Stranger Things
Stranger Things
By Pete Garcia
America 2017 could not be a weirder time to be alive. I know you see it too. It is as if the spirit of lawlessness had suddenly decided to manifest itself in a very real and tangible way. The century’s long battle over American ideology has finally come to a head, and the results are not pretty. But adding to the rapid and widespread increase of wickedness, something equally diabolical was/is afoot; the hijacking of the information age. By hijacking, I mean there is as much misinformation as there is real information mixed in with what we call the mainstream news today.
When people don’t know what to believe or trust anymore, it causes them to either mentally check-out or go into full-blown panic mode. The mainstream news (people and organizations) are overwhelmingly leftist (progressive) in their political and ideological worldviews, and they want to drive the national narrative. The reason they had to hijack the narrative, is that objective truth (what is) is lethal to their left-wing ideological pattern of subjective reasoning (the agenda). So if truth can’t be destroyed, the only options left for the left, is to either silence (by force) those who oppose their view, or to sow as much confusion into what is real, that the truth becomes completely obscured.
Clearly, this has been going on for some time now. How the spirit of lawlessness has become visible in 2017, is that we’ve actually moved beyond obfuscation. We are now to the point where truth has become irrelevant.
A Spiritual Vacuum
I do not have the time or space to rehash four centuries worth of spiritual movements, awakenings, and revivals throughout America’s history. But I do want to touch on a weird, brief, flirtation Americans (and Europeans) had at the turn of the previous century. At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, the world briefly flirted with spiritualism (secret societies, Theosophy, séances, mediums, Aleister Crowley, magicians, Spiritism, cults, etc.) before shifting hard into decades of “science” based human-secularism. That ideological shift resulted in the deaths of hundreds of millions of people who were subjugated to militant atheism backed by the political auspices of communism, socialism, and fascism that ran strong from the 1920’s through the 1970’s.
But that ideological shift away from atheism toward spiritualism began in the 1960s and generally stayed the pattern through to the early 2000’s. This was largely due to the popularization of rock (rap/country/etc.) music, free love, recreational drugs, and Eastern Mysticism. People were desperately trying to find a meaning for life apart from Biblical truth. What we are witnessing today is the swing away from sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll (hedonism), into the incorporation of music, occultic and Eastern spiritualism, but infused with technology (via the Internet, virtual reality, robotics, artificial intelligence), and pharmaceutical enhancements.
Truth v. Fiction
Objective truth is as popular now, as acne was when you were a teenager. 2017 has become a watershed year where subjective reasoning and people’s feelings finally trump reality. We are to the point now where the government is actually mandating many of these things, for example:
- Men can identify as women.
- Women can identify as men.
- Men and women can identify as either, or neither.
- Physically healthy people can identify as disabled.
- Adults can identify as toddlers or babies or animals.
- Babies are no longer human.
- Human overpopulation is the world’s second greatest problem.
- The world’s first great problem, (whether anyone admits it or not) is that Israel exists again.
- Borders and walls are bad.
- Unchecked immigration is good.
- Islam equals peace.
- Christianity equals hate.
- The American Constitution no longer matters.
- Socialism is in.
- Capitalism is now fascism.
The sad thing is that if you disagree with any of the above, you a labeled a hater, homophobe, Islamophobe, racist, bigot, fascist, etc. While this is troubling, stranger things than this are on the horizon. Truth is violently being redefined to mean whatever the hearer wants it to mean. This spirit of lawlessness has demonic fingerprints all over it. And it stands to reason that if evil spirits could use drugs, music, and the occult as gateways into demonic possession and oppression, the same could be done with technology and the abandonment of truth. All of these then are simply mechanisms (tools) that dark forces use to ensnare people into a web of lies that deadens discernment and even the ability to reason. For this reason then…the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness… (Romans 1:18-32).
If we look at what the Bible says the future looks like, it becomes apparent that the supernatural world is bubbling back to the forefront and is being fused with drugs (Pharmakeia) and technology to provide a worldwide deception for people who willingly abandoned the truth.
The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness. 2 Thess. 2:9-12
A Brief History
Although many today would consider it a time without equal, we have in certain ways, found ourselves eerily paralleling two other periods of human history. On a cultural level, we are living in a time as described by Jesus is as being as it was “in the days of Noah.” Geopolitically speaking, I would liken our world in 2017 to pre-World War I Europe.
Between the years 1890 and 1914 (this being the same period of the spiritual interest in the occult), the zeitgeist in Europe was a volatile mixture of competing philosophies (economic and governmental), rapidly developing technologies, and ever-increasing political tension. The political instability caused the leaders of the European aristocracy to begin ramping up their militaries in the potential that something would eventually happen. They didn’t know what that “something” was, or how it would manifest itself, but it was in the air. They could sense it. By the time they could see it (the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria), it was too late. Things were in motion that could not be undone. And as the writer Anatole Kaletsky once noted, things went straight from impossible to inevitable — without ever passing through improbable.
The Change Agent
If the world (in its current form) were going to be here decades from now, people then would view the election of President Donald J. Trump as probably the single greatest disruption to American politics since Abraham Lincoln. A complete political outsider with enough connections, resources, and political-moxie to run and soundly beat the anointed successor (H.R.C.). His victory stunned the elites and derailed their globalist agenda. Since day one, he (Trump) has been fighting multiple running gun-battles with: A hostile media, deep-state bureaucracies (shadow government), Democrat and Republican aristocrats, pop culture, the NFL, Mexicans, and angry millennials…and those are just within our borders.
