At the beginning of this month, many people were celebrating the death of Bin Laden. Some of you might be wondering why I waited for almost a month to say something about it. Well, the wait is over (if the truth be told, the honeymoon for celebrating is also over).
I remember 9/11/01, I was at work and I’ll admit I was nonchalant about it when it hit the towers. My world stopped when it hit the Pentagon. I won’t belabor all of my feelings about 9/11/01 here, but I’ll say this – don’t forget those who died. Today, if you’re reading this and feeling like there’s now peace & safety in this world now that Bin Laden is dead, I need to remind you of 1 Thessalonians 5:3. It says (from the Message Bible): About the time everybody's walking around complacently, congratulating each other—"We sure have it made! Now we can take it easy!"—suddenly everything will fall apart. It's going to come as suddenly and inescapably as birth pangs to a pregnant woman.
The problem with us as a country, we love violence. We love the death of guilty people, death in movies (granted, we love horror movies), the death of innocent people, but we don’t like the death of animals (dog, cat, etc.). Granted, we care more about pets than we do the unborn. But here’s a thought: what happens when a death happens to someone close to you (a brother, sister, a parent, a child, etc.)? We must’ve forgotten about that. I could even extend that further, the world loves violence. The world was rejoicing when Christ was crucified, the majority of the world when civil rights leaders were murdered. The world rejoices over death whether the person was in the right or in the wrong. We don’t glorify life anymore.
I posed this question on Facebook (and it came from a book entitled Unfair Advantage). Think about this:
1. What would an ounce of gold cost at the end of the next decade (12/31/20)?
2. How much will a gallon of gasoline cost in 2020?
3. What will food cost in the next 10 years?
After reading some of the responses that I got on those questions on Facebook (Sister Lori: I thank you for provoking my thought), I have this to say:
Yes, these things are temporal. The last thing we need to do is be laissez-faire about it and live your life like a flake. We need to be intelligent while we are here on earth while still looking to God who is our ultimate source.
What do I foresee? I foresee more government control over our lives. Here’s the travesty: because the majority is so naive putting our political views over our spiritual views, they’ll vote for more government control. The end result will be a loss of identity (who we really are on God is loss to who the government says we are). It’s foretold that there will be a one world government, one world economy and a one world religion. Anyway, I believe our borders will not remain secure, and our agents will not be supported, US laws won’t be enforced. I also foresee those who say they are for peace, will really be for war. We need to stand fast in the faith, be brave, be strong; let all that we do be in love (1 Corinthians 16:13-14). People will also link political views with spiritual views, so if you don’t agree politically, you will be considered anti-spiritual (and you will be attacked). If you are being attacked because people are considering you anti-spiritual, remember 2 Timothy 3:12, all those who will live godly shall suffer persecution. This will increase the more as these days progress (in fact, you trying to live godly will be considered a hate crime). The question I pose is this: are you going to bow the knee to the world? As I think about it, this post will be considered hate to some. It will only be hate to people who only want their flesh satisfied and not their spirit. It will be love for those who receive this in a loving spirit (and this I pray). I foresee people are going to want their mouths fed by somebody (like a baby still needing to be fed) and they don’t want to feed themselves. We want to be told by another human being how to conduct our lives and we as passive people will do what they tell us to do, as long as we can stay in our complacent comfort zone. There’s a part of me that wants to say to that (yes, again), you’re an adult, GROW UP please! It’s also recorded in Scripture that people will betray and hate one another. Love will be a thing of the past. I can imagine that the government will turn around and betray us intentionally. The question I pose to that is this: where will your faith rest on?
Now I don’t want to play devil’s advocate when I say this: it’s interesting that we police other countries and we assist other countries when they have a disaster (such as tsunami’s, etc.); I’ve yet to see other countries help us during Hurricane Katrina. It’s also interesting that we’ll sing songs that state “we’ll go through the storm and rain,” but when they come (I believe we’re going through it now), we want to rebuke & complain about it. This is really going to upset some people: it’s interesting that US citizens can be charged for sending money to Pakistan , but it’s OK for the government to send money to Pakistan
