Hello everyone. Once again let me welcome you to another episode in our multi-part series involving a thorough consideration of the 18th chapter of the book of the revelation. In this 10th presentation, we will be picking up where we left off in the previous discussion, begun in episode number 9, centered around the question of American exceptionalism. Our objective is to settle the issue of divine spiritual worth, what's the standard?
Who determines or sets that standard? God, or the evangelical churches? How does God assign value to a nation's spiritual worth? Is it by a leader's quotations of scripture? Or, is it based on the scope and the gravity of a country's achievements? Or, bearing in mind that God selected and destroyed the grandeur of both the Egyptians and the Babylonians, does one's relationship to the apple of his eye, standalone, necessarily give a nation special standing in the mind of God?
Each of these ancient powerhouses was a choice instrument in the preservation and in the punishment of the people of God, by his design. Harkening back to the words of the late Ben Hayden, let's talk about it. Highways and byways, in search of Private Ryan. Thus, we can justifiably conclude that, if quoting the Bible does not make a man of God, it certainly won't ever prove anyone is Christian.
Moreover, then, we must also concur that most white preachers and Bible teachers, with and without undergraduate or postgraduate degrees, from even the nation's top so-called Christian schools, seminaries and universities are all, or all too many are, spineless liars who lie through their teeth each time they stand up publicly, showing their ignorance and a lack of concern for the Bible, and thus, nothing short of apathy for God.
Therefore, these institutions are essentially, bastions of deceit to wit, Biola, Moody, Baylor, Masters College, Wheaton, Dallas Theological, etc. They are like breeding grounds that foster only masters of deception, well-schooled in the art of cleverly mixing poisonous ounces of strategically placed flavorful half-truths and lies by omission with pounds of truth, compounded for a, sophisticated, American white Christian audience that will not budge, where God's will clashes with theirs.
When they broadcast to the nation and around the world about a Christian country, founded and led by God Lee Christian Forefathers Deut who quoted the Bible, a nation to which God, they say, longs to see us return, they speak of a Christian people that simply has never existed.
Only spiritless idiots of no understanding and or fools who despise the things and will of God, blinded and guided by the stupor of religion, would ever wish for a return to the racist, anti-God legacy she should be leaving behind, but lives on to this very hour.
Rather, a greater more noble objective would be to transcend the ignominy of that hellish past, aiming instead to steer the nation to an orbit where it can, for a change, for once, be all that God ever wanted this nation to be, before it is too late.
For, without question, he is the author of her inception exclusive, of course, of her selfishness, arrogance, and racism. It is these unbelieving, private Ryans, of life, white, black, or, of whatever nationality, more so than the bigoted, frequently egotistical, unrepentant white, or black, etc., hypocrites of the local churches, who are the true objects of God's affections.
Further, in view of the foregoing conclusions, then, we can infer that practically every soul, of every professing Christian that has ever darkened the door of an American church, is now lost, black or white, in so far as, the harsh outlook taken in view of the white churches, can also be applied to African-American and all other churches as well.
However, the thrust of the theme of Rev. 18 is directed more toward that people group with whom the nation is more readily associated and by whom it is most readily identified, from the outside, by the watching world. Namely, the white America, for obvious reasons they control the politics, the property and all the natural resources and thus, the national purse.
Few, of any race in America, have any meaningful sensitivity for the things of God, beyond their, traditional, sectarian and or personal beliefs. Those from the outside who choose to settle among them, soon look and think like they do or they move on, sometimes subject to force. Those recruited, in foreign lands, for instance, more by white denominations than by any other, are frequently chosen on the basis of malleability and their willingness to bend to their will.
These offer no fuss. They put up no challenges when confronted with what they know and can see as wrong they flow with the tide and roll with the punches, as it were.
Someone, one believes it was John MacArthur who, quoted another Billy Graham remark to the effect that, in all likelihood, not more than 5% of all the people who ever came forward to receive and make a profession of faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior were ever really saved, at all of his crusades or continue in the faith, to this day, see the sidebar below, going to hell in a handbasket.
P 83 Thus, being rejects already, it is not the, fruitless, man in the white pews whom God delights to save at this late hour. As rather, it is those on the outside, hidden in the hedges of unbelief. Those who refuse to darken the doors of any local churches because they resigning themselves to the highways and byways of doubt and consternation see and therefore know, on which grounds they reject, the unholy rot, marked by a spiritual stench, that consumes those churches.
