing was visible, but I still had to take a look. In the 7 days, I covered a lot of land. But in the hopes ofnot making this too lengthy, I’ll skip to the Jerusalem visit. What more needs to be said about the ancient City of Jerusalem? That is the central point of all Israel. That is the central focus of most of Scripture. Bible prophecy squarely points to Jerusalemand many yet unfulfilled events that will happen there in the near future. A Christian who has studied prophecy and the history of the Jews and the accounts of Jesus wants to be there, walking upon that unique place on Earth. It is a supreme thrill to walk alongits streets, alleys, passageways, and to experience life there from that vantage point. Nothing and nowhere compares to the level of excitement of just being in the midst of that place, soaking in the ambiance of that ancient city. It is very cool to try toabsorb it all in. Unparalleled excitement. Palm Sunday and Passover were approaching. The evening meals that I was enjoying mentioned in the hotels where I stayed were offering less and less food as Passover neared. Kosher dietaryrestrictions associated with the Feast required less and less leavened items to be included with the food service. I could still grab a bite to eat out on the streets. So, again, not a problem. I love how the Lord coincided this unforeseen trip to Israel with the coming event of Palm Sunday. Maybe he knew that sometime in the future, the Palm Sunday celebration and what transpiredwould be an article topic of a neophyte part-time writer. What I observed was an eye-opener for me, and maybe there is something to the conclusions that I drew as a result of it. Having spent two days in the Jewish capital and visiting all the sights – Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum; the Garden Tomb; Golgotha (and yes, it does look like a skull!); the Old City; theMount of Olives; the Temple Mount; and all of the other highlights of Jerusalem, it was certainly a blessing to be there on Palm Sunday, when throngs of people were retracing the steps of Jesus coming down from the Mount of Olives and into the Old City. There were thousands of folks from all over the world taking part in this long procession. They were smiling, singing, waving palm branches, enjoying the beautiful sunshine – all in honorof Our Lord. I wanted to jump in and join them, but I stayed on the sidelines, capturing it all on video on my iPhone. It actually did not dawn on me to jump in line till after, but I’m glad that I didn’t.Had I done that, I would not have seen what was coming at the end. So, in all, I think that the procession lasted close to an hour and a half. There were that many people being a part of it. Again, a very cool thing to watch and enjoy. But then, at the very end of the line of people, came a smiling and waving Roman Catholic bishop or prelate – or whatever his role was in the Catholic Church to the City of Jerusalem – actinglike we were all there to see him. He was like a Santa Claus at the end of a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, waving at all the people like we couldn’t wait for his presence. I was starting to grind my teeth. All these beautiful people are there to celebrate what our Lord and Savior had done there two millennia ago, and this guy is acting like we were there celebratinghis arrival. Man, was I fuming. Even a guy directly in front of him in the procession kept turning back to him, showing his displeasure, and confronted this “priest.” Two or three times, he turned to rush him and yell athim. I kept thinking, “I’m right there with you, buddy. I’m not happy with his actions either.” Why ruin an otherwise awesome display of love toward the Redeemer? Who does this guy think that he is? Does this occur at every Palm Sunday celebration there, and I’m just not aware of it? It was completely upsetting to watch this guy give a parade wave to all of us on the sidelines. Like he is trying to soak in some pretense of adoration that no one on the sidelines was directingtoward him. It was buffoonish. I’m surprised that more of the procession participants didn’t voice their anger at him. In a joyous celebration of Jesus Christ, it was totally uncalled for. After I left Israel, I got to thinking about that occurrence. And especially how a scene such as that could be an indicator of what might eventually take place in Jerusalem in the near future. We know from Bible Prophecy that the Antichrist will enter the Holy of Holies in the rebuilt Temple midway through the Tribulation Period to declare himself to be God. Lucifer and his fallenhorde of angels have been permanently kicked out of Heaven; they go on a devilish rampage against the inhabitants of Earth, and Lucifer enters into his antichrist figure. We read that the False Prophet will force everyone to worship the image of the Beast. Could it be that the actual Antichrist will sit in the Holy of Holies to make his declaration, but therest of the world will see his image via a worldwide satellite system, beamed to everyone’s TV screens? That would certainly qualify as his image, and the author of Revelation had no idea 2,000 years ago of television imagery or how to describe it. But how will the Antichrist or the Beast make his way to the Temple Mount? Will he be part of a Palm Sunday Triumphal procession into the Old City from the Mount of Olives? Will he try tomimic what Jesus Christ did 2,000 years ago? To present himself as their long-awaited Messiah? Just like that Roman Catholic priest did when I was there to witness such a farce? We know how Satan likes to deceive and discredit Jesus Christ at every opportunity. Why wouldn’t he use such an occasion to get his man of sin into the city and make his declaration of Godhood?It would fit his M.O. perfectly. Do what the real Christ did, but put his personal flavor onto that entrance. I think that it could certainly happen that way. Never gave it much thought before my Palm Sunday visit to Jerusalem. We know that the Roman Catholic Church has ambitions for the Holy Land. They had their series of Crusades to wrest control away from the Islamic hordes that held the city. They put up theirCatholic shrines at various key locations throughout the city that traditionally marked spots where Jesus supposedly was birthed and died. They want control of the affairs of that place. Roman Catholicism does not recognize God’s covenant with Israel, in that all the land is for the Jewish people. They want it to be an “international city” but governed over by a Roman Pontiff,very much like their predecessors, the Roman Caesars. It begs the question then: will it be a Roman Pontiff who enters into the Holy of Holies? Will a pope eventually be at the tail end of a Palm Sunday march into the city? Will he be the onesmiling and waving at ALL on the sidelines, throughout the world via TV, as he makes his way to declare himself God? The popes already call themselves “Holy Father,” a title reserved ONLY for God the Father in Heaven. They call themselves “Vicarious Christi,” meaning ‘in the place of Christ.’ Can a bettername be applied to who or what the Antichrist will be? A person both opposed to and operating in the place of Christ? Those titles must mean a lot more than appears just on the surface. They have to have a more latent intent than just window dressing for theirfaithful. Otherwise, why defy God and name mere men titles reserved for God the Father and the Holy Spirit? The titles, the similarities, and the way the popes operate seem like more than a coincidence to how the Antichrist will perform when he is unleashed upon the world. A Roman Catholic priest at the end of a Palm Sunday parade seems also like more than just a random happenstance or nothing worthy of consideration. It may be nothing at all, but it could alsoportend what is to come. History will provide the answer. And that history could happen in the very near future. I’m just retelling what I saw and offering up a possible scenario. I also think that it could be anomen. Perhaps a Pope Damien is waiting in the wings. “And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven” (Matthew 23:9). “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposes and exalts himselfabove all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sits in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God” (2Thessalonians 2:3-4). stevemeehan1225@aol.com