Prophecy
The New Nazis and a Lone Prophetic Voice
On September 29, 2014, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke before the the United Nations General Assembly. His remarks reminded me of Winston Churchill in 1939–a lone prophetic voice of moral clarity in a sea of drivel.
He warned that a new group of “Nazis” threaten the entire world. He deplored the UN’s duplicity of speaking against ISIS while supporting Hamas and caving in to nuclear-bound Iran. His words were sobering yet carried a ring of truth.
I wish he’d gone further. We need to dismantle the corrupt and inept United Nations and call for a new global alignment to take its place.
Let’s call it Free Nations--whose members must be committed to truth, justice, and liberty.
That, and the return of Jesus Christ, are our only hopes of winning World War III.
Listen to the prophet’s words.
This speech is worth reading in its entirety. I have edited it slightly, and have placed some captions and highlights to clarify his main points.
If the reality of Israeli nationhood, the inspiration of its leader, and the truths he shares don’t convince you of God’s reality, then nothing ever will.
May we hear the voice of the prophet and rise to defeat evil in our day.
Benjamin Netanyahu
Ladies and Gentleman,
The people of Israel pray for peace. But our hopes and the world’s hope for peace are in danger. Because everywhere we look, militant Islam is on the march.
Militant Islam
It’s not militants. It’s not Islam. It’s militant Islam. Typically, its first victims are other Muslims, but it spares no one. Christians, Jews, Yazidis, Kurds – no creed, no faith, no ethnic group is beyond its sights. And it’s rapidly spreading in every part of the world. You know the famous American saying: “All politics is local”? For the militant Islamists, “All politics is global.” Because their ultimate goal is to dominate the world.
Now, that threat might seem exaggerated to some, since it starts out small, like a cancer that attacks a particular part of the body. But left unchecked, the cancer grows, metastasizing over wider and wider areas. To protect the peace and security of the world, we must remove this cancer before it’s too late.
Last week, many of the countries represented here rightly applauded President Obama for leading the effort to confront ISIS. And yet weeks before, some of these same countries, the same countries that now support confronting ISIS, opposed Israel for confronting Hamas. They evidently don’t understand that ISIS and Hamas are branches of the same poisonous tree.
ISIS and Hamas share a fanatical creed, which they both seek to impose well beyond the territory under their control.
Listen to ISIS’s self-declared caliph, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi. This is what he said two months ago: “A day will soon come when the Muslim will walk everywhere as a master… The Muslims will cause the world to hear and understand the meaning of terrorism… and destroy the idol of democracy.” Now listen to Khaled Meshaal, the leader of Hamas. He proclaims a similar vision of the future: “We say this to the West… By Allah you will be defeated. Tomorrow our nation will sit on the throne of the world.”
As Hamas’s charter makes clear, Hamas’s immediate goal is to destroy Israel. But Hamas has a broader objective. They also want a caliphate. Hamas shares the global ambitions of its fellow militant Islamists. That’s why its supporters wildly cheered in the streets of Gaza as thousands of Americans were murdered on 9/11. And that’s why its leaders condemned the United States for killing Osama Bin Laden, whom they praised as a holy warrior.
ISIS and Hamas the Same
So when it comes to their ultimate goals, Hamas is ISIS and ISIS is Hamas.
And what they share in common, all militant Islamists share in common: • Boko Haram in Nigeria; • Ash-Shabab in Somalia; • Hezbollah in Lebanon; • An-Nusrah in Syria; • The Mahdi Army in Iraq; • And the Al-Qaeda branches in Yemen, Libya, the Philippines, India and elsewhere.
Some are radical Sunnis, some are radical Shi’ites. Some want to restore a pre-medieval caliphate from the 7th century. Others want to trigger the apocalyptic return of an imam from the 9th century. They operate in different lands, they target different victims and they even kill each other in their quest for supremacy. But they all share a fanatic ideology. They all seek to create ever expanding enclaves of militant Islam where there is no freedom and no tolerance – Where women are treated as chattel, Christians are decimated, and minorities are subjugated, sometimes given the stark choice: convert or die. For them, anyone can be an infidel, including fellow Muslims.
Militant Islam’s ambition to dominate the world seems mad. But so too did the global ambitions of another fanatic ideology that swept to power eight decades ago.
