Pilgrim, Don't Fret About the Upcoming Election - It's What's Next
That'll Curl Your Hair. 

The mathematics below is terrible and real. Will it all work out as I
have speculated? Perhaps, perhaps not, but the point of putting it all
down is to show that there is a window of opportunity for it all to
happen - without - magic. So, read. I guarantee you will not find it
boring - if - you can resist the urge to grab for the pot of tar and the
bag of feathers.

The Baby Boomers were born between 1945 and 1950 and will be 65 between
2010 and 2015.

If the retirement age is increased to 67 as scheduled, then they will be
asking for retirement in 2012 for those receiving full benefits (starting
in 2009 for the earlies (75% of benefits), if still allowed).

If President Bush is re-elected, he will have to stand down in 2008.
Hillary will surely make her attempt then and will conclude her first
term in 2012. If she runs true to her promises, she will install a
comprehensive health care package that will come close to bankrupting the
economy - but the effects will not be felt until after the election of
2012. During her second term the baby-boomer retirees will reach crushing
proportions about the SAME TIME the bill for her health-care package
starts to come due.

This problem is not unique to America, indeed, it is far worse in Japan
and Europe where they have restricted births far more than we have in the
past few decades. This means there simply is not going to be a large
enough employed working base to support the huge baby-boom population
that they also have. The whole Western world will spiral into a
depression far worse than the 1929-1939 decade.

The collapse of the U.S. economy will be sudden and deep, truly
magnificent. It will be made terribly worse because Madam President will
attempt to deny that it is happening at all.

And then - ! [ Here, we speculate that this next scene is a stage
production - not just another dress rehearsal. If it IS just another
dress rehearsal among many in the recent past, then edit out the parts
that have to do with the catching away and put everything on hold for
another few decades - - when - - someone else will dust off the same
theme and have a go at it again. They (we) have been doing it now and
then since the death of Christ - Martin Luther was convinced that his
generation would see the return of Christ! But, - but, this is the first
time the play has had all the characters in the right places and wearing
the correct costumes.  This one's different, pilgrim. This one's at least
a full dress rehearsal. ]

AND THEN!

And then, Russia will be faced with the worst famine it has ever seen.
The government will blame everything in sight for the crop failures (and
say nothing about its own failures.).

Finally it will come up with a grand delusion, believed for generations
of peasant farmers, that the solution to better crops is chemical
fertilizers - and everyone "knows" that the Dead Sea in Israel is the
world's greatest repository of these chemicals.

The peasant farmers of Russia will buy into the governments deliberately
distracting propaganda in such huge numbers that the government will be
taken completely by surprise. Huge numbers, millions, of farmers will
drive, pull, push anything with wheels down thru - -& -- & -- to Israel.
At first they will keep to major highways - but the crush will soon
overtax even the largest super highways and the mass will spill over into
the country-sides and into the fields. Fences will be uprooted, orchards
will be destroyed by the mobs of people. At first Israel will merely
protest and attempt to re-educate the advancing wave, but nothing will
stop their mad rush. Sooner or later the Israeli police will shoot a few
of the worst offenders, perhaps a few who stole vehicles.

The Russian government will cry out against Israel for shooting "starving
peasants who mean no harm" - and will threaten to send troops to protect
them - or at least to help keep order. The U.S. government will protest
against this invasion by Russian troops and the whole thing will get out
of hand so suddenly that no-one will be able to catch his breath.

Atomic tipped missiles will fly without warning and destroy several
cities in Europe and in the U.S. Several more missiles will fly to
destroy Russian cities - and then all h--- will break loose. Everyone who
has a grudge against anyone will throw missiles and bombs. A fifth of the
people on planet earth will be killed or will be in process of dying
inside the space of three months.

Madam President will sue for peace at any price - even unilateral and
unconditional surrender - to STOP THE KILLING.

Stop the killing!

Surprise, the other nations will not stop the killings and they will not
treat the now defenseless United States as the U.S. treated those it has
conquered.

Europe will have been devastated, Russia will have been thoroughly
destroyed, the U.S. will have been badly damaged. The surrender will all
have been un--necessary and all for nothing. But the U.S. will have gone
beyond "the point of no return" before our people realize what had been
done to them.

What is left of the United Nations will carve up the U.S. and distribute
the pieces to whoever can make the loudest and most ancient claim. Mexico
will take the southern states of New Mexico and Arizona and all of
California "back." Native Americans will once again become tiny
vulnerable nations. The Mormons, if they act quickly, will be able to
declare all of Utah and some of Colorado and Idaho as their long sought
nation. French Canada will make a bid for much of the Louisiana Purchase
and will separate from the English provinces. Russia, of course, will
take "back" Alaska and if British Colombia and the English speaking
provinces don't act swiftly and aggressively enough Russia will take
parts of Washington State and Oregon. Cuba will take Florida - why not!
Texas will have to become an independent nation once again, but it won't
be any easier than it was the first time. Remember the Alamo all over
again.

When London is destroyed, the world will have to find a new financial
capitol for the world of business and when Zurich is destroyed all the
petty dictators and big time thieves will have to find a new place to set
up numbered accounts to hide the money they steal. Baghdad (mystery
Babylon) will take the place of London, and Jerusalem will take the place
of Zurich. Baghdad banking will give the Antichrist his claim to world
power, and Jerusalem numbered accounts will be the hidden trigger to
bring the armies of the world to save the leaders stash - although those
in the armies will not have the slightest clue as to why they are there.
Who would think that a simple thing like numbered bank accounts would set
up this collection of the world armies to begin Armageddon #2? [If you
don't like my trigger, then find your own, the Bible doesn't give us a
clue WHY the armies of so many nations gather for this 2nd battle of
Armageddon. The trigger for the 1st was famine, the "hook in the jaw,"
perhaps.] The 1st battle of Armageddon will set up the 2nd battle in much
the same way The World War (I) set up WWII, and there well may be a
similar space between them.

