INTRODUCTION
Undoubtedly, there are many people (especially Christians) who would
be surprised to learn that the roots of the radical Islamic movement
- the same one that is plaguing Israel today and, sadly, sending
hate-filled Palestinian teenagers into Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, etc. bent
on suicide in the name of Allah - are NOT to be
found in some kind of religious genetic code that predisposes the Israelis
and the Palestinians against one another. Instead they are to be found
in the pernicious machinations and maneuverings of America's oil elites
and the CIA to combat what appeared to them in the late 1950s and early
1960s to be an IRRESISTIBLE SOCIALIST TIDE directed against
them (and their economic interests) in the Middle East - a raging torrent
of socialist fervor that threatened to dislodge them entirely from the
area. Moreover, it seemed self-evident at the time that their communist
antagonists in the Kremlin were behind it all.
Naturally enough, the fact that radical Islam is the creation of America's
oil elites and the CIA (and not the Kremlin or any other such thing)
is something that today both groups want to obscure and conceal as much
as possible from the American people. Far better that Americans should
blame the poor and downtrodden of Baghdad, and Cairo, and Damascus,
and Beirut, and Amman than the elites that inhabit the Hamptons and
the suburbs of the ultra-rich in Houston and Dallas. And far, far better
that they should blame the "crazy" Muslims - whom the elites would have
Americans believe are by nature somehow or other disposed towards fanaticism
- than they should blame "staid, sober-minded" Christians (i.e., Christians,
so-called) like George Bush, Don Evans, Dick Chaney, Archie Dunham,
ad naseum. After all, what would happen to George Bush's "Christian
connection" if these same Christians came to believe that Bush and his
cabal of oil elite pals were the ones that bore most of the blame for
the creation of al-Qaeda, Herzbollah, the Mujahadeen, the Islamic Brotherhood,
etc. and - ipso facto - the fanaticism that led to the catastrophe
of 9/11.
RELIGION AS AN ANTIDOTE TO "GODLESS" SOCIALISM
Nonetheless, the fact remains that religion (Islam, in this case) was
the means that the CIA and America's oil elites eventually hit upon
to neutralize the effect that socialism was having on the "masses" in
the Middle East in the late 1950s and early to mid-1960s; and no doubt,
it was having a big effect: Nasser had seized power in Egypt and allied
himself with the Kremlin, the Ba'athists (socialists) had taken over
in Iraq and Syria and had similarly linked themselves up with Moscow,
Qadhafi took over in Libya, and anti-colonial socialists kicked the
French out of Algeria. THE STATED AIM OF ALL THESE REVOLUTIONS
(contrary to what average people in the United States and in the
West were told) WAS THE MORE EQUITABLE DISTRIBUTION OF THE OIL WEALTH
OF THE AREA. But if that happened, America's (and Britain's) oil
companies would be left out to "dry in the desert sun." That would never
do! - nonetheless, by the late 1950s and early 1960s it seemed that
socialism was an IRRESISTIBLE force whose time had come
in the Middle East.
It
was then that the United States turned to Islam as a counter-weight
to socialism. The thinking here was simplicity itself: "play up" the
"godless nature" of socialism and juxtapose it against Islam
in an effort to discredit socialism (i.e., you can't be a socialist
and a "good Muslim" at the same time) and turn the masses away from
it - PRECISELY WHAT THE ELITES ARE DOING TODAY IN THE UNITED STATES,
only in America the elites are using Christianity. Islam or Christianity;
one is as good as the other! - it's all the same to the elites; insofar
as they're concerned, there's no difference between the two. [NOTE:
Naturally enough, the oil elites would like people to believe that what
they are battling for in the Middle East is American access to oil so
American consumers can have gasoline for their cars; but that's not
at all what the battle over oil is about in the Middle East. That's
just a smoke screen. No matter who controls the oil, it would keep flowing
to consumers in the West. Where else would it go? - to Mozambique? No,
what the battle in the Middle East is all about is where the profits
from the oil go? - to the people of the Middle East or to the coffers
of the oil elites in Houston, Dallas, Midland, etc.? That's what the
battle is really all about!]
The truth is , the value of religion to the elites has nothing to do
with the spiritual message of either Islam or Christianity, but rather
in the fact that it acts as a very effective antidote to "godless
socialism" (so-called). There's no concern here for religion; there's
no concern here for the "spiritual welfare" of the people. RELIGION
IS MERELY A TOOL IN THE ELITE'S HANDS - A TOOL THEY WIELD AGAINST
SOCIALISM; THEIR REAL MOTIVATION IN EMBRACING ISLAM (OR CHRISTIANITY,
FOR THAT MATTER) HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH GOD, AND EVERYTHING TO DO WITH
MONEY.
THE RICH ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH GOD EXCEPT
AS HE CAN BE MADE TO SERVE THEIR INTERESTS
The
very real fact of the matter is, the rich are not concerned with God
- even a false understanding of God. Their only real concern is for
money. There's not even much of a concern for Satan. Indeed, the thought
by many very naive Christians that there exists a cabal of the ultra
rich who are "dedicated Satan worshippers" and who have been plotting
and planning to take over the world for eons is nothing more than a
figment of the imagination - a ridiculous phantasm that inhabits only
the minds of buffoons and nincompoops. To think otherwise is to believe
that the rich are motivated by something other than money. But they
are far too shallow for that. For the elites, money-making and the accumulation
of wealth are the raison d'être of life. The lust for wealth;
the lust for money - this is what the elite is all about. Ideologies
(or theologies) of any kind are merely masquerades and artifices that
they use to ingratiate themselves to that portion of the population
which at the time they feel they must "pacify" in order to maintain
themselves in power and, ipso facto, hold on to their wealth
and prerogatives. The late Professor C. Wright Mills of Columbia University
writes,
"The
pursuit of the moneyed-life is ... (the elite's) commanding value,
in relation to which the influence of all other values (is non-existent)
... (They have) narrowed the meaning of 'success' to big money
... raising money to the plane of an absolute value."
THE NIGHTMARES OF THE ELITES
Given
this reality insofar as the rich are concerned, SOCIALISM IS THE
STUFF OF NIGhtmlARES; it threatens to strip them of their wealth
- which is PRECISELY what happened to them in Russia in 1917;
and it's what Patrice Lumumba menaced them with in Zaire (the Congo)
in 1960, what Jacobo Arbenz threatened them with in Guatemala in the
early 1950s, and what Salvadore Allende imperiled them with in Chile
in the early '70s - and it's why all three of these leaders were killed
(MURDERED). Jesus wasn't kidding around when He said:
"For the LOVE OF MONEY IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL
..." (1 Tim. 6:9-10)
That's ALL evil; not just some evil, but ALL
evil.
