One World Government

[Damon Rambo]

#1 The degree of persecution against God's church.
FACT: There have been more Christian Martyrs in the last 100 years, than in the entire previous 19 centuries combined.

That is a totally meaningless statement. For one thing, there are more Christians now than at any point in the past. So, in the first 10 years after Christ rose from the grave 10 percent of all Christians could have been killed and that might have been only a few hundred people, while now 1,000,000 Christians could be killed, and that would only be 1 percent of total Christians.

For another, were 600,000 Armenians killed by the Turks where they had been living for 500 years because they were Christian martyrs or because of complex politics? Were 3,000,000 Poles killed because they were Christian martyrs or because they took a British treaty more seriously than common sense?

I do not believe evil is percentage based. If I take 10 people, and kill one of them, it is not the moral equivalent of taking 1 million people, and killing one hundred thousand.

#2 The number of people getting killed by the unrighteous, period.
FACT 150 million people have been killed in wars, in the last 100 years. It has been the bloodiest century in History, outside of Old Testament events (Noah's flood).

Again, meaningless. Less people died during the Plague, but a higher percentage of the world population died of the Plague than died in the last century's wars. And why do people die less often from the Plague? Because science has finally caught up to the Bible in understanding the principles of hygiene, and it is a direct result of the Christianization of Europe.

More people died, per capita, in the 20th century, than in the 1st. You are including disease: I did not. However, if you want to look at that, as many as 500 million people died from smallpox alone. Considering the population median of about 2.3 billion, that makes a ratio of 1:4.6.

Compare this to the Black plague of the 14th century, when the median population was 400 million. It killed a maximum 75 million. A ratio of 1:5.3. Much lower.


Then add in the OTHER huge diseases of the 20th century (Like Polio).

#3 Holiness.
FACT Although in some ways the Romans were just as immoral as we are today, in other ways they were not. For example, in Roman Culture, there was a GREAT respect for parents. Also, even in regards to things like Adultery, the Roman society was not as bad as today. In that time, you could at least get away from unholy things: now, people are bombarded with them from the time of their youth. Things like p0rnography are rampant; effecting even those who desire and struggle to separate themselves unto God. This is more difficult today, than at anytime in history.

Things are illegal in Sweden today that were legal in Rome!!! Please

[/quote]

There are things that are legal in the U.S. today, which were illegal in Rome.

When my Lord says things will get worse and worse, I believe Him. Of course, this whole thing is not the purpose of the thread; my only point was to show that Premillenialism sees things as getting worse until Christ returns, not better, as some seemed to claim.

 

[TimV]

I do not believe evil is percentage based. If I take 10 people, and kill one of them, it is not the moral equivalent of taking 1 million people, and killing one hundred thousand.

Your whole point was relative! You said worse and worse. So, if New York's violent crime has dropped by 5% in the last decade, and New York's population increased by 12% in the last decade, there could be more crime, but no reasonable person would say that it's getting worse and worse in New York.

The tribe I was with in New Guinea had a 35% mortality rate for kids under 5. A couple dozen kids died every year. Here in California hundreds of kids under 5 die every year, but the child mortality rate in California is much better, right?

When my Lord says things will get worse and worse, I believe Him.

And we don't believe Him?

 

[Blueridge Believer]

I guess that's where they got the saying "I'm in Dutch."



LBCF, homie. (please see Article 31).

Actually it's Swiss.

My apologies: is not this confession of Faith most commonly tied to the "Dutch reformed" churches? Outside my particular area of expertise.

Normally they use the 3 forms of unity. The Helvetic confessions were mainly for the Swiss and Germans I believe. Others here would certainly know more about that than I. A very good book on the 2nd Helvetic, three forms of unity and the WCF as well as the WSC and WLC is "Reformed Confessions Harmonized" by Joel Beeke and Sinclair Ferguson. It is well worth the money.

 

[Peairtach]

Not quite sure where you got this from. Pre mills believe things will "wax worse and worse."

A hundred years after Christ rose from the grave how were things compared to now?

How tall were people? How many calories did they have to eat? How long were their work days? What percentage could read? How many clothes did they have? How many rights under their leaders did they have? What percentage lived past 5 years old? How many books could an average person afford to own? What did their teeth look like? What relief from pain did the average person have? How far from their place of birth did they go for vacations? How bright was the light they used after dark? How far had the Gospel gone forth from the Mideast?

When I was in Papua New Guinea during the mid 1980s, the people called the era before the first missionaries the "Time No Good". And that's pretty much what happened everywhere. I wonder (this isn't me being sarcastic since when I was a teenager growing up in a dipsy baptist church I felt like you) how a person can honestly stare history in the face and hold to that sort of pessimistic dipsy thinking. You might find your thinking challenged in the coming years after a bit of consideration ;-)

Since I am not Charismatic, I do not gauge the increase of Gods Kingdom by things like physical health and wealth. I gauge it by other factors, such as:

#1 The degree of persecution against God's church.
FACT: There have been more Christian Martyrs in the last 100 years, than in the entire previous 19 centuries combined.

#2 The number of people getting killed by the unrighteous, period.
FACT 150 million people have been killed in wars, in the last 100 years. It has been the bloodiest century in History, outside of Old Testament events (Noah's flood).

#3 Holiness.
FACT Although in some ways the Romans were just as immoral as we are today, in other ways they were not. For example, in Roman Culture, there was a GREAT respect for parents. Also, even in regards to things like Adultery, the Roman society was not as bad as today. In that time, you could at least get away from unholy things: now, people are bombarded with them from the time of their youth. Things like p0rnography are rampant; effecting even those who desire and struggle to separate themselves unto God. This is more difficult today, than at anytime in history.

I do not know how someone can point to things like the decrease in tooth decay, as an example of the increasing presence of God's Kingdom, when unholiness, persecution against God's Church, and violent death are at an all time high.

You've got to remember that the Devil gets wilder, the more that he sees his time is short. As the Gospel gets spread wider and wider accross the world the remaining wickedness intensifies until it is eventually routed. The tighter the chain of the Gospel around Satan's neck the more desperate his schemes, until he is finally sealed up.

E.g. II Timothy 3:9 and previous verses; Revelation 12:12; Revelation 19. Revelation 19 portrays a spiritual battle of Armageddon in which the forces of evil are thoroughly defeated in history by the Word of God. Revelation 19 may anticipate Christ's literal and physical Second Advent at the Last Day, but it is not that Second Advent itself.

Having said that postmils do not know when the really good days will come. That could be 20 years from now, 100 years from now, 500 years, 1000, who knows. We will see the whole of God's providence in history in Heaven and glorify Him for it.

The rise of persecutory Communism in the twentieth century was not predicted specifically in the Bible, as far as I am aware. In the same way, the possible rise of a One world Government bid, with persecution of Christians
in the twenty-first or twenty-second century, if it happens, may not be specifically mentioned in prophecy. As far as I'm aware it is not.

What is taught is that the First Beast (state persecution, embodied by Nero) comes back again and again until civil government throughout the world is sanctified. Often the First Beast is accompanied by the Second Beast or "False Prophet", ecclesiastical falsehood (Antichrist and antichrists) and persecution.

I agree that Revelation isn't the easiest of books.

It's not made easier when the book indicates that its events are to commence "soon" and that is ignored by interpreters, nor that its events are "signified" and that is ignored or belittled by interpreters.