The social aspect of Obama’s wrecking crew is what worries me the most. By the time Obama is done, homosexuals will be the accepted ones and Christians will be persecuted. To oppose them in any way will be hate speech whereas their death threats and actual violence will be excused. I am also thinking Obama is likely to stand quietly by while Iran and the Arabs attack Israel. Israel will be severely injured, but her enemies will be destroyed. I wonder what will happen in this country when Obama stands idly by and lets Israel take it on the chin from the bullies that surround her. Israel will be abandoned by men, but not by God. Here is the scenario.
[Israel’s enemies want to destroy her]
Psalms 83:2 For, lo, thine enemies make a tumult: and they that hate thee have lifted up the head.
3 They have taken crafty counsel against thy people, and consulted against thy hidden ones.
4 They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.
[God is petitioned to personally intervene for Israel]
Psalms 83:11 Make their nobles like Oreb and Zeeb And all their princes like Zebah and Zalmunna,
12 Who said, “Let us possess for ourselves The pastures of God.”
13 ¶O my God, make them like the whirling dust, Like chaff before the wind.
14 Like fire that burns the forest And like a flame that sets the mountains on fire,
15 So pursue them with Your tempest And terrify them with Your storm.
16 Fill their faces with dishonor, That they may seek Your name, O LORD.
17 Let them be ashamed and dismayed forever, And let them be humiliated and perish,
[Here is the prediction of what will happen to these invaders. Notice the specific predition that these invaders will be confounded even as the prayer requested in Ps 83:13, i.e. they will be chased like chaff and the whirling dust]
Isa 17:11 13 The nations rumble on like the rumbling of many waters, But He will rebuke them and they will flee far away, And be chased like chaff in the mountains before the wind, Or like whirling dust before a gale.
14 At evening time, behold, there is terror! Before morning they are no more. Such will be the portion of those who plunder us And the lot of those who pillage us.
A very intersting point to me is the prophecy that when Israel is surrounded by enemies and without a helper and these enemies attack to take away God’s people (Ps 83:4), God will fight for them (Ps 83:15, Isa 17:11-13). The Psalmist asks (obviously with God’s permission to put the request into the psalm) for God to pursue the enemies with His storm and His tempest. It sounds to me like that though Israel will be forsaken by men that God will intervene with some visible stormy manifestation, even as He did in the days of Joshua (Josh 10:11). When this thing with the Day of Jacob’s trouble is over, God will have unmistakeably shown Himself to be the Savior of Israel. Israel will be severely injured (Isa 17:6-9), but her enemies will be destroyed (Jer 30:8), and she will live in peace until the time of the end (Jer 30:10, Rev 11:3-7, Ez 38:8, 11-12, 14).
I know a lot of people believe that Ezek 38 will come into play shortly after the time of Jacob’s trouble. I do not believe that is the case, however. I believe Ezek 38 to be the Battle of Armageddon at the end of the world. To determine the context of Ezek 38, we need to look at the complete account of the Gog/Magog invasion, and that account covers all of Ezek 38-39. There are several things that make this lengthy passage highly unlikely to be describing a scene before the end of the world.
Consider Ezekiel’s description of the invasion as being one of men mounted on horses (Ez 38:15). That does not correspond to a modern invasion by Russia with tanks and planes.
Ezekiel also promises that Israel will know that the Lord is their God from that day forward (Ezek 39:22). Whenever the Gog/Magog event takes place, Israel will uniformly thereafter serve God, but such a thing would not happen before the establishment of universal righteousness upon the earth, and that does not happen until the end of the world (Isa 11:1-9, Hab 2:14).
Another verse that shows the end times context is Ezek 39:25. God will restore the fortunes of Jacob and have mercy on the whole house of Israel (Ezek 39:25). At this point in our modern time, only some from Judah and Manasseh have returned to Israel, but the text promises that when God destroys Gog, He will gather Israel from all the nations. He will not leave ANY of them in these lands any more (Ez 39:28). There are currently Jews living all over the world, and probably will be until the end of the age. Having remnants of Israel scattered all over the world does not fit Ezekiel’s prophecy. The Bible describes the reunion of the 12 tribes in Hosea 1:11. Hosea recounts a reunion of Judah and the children of Israel at a time when they appoint a common leader. After this historic reunion of the 12 tribes and the selection of a common leader, instead of uniting to build up Israel and living happily ever after in the land, they incredibly immediately leave the land! The most plausible explanation for this incredible action is that the Antichrist is invading and these reunited tribes retreat to Bozrah where scripture foresees the beginning of their eternal victory at Jesus’ return (Micah 2:12-13, Zech 12:7, Isa 34:6, 63:1, Jer 49:22).
