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About Jesus - Steve Sweetman Not
Invincible Many of us in the West,
especially in America, tend to believe our nations are invincible.
This presupposition is a false premise to prepare for a nation's
future. Even an elementary
introduction to history tells us that nations rise into prominence and
nations fall into obscurity. Daniel
2:21 and 4:17 declares God's involvement in both the rise and fall of
nations. Daniel 2:21 reads: "He [God] changes
times and seasons; he deposes kings and raises up others. He
gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning." Daniel 4:17 reads:
"The decision is
announced by messengers, the holy ones declare the verdict, so that the
living may know that the Most High is sovereign over all kingdoms on earth
and gives them to anyone he wishes and sets over them the lowliest of
people." Ephesians 1:20 concurs
with Daniel 2:21 and 4:17 when it states that God has authorized Jesus to
be the supreme authority over all nations. "... he [God] raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come." The Bible teaches that
in this present age the Lord Jesus Christ is the final universal
authority, as Jesus claimed in Matthew 28:18. "Then Jesus came to
them and said, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to
me.'" With the above in mind,
I refer you to Francis Schaeffer, a twentieth-century Christian
philosopher/historian. In his
1976 book entitled "How Should We Then Live," he documented the
rise and fall of nations and civilizations as seen in Daniel 2:21.
What Schaeffer wrote on page 227 of his hard-cover edition can't be
ignored. There, he quoted
Edward Gibbon and listed five attributes that preceded the fall of the Roman Empire.
"Edward
Gibbon (1737 - 1794) in his Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire (1776 -
1788) said that the following five attributes marked Rome at the end;
first, a mounting love of show and luxury; second, a widening gap between
the very rich and the very poor; third, an obsession with sex, fourth,
freakishness in the arts, masquerading as originality, and enthusiasm
pretending to be creativity; fifth, an increased desire to live off the
state." As I list these five
cultural attributes again, note how they prevail in our western-world
today. The West is consumed with: - a widening gap between the very rich and the very poor The above cultural
attributes certainly portray the social reality of the West today.
They remind me of what Billy Graham said in a May 15, 2011,
message. "If God does not
judge America, He must apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah." I conclude that God will
never apologize to
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