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Satan's 'Spin' on Tribulational Events

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The events of the official Tribulation are recorded in a bizillion passages of Scripture. It takes some years to go through them all. Many books have been written summarizing the events. So, I'll try to write something "different". What follows is a scenario of how Satan&Co. "spin" the Trib to achieve their goals. The purpose of this hypothetical scenario is really to show how Satan&Co. deceive NOW -- but, applied to circumstances THEN. In other words, the scenario below misstates some details and events to suit popular notions of them. (You need to study under a pastor to get the actual rollout and underlying doctrines of the Tribulation. I am not a pastor, and do not want to be used as a substitute for one. So this is just brainstorming material. So I'm not going to stick to the actual Bible rollout scenario, here, so I can't be USED as a substitute. So, here are some of the DIVERGENCES versus Bible, in what follows below: Bible doesn't say the Two Witnesses come down from heaven, but that's the popular belief; doesn't say the Rapture will be a PUBLICALLY-VISIBLE disappearance, but that's the popular belief; the demons coming up out of Abyss really don't come up the way and when depicted below, but there will BE demons active and maybe visible, then, depending on what God allows and what Satan&Co. choose to do.) But the "spin" scenario's underlying STRATEGY and TACTICS would still be correct. [For example, the scenario assumes that the 5th-6th Trumpets sound in the first half of the Trib, mainly because the Witnesses are listed in the 6th Trumpet; that's not true. The 5th and 6th trumpets begin in the third year of the Trib. The Witnesses are killed AT the Trib-midpoint, and then the 7th Trumpet begins. See RevPlay.htm for a better outline of the real Trib. What follows below isn't intended to represent the real order of real Trib events, but how Satan spins the events.] Why? Because the Holy Spirit explains these future events, so we can discern the underlying strategy and tactics; thus, so we can avoid ourselves being casualties.

Understand how Satan works. Basically, he thinks he's better than the Lord. So he:

  1. Plagiarizes/'kidnaps' ALL that the Lord Himself is/does. Satan claims to have the Lord's Attributes, or to be the author of something the Lord does, or he imprisons whatever is of the Lord. Religion, of course, is how he plagiarizes God, substituting himself. 'Kidnapping' Examples: the incredible kidnapping of Scripture from Day One, and the awesomely drugged-incompetence of interpretation and translation of Scripture throughout history.

  2. "Spins" whatever is God's -- God's activity, God's people, God's Word -- as demonic.
  3. "Spins" whatever is his own -- activity, people, word -- as God's.

Thus, he can afford, as always, to agree that "x" is true -- but REVERSE the origin. That's always been his favorite ploy: "spin" what's satanic as God; and what's God, as satanic. So, he can "spin" the spectacular events of the Rapture, its supernatural cataclysms and plagues, the "two witnesses", the three angels flying in mid-heaven daily, etc -- as demonic activity, using all these events to his advantage. Or, as Divine, but specifying an opposite meaning, or an opposite group as targets of the judgement. We'll see how, in the next subsection.

Satan's basic strategy re the official Tribulation: A) make the first half of the Trib look like the last half, B) make the mid-point of the Trib look like the Second Coming, and C) make the last half look like the beginning of the Millenium (which it could resemble, to the less-informed).

Satan's main goals for the Tribulation: 1) make the world refuse Christ (especially via "Lord, Lord"! religiosity); meanwhile, 2) confiscate/obfuscate as many Bibles (and believers!) as he can get, and 3) kill enough Jews and believers to leave too small a "remnant" for the "promise" to be fulfilled (to Israel). Notice how TIMING is his focus: the entire MEANING changes by merely mistating what TIME is represented. We'll see how this works in the Tribulation scenario, below.

