A member of my congregation forwards all his viral email to me. I don’t mind; I’ve been deleting email since 1979, so a little more won’t kill me.
This one, however, was so bad I felt I had to comment on it:
This will make you re-think : A Trivia question in Sunday School : How long is the beast allowed to have authority in Revelations ? Guess the Answer? Revelations Chapter 13 tells us it is 42 months, and you know what that is.
Almost a four-year term to a Presidency. All I can say is Lord Have Mercy on us.!!!!!!
According to The Book of Revelations the anti-Christ is: The anti-Christ will be a man, in his 40’s, of MUSLIM descent, who willdeceive the nations with persuasive language, and have a MASSIVE Christ-like appeal….the prophecy says that people will flock to him and he will promise false hope and world peace, and when he is in power, will destroy everything ..
Is it OBAMA?? I STRONGLY URGE each one of you to repost this as many times as you can!
Each opportunity that you have to send it to a friend or media outlet…do it! I refuse to take a chance on this unknown candidate who came out of nowhere
(I especially like to read SHOUTING in email.) It turns out this particular nonsense has been going around awhile (see this snopes article from April).
Here are my objections, which I mailed back to my friend:
1. Even as a joke, this is pathetic: 42 months isn’t 48 months. Revelation 13:5 says “forty months and two.” Not “forty months and several more, indeed, nearly eight.” Was the world created in seven days (six plus one of rest) or in “nearly 13”? Did Jesus have “nearly 18” disciples? Was he raised from the dead on “nearly the 9th” day after his crucifixion? Please.
2. The term “antichrist” actually comes from the letters 1 John and 2 John.
3. “In his 40’s.” Hmm. I don’t recall anything about that. To be sure, I looked up “years” in Revelation and the only references were to 1000 years. I looked up forty and found only references to 42 months, the number 144,000, and the wall 144 cubits in length. Where does it say “the” antichrist is in his 40’s?
4. “Muslim descent.” Oh? There’s no a single word anywhere in any part of the Bible that talks about Muslims. Further, the notion that someone’s faith “descends” (rather than being “transmitted”) through one’s parents is not Biblical. (Race does, but being a Jew is not synonymous with having a Jewish faith.)
I assume from the number 42 in the letter, that the figure being so casually equating with “antichrist” is one of the beasts from Revelation 13. Note, then, that “the beast was allowed…also it was allowed”. Nothing the beast does or did will happen except in accordance with God’s controlling will. If Obama were the beast, and God is allowing him to rule, who am I to attempt to overrule God? Or to put it another way, can I by casting a single vote among millions at the ballot box this November, thwart the will of God?