- Get link
- X
- Other Apps
Mayan doomsday hysteria is overtaking people, towns, whole nations. According to an incorrect interpretation of the long count Mayan calendar, (Baktun) the world is supposed to end tomorrow. The fascination with this calendar and its prediction of global doom has apparently affected many, many people. Crimes are being committed. Deaths are occurring. Government decisions are being made.
O, would that they would do the same by taking the bible seriously! If people changed their lives, thought of their mortality, made decisions based on the truth and fact of a REAL doomsday that will come for every human who ever lived...what a world this would be. Alas, it is not.
But be that as it may, the troubles of the mind are bubbling to the surface. The intuitive fear that every human has is giving rise to actions that are caused by those fears.
And what are those fears? Follow me on the progressive thought: The bible says eternity is set in our hearts. (Ecclesiastes 3:11). It says that we are influenced by the general revelation of God in nature, (Romans 1:20; more here) and also that we have been influenced by special revelation which is the spoken Word, miracles, visions, dreams, and Jesus. And if we are influenced by God in those ways, we also intuitively feel the weight of our sins, (2 Timothy 3:6; Isaiah 1:4). Therefore we understand deep in the recesses of the darkest corner of our minds, that we are accountable for them. Each individual in the world at some point before their death, unless they were a babe or cognitively impaired, have pondered the eternal question- what happens after death? Is this all there is?
Not knowing the answer to that question bothers people. Of a mundane day to day living, the issue doesn't come up so often. However if a person is confronted with a horrific event, such as the Newtown School massacre, they think about it. Or if they receive a dread diagnosis, they think about it. Or if they approach old age, they think about it. It's natural to wonder.
Not having the answer, some people go more crazy and frantic when faced with a looming appointment with mortality. For many today, that looming appointment seems to them to be the Mayan end date and alleged pagan Apocalypse. People really are going crazy. See this news from around the world:
Oh, the Lord may rapture His believers any day, and the last 7 years of doom on earth may begin. That last 7 years does include days of darkness as the Mayans "predict", and asteroids and comets and other doomish happenings. But if it does occur it will not be because the Mayans said so, it will be because GOD said so.
However, the heartbreaking concepts in all this are two-fold. First, that people and governments are making decisions based on a false prediction from a lost cult of the Mayans. Their religion means nothing and it came to nothing. Chances are that naught untoward will happen tomorrow. Sadly, many people who have either committed suicide, or killed someone or went underground or sold all their stuff will sheepishly understand they made an eternal mistake based on false intel.
Secondly, what we're seeing with all the hullabaloo is the roiling of usually placid waters of apparent unconcern with their eternal destiny. People hide or suppress the turmoil of fear and uncertainty underneath. (Romans 1:18). We don't usually see a person's turmoil. Big events stir up that inner turmoil. That is what we're seeing today.
In this case it is the specter of doom in the form of an ancient pagan prediction. However, even the Newtown massacre prompted full churches and candlelight vigils in the search for meaning among the face-off with death and its eternal question.
"Oh, the raging of many nations--they rage like the raging sea! Oh, the uproar of the peoples--they roar like the roaring of great waters!" (Isaiah 17:12) Isaiah likened the turmoil of nations with its endlessly raging peoples to the roaring seas. So did Luke:
"And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves," (Luke 21:25)
Isaiah's use of roaring is from a Hebrew word hamah that means to 'murmur, growl, roar, be boisterous' and that is exactly what we see when a great many people across the world at once are forced to face mortality and confront their conscience with the question of "what happens after death?" Like a Mayan apocalypse. They murmur, growl, become boisterous, just like the raging sea.
One can be peaceful, placid, and avoid the roiling of waters by being in Jesus. HE brings peace, and only HE brings peace. Without Him, there is no peace. And no answers.
"For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace;" (Ephesians 2:14-15)
"To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace." (Luke 1:79).
The Apocalypse is coming. It is not the Mayan apocalypse, but the Jesus Apocalypse. Apocalypse literally is from the Greek word apokalýptō and Strong's concordance defines it as:
"properly, uncover, revealing what is hidden (veiled, obstructed), especially its inner make-up; (figuratively) to make plain (manifest), particularly what is immaterial (invisible)."
The last book of the bible is Revelation and it reveals the things of the last days. It reveals to one and all the terrible wrath of God leveled upon the world for their sins. He reveals what He will do.
In Amos 3:7 it is written, "For the Lord GOD does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets"
and in this case He revealed His intentions to John, who was also instructed to write it down and thereby it becomes instructive to us in this generation.
"The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near. ... Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea." (Revelation 1:1-3, 11)
We are meant to read the book and to understand the price that pride and sin and rejection of Jesus brings. Surely the LORD does nothing without revealing it...and He has. The Mayans have not.