It's for this reason that people make a BIG mistake when
they underestimate the fear the elites have for SOCIALISM
- the fear that they will be stripped of their wealth. That's something
that CAUSES THE ELITES TO "PEE IN THEIR PANTS" (please
forgive the descriptive but very apropos phrase here) - especially
a cabal of "worthies" who, as Michael Parenti suggests, actually
believe they are somehow or other entitled to "EVERYTHING:"
"All the choice lands, forests, game, herds, harvests, mineral deposits
and precious metals of the earth; all the wealth, riches, and profitable
returns; all the productive facilities, gainful inventiveness, and
technologies; all the surplus value produced by human labor; all the
control positions of the state and other major institutions; all public
supports and subsides, privileges and immunities; all the protections
of the law with none of the constraints; all the services, comforts,
luxuries, and advantages of civil society with none of the taxes and
costs. Every 'ruling class' has wanted only this: all the rewards
and none of the burdens." [Please see our last article, "The Coming
War In Iraq: What It's Really All About."]
They
(i.e., the elites) actually believe that the world belongs to them,
and average people exist only to serve their needs and desires; to the
elites, average people serve no other purpose. These (i.e., the elites)
are the people that Mark Twain once described in The Mysterious Stranger
as feeling defiled -
"... if ... (ordinary people) touch them; would shut the door in
their face if they proposed to call; whom ordinary people slave for,
fight for, die for, (but who assume toward them) ... the airs of benefactor
toward beggar; (and) who address them in the language of master toward
slave ..."
These are the people the Bible says are drowning in -
"DESTRUCTION and PERDITION." (1 Tim.
6:9-10)
THE OIL ELITES CHOOSE SAUDI ARABIA AS THEIR BASE FROM
WHICH TO LAUNCH THEIR RELIGIOUS COUNTER-OFFENSIVE
Obviously then, religion means NOTHING to the rich -
at least on a spiritual level: at best it is only another weapon in
their arsenal to combat socialism with - a very effective weapon, no
doubt, but a weapon (i.e., a tool), and nothing more. And it was with
such an attitude towards "all things spiritual" that the American oil
elites turned to Saudi Arabia in their effort to do battle with their
hated nemesis, socialism, in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia would become
their base from which they would launch their religious COUNTEROFFENSIVE
against the growing socialist tide in that area of the world.
AND ONE SHOULD BEAR IN MIND HERE THAT PRIOR TO THIS POWERFUL RADICAL
ISLAMIC COUNTEROFFENSIVE AGAINST SOCIALISM ENGINEERED BY THE
OIL COMPANIES, RADICAL ISLAM DID NOT EXIST AS A MOVEMENT IN THE
MIDDLE EAST AT ALL, AT LEAST NOT OUTSIDE SAUDI ARABIA: NOT IN IRAN,
NOT IN SYRIA, NOT IN TURKEY, NOT IN ALGERIA, NOT IN EGYPT, NOT IN LIBYA
- NOT ANYWHERE. THE FACT OF THE MATTER IS, RELIGION IN THE MIDDLE EAST
WAS A VERY MILD AFFAIR - THERE WAS NOTHING POLITICAL ABOUT IT
AT ALL. SOCIALISM WAS WHAT WAS MOTIVATING AVERAGE PEOPLE - WHICH WOULD
HAVE BEEN IMPOSSIBLE IF THE PEOPLE HAD BEEN PREDISPOSED TO ANY GREAT
DEGREE TO ISLAM.
RADICAL ISLAM OF THE HAMAS, HERZBOLLAH, MUJAHADEEN VARIETY IS ENTIRELY
A CREATION OF THE CIA AND THE OIL COMPANIES - AND IT DID NOT APPEAR
UNTIL THESE TWO ENTITIES BEGAN SURREPTITIOUSLY PROMOTING IT IN CONJUNCTION
WITH THE SAUDIS IN THE MID-1960S.
In their explosive new book, Forbidden Truth, French authors
Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquie write that religion has always
played a decisive role in Saudi Arabia, contrary to how religion was
viewed elsewhere in the Middle East (which had come under the influence
of the gleaming, urbane, and relatively non-religious Emirate of Cordoba).
It was there (i.e., in Arabia) around 1745 that Muhammad bin Abed al-Wahhab,
an Islamic dissident, found refuge - in Dir'iyyah, an oasis controlled
by the Al Saud clan. His austere religious ideas collided with
the softness he saw in Islamic religious practices elsewhere in the
Middle East. The leader of the Al Saud clan, Muhammad bin Saud, adopted
Wahhab's strict faith and interpretation of the sharia (Koranic
law). Wahhab forbade poetry, music, tobacco, jewels, alcohol and anything
considered a novelty - and it was on this strict and forbidding basis
that the foundations of Saudi Arabia were laid, though the country itself
was to go through a number of deaths and rebirths before it finally
emerged in its present form in 1932.
Wahhab and his descendants were responsible for religious matters,
making sure the people stayed obedient to the ruling power by legitimizing
it, while Saud and his descendants exercised the political authority,
making Wahhabism the state religion. Brisard and Dasquie write:
"Temporal and spiritual powers went hand in hand, and both benefited
from the arrangement."
Thus, Wahhab, the religious leader, and Saud, the warrior - who would
give the country his name - became allies, making a sacred pact to spread
the cause of Islam and lead the faithful on a path to God. And so it
was, from the very beginning, that faith and power were intimately connected
in Saudi Arabia - EVERY BIT AS MUCH AS FAITH AND POWER HAVE BEEN
CONNECTED IN IRAN TODAY - and, consequently, one might ask, If Iran
can be labeled a radical Islamic state, why isn't Saudi Arabia labeled
one also? It seems that to do anything less would be not only inconsistent,
but dishonest. Yet that is EXACTLY what the Americans
- under pressure from the oil companies - have done. And what is it
that accounts for the difference in America's perception of Iran over
and against Saudi Arabia? - Iran refuses to kowtow to the American oil
elites, and Saudi Arabia does.
THE LETHAL MIX OF AMERICAN OIL COMPANIES,
THE CIA, WAHHABISM, AND THE HOUSE OF SAUD
The first Saudi oil concession was granted in 1923 to a group of British
investors, the Eastern and General Syndicate. Since there had yet to
be a drop of oil discovered in the region, the company didn't really
know what to do with this concession, and hoped to sell its exploitation
rights. But no other British companies would bite, and the concession
fell null in 1928. Soon after, an American oil company, Standard Oil
Company of California, discovered oil in the Persian Gulf - in Bahrain
in 1932, and then in Arabia in May of 1933. To exploit the concession,
Standard Oil created ARAMCO (the Arabian American Oil Company) and brought
in Texaco, Standard Oil of New Jersey and Socony-Vacuum (Mobil).
