Discourse 127 – Will the Antichrist be a Moslem?




Will the Antichrist be a Moslem?

The Koran.

The Islamic Mahdi.

The Jewish Messiah.

The Jewish Antichrist.

The Christian Redeemer.

The democracy trap.


(Texts in a black frame are quotations from visitors to this site or from other authors.)

(Will the Antichrist be a Moslem? / Commentary by HerbL 00, 2017-10-12)


Hello Mr. Horak,

I am always fascinated by your clear view of the things we will be faced with in the Last Days.
ZOn the question "Who is the Antichrist?" there have been quantities of material and speculations to date.

But I was particularly impressed recently by Joel Richardson’s book "The Islamic Antichrist".

Joel Richardson writes very convincingly – producing good evidence from scripture to back up his argument ’ that the coming sole global supremo is also ardently anticipated by believing Moslems (as the Mahdi), and that he will be accompanied by "Jesus" (the false prophet). Nor is he the only author who is more or less convinced that the Antichrist will come from an Islamic country, to seize global power into his hands. I was particularly convinced in view of the fact that he builds up this thesis just on the basis of prophecies referring to this time contained in the Koran and the Bible:

"The Bible foretells that in the Last Days a charismatic leader will appear and will gain a global following in the name of peace. Islam too expects a man who will arise to lead the nations, and promises an era of peace as a result. Joel Richardson’ s fascinating insights and analysis suggest that with the Islamic Mahdi and the Antichrist from the Bible, we actually have to do with one and the same person. It seems that the false Christ would be likely to come from the heart of the Middle East, rather than from Europe as has frequently been supposed."

With an Islamic ruler, the sentence in Jn 16,2 would also be fulfilled: "An hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think he is offering service to God," as well as Rev 20,4: "And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on the forehead and on the hand…"

Here’ s a quote from a customer review: "According to the Bible and Islamic eschatology, Christians and Jews who oppose this development will be done away with! Christians and Jews who know that this Antichrist is inimical to God will oppose him. And Moslems will be unaware of the ungodly nature of their hero, because in their eyes the Antichrist is the Mahdi, who will make Islam great as the most antichristian of all religions."

What do you think of this thesis?
Many thanks in advance for your response.
Best wishes,

HerbL



Many thanks for your visit to Immanuel.at and for your comments.

In recent months I have had two similar inquiries, and so I think it could be useful for readers at Immanuel.at if this issue were to be treated and analyzed separately from the general events of the Last Days, like the Great Tribulation, the persecution of Christians and God’ s eschatological judgments.

So let me start right away with your first statement. You write:


(Texts in a black frame are quotations from visitors to this site or from other authors.)


Joel Richardson writes very convincingly ’ producing good evidence from scripture to back up his argument ’ that the coming sole global supremo is also ardently anticipated by believing Moslems (as the Mahdi) and that he will be accompanied by "Jesus" (the false prophet). Nor is he the only author who is more or less convinced that the Antichrist will come from an Islamic country, to seize global dominion into his hands. I was particularly convinced in view of the fact that he builds up this thesis just on the basis of prophecies referring to this time contained in the Koran and the Bible.



Yes, as I have said, I have already had some similar inquiries recently, and of course it is altogether understandable, as well, that rightly believing Christians ’ and not just them ’ should be considering the question whether the present situation in Europe and Africa, together with terrorist dangers emanating from political Islam, might not be just the beginning of a much more comprehensive, because total, world dominion of the Antichrist prophesied in the Bible.

FFor the more analytical observer, however, it must be stated first of all that the "Mahdi" (al-mahdi) is not referred to with even a single word in the Koran of Mohammed. So it follows that this thesis is absolutely incapable of being developed "just on the basis of prophecies… contained in the Koran," as you write above. And of course there is no mention in the Bible either of a "Mahdi" or Islamic prophet.

On the other hand, the "Prophet" Mohammed is not mentioned anywhere in the Bible either, although he claims to be a "messenger of God" and so places himself on an equal footing with Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who says of himself:

The Father who sent Me.

Jn 6,44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up on the last day. Jn 6,44;

He who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life.

Jn 5,22 "For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son, 5,23 so that all will honor the Son even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. 5,24 "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life. Jn 5,22-24;


The Koran.

