CONTENTS 

PERILOUS TIMES ARE HERE

VAIN POLITICIANS AND BIASED PRESS

MARKETS FEAR AS SAUDI MILITANTS EYE

VITAL OIL TARGETS

$6 BILLION WORTH OF OIL IN ISRAEL

BUSH SEEKS TO ADD $1 TRILLION  MORE TO NATIONAL DEBT

GERMAN CANNIBAL sentenced to 8½ years

 

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PERILOUS TIMES ARE HERE

Filling men’s hearts with fear

Freedoms we all hold dear

Now are at stake!

THESE are some of the words of a Scriptural song, written way back in “the good old days.”  Today the perilous times have come!

True! In the past there have certainly been very perilous times. The 20th century saw the Great Depression, two great World Wars, the forces of Fascism and Nazism wrecked havoc across Europe, and Japanese hordes swept throughout much of Asia and the Pacific.  The century witnessed the enslavement of hundreds of millions under communism and tyranny.

Today we see new levels of the twin perils - terrorism and drugs - perilous times indeed!  And then we see every type of corruption abounding, and tragically, this beautiful globe roller-coasting towards the “mother of all disasters” - the Climax of the Age.

The times are perilous, and the question on many a lip is, “What on earth is the World Coming to?”

But some will say, “Oh, that’s all negative! You’re an alarmist!  Look on the bright side - see the progress, the prosperity, and all the advances in science and technology.”

Yes, India is one nation that is boasting of its economic boom. But how real is it?  650 million Indians who live off the land are yet to experience anything of the boom.  As a welfare worker in Andhra Pradesh said, “Marriages are breaking down, many farmers are turning to begging, and some are selling their children as domestic servants.” (Time / 31 May 04)

Many drought-stricken farmers in India are resorting to suicide because of the intolerable burden they carry; some having borrowed heavily to drill bore wells that have produced no water. The boom hasn’t helped them!

The world economy may seem to be booming, but actually, like an inflated balloon, it is ready to burst. When you consider the trillions of dollars indebtedness in the US, and the ultimate impact that has been predicted for the rest of the world because of it, you don’t become too excited about “the prosperity” of the world.

WHAT’S SO ALARMING IN THE WORLD THIS MONTH?

      * The crucial situation in Iraq,

      * the alarming developments in Israel,

      * the savage attacks on oil personnel in Saudi Arabia,

      * the fears for the global oil industry,

      * the expanding global Jihad,

      * Iran’s role in promoting insurgency in the Middle East

* imminent threats of more terrorist attacks in the US, UK and Australia in the

   lead up to crucial elections,

      * the horrors in Nigeria and Sudan,

      * the incredible indebtedness of the US, and the world.

      * the declining social and moral conditions worldwide,

      * and with it, bankrupt political developments, 

      * the huge heroin production in Afghanistan, which is funding the resurgence of  the Taliban, and terrorism,          

      * the European Union push towards superpower status,

      * the military and economic resurgence of Russia, and

      * the brewing crises in N Korea, Taiwan and China.

It’s a world in crisis, and the stakes are higher than ever. And the Day of Yahweh is not far off!

 

WARS WILL CONTINUE UNTIL THE END

“Nation (ethnos) will rise against nation (ethnos), and kingdom against kingdom.”  (Matthew 24:7)

THE Master’s words indicate there will be ethnic strife as well as civil and international wars.

The disastrous state of affairs in Israel, and the grave situation in Iraq, make the Middle East an increasingly volatile and explosive region. The world is tied into a state of war, as terrorism, backed by calls for Jihad (“holy war”) reverberate across much of the globe.

And it is not simply a war of Islam against the West and Israel; in virtually every Arab or Islamic nation there are militant movements bent on toppling existing regimes, and replacing them with fundamentalist rule, including Sharia law.

Even in non-Islamic nations such as Nepal, Thailand, and Zimbabwe, fear and terror grip the minds of men.

“But realize this, that in the last days perilous times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, blasphemers, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy (profane), without natural affection, (callous and inhuman), unloving, unforgiving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips (slanderers), without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited (traitors, headstrong, haughty), lovers of sensual pleasures rather than lovers of God …”      (2 Timothy 3:1-4)

And the prophet Daniel declares: “The end will come like a flood. To the end there will be war, and desolations have been decreed.”           (Daniel 9:26)

The Jerusalem Post, in an article (16 May 04), entitled,

 

“WE ARE IN A WORLD WAR, YET DO NOT NOTICE IT,”

gave a sobering summary of the world in conflict, and the confused thinking of news media, and of governments, including the Bush administration.