From the moment ARAMCO started drilling for oil in Arabia, the president
of the company was virtually the American ambassador in Saudi Arabia.
In 1945 President Roosevelt visited Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud on his (Roosevelt's)
warship, the Quincy, off Jeddah and concluded what has become known
as the Quincy Accords. It marked the beginning of the American MONOPOLY
not only over Saudi oil - which continues to exist today despite the
fact that ARAMCO, as it was originally conceived, no longer exists -
but over the whole of the country as well. THE VERY REAL FACT OF
THE MATTER IS, SAUDI ARABIA IS GOVERNED BY A LETHAL MIX OF AMERICAN
OIL COMPANIES, THE CIA, THE SAUDI MONARCHY AND WAHHABISM. All these
elements have been fused together in an almost seamless whole, and it
is no longer possible to tell where the one leaves off and the other
begins. They are all four one-in-the-same, and ANYONE
who would tell you differently is lying. There is NOTHING
- I repeat, NOTHING - that one of these elements can do
without the knowledge of the other three.
SAUDI SUPPORT FOR RADICAL ISLAM
Naturally, it is not advantageous for either the CIA or the oil companies
to publicize these facts, but all this is - nonetheless - the truth.
FOR THE GOVERNMENT TO SAY TODAY THAT SAUDI ARABIA IS TAKING ACTIONS
WITH REGARD TO RADICAL ISLAMIC GROUPS IN THE MIDDLE EAST (OR, FOR THAT
MATTER, ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD) WITHOUT THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE U.S. GOVERNMENT
IS A BOLD-FACED LIE - PLAIN AND SIMPLE! AND IT IS ABSOLUTELY
ESSENTIAL FOR YOU TO REALIZE THIS AS YOU WORK YOUR WAY THROUGH THIS
ARTICLE.
There is NO undertaking that the Saudis are involved
in that the U.S. is NOT aware of - AND THAT IS ESPECIALLY
TRUE INSOFAR AS SAUDI SUPPORT FOR MILITANT ISLAMIC GROUPS LIKE HAMAS,
HERZBOLLAH, THE ISLAMIC BROTHERHOOD, THE MUJAHADEEN, THE GIA, ETC. -
NOTHING! NADA! ZIP! ZERO!
As Brisard and Dasquie write:
"The 'heroes of liberty" (i.e., the Americans), the new world superpower
combating Soviet totalitarianism in Europe, had just invented, under
the Tropic of Cancer, a petro-monarchy - A MIX OF POLITICAL AND
RELIGIOUS ABSOLUTISM with a universal currency, the dollar ...
"In the country that witnessed the birth of the Prophet, religion
was everywhere. The Koran, the Sunna, Al Ijmaa, and Al Ihtihad remained
the four pillars of the sharia. Life in Saudi Arabia revolved
around the five daily prayers, when all good Muslims had to kneel
and face Mecca. The country's rapid development from pastoral to mono-industrial
never diminished the importance of religion, which was OMNIPRESENT."
Brisard and Dasquie continue:
"Saudi Arabia was like a mosque, which made it easy for authorities
to legally justify the banning of all other religions. To ensure successful
PROSELYTISM, the ulama and imams created the 'Committee
for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice', which was nothing
more than a religious militia in charge of policing the state's 18
million inhabitants. Canes in hand, 4,000 to 5,000 Mutawwaeen had
the job of enforcing the sharia. They hunted down women who
dared to wear clothes that were too Western, or anyone who consumed
alcohol - which was forbidden even at home - and made sure that there
was no mixing of the sexes in public places. [One might ask, What's
the difference here between what the Taliban in Afghanistan were doing
and what the Mutawwaeen are doing today in Saudi Arabia? - THERE
IS NONE. Again, the only conceivable difference is that the Wahhabi
kowtow to America's oil elites, and the Taliban have run afoul of
them. There certainly are no other differences - not in their severity
towards women, not in their use of "the cane" on recalcitrants, not
in their view towards Christianity, and certainly not in the fright
and anxiety they create in the population.]
"These zealous bullies of Islam, led by a religious leader with the
same power as a (government) minister, invoked fear in the population
and created a permanent climate of paranoia and apprehension. AS
THE COUNTRY DEVELOPED AND SAW TECHNOLOGY IMPROVE THANKS TO OIL PRODUCTION,
THE PARADOX ... OF WAHHABISM ... (REMAINED) ...
"Though the ruling family (i.e., the House of Saud) was represented
in all aspects of the regime - from ministerial positions to administration
to boards of directors in large corporations - IT HAD NEVERTHELESS
LEFT ALL MORAL MAGISTERIUM TO THE DESCENDANTS OF MOHAMMED BIN ABD
AL-WAHHAB, THUS CREATING A QUASI-BICEPHALOUS SYSTEM AT THE HIGHEST
LEVEL ... UNTIL HIS DEATH IN 1999, THE GREAT MUFTI ABDEL AZIZ BIN
BAZ WAS ONE OF THE KINGDOM'S KEY FIGURES ALONGSIDE KING FAHD."
WHERE WAS THE SUPPOSED CHRISTIANITY
OF AMERICA'S OIL ELITES?
AND ALL THIS SUITED THE CIA AND THE OIL ELITES JUST FINE because
it stopped socialism dead in its tracks. Of course, one might
ask, Where was the Christianity that the oil elites advertised to their
"constituencies" back home in the United States; in Texas, for instance
- in Odessa, Houston, Waco, Dallas, etc. - where most of them shamelessly
posed as "honorable Christian men" -- CEOs like the Bush boys,
Archie Dunham, James Baker, Dick Chaney, Don Evans, Frank Carlucci,
Richard Darman, George Schultz, Clark Clifford, Bert Lance, John Connally,
Roy Carlson, ad naseum -- many of whom are (were) known
to open the meetings of their Boards of Directors with Christian prayer?
Doesn't their Christianity mandate that they take the Gospel to all
"the corners of the earth?" Isn't that what Christ commanded all His
disciples to do? -
"And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the
gospel to EVERY creature (i.e., person).
"He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that
believeth not shall be DAMNED." (Mark 16:15-16)
THOUGH CHRISTIANS SHOULD NEVER FORCE THEIR FAITH ON ANYONE,
aren't they at least obligated to gently share their faith with those
with whom they come in contact? Isn't that what the Scriptures say here?
Or are the Archie Dunhams, the George Bushes, the Karl Roves, and the
Dick Cheneys of this world - WHO PROCLAIM THEIR CHRISTIANITY WITH
BULLHORNS AT ELECTION TIME - somehow or other exempted from this
commandment? (Mark 16:15)
And more than that, if one takes the words of Christ here at face value
- which one MUST do if he really is an evangelical (which
most of these men claim to be), then how in the name of Christ can they
ally themselves with an Islamic sect (i.e., the Wahhabis) which forbids
the preaching of the Gospel - and makes belief in Christ a CRIME
against the state - a capital offense for which one can be executed?