RELIGION IS KEY TO ACHIEVING THESE GOALS, because he needs to round up believers. Just like the candy house attracted Hansel und Gretel, so also a grand religious house is a sweet attraction to the misguided believer or Jew. Self-righteous arrogance finds religion "sweet". Self-righteous arrogance is a mutation of a genuine desire for God's Righteousness which "goes over the edge" like the 2nd Temptation in Matt4 -- grace is chopped out of Ps91, the promise that GOD works. God is chopped out, by self-righteous arrogance, in favor of self doing something. This was Satan's flaw, why he fell. This is why religion is his creation, never God's. This is why people routinely fall for religion in every epoch of history, and this is why people persecute others. All to glorify self. Blindly. Feeling holy, the meanwhile! Feeling, Feeling, Feeling! Rationalizing, Rationalizing, Rationalizing! "Mincing steps", Isa3:16!


Why Religion is, as my pastor puts it, Satan's "Ace Trump"

KEY ==> For Satan to best achieve his goals, it's VITAL he get folks to believe that they can "help" Christ return. Not only Christians. If you look around the web, you'll find that there are countless messianic-style counterfeits in every version of religion, since the dawn of time. People get active, if they can 'do' something to bring God to them! Look around the web: whether it's some channeler sessions at the United Nations, or the push for United Religions and new-age-ism, or any flavor of 'faith' you want to examine, you'll see one common theme they all tout: a new golden age is on the rise. Which, of course, by means of something 'we' do, we can 'help' make happen sooner. BEWARE.

That's why even NOW Satan keeps on spinning the lie that the Church will be in the Tribulation. HE NEEDS BELIEVERS NOW TO MISTAKE THE REV17 HARLOT FOR THE REAL CHURCH. See? If folks realize the Church is NOT in the Tribulation, then he can't spin the Trib events to suit his goals. See, HE NEEDS THE LIE OF CHURCH-IN-THE-TRIB, SO BELIEVERS WON'T RECOGNIZE THAT THE 'CHURCH' HE CREATES IS THE HARLOT OF REV17. Why do you think John was given the vision, in the first place? AS A WARNING.

Think carefully, here: why do you think God gave the warning to John? What do you see in the history of Christianity, beginning within a generation of Christ's Ascension? THE HARLOT. Let's look at the history of the suddenness of religious coalescence beginning after the Cross:
See, a religion/"faith" is really a HARLOT, when it:

  • CLAIMS "Old"="correct"! Note the blatantly irrational claim.
  • REPLACES (Eph4:5) "One Lord, One Faith (Faith-alone-in-Christ-Alone,AND Bible-Alone), One Baptism (Spirit's Placing us in Union with Christ at Salvation)",
    with 'OUR pope/leadership, OUR interpretation, OUR tradition'!

  • THEREFORE INSISTS it's "the one true faith", banging the drum on a few doctrines which are narrowly interpreted, and calling all who differ 'heretical' to the point of ostracizing/ excommunicating/ persecuting those who disagree;
  • THEREFORE ENTICES by means of doing-something-structured, emphasizing/tabooing days, foods, activities, clothing -- all to make one FEEL 'right' -- or, FEEL bad/unworthy if one DOESN'T 'obey' activities/prohibitions;
  • THEREFORE INSISTS on being "paid" works/money, and on "rewarding" those who "obey" with approbation (a harlot must be paid for her favors);
  • THEREFORE institutionalizes;
  • THEREFORE seeks to gain (or have influence over) political power.
    (Christian activism is always harlotry, anytime, anywhere; likewise, it always is based on false doctrine and those in it will be horribly disciplined. Bible has so many examples of this fact; 'scary, how folks miss its many warnings.)

    You can EASILY prove these characteristics by reviewing Revelation 17. Suggest you use a study Bible, so you can more easily read the cross-references which elaborate on what each metaphor means throughout Scripture. It's real important to see that the Revelation imagery is a frequent warning-theme in Scripture, not merely some isolated passage. So, if you don't have such a Bible, here's a short glossary: "sits" doesn't mean merely sitting, but dominating -- idea that the 'beast' is skillfully ridden. "Purple" denotes religious power; "scarlet", political power. "Beast" denotes a political entity, while "horn" or "head" denotes those ruling the entity. "Harlot" is a frequent metaphor in the Bible for spiritual fornication, i.e., the phallic cult or religion. "Mystery" always means something known only to 'insiders'. In the NT, it's also a keyword for CHURCH, but here is used sarcastically, to mean a FAKE CHURCH. (As should be obvious, since it's really a HARLOT.)


