Dennis Pumford’s Revelation Decoded Weekly - Election 2004

Election 2004

The election is finally over! It seemed permanent!  And, we might ask what we can learn from it that concerns the book of Revelation.  What caught my attention was the number one issue that concerns Americans most according to the exit polls: morality.  That’s right—not the economy.  Not Iraq.  And even above the fear of terrorism was the concern over what direction our nation is going morally.  Actually, the pendulum has been swinging that way since the mid nineties.  This election revealed that the direction people want our country to go back to has not changed.  All states that put marriage up for a vote were told clearly what the people want: traditional morals.  In fact, as I read through all the issues on the ballots of many states and locales, it seemed that conservative values won the day, by-and- large.  

According to Revelation chapter 13, there will come a time just before Jesus comes when the pendulum will swing so far in the direction we are seeing it go that morality will be required of all.  “And there was given to him to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast might even speak and cause as many as do not worship the image of the beast to be killed,” Revelation 13:15.  That is a heavy-duty swing of the moral right!  Without going in to all the ramifications of the first beast, the second beast and the image to the beast, we can learn a simple fact: someday, the majority will coerce the rest to worship.  Pendulums do not swing that far under normal circumstances.  There are conditions that bring about desperate actions of leaders whose hands are forced by their constituents.  Why did Hitler and the Nazis come to power in 1934?  It was the desperate financial circumstance that all Germans found themselves in.  Our “Great Depression” was like a walk in the park compared to what the Germans were experiencing.  So, desperate people put a mad man with “solutions” into office, and the world had the Third Reich, and we entered World War II.  When things are going relatively well, as they are now, people do not vote extreme measures to be taken.  Apparently, before we get to the situation described in Revelation 13, we will go through desperate circumstances.    This is the scenario as I see it: We are in a pendulum swing towards conservative, traditional values.  That is actually good.  But, as we approach the end of time, the angels holding back the “four winds” will be released.  Then the world will experience the “time of trouble such as never was since there was a nation.”  Leaders will win office at that time who promise solutions.  Those solutions will be in response to what the majority want.  The majority will be blaming the problems we are coping with on our abandonment of the Christian principles and values that “this country was founded on.”  They will contend that God has withdrawn His blessing from such a formerly favored land because we have abandoned His principles in favor of immorality.  The cry will be: “Let’s get back to God and His commands.”  That actually would be a good idea, but it must be done on a person-by-person, voluntary conversion basis.  But, desperate people take desperate measures, and the prophecies of Revelation 13 will be fulfilled when “worship” will be forced with the threat of death.  

I am glad the pendulum is swinging in the direction of morality.  I am glad the majority of Americans are concerned about values.  But, understanding prophecy as I think I do, I am also very aware of the direction the pendulum is swinging and just how far it will go.  

Today, many would like to “get back to our Puritan roots.”  That is really too far back.  What makes America great and blessed of God is the fact that we allow people to be free to worship or not to worship.  God is about freedom.  He even gave Lucifer, and our first parents, Adam and Eve, the right to choose.  America is great because of freedom, not morality.  The Puritans were so concerned that everyone “be good” that they required all to attend church on Sunday and refrain from work or business.  The freedom to do as one pleased spiritually did not come to America until many battles for that freedom were won by people who were in the minority in their religious convictions.  To go back to our religious roots would mean that the morals and scruples and ways of the majority be imposed on the rest.  We are not saying that God is not concerned about morals.  Indeed He is.  Look at Sodom and Gomorrah!  But, God is not impressed by people who are doing the right thing because they are forced to.  He wants to see a righteous people who are free to be otherwise.  The first two hundred years of American history was our growing up period.  We learned many things and made many corrections.  Let’s go back to when society recognized right and wrong and ethics prevailed, but let’s not go back so far that we make the same mistakes that the Puritans made.   

Until next week, let freedom ring! 

Dennis
dennispumford.com

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