By doing so, they exhibit a very "unchristian" (to put it mildly) concern
for the souls of the people of the Middle East - leaving them to be
"DAMNED to hell" (Mark 16:16) - hardly a "correct" attitude
for a "Christian" (so-called) like George Bush who says -
"Christ is the most important person in my life."
UNMASKING THE "CHRISTIANITY" OF GEORGE
BUSH AND HIS "CHRISTIAN" COHORTS
But if that were really the case - i.e., that Christ was the most important
person in Bush's life - it would be impossible for Bush and his so-called
"Christian" cohorts in the oil elites to ally themselves the way they
have done with Saudi Arabia - again, a country which forbids Christianity
to be preached in their land. Why? - because, if one really loves Christ,
he cannot help but spread the "good news" of Christ as Savior for the
joy that is in him, thus, fulfilling the commandment of Mark 16:15.
Jesus says:
"He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth
me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will
love him, and will manifest myself to him." (John 14:21)
If we love Christ, we will keep His commandments - and certainly that
applies to Mark 16:15. And if we fail to do so, we reveal ourselves
to be hypocrites - i.e., people who, as Jesus said -
"... draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with
their lips; but their heart is far from me." (Matt. 15:8)
And why is that? - because Jesus said:
"He that loveth me NOT keepeth NOT my
sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father's
which sent me." (John 14:24)
In other words, he that doesn't really love Christ is indifferent to
the Gospel and the injunction to carry the Gospel to the unsaved! (Mark
16:15)
But, then, perhaps America is so vital to God as His REDEEMER
NATION that it is worth it to God for us to ignore Mark 16:15
and sacrifice the souls of all the people of the Middle East to keep
the oil flowing. Maybe that's it. Maybe that's a "trade off" that the
Lord will just have to live with?
THE HYPOCRISY OF THE OIL ELITES INSOFAR
AS THEIR CHRISTIANITY IS CONCERNED
OR MAYBE - JUST MAYBE - THE SO-CALLED "CHRISTIANITY" OF THE
OIL ELITES - THE OIL ELITES OF HOUSTON, DALLAS, MIDLAND, ODESSA, ETC.,
THE OIL ELITES THAT SURROUND THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION - DOESN'T COUNT
FOR ANYTHING WHEN THE "BOTTOM LINE" IS IN QUESTION. Maybe these
are the people of whom Jesus said:
"... it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye, than
for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." (Luke 18:25)
And one should be very, very clear here, prior to the oil elites "mucking
things up" in the Middle East for Christianity by helping the Wahhabis
of Saudi Arabia spread RADICAL ISLAM throughout the area,
it was not at all difficult to preach the Word in that region of the
world. Indeed, all the nations of the area - from Iraq to Lebanon to
Egypt to Jordan etc. had thriving Christian communities. Not any more!
The oil companies saw to that. IT'S AT THE DOORSTEP OF CHEVRON
OIL, EXXON/MOBIL, STANDARD OIL, UNOCAL, HALIBURTON, BECHTEL, ETC. THAT
THE BLAME FOR CHRISTIANITY'S DEMISE IN THE MIDDLE EAST MUST BE PLACED.
AND THESE ARE THE PEOPLE THAT EVANGELICALS HAVE ALLIED THEMSELVES WITH?
THE SHEER STUPIDITY OF AMERICAN EVANGELICALS IN THIS MATTER IS PALPABLE.
Yes indeed, "... it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's
eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God."
THE PATHETIC CHRISTIANITY OF THE RICH
There are, of course, those Christians who have been told by their
pastors that "the eye of the needle" through which a "rich man shall
hardly pass" (referenced also in Matt. 19:24 and Mark 10:25) is
the name of a narrow gate in the walls of Jerusalem, through which a
camel, with some difficulty, could actually get through. This is what
Father John Neuhaus, a Catholic and the darling of all those evangelicals
who today are pressing for a rapprochement with the Catholics --
evangelicals like Pat Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition
and president of the Christian Broadcasting Network; Charles Colson,
head of the International Prison Fellowship Ministry; Steve and Lou
Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition; Dr. Richard Land and Dr.
Larry Lewis, officers of the Southern Baptist Convention; Mark Noll,
of Wheaton College; Glen Cole of the Assemblies of God, etc. --
believes.
But such a contention is so COMPLETELY ridiculous that
even Peter Singer (hardly a Christian), clearly sees through this hypocrisy.
Writing in the humanist magazine Free Inquiry, Singer sarcastically
(but very properly) reveals the "pretense to virtue" of Christians as
they squirm to avoid the clear meaning of these Scriptures (i.e., Luke
18:25, Matt. 19:24 and Mark 10:25) - A "PRETENSE TO VIRTUE" UPON
WHICH THE OIL ELITES CLEARLY HANG THEIR HATS.
As Singer points out, there is zero archeological or historical evidence
for this interpretation, which can only be traced as far back as the
ninth century. Jesus was using a metaphor popular at the time, although
one that usually referred to elephants rather than camels. And, moreover,
the disciples very evidently understood what Jesus meant here - i.e.,
that it was impossible for a rich man to enter heaven - because,
"... they were ASTONISHED OUT OF MEASURE (at
this teaching), saying among themselves, Who then can be saved?" (Mark
10:26)
To this question, Christ offers a crumb of reassurance: "With men
this is impossible; but with God all things are possible." Possibly!
Maybe! - but the original injunction stands: Christians who want to
follow Jesus and inherit eternal life will do well to give all they
have to the poor. Hardly an idea calculated to win Christianity the
devotion of the rich! Hardly a saying that pastors - who desperately
need the support of the rich if they are going to keep up the mortgage
payments on their super-churches - can use to persuade "men of wealth"
to take a seat on their Board of Trustees as Second Baptist Church in
Houston, Texas has done with Archie Dunham, the Chairman and CEO of
Conoco Oil.
HUMANISTS TEACHING CHRISTIANS HOW
TO PROPERLY INTERPRET THE WORD OF GOD
Neuhaus haughtily denies Singer's assertion that the Christian ethic
tells us to share extensively with the poor, and he seems extremely
annoyed that a "humanist" like Singer would be telling him (supposedly
a Christian) how to interpret Scripture. Neuhaus responds to Singer:
"... the Christian ethic ... underscores that we are 'situated' creatures
with duties framed by specific place and time and possibility ...
The Christian view is grounded in the particular, and most particularly
in the incarnation ... (of Christ) ... The vaulting ambitions of Singer's
concept of 'a morally descent person' (giving their money to the poor)
are implausible in theory and impossible in practice."
