Jan 14
Bush Bothering the Burdensome Stone
For nearly 60 years, world leaders have been trying to resolve a conflict that exists between Israel and its neighbors. There have been a few successes in easing tension, but any concessions on Israel's part only lead to new demands.
The Bible predicts that Jerusalem will be the final stage in what I now see as the peace process. What started with the 1978 Camp David agreement will eventually lead to the point where the Antichrist gives his blessing to a treaty that will bring a brief period of harmony to the city of Jerusalem.
This past week, President George W. Bush has been in the Middle East trying to lay the groundwork for an agreement that would involve Jerusalem. Bush, at a press conference, said, "I believe it's going to happen, that there will be a signed peace treaty by the time I leave office."
Bush pressed the idea of a two-state solution. "There should be an end to the occupation that began in 1967," Bush said. The president went on: "The agreement must establish Palestine as a homeland for the Palestinian people, just as Israel is a homeland for the Jewish people." Of course, a Palestinian state would have western Jerusalem as its capital. So far, the Israelis have no plans to comply with this demand.
What President Bush fails to see is that the Palestinian people have no desire or ability to govern themselves. The liberation of the Gaza Strip has been a huge disaster. You may remember that Israel pulled out, giving the Palestinians full control. As soon as the Israeli military left, Gaza fell into total chaos. Hamas and Fatah political factions began killing each other, and the local economy collapsed.
Israel is blamed for allowing Gaza to become the armpit of the Middle East, but how can that be? If you’re going to be independent for another nation, you need be able to take care of your own needs.
Of course, what we have here is a tiny nation run by corrupt terrorists. All the responsibility in building roads, running the police force, and maintaining the local economy rests with them. Despite billions of dollars of foreign aid pouring into Gaza, it still can't function without Israel's help. The situation has become so critical that thousands of Palestinians are barely surviving.
With such a prime example of gross incompetence, it's insane for Bush and other world leaders to insist this plan be duplicated for the West Bank. The only thing the Palestinians excel in is in their hatred of Israel.
My view of President Bush has declined steadily in the past couple years. The only thing saving him from being ranked among the worst presidents in American history is the realization that a President Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama would be pressing all the harder for Israel to make a deal with the devil.
I'm very concerned about what will happen to our nation if Bush continues to guide Israel towards a plan that will divide Jerusalem. The Bible promised doom for any nation that seeks to tamper with God's holy city.
I don't believe in the knee-jerk reaction that many prophecy sites have promoted. When Bush left for the Middle East, several people claimed a series of tornadoes in the southern states was a demonstration of God's wrath over our tinkering in Israeli affairs.
I think we will suffer consequences of our foreign policies regarding Israeli, but I believe God is more subtle in His dealings with the nations. The greatest danger is that once we get on the Lord's bad side, it may become impossible to reverse our course.
"And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it" (Zech. 12:3).
-- Todd
Foretelling Foolishness Strikes Again
Todd has been faithful in past years to point to the phony prognostications of those self-appointed soothsayers within Christian ranks. This is something that needs to be done–the pointing out of such foolishness, at best, and egregious disservice to the cause of Christ, at worst. Certainly, such false prophesying is counterproductive to the labor of those of us who strive to put before the various publics what God’s Holy Word truly has to tell this generation about things to come.
One particular person, as usual (and as he has for the past number of years), stands front and center before the media cameras and microphones. He does so in order to make yet more of these fortune-telling pontifications to a serious-façaded but inwardly snickering American press.
Robertson Sees Year of Violence, Recession
Religious Broadcaster Shares What He Believes God Has Told Him
NORFOLK, Va. -- Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson said Wednesday that 2008 will be a year of violence worldwide and a recession in the United States, followed by a major stock-market crash by 2010.
Praying about events in the coming year and sharing what he believes God has told him is an annual tradition for Robertson, founder of the Christian Broadcasting Network.
“The Lord was saying that there's going to be violence and chaos in the world,” Robertson said on his “700 Club” news-and-talk show.
“We've just begun to see what's going to happen, and the nations are going to be convulsed with violence,” he said, citing as an example unrest [because of the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto] in Pakistan… “We will see the presence of angels and we will see an intensification of miracles around the world, which I think is going to be a wonderful thing,” he said.
He also predicted that there will be a recession, oil will reach $150 a barrel and the U.S. dollar will continue to fall. He added that there will be a major stock-market crash in 2009 or 2010…Last year, Robertson predicted that a terrorist act, possibly involving a nuclear weapon, would result in mass killing in the United States. Noting that it hadn't come to pass, Robertson said, “All I can think is that somehow the people of God prayed and God in his mercy spared us” (CBS 46 newsline, Atlanta, “Religious Broadcaster Shares What He Believes God Has Told Him,” posted 8:47 pm EST January 2, 2008).
God’s prophetic Word, through Peter the apostle, foretells that in the last days scoffers will come forward (2 Pet. 3: 3-4). The tragic thing is that those like Mr. Robertson and their false prophecies bring the scoffers out. The lost minds of men, therefore, have--they sadly believe--“proof” that everything about prophecy in the Bible is tomfoolery.
We are correct to call Robertson’s form of “prophesying”–through the “word of knowledge” and other self-appointed false prophetic methodologies—false, thus damaging to God’s work in preaching and teaching to the lost. Every Old or New Testament prophet whose prophecy did not come to pass in a near-term sense were subject to stoning. If this were true of Mr. Robertson, it would take some major earth-moving equipment to locate his bones.
It is sad to have to point to the way this false prophesying has been used by those who look for their own deluded and deluding information that will put forth their luciferian message of disdain for all things Christian. One such group has on its website the following:
Pat Robertson's Pathetic Predictions
At the beginning of last year, I mentioned a prediction made by Pat Robertson:
As reported by Americans United, Pat Robertson has joined in the fun, predicting "mass killings" to occur on American soil due to a terrorist attack sometime this year. (Robertson said he expected this to come in the form of a nuclear attack, but emphasized that this was only his educated guess - as opposed to the rest of this prophecy, which was clearly straight from God's mouth and not at all just made up.)…
The prophecy in question comes around the two-minute mark, where Robertson forecasts "very serious terrorist attacks" against America, resulting in "mass killings... possibly [of] millions of people", and "major cities injured".
By now, I think we can safely assume that this is another prophetic failure. The only question is, was Pat Robertson making up prophecies on his own initiative and attributing them to God, or was it God himself who blew it?…” (CBS 46 newsline, Atlanta, Daylight Atheism, http://www.daylightatheism.org).
Pat Robertson’s false prophecies are listed. They can’t be denied. The accusations these God-hating bloggers bring out are valid, and we must acknowledge as much. False prophecy is false prophecy. This is meant in no way to validate the “atheist” site or those listing the predictions, many of which Mr. Robertson declares to be directly from God.
· In 1980, Robertson predicted the start of World War III, telling his audience that God said the year would be full of “sorrow and bloodshed that will have no end soon, for the world is being torn apart, and my kingdom shall rise from the ruins of it.” He also prophesied in the same year that the Soviet Union would invade the Middle East to seize its oil reserves.
· In 1988, Robertson claimed that God told him to run for president. He did not win the Republican primary.
· In his 1991 book, The New World Order, Robertson forecast that U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller would be elected president in 1996.
· In 1998, Robertson threatened that, as punishment for flying rainbow flags during Disney World's annual Gay Days event, the city of Orlando would be struck by “earthquakes, tornadoes and possibly a meteor”.
· In 2004, Robertson predicted that George W. Bush would win reelection in “a blowout”. Although Bush was reelected, it was by 50.7% to 48.3% - the closest-ever margin for a sitting president.
· In January 2006, Robertson forecast that the U.S. midterm elections would leave the Republican Party in control of Congress. He also predicted that the Iraq war would "come to a successful conclusion" that year and U.S. troops would begin withdrawing.
· Robertson also predicted in 2006 that devastating storms and hurricanes would lash the U.S. coast. He must have thought this a particularly safe guess, but in fact no hurricanes made landfall in the U.S. in that year.
Of course, Robertson has suffered no fallout from these repeated failures. Like most religious phonies, he can count on his followers never doing any follow-up work. He can make whatever absurd guesses he likes, and his devoted true believers will oblige him by forgetting about all the ones that fail to pan out.
God’s Word says about true Bible prophecy:
We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts: Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction (2 Pet. 1:19-21).
A note to these bloggers and their website: Although these “prophecies” by Mr. Robertson were not from God, prophecies in God’s Word, the Bible, are truth. They will 100 percent come to pass. You are part of those prophecies, despite your sneering, mocking declaration that no such thing exists. You will ultimately either spend eternity in hell following your appearance at the great white throne judgment (Rev. 20:11-15,) or, if you accept Christ as Savior –and this must be done now, while you are alive (John 3: 16)-- you will spend forever in Heaven. There will be no tears there, where the peace that mankind has for so long searched on this fallen earth will at last be achieved. God will embrace His children in His love forever.
--Terry
