America In Prophecy: Or Is It? Part 2

 

February 7, 2021                      NOTES NOT EDITED
America in Prophecy—Or, Is It? Part 2
Acts 17:24; Psalm 9, esp. vss 16-20

 

SIS: The decline of America as a world power is a major step toward the coming End of the World, and Christians, especially in America should step up efforts to win the lost.

This is Part 2 of a three-part series on America in prophecy. Last week we surveyed “POSSIBLE SIGHTINGS of America in Prophecy.” The conclusion was, the America is either absent in the Last days, or a vassal nation of a Global Confederacy that will rise up against Israel.  This week we want to look at PROBABLE REASONS for the silence of prophecy in regard to America.

To establish the context for how God works with, in, and through nations, let’s read from Psalm 9 and Acts 17:26-27.

PROBABLE EXPLANATION for Bible’s Silence on America

My Conclusion:  A process is already taking place in which will result in America being gobbled up by a larger global confederacy that will eventually attack Israel at the Battle of Armageddon.  First, let me survey four “possible” factors for the fading of America as a superpower in the last days which contribute to America’s fading as a superpower, and the one catastrophic event that seals her fate. The first three are like flood waters of wrath rising up behind a great dam and a final fracture will bring judgment pounding upon the world the likes of which nobody has ever, or will ever again see.

❶ Crushing Economic Implosion

Let me say that it is no secret why empires fall.  History gives us an abundance of examples, and a significant factor deals with something as simple as arithmetic.  You might state it like this: “if your outgo exceeds your income it will be your downfall.” 

The Book of Deuteronomy give the principles to govern a new nation God is developing.  That nation is Israel.  Israel’s welfare as nation was based upon a very simple, but powerful principle.  It is the principle of “Blessing and Cursing.” Israel, as a nation, serves as an example to all nations.   Deu. 11:26-28 gives this principle:

““Look, today I set before you a blessing and a curse: there will be a blessing, if you obey the commands of the Lord your God I am giving you today, and a curse, if you do not obey the commands of the Lord your God.”

God’s commands cover every aspect of life, including the economics of a nation.  A few chapters later Deu. 28:12 tells us:

“The Lord will open for you His abundant storehouse, the sky, to give your land rain in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. You will lend to many nations, but you will not borrow.”

Massive debt is a major contributing factor to any democracy, or a democratic Republic, simply because man’s greed always overcomes his good sense—both individually and as a government.  Remember my simple principle of economics:  “If your outgo exceeds your income it will be your downfall.”

Currently, the debt is over $27 Trillion dollars, [SLIDE] or over $83,000 per person growing at something like $45 per second—IF WE STOPPED ADDING TO IT BY TRILLIONS A YEAR!.  As I said, scholars of history have known the crippling power of debt for centuries.  Here’s what one history scholar said about why economic policies kill nations:  “A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.”  [SLIDE]

That is the warning of Alexander Tytler, a Scottish nobleman and professor of history in the 19^th Century.  He developed what his called the Tytler Cycle. [SLIDE] I’ve included a copy in your notes.  Democracies, or democratic republics cycle from the birth of freedom to the death in tyranny in about 200 years on average.

During the Covid pandemic alone the government has committed almost $4 trillion in relief, with almost $3 trillion disbursed.  Did the government just sell $3 trillion in gold to someone?  No, all those stimulus packages are “monopoly money.”  They are just increased borrowing against our nation’s future, almost certainly guaranteeing our future will be very bleak.  How much is a Trillion Dollars?  If a person spent $1 million every day since Jesus was born, you would still not have spent a trillion dollars. 

I want to take a “video pause” for just a minute to try to demonstrate the enormity of the U.S. Dept [VIDEO]

US Debt of $20 Trillion Visualized in Stacks of Physical Cash - YouTube

One very big contributing factor to the reason America is no longer a superpower in a few short years is a crushing economic implosion.

❷ Crippling Encroachment (Attack) by Foreign Power 

Many people worry, and with some good reason, of an attack from another nation, perhaps Russia, China, or North Korea.  I think that type of devastating attack would almost certainly require some kind of nuclear attack, which would be self-defeating for any nation making that move.  During the Cold War we referred to this as “MAD”—or Mutually Assured Destruction.  So, I don’t think a military attack from beyond our borders is what contributes to our demise as a superpower.