In Israel, Palestinians, like their Iranian and Hizb'ullah overlords, have consistently stated that their aim is to destroy Israel in stages. The Palestinian message in the killing of  Gaza settler, Tali Hatuel and her four young daughters on the day of the Likud poll (May 2), says:

“Regardless of what you desire, we will push you out of Gaza as we pushed you out of Lebanon, and as we will push you out of the rest of Palestine that you refer to as Israel.”

In Iran, the fundamentalists have consolidated their hold over the country, and stifled the reformist movement. At the same time this Shi’ite nation brazenly fans the flames of conflict in Iraq.

Irani officials and religious leaders have expressed outrage in recent weeks about the presence of US-led forces in the holy Shi’ite Iraqi cities of Najaf and Karbala. And following the accusations that Iraqi Governing Council member Ahmad Chalabi had passed sensitive US intelligence about Iraq to Iran, Tehran sent a formal message of warning to the United States about its actions in neighbouring Iraq.

In Nigeria, Muslim mobs, brandishing machetes, butchered some thirty Christians in the streets of the city of Kano. The panicked Christians ran for shelter in police stations as they watched their co-religionists butchered and set aflame before their eyes.

The problems in Nigeria began in 1999 after elections brought an end to military rule in the oil rich country. Today 11 of Nigeria’s 36 states are governed by Sharia law. Rights of women and non-Muslims in these areas have been summarily destroyed.

Nigeria’s turn to jihad has been spurred on by foreign Arabs. Palestinians, Saudis, Syrians and Sudanese have all been acting as advisers to the mullahs in Nigeria and have been actively funding and training the Muslim militias that have killed thousands of Christians there over the past few years.

In Indonesia, neither major party received much more than 20% of the popular vote, which means small Islamic parties will be able to exert great influence over the new government.

In the Philippines, President Gloria Arroyo has given de facto autonomy over large swathes of the country to an al-Qaida linked group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, operating in the southern parts of the archipelago dominated by the country’s Muslim minority. The MILF too is supported by the Saudis and other Arab states with money, arms and jihad indoctrination.

Saudi Arabia has been accused of supporting terrorists, but its own oil-related companies are now being targeted by al-Qaida. The terrorists’ goal is transparent – to force expatriate oil workers out of the kingdom, and to collapse the Saudi oil industry. This aims, indirectly, at hitting the US economy (which would in turn affect the whole world). And more, the aim is to bring down the House of Saud, and to replace it with a fundamentalist regime.

Western intelligence agencies are very concerned about Europe, the US, and other western nations, where large and increasingly extremist Muslim minorities are demanding cultural autonomy, while at the same time, preaching, funding and training men for jihad.

 

VAIN POLITICIANS AND BIASED PRESS

The Jerusalem Post article berates the “beleaguered and vain politicians” who would condemn themselves and their own countries, rather than face up to the truth that there is a determined, brutal globalist enemy out there that is seeking to destroy Israel and western civilisation.

Much of the Israeli and Western press, as most of us realize, is biased and destructive in its reporting. 

The Jerusalem Post presents the facts concerning Israel and its enemies, as it sees it:

Our press pushes a different story to the real facts. Their story is that there is no enemy, only Israel.

Our enemies, the forces of global jihad, be they Palestinian or Jordanian, Saudi, Egyptian, Syrian, Lebanese, Iranian or Iraqi, use all the means at their disposal to wage their war against us. From their television and radio stations and newspapers they incite for our destruction and feed us fictions of our own culpability, to both strengthen their forces’ will to fight us, and to weaken our will to defend ourselves.

In the UN, the Arab League, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, and on countless other international stages, they seek to criminalize us for our crime of defending our existence. In this they find accomplices among our own self-absorbed elites who are only too happy to blame the war being waged against us on ourselves.

When we limit our gaze to ourselves not only do we fail to take notice of the nature of the war, we craft national policies that harm both ourselves and our allies. In Israel, our self-obsession has brought about plan after plan, all of which have weakened us and our allies in the global struggle.