It is these unbelieving private Ryans of life, white, black, or of whatever nationality, who are the true objects of God's affections, in America and around the world, in these last days more so than the bigoted, frequently egotistical, unrepentant white, or black, etc., hypocrites of the local churches.
Having been misled and or denied access to the truth of the Gospel message by the Jekyll-Hyde personas of Christian America, they are the, people, sitting in the darkness of sin and shame, longing for light, perhaps, on the one hand, actually, actively spurning that light, on the other, to whom God wishes to show the great light, the light of the world. Matthew chapter 4 verses 15 to 16
Blessed of God never infers automatic favor with God. God's, dealings with the Pharaoh and the kings of Babylon and of the Persians shows that it is he who richly blesses the most unlikeliest of people, unrighteous, though they are, so as to use them, subsequently, for some special purpose in his divine plans, often, in a manner adverse to the aforementioned blessing and ultimately, dangerously injurious to whatever the previous level of prosperity.
Dangerous, blessed, but not right with God. Americans arrogant, self-righteous Caucasian Christians, the, white people, habitually delude themselves and they consistently mislead the world with the notion that America is blessed of God because of righteousness, usually having to do with a fabled righteousness of her founding fathers.
Even though the founding of this nation is undeniably the work and brainchild of Almighty God, he himself makes it plain that he is responsible for the formation and the coming of all powers that be, at whatever given point in time, the good and the bad, including ancient Egypt, Israel, Assyria, Babylon, Persia, the Romans, the Mayans, the British Empire, even Hitler's failed, Third Reich, etc., etc., etc. Daniel chapter 4 verse 17, Isaiah chapter 45 verses 1 to 7.
It matters not whether they acknowledged him or submitted to his will. Moreover, his dealings with them, i.e., his blessings upon them had nothing at all to do with righteousness theirs or anyone else's. Blessed of God, then does not imply, and so, should never be construed as, either a right standing, or, even a, good, standing with God or, in the eyes of God.
Jesus says of the Father, he makes his reign to fall on the just, and, on the unjust. The apple of God's eye, wholehearted, committed idol worshipers by the time of Moses, was promised the blessing of a homeland, flowing with milk and honey, but told in no uncertain terms, point blank, that they were anything but righteous. Exodus chapter 32 verses 9 to 10.
Deut. 9, 4 to 6, 32 to 5. Righteousness, then, was not a factor in either his selection, or in his determination to administer favor to Israel. They were in God's estimation a nation of stubborn rebels, whom he often wanted to destroy.
In the aftermath of one rebellion after the other, apostasy after apostasy, all of which he knew were coming, God repeatedly expressed a sore longing to bless that apple, and, to lift it up like a beacon, spit-shined, and polished, as a nation marvelously well favored, before the eyes of the entire watching world all to his glory and for his name's recognition.
Even the powerful but wicked Ninevites of Assyria, blessed with relentless oversight and control over this blessed apple, in its rebel years, were further blessed with advance warning of their impending God-ordained doom by a God-commissioned bigot named Jonah, thus illustrating his supreme concern for name recognition among the unrighteous thousands in Nineveh.
. Who did not know their right hand from their left, that is, being idol-worshippers, they did not know the true and living God, at all, made no advances toward him, and yet, they were royally, magnificently, blessed by the God who lives.
In addition, his dealings with Egypt's Pharaoh. I raised you up for this purpose, Babylon's tyrant Nebuchadnezzar, that you may know, God rules in the affairs of men, and the Persian Cyrus, my servant, shows that he randomly, richly blesses the most unlikely of people, unrighteous, though they are, so as to use them, subsequently, for some special purpose in his divine plans, often in a manner inverse to and irreversibly adverse to the aforementioned blessing and ultimately,
dangerously injurious to any attendant prosperity, although he knows they will never reciprocate by giving him the least bit of recognition. Thus, strange as it may seem, it matters not whether they benefit from implementation of the plan God initially envisions no matter how blessed they might have been otherwise.
Moreover, the ancient Israelis hand-picked and chosen by God to be the matrix for his Messiah were warned, solemnly, never to think, or to say of themselves, that they were selected on the basis of, my righteousness, given that he was keenly aware of their stubbornness, driven by wicked, rebellious hearts. How much more then should American white people adopt this kind of a mindset?
Clearly, his reason for setting up a religious United States bears no resemblance to his reason for rescuing pagans, preserved within a matrix of pharaoh-worshipping pagans, who held them in the clutch of a crucible of suffering, to give birth to a, Christ, who would die, to save a lost world.