  • What does Satan gain, tactically, through this push of religion? Look: without popular support, Satan can't get Jews and believers rounded up and killed. Well, how does he manufacture that popular support? Rev17! Spiritual prostitution! So, with RELIGION, Satan motivates a pan-international UNITY. Via centralized RELIGION, Satan can CONTROL the dissemination of any truth to suit his goals. Via such RELIGION, Satan can motivate the kind of zeal he needs to foment pogroms of whomever he feels should be 'eliminated'. Without such religion, he can't, because ONLY religion can transcend tribalism/ nationalism loyalty-structures. History has proven that to us time and again. So what must NOT be in the Tribulation, to best WARN believers then? CHURCH! Thus they will know that ANY 'Christian Religion' at that point is ONLY Satanic.

    Satan also gains by using religion to arouse opposition against it. See, anyone who needs power over a lot of other beings needs to find some way to divide them. If people are divided against themselves, an outsider can more easily control them all, because they will look to that outsider for alliance. That's why he's constantly pushing economic/racial/cultural/ ethnic/national differences "over the edge", just like he tried to do to the Lord in the Second Temptation. Overstress makes for black/white polarizations, so Satan promotes religifying every human distinction he can. So, one 'belonging' to that distinction feels disloyal for not zealously supporting it. So, those not having that distinction are more motivated to oppose. So, he can wipe out whatever group he himself promoted, anytime it suits him, by riling up some other group he chooses to defeat it. Using BOTH to kill each other. This pattern, so frequent in history, is likewise key to realizing his goals in the Trib. The political rulers get real tired of the religious domination they themselves at first promoted in order to gain political power; so, they end up warring against the religion (Rev16:17ff).

    Bear the above strategy and goals in mind as you read what follows, because Satan's strategy, goals, and tactics are EXACTLY THE SAME NOW. NOW is his better opportunity, because NOW God is deliberately invisible, as we learned from Parts III and IV. So, Satan NOW has a monopoly on visibility. That gives him an advantage NOW which he will no longer have, when the official Tribulation begins. So -- yes, he wants the official Trib, but on his terms, NOT God's. He figures that if he plays his cards right, he can outmaneuver God the Son. So, when God "goes visible" again, Satan wants to be in such a good strategic position, no matter what God does, NOT ENOUGH folks want Christ's ACTUAL Return. So, if Satan manages to get in a good-enough strategic position, he himself will demand the removal of the Church -- and God just might then agree. (Now do you see why your role in 'Church' is so important?)


    Warning: what follows is deliberately written in a cavalier, caustic style, to mimic Satan's attitude toward the human race. (His style more erudite than I show, but I don't want to cover up his venom with fancy words.)


    "Spin" for the First Half of the Tribulation

    So, let's begin. First, what will people then be like? Pretty much like now. One "layer" of folks will have these characteristics: Mostly apathetic, mostly looking for a good time. Mostly uninterested in anything Biblical. Mostly skeptical, jaded, bored, empty. Shallow. Fragmented, short-attention spans. Busy. Go-getters. Acquisitive. Fond of the "new".

    In short, the "normal" trends of today will continue. So, folks will be rather jolted by the Rapture. It will be "new". It will be televised. Wow. Bartenders will do well that day.

    The official Trib, of course, begins with the Rapture. Big, noisy, cataclysmic. People suddenly disappearing from shops, beds, workplaces -- the police will get more telephone calls than they can handle. Lots of folks will hit the churches, afraid. Notice carefully: people are VERY religious, just like Satan is. Spectacular stuff, like people disappearing while driving their cars -- so maybe a demon slips behind the driver's seat, to make sure the de-occupied car doesn't kill people. So, if you're alive then (I hope not!) you may find yourself driving next to an angel -- if they're Satan&Co.'s angels, they smile a lot, I hear. Be sure to smile back -- and believe in Christ right away.