From the Oslo initiative to the retreat from Lebanon to Sharon’s pullout plan from Gaza and parts of Samaria, we have hurt ourselves and our allies. We have hurt ourselves by weakening our ability to recognize our enemies as such, seeing them rather as erstwhile peace partners. We have hurt ourselves by discrediting our own right to live unmolested, as large swathes of our elites have preferred our enemies the Palestinians to our own citizens in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

In behaving as though the Palestinian branch of the global jihad is engaging in a war over a few kilometres in Gaza, Judea and Samaria rather than playing a central role in the global jihad against non-Muslims, we are making it harder for our allies, first and foremost the Americans, to see the true nature of the war they too are fighting.

 

THE EVILS IN THE WEST

WHILE we all could, and should, condemn the increasing evils in the west, we don’t need an evil Taliban, or Iranian fundamentalist regime, to complete the destruction of our freedom to worship the living God.

The judgment of the western nations will take place in God’s time, but till that time we must stand firm against the enemies of Yahweh-Y’shua, the one true God. The great enemy, of course, is Satan himself - a greater enemy than the Taliban or the forces of jihad!

“Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Heavenly Master, and in the strength of His power. Put on the whole armour of God, that you may be able to stand firm against the schemes and strategies of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against authorities, against the world-rulers of the darkness of this age, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”  (Ephesians 6:10-13)

As well as standing firm against Satan, we need a mighty spiritual renewal, and a return to the principles of the Word of God. For ...

“Blessed is the one who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy (the Word of God), and take to heart, and guard and keep what is written in it, for the time is near!”  (Revelation 1:3)

 

 

OIL WOES  

MARKETS FEAR AS SAUDI MILITANTS EYE

VITAL OIL TARGETS

 

A SHOOTING rampage at a petrochemical complex in Saudi Arabia has world oil markets fearing militants are out to stage a destabilising attack on the infra-structure of the world’s top oil exporter.

Having scored their first hit on a Saudi energy site, the nightmare scenario now is that emboldened fighters would move on to Saudi oil nerve centres in the Eastern Province and choke off five million barrels per day (bpd) of crude to world markets.

That thought alone will stoke oil prices which are already in a bull mood after the recent raid on an Iraqi oil export terminal. Even a symbolic attack would trigger oil market turmoil, analysts say.

The most apocalyptic possibility would be a full scale hit in the east of the kingdom on Ras Tanura, the world’s biggest offshore oil loading facility, or Abqaiq centre which handles some five million bpd of oil pumped from the giant Ghawar field.

“We can’t rule out the possibility that secret cells are working on a massive strike on Ras Tanura or Abqaiq,” said a Saudi oil industry consultant. “Hitting Abqaiq would be catastrophic. It would bring the kingdom to its knees.”

State owned Saudi Aramco has done its utmost to protect the oil giant’s employees and energy facilities, steadily bolstering its defence system over the past two decades. It has 5,000 guards protecting its 54,000 workers and sites.  But while the kingdom has won worldwide praise for its state-of-the art security, both Saudi and Western executives admit nothing can guard the energy sector against an inside job.

The concern is that Islamists linked to al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden might still be working in Saudi Aramco or the country’s security services, said analysts in the kingdom. - Dubai / May 2, 04

Terrorists Threaten Oil Industry

IN yet another attack, suspected militants shot at US military personnel outside Riyadh, while in a separate incident security forces killed two militants after a 12-hour chase on foot through desert mountains.

The incidents added to fears over stability in the world’s biggest oil producer after 22 persons were killed in a weekend attack on the oil hub of Khobar. A group linked to al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack. No Americans were hurt in the shooting outside a US military compound in Riyadh and authorities vaguely linked the two terrorists killed in the mountains to the Khobar attack.  - Washington Post /  3 June 04

 

 $6 BILLION WORTH OF OIL IN ISRAEL

There could be reservoirs of 980 million barrels of oil at the Meged-4 well east of Kfar Sava, exploration company Givot Olam says while announcing the findings of geological studies.  - May 4, 04 /Ha’aretz / Israel

“And I will give you the treasures of darkness, and hidden wealth of secret places, so that you may know that it is I, YHWH, the God of Israel who calls you by your name.”  (Isaiah 45:3)

 

THE  FRAGILE U.S. ECONOMY 

BUSH SEEKS TO  ADD $1 TRILLION

MORE TO NATIONAL DEBT

PRESIDENT Bush, while maintaining the economic recovery in the US is firmly in place, has proposed adding $1 trillion to the national debt to fund the cost of shifting to a partially privatized Social Security system.

That massive increase in debt, coming on top of a $7 trillion national debt that is growing by about $500 billion a year, adds controversy to what promises to be a difficult reform to get enacted.

The debt increase is acknowledged in the 2004 Economic Report of the President, which was penned by the White House Council of Economic Advisers.

The economic report for the first time tentatively provides the answer — with borrowing — as well as a rationale for the decision that asserts that adding the cost of privatizing the program to the national debt would have little detrimental effect on the economy or workers.  - The Washington Times / 10 Feb, 04

Just one trillion; thanks, folks!

My reader, do you know how much a trillion is?

Well, if Adam had to count that amount, and had started 6000 years ago, counting dollars at one dollar per second, in AD 2004, he would be almost up to 190 billion  -  810 billion short of a trillion. 

To count a trillion would take 32,000 years.

Of course if you counted $100 notes it would only take 320 years. Even if you counted in $1000 notes, it would take you every second of every day for 32 years.

But today treasurers count billions in seconds.  Counting by computer, it does not seem nearly as much.  Just a few seconds folks.  Just one trillion. Thanks!

U.S. DEFICITS THREATEN WORLD FINANCE

THE International Monetary Fund has warned that the uncontrolled US budget deficits would pose a serious threat to global prosperity in coming years as rising interest rates depress economic growth in the United States and around the world.

The budget deficit will hit $521 billion this year, a record in dollar terms, and it shows little signs that it will improve in coming years.

The new IMF analysis predicts that if nothing is done to get control of the soaring US deficits, it would shave global economic output by 4.2% by 2020 and reduce US economic growth by 3.7% during the same period.

IMF economists said much of the adverse impact would occur because of increased borrowing demands in the United States to finance the budget deficit. This would drive up US interest rates and interest rates in other countries as the global supply of available capital is reduced, they said. “The rest of the world is affected seriously by the US fiscal deficit,” a leading IMF economist Raghuram Rajan told reporters.

The IMF wants the United States to pursue more rapid deficit reduction.

President Bush submitted a budget to Congress this year which projects that he will be able to cut the deficit in half over the next five years, reducing it to a shortfall of $237 billion in 2009.  - Washington / AP /Apr 14, 04

The world economy is alarming! Maybe it’s better not to think about it?  But let’s face it – our monetary system will crash in due time, as the apostle James indicated:

“Come now, you rich, weep and wail because of the miseries that are coming upon you. Your wealth has become rotten, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will testify against you and will consume your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the Last Days!”  (James 5:1-3)

But the word to God’s people is:

“Be patient, therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Master. See how the farmer waits expectantly for the precious ‘fruit of the earth,’ waiting patiently until the land receives the early and late rains. You too be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Master is near. Do not complain against one another brethren, so that you yourselves may not be condemned. Look! The Judge is standing right at the door!” (James 5:7-9)

Y’SHUA THE MESSIAH SAID:

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. For this reason I tell you, do not be anxious for your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body as to what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food, and the body more than clothing?”   (Matthew 6:19-21, 25)

 

GERMAN CANNIBAL sentenced to 8½ years

IN my book, “When the Leaves Fall,” I reported the shocking case of a cannibal murderer on trial in Germany. To recall that report …

FANTASY  LEADS  TO CANNIBALISM

IN a grisly murder case, a 42-year-old man confessed to eating his victim, who, he claims, wanted to be eaten. This was not in the jungles of Africa; it was in GERMANY!

The killer, Armin Meiwes, dubbed as “the Cannibal of Rotenburg,” was driven by sexual and cannibalistic fantasies. In his trial he has testified that he first contacted his victim, a computer software programmer, on the internet. The two men entered into a “deadly internet courtship” for two months, during which the victim also fantasized on being eaten.

According to Meiwes, the victim came by train to the Kassel station, where he met him and then took him to his farmhouse. There the victim submitted to Meiwes who cut off parts of his body and ate them before finally killing him.

In the murder case in Kassel, Meiwes pleaded guilty to the charge of mercy killing, claiming his victim wanted to be slaughtered. Emails between the two men have been read in court to support his case that it was not murder, but euthanasia.  –  The Times & net reports / 31 Dec 03

The case is still going on!