I don’t worry so much about an attack from beyond our borders as I do an invasion across our borders. On January 21, one day after Biden signed a sweeping executive order eliminating deportations and ending the examination of non-citizens at the border BEFORE they entered the US, a caravan of thousands of people from Honduras seeking entrance into the US.  Here’s what one report said, “Mark Morgan, Acting Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner, believes that the migrant caravan could in fact contain as many as 5,000 people. He blames the Biden administration for this crisis. Ken Cuccinelli, acting DHS Deputy Secretary, said that the caravan is “an absolute human Petri dish opportunity for the transmission” of the CCP virus. He warned that the new strains of the virus might enter America through these people.”

A nation without borders cannot sustain itself as non-citizens take more resources than citizens can provide.  A nation cannot survive this “open border” policy that invites a migrant invasion. It is not a matter of humanitarianism but of commonsense policy.

Not a “nuclear” attack from beyond our borders but “non-citizens” encroaching in massive numbers across our borders.  Recall from our texts in Psalms and Acts, and there are others, God establishes nations. There can be no nation if there are no borders.  Open borders equals chaos.

Notice what is part of the curse for a nations that has rebelled openly against God, as ours has (Deuteronomy 28:33):  “A people you don’t know will eat your land’s produce and everything you have labored for.” [SLIDE]  Hear this:  open borders are not the “cause” of our calamities in the U.S., but part of the curse for not honoring God. The border crisis is a symptom, not the disease.

❸ Contaminating Crud of Moral Depravity

Over 40 years ago, a beloved Christian evangelist, Vance Havner, spoke directly about America’s rapidly deteriorating moral foundations.  He said, “At the rate America is decaying morally, we should change our national symbol from an eagle to a vulture!” [SLIDE] And, that was 40 plus years ago long before Same-sex marriage, and a man by the name of Bruce Jenner would be voted Glamour Magazine’s “Woman of the Year.” In accepting this award, Bruce Jenner [SLIDE] (man-becoming-a woman) said, ““I never in a million years thought that I would be here.”  Well, Vance Havner would have certainly said the same thing if he were alive in 2015.  (He died in 1986).

As I have noted before, Ronald Reagan once said, “America is great because America is good. When we cease to be good, we will cease to be great.”  Someone else has said, “When we are no longer One Nation Under God, we will be One Nation Gone Under.”

The contaminating crud of moral filth flows into American life like a busted four-inch pipe pump at a sewage treatment plant pumps raw sewage into the streets.  The stench from the moral decay of America is hard to imagine. During his reign of terror, Hitler brutally murdered at least 12 million Jews, disabled people, Slovakians, gypsies, black people, and other persons considered, undesirable.” In most peoples’ minds, Hitler is a personification of the Devil, himself.  Yet, in just one year, 2020, America murdered over 42.7 million babies!  A baby can be legally killed by decapitation while she is in the birth canal entering this world.

Just the moral depravity of the abortion slaughter is enough for God to utterly despise America and rain down upon us the full weight of His wrath.  Consider Romans 1:24-28.  Listen for the repetition of a very significant phrase:

24 Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them.

25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. 28 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper.

The phrase, “God gave them over,” is repeated three times. It comes from one word, “paredōken, literally means, “to give something to someone.” It is in the active voice. It is not merely the fact that God takes the Hand of His blessing from a morally depraved nation, but He actually “gives them to the Devil.” Henry Alford, a nineteenth century Greek scholar of great note, said this about paredōken: “not merely permissive, but judicial . . . the divine wrath hardens men, and hurries them on to more fearful degrees of depravity.”

When a nation becomes so contaminated with the creeping crud of moral depravity, they have crossed the line of no return.  Now, look at where this text in Romans draws the line of no return.  Verse 24:  “Therefore God delivered them over in the cravings of their hearts to sexual impurity, so that their bodies were degraded among themselves.”

Then, that sexual impurity is further described verses 27-28:  “The males in the same way also left natural relations with females and were inflamed in their lust for one another. Males committed shameless acts with males and received in their own persons the appropriate penalty of their error. And because they did not think it worthwhile to acknowledge God, God delivered them over to a worthless mind to do what is morally wrong. 

Here's an important point to note. Once a society embraces “rampant homosexuality,” they have already passed the point of no return.  America passed that point on June 26, 2015, when the Highest Court in our land declared Same-sex marriage as the law of our land. People cheered in the streets and Obama, president at that time, had the White House lit up to resemble the Gay Pride Flag.  [SLIDE]  Trump turned American away from embracing Gay Activism.  Biden is turning America back.  His Ass’t Secretary of Health is a man who thinks he is a woman.  Rachel Levine used to be Richard Levine. [SLIDE]

Our crippling economic crisis, the creeping encroachment of illegals invading our borders, and the contaminating crud of the total moral collapse of our society has guaranteed that America will soon no longer be a superpower on the world stage.  