You have been warned, as every generation has been warned since the generation of John and the closing of the bible with the words of Revelation He ordained John to write.
Wrath is coming. But the Peace that passes all understanding is also revealed. (Philippians 4:7). That also, is yours for the choosing. I beg and plead with you who do not believe, I entreat and urge those who do believe but are falling away. I am not so proud that I would not beg you in abject tears to heed the words of Jesus the Christ who is and who was and who is to come again.
It may be today. It may be tomorrow. It may be next month. Or your very death may cause you to slide in due time toward the eternal destiny He has set before us. (Deuteronomy 32:35). There are only two destines for every person who ever lives: eternity in hell away from Him, and eternity in heaven with Him.
As Paul wrote in the great book of Romans,
"I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect". (Romans 12:1-2).
What is the will of God, you ask?
"For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him, may have eternal life; and I Myself will raise him up on the last day." (John 6:40)
Believe on Jesus, the resurrected God-man who was slain for the sins of the world, and who took YOUR wrath as the substitute. Repent and believe. And then you will no longer wonder about your appointment with mortality. You will KNOW. You will never worry about anything so foolish as a Mayan apocalypse again. It is His delighted pleasure to reveal to you your destiny which is peace and glory and perfection and joy. His peace is amazing. Jesus is amazing. Come join us in His peace, I beg you.
O, would that they would do the same by taking the bible seriously! If people changed their lives, thought of their mortality, made decisions based on the truth and fact of a REAL doomsday that will come for every human who ever lived...what a world this would be. Alas, it is not.
But be that as it may, the troubles of the mind are bubbling to the surface. The intuitive fear that every human has is giving rise to actions that are caused by those fears.
And what are those fears? Follow me on the progressive thought: The bible says eternity is set in our hearts. (Ecclesiastes 3:11). It says that we are influenced by the general revelation of God in nature, (Romans 1:20; more here) and also that we have been influenced by special revelation which is the spoken Word, miracles, visions, dreams, and Jesus. And if we are influenced by God in those ways, we also intuitively feel the weight of our sins, (2 Timothy 3:6; Isaiah 1:4). Therefore we understand deep in the recesses of the darkest corner of our minds, that we are accountable for them. Each individual in the world at some point before their death, unless they were a babe or cognitively impaired, have pondered the eternal question- what happens after death? Is this all there is?
Not knowing the answer to that question bothers people. Of a mundane day to day living, the issue doesn't come up so often. However if a person is confronted with a horrific event, such as the Newtown School massacre, they think about it. Or if they receive a dread diagnosis, they think about it. Or if they approach old age, they think about it. It's natural to wonder.
Not having the answer, some people go more crazy and frantic when faced with a looming appointment with mortality. For many today, that looming appointment seems to them to be the Mayan end date and alleged pagan Apocalypse. People really are going crazy. See this news from around the world:
Almost 1,000 doomsday cult members arrested in China
Police in China have carried out further arrests of members of a doomsday cult for spreading rumours about the imminent end of the world, state media say.
State media terms Almighty God an "evil cult" - the same description it applies to the banned Falun Gong group.
As 'Doomsday' Looms, Serbs Cash In On Mystical Mountain
If doomsday really falls on Friday, the residents of this Serbian mountain region are cashing in while they can. "We're booked out December 20-23. We have a New Age convention and guests are coming because of the end of the world," said Nebojsa Gajic, manager of the 160-bed, Communist-era Millennium Hotel on the slopes of Mount Rtanj. The region is selling itself as the best place to survive the looming apocalypse--which will fall on December 21, according to mystics whose calculations depend on the ending of an era in the 5,125-year-old Mayan calendar.
Dec. 21, 2012: Fearful 'end of world' callers flood NASA
If there's one government agency really looking forward to Dec. 22, it's NASA. The space agency said it has been flooded with calls and emails from people asking about the purported end of the world — which, as the doomsday myth goes, is apparently set to take place on Dec. 21, 2012. ... NASA decided to do "everything in our power" to set the facts straight. That effort included interviews with scientists posted online and a web page Brown said has drawn more than 4.6 million views. [italics mine]
School Districts Cancel Class Due To Doomsday Talk, Potential Threats
Thousands of students will have an extra long holiday break after school administrators in at least two Michigan counties decided to cancel classes because of talk surrounding the shootings in Newtown, Connecticut and rumors connected to the Mayan calendar predicting the end of the world. Five districts in Lapeer County and 20 districts in Genesee County posted announcements Wednesday evening cancelling classes Thursday and Friday. ... Additionally, rumors connected to the Mayan calendar predicted end of the world on Friday have also surfaced,” a letter from Matt Wandrie, Superintendent of Lapeer Community Schools said.
Chinese police suspect man who stabbed 23 kids 'influenced' by doomsday rumorPeople are taking this thing seriously. Too bad they are all wrong. They are going crazy. And they do not need to.