In other words, what Neuhaus is saying is that Christ's injunction
to His disciples to share EXTENSIVELY their wealth with
the poor is not only "implausible," but "impossible;" that we are creatures
of the "situation" God has placed us in, and as such we have "responsibilities"
to that "situation" that take precedence over "giving to the poor."
What DRIVEL! What utter NONSENSE! - and
Singer clearly recognizes it as such. He sneeringly (and mockingly)
retorts to the "idiocy" advocated by Neuhaus:
"Presumably Father Neuhaus is suggesting that from the fact that
God has been incarnated in the form of a PARTICULAR
person (i.e., Christ), it follows that we have particular duties,
to our families, friends, compatriots, and so on, which override the
injunction to sell what we have and give it to the poor. But by what
principle of interpretation does a vague reference to the 'incarnation
of Christ' count for more than the EXPLICIT Gospel account
of the WORDS OF JESUS HIMSELF? ... Only, I guess, because
the idea that the founder of Christianity told us to give away our
assets is not at all to Father Neuhaus's liking. Nor, presumably,
would it be congenial to the conservative Christians of ... (today)."
This kind of thinking - the kind that says
that we have responsibilities to our "particular" "situations" (i.e.,
to our immediate families, our mothers and fathers, sisters and
brothers, etc. that take precedence over our responsibilities in
the larger community of Christ) - was clearly repudiated by Jesus
Himself in Matt. 12:46-50:
"While he yet talked to the people, behold, his mother (i.e.,
Mary) and his brethren stood without, desiring to speak with him.
Then one said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand
without, desiring to speak with thee. But he answered and said
unto him that told him, Who is my mother? and who are my brethren?
AND HE STRETCHED FORTH HIS HAND TOWARDS HIS DISCIPLES, AND
SAID, BEHOLD MY MOTHER AND MY BRETHREN! FOR WHOSOEVER SHALL DO
THE WILL OF MY FATHER WHICH IS IN HEAVEN, THE SAME IS MY BROTHER,
AND SISTER, AND MOTHER."]
WE SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF OURSELVES
We
as Christians should be UTTERLY and COMPLETELY
ashamed and embarrassed by all this: that it takes a non-Christian (and
a "humanist," no less) to "rightly divide" (i.e., interpret) the Word
of God for us in this connection. The very real fact of the matter here
is that Singer is right, and Neuhaus and his ilk (i.e., D. James Kennedy,
Tim LaHaye, Charles Stanley, Kenneth Copeland, Kenneth Hagin, Dutch
Sheets, C. Peter Wagner, etc.) are wrong. Truly Christ was right when
He said:
"... the children of this world are in their generation wiser than
the children of light." (Luke 16:8)
Nonetheless, the interpretation of Scripture offered by Neuhaus is
the interpretation to which George Bush and his cabal of Christian friends
subscribe. It's what I call "Texas Christianity" - the kind of grasping
and avaricious Christianity that we described in great detail in "George
Bush, The Promise Keepers, And The Principles Of Messianic Leadership"
- the kind of Christianity that Bernie Ebbers of WorldCom subscribes
to (please see our article, "Get Out Before It's Too Late").
NO,
THIS KIND OF CHRISTIANITY IS VERY FLEXIBLE - BUT IN A MOST PERVERSE
AND SINFUL (YES! - SINFUL) KIND OF WAY: IT'S PERVERSELY
FLEXIBLE INSOFAR AS MONEY IS CONCERNED; IT'S PERVERSELY FLEXIBLE
INSOFAR AS THE GOSPEL IS CONCERNED - ESPECIALLY AS THE GOSPEL PERTAINS
TO MUSLIMS AND THE PEOPLE OF THE MIDDLE EAST; AND IT IS PERVERSELY
FLEXIBLE INSOFAR AS BEING ABLE TO JUSTIFY AN ECONOMIC ALLIANCE BETWEEN
RADICAL ISLAM AND CHRISTIANITY FOR THE SAKE OF OIL PROFITS -
AGAIN, OIL PROFITS DESTINED FOR THE COFFERS OF "CHRISTIANS" (SO-CALLED)
IN ODESSA, MIDLAND, HOUSTON, AND DALLAS.
THE SAUDI STATE AND INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM
And so we return to the fact of what the Saudi state is all about:
A LETHAL MIX OF AMERICAN OIL COMPANIES, THE CIA, THE SAUDI
MONARCHY AND WAHHABISM (i.e., RADICAL Islam). Brisard
and Dasquie write:
"From the very beginning, the kingdom ... invested a large part of
its profits in the promotion of ... Islam (specifically, the extremely
RADICAL form of it that formed the basis of the Saudi
state: WAHHABISM). ALMOST ALL OF THE ISLAMIST NETWORKS
IN THE NEAR EAST, AFRICA, AND THE WEST WERE FINANCED BY THE SAUDIS,
OR BY WAY OF THE INTERNATIONAL ISLAMIC INSTITUTIONS THEY CONTROLLED."
From the very BEGINNING? Wow! What's that say about the
oil companies? What's that say about the CIA? - which was, from the
very beginning, INEXTRICABLY linked with the Saudi
intelligence service, which the CIA created out of "whole cloth!" It
says that the Saudis were doing EXACTLY what the CIA and
the oil companies wanted them to do: PROPAGATING THE FAITH (i.e.,
ISLAM) , AND IN THE PROCESS - HOPEFULLY (FROM THE OIL COMPANIES' AND
CIA's STANDPOINT) - INOCULATING THE POPULATIONS OF THE MIDDLE EAST AGAINST
SOCIALISM.
And once again, bear in mind: The form of Islam that the Saudis were
propagating was NOT a moderate form of Islam, the kind
that average people at the time (i.e., in the fifties and sixties) embraced
in the streets of Damascus, Baghdad, Cairo, etc. - but the very radical
Wahhabi variant - and the CIA (and the oil companies) KNEW
that such was the case. It was, after all, plain enough to see. To say
otherwise is tantamount for someone who has just visited a snake-handling,
tongue-speaking, dancing-in-the-aisle holiness meeting in the backhills
of Tennessee to describe it afterwards as if it had been the staid meeting
of the neighborhood Presbyterian Church. The difference is palpable.
THE WEB OF TERROR
According to Brisard and Dasquie, among the organizations Saudi money
helped to create was the Organization of the Islamic Conference (created
in 1969); in addition, it created the Muslim World League (an NGO created
in 1962 with MISSIONARY objectives). The league soon was
operating in over 120 countries throughout the world;
it offered Saudi financial backing for economic development to any country
ON THE CONDITION THAT THEY BE OPEN TO THE PROPAGATION OF A
SUNNI ISLAM OF THE "HANBALITE" RITE (WHICH HAD INFLUENCED SAUDI WAHHABISM).
