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Volume. XXIV, No. 22 The Bible and a New World OrderWinston Churchill, Jimmy Carter, Gorbachev, George H. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Gordon Brown, and recently Barrack Obama have all called for a "New World Order". In 1989, President George H. Bush (George Bush senior) introduced the “New World Order” in his commencement address at Texas A&M University, saying, "Ultimately, our objective is to welcome the Soviet Union back into the World Order. Perhaps the world order of the futurewill truly be a family of nations." Two years later, President George Bush (January 1991) also stated in one of his public speeches, "If we do not follow the dictates of our inner moral compass and stand up for human life, then this lawlessness will threaten the peace and democracy of the emerging ‘New World Order’ we now see, this long dreamed-of vision we’ve all worked toward for so long." Washington Times columnist Jeffrey T. Kuhner wrote on 25th Oct 2009, “President Obama is on a path toward establishing a one-world government. This is the warning of Christopher Monckton, a former major policy adviser to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher…Global-warming alarmists are using the myth of climate change to impose an embryonic socialist world government. Following the collapse of communism, the West\'s progressive elites desperately searched for a viable ideological alternative. They found it in environmentalism.” What of the “New World Order” and of the “One-World Government”? The “New World Order” is a term used to describe the uniting of the world\'s so-called superpowers to secure and maintain global peace, prosperity, safety and security. Synonymous with the term New World Order are the terms “One-World Government,”“Global Governance,” and “Globalization”. All these terms are used interchangeably and at different times to communicate to different audiences. And the “long dreamed-of-visionof man” Bush mentioned for a global government and dominance, of course, can be traced back to the Tower of Babel “incident” of Genesis chapter 11, in which God providentially intervened and halted the progress of man’s ambition to establish a one-world government system. Throughout the history of mankind, the world leaders (or tyrants and despots) energized by the “prince of this world” (Jn 12:31, 16:11) have never abandoned the Satanic scheme to form a one-world government. In recent decades, the world leaders have been very excited at the prospects about bringing the so-called “global peace, prosperity and security,” and there has been much talk about entering this "new era" and the establishment of a "New World Order." Is the “New World Order” going to be realised in the not so distant future or it is just overexcitement expressed by some conspiracy theorists? Does the Bible have anything to say about this eschatological event which would impact every individual on this planet? What can Christians anticipate and what duties need to be fulfilled?
Daniel’s Visions
In the book of Daniel, we read that the prophet Daniel saw a vision of a great statue (Dan 2.31-35) and was told its interpretation (Dan 2.36-43). The statue symbolised four great empires that would reign over Israel, namely the historic Babylon (Dan 2:37,38), Medo-Persia (Dan 2:39a), Greece (Dan 2:39b) and the Roman Empire (Dan 2:40). According to Daniel’s prophecy, the fourth Kingdom, the Roman Empire, is being symbolised by the statue\'s legs of iron and its feet of ironmixed with potter’s clay (Daniel 2:41-43). However, there is actually a “fifth empire” or an empire which is reconstructed out of the fourth empire, that Daniel foresaw which will be the last empire that will dominate the world, namely the feet as described in Dan 2:33.
How is this possible? Since historic Rome has already collapsed? It is interesting to note that Daniel did not say that the fourth empire was destroyed (Dan 2:40) but would simply “reconstitute” herself into a New Empire of similar characteristics (Dan 2:41-43). Historians can testify that the Roman Empire indeed has never been conquered nor destroyed, but simply disintegrated from within. Technically speaking, Rome has never fallen but adapted. Wikipedia says, “(the Roman Empire was) Plagued by internal instability and attacked by various migrating peoples, the western part of the empire, including Italy, Hispania, Gaul, Britannia and Africabroke up into independent kingdoms in the 5th century AD.”
