Dear Friends,
Last week when Jesus told the disciples it was time to go back to Judaea, they said it was too dangerous (v 8). Jesus assured them it was safe enough for now, but they did not understand. Thomas expected to be killed along with Jesus when they arrived in Judaea (v 16). Jesus said they had to go and wake Lazarus out of sleep, but again, the disciples did not understand. He then told them plainly, Lazarus is dead. For the disciples, the situation looked gloomy to say the least.
Give us understanding, Father, as we continue in John 11, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
John 11:15-21
15 And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe; nevertheless let us go unto him.
16 Then said Thomas [from Heb ta’owm; lit Twin], which is called Didymus [Gk didumos; lit Twin], unto his fellowdisciples, Let us also go, that we may die with him.
17 Then when Jesus came, he found that he had lain in the grave four days already.
18 Now Bethany was nigh unto Jerusalem, about fifteen furlongs off [1.875 miles]:
19 And many of the Jews came to Martha and Mary, to comfort them concerning their brother.
20 Then Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went and met him: but Mary sat still in the house.
21 Then said Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.
John 11:15-21
John 11 addresses the age-old dilemma of mankind: Death.
In 2021, we are looking at this age-old problem in its most lethal form: Democide, or death by government. According to political scientist R J Rummel of the University of Hawaii, 262 million people were victims of democide in the 20th century. More recently, seven children were killed in the Kabul drone strike on August 29. Add to this somewhere between 22,000 and 48,000 civilians killed by US airstrikes since 9/11. Considering the role of the military-industrial complex in the rise of the new world order, this is what one might expect. Let us now consider the most recent manifestation of democide in the twenty-first century, one that hits much closer to home.
On Thursday of last week, a sweeping federal mandate was announced that will require some 100 million Americans to take the toxic mRNA jabs in order to stay employed. Aside from the fact that this strategy did not work for the UK or Israel (more here), it is illegal on so many different levels that the mind boggles. (For starters, see the Nuremberg Code, states’ rights, and the Hippocratic Oath.)
For all practical purposes, what we see taking place is a worldwide death cult. As with any cult, followers put blind confidence in their leader or leaders and either ignore or dismiss any information that contradicts what their leader says. (People who are in a cult do not know they are in a cult, because they trust their authority figure or figures.) We are less than a year into this failed mRNA experiment, and already more people have died from the poison mRNA shots than all other vaccines combined according to the Health and Human Services Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting database, VAERS. If you have not downloaded the data from the VAERS database to read it for yourself, I highly recommend you do so. Then ask yourself, why should I take these toxic shots when Congress is exempt from the mandate? When Fauci admitted to Congress that only around half of the staff at the NIH and CDC voluntarily took the shots? When it has been proven that natural immunity is at minimum 13x more effective than the jabs — a question Fauci has no answer for? With these salient questions in mind, let us consider our Scripture passage in its historical context.
In Lazarus’ day, the cross was feared throughout the Roman Empire. Half the population consisted of slaves which kept the empire functioning, yet had to be regularly replaced as their numbers were depleted through attrition. The ancient world was a dark and dangerous place. Things are looking dark in our day too, but perhaps not quite as dark as in Lazarus’ day, at least not yet. Before we consider Lazarus and how his story applies to us today, let us consider what Scripture has to say about our day, or days soon to come.
In his book, The Oracle (Charisma Media, 2019), Jonathan Cahn explains the principle of the jubilee, how everything eventually returns to its original state. According to Cahn, God applies this principle in many different ways beyond what He outlined in Leviticus 25. The great tribulation period will be what Cahn calls a ‘dark jubilee’ — a return to the Roman Empire that ruled the world at the time of Christ. Nebuchadnezzar foresaw this final empire as iron mixed with potters’ clay (Dan 2:41-43), separate from the legs of iron representing the Roman Empire. This is how things appear from a human perspective. In Daniel’s vision, however, Rome and the New World Order were both one and the same, represented by a single beast (Dan 7:7). That is how God sees it; the New World Order will simply be an extension of the old Roman Empire. And this final empire is rising in our day. The COVID era has made it plain to see that there is a centralized power structure implementing monolithic policies, at least in terms of public health. Countries that resist this one-size-fits-all approach are frowned on in the media.
The mayor of Chicago wants department heads and deputies to pledge allegiance to the “new world order.” Health officials in Australia have been speaking candidly about how contact tracing fits into the “new world order.” In fact, George H W Bush introduced the rise of the new world order in his Gulf War speech on September 11, 1990, exactly eleven years before the attacks on the WTC and the Pentagon. More recently, his son, George W Bush, compared Trump supporters to al-Qaeda. (This narrative-flip painting patriotic Americans as terrorists is not new. I wrote about it in Dragon Slayer Jesus Christ.) Although Rome has changed her image and her methods since the early days of the empire, she has maintained her original headquarters and many of her traditions. She still wields an enormous amount of power worldwide. In the great tribulation period, the false prophet will be a Roman:
…..And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.