It also helped in the construction of mosques and Islamic centers around
the world - even in Europe and North America.
In addition, Saudi Arabia developed an entire banking web to facilitate
the "propagation of the faith" which centered around three critical
banks: Faisal Islamic Bank (FIS), Dar al-Mal, and Dallah Al-Baraka.
Furthermore, the Saudis built a vast network of Islamic "charitable
and mutual assistance organizations," many of which were, in reality,
nothing more than RECRUITMENT and FINANCING
centers for radical Islamic groups like Hamas in Palestine, the Taliban
in Afghanistan, and the GIA in Algeria, including bin Laden's al-Qaeda
network. AND - AGAIN - IN ALL OF THIS, IT IS CRITICAL TO UNDERSTAND
THAT BOTH THE CIA AND THE AMERICAN OIL COMPANIES PLAYED A CENTRAL ROLE
IN WHAT WAS OCCURRING.
THEY KNEW WHAT WAS HAPPENING, AND APPLAUDED THE SAUDI EFFORT AT ISLAMIC
PROSELYTIZING. IT WAS ACCOMPLISHING WHAT IT WAS DESIGNED TO DO - INOCULATING
THE "MASSES" IN THE MIDDLE EAST AGAINST THE MENACE OF SOCIALISM.
TO THINK THAT THE CIA AND THE AMERICAN OIL COMPANIES WERE NOT A PART
OF IT ALL IS SO INSANE AND JUST PLAIN STUPID THAT TO BELIEVE
THEY WEREN'T WOULD AUTOMATICALLY QUALIFY ONE FOR MEMBERSHIP IN THE "FLAT
EARTH SOCIETY."
WORKING HAND-IN-GLOVE WITH TERRORISM
The
fact of the matter is, the oil companies worked hand-in-glove with Saudi
money and radical Islamic groups in the War in Chechnya where the U.S.
and Chevron Oil sponsored Chechin Islamic terrorists in their fight
against Russia - a struggle which aimed at separating Chechnya from
Russia in order to block that country from it's legitimate foothold
in the Caspian Sea area and Central Asia. [Please see our article, "The
Caucasus Mountains, Gog, Magog, And Chevron Oil;" please also see our
article, "The Elite's Explanation Of What's Happening In Chechnya."]
They played the same game in the Balkans with the Mujahadeen. [Please
see our article, "A Story Concerning The Drug Lords The United States
Government Has Allied Itself With In Kosovo."]
All these efforts - and many more besides (for example, similar efforts
in Nigeria, in Ghana, in the Sudan, in Ethiopia, in Kenya and east Africa,
etc.) reveal clearly the hand-in-glove relationship the CIA and the
oil companies have always had with radical Islam.
A KENNETH LAY-KIND OF CHRISTIANITY
What a joke it all is - and a very twisted one at that! A cruel hoax
on Christians! - that CEO's, many of whom, amazingly, open their board
meetings with Christian prayer can participate in such a fraud with
the look of innocence on their faces. It's the height of hypocrisy.
Yet average Christians don't seem to see it.
But
it's no secret what's happening. The information is there for anyone
to see if they want to see. The problem is, Christians in this country
don't want to see what's happening. The love of money has dulled their
senses so that, as Jesus said, their -
"... heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and
their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with
their eyes and hear with their ears, and should understand with their
heart ... and I should heal them." (Matt. 13:15)
And just how "gross their hearts have waxed" (and how "dull of hearing"
they have become, and just how much "their eyes have closed") to the
things of the Lord is made manifest by the "love affair" most Christians
had with Kenneth Lay, the son of a Texas Baptist minister, who - prior
to his "fall from grace" at Enron - was the "darling" of Christians
everywhere. For years and years, Lay - along with Bernie Ebbers of Comcast
- had been "Christianity's "poster-child" for everything that's good
insofar as the so-called "Christian business community" is concerned.
Moreover, he was the man most responsible for lining up Christian support
for Bush, and for obtaining the initial financing for George Bush's
run for the presidency. He created the "Club of 100" - a group of 100
ultra-rich members of America's oil and energy elites which - under
the prodding of George Schultz, former head of Bechtel Corporation and
former Secretary of State for Ronald Reagan - came up with almost all
the early money for the Bush campaign.
Like Ebbers and countless others of his ilk, Lay opened and closed
many of Enron's business dinners - and particularly special ones with
directors and senior employees and community leaders - with prayer.
Indeed, Lay told Robert Darden of Door Magazine that -
"I think that it (i.e., prayer) sets the tone as to the importance
of faith (here at Enron), at least in my life and sets the tone for
the entire meeting ... My employees know that I take basic religious
principles very seriously. Our value system has as its first value,
respect for each other. This is really not much more than the golden
rule. Our second value requires every one to practice ABSOLUTE
INTEGRITY in everything they do. Everyone knows that I personally
have a very strict code of personal conduct that I live by. This code
is based on Christian values. It's not something I carry around on
my sleeve or talk about that much with employees, but they've read
about my life and my experiences and about my dad, so they've heard
many of the stories of my life and the role that my faith has played.
They just know that's a very important part of my life."
WHO IS KIDDING WHOM?
Wow! - who's Lay kidding here? The shenanigans that Enron - under the
leadership of Kenneth Lay himself - was up to during the EXACT
time that Lay was giving this interview to Darden are beyond the imaginings
of most people - from the energy crisis that Enron, together with Williams
Energy (another so-called "Christians" business), almost single-handedly
pulled off in California (which ended up defrauding millions and millions
of ordinary people there of untold amounts of money), to Enron's boondoggle
in Bombay, India where Lay has been specifically accused of "bribery"
of Indian officials and "influence peddling" in connection with a power
plant that Enron was building there. So heavy-handed were Lay's (and
Enron's) activities in Bombay, that they actually extended to hiring
thugs who pulled activist protesters against the project from their
homes and beat them up. One wonders how all that squares with Lay's
assertion to Darden's question: "From a business standpoint, does
being a Christian mean you're going to have to make some difficult decisions?
For instance, working in countries where bribes are an expected way
of doing business?" To that question, Lay told Darden:
"I don't find matters like that difficult at all ... I think there
are the right things to do and there are the wrong things to do. Let
me also say that, from the standpoint of the example you just mentioned,
U.S. law prohibits bribing any public officials. But even beyond that,
when I talk about integrity as one of our values, I usually talk about
ABSOLUTE integrity ... It is really always doing the
right thing. Not bending the rules, not cutting the corners, not doing
things that are illegal or immoral. I think that fits my faith, but
it's also good business. I don't find it difficult. And we have been
in countries where it became apparent that you couldn't do business
without bribing somebody and we just pulled out. We will leave a country
before we will compromise our values."