Rather, just as was true of those once powerful ancients and with Israel, so with the United States of America, like a tender young calf, intentionally nourished and fatted for slaughter, she, the U.S. of A., is a nation blessed, albeit, for destruction.
Hers will be a massacre that rooted on the firm foundation of a kind of consummate betrayal of trust will garner for him the undivided attention of the entire watching world, a feat that cannot now be achieved, with her, at this time, in the picture.
Thus, in the overarching psychology of the grand scheme of things, one might say, the expected return on his initial investment in her comes then, not from her current lust standing on the global stage, sad to say, but in her eventual, hellish downfall before awestruck, horrified eyes, watching and weeping in fear, all around the globe.
That is when the pure, unadulterated gospel, free from the blight of her theological twist and taint, will be preached around the world. That is when multitudes of men will truly look to the God of all the universe, and be saved.
Furthermore, God takes full credit not only for the being of secular, unrighteous, non-God-fearing but powerful cultures, he takes credit as well for all their greatness and for all the blessings they enjoyed to wit, their material wealth, strength as military forces, and for their prowess and successes on the battlefields.
The scriptures clearly teach then, that none of these were ever chosen because of righteousness, nor did their selection in any way, to any degree ever make them or mark them as righteous people Jew or Gentile in God's eyes. Hence, their rise was not borne on wings of righteousness. In view of this fact then, one should note as well that their lives and mannerisms have done nothing to disappoint this fact.
Thus, when American white clergy, religious men in media or politics and other statesmen, stand up and talk about a righteous, Christian nation, blessed because of a righteous past, resting on the foundation of righteous forefathers and their, quoting, of the Bible
as the first of the nations of the world and Christians everywhere beware they are lying hypocrites, utterly abhorred and loathed by God, as this treatise has shown and will further prove, not unlike as were the old Pharisees, scribes and lawyers of Jesus' day, they were altogether abhorred, in the eyes of God.
There has never been such a nation as they project, and, one may rest assured that, at this point, there likely never will be prior to the return of Almighty God, in the form of the Son, who will come to rule in righteousness.
Psychological warfare. Weapon of choice in church-based antagonism. Having had occasion to visit a few white churches, sitting in on some of their Bible-related sessions, in addition to having heard the better preachers and teachers of their own ranks describe them, one has been privileged to watch and to listen as arrogant, sometimes cocky, otherwise intelligent but largely bigoted, self-righteous, often affluent, educated, high-minded white intellectuals made theological mish-mash of these times dubbed, Bible-savvy.
Somehow, it seems, interestingly, even those intellectuals under a teacher's mantle never seem to grow beyond these, messes. For this reason, although being in a Bible-study setting, they show no real interest beyond a contempt-leaning, self-serving, desire to, no, God.
Thus, it becomes increasingly clear with each passing day that by their lies and display of self-righteous plumage, at home and abroad, the white evangelical fundamentalist and conservative antagonists to the will of God have done a masterful job of undermining the work of God, as they have psychologically undercut the effectiveness of His Word by their own will, to the degree that God has allowed, from pulpits and lecterns all around the nation.
Following the lead of their master, the fallen Lucifer, light-bearing, morning star, these antagonists shine like angels of light. They actually do look righteous, sound righteous, and speak righteously, as long as your understanding of Scripture does not surpass theirs.
As such, in a manner reminiscent of Satan's wilderness temptation of the Master, they assault any hunger and thirst for truth and righteousness delicately, with subtlety perhaps, but with cunning and passion, wherever it is found. Like the accuser of all brethren, they employ the very tool needed to quench and satisfy that thirst and that hunger, that is, they use the Bible.
Under the banner of this strategic ruse, they invariably ensure that God will never be able to foment the rise of an Israel or another Luther, white or black, from within American shores. All church leadership must be subject to their domination, control and manipulation.
The Gospel preached is the same kind of short-circuited, truncated theology that is being delivered daily to foreign shores, in the name of global Gospel evangelism by fundamentalists, evangelical conservatives and Pentecostals, as well as by African-American churches for the same basic reason. God can hardly, if at all get a thing to American saints, that her wayward churches, schools and missionary societies have not prepared and or funded.