The New Nazis
The Nazis believed in a master race. The militant Islamists believe in a master faith. They just disagree about who among them will be the master… of the master faith. That’s what they truly disagree about. Therefore, the question before us is whether militant Islam will have the power to realize its unbridled ambitions.
There is one place where that could soon happen: The Islamic State of Iran. For 35 years, Iran has relentlessly pursued the global mission which was set forth by its founding ruler, Ayatollah Khomeini, in these words: “We will export our revolution to the entire world.”
Listen to its current commander, General Muhammad Ali Ja’afari. And he clearly stated this goal. He said: “Our Imam did not limit the Islamic Revolution to this country… Our duty is to prepare the way for an Islamic world government…” Iran’s President Rouhani stood here last week, and shed crocodile tears over what he called “the globalization of terrorism.”
Maybe he should spare us those phony tears and have a word instead with the commanders of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. He could ask them to call off Iran’s global terror campaign, which has included attacks in two dozen countries on five continents since 2011 alone. To say that Iran doesn’t practice terrorism is like saying Derek Jeter never played shortstop for the New York Yankees.
This bemoaning of the Iranian president of the spread of terrorism has got to be one of history’s greatest displays of double-talk.
Now, Some still argue that Iran’s global terror campaign, its subversion of countries throughout the Middle East and well beyond the Middle East, some argue that this is the work of the extremists. They say things are changing. They point to last year’s elections in Iran. They claim that Iran’s smooth talking President and Foreign Minister, they’ve changed not only the tone of Iran’s foreign policy but also its substance. They believe Rouhani and Zarif genuinely want to reconcile with the West, that they’ve abandoned the global mission of the Islamic Revolution.
Really? So let’s look at what Foreign Minister Zarif wrote in his book just a few years ago: “We have a fundamental problem with the West, and especially with America. This is because we are heirs to a global mission, which is tied to our raison d’etre… A global mission which is tied to our very reason of being.”
Nuclear Iran
So don’t be fooled by Iran’s manipulative charm offensive. It’s designed for one purpose, and for one purpose only: To lift the sanctions and remove the obstacles to Iran’s path to the bomb. The Islamic Republic is now trying to bamboozle its way to an agreement that will remove the sanctions it still faces, and leave it with the capacity of thousands of centrifuges to enrich uranium. This would effectively cement Iran’s place as a threshold military nuclear power. In the future, at a time of its choosing, Iran, the world’s most dangerous state in the world’s most dangerous region, would obtain the world’s most dangerous weapons.
Allowing that to happen would pose the gravest threat to us all. It’s one thing to confront militant Islamists on pick-up trucks, armed with Kalashnikov rifles. It’s another thing to confront militant Islamists armed with weapons of mass destruction. Imagine how much more dangerous the Islamic State, ISIS, would be if it possessed chemical weapons. Now imagine how much more dangerous the Islamic state of Iran would be if it possessed nuclear weapons. Would you let ISIS enrich uranium? Would you let ISIS build a heavy water reactor? Would you let ISIS develop intercontinental ballistic missiles? Of course you wouldn’t.
Then you mustn’t let the Islamic State of Iran do those things either.
Because here’s what will happen: Once Iran produces atomic bombs, all the charm and all the smiles will suddenly disappear. They’ll just vanish. It’s then that the ayatollahs will show their true face and unleash their aggressive fanaticism on the entire world. There is only one responsible course of action to address this threat: Iran’s nuclear military capabilities must be fully dismantled. Make no mistake – ISIS must be defeated. But to defeat ISIS and leave Iran as a threshold nuclear power is to win the battle and lose the war.
To defeat ISIS and leave Iran as a threshold nuclear power is to win the battle and lose the war.
The fight against militant Islam is indivisible. When militant Islam succeeds anywhere, it’s emboldened everywhere. When it suffers a blow in one place, it’s set back in every place. That’s why Israel’s fight against Hamas is not just our fight. It’s your fight. Israel is fighting a fanaticism today that your countries may be forced to fight tomorrow.
The Truth About the Recent Israeli-Palestinian War
For 50 days this past summer, Hamas fired thousands of rockets at Israel, many of them supplied by Iran. I want you to think about what your countries would do if thousands of rockets were fired at your cities. Imagine millions of your citizens having seconds at most to scramble to bomb shelters, day after day. You wouldn’t let terrorists fire rockets at your cities with impunity.
