It probably shouldn’t surprise us, but end times events are happening on an increasingly rapid pace. It seems that daily we read about an earthquake, or another assault on Israel, or a slur on religious people and institutions, or economic problems that must inevitably lead to a global crisis. Google “earthquake” and look at how dramatically the number of earthquakes has increased since the early 1980s. We are told in scripture that earthquakes will be like “birth pangs”.
It also seems that the White House, now that the distraction of the “health care law” is over, comes up with new policy surprises almost every day. Examples: a.) dismissively walking out of a meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu violating protocol and good manners (thereby conveying a clear message of anti-Israeli US sentiment); b.) announcing that America’s enemies who kill us with chemicals or biological agents (but who are “in compliance” with Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaties) are assured that the US will not use its nuclear weapons in response; c.) opining as part of signing an essentially meaningless arms control agreement with Russia that the former US nuclear umbrella over Europe wouldn’t apply today because if Russia invaded Europe today (though it was said this would be unlikely) US nukes would today not be used – thus amounting to handing Russia an invitation to invade if it so chooses.
Not content with offending Israel by snubbing its elected leader, an Obama Administration insider on Sunday in the Washington Post sent an unmistakable message of warning. What was the warning? Give up the eastern part of the West Bank and Jerusalem, otherwise the President will fly to Israel and force Israel to do so. The warning was contained in an article co-written by Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser to President Jimmy Carter, and undoubtedly advising the White House on Middle Eastern affairs. Brzezinski called on President Obama to fly to Israel, along with leaders from Russia, the European Union and the UN, and demand that the Israeli Knesset “share” Jerusalem by giving East Jerusalem up to Muslim rule. He suggested a speech by the President in Jerusalem’s Old City “addressed to all the people in the region and evocative of his Cairo speech to the Muslim world in June, 2009”. What if Israel says no, even under all that pressure? Brzezinski suggests that the President go the United Nations and generate “worldwide pressure”. Nice way to treat an ally nation.
In the midst of all of this, the US is essentially giving Iran a free pass to continue to develop its store of nuclear materials and ultimately nuclear weapons. By January of this year, Iran was to have decided during its one year warning period to eschew nuclear weapons. Didn’t happen. And the US, Russia and China are doing nothing, literally nothing, to curtail Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Joel’s and Ezekiel’s descriptions of a land invasion of Israel (after it “dwells safely” as a result of a signed peace agreement) mean that Iran is not likely to use its (newly acquired) nuclear weapons on the land that it wants to conquer, but Jeremiah 51:28 tells us that part of the destructive force when the Daughter of Babylon/America attacks will come from the Kings of the Medes, which is a description of today’s Iran. We turn our backs on Iran’s manufacture of nukes at our own peril. Senator Lieberman described this as “The turning point in history…I worry more that we’re not going to do enough to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon quickly enough.”
Israel – and the United States – are truly standing at a turning point in history. What they do, through their elected leaders, in the next few months, will determine how the people of the world live in the years ahead. Prayer is still the best way to influence our times, and the timing of those times.