    At the SAME TIME that this very-public Rapture occurs, God's envoys COME DOWN FROM HEAVEN, to explain why it happened: the "Two Witnesses". They spectacularly explain to the whole world what the Rapture means, and what is about to happen. (In the OT, God ALWAYS publicly warned folks before He administered judgement. Since the official Trib is a reversion to an OT time, it will likewise have this OT characteristic).

    Meanwhile, all kinds of horrific natural cataclysms are occurring, Exodus-style: the first six trumpets (the Two Witnesses are part of the sixth one). ORDERED, not random; each one rolls out, plays for awhile, and is superceded by a fresh cataclysm. So that you can READ in Revelation, what these things MEAN. So you know REAL God is behind them. [You don't have to wait that long: see Mirroring.htm and LvS4a.htm, which show that even today, we have unimpeachable, empirical PROOF that the God of the Bible is the real God. Which evidence, we've been ignoring, though it's been in front of our faces, for centuries.] Earthquakes due to volcanic eruptions. Wholescale fires. Pollution of both sea and freshwater. On so grand a scale are these eruptions, that agriculture can't cope! No food! No water! Many thousands sicken, famine is widespread, tragedy everywhere in epic proportion. Worse, suddenly these alien-looking creatures swarm all over the place, torturing and murdering. (The demons in Abyss are not disembodied spirits; at this point God releases them from their millenia of imprisonment.) So the arrival of the Two Witnesses has a rather spectacular backdrop, and you can be sure everyone's interested in the explanation by the Witnesses. And they DO explain. And warn anyone believing in God, to STAY AWAY from the Temple. Because (as per Rev11:1ff's sarcasm, compared to Eze39ff), GOD DIDN'T AUTHORIZE the current "Temple", to BE there.

    Lots of folks all over the world will go scrambling for Bibles. Which is exactly what Satan wants. Everyone will be combing the pages of Scripture, suddenly! to find out what all this means, how to 'read the signs'. Most, of course, will be deflected into Satan's spin, that way. A few will not.

    The 144,000 Jewish evangelists appear to believe in Christ right away, maybe from the first day of the Rapture. As unbelievers, they probably came from "Lord, Lord" (Matt7:21ff) religious backgrounds, and know the Bible by heart, since that's the most common category (just turn on 'Christian' cable and see how NO ONE gets the Gospel right); and/or, as unbelievers they were exposed to a LOT of Biblical material (yet didn't believe it) prior to the Rapture. So, at the Rapture, suddenly all that learning 'clicks': it suddenly all makes sense. They believe. Geographically, they will be located all over the world when this happens. So, between the spectacular displays of the Rapture, and the Two Witnesses, these folks all believe. They become so convinced, so quickly, that they resolve to live solitary, peripatetic lives: that's why they don't date or marry. They will know they've only got 7 years left. [I think my pastor says they don't even live beyond the first half of the Trib. I need to check my notes and the exegesis supporting his statements, to verify the notes!]

    How do Satan&Co. respond to all this? As always, they will 'bang the drum': oh, this is happening, oh, this disaster, oh, focus on the shock, oh oh oh oh oh. Beat LOUD the "feel" of some truth (e.g., human life is sacred), and you obscure its CONTENT (so ONLY God makes one human, at birth). So, they will STRESS the visible, the spectacular, so to obfuscate the CONTENT of the message. As always, they thus take advantage of people's shock and titillation in SEEING: here, seeing supernaturality. [Note how the demons in the Gospels are always keen to advertise that Christ is the Messiah; how that demon-possessed girl kept running in front of Paul in Acts, advertising he was from God. Note further how in all these cases the response was to hush them.]