Nor would you let terrorists dig dozens of terror tunnels under your borders to infiltrate your towns in order to murder and kidnap your citizens. Israel justly defended itself against both rocket attacks and terror tunnels. Yet Israel also faced another challenge. We faced a propaganda war. Because, in an attempt to win the world’s sympathy, Hamas cynically used Palestinian civilians as human shields. It used schools, not just schools – UN schools, private homes, mosques, even hospitals to store and fire rockets at Israel.
As Israel surgically struck at the rocket launchers and at the tunnels, Palestinian civilians were tragically but unintentionally killed. There are heartrending images that resulted, and these fueled libelous charges that Israel was deliberately targeting civilians.
We were not. We deeply regret every single civilian casualty. And the truth is this: Israel was doing everything to minimize Palestinian civilian casualties. Hamas was doing everything to maximize Israeli civilian casualties and Palestinian civilian casualties. Israel dropped flyers, made phone calls, sent text messages, broadcast warnings in Arabic on Palestinian television, always to enable Palestinian civilians to evacuate targeted areas.
No other country and no other army in history have gone to greater lengths to avoid casualties among the civilian population of their enemies. This concern for Palestinian life was all the more remarkable, given that Israeli civilians were being bombarded by rockets day after day, night after night. As their families were being rocketed by Hamas, Israel’s citizen army – the brave soldiers of the IDF, our young boys and girls – they upheld the highest moral values of any army in the world. Israel’s soldiers deserve not condemnation, but admiration. Admiration from decent people everywhere.
Now here’s what Hamas did: Hamas embedded its missile batteries in residential areas and told Palestinians to ignore Israel’s warnings to leave. And just in case people didn’t get the message, they executed Palestinian civilians in Gaza who dared to protest.
No less reprehensible, Hamas deliberately placed its rockets where Palestinian children live and play.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is a war crime. As Israeli children huddled in bomb shelters and Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system knocked Hamas rockets out of the sky, the profound moral difference between Israel and Hamas couldn’t have been clearer: Israel was using its missiles to protect its children. Hamas was using its children to protect its missiles.
By investigating Israel rather than Hamas for war crimes, the UN Human Rights Council has betrayed its noble mission to protect the innocent. In fact, what it’s doing is to turn the laws of war upside-down. Israel, which took unprecedented steps to minimize civilian casualties, Israel is condemned. Hamas, which both targeted and hid behind civilians – that a double war crime – Hamas is given a pass.
The Human Rights Council is thus sending a clear message to terrorists everywhere: Use civilians as human shields. Use them again and again and again. You know why? Because sadly, it works.
By granting international legitimacy to the use of human shields, the UN’s Human Rights Council has thus become a Terrorist Rights Council, and it will have repercussions. It probably already has, about the use of civilians as human shields.
It’s not just our interest. It’s not just our values that are under attack. It’s your interests and your values.
The New Tyrannies
We live in a world steeped in tyranny and terror, where gays are hanged from cranes in Tehran, political prisoners are executed in Gaza, young girls are abducted en masse in Nigeria and hundreds of thousands are butchered in Syria, Libya and Iraq. Yet nearly half, nearly half of the UN Human Rights Council’s resolutions focusing on a single country have been directed against Israel, the one true democracy in the Middle East – Israel. where issues are openly debated in a boisterous parliament, where human rights are protected by independent courts and where women, gays and minorities live in a genuinely free society.
The Human Rights… (that’s an oxymoron, the UN Human Rights Council, but I’ll use it just the same), the Council’s biased treatment of Israel is only one manifestation of the return of the world’s oldest prejudices. We hear mobs today in Europe call for the gassing of Jews. We hear some national leaders compare Israel to the Nazis. This is not a function of Israel’s policies. It’s a function of diseased minds. And that disease has a name. It’s called anti-Semitism.
It is now spreading in polite society, where it masquerades as legitimate criticism of Israel. For centuries the Jewish people have been demonized with blood libels and charges of deicide. Today, the Jewish state is demonized with the apartheid libel and charges of genocide. Genocide? In what moral universe does genocide include warning the enemy’s civilian population to get out of harm’s way? Or ensuring that they receive tons, tons of humanitarian aid each day, even as thousands of rockets are being fired at us?