But now, as we have demonstrated in Discourse 123, the Koran is not actually a source to be credited, because Mohammed copied the greater part of his texts, sometimes word for word, from the Bible; while those statements that bear no resemblance at all either with the Torah or with with the New Testament and so emanate from a third source, presumably from Mohammed himself, contain an astonishing quantity of commands and prohibitions, designed to establish the position and power of the "messenger" in the eyes of his followers.

Likewise the fact that Mohammed, in his assessment of Christian teaching in the Koran, committed a serious mistake by confusing the unbiblical "Mary", invented by the Catholic church at the Council of Ephesus (431 AD), with the Holy Spirit, and understands her, together with God the Father and God’ s Son, as constituting the Christian "Trinity", does not make the Koran any more credible. This error can hardly be attributed to the Archangel Gabriel, who is supposed to have given these texts to Mohammed in a cave.

Still less could we accuse the Archangel Gabriel of being unfamiliar with the bodily nature of an angel, on the grounds that he gave Mohammed incorrect information about this state in eternity with reference to the Koran’ s "72 virgins":


Mohammed and eternity

(Extract from discourse 123: "The Prophet Mohammed, the Koran, the Bible and true Christianity")

And then we come to those famous 72 virgins, who supposedly wait in paradise for the Muslim martyr to come and deflower them. And in a "hadith of the prophet", Mohammed also promises that after being deflowered the virgins will recover their virginity again, and the martyr will have a constant erection (WikiIslam / English).


Mohammed

Mohammed’s ascension to heaven with his horse (woman ??) Buraq

Quite apart from the morally deplorable circumstance that this represents an attempt to seduce young men with sexual enticements, so that they will sacrifice their lives to further the power hunger of a self‒styled "prophet", and later on to extend the power of a false religion – it is these "promises" of the Koran, above all, that testify to the fact that Mohammed had absolutely no idea about life in eternity.

For as the Koran itself confirms, after the Resurrection eternity begins. The people who will live in eternity will naturally also live eternally. Now if people in eternity live eternally, no one is going to die any more and so people won’t need to go on being born either. It follows that in eternity there will not be any begetting of children, nor will there any longer be sexual intercourse. So people will not longer have sexual organs either, it will no longer be a matter of man and woman – they will all be like the angels, sexually neutral in other words.

So if Mohammed had read the New Testament more attentively, he want have found an explanation of these matters by the Son of God. The Jews of the day had asked him a trick question, telling him the famous biblical story of the seven brothers with the one wife:

In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife of the seven will she be? For they all had married her.

Mt 22,23 On that day some Sadducees (who say there is no resurrection) came to Jesus and questioned Him, 22,24 asking, "Teacher, Moses said, ‘if a man dies having no children, his brother as next of kin shall marry his wife, and raise up children for his brother’ 22,25 "Now there were seven brothers with us; and the first married and died, and having no children left his wife to his brother; 22,26 so also the second, and the third, down to the seventh. 22,27 "Last of all, the woman died. 22,28 "In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife of the seven will she be? For they all had married her." 22,29 But Jesus answered and said to them, "You are mistaken, not understanding the Scriptures nor the power of God.

22,30 "For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. Mt 22,23-30;


As we can see, Mohammed fell into the same trap as the Jews back then. But whereas the Sadducees denied the Resurrection as such, Mohammed took over the Resurrection and eternal life from the New Testament, but overlooked the associated consequences – the fact that progeny will no longer be needed in future. And so he culpably promised "paradisal conditions" that he had invented himself, so as to persuade young people to go to their deaths for him.

The conclusion is clear: logic was not the strong point of the "prophet" back then, nor is it a conspicuous characteristic of his followers today.

(See also discourse 36: "Is Islam a peaceful religion?")


So taken all in all, the Koran must be seen as commanding little credit, and so "prophecies" from the Koran are not worth the paper on which they are written.


The Islamic Mahdi.

So much for the credibility of the Koran. Now as for the "Mahdi", this name, as mentioned above, does not appear even once in the Koran and so comes from the post-Koranic period. But here again we find a borrowing from the Bible. After the ninth century AD or so, when the New Testament came to be more widely disseminated and known, the different Islamic sects ’ of which there were and are a great many, as is the case with Christian denominations ’ borrowed from the Christian religion by inventing a "Redeemer" of their own. He was supposed to be a descendant of Mohammed, who would do away with the injustice of this world in the Last Days.