I want to notice several characteristics of Ez 38-39 and compare them to passages in Revelation to show that the context of Ez 38 is the end of the world. The comparable passages in Revelation are clearly linked to the very end of the world, because Jesus comes, defeats His enemies and casts them into Gehenna hell (the lake of fire–Rev 19:20, 20:10). Since Ez 38 and the Rev passages are parallel, then Ez 38 is also the end of the world.
To understand my arguments regarding the Battle of Armageddon passages in Rev (Rev 16:13-16, Rev 19:17-21 and 20:8-9), I need to explain my analysis of Rev 8-22. My view of Rev 8-22 is that this large section of Revelation deals with Christ’s power over the course of history that He obtained when He opened the 7th seal (Rev 8:1). These chapters 8-22 are a prophetic description of God’s plan between Pentecost and the Second Coming for the three major groups of people on earth: Israel, the nations/Gentiles, and Christians. The prophetic plan for the course of the history of Israel is in Rev 8-14. The prophetic plan for the history of the nations is in Rev 15-19, and the prophetic plan for Christians is in Rev 20-22. Each of these major sections has a coming of Christ to the Battle of Armageddon. Hence you have several accounts of the Battle of Armageddon (Rev 16:13-16, Rev 19:17-21 and 20:8-9) and the events in preparation for it (e.g. Rev 9:13-19, 11:7-13).
Now lets look at the Gog/Magog invasion in Ezek 38 and compare the characteristics of the Ezekiel invasion with the Battle of Armageddon that happens at the coming of the Lord. We notice that Ezekiel’s invasion happens in the last days (Ez 38:16). It comes from the north (Ez 38:15). There will be so many of the invaders they will be like a cloud covering the earth (Ez 38:9). During their invasion there will a severe world-wide earthquake (Ez 38:19-20). God comes and fights for His people (Ez 38:18-19, 21-22). The invaders will fall and God will call the animals and birds to eat them (Ez 39:17-18). God will set His glory among the nations and ALL the nations will see the judgment that God has executed (Ez 39:21). God’s servants will thereafter always know that the Lord is God (Ez 39:22). These descriptions of Gog’s invasion include the same details as found in Revelation regarding the invasion of the Antichrist/Beast/Man-of-Sin. There are parallel accounts of this last invasion in Rev 16:13-16, Rev 19:17-21 and 20:8-9. The Gog/Magog invasion happens right at the end of the world (the Beast captures Jersusalem in Rev 11:9-12, but it is just before and at the Second Coming and the resurrection of the dead). In these accounts we find that the invaders first gather at Armageddon (Rev 16:16) in the north of Israel and ride from there south to Jerusalem (Rev 11:7-8, Joel 2:9, Zech 14:2). The heavens and earth will quake before them (Rev 16:18, Joel 2:10). Christ and His armies return and fight for their people (Rev 19:13-14). Jesus and His armies kill the hordes of the Devil and the birds eat the slain (Rev 19:21). After God’s victory at the last battle (Rev 20:8-9), He brings New Jerusalem down from heaven and sets His glory in the midst of the nations (Rev 21:10-11). Thereafter the servants of God will KNOW that the Lord is God, because they can see His house and see His face (Rev 22:4). The descriptions of the last battle as described in Revelation match the characteristics of Ez 38-39, but the events in Revelation are obviously the end of the world (Rev 19:20-21, 20:8-10) because of the resurrection and final judgment.
The day of Jacob’s trouble is a highly significant event in God’s plan. The plight of Israel being surrounded by the nations and having no one to help but God is a type of the end of the world when the remnant of the forces of righteousness will be shut up at Bozrah (Micah 2:12) where they will be surrounded by the forces of the Devil. God will fight for Israel on the day of Jacob’s trouble, and His deliverance will be spectacular. It will be clear to all that it was God that delivered Israel from their trouble. No man was able to help them, but God will gloriously deliver them. God’s deliverance on the day of Jacob’s trouble will be a type of the end of the world as when Jesus comes to deliver His people from the army of the Devil (Rev 19:19-20, 20:8-10, Jer 48:40, 49:22). After the day of Jacob’s trouble, Israel lives in peace and prosperity until the very end of the world (Ezek 38:11-12). That is a type of the peace and prosperity that God will bring to His people forever when He sets up the new heavens and the new earth (Mi 4:4-5, Isa 65:17-19, II Pet 3:13).
The Bible has quite a bit to say about the day of Jacob’s trouble, but I don’t know what happens to the USA under Obama. If you believe George Washington’s prophecy (http://www.civil-liberties.com/pages/prophesy.html), there will be a remnant of us left when Jesus comes. If you believe the USA is the 7th head of the beast (Rev 13:1), then we recognize that the 7 headed nation beast is under the control of the Devil (Rev 13:2). That would mean the USA goes over to the dark side. That’s the way it looks to me at the moment, which is bad news for Christians. The power to tax is the power to destroy.