You don’t want to know any more about this depraved, dissipated, decadent, debauched world, do you?  And I don’t think God does either.  He says to the whole world today:

“Why should you be stricken any more? Why should you persist in your rebellion? Your whole head is diseased, and your whole heart is sick. From the sole of the foot even to the head there is nothing sound in it; only bruises, wounds, and open sores, that have not been cleansed or bandaged, or soothed with ointment.” (Isaiah 1:5-6)

 

The end of that trial saw Armin Meiwes convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 8½ years in prison. The 42-year-old computer expert, confessed to killing, dismembering and eating a man who allegedly agreed to the arrangement.

Prosecutors had sought a life sentence, calling Meiwes a “human butcher” who acted simply to “satisfy a sexual impulse.” A grisly video he made of the act was shown to the court during a closed session.

The defense argued that since the victim volunteered to be killed and eaten, the crime should be classified as mercy killing, which carries a 5-year maximum penalty.

The state court ruled that Meiwes had no “base motives” in the crime - sparing him a murder conviction.

In his closing statement Meiwes told the court: “Bernd came to me of his own free will to end his life. For him, it was a nice death … I had my big kick and I don’t need to do it again. I regret it all very much, but I can’t undo it.”                                                                                                                  - Source: AP/Yahoo / 30 Jan 04

Arguments will go on as to whether Meiwes received an appropriate penalty.  But as a sequel to this bizarre and depraved case, let us ask the question ...

“Could God possibly forgive Meiwes  

                for this heinous sin”

Human rationale would most likely, say, “No!  God is a God of justice. He won’t forgive such terrible things - it would just not be right! That wretched cannibal should suffer eternal banishment, not just 8½ years in prison!”

But the Scripture says that if anyone turns to God and confesses his sin, and receives the Lord Jesus as his personal Saviour, God will be compassionate, for He has promised ...

“Seek Yahweh while He may be found. Call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let him return to Yahweh, and He will have compassion on him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways.”  (Isaiah 55:6-8)

The Almighty, who is indeed “Love,” is longing for sinners to turn to Him, so that He might save them from their fallen state.  And when He forgives, He also works to straighten the bent-over derelict; to restore the broken life, and to make it new!

“Therefore if anyone is in Christ - the Messiah, he is a new creation; the old things have passed away; see, all things have become new.”   (2 Corinthians 5:17)

When God forgives, He also graciously cleanses and purges the life ...

“Come now, let us reason together,’ says Yahweh. ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, they will be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool.”  (Isaiah 1:18)

But some will argue, but Meiwes is not worthy to be saved!  True! And not one of us is worthy to be saved! We may not have committed such a heinous sin, but nevertheless, we have all sinned in many, many ways:

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  (Romans 3:23)

If God saves any one of us, it is not because of any goodness in us, for as Isaiah makes it clear ...

”All our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment.” (Isaiah 64:6)

We, every one of us, need the salvation of God, just as much as Armin Meiwes does. The Good News is ...

“When the kindness and the love of God our Saviour toward mankind appeared, He saved us, not because of righteous works that we have done, but because of His mercy. He saved us through the washing of regeneration (the new birth), and through the renewing power by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us abundantly through Y’shua the Messiah our Saviour, so that, having been justified by His grace, we should become heirs having the hope (the assurance) of eternal life.”  (Titus 3:4-7)

The Good News is that the Messiah -  God’s Anointed One - paid the penalty of all our sins, when He died on our behalf, on the cross at Calvary. And now ...

“WHOEVER WILL CALL UPON THE NAME OF Yahweh-Y’shua the LORD WILL BE SAVED.”   (Romans 10:13)

My reader, if you have never received the Lord Jesus as your personal Saviour, and received His forgiveness and salvation, why don’t you pray to Yahweh, the Almighty God, right now?  Receive Y’shua, Jesus the Messiah, as your personal Saviour, and know His forgiveness and salvation this very day. God bless you!

 

TRANSACTION PRAYER  ►►

 

May the PEACE of the MESSIAH be yours!

The Hebrew word shalom means “peace” in the fullest sense of the word - in every part of our lives.  And this is the peace I pray will encompass each one of us in these times.

Let me remind you of the words of the Messiah, Y’shua, (Jesus), for He is the only One who can bring lasting peace to our lives, and to our families. And He is the only One who can bring true peace to this sin-sick world.  The Messiah says to each one of us:

“Let not your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me … Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives.

“Do not let your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. You heard that I said to you, ‘I am going away, and I am coming to you.’ If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced, because I said I am going to the Father; for the Father is greater than I … In My Father’s House are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you, for I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, so that you also may be where I am.”                                                                                     (John 14:1-2, 27-28, 3)

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