By default, the focus of world power will shift to the Middle East. The
U.S. will have been carved up, Europe will have been destroyed, Egypt
will have been destroyed, Russia will have been badly damaged - and a
petty dictator from Iraq will stand up "calling himself" the ruler of the
world. He won't be the ruler of the world, but he will call himself by
this title and the other nations will allow it - - as long as he promises
to sell oil to them.

The AntiChrist is called anti - Christ, he is not called anti - Jew.
Indeed, he will make a league of peace with the nation of the Jews. One
part of this treaty will include open borders (so the p-o-o-r
Palestinians can have access to Israeli labor markets), but the
AntiChrist will not count on the Jews who have become followers of the
Jewish Messiah. These will not be after the sort of Messianic Jews out of
the evangelical tradition of today (they will have been taken in the
catching away), but a uniquely Jewish version. They will go everywhere
preaching the good news  - to - the Moslems - in their own back yards -
and they will be protected by treaty. The good news that God (Allah)
loves and that Jesus has the cure for human guilt (sin) is an exceedingly
compelling welcome, especially to people caught in a religion of fear and
denial. The Moslem clerics will have a royal fit! They will demand -
DEMAND - an end to this Jewish horde of proselytizers. And he will HAVE
TO break the treaty with the Jews - - because - - of the message of
Christ.

It will be a real Zoo out there everywhere else. Arab hunting parties
will be traveling all over the places that are not firmly tied up into
some collective. The Arabs will be seeking Christians to behead and
seeking blonde, blue eyed women to wed by force.

It won't take long for the Moslem Jihad to topple one nation after
another and for Sharia law to be instituted everywhere they have
influence. Christians will quickly become an endangered species. Those
"Christians" who remain after the catching away, someplace in the midst
of the nuclear exchanges, will either convert to Islam or else face -
eventual - beheading.

Why do I think the catching-away will come in the midst of the atomic
holocaust? Because it's God's style to not give to the pagans more
evidence of His presence than He gives to His own children. The catching
away of the Church will be a public event, but will be ignored due to the
massive world terror. Besides it will just be a few hundred million
bodies that will not have to be buried, there being so many hundred
millions, perhaps billions remaining to be buried. Who will miss them
among so many others missing and presumed dead? This is the war spoken of
in Ezekiel chapter 38 and 39 and Isaiah chapter 19. It is the first of
three "battles of Armageddon" described in the Bible. (The other two
being the "bookends" of the Millennial reign of King Jesus Christ.)

[ If you quarrel with my insistence on three battles of Armageddon, read
the passages yourself - and set aside, if you can - your Western
triumphalism - and you will see that these passages cannot possibly be of
the SAME event. True, the battles all occur in the same place - that's
why they are called "Battle of Armageddon;" they - each - take place in
the valley of Megiddo at the foot of Jerusalem. And they - each - consist
of numbers of people groups, the first two battles being led by forces
from the North, namely Russia. But there the similarities end. The start
of the war is different in each case; the opposing force in the first one
is a collection of other nations, but not in the other two; the course of
the battle is different; and the outcome is different. They are not the
same war. Read for yourself. It won't be an easy task, but the
differences will be much more obvious than the tortured similarities that
are so prevalent in most triumphalistic literature.

Jesus said that faith would be so rare as to be thought non-existent by
the time He comes to settle the (2nd) battle of Armageddon - at the start
of His Millennial reign. We have thought this to be impossible up 'til
now. We thought slavery was out of style - 'til now. We thought beheading
had gone out of style - up 'til now. 

Up 'til now.

Today, all the prophesies of the end times can be fulfilled and reported
as headlines of the world newspapers and people will take no more thought
than of a hurricane or earthquake. Islamic Jihad can - and in my opinion
- will - fulfill every one of the Bible prophesies and few will notice.

Few will notice anything out of the ordinary.

That, pilgrim, is God's style. God does not rub the noses of the
non-believers in His majestic presence. God reveals Himself only to His
own. To others He acts in full view and they do not understand what they
see.

Read and see.   -   Or  -  muddle on. It's your choice.

And - -

- - it ain't going to be fun.

Except - - except for the ones having the party in the presence of THE
BrideGroom, a party He has been preparing for some two thousand years!
*************
"Hey, man, why don't you rewrite this in a more orderly progression!"
'Cause I don't want to. The end times will be so chaotic they will defy
logic, they will defy sensibility. Besides, I do not want to set things
up for the pagans as clear as a cook book recipe. The last thing we need
is more half washed people who want not to come to the Holy God who loves
them, but who ONLY want to save their own bacon - they - can go to ----
where they belong. Sigh, indeed, we all "belong" in Hell but for the
sacrifice of Jesus, which sacrifice made it possible for a loving God to
allow us into His Holy presence and for Him to remain Just - and -
"Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as He is pure."
(1Jn3:3)
  
R.Jim Seibert 1392 E. Wash. Sequim WA 98382  fax/tel. (360) 681-7492
 - Everybody wants a religion that will allow him to call himself a child
of God, but without a truly changed heart  - and everybody wants to pray
to the Holy God without any preconditions whatsoever.