In the past, outrageous lies against the Jews were the precursors to the wholesale slaughter of our people.
But no more.
Today we, the Jewish people, have the power to defend ourselves. We will defend ourselves against our enemies on the battlefield. We will expose their lies against us in the court of public opinion. Israel will continue to stand proud and unbowed.
Despite the enormous challenges facing Israel, I believe we have an historic opportunity.
An Opportunity to Unite Against Evil
After decades of seeing Israel as their enemy, leading states in the Arab world increasingly recognize that together we and they face many of the same dangers: principally this means a nuclear-armed Iran and militant Islamist movements gaining ground in the Sunni world.
Our challenge is to transform these common interests to create a productive partnership. One that would build a more secure, peaceful and prosperous Middle East.
Together we can strengthen regional security. We can advance projects in water, agriculture, in transportation, in health, in energy, in so many fields.
I believe the partnership between us can also help facilitate peace between Israel and the Palestinians. Many have long assumed that an Israeli-Palestinian peace can help facilitate a broader rapprochement between Israel and the Arab World. But these days I think it may work the other way around: Namely that a broader rapprochement between Israel and the Arab world may help facilitate an Israeli-Palestinian peace.
And therefore, to achieve that peace, we must look not only to Jerusalem and Ramallah, but also to Cairo, to Amman, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh and elsewhere. I believe peace can be realized with the active involvement of Arab countries, those that are willing to provide political, material and other indispensable support. I’m ready to make a historic compromise, not because Israel is occupying a foreign land. The people of Israel are not occupiers in the Land of Israel. History, archeology and common sense all make clear that we have had a singular attachment to this land for over 3,000 years.
The Middle East is in chaos. States are disintegrating. Militant Islamists are filling the void.
Israel cannot have territories from which it withdraws taken over by Islamic militants yet again, as happened in Gaza and Lebanon. That would place the likes of ISIS within mortar range – a few miles – of 80% of our population.
Land for Peace, or Suicide?
Think about that. The distance between the 1967 lines and the suburbs of Tel Aviv is like the distance between the UN building here and Times Square. Israel’s a tiny country. That’s why in any peace agreement, which will obviously necessitate a territorial compromise, I will always insist that Israel be able to defend itself by itself against any threat. Yet despite all that has happened, some still don’t take Israel’s security concerns seriously. But I do, and I always will. Because, as Prime Minister of Israel, I am entrusted with the awesome responsibility of ensuring the future of the Jewish people and the future of the Jewish state.
And no matter what pressure is brought to bear, I will never waver in fulfilling that responsibility.
I believe that with a fresh approach from our neighbors, we can advance peace despite the difficulties we face.
In Israel, we have a record of making the impossible possible. We’ve made a desolate land flourish. And with very few natural resources, we have used the fertile minds of our people to turn Israel into a global center of technology and innovation.
Peace, of course, would enable Israel to realize its full potential and to bring a promising future not only for our people, not only for the Palestinian people, but for many, many others in our region.
But the old template for peace must be updated. It must take into account new realities and new roles and responsibilities for our Arab neighbors. There is a new Middle East. It presents new dangers, but also new opportunities. Israel is prepared to work with Arab partners and the international community to confront those dangers and to seize those opportunities. Together we must recognize the global threat of militant Islam, the primacy of dismantling Iran’s nuclear weapons capability and the indispensable role of Arab states in advancing peace with the Palestinians.
All this may fly in the face of conventional wisdom, but it’s the truth. And the truth must always be spoken, especially here, in the United Nations.
The Biblical Prophetic Word
Isaiah, our great prophet of peace, taught us nearly 3,000 years ago in Jerusalem to speak truth to power.
“For the sake of Zion, I will not be silent. For the sake of Jerusalem, I will not be still. Until her justice shines bright, And her salvation glows like a flaming torch.”
Let’s light a torch of truth and justice to safeguard our common future.”
Answering Bill O’Reilly’s Question about Israel
Have you ever watched a television broadcast–maybe a newscast or even a game show–where a question was posed, and when no one seemed to know the correct answer, you leapt to your feet and shouted it out toward the screen?
The other night Shirley and I were watching the O’Reilly Factor which is the number one cable news program in America. Bill O’Reilly strikes some people as arrogant, and interrupts guests when they dodge his questions in the “No Spin Zone,” but he’s the clearest thinking television journalist in America and that’s why his program is number one.
For fourteen years running.
This week he asked a guest a question about Israel. Bill didn’t know the answer and neither did his guest. The question was: “Why is the tiny nation of Israel hated by so many people and nations?
Do you know why?
To be honest, I was surprised by Mr. O’Reilly’s question and his honesty about it. He asked his guest point blank at least two or three times why anti-Semitism was so prevalent in the world. He noted that Israel was a very small nation–and there are many small nations in the world.
So why the hatred toward puny Israel?
He mentioned that Israel was not a country for thousands of years, and then was reborn in 1948 after World War II. O’Reilly seemed sincerely confused as to why Hitler would kill millions of Jews (of all people), and why, at this present time, anti-Jewish protests were taking place in Europe and other parts of the world.
After all, he opined, we don’t hear of the terrorists vowing to wipe Lichtenstein, or Monaco, or the Gambia off the map.
Why tiny, peaceful and democratic Israel?
Bill O’Reilly also lamented the biased reporting on the present Middle East war. Most of the mainstream media is anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian–despite the fact that Hamas started this war, they lie about everything (including their casualties and using children as human shields), and used much of their United Nations aid to build terrorist tunnels to kidnap and kill Jews instead of providing schools and hospitals for the people.
Bill O’Reilly, the most watched journalist on television, had no idea why the nation of Israel has always been and currently is being hated, slandered, and singled out among the two hundred nations of the world.
So I stood up and shouted out at the television the answer:
“It’s all about God’s plan of salvation.”
Apparently Mr. O’Reilly’s education failed to teach two very important worldview truths without which the history of earth makes little sense.
First, the reason for evil in the world is because a Devil exists, there are demons that tempt and deceive human beings, and all hatred, animosity, violence and non-defensive wars can be traced to the influences of the kingdom of darkness.
The main purpose of this dark kingdom is to kill, ruin, and destroy human beings so that they cannot be reconciled to God (John 10:10).
The second worldview truth is the most important one. There is a loving God who is actively involved in trying to reconcile all people into a right relationship with Him. His plan of salvation has been progressively unveiled through Abraham, the Jewish nation, the coming of the Messiah, Jesus (a Jew), and now through his people, the Church.
Israel is His chosen Old Testament people. He gave them his laws, a land on the Mediterranean Sea, and brought the Savior of the world through them.
Followers of Jesus, both Gentiles and Jews, are now the New Testament “Israel” of God (Galatians 6:16). They have been given a “Great Commission” to take God’s message of salvation to every person on earth (Matthew 28:18-20).
So Israel, both old and new, is at the center of God’s salvation plans. The destruction of the Jews and persecution of Christians is at the heart of the satanic strategy to stop it.
Gary Randall points a few important facts about Israel and its Messiah, Jesus.
1. In Genesis 12:2-3 God says to Abraham, “I will make you a great nation, I will bless you and make your name great, And you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, And I will curse those who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
2. Paul wrote in Romans 15: 27 “…For if the Gentiles have been partakers of their ( Jews) spiritual things, their duty is also to minister to them in material things.” The Jewish people gave birth to the Christian faith and have given us the sacred Scripture, the Prophets, the Patriarchs, Mary Joseph and the baby who was God in the flesh, the 12 disciples and the Apostles. It is inconceivable to claim to be Christian and anti-Israel.
3. Some of the religious left attempt to separate Jesus of Nazareth from the Jews of the world. Jesus never denied His Jewishness. He was born Jew and circumcised a Jew on the 8th day according to the Jewish tradition.
4. Psalms 122:6 “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem, they shall prosper that love you.”
5. Jesus went to the house of Cornelius ( Acts 10) and healed his servant. Luke 7:5 tells you why. “For he loves our nation, and has built us a synagogue.”
6. Acts 10:4 further illuminates this principle in relation to Cornelius-“Your prayers and your alms have come up for a memorial before God.” To whom were his “prayers and alms ” directed? The Jews.
7. All other nations were created by an act of men, Israel was created by an act of God. Genesis 12:1-3, 13: 14-18, 15: 1-, 17:4-8, 22: 15-18, 26: 1-5. Psalms 89: 28-37.
Isaiah 40:10 is a promise to Israel and to all who serve God;” Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.”
Verses 11 and 12 promise the Lord’s faithfulness saying those who “strive” against you shall “perish” and those who “war against you” shall be as nothing—nonexistent.”
Let’s add to these promises that in the last days of history there will be a great turning of the currently secular nation of Israel back to the God of their fathers (Romans 11:26).
They will accept their true Messiah–Yeshua (Jesus).
So, to sum up, the world’s hatred for and attention on the tiny nation of Israel is due to the special calling of Israel by God and their place in world history. It’s not because they’re worse than anyone else, or wealthier than everybody (though the blessing of God has brought great prosperity to many Jewish families).
It’s all about salvation.
The tiny nation of Israel is front and center in the news, hated by the terrorists, and protested all over the world because they are a sign of God’s coming salvation. The Devil wants to stop it–using his demons to stir up people to try and destroy the Jews (and also the Church).
That’s not so difficult to understand, especially when you understand the biblical worldview.
The evil plan will fail because God is directing history.
And Bill–that’s truly no spin.
Do You Want Electronic Life or Eternal Life?
I have a new cell phone–an Android Galaxy Note 3 which is an amazing machine. I’m about to upgrade my laptop to a Hewlett Packard Spectre that can do one thousand times what my original computer did for one third of the price.
I’m going to send this blog all over the world via the Internet which didn’t exist when I was in high school. It only takes a few keystrokes and VOILA! My writings circle the globe in less than ten seconds.
These new contraptions are incredible tools, but as Bill O’Reilly has pointed out recently, they can be extremely addicting, distracting, and destructive to our spiritual health.
We may want to ask ourselves the question: Do I want electronic life or eternal life? (Or both.)
Even the secular media is getting the idea that people are getting addicted to the machines, especially impacting kids and parents. Here’s an April 22, 2014 article by Kate Raddatz of CBS Minneapolis:
“It’s not just our kids getting too much screen time these days. Parents are also guilty of spending too much time on their electronic devices.”
“Researchers at the Boston Medical Center observed 55 different groups of parents and young children eating at fast food restaurants. The study found the majority pulled out their mobile devices right away, and, in turn, their kids tended to act up more.”
“’It’s just normal childhood behavior,’ said parenting coach Toni Schutta. ‘If I can’t get your attention in a positive way, I’m going seek it in a negative way.’”
“Suzanne Ferguson, of Minneapolis, said she and her husband used to be smartphone addicts, checking their emails around their kids.”
“‘We were the couple that would go out to eat at dinner and both be on our own phones before we had kids,’ she said. ‘We’re very much attached to our phones.’”
“Schutta says parents spend, on average, 11 hours a day using electronic devices. All that time takes away from face to face communication which helps kids learn behavior.”
“’Kids in preschool and kindergarten are no longer as able to read social cues from other human beings,’ Schutta said. ‘That’s in part because of their own media use and it’s in part because of their parents’ media use, they’re just not getting that training.’”
“Too much time on technology can also leave an emotional impact on your child, if you’re missing life moments for email.”
“’We get such a limited amount of time with our kids in the day, we need meaningful conversations,’ Schutta said.” Ferguson said once her daughter starting talking, it was the kick she needed to kick her phone habit.”
“’Dinner is a good time to have family time, so trying to keep the phone as much as possible away,’ she said.”
Of course, the machine craze goes way beyond family life. Driving while texting is probably the biggest new problem on the freeways, and electronic addiction to endless video games (let alone pornography) are driving down our productivity.
Interestingly, the Bible said this explosion of knowledge (via the machines) would come one day.
Daniel 12:4 sounds like 2014: “Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.” Doesn’t that remind you of our fast-paced society and the reams of information we must now process each day?
Yes, we are living in a day of abundant travel (running to and fro) and increased knowledge (the Information Age). But have we stopped to ponder what it might do to ourselves, our families, and our souls? What is the godly response to the dawn of an age aggressively molded by information and technology?
First of all, let’s look at the positive. The Bible says that “knowledge is power” (Proverbs 24:5). Thus the use of fiber optics, high speed airplanes, the Internet. etc. can all be used to empower the Christ’s Good News to spread throughout the earth. This is certainly God intention: To use this age to increase the knowledge of His Son in all the nations of the world.
