Christianity has been done no favor by national publicity and
billboards declaring May 21 as the coming Day of Judgment. It
serves to discredit Biblical Christianity at a time when it may
count the most in the lives of everyone.
Christianity has been done no favor by national publicity and billboards declaring May 21 as the coming Day of Judgment. It serves to discredit Biblical Christianity at a time when it may count the most in the lives of everyone.
Decadent and amoral societal lifestyles being lived out today are not only legion but accepted in America as the norm. It is obvious to those who possess traditional values of our American culture, born out of Biblical influences, that something is radically wrong. Two questions go begging regarding the three generations that have lived after me: 1. Are they a shining-light to civilization who have raised the standard of fallen humanity? Or 2. Are they degenerating toward the likes of tribal life immersed in ignorance and superstition?
First, consider my generation, who began leaving God out of their equation in the ’60s. Likewise, their kids (including those kids born to half-parent hippies) may have been taught and raised with some morals or ethics, but many were absentee working-parents who have been unable to teach their kids adequate morals and ethics necessary for a healthy civilization. Certainly they haven’t been too interested in making a connection with God.
Then consider the children of these children … they are a generation of 30 year olds, who have been taught that homosexuality is not only just an “alternative lifestyle”, but the norm; that men marrying men and women marrying women is also a norm – even a moral right. That sexual relations with someone outside of marriage is “sexual liberation”; that abortion for convenience is not murdering an innocent child, but a “choice”. Many in this generation are now walking alongside mainstream America wearing full body tattoos and mutilations. Also, many of this generation do not have a religion or ethic except that whatever works in cyber-tronics is good and there is no objection to things like greed. No one except “myself” comes first above all. Things like God, compassion, discipline, order and responsibility sit on the sideline.
Furthermore, they believe Christianity has a “book” which is false and are beginning to embrace that “there is no god”. They do not intend to turn their face toward God in defiance of the Word of God which reveals that if people would turn their face toward Him, He would forgive their sins and heal their land. Subsequently, they have no clue who God is and know nothing about Him, which is reinforced by the fact that He has been taken out of the public arena. These folks vote and have children now … do you think America and the kids of this generation can survive or are they going to see “Armageddon”?
The book, “Mega Trends”, theorizes that if the nations of the world become so dependent and interwoven in a global economically, they won’t be bombing each other off the face of the earth. This global economy will champion theocracies, monarchies, dictatorships, socialists, tribalism and even democracies, all of which have produced over 15,000 wars since the beginning of recorded history. The great hope of the economic global economist is that it will bring prosperity, security and world peace, rescuing us from apparent self destruction, thus avoiding “Armageddon”.
I don’t believe that mankind is going to avoid Armageddon or achieve a permanent peace by its own efforts and not by any political party or system. Nor do I believe that the nations of a global free-enterprise economy will either. I am in good company because even secular scholars and philosophers for the past 50 years have maintained we are already on an “irreversible trek” to self-destruction. They base their premise on three basic factors which they believe is now cast in cement:
n Overpopulation
n The ability to destroy ourselves with weaponry carrying payloads of catastrophic devastation, including nuclear bombs.
n That the heart of mankind is basically evil and corrupt. Combine all three and they see an “irreversible trek” to self-destruction on planet earth.
Many scholars, military leaders and politicians realize that World War III is likely … trouble is, there will not be a World War III, but by definition, “Armageddon.” (A war that destroys everything including mankind is Armageddon.) One does not have to be a scholar, a theologian, or a political leader to know that another world war will be the end for mankind. Common sense tells us it is so and that something is terribly wrong in the world now.
Now about that book the Christians have. It’s called the Bible. It tells about an end-of-the-age scenario, where all but a fraction of mankind will destroy itself except that God intervenes after a mighty cataclysmic war never experienced since men were on earth.
It tells that even after many natural and cataclysmic events, (and here’s the problem and solution) survivors would not repent of worshiping false gods and idols of gold and silver. Nor did they repent murders, sorceries, false religions, thefts and sexual immorality. The Bible reveals, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Therefore all mankind is already condemned). However, before the great war of Armageddon, one can come to salvation which promises, permanent peace, forgiveness of his or her sins and everlasting life. It’s man’s great hope and all about repentance, confession and faith in Jesus Christ … He says, “No one comes to the Father except through Me.” All who turn to Him in faith will avoid Armageddon (those who do, are not appointed to God’s Armageddon wrath.)
I categorically reject and oppose date setting of Judgment Day and “End-Of-The-Age”. The scriptures provide the conditions that reveal only the “season” of the end-of-the-age and Judgment Day, but not the “date”, saying, “No one knows the day or the hour … “, adding that “When you see the fig tree put forth its leaves, you know summer is near. So you also know, when you see these things that He is near, right at the door”.
I simply have a view. I am not a prophet. I have stated what has been prophesied and recorded long ago in the Scriptures. Our generation and global conditions look extraordinarily similar to the time just before the end of the age as portrayed in the Scriptures, which will usher in Armageddon. The good news is that everyone still has a choice in his or her destination.
Jim Langdon is a longtime, Gilroy businessman, now retired, who has engaged in economic, political and biblical studies his entire adult life and still finds time to occasionally go fishing.