As Daniel prophesied, the last empire will have the strength and brutality of Rome, as symbolised by the breakingand subduing \'iron\' of Dan 2 and Dan 7. It isbecause this empire is essentially the same as the fourth beast (Dan 7:19) or fourth empire (Dan 7:23) with slight modification. But this last empire will also have great weakness. Just as iron does not combine with clay, the member states of this government will never readily combine with each other. This is symbolised by the \'part of potters\' clay, and part of iron\' (Dan 2.41-43). Indeed, as Daniel pointed out (Daniel 2:43) the empire would be a conglomeration, multi-cultural and ethnic-linguistic leagues of nations. Before this last empire is divinely and utterly destroyed (Dan 2:44,45), the prophecy also points that the king of this last empire will rule the whole world (Dan 7:7,8,23-24; Rev 13) during the seven years of Tribulation (Dan 7:25, 9:26,27), and he is called “the beast” in Revelation 13:1-6.
The Book of Revelation
Most theologians would agree that the book of Revelation is the key to understanding the eschatological implications of the end time prophecy recorded in the book of Daniel. The book of Revelation reveals that in the final moments of earth’s history, the entire planet will be under the control of one man, backed up by leagues of most powerful (both economically and militarily) nations (Rev 13:1-5; 17:12,13) who will usher in the worst and most cynical tyrannical reign ever known to man. Of course, then national sovereignty of each nation would be destroyed and the constitution of certain countries that guarantees various rights and freedoms would be forever lost under this tyrannical planetary regime. And, this autocratic world ruler code named “the beast” (Rev 13:3,4) or “the man of sin” (2 Thess 2:3) will dominate world’s political and religious affairs and will claim himself to be God,demanding worship from all corners of the earth (2 Thess 2:4); for this reason, he is also called “the Antichrist”.
Through his “global” and “international” agencies and organisations, he will determine who is to live and who is to die or how much production you can produce or how much energy you can consume each day. In a pretence of bringing in global peace, security and prosperity, this despot will bring in false peace, sense of security and prosperity during the first three and a half years of his global dominance (Dan 9:27). After which (ie. after the first three and a half years), he will reveal himself to be the agent of chaos, destruction and despair and whoever refuses to worship him or his image would be killed (Rev 13:15). Whoever does not receive the mark of the beast, whatever that is, will not be able to make any financial transaction (Rev 13:16,17) or have the right of access to sufficient food and daily necessities. Food will be rationed for some, for others it will be totally denied, if they disagree with certain tyrannical global policies or unreasonable and outraged tax schemes. All in all, this short reign of the beast will be what Daniel described in the following manner “there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time…”(Dan 12:1) It is not too dramatic to say that at a time (perhaps not far from now) the world that we know now will be transformed into a house of terror before her destruction as the result of divine judgment (Dan 2:34,35,44,45) at the battle of Armageddon (Rev 16:16; Rev 19:11-21).
The Destruction of the Last Empire
Consider Daniel\'s first vision again, "... a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces." (Dan 2.34) This refers to the destruction of the final form of one-world government at the Second Coming of Christ (Rev 16:16; Rev 19:11-21). The stone cut out without hands or Christ Himself will crush not only the final empire but also all trace of previous world empires (Dan 2:25). Then the glorious and righteous kingdom of Christ will be established and Christ will rule the world that “fills the whole earth” (Dan 2.35; Is 2:2-4; Is 65:25; Eze 34:17-24; Zec 14:8-21; Mic 4:1-5; Rev 20:4,5) from Jerusalem with His saints (Rev 20:6) as a fulfilment to the covenant promise made to king David (2 Sam 7:16; Zec 12:10)!
Conclusion:
The world we live in today seems to be all gearing up for the coming of a one-world government system. Bible prophecies are literally fulfilling before our very eyes in our own generation. The world leaders today are more serious than ever before and have “come out of the closet” to declare their ambition working toward a “New World Order” which will turn the world into a planetary tyrannical regime. As Christians, however, there is no need to be apprehensive or feel uncertain about the future. The Bible has already foretold and forewarned about all that would come to pass before the Second coming of Christ. There will come a day that the world would gather her armies at the valley of Megiddo (Rev 16:16) to make war with the Lamb of God and His saints (Rev 17:14b; 19:14). And Christ shall smite the nations with the word of His power and be victorious over His enemies (Rev 19:15). Having known God’s plan for His people and how the world is going to end, Christians should go out to win people to Christ and urge them to find refuge and rest in Jesus Christ, the only mediator between God and man, who can wash away their sins and enable them to escape from both the temporal wrath of God which will pour out at the end of tribulation period and the eternal damnation of hell. May God help us.
Ps Weng |
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