Oh, really? How then does Lay account for what Enron did in California?
What does Lay say about "cooking" Enron's books to the tune of almost
$4 billion (now $7 billion) over a mere 15 month period? How does Lay
explain Enron's attempt to bribe Indian officials in Bombay? And, finally,
how does Lay justify the use of "company thugs" to beat up community
activists in Bombay who protested Enron's heavy-handed way of doing
business there?
Of course, Lay says he knew nothing about all this. This is what Linda,
Lay's wife, told NBC's Today Show:
"The only truth I know 100 percent for sure is that my husband is
an honest, decent, moral human being who would do absolutely nothing
wrong ... There's some things that he wasn't told."
LYING WITHOUT SHAME
But come on now! That's the last refuge of a scoundrel: "I didn't
know." Really? The truth is, Lay is LYING, and he
is doing it BOLDLY and without shame - the kind of lying
that Jesus rebuked the religious establishment of His day by saying
to them:
"Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye
will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the
truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he
speaketh of his own: FOR HE IS A LIAR, AND THE FATHER
OF IT." (John 8:44)
To believe Lay didn't know what was going on is sheer nonsense. That
is PRECISELY what a CEO is paid to do! - to know what's
going on in his company. That's supposedly what they get the "big bucks"
for. To believe that Lay didn't know is to say that he was nothing more
than someone else's puppet and a naïf - and he certainly wasn't
those things!
Some Christians will undoubtedly say that we should give Lay the benefit
of the doubt here, or at least extend to him a modicum of "Christian
compassion." Oh, really? - you mean the way Christians gave Clinton
the benefit of the doubt over Whitewater, and then - afterwards - when
Clinton was caught in a lie with regard to the Lewinsky affair - offer
to Lay the same kind of "compassion" the Christian community gave to
Clinton? Really? - the same kind of compassion Christians gave to Clinton?
- that would mean that Lay has no compassion coming to him, because
that's EXACTLY what Christians gave Clinton: NO
compassion! NONE! ZIP! NADA!
- ZERO! Or is compassion something that only Christians
are supposed to get? That's not what the Bible says; Jesus said:
"Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour,
and hate thine enemy.
"But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you,
do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully
use you, and persecute you;
"THAT YE MAY BE THE CHILDREN OF YOUR FATHER WHICH IS IN HEAVEN:
for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth
rain on the just and on the unjust.
"For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not
even the publicans the same?
"And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others?
do not even the publicans so?" (Matt. 5:43-47)
TODAY'S CHRISTIANITY: A WOMAN RIDING A BEAST
It's
PRECISELY this kind of pathetic Christianity - the kind
that George Bush, John Ashcroft, Don Evans, Bernie Ebbers, Kenneth Lay,
etc. subscribe to - that has made common cause with radical Islam; the
kind of Christianity that "climbed in bed" with radical Islam for the
sake of oil profits; a Christianity that long ago forgot that -
"... the friendship of the world is enmity with God; whosoever therefore
will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God." (James 4:4)
The fact is, so tightly linked have these Christians become with the
world, that the world's values have now become their values, and the
purposes and goals of the world have now become their purposes and goals.
And, sadly, this is where most average Christians in the United States
are today too - especially those Christians who have so blindly and
naively devoted themselves to Bush and his minions. They simply are
no longer able to differentiate between the material wealth of this
world (kosmos) and the spiritual wealth of the Kingdom of Heaven.
Like the PRETEND Christians who surround Bush and his
Administration, they measure the vitality of their Christianity by the
wealth they possess.
Of
course, it isn't as if the Scriptures had not anticipated this condition
of things. It has - in the figure of a woman (the church) riding a beast
(the world or the state; specifically, the American "New World Order
System"). [Please see Chapter 15 of the Antipas Papers,
"The Woman Of Revelation 17."] Concerning the church that will hold
sway over the world just prior to Christ's return - i.e., the Laodicean
Church - the Bible says:
"And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These
things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning
of the creation of God;
"I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would
thou wert cold or hot.
"So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I
WILL SPUE (i.e., VOMIT) YOU OUT OF MY MOUTH."
(Rev. 3:14-16)
Now, if this offends you, don't argue with us, argue with God. Your
controversy is with Him, it's not with us! - and don't try to dodge
the issue by claiming that the believers in Laodicea were (are) not
real believers. They were (are)!! The Lord is clearly addressing CHRISTIANS
in these verses. You doubt? - well, remember what a church is; it is
an "assembly" of BELIEVERS - hence, when Christ refers
to the "assembly" in Laodicea as the "church" in Laodicea, He is, ipso
facto, recognizing the condition of the individual Christians in
Laodicea as being "born again." These are not "counterfeit" believers.
These are real believers!
LAODICEAN CHRISTIANITY
Nonetheless, Christ says of them that their condition as Christians
is so loathsome and disgusting, that He is about to VOMIT
them out of His mouth!! - and He gives a very SPECIFIC
reason for this condition that "infects" the believers at Laodicea;
Jesus says:
"Because thou sayest, I am (materially) rich, and increased with
(material) goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou
art (spiritually) wretched, and (spiritually) miserable, and (spiritually)
poor, and (spiritually) blind, and (spiritually) naked ..." (Rev.
3:17)
Christ is juxtaposing the material wealth that this world offers against
the spiritual wealth that the Kingdom of Heaven offers - and in doing
so, He is implying that they (i.e., the believers in Laodicea) have
made the wrong choice: that's what this verse is all about - and all
this despite the clear injunction of Holy Writ against doing so:
"... they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and
into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction
and perdition." (1 Tim. 6:9)
It is PRECISELY this type of Christianity that permeates
the kind of Christianity that surrounds the Bush White House. It is
a FAKE Christianity, and it has NOTHING
to do with the kingdom of God. It is for this reason that Christians
who subscribe to it have found it so easy to embrace an alliance with
radical Islamists for the sake of oil profits - after all, when one's
Christianity is measured by the wealth one possesses, this is surely
the way of gaining a glorious entrance into the Kingdom of God.
THE ASTOUNDING GROWTH OF ISLAM - THANKS
TO THE CIA AND THE AMERICAN OIL COMPANIES
Islam today is the most rapidly expanding religion on earth, and many
Christians bemoan that fact. They seem totally unable to fathom what's
been happening - i.e., THAT ISLAM IS THE FASTEST GROWING RELIGION
ON EARTH LARGELY BECAUSE OF ALL THE MONEY AND SUPPORT THE CIA AND THE
AMERICAN OIL COMPANIES - TOGETHER WITH THE SAUDI REGIME (WHICH IS NOTHING
MORE THAN THE CREATURE OF THE CIA AND THESE SAME OIL COMPANIES - HAVE
BEEN POURING INTO IT.