    So, the media will cover the disappearances and cataclysms on every channel/station, in every newspaper. Just like they do now, ever greedy to feed the hunger for blame. So, Satan&Co. become visible (and possess the willing) right away, so they can say -- I bet -- that the 2nd Advent has just occurred, but that it is being implemented by "forerunners". These "forerunners" are the demons. They have so many awesome powers, they could pass themselves off as Resurrected believers. Or, as what they are: angels -- but pretending to be of "God". (The actual 2nd Advent has the Lord coming first, with angels and believers coming behind Him. Further, angels don't rule in the Mill. In short, the actual 2nd Advent is very different, but people on earth at the time of the Rapture are too shocked to think, even if they had any real knowledge of the true events.) Let's call these demons "Resurrected Ones", aka "RO", just to give them a name they might claim, as a ruse. So it will be EASY for their gorgeous appearances ("long hair" is a metaphor for captivating beauty, in Rev9:8) to fool mere humans. [It's more likely, considering the "Wormwood" passage, that Abbadon&Co. are released by Satan, due to some argument he makes in the Trial; then, he's thrown out at the Trib. midpoint; so the demons are probably released about 6-8 months before it. However, the first half of the Trib will have demons pretending that they are forerunners. So take your pick as to which demons you want to use, in this scenario. Not all demons are disembodied. The ones in the Abyss, are visible. Those not part of the Genesis 6 debacle became disembodied spirits, as a result of it, but that hardly matters; they can do a LOT of visible things: they can make people hallucinate seeing them, etc. -- so could nonetheless pull off the kind of thing illustrated here. It's just a question of 'how'.]

    Yeah, baby. The RO can easily claim that the disappearing folks went to Hell under the Baptism of Fire doctrine (right doctrine, wrong timing, wrong folks, but few will figure that out). That they, the Resurrected Ones, have now come to earth, to set it up for Christ's RETURN. A sort of advance cadre, so to speak. After all, the Lord shouldn't have to do things Himself -- He has underlings. They will appear VERY beautiful, humble, loving, etc. (If you ever saw the Twilight Zone episode, "To Serve Man", you'll get the idea. It's a frequent theme in alien movies.)

    So, just as the media does with any governmental announcements, what the Two Witnesses say will be distorted into soundbytes. Ahhh, what they mean is this 'church' thing. Ahh, the departure of all those people is the Baptism of Fire! And the arrival of the "RO" at the same time is the preparation for the Second Coming. Ahhh. This 'uniting' church is part of that preparation!

    So, the RO/angels are here 'early', preparing the world for Christ to return. They will warn everyone that it's real important to join (they will slyly distort the Gospel into works), because if you've not joined up by the time the Lord returns, you'll be zapped into hell. This tactic will help everyone get on-board, get excited, etc. A delayed Advent is thus an important tactic, for it builds interest. (Satan knows man is always more excited to seek, than to actually GET. So he needs to dangle the carrot. Show a little leg. But not give away the store.) So, out goes the call -- believers everywhere! Come register! Bring your Bibles! Celebrate! Tell all your friends! Get them to come along! Regional and local registry 'chapters' will be set up. You know: potlucks, get-togethers. Prayer groups. The works.

    Note their cleverness here: Satan, who at this point still wants to maintain a low personal profile (God's supposed to be invisible, see) -- can use the Two Witnesses as representing his message, so to coalesce the new believers in easy-to-kill locations: Rome ("Babylon"), and Jerusalem. The 'church' will have TWO headquarters, not one, so to speed Jewish regathering in Israel. 'Especially, if the Temple is rebuilt before the Rapture begins. In short, Satan&Co. will seem to AGREE with God's envoys, AND will distort their message, just as they always have: See? Israel gets peace from its enemies: friendly Gentile nations. These Gentile nations federate, with Rome as the Federal capital. 'The Lord' chose Rome also, because that was the ruling power which officially crucified Him. (Cute, huh.) So, Rome shall be the Gentile religious capital, too. Everyone register in the Book of Life! Get on the Internet! Register with your respective capital, so you won't go to hell! (Of course, the most enthusiastic of these new believers will indeed move to either Rome or Jerusalem. Right where Satan wants them. More-apathetic types can be rounded up later, locally.)

    This move to 'church' will polarize the world. Obviously every Moslem will be VERY antagonistic, for one of his shrines has been taken over by the infidel! More importantly, Abbadon&Co. want to beat Satan's forces for their own reasons, so while ALL demons are intent on destroying believers and Jews, they are also at war with each other. They ally and form groups against each other. So, a whole lot of humans will be maximally encouraged (and possessed) to be antagonistic. So, for those who still don't believe the spectacular messengers (who are really from God), the competing demon groups "help" the human disbelief still further, by letting them 'know' -- pssssst -- those messengers are demons/demon-led humans! 'God' will use the entire 'church' thingy to get all the demons rounded up and defeated! With their 'help' -- their rewardable help. So, (to the skeptic), why not join, so you can help wipe them out? Or, variantly, why not enlist with the godly opposition, and hunt such folks down? God will reward you if you do (of course).

    What about the natural disasters? And the plague-diseases? All three demon groups can pass them all off as warning judgements that precede the Return of Christ -- which of course, they are. Thus the first half of the Trib looks like the last half. So, they can dramatically increase interest (demons are nothing, if not greedy for attention), because the world thinks it's got to get 'on board', for Christ's 'Return'. So, Satan (etc.) can say, ok -- we gotta get the faithful to 'join', now --under the 'church'! So, the real believers who didn't get suckered in the first time, give in now. To their destruction.

    Satan will ALSO say, for he loves satirizing the truth so much, that demons are also on earth right now to prevent Christ's return! (Which, of course, they are!) So, people, we gotta pull together and fight these demons! Now! (Ahhh. People love to have someone to hate.) So, this justifies a sort of pogrom -- let's find the unfaithful! So, an intensive manhunt begins. Any real believers -- particularly Jews -- who didn't get tricked into 'joining' during the first two passes, will be now hunted. (As always, Satan marks off some Jews as 'right', and others as 'wrong', so he can kill ALL of them, yet avoid anyone detecting that goal.)

    Meanwhile, of course, the earth is settling into a busy peace. 'A blend of world's busy-ness during both the late 1930's and the mid-1950's. If you know your history, you remember that in such times what really happens is a busy-choosing-of-sides, an INTERNAL preparation for war. So, on the surface, the world seems to have finally hit nirvana (well, excluding those nasty Divine disasters and diseases), for everyone is soo very busy. War preparation is good for business, heh. 'And for internal-struggles-for-power. Like, for religious power. (In Europe, all this shock has finally motivated one guy to take over: the guy who'll end up winning control as the first "beast" by Rev. 13, here gets the 3rd Temptation from Satan, and loves it. After all, the demons are also fighting with each other; so, they begin immediately to motivate internal rivalries among humans, and 'ally' with them.)

    So, this phony "peace" period thus has (at least) the following nicely-tyrannical characteristics:

    During this respite, people will grow more and more negative to this 'church'. Most will display the negativity as apathy, given the progressive fear which will pervade. Of course, whole masses of folks of other religions will be very hostile. And, 'the Lord' isn't coming, yet. Time passes. People get itchy. Maybe this 'Lord' isn't really coming, after all. Maybe it's a hoax. Maybe it's a power ploy. So, the 'underground' grows, too. Not merely of believers. In short, lots and lots of antagonism to this 'church' builds. Which is EXACTLY what Satan wants. Everyone focuses on ANYTHING but the Real God. Mostly 'in God's Name'. Perfect.

    So, Satan finally got hegemony over both demons, and man. So, he switches tactics. His time has come! No one wants the Most High! Further, Satan thinks he's gotten enough Jews and believers killed. He thinks he's won! But God disagrees! So, REVOLT!!! Satan&Co. try to take over Heaven. It doesn't work, and the lot get tossed out of Heaven for good (Rev12:12 is when the 7th Trumpet actually sounds).


    "Spin" for the Second Half of the Tribulation

    Now, stuck down here, they REALLY have to get moving. The first task is to stage a fake-2nd Advent.

    For a nice, flashy entrance, Abbadon (via his indwelling the Gentile) kills off the Two Witnesses. Everyone celebrates. Simultaneously, Satan&Co. use this victory to legitimate and set up the Danite and Gentile guy, who are newly-revealed as prophet and CHRIST, respectively. The spin? It's the REAL 2nd Advent, folks! After all, who but the REAL Christ was able to kill those two scalawags? So, the Gentile guy, now sold as a Jewish christ (maybe á la the Plantard claim), swoops down on the federation: "Ahh, you 'church', you were the demons and demon-influenced humans! Time to get rid of you all!" Thus is mimicked -- again! -- yet another (still fake) Baptism of Fire, to justify yet more pogroms. Everyone celebrates even more! At last! This must be the TRUE Lord, yay! So, the 'RO' folks will seem to be destroyed (they'll just change their looks). Oh -- They'll pass off the spectacular resuscitation and Ascension of the Two Witnesses on Day 4 as judgement against them. Folks will believe it, since they didn't like the Two Witnesses anyway.

    Meanwhile, how does Satan&Co. promote the Gentile anti-christ as Christ in Israel? After all, the REAL Christ is supposed to rule from Jerusalem. Moreover, the Danite needs to be ruling, since the Danite is virulently anti-semitic. Can't promote the Danite as Christ, for it's the Gentile guy who'll excite those of other faiths to war with him. Israel all by itself excites little interest. For Israel, alone, has always been worth no more than a 'footstool' -- a bridge one uses on the way to conquer someone else. Kinda like the way Christ has always been valued by man.

    The media will focus on the Statue, too. Now the pogroms can TRULY escalate. All over the world. He's BACK! Whoever won't wear (by laser/microchip implantation?) "the holy number", dies! [Bible merely says the 'mark of the beast' is a human identification number. "666" isn't said to be the actual number, for "6" in Biblical numerology is the symbol for humans. Besides, Satan's not dumb enough to use THAT number.]

    In short, the entire cycle of the first 3.5 years begins anew, but this time with the allegedly-'right' Messiah. Folks will fall for it the second time, because they fell for it the first time. Lightning strikes twice because it struck successfully once. (That's why Hitler CHOSE to go through the Ardennes, the same surprise tactic as Bismarck had used. The French did not learn from WWI.) This second-cycle of banding the 'faithful' together, and pogroms, will be much more intensive. People are very tired; they want their earlier fantasies realized. Those who hated the first 'church' will hate this second one even more. Those who loved the first 'church' -- and are still alive -- will love the second one, more. They can rationalize away any former gullibility due to the similarities between the two takeovers. The second 'church' will have much more punch. Believers who didn't get tricked into the first 'church' will get tricked into this second one, now that a messiah is on earth doing miracles. Punch!

    So, Satan&Co. have prepped the surrounding power blocs for war. All this past attention on Israel has been easy to whip into religious fervor and jealousy. Federations of opposition, even: four groups. The 'King of the North' (KON) swoops down pre-emptively on the 'King of the South' (KOS), to prevent KOS from taking over Israel, and to prevent the 'King of the West' (that Gentile, KOW) from centralizing his power. Meanwhile, the 'kings of the east' (KOE) are advancing, too -- especially to take advantage of the KON's strung-out supply lines. So, now the balance-of-power is to be fought over -- in Israel, of course, the 'woman' of Rev12. (The battle path was already covered, in Part V, just before "The Tribulational Spiritual Life" section.)

    So, the last 3.5 years have two types of "world war" going on. First, intra-nation "war" between the believers in this yet-fake-again-Advent, and those who don't believe in it. Pogroms galore. Second, military-style world war. Everything's somehow Israel's fault, as usual. Or, 'the other guy' is to blame, and we must fight holy war! to get rid of the infidel (sold to each bloc, of course). Motivate folks to war against each other, get vengeance (and plunder), by rushing over to that 'footbridge', the hapless nation Israel. That's Satan's style: get everyone to blame everyone else, so that the blamer can feel holy. So that the one blamed can feel martyr-holy. Everyone's happy, now. At war.

    So God (just as He does now with fires and other weather disasters in US), in that future time, REPEATS the types of punishments He sent during the first 3.5 years. Well, the second time He does them more intensely, and precedes them with a personal plague. 7th Trumpet: #1-#5 of the Goblet (vial) Judgements. If you compare the first four Trumpet Judgements with the Goblet (vial) Judgements #2-#5, you'll see that the latter group are in the same categories. 'Varied just enough, versus the first group, to prove it's deliberate, kinda like what God did when Gideon kept putting out the fleece. Additionally, now THREE angels fly at noon (per time zone, so everyone sees the angels at the local 'noon' hour), warning humanity of the "woes" of this last half -- last call, folks! But, as Revelation sadly records, few listen. ('Kinda like today.)

    The seventh Goblet is Armageddon, really. 'Sixth Goblet merely sets it up as a consequence of drying up Tigris-Euphrates; the froglike-spirits indicate worldwide demonic conspiracy to foment the war. [Frog-demon metaphor refers to Aristophanes' The Frogs, a satirical comedy everyone knew. This very funny play is about smiley subterfuge and hypocrisy. In only one scene do the frogs appear: when Dionysus (Bacchus) is going to Hades. The frogs' 'job' is to make him row to a certain beat, even though he has to pay the boat owner for the ride! So, they entice Dionysus to 'battle' with their croaking. Their croaking keeps him occupied with them; meanwhile, he doesn't notice how he's obeying their "timing song" by rowing himself sore. In short, he thinks he's battling them by croaking back: but, thus they control him. Only the owner of the boat-to-Hades is able to break Dionysus' progressive obsession with the frogs. God chose a GREAT way to depict the Sixth Goblet, by having John depict the demons as 'frogs'!] As the last half of Rev16 explains, a world war is going on: looks like tactical nuclear war. Moreover, as Chapter 17 explains, the politicos running Rome get good and tired of being dominated by the religion ("sits" in Chap.17 really means sits and dominates, like a trained rider does a horse). So, as noted above, there's a real internal power struggle not only in the head of the imperium, Rome, but also everywhere else. Just as God says so many times in Scripture, His enemies eventually wipe each other out. Satan, and many a human ruler, will foment divisions under the 'cloak' of unity, since that's the ONLY way to control everyone. So the second half of the Trib, as noted earlier, is just like the first half: use religion to dominate, to make people rebel against it, to thus bring about Gotterdamerung. To hell with Valhalla!

    Armaggedon is but the LAST of the military campaigns being fought. So, as usual, the Bible uses Armaggedon to depict two realities. First, Gotterdamerung characterizes the second half of the Trib, "the Great Tribulation". (Of course, at any time in post-Cross history, trends are always veering toward or away from Gotterdamerung, depending on the aggregate "pole" of believer volition (positive, "away"; negative, "toward".) Second, in the plain of Esdraelon the greatest land battle of the world will be fought, and Israel would be destroyed by it but for the 2nd Advent.

    At the 'end', Satan has managed to group Jews in pockets, as illustrated by the many Biblical passages on that final siege of Jerusalem. So there will be many such 'sieges' going on world-wide, for the Jews are STILL in dispersion, even then. Daniel, Nehemiah, Isaiah, Zechariah (etc.) prophesy how the Siege of Jerusalem (the pattern) turns out. Very few Jewish believers are left to fight, but 'enough' hang on, to finally become the Israel large enough to 'choose' Him. Conversely, most believers stupidly bought Satan's spin, and thus got killed (i.e., martyred) as a result. They didn't read the Bible they claimed to love. So, they didn't heed its escape routes. Just as most believers always fail, historically, to learn God's Script. Ergo the REAL 2nd Advent is all that saves us. But for the Lord's return, we animalistic humans, believers and unbelievers alike -- would not survive. Period.


    The above scenario will probably differ from what will actually occur -- but the scenario still depicts how Satan could easily deceive us, even in our modern age. With our all-too-eager consent.


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