NOW LET ME NOTE:  Don’t despair. This does not mean that there will not be a great harvest of souls yet gathered into the ark of God’s salvation. America’s chapter as a superpower may be coming to an end but the work of the church is just getting started.

The crippling economic crisis, the creeping encroachment of non-citizens at our borders and the contaminating crud of moral depravity alone would knock, and has knocked, any nation off the world stage.

But, there is one more event—the most cataclysmic event to date in human history that will utterly fracture the America’s foundations, and also the world’s.

❹ Catastrophic Fracture of the Rapture

I cannot say how long it will be before America really crashes and burns as a superpower and is absorbed into the “toes of Nebuchadnezzar’s statue” (Dan. 2). It may be hours, maybe days, perhaps even a few years (though I don’t think our time is going to be measured in years).  I believe the Bible indicates that one final event will be the catastrophic event that sends America into absolute chaos—and I don’t think “absolute” is even a strong enough term.

The Bible tells us, (1 Thessalonians 4:16–18):  “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the archangel’s voice, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are still alive will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”

[SLIDE] This refers to the “rapture,” or the “snatching away” of God’s people from the earth.  The word translated, “caught up,” is “harpāzō. It means to “take something forcefully or quickly.” We get the word, “rapture,” from the influence of Jerome’s Latin Vulgate Bible.  “Rapere” in Latin means to “kidnap, or snatch away.”

Now imagine in the United States what kind of chaos will ensue when in one catastrophic event literally millions of Christians vanish. Here’s one prophecy teacher’s description of what will follow when millions of Christians are snatched away in the rapture: [SLIDE]

“Jumbo jets plummet to earth as they no longer have a pilot at the controls [assuming the co-pilot is also a Christian].  Driverless busses, trains, subways, and cars will cause unimaginable crashes. Students will sit staring at the front of the classroom where once there was a teacher. Doctors and nurses will seem to have abandoned patients in the middle of surgeries. Doctors and nurses will stand holding surgical instruments over an empty table where there once was a patient. Fires and explosions may rage from stoves and appliances left unattended. Panic grips every household and city in the country (D. Jeremiah. 97).”

The “catastrophic fracture” from billions of people globally being snatched away will cause such incredible panic that the world will cling to any “messiah figure” that can offer hope and order.  Enter:  the Anti-Christ.

Everything will change in one catastrophic moment.  For those that are “Left Behind,” and not taken in the rapture, the changes will be more horrible than anyone can imagine.  But, what about those of us taken in the rapture?  We will also undergo a cataclysmic, eternal change.  Paul says in 1Cor. 15:52: 

“in a moment, in the blink of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed.”

That change will be beyond spectacular.  This reminds me of an old hillbilly who took a trip to New York City.  He’d never been out of his little town in the hollers of Appalachia before.  His wife and daughter were shopping and the man and his son were just in the mall taking in the sights.  The man noticed a set of metal doors that opened and an old lady walked in.  The doors closed behind her.  About a minute later, the doors opened again and out walked a beautiful young lady with flowing blonde hair.  The old hillbilly nearly swallowed his tongue and said to his boy, “Quick son! Go get your Momma’! I’m gonna’ run her through that machine.”

The Rapture is the event that changes everything in the twinkling of an eye.  Sadly, for our nation, it will utterly fracture the already crumbling foundations.

[SLIDE] Crippling Economic Implosion, Crushing Encroachment of Illegals across our borders, the Contaminating crud of moral decay in our society all contribute to the fall of America from a place as a superpower, but the Catastrophic Fracture of the Rapture will utterly destroy our nation. 

Is America a major player in the Biblical prophecy of the Last Days.  No, she is not.  As hard as that is for people to accept, it is the sad reality.  Nobody can say exactly when any prophetic event will take place, but all the signs point to it be very, very close. There are no additional prophetic signs or events that must be fulfilled before the Rapture.

As we leave this morning, I want to remind us of the purpose for prophecy in the Bible.  Over half the Bible is prophecy, and 100% of the Bible’s message is to prepare us for heaven.  The situation in America in the immediate future might see a brief period of seeming prosperity and revival—or it may not.  All the signs of a coming cataclysmic closure to human history are lining up like never before in history.  America, as we have learned, is not a superpower at the end.

So, are you READY?  Are all your loved ones ready?  The rapture is just around the corner. Have you given your life to Jesus Christ?