Mosque building, Islamic recruitment of the poor and dispossessed (people
that Christianity largely ignores), the spectacular growth of Islamic
"charitable and mutual assistance organizations," etc. - all this has
contributed immeasurably to the growth of Islam over the past fifty
years - and it all began only after THE OIL COMPANIES, THE
CIA, AND THE SAUDI STATE BEGAN POURING MONEY IN THE MID-1960s INTO ISLAM
AS A WAY OF SUBVERTING SOCIALISM IN THE MIDDLE EAST.
THE ZAKAT SYSTEM
Brisard and Dasquie report that the largest "charitable and mutual
assistance" organization in the Islamic world is the International Islamic
Relief Organization (IIRO) which finances numerous Islamic "missionaries"
and maintains close ties with frontline Islamic terrorist groups.
Founded in Jeddah in 1978, the IIRO is based all over the world from
Bosnia-Herzegovina to Kosovo to Chechnya to Afghanistan. It is supported
by the zakat system, a religious tax which requires companies
doing business with the Saudis to donate a certain amount of their own
funds to the IIRO and other charitable Muslim organizations as part
of the price for doing business in the Monarchy.
Everyone knows what the zakat is all about in the Middle East,
including the oil companies, AND THEY KNOW WHERE THIS MONEY IS GOING
AND WHAT IT IS PURCHASING (and if they don't know, it's because the
have CHOSEN NOT TO KNOW). American and European businesses can opt
out of the tax if they want; but if they do, there is a price to be
paid insofar as "Saudi goodwill" is concerned.
THE BIN MAHFOUZ CLAN, RADICAL ISLAM, AND THE
AMERICAN OIL ELITES - "OH WHAT A TANGLED WEB
WE WEAVE WHEN FIRST WE PRACTICE TO DECEIVE"
At the financial heart of the radical Islamic terrorist network is
the bin Mahfouz clan. The head of the clan today is Khalid bin Mahfouz.
The bin Mahfouzes came from the province of Hadramaut in southern Yemen.
Having descended from a long line of merchants, they immigrated to Saudi
Arabia at the beginning of the last century. In 1950, Khalid's father
founded Saudi Arabia's first bank, the National Commercial Bank (NCB).
Today the bin Mahfouz financial empire is a vast one, covering all the
major sectors in Saudi Arabia and abroad, most notably banking, agriculture,
pharmaceuticals, and telecommunications. A report in 1992 to the U.S.
Senate from the Foreign Relations Committee chaired by Senator John
Kerry describes Khalid bin Mahfouz as "the most powerful banker in the
Middle East."
According to Brisard and Dasquie, the NCB is at the very center of
the Saudi's terrorist network - and that this is a "well-known secret"
in Saudi Arabia and in oil company circles. In 1989, Khalid bin Mahfouz
was appointed to ARAMCO's "supreme Council" by King Fahd, and bin Mahfouz
entered into a close and intimate relationship with the American oil
elites - a relationship that necessitated a lavish residence in Houston,
at the very center of the oil elite's universe. According to the Washington
Post, Khalid's luxurious estate in the suburbs of Houston soon became
a new Mecca for Saudis all over the world.
From his lavish estate in Houston, bin Mahfouz developed close, personal
relations with the rich and powerful in America - especially insofar
as the oil elites were concerned. Brisard and Dasquie write:
"The bin Mahfouz galaxy ... gives a new dimension to business relations
... notably with the United States. A Pakistani bank in which he (i.e.,
bin Mahfouz) is the main shareholder is a good example: Prime Commercial
Bank is run by Sami Mubarak Baarma, a Saudi Arabian citizen, born
in 1955; Saeed Chaudhry; and Abdul Rahman bin Mahfouz, son of Khalid
Mahfouz. Sami Mubarak Baarma is an executive of SNCB Securities Limited
in London, another bin Mahfouz financial subsidiary. For the NCB,
he manages a financial network called Middle East Capital Group (MECG),
based in Lebanon. One of MECG's directors is Henry Sarkissian, who
runs several companies in the bin Laden Group. Sami Mubarak Baarma
is also in charge of the Saudi National Commercial Bank's international
division. AS A RESULT OF HIS INFLUENCE IN PAKISTAN, HE BECAME A
MEMBER OF THE CARLYLE GROUP'S ADVISORY COMMITTEE. [The
Carlyle Group, for those of you who don't know, is an amalgamation
of groups heavily invested in businesses associated with the American
oil elites.]
"The Carlyle Group's leading investors include many figures from
former U.S. President GEORGE H.W. BUSH's entourage, as well
as that of President GEORGE W. BUSH. Its board of directors
includes important figures from the Bush 1 team: JAMES A. BAKER
III, former secretary of state under the first President Bush;
FRANK C. CARLUCCI, former secretary of defense under Ronald
Reagan, RICHARD G. DARMAN, former director of the Office of
Management and Budget under George H. W. Bush between 1989 and 1993;
and JOHN SUNUNU, former White House chief of staff under George
Bush 1. In addition, Saudi Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, nephew of King
Fahd, owns an indeterminate stake in the group. Even President George
W. Bush was a member of the board of directors of one of the Carlyle
Group's subsidiaries, Caterair, between 1990 and 1994."
THE CARLYLE GROUP: A DETAILED LOOK INTO THE INTIMATE
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE OIL ELITES AND RADICAL ISLAM
It's here in the Carlyle Group that one stumbles across a perfect example
of how CONNECTED the CIA, the oil elites, the Wahhabis
and the members of the House of Saud really are. IT IS SIMPLY ABSURD
TO BELIEVE THAT ALL THESE PEOPLE ARE NOT INTIMATELY AWARE OF WHAT THE
OTHERS ARE INVOLVED IN.
And that is especially insofar as the Americans are concerned - or
is it really conceivable to believe that a former Director of the CIA
(the first George Bush) and a former secretary of defense (Frank Carlucci)
wouldn't know what the bin Mahfouz and the bin Laden families were really
up to? IF ONE BELIEVES THAT, THEN ONE IS ENTITLED TO A FREE, LIFE-TIME
MEMBERSHIP IN "CLUB NAIF."
THE GEORGE W. BUSH CONNECTION
And the connections don't end there. Brisard and Dasquie continue:
"In 1987 an obscure Saudi financier named Abdullah Taha BAKKSH
invested in HARKEN, a Texas oil company of which George
W. Bush was a director from 1986 to 1993. The deal consisted of recapitalizing
the company, which was going through difficult times. This Saudi investor
(i.e., BAKKSH) is none other than the partner of Khalid
bin Mahfouz ... And so Taha BAKKSH BECