July 6, 2012
“Now
when these things begin to happen, LOOK UP and LIFT UP your heads,
because YOUR
REDEMPTION draws near.”
Luke
2128.
Dear Brethren,
After the devastation of
the hurricanes and resulting devastation with
massive flooding created by Katrina and Rita, I wrote an article to be
placed
in the Journal, the News Paper in Big Sandy, Texas.
In this writing, I intend to use parts of that
same writing while adding
important news articles that sheds light on the understanding of
end-time Bible
prophecies that make known we have already entered into their beginning
fulfillment.
Though we have witnessed disasters in past
years they have been much farther apart and in most cases isolated in
different
places. Now we are seeing these disasters coming much closer together
and not
so isolated any longer.
Looking back and considering what we are now
learning from the News Media
of the recent and current disasters, we have a much better and clearer
picture
in mind of how they are all related to each other while showing the
closeness
of the coming doom of the House of Joseph and the return of Jesus Christ back
to this earth.
We are presently standing on the threshold of
seeing the fury of nature
with such unprecedented force of terrible devastation and enormous loss
of life
that has never before been witnessed (Matthew
24:21)!
For over 50-plus years,
God’s watchman, Mr.
Herbert W. Armstrong, lifted up his voice and cried out the warning of
this
terrible time from the writings of an ancient prophet of God:
“Doom
has
come to you, you who dwell in the land; the time has come, a day of
trouble is
near . . . My eye will not spare, nor will I have pity; I will repay
you
according to your ways and your abominations will be in your midst.
Then you
will (come) to know that I am the
LORD who strikes . . . Disaster will
come upon disaster . . .” (Ezekiel 7:7, 9, 26).
An Overview
of the
Disasters Then and Now
To try and connect the frequency of the
disasters of
the past with what we are now witnessing should enable us to understand
the
closeness of the Great
Tribulation,
which also encompasses the Famine
and the Disease Epidemics.
AN OPEN
LETTER
To the true
and faithful members of God’s Church
–
Worldwide –
At that time, I wrote that all of us experienced
sadness and grief for
all of the people who had suffered loss of family members and friends
caused by
the hurricanes of Katrina and Rita.
To get this in perspective let us take a look
back to the time of the
two worst hurricanes to strike America in this century:
The
Hurricane Katrina
From
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hurricane
Katrina was the deadliest
and most destructive Atlantic hurricane of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season.
It
is the costliest natural
disaster,
as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes,
in the history of the United States.[3]
Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it
was the sixth strongest
overall.
At least 1,836 people died in the actual hurricane and in the
subsequent
floods, making it the deadliest U.S. hurricane since the 1928 Okeechobee hurricane; total
property
damage was estimated at $81 billion (2005 USD),[3]
nearly triple the damage wrought by Hurricane
Andrew in 1992.[4] . . .
At a
news conference at 10 am on August 28, shortly after Katrina was
upgraded to a
Category 5 storm, New Orleans mayor Ray
Nagin
ordered the first-ever mandatory evacuation of the city,
calling
Katrina "a storm that most of us have long feared."[33]
The city government also established several "refuges of last resort"
for citizens who could not leave the city, including the massive Louisiana Superdome, which sheltered
approximately 26,000 people and provided them with food and water for
several
days as the storm came ashore.[34][35] . . . .
Between 80 and
90 percent of the residents of New
Orleans was evacuated safely in time before the Hurricane struck,
testifying to
some of the success of the evacuation measures. [5]
Despite this, many remained in the city, mainly those who did not have
access
to personal vehicles or who were
isolated from the dissemination of news from
the local governments. The Louisiana Superdome was used to house
and
support some of those who were unable to evacuate. Television shots
frequently
focused on the Superdome as a symbol of the flooding occurring in New
Orleans.
Hurricane
Rita, "the third-most intense storm ever recorded in the Atlantic
basin,
speeded up as it bore down on the Texas coast. The Category 5 storm
[was then]
more powerful than Hurricane Katrina, which left more than
1,000
dead last month in Louisiana and other states," Bloomberg News reported
September 22, 2005. With "winds of 175 miles (280 kilometers) per
hour," the National Hurricane Center said that Rita was "potentially
catastrophic."
The "projected path
of
Hurricane Rita shifted east Thursday, [September 22nd,] pushing the
storm on a
track toward the Houston or Galveston areas."
"As Hurricane Rita prepares to hit the Texas coast
in the early
morning hours on Saturday [September 24, 2005,] with wind gusts of
175-mph,
state and local officials up and down the coast (and Louisiana
officials)
[September 21st] issued mandatory evacuation orders. Americans feel
sympathy
and concern for the thousands of evacuees and are praying that the
aftermath of
Rita will not bring the same devastation as Katrina brought.”
Headlines
in News Papers about the Hurricane Rita:
End Quotes
Though Rita was weakened to a tropical storm
before it made landfall and
caused little damage in comparison to Katrina, it should have been A
WAKEUP CALL for all of us, as we viewed the loss of
possessions,
homes, and employment, for sooner or later, all of us will experience
disasters
of one sort or another.
There is no doubt in my
mind as to why Rita
weakened from a category 5 to a 1, and ended up as just a tropical
storm.
At one time there were at least 4 Churches of
God in large numbers in
Houston alone. I am confident many of those people were probably
praying more
fervently than they have ever prayed before realizing what could happen
to all
of them based on what they had seen take place in Louisiana,
Mississippi and
Alabama with Katrina.
God in His abundant mercy responded to their
cries to Him and spared not
only them but all others as well even though the majority had turned
away from
Him in 1995.
Will Jesus Christ do the same the next time? I seriously question that He will unless they
truly repent! One thing I do know is that God is going to continue to
deal with
this country, along with Ephraim, and the other tribes of Israel, just
as He
has said that He would in the endtime.
I think there is a tendency for us to forget
such prophecies as
Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 that make it very clear there is A
CURSE on the
house of Israel because of disobedience to God’s holy and righteous
laws.
We should have known and understood that sooner or later what God has stated in these prophecies would begin to take place! And we are now beginning to see the reality of them.
The
Twin Towers in New York City
From
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
On the morning of September 11, 2001, Al-Qaeda-affiliated
hijackers flew two Boeing 767 jets into the complex, one into each
tower,
in a coordinated terrorist attack. After burning for 56
minutes,
the South Tower (2) collapsed, followed a half-hour later by the North
Tower
(1), with the attacks on the World Trade Center resulting in 2,753
deaths.[7]
The September
11 attacks (also referred to
as September 11, September 11th or 9/11)[nb
1]
were a series of four suicide attacks that were committed in the
United
States on September 11, 2001, coordinated to strike the areas of New
York City and Washington, D.C. On that Tuesday morning,
19 terrorists
from the Islamist
militant group al-Qaeda
hijacked four passenger jets. The
hijackers
intentionally piloted two of those planes, American Airlines Flight 11
and United Airlines Flight 175,
into the
Twin Towers of the World Trade Center complex in New York
City;
both towers collapsed within two hours. The hijackers also
intentionally
crashed American Airlines Flight 77
into the
Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, and intended to
pilot the
fourth hijacked jet, United Airlines Flight 93, into
the United States Capitol Building[2]
in Washington, D.C.; however, the plane crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania after
its
passengers attempted to take control of the jet from the hijackers. Nearly 3,000 people
died in the
attacks including the 227 civilians and 19 hijackers aboard the
four planes,
none of whom survived.
End Quotes
Brethren,
all these areas hit as hard as they were, are hardly anything compared
to what
we will soon be experiencing in this country.
There is no question but that we have entered
into the very close of
this age and the demise of the nations of Israel.
The Great Tribulation is now very
close to us
Long time members of God’s Church should clearly
remember the warnings
given over many years from the end-time prophecies of the Bible by
God’s late
apostle, Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong.
Many ministers and members who were once of the
parent Church, as it was
during the lifetime of God’s late apostle, Mr. Armstrong, have for all
practical purposes removed him as one who was mightily used by Jesus
Christ for
over 50 years to restore the true doctrinal teachings within God’s true
Church,
preach the Gospel and sound the Ezekiel warning message.
The day is almost here when they will deeply
regret their rejection of
the man God chose to send to us in this endtime.
End-Time
Prophecies
One of those prophecies that makes known where
we are right now can be
found in the Book of Ezekiel:
“... the
end has come upon you ... it HAS DAWNED for you ... Now upon you I
will SOON
pour out My fury ... Disaster will come upon Disaster; and rumor will
be upon
rumor ... ” (Ezekiel 7:1, 26).
Rumors of even worse things to come than what
has already been witnessed! God wants all of us to WAKE UP!
This is so very serious
that God
further had His prophet to write to His people:
Thus says the Lord God. “Pound your fists and
stamp your feet, and say, ‘Alas, for all the evil abominations of the
House of
Israel! For they shall fall by the sword,
by famine, and by pestilence’” (Ezekiel
6:11).
God makes some of
the blatant sins very plain though another prophet:
“Hear the word of the LORD, you children of
Israel. For the LORD brings a charge
against the inhabitants of the land. There is no TRUTH OR MERCY or
KNOWLEDGE of
God in the land. By swearing and lying,
killing and committing adultery, they break all restraint, with
bloodshed. Therefore
the land will mourn and everyone who dwells there will waste away with
the
beasts of the fields and the birds of the air; even the fish
of the sea will be taken away” (Hosea 4:1-3).
There is already evidence of seeing these
things in their growing stages.
Biblical
Proportions
Katrina has been described as having caused such
great devastation and widespread deaths so as to be reaching towards
BIBLICAL
PROPORTIONS!
The fallout from these hurricanes foretold by
prophecies of the endtime are now coming to real life, while making
known we
are now very close to the Great Tribulation,
and the end of this age.
In view of what we
are now witnessing, and will be in the near future, I recommend the
reading of
an ‘Open Letter’ I wrote, dated
2-14-05, that appeared in the Journal, in which I used quotes that make
known one
of the worst years in our time regarding disasters that occurred in
2004! (This
can be found in the Open Letter archives on our website.)
Year in Review: Overview –
Nature’s Fury. They write of the hurricanes that battered Florida: Charley
and
Frances to be joined by Ivan and then followed by Jeanne.
Also according to the U.S. Geological Survey
(USGS), 2004 was the deadliest year for earthquakes since the
Renaissance Age,
making it the second most fatal in recorded history …”
For
over 50 years God’s late apostle warned of the calamities that
would be coming on Israel and the world before the end. A quote from
him:
“When God intervenes in world affairs, catastrophic
earth tremors will create imagination-defying waves, sweeping whole
cities from
their foundations, killing millions of terrified unrepentant victims in
their
surging power of destruction. Mankind will learn its lesson IN NO other
way!”
Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong.
We recently witnessed one such great
earthquake in Asia, and the total destruction combined with the
enormous loss
of life left in its wake.
Warnings
from Leviticus 26
Biblical
history and teaching make known that after Prophetic
Warnings; God usually allows
some time to pass before they take place for the reason that God
desires
repentance so He won’t have to bring about destruction! Jonah 3;
Ezekiel 33:11.
Leviticus
26 makes this very clear. The LORD God speaks of four
separate Seven Time Periods of punishment to befall the House of
Israel— each
Seven Times, from the beginning of the first one to the last one,
speaks of
greater punishment to follow with the next one, until the last one will
bring
with it nuclear warfare, captivity, and slavery—unless there is
repentance and
turning to Jesus Christ with the observance of His Holy Righteous Laws.
Mr.
Herbert W. Armstrong did WARN
Israel and the world for over 50 years. He
spoke and wrote continually of the CURSE from
God that is on Israel while urging repentance just as did the other two
Elijahs. A quote from him regarding these terrible times is as follows:
United States
and Britain in Prophecy,
“People
of the Western World would be STUNNED - dumbfounded - IF they
knew! The governments of the United
States, Britain, Canada, Australasian, and South Africa would set in
motion
gigantic crash programs – if they knew!
They could know! But they
don’t! Why?”
God
our only Hope
God is
our only hope in an age whose end is nigh at hand! When we consider
what took place with terrorists in 9-11-01 followed up by the
hurricanes in
2004, and continuing to learn of records being broken each year we
should be
able as Jesus said to be very observant of the times along with
knowledge of
revealed prophecy:
“. . . Look at the fig tree,
and all the trees. When they are already
budding (seeing these terrible
things now taking place
that fits with the foregoing Scriptures), you see and known for
yourselves that summer is now near. So you, likewise, when you see
these things
(beginning, verses 7-11) happening, know that the Kingdom of God is
near. . . : (Luke 21:29-33).
Famine and Disease
Epidemics
Jesus
also spoke of FAMINE AND PESTILENCE to soon come upon Israel and
the world!
“For nation will rise against
nation, and kingdom against kingdom. AND THERE WILL BE FAMINE,
PESTILENCES, and earthquakes in various places. All these are
THE
BEGINNING OF SORROWS” (Matthew 24:7-8).
How
close and how quickly could FAMINE take place WITHIN THIS GREAT
COUNTRY? We have a tendency to think everything will remain as it now
is! The
grocery stores are so full of food items they have specials each week
to
attract customers to them.
In the
Open Letter, 2-14-05, I quoted an agricultural official in
Kansas, who expressed his alarm upon learning that the cupboard in this
nation
is bare regarding food reserves, and further, the sobering fact that
the world
now feeds us.
Reflecting
on that
shocking information at that time along with worsening stats since in
both
America and England should be met with sober thought! We need to
realize the
imperative need of preparing
ourselves, mentally and spiritually, for these catastrophes that will
be experienced
in the near future.
We
need to be praying as fervently, if not more so, than the members in
the Houston, and Galveston, Texas areas, were praying for the safety of
their
lives and all they owned at the time of the Hurricane Rita.
This
is no time for sleeping and complacency, but remaining alert and
vigilant
while in a state of readiness. For
whether we want to believe it or not, TERRIBLE
TIMES HAVE ALREADY BEGUN TO BEFALL AMERICA
AND BRITAIN!
For
some years the News Media has been making known there were real
problems in the agricultural states of this country: drought, flooding,
crop
failures. Not all that critical up to now, but now enough for the
astute
observer to read the signs of where these problems have been building
to soon
become full-blown!
What
is now taking place strongly suggests that we are seeing the beginning
of the Famine to be followed by a real outbreak of a pandemic diseases
that
will take the lives of a third of the people in the House of Israel (Ezekiel 5:12).
Remember,
the three and one/half years of Famine that befell ancient
Israel in the time of Elijah was not
severely felt until close to the end of it (I Kings 18:5). Undoubtedly
the
famine now beginning to take place can be compared to that time.
Note
the alarming recent news of alarm:
Very Recent
Headlines of Alarm
U. S.
NEWS. July 7, 2012
Drought
hits 56 percent of continental US; ‘significant toll’ on crops
msnbc.com
U.S. News by Miguel Llanos
“The
prolonged heat across the midwest has not only set temperature
records, it is also expanding and intensifying drought conditions – and
relief
isn’t on the horizon for most areas, the National Weather Service
reported
Thursday. Drought conditions are present
in 56 percent of the continental U.S., according to the weekly Drought
Monitor.
. . .”
What
Happens If Record Heat And Crippling
Drought Cause Widespread Crop Failures Throughout The United States?
It
is too early to panic, but
if there is not a major change in the weather very soon we could be
looking at
widespread crop failures throughout the United States this summer.
Record heat and
crippling drought are absolutely devastating crops from coast to coast.
Unfortunately, this unprecedented heat wave just continues to keep
going and record high
temperatures
continue to scorch much of the central United States. In fact, more
than
2,000 record high temperatures have been matched or broken in the
past week
alone. Not only that, but the lack of rainfall nationally has caused drought
conditions from coast to coast. If temperatures continue to stay
this high
and we don't start seeing more rain, farmers and ranchers all over the
nation
are going to be absolutely devastated. So what happens if we do see
widespread
crop failures throughout the United States? That is a question that is
frightening to think about.
Right
now is an absolutely
crucial period for corn. It is time for pollination and rainfall is
desperately
needed. The following is from an article recently posted on agweb.com....
With
some parts of Indiana now nearing a month without significant rainfall
and the
critical pollination phase of corn either already started or about to
begin,
large crop losses appear likely for some farmers.
The
U.S. Department of
Agriculture had been expecting a record corn harvest this year, but now
the
outlook is rapidly changing. The Department of Agriculture now says
that 22 percent of all U.S. corn
fields are
in poor condition, and that number could rise significantly unless
current weather
patterns change.
Sadly,
the corn in some areas of
the country may already have been permanently damaged according to the Washington Post....
Some
growers are already reporting damage to corn, which is at a critical
pollination stage. In some areas, the corn already has been damaged to
the point
that rain may not be enough to salvage the crop, Telvent DTN analyst
John Sanow
said.
He
and
other analysts have lowered their yield estimates to an average of
about 150
bushels per acre or less. That compares with the U.S. Agriculture
Department’s
June estimate of 166 bushels per acre.
Meanwhile,
corn supplies are
dropping at a rate not seen in many years. The following is from croplife.com....
Corn
supplies in the U.S. are declining at the fastest pace since 1996 as a Midwest heat wave
damages the world's largest harvest for a third consecutive year.
Bloomberg
News reports that stockpiles were probably 3.168 billion bushels (80.47
million
metric tons) on June 1, 47% less than on March 1
So
what does all of this mean?
It
means that food prices are
going to rise.
Over
the last month, the price
of corn is up about 27 percent.
The
price of wheat is also
soaring. The price of September wheat is up about 26 percent since the beginning
of June.
So
is there hope that things can
be turned around?
Unfortunately,
things look quite
bleak at this point. According to the Washington Post,
the
outlook for the rest of the growing season is very ominous....
“Based
on the drought outlook, the potential for further degradation is very
high, and
the potential to reach exceptional levels of drought — where there are
major
crop failures — is very high,” said Matthew Rosencrans, a Weather
Service
meteorologist. “The climate signals we are looking at right now don’t
correlate
with wetness in that region.”
Jay
Armstrong, owner and operator of Armstong Farms in Kansas, flew his
small plane
over a portion of the affected area and landed with the impression that
the
potential damage is far worse than is commonly understood.
“At
this time of year, when you look down in a place like Indiana or
Illinois, you
should see just lush green fields,” Armstrong said. “I saw bare soil. I
just
thought to myself, the market has no idea what’s coming.”
Those
are frightening words.
Nobody
wants to hear about the
possibility of "major crop failures" or that "the market has no
ideas what's coming".
Ranchers
are being absolutely
devastated by this hot, dry weather as well. The following comes from a
comment
that was posted on one of my recent articles by a
reader
identified as Cinderella Man who works in the business....
As
of
6/27/12 at the Torrington WY auction 2,248 head sold in one day.
Usually only a
couple hundred sell at a time. Whats happening is the ranchers are
trying to
sell when the price is high, and they know that hay is going to be
expensive in
the fall. We already see ranchers from WY coming up here looking for
hay. Let
me put it to you this way: Last night I went with my Dad to his
hayfield and he
said he would be lucky if he got a third of the hay he got last year!
Second I
work in the feed and mineral supply business and I have seen grain feed
sales
through the roof. Same goes for mineral and lactation supplements. The
other
day a Hutterite colony bought 25 tons of grain distillers to feed their
sheep.
Everywhere south of us is dry and we are catching up. People are
scrambling to
find corn and my elevator is one of the last places that have it. Going
back to
the minerals and supplements the cows are on poor grass and they have
baby
calves to feed. They go dry and cant produce milk for them so a rancher
has to
buy minerals and supplements to get the mama cow to produce milk. Sales
have
been soaring. You add it all up and you can only come up with the
conclusion
that we are in SERIOUS TROUBLE this year and I dont know how small
producers
like my family are going to weather this. All I can say is the ones who
were in
glee at Texas’s plight last year and crying in their beers right now.
If
this continues, we won't just
see corn and wheat become much more expensive.
We
will also see the price of
meat go through the roof as well.
This
is not welcome news at a
time when the economy is already in really bad shape and millions of families
are barely making it from month to month.
End Quotes
Continuous Prayer
with Vigilance
Brethren
as we approach this critical time of the end of the House of
Joseph and the Great
Tribulation, we should
realize more than ever that our relationship with God is the only thing
that
really matters.
If it
is right, and ongoing, then we need not worry nor be afraid of
whatever catastrophe, or disaster, might come to pass! As God’s true
people, we
should be looking beyond this physical life to the awesome blissful
future promised
to us; one that will never end. Nothing should be more important to us (Matthew 16:24-27).
While
there is yet day, we MUST be about our Father’s business and
doing all that He enables us to do in reaching out an extended hand to
our
brothers and sisters who are yet in the wrong places before the
darkness of
night befall this age.
Preparing
the Church of
God
The commission Mr.
Armstrong left
before his death was to PREPARE
the Church for the coming of Jesus Christ. This is the continuing
effort God is
enables us to do while praying to Him for the needed true laborers to
place
their hands in our hands to work together in the harvest (John 4:34-38).
At the same time, each
of us
must try very hard to overcome our drowsiness and complacency and be as
close
to our God as possible, so that His promise of deliverance may be
fulfilled in
our lives (Luke 21:36).
These
warnings and instruction from Christ should be a real motivating
force within each of us to be praying for one another, as well as for
ourselves.
The
Fall Holy Days
Very soon, with God’s good blessings, we will be
observing the Feast of Trumpets
that pictures the coming of Jesus Christ back to this earth to begin
His holy
and righteous reign over all the nations of this earth. The Feast of
Tabernacles
that follows pictures that wonderful new world.
We should always have the meaning of these Holy
Days in our memories
with their meaning and be encouraged by them, knowing their fulfilment
is not
all that far away.
Encouragement from Jesus Christ
Hopefully the observance of God’s Sabbath and
the soon-coming Holy Days
should cause us to lift up our head and hearts as we see the unfolding
of these
end-time prophecies that with them will bring about the terrible
problems that
are already befalling mankind and focus on what Jesus Christ said to
encourage
us:
“And there will be
SIGNS
in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of
nations, with perplexity, the sea and waves roaring; men’s hearts
failing them
for FEAR and the expectation of those things which are coming on the
earth, for
the powers of the heavens heaven will be shaken. Now when these things BEGIN
to happen, LOOK
UP
AND LIFT UP YOUR HEADS, FOR
YOUR REDEMPTION DRAWS NEAR” (Luke 21:25-28).
These Scriptures coupled with what is being seen
through the News Media makes
known we are beginning to see the end-time is now virtually in sight;
and our
redemption is indeed much closer than perhaps any of us have realized
heretofore!
Our love and prayers is for
all of you as brethren in Christ Jesus our Lord,
Don Billingsley
Your
friend and pastor,
Don Billingsley
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