Outside the U.S., the sea of nations is restlessly churning and turning. The “civilized” world is angry that Trump pulled out of the Paris Climate Accords, as well as moving away from the Iranian Nuclear Agreement. Both of these were the previous administration’s attempts to ensnare the US into ever-increasing international entanglements.
Russia and China are making major moves in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and in the Pacific. North Korea and Iran’s nuclear ambitions are forcing the West into either one of two uncomfortable scenarios, either we capitulate and accept them as nuclear powers, or we exact military force to stop them. There no longer is a third option available to us. It wouldn’t be so bad if it were just North Korea and Iran. The reality is that both Iran (Russia) and North Korea (China) have powerful benefactors who would almost invariably side with them in the event of military conflict.
Israel is inching closer to bombing Syria back into the proverbial Stone Age. She simply cannot afford (existentially speaking here) to allow Iran to be imported into what used to be Syria any more than she already has. But by doing so, Israel risks bringing even more unwanted military attention from the likes of Iran, Russia, and now Turkey. This would also incur a quick reaction from the counterfeit Palestinian militants, who will undoubtedly use that as an opportunity to launch missiles and attacks against Israeli cities and communities.
The Iraqi Kurd’s recent bid for independence has begun another Mid-East conflict. Traditionally speaking, the US has sided with the Kurds, and we are in a bit of a bind now since the threat of ISIS has all but dissipated in Iraq. A national Kurdistan presents a huge threat to the post-WWI boundaries of Iraq, Iran, and Turkey and they simply will not allow Kurdistan to become a reality.
All of these issues (just to name a few) have become a geo-political mine-field for the President. Any of these are ready to explode if even a single misstep occurs. Even though they are not all necessarily connected per se, you can bet that if any of them kick off, they all could.
So where do things go from here?
Conclusion
When you add up the inability to reason (subjective reasoning replacing objective truth), demonic influence, political instability/military positioning, and a powerful change agent, you have the real potential for a world that is already unhinged, to fully go off the rails.
I believe that God divinely appointed President Trump to win the 2016 presidential election for a reason (Daniel 4:17; Romans 13:1). I don’t pretend to know exactly why, but my guess is that it has to do with setting the prophetic stage. According to Scripture, when the Antichrist (man of sin, son of perdition, the rider on the white horse, etc.) arrives on the scene, he does so at an unprecedented time of crisis and upheaval. A world clamoring for peace and security doesn’t do so if it already has peace and security in place (1 Thess. 5:1-3).
This man of sin disguises his political ambitions under the false banner of peace (Daniel 7:8, 8:24, 11:36; Rev. 6:1-2). But in order for there to be a global demand for peace, there first needs to be a global crisis, instability, and war.
Think about it this way.
Why do we even know the names of men like Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.? Well, they were great peacemakers who rose up in a period of great injustice. If there hadn’t been an injustice to begin with, they wouldn’t have felt the compulsion to do something about it. But because there was a great injustice, they did rise up, and their message was heard, and it did resonate with the masses, thus propelling them into historical greatness.
This is why I believe President Trump is prophetically significant. He is a leader who has watched the world moving in the wrong direction for a long time and feels compelled to do something about it. For decades, previous American leaders have allowed the crisis we see today to fester and go unchecked. In turn, it has created a world where the options for peaceful resolutions have become all but non-existent. This is very much the same way that the pre-World War II European leaders refused to deal with Adolph Hitler until they were forced to deal with him.
The only options left to us now in regards to both Iran and North Korea is war and war brings instability to the world order. Decades of lessons-learned (failed attempts) prove both that our economic embargoes and diplomacy have repeatedly and gloriously failed. But out of war and instability will come a world who demands peace and security above all else. Let us not forget that in the aftermath of both WWI and WWII, came serious and concerted efforts to create globalist organizations (League of Nations, United Nations) that would unite the global order into one. After the next World War will be when the man Antichrist rises up.
“What we want is a man of sufficient stature to hold the alliances of all people and to lift us out of the economic morass into which we are sinking. Send us such a man, and be he god or devil, we will receive him.” Henri Spaak circa 1957-1960 Secretary General of NATO
The geopolitical situation will allow the opportunity for a man such as this to arise on the political stage. This man who comes on the white horse of false peace, will take advantage of the advancements in technology along with the supernatural backing of his satanic benefactor to impose his iron-fisted will over the entire world. He will capitalize on the moral and spiritual bankruptcy of a world that had been “left behind” to deceive them. These are they who had not received a love of the truth.
The stage has already been set. The actors are in place. What we are about to witness now, is the curtain rise and the prologue to begin. While the Church is promised by Christ Himself to not enter into the 70th Week (John 14:1-3; Rev. 3:10), what we are witnessing now is the first act of things to come before we are supernaturally caught up to be with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. If you do not know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, do not hesitate even one second longer.
Admit you’re a sinner and need God (Romans 3:23, 6:23)
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and His death, burial, and resurrection as sufficient payment for your sins (John 3:16)
Confess your faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 10:9-13)
If you’ve done this with a sincere heart, then the Bible states that you are sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of redemption (Eph. 1:13-14) and that you will be redeemed before the 70th Week of Daniel. This is the time when God’s wrath is poured out upon the unbelieving earth.
For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. Therefore comfort each other and edify one another, just as you also are doing. 1 Thess. 5:9-11