Daniel 9:26
The city and the sanctuary were destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD, therefore the prince that shall come will be a Roman too. Ie, the false prophet will be a pope. This is something many Catholic and Protestant scholars agree on. One of the preparations for the mark of the beast that the false prophet will eventually implement is unilateral control of our private bank accounts. The government is therefore preparing to monitor all transactions of any account containing over $600. This plan is in the works but still subject to congressional approval.
Meanwhile, many other components of the mark of the beast are being quietly phased in with negligible resistance: Canada is encouraging businesses to comply with the Chinese social credit system, a system which according to the Canadian website can penalize non-compliant businesses with ‘public blaming and shaming’ and ‘being blacklisted’. In the UK, they halted their plans for a vaccine passport only to do an about-face a day later. In Turkey, citizens are protesting their vaccine passports but in Israel, there are plans to implement DNA testing in conjunction with their Green Pass vaccine-passport system, a dystopian scenario like the one portrayed in the movie Gattaca. Italy has just approved the vaccine passport mandate for all private-sector workers. Here in the US, one in five say their employers require them to get the shots. It remains yet to be seen how that number will be affected once the pending challenges to the new federal mandate pan out, but that is not the real issue.
If the (now deleted) Deagel report is any guide, we can expect to see mass depopulation soon, probably beginning this fall as the flu season kicks in and the variants created by the shots begin to multiply. Deagel is a military intelligence website. Their page for the US that previously predicted a US population of 100 million by 2025 now only shows the current population with no future projection. Of course, I can not say exactly when this will take place, but I think we can expect to see a major spike in mortality rates over the next few years based on the Deagel report, the VAERS database, and what top scientists have said (forward to around 36:30). We have known they are planning to depopulate for quite some time; not just because they openly write about it, speak about it, and even engrave it in stone, but most of all because the Bible says so (Rev 6:8 et al). Even if mass depopulation was not imminent, it seems almost certain that vaccine passports are leading to a worldwide medical ID that will be a precursor to the mark of the beast. The vaccine passport system is already being used by a landlord in Florida to evict the un-vaxxed. The mark of the beast, a mark on the right hand or forehead, will likewise be used in this manner worldwide (Rev 13:16-18). This brings us full circle back to this week’s text. I don’t know about you, but after considering these things, I need some good news. With all that has been happening over the last year, many Christians are having doubts and anxieties, but once we apply our text to our current-day situation it will put things in perspective. It has been said that God loves a cliff hanger. Considering our text, you might even say He loves a cliff drop. Lazarus was already dead.
The situation was not just bad, it looked like it was too late to do anything about it. Martha even seems to be blaming Jesus for not coming in time (v 21). Mary will make the same insinuation (v 32). Jesus, however, said He was glad He was not there to heal Lazarus. Because Jesus saw the big picture. He was teaching his disciples that they could trust Him, even when things look hopeless. He purposely waited so that they would believe; neither Thomas nor Martha, not to mention Mary, were able to see the big picture — the victory over the grave that Jesus had planned for Lazarus, or the victory over his own grave that was soon to follow. We are now only a few weeks away from the cross. Jesus sees it coming but He remains steadfast and unfazed — because He sees the big picture. Here in 2021, things may look terrible, but Jesus is still in control. He is making all things new, just as He has done from the beginning; just as He did in the lives of Joseph, Moses, and Job. Just as He did in the life — and death — and life of Lazarus. Jesus takes impossible situations and uses them for his glory; our situation is no different. Joseph’s moment of deliverance came when Pharaoh promoted him. For Moses, it was when God parted the Red Sea. For Job, it was when God spoke to him out of the whirlwind and restored everything he lost twofold. For Lazarus, it was when Jesus said Lazarus, come forth. For us, it is the blessed hope. It was prefigured by Enoch, Elijah, and our Lord and Saviour. It’s a promise. Its coming is as certain as a sunrise. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man. … Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.
Father, thank You for sharing your plan with us and showing us what the future holds. Thank You for your promise to never leave us or forsake us. Thank You for your promise that no weapon that is fashioned against us will stand. Thank You for the great salvation and mighty deliverance You have prepared for us. We love and trust You, Father. Thank You most of all for giving us your Son, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
PS: However you feel about the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, it presents a new opportunity to fulfill the Great Commission. Some 48,000 Afghans have already arrived in the US. You do not have to leave the country to be a missionary. God sends plenty of people to the US from all over the world. Jesus told us to preach the gospel to every creature.