According to traditional Islamic belief, the Mahdi (Arabic المهدي,, DMG [German Oriental Society] transliteration al-Mahdī, "the guided by right"; in Persian and some Arabic dialects sometimes pronounced "Mehdi") is a descendant of the prophet Mohammed, who will emerge in the Last Days and do away with the injustice on earth. Belief in the appearance of the Mahdi is both a central element of the Shiite confession, and also disseminated in the chiliastic expectations of Sunni Islam, and is accordingly set forth in the traditional canonical collections in the form of hadiths.
(WIKIPEDIA)



This is probably also what is referred to, in the commentary of the above visitor, in the passage he quotes from the book "The Islamic Antichrist" by Joel Richardson:

"The Bible foretells that in the Last Days a charismatic leader will appear and will gain a global following in the name of peace. Islam too expects a man who will arise to lead the nations, and promises an era of peace as a result. Joel Richardson’ s fascinating insights and analysis suggest that with the Islamic Mahdi and the Antichrist from the Bible, we actually have to do with one and the same person. It seems that the false Christ would be likely to come from the heart of the Middle East, rather than from Europe as has frequently been supposed."


And here we must state specifically that the Bible nowhere speaks of a "leader", or for that matter of a "global following". The Bible’ s Old Testament prophesies a Jewish Messiah who will set up a world kingdom at the end of the world. And the New Covenant, or New Testament, reports that this person is actually the Son of God, who became human in Jesus of Nazareth some two thousand years ago, in Israel, as a Jew. The Jews of the time however refused to acknowledge their Messiah, branded him an imposter and blasphemer and handed him over to the Romans to be crucified.

But he then rose from the dead and has returned to his Father in heaven, and will come again from there to initiate his world dominion and set up a thousand years Kingdom of Peace (The Millennium) as the last empire of this world, war being banished from this planet. He will not have a global following, though, as there will still be peoples that refuse to submit to the rule of the Son of God and so will be punished for it. (Zech 14:17).

So it is incorrect ’ or at least based on superficial study of the Bible ’ when Richardson says above "…that with the Islamic Mahdi and the Antichrist from the Bible, we actually have to do with one and the same person." [Islam’ s savior is called the Mahdi. However, the man in the Bible is the Antichrist.]. Islam sees its Mahdi as being in the opposite position to the Messiah of the Jews and to Jesus Christ, the Son of God and Redeemer of the Christians, and not as the biblical Antichrist.

(See also discourse 123: "The Prophet Mohammed, the Koran, the Bible and true Christianity.")


The Jewish Messiah.

But the Jews too are waiting for their Messiah (Hebrew for "anointed", in Greek Christos) to establish a kingdom or world dominion, in accordance with the statements of the Tanach (Old Testament). By contrast with Islam, however, these are genuine prophecies of God the Almighty, which were fulfilled two thousand years ago already, through the appearance of this Messiah as man and as the Son of God. Unfortunately the Jews of the time in some cases failed to recognize him, in fact the majority of them directly rejected him and condemned him to death.

And consequently the Jews are still waiting today for their "true" Messiah. And according to the prophecies of the New Testament, another Messiah ’ a false one ’ is actually to come, namely the so-called "Antichrist". He will make out that he is the true Messiah the Jews are expecting, and set up a global reign of terror. But the Son of God, on his Second Coming, will annihilate him and then establish his Kingdom of Peace.

Through their rejection of their true Messiah ’ the Son of God ’ two thousand years ago and their condemning him to death, the Jews broke their covenant with God. God has accordingly dissolved this covenant, and made a new covenant with all human beings through the sacrificial death of his Son. In future every human being who requests it from God is to have his or her sins forgiven in the name of this "redeeming sacrifice". They will then stand before God as justified and freed from sin, and will not be condemned in the Last Judgment.

(See also discourse 30: "Why did Jesus have to die on the cross?")