Whatever God does manage to squeeze through her armor of deception is sorely frowned upon. They are often baffled by the sight of one who dares not subscribe to their prescribed theological protocol. Blessed of God, although she is indeed, America and her churches, is, therefore, no less a nation in reality, quite literally, at war with Almighty God by her own choosing, like Pharaoh and like Nebuchadnezzar, but also, more like the scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees.
Whereas God intentionally set her up, like a choice young calf, blessed to a fatness, guided by an ego, leaving her, fit only for slaughter, she was left, no less, with both a free will, and the sovereignty of a sovereign granted alternative.
Having fled the tyranny and the authority of both the crown and the Roman papacy ostensibly to serve God freely, on biblical terms, armed, therefore, with at least a working knowledge of Him, unlike Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar, who never knew God, during their rise to power and privilege, there was nothing to stop her from ordering her life, along actual Christian and social lines, entirely in accord with the will and the purposes of the living God.
Nothing, that is, except herself, her greed-smitten heart and the tyranny she herself brutally affected toward others, to satisfy that throbbing, ravishing greed. The Africans she enslaved, mercilessly victimized, and miserably abused during the colonial, antebellum and Jim Crow years were, are the most notable victims of her well-documented dark side.
As with the self-proclaimed prophetess Jezebel among the compromising but otherwise theologically correct saints at Thyatira by his dealing of a crushing, bloody blow to the heinous slave trade and the Bible-based bashing and crumbling of openly flaunted, institutionalized Jim Crow legislation she has, by God, been given more than ample time to repent, and to make right the wrongs of her past.
Still, she persists, maintaining her racist stranglehold on God's country the most blessed nation of all time. Similar to Jacob, perhaps, she is a nation locked in a unilateral tug of spiritual warfare, as she alone fights, to this day, against his will united in a hellish purpose, divided on purpose, waging battles on two fronts, secular and religious, in a war that God assures her through this message of Revelation chapter 18. She cannot, and she will not, win.
Meanwhile, he, the Almighty, simply sits, watching in quiet savor, waiting, patiently anticipating the day and the joy of her absolute, horrific destruction, in one hour.
In spite of the presences and the work of the likes of Sam and John Adams, their own theological excess baggage notwithstanding, there is and there has never been any righteous past to which she can ever return that would make her more acceptable to God, so as to escape, or, to prolong the coming of this dreadful day of horrendous judgment. She can always move forward, in true repentance, but there is no rationale in looking backwards.
Blessed or not, whatever her status and purpose in his end times plans, unlike the grabber and, contrary to the lies, the letting and the so-called world views of evangelical fundamentalists the United States of America has, in fact and in truth, no power with the ever-living, omnipotent, omniscient God.
Sidebar Number 1 William Wilberforce In 1785, he underwent a conversion experience and became an evangelical Christian, which resulted in major changes to his lifestyle and a lifelong concern for reform. In 1787, he came into contact with Thomas Clarkson and a group of anti-slave trade activists, including Granville Sharp, Hannah Moore and Charles Middleton. They persuaded Wilberforce to take on the cause of abolition, and he soon became one of the leading English abolitionists.
He headed the parliamentary campaign against the British slave trade for 26 years until the passage of the Slave Trade Act of 1807. In later years, Wilberforce supported the campaign for the complete abolition of slavery and continued his involvement after 1826, when he resigned from Parliament because of his failing health. That campaign led to the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833, which abolished slavery in most of the British Empire.
Wilberforce died just three days after hearing that the passage of the Act through Parliament was assured. He was buried in Westminster Abbey, close to his friend William Pitt.
William Wilberforce, from Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia Sidebar Number 2 Going to Hell, in a Handbasket A Mormon, speaking out of the blue alluding to the wrongs of the self-deceived white people of this great nation, perpetrated in the name of God, and who probably represents the hearts and minds of far too many evangelical fundamentalists as well readily admitted to a belief in God and of Hell, and, that he knows he is going there,
meaning, apparently, that he is not only not sorry or remorseful for the evils of his white past, but he has no intention of, repenting, for the wrongs to which he is privy. At this point in time, it might well be argued that the whole nation, self-deceived and deluded, on top of all of its many, many blessings, is headed straight for, Hell, in a Handbasket. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, that will do it for this edition of the podcast.
You are herewith invited to join us next time for episode number 11, of this study rooted in the book, Judgment Day, volume 1, Prelude to Armageddon, part 1, The United States of America in Bible Prophecy. Until we meet again, we ask that you give us a, like, if you would please, and we pray that God will bless you, in the mean time.