Chinese police said Monday that the man who stabbed 23 children in a rural Chinese elementary school just hours before the Newtown, Conn., massacre may have been “influenced” by doomsday predictions. A belief that the Mayan calendar predicts an apocalypse this Friday, Dec. 21, has gained peculiar currency here. And the knifing spree is the darkest manifestation yet of how end-of-the-world rumors have taken hold in China.
Oh, the Lord may rapture His believers any day, and the last 7 years of doom on earth may begin. That last 7 years does include days of darkness as the Mayans "predict", and asteroids and comets and other doomish happenings. But if it does occur it will not be because the Mayans said so, it will be because GOD said so.
However, the heartbreaking concepts in all this are two-fold. First, that people and governments are making decisions based on a false prediction from a lost cult of the Mayans. Their religion means nothing and it came to nothing. Chances are that naught untoward will happen tomorrow. Sadly, many people who have either committed suicide, or killed someone or went underground or sold all their stuff will sheepishly understand they made an eternal mistake based on false intel.
Secondly, what we're seeing with all the hullabaloo is the roiling of usually placid waters of apparent unconcern with their eternal destiny. People hide or suppress the turmoil of fear and uncertainty underneath. (Romans 1:18). We don't usually see a person's turmoil. Big events stir up that inner turmoil. That is what we're seeing today.
In this case it is the specter of doom in the form of an ancient pagan prediction. However, even the Newtown massacre prompted full churches and candlelight vigils in the search for meaning among the face-off with death and its eternal question.
 |
| Source |
 |
| source |
"Oh, the raging of many nations--they rage like the raging sea! Oh, the uproar of the peoples--they roar like the roaring of great waters!" (Isaiah 17:12) Isaiah likened the turmoil of nations with its endlessly raging peoples to the roaring seas. So did Luke:
"And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves," (Luke 21:25)
Isaiah's use of roaring is from a Hebrew word hamah that means to 'murmur, growl, roar, be boisterous' and that is exactly what we see when a great many people across the world at once are forced to face mortality and confront their conscience with the question of "what happens after death?" Like a Mayan apocalypse. They murmur, growl, become boisterous, just like the raging sea.
One can be peaceful, placid, and avoid the roiling of waters by being in Jesus. HE brings peace, and only HE brings peace. Without Him, there is no peace. And no answers.
"For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace;" (Ephesians 2:14-15)
"To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace." (Luke 1:79).
The Apocalypse is coming. It is not the Mayan apocalypse, but the Jesus Apocalypse. Apocalypse literally is from the Greek word apokalýptō and Strong's concordance defines it as:
"properly, uncover, revealing what is hidden (veiled, obstructed), especially its inner make-up; (figuratively) to make plain (manifest), particularly what is immaterial (invisible)."
The last book of the bible is Revelation and it reveals the things of the last days. It reveals to one and all the terrible wrath of God leveled upon the world for their sins. He reveals what He will do.
In Amos 3:7 it is written, "For the Lord GOD does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets"
and in this case He revealed His intentions to John, who was also instructed to write it down and thereby it becomes instructive to us in this generation.
"The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near. ... Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea." (Revelation 1:1-3, 11)
We are meant to read the book and to understand the price that pride and sin and rejection of Jesus brings. Surely the LORD does nothing without revealing it...and He has. The Mayans have not.
You have been warned, as every generation has been warned since the generation of John and the closing of the bible with the words of Revelation He ordained John to write.
Wrath is coming. But the Peace that passes all understanding is also revealed. (Philippians 4:7). That also, is yours for the choosing. I beg and plead with you who do not believe, I entreat and urge those who do believe but are falling away. I am not so proud that I would not beg you in abject tears to heed the words of Jesus the Christ who is and who was and who is to come again.
It may be today. It may be tomorrow. It may be next month. Or your very death may cause you to slide in due time toward the eternal destiny He has set before us. (Deuteronomy 32:35). There are only two destines for every person who ever lives: eternity in hell away from Him, and eternity in heaven with Him.
As Paul wrote in the great book of Romans,
"I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect". (Romans 12:1-2).
What is the will of God, you ask?
"For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him, may have eternal life; and I Myself will raise him up on the last day." (John 6:40)
Believe on Jesus, the resurrected God-man who was slain for the sins of the world, and who took YOUR wrath as the substitute. Repent and believe. And then you will no longer wonder about your appointment with mortality. You will KNOW. You will never worry about anything so foolish as a Mayan apocalypse again. It is His delighted pleasure to reveal to you your destiny which is peace and glory and perfection and joy. His peace is amazing. Jesus is amazing. Come join us in His peace, I beg you.
I was actually going to quote Luke 21:25 and say that I think the sea also refers to the multitudes of people, but I saw that you already did. =)
ReplyDeleteDrew