This possibility, of having their sins forgiven through faith in the Son of God, is of course open to the Jews as well. But for Orthodox Jews ’ and for their two Grand Rabbis of Israel ’ the Christian faith is an insult: "Crucifixes are offensive to Jews. The cross is against the Jewish religion, and looking at the cross is forbidden to Jews" (Israel Meir Lau, Grand Rabbi from 1993 to 2003). But even without this godless prohibition, the Jews ’ whether they are of the Mosaic faith, or godless, as in fact are the great majority of the Israeli population ’ have no access to God. They have been God-less for two thousand years and will remain so until the Millennium.

This banning of the cross induced the Catholic Pope, when he visited the two Grand Rabbis in Israel, to hide the cross which he wears on a chain around his neck in his cingulum (belly tie), when in the presence of the rabbis.


Papst Franziskus   Papst Franziskus   Papst Franziskus




The Jews were severely punished by God for breaking the covenant two thousand years ago. During the First Jewish War (66-74 AD), in the year 70 the Temple and the entire city of Jerusalem was razed to the ground by the Romans under Titus. Sixty years later, in the Third Jewish War (the Bar-Kochba rebellion, 132-135 AD), the remaining area of Judea settled by the Jews was destroyed and the whole of Israel was banished into the diaspora. Only in our own day – in the year 1948 – did the Zionists of Theodor Herzl again bring about the resettlement of Palestine by the Jews.

(See also discourse 111: "The pseudo-Christian betrayal of the Israelites.")


The Jewish Antichrist.

Zionism, of course, is a political movement in Judaism which planned the Jewish national state in Palestine as early as the start of the previous century, and then accomplished it in 1948. In a falsification of the biblical prophecies, this was heralded as the "Gathering of Israel" promised by God, so that the appearance of the "Messiah" was accordingly shifted into the immediate future.

And here too, of course, a plan was worked out with a view to helping this false Messiah to gain power and with him achieving world dominion. The details of this plan may be found in the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", where we find it written, for instance (italics in brackets supplied by me):

"In order that the masses themselves may not guess what they are about we further distract them with amusements, games, pastimes, passions, people’s palaces… Soon we shall begin through the press to propose competitions in art (film festivals, Oscar award ceremonies etc.) , in sport of all kinds (Olympic Games, world championships etc.): these interests will finally distract their minds from questions in which we should find ourselves compelled to oppose them. Growing more and more disaccustomed to reflect and form any opinions of their own, people will begin to talk in the same tone as we, because we alone shall be offering them new directions for thought of course through such persons as will not be suspected of solidarity with us." (13th Protocol).


So Zionists want the masses to "lose the capacity for independent thought", in order to introduce their "king" ’ first of all in secret, and then increasingly brazenly ’ and set him on the throne. This is in fact quite clearly confirmed at the end of the Protocols:

"In the person of the king who with unbending will is master of himself and of humanity all will discern as it were fate with its mysterious ways. None will know what the king wishes to attain by his dispositions, and therefore none will dare to stand across an unknown path.
It is understood that the brain reservoir of the king must correspond in capacity to the plan of government it has to contain. It is for this reason that he will ascend the throne not otherwise than after examination of his mind by the aforesaid learned elders.
That the people may know and love their king it is indispensable for him to converse in the market-places with his people. This ensures the necessary clinching of the two forces which are now divided one from another by us by the terror. This terror was indispensable for us till the time come; for both these forces separately to fall under our influence.
The King of the Jews must not be at the mercy of his passions, and especially of sensuality: on no side of his character must he give brute instinct power over his mind, Sensuality worse than all else disorganizes the capacities of the mind and clearness of views, distracting the thoughts to the worst and most brutal side of human activity.
The prop of humanity in the person of the supreme lord of all the world of the holy seed of David must sacrifice to his people all personal inclinations.
Our supreme lord must be of an exemplary irreproachability." (24th Protocol)


In reading the above statements we must bear in mind that these Protocols purportedly come from around the begin of the previous century, and attentive contemporaries will certainly be able to recognize some parallels with the measures announced here even in our present day of the "mobile phone generation".

(See also discourse 112: "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion – the Analysis.")


But we also find indications in the Bible that the coming false Messiah ’ the Antichrist ’ will be a Jew. When Jesus recognized that the Jews were really going to reject him and hand him over to the Romans to be crucified, he said to the Jews:

If another comes in his own name, you will receive him.

Jn 5,43 "I have come in My Father’ s name, and you do not receive Me; if another comes in his own name, you will receive him. Jn 5,43;


The meaning of this prophecy is this: just as the Son of God, the Messiah of the Jews, came to the Jews acting on God’ s instructions, but they rejected him and condemned him to death, so another ’ likewise as the "Messiah" ’ will come to the Jews in his own name (without the authority of God, in other words), and they will accept him.

So it emerges quite clearly from this passage that a false Messiah will come. And it is expressly emphasized that he will come to the Jews. So he is not a Mahdi, who comes to the Moslems, nor (as yet) is he the Redeemer Jesus Christ, who comes to the Christians. It is a false Messiah who will come to the Jews.

And Paul too indicates, in his second letter to the Thessalonians, that the "man of lawlessness", as he calls him, will take his seat in the Jewish Temple, which has by this time been rebuilt, and claim to be God.

So that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God.

2The 2,3 Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, 2,4 who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God. 2The 2, 3- 4;


And Paul makes it somewhat clearer by specifying where this "man of lawlessness" comes from. He calls him "son of destruction". In the Bible the name "destroyer" is a name of Satan (Heb 11:28; 1Cor 10:10; Pro 28:24), and "son of destruction (in Greek: υιός της απωλειας)" therefore means "son of Satan".

Jesus Christ, then, came to the Jews as the Son of God, and they rejected him. Another will come to them as the "son of Satan", and they will accept him. And he too will be the one who first rebuilds the Temple in Jerusalem, but then abolishes the daily sacrifice (tamid), takes his seat in the Temple and claims to be God himself.

(See also discourse 86: "The first and the second Antichrist.")


The Christian Redeemer.

Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died on the cross two thousand years ago. After three days he rose again and ascended to his Father in heaven. And from there he will come again. This Second Coming is confirmed in numerous passages of the Bible:

They will see coming the Son of Man in the clouds of heaven.

Mt 26,64 Jesus said to him, "You have said it yourself; nevertheless I tell you, hereafter you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power, and coming on the clouds of heaven." Mt 26,64;

Mk 14,61 But He kept silent and did not answer. Again the high priest was questioning Him, and saying to Him, "Are You the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?" 14,62 And Jesus said, "I am; and you shall see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power, and coming with the clouds of heaven." Mk 14,61’ 62;


In the above passage, Mt 14,61, it is the high priest who asks Jesus whether he is the Son of God. And the Lord not only gives an affirmative answer to this question, at the same time he confirms, before the entire Sanhedrin at once, that he is now going to the Father, and that he will later come again "with the clouds of heaven".

Just the same information is given to the disciples when they see the risen Lord being carried away into heaven before their eyes.

This Jesus will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.

Acts 1,6 So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, "Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?" 1,7 He said to them, "It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority; 1,8 but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth."

1,9 And after He had said these things, He was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. 1,10 And as they were gazing intently into the sky while He was going, behold, two men in white clothing stood beside them. 1,11 They also said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven." Acts 1,6’ 11;


Based on these texts, the infallible sign of the Second Coming of the Lord in this world, after his death, raising from the dead and ascension ’ so after almost two thousand years to date ’ is his appearance "on the clouds of heaven". We can therefore assume that all prophecies that show the Lord coming "on the clouds of heaven" relate to this event.

A first indication of this kind is to be found in the gospels. Here the Lord mentions this event to the disciples, and at the same time lets them know the advance signs of his Second Coming.

The Son of Man will come in a cloud with power and great glory.

Lk 27,25 "There will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth dismay among nations, in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, 27,26 men fainting from fear and the expectation of the things which are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 27,27 "Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory". Lk 21,25’ 27;

 They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky.

Mt 24,29 "But immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 24,30 "And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. 24,31 "And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other. Mt 24,29-31;


After we have learned how the Lord will come again, we are also told when he will come. In his statement above (Mt 24,29), the Lord says that this will be immediately after the tribulation of those days. This is the so-called "Great Tribulation", and of this too we find confirmation in the Bible:

There will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time.

Dan 12,1 "Now at that time Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone who is found written in the book, will be rescued. Dan 12, 1:

A time of tribulation such as has not occurred since the beginning of the creation.

Mk 13,19 "For those days will be a time of tribulation such as has not occurred since the beginning of the creation which God reated until now, and never will.  Mk 13,19;


So there is going to be a tribulation such as has never before occurred on earth. And immediately after this tribulation, the Son of God will come again. So now we know both how and when the Lord will come again. We are only lacking the answer to the question for what purpose he will come. And this we learn too in the next verses following the biblical passage above (Mk13,21), namely in Mk 13,27:

He will send forth the angels, and will gather together His elect.

Mk 13,24 "But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light, 13,25 and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken. 13,26 "Then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. 13,27 "And then He will send forth the angels, and will gather together His elect from the four winds, from the farthest end of the earth to the farthest end of heaven. Mk 13,24’ 27


He will send his angels, and they will gather his elect over the entire planet. Please note that this is not the General Resurrection at the end of the world, but only the so-called "Rapture" or "Pre-rapture" of the Christian faithful on the Second Coming of the Lord, at the sixth seal, before the day of the wrath of God. After that the Millennium is still to come, the thousand years kingdom of peace of the Son of God ’ that empire which is prophetically foretold in the Old Testament as the "kingdom" of the Messiah. And only then comes the end of he world with the General Resurrection.

But who, now, are these elect whom the Lord sends his angels to gather? Paul tells us this in his first letter to the Thessalonians:

The dead in Christ will rise first and with they who are alive caiught up.

1The 4,15 For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 4,16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 4,17 Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. 1The 4,15-17;


So it is the dead in Christ ’ in other words, those human beings who have come to believe in Jesus Christ in their lifetime and died without having seen him (Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed). They will be raised first. And then, together with the living whom the angels have gathered from all over the world who likewise believe in Christ, they will be caught up into the air to meet the Lord. All of them will then ascend with the Lord into heaven. That is not written here, admittedly, but we can infer it from the following scriptural passage:

These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation.

Rev 7,9 After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; 7,10 and they cry out with a loud voice, saying, "Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb." 7,11 And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures; and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 7,12 saying, "Amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might, be to our God forever and ever. Amen." 7,13 Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, "These who are clothed in the white robes, who are they, and where have they come from?" 7,14 I said to him, "My lord, you know." And he said to me, "These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

7,15 "For this reason, they are before the throne of God; and they serve Him day and night in His temple; and He who sits on the throne will spread His tabernacle over them. 7,16 "They will hunger no longer, nor thirst anymore; nor will the sun beat down on them, nor any heat; 7,17 for the Lamb in the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and will guide them to springs of the water of life; and God will wipe every tear from their eyes." Rev 7, 9-17;


Here John has a vision in heaven. He sees a great multitude of people, of all the tribes and nations of this world, standing before the throne of God. And he asks the elder who these people are. And the elder tells him that they are the ones who come out of the Great Tribulation. Since no one who does not believe in Jesus Christ is able to enter heaven, these must be the raptured dead Christians of all time and the living who believe in Christ from the Great Tribulation. And they are before the throne ’ in other words, in heaven. .

The fact that it is stated here, in Rev 7,14, that they "come out of the Great Tribulation" gives additional confirmation, yet again, that the Rapture takes place after ’ and indeed "immediately after" (Mt 24,29) ’ the Great Tribulation, and not before the Tribulation, as so many Christian preachers misleadingly tell their congregations. So the Christians will have to live through the Great Tribulation. And there will not be many of them left who survive this time of affliction, as Paul reveals to us in 1The 4,15 and 17 above, when he refers to these survivors as those who "remain".

(See also discourse 126: "Are all religions equal? – the position of Biblical Christianity.")


The democracy trap.

So that would be the sequence of events as they are prophesied in the Bible. When it comes to the details you could have deviations in one place or another, but in terms of the big picture this is all ’ for any biblically focused Christian believer ’ relatively clear and convincing. Can we find any kind of connection here with the present day? Above all the refugee crisis, with mass immigration to Europe (largely made up of Moslems and Moslem families), is obviously, when you come down to it, a good reason for asking the question whether Islam could be a sign of the Last Days.