And it is happening. I can e-mail or SKYPE missionary friends all over the world and plan evangelistic initiatives in a matter of minutes. That used to take two weeks of postal delivery–or three-to twelve months to deliver by boat–or it wasn’t possible at all.
Technology has changed all that.
What about travel? In the 1990s alone, Our King’s Kids missionaries flew over six million miles and preached Jesus to hundreds of thousands of people. Why? Technology.
When you look at the great missions advance of the past fifty years (hundreds of millions of people coming to Christ on every continent of the world), there is no question in anyone’s mind that technological advances have played a great part in the harvest.
And the best and greatest still lies ahead. I chronicle that in my book The Fourth Wave.
But there is a negative side also. Much of today’s media is in the hands of ungodly people or institutions that are discipling the planet with it, and only a small perecentage is being consciously used to advance God’s kingdom.
A recent article almost glowingly looks at the most unifying part of that techno advance–The Internet–with these sobering words:
“We’re at the beginning of a new way of working, shopping, playing and communicating. We’re calling this phenomenon e-life, and it’s just in time. Because the day is approaching when no one will describe the digital, Net-based, computer-connected gestalt with such a transitory term. We’ll just call it life.”
E-life. Interesting term. Of course they mean electronic life, but there’s another phrase that comes to my mind: eternal life. In the article’s paradigm, electronic life is the very future itself–life. Are we preparing the world to accept the Information Age as the true heaven–a worldly substitute for relationship with God (which Jesus said was eternal life)?
I fear so, and I don’t want a part of it. This planet, wired to the hilt without God, is already hell. Can you imagine what the evil use of technology could create on earth in the coming decades?
Technology is only a tool, but used improperly it can easily become a master (think atomic bombs). Or an idol. Or a substitute for God. I believe that one of Satan’s quiet strategies is to lull us into believing that technology can be a meaningful God replacement.
Ponder this E-life substitute for friendship with the Living God:
1. Movies can be a substitute for God’s omnipotence. Instead of marveling at God’s REAL voice speaking from heaven during Moses’ time, you go into a movie theater and see actors whose heads are fifteen feet high, whose voices boom in Dolby stereo, and appear to have the power to do anything (the story line allows).
2. Television and radio can be a substitute for God’s omnipresence. They’re everywhere–always babbling away. They’re on in many homes 18-24 hours a day. Every airport you travel trough has TV monitors at each gate and in most restaurants. When you need comfort, companionship, or stimulation, or just to pass the time–where do you turn? The TV knob. It even makes a great babysitter for the kids.
3. The Internet can be a substitute for God’s omniscience. It’s the place to go for all knowledge. Right now there are over 2 billion world-wide users. There are hundred of thousands of pornographic sites and they get more hits than Netflix–corrupting the human heart at the click of a button. 160 million Americans use e-mail. On our favorite machines–the cell phone–you can chat, buy food, pay bills, watch movies, or whatever you like, and spend hours a day looking at an impersonal screen. Hours of prayer have given way to hours of texting and surfing.
A wired, fast-as-a-bullet world has captured our hearts, time, attention, family life, and pocket books (ever count up the money you spent on technology in the past few years?). In some ways, it is becoming our god (what you give your time and supreme attention to).
While using technology for the noble purposes of advancing God’s Kingdom, how can we keep ourselves unstained by the god-substituting lust of the e-world? Which do you enjoy more: The wonders of e-life, or the hope of eternal life? Or can you have both?
Here are my encouragements during this Daniel 12:4 time period:
- Use all machines to learn, grow, and love those God has put in your life.
- Spend more time in prayer, Bible-reading, book reading, and worship than you do fingering keyboards and touchscreens.
- Keep the machines out of sight when you’re with family and friends–especially during meals.
- Never use the machines for evil. Stay away from all the bad stuff.
- Use your electronic life to advance God’s kingdom and fulfill the Great Commission.
- Shut off the machines more and listen to God. Take walks. Meditate in the silence. Long for His voice more than the chatter of a multitude of human voices.
And more than anything, never enjoy your e-life more than you long for eternal life.
You can have both–but one is a grain of sand and the other is an unending ocean of relational delights.