(See also discourse 1133: "How and why the Great Tribulation begins: "The beginning of birth pangs".")

(See also discourse 122: "Still 224 years to go till the Millennium.")


But for this, evidently, it is still too early. We do have the possibility, however, based on comparison with similar historical events, of coming to an approximate judgment at least of this issue. If we are looking for a comparable historical event in relation to the appearance of the Antichrist, we can find some examples in European history.

We can take the October Revolution in Russia in 1917, where Lenin came to power with his "party of the proletariat" and created the Soviet Union, or the global economic crisis of 1929/30 in Germany, where in the subsequent outcome Hitler seized power with his "National Socialist Party" and established the Third Reich. In both cases the seizure of power was preceded by a crisis, which shattered the fundamental certainties of the population and made them pliable for a new kind of political direction. .

Let us just picture the following scenario. In the year 2016 alone, the European Union took in a total of over 1 million refugees. And as these families are extremely fertile, they will generate more and more children over the years, who will become European citizens. And these European citizens are for the most part Moslems.

And these Moslems remain Moslems. This is a different situation from Catholics worldwide, who only rediscover their Christian identity when they are hit by a major disaster or when they are on the point of death. An Islamic believer is not going to switch faith so readily. In 15 to 20 years, all these children will be grown up, and will of course come together in democratic political parties.

And here’ s where the democracy trap snaps shut. In democracy, the ones who have the most votes, the majority of votes, are the ones who invariably have power. Whether they are homosexuals, terrorists (like Hamas in the Gaza strip) or Islamic believers (like those from Turkey), they will participate in political happenings ’ with the same punctiliousness they bring to Friday attendance at the mosque ’ and cast their votes.

The consequence of this, of course, is that before long the Islamic party becomes the strongest party in Parliament. And any European nationals who think that by then the Moslems will have been converted, or at least will have toned down a bit, should get that idea out of their heads.

As the strongest party, they would be forming governments and passing legslation. And seeing that the Moslems, even today, are not prepared to acknowledge democracy and its laws, they will introduce their own law, the Sharia (and if you don’ t know what the Sharia is, just take a look on the internet!). And the Sharia knows no separation of religion and politics. Islam and Sharia together add up to a totalitarian system, which organizes society in every area of life (see Turkey and Saudi Arabia).

Scharia

Outrages: Moslems demand radical Islamic legislation


And precisely that could now lead, all over Europe, to civil wars and to a crisis which would be a fertile ground for the takeover and seizure of political power by the Antichrist, the Jewish "Messiah". With Israeli and American support, he would once again liberate Europe and drive out Islam. He would be celebrated, honored and worshiped in Israel as the long desired "Messiah" and in Christian European congregations as the "Second Coming of Jesus Christ".

The view of many politicians that democracy is the best of all possible forms of government is thus quite simply wrong. There is one form of government, with which these politicians, in their godlessness, are not conversant ’ theocracy. This is the rule of God. Human beings will experience a government of this sort in the Millennium, the thousand years kingdom of peace of our Lord Jesus Christ. There will be no more wars. Indeed, they will no longer even train for war.

Then they will hammer their swords into plowshares and never again will they train for war.

Mi 4,3 And He will judge between many peoples And render decisions for mighty, distant nations. Then they will hammer their swords into plowshares And their spears into pruning hooks; Nation will not lift up sword against nation, And never again will they train for war. 4,4 Each of them will sit under his vine And under his fig tree, With no one to make them afraid, For the mouth of the LORD of hosts has spoken. 4,5 Though all the peoples walk Each in the name of his god, As for us, we will walk In the name of the LORD our God forever and ever. Mi 4, 3’ 5;


Theocracy ’ the rule of God over His creation ’ is and remains the best of all forms of government. But God has given human beings freedom of choice, freedom of election. They can do what they think is right. They do not even need a majority to do so. Each individual can decide for himself or herself ’ but then, they must take responsibility for their decision.

In the light of this, the well known evangelist and preacher Wilhelm Busch said to his hearers, "You don’ t need to accept the message I am giving you. You can choose not to convert to Jesus. But just be aware that this means you are choosing hell! You have complete freedom ’ it’ s your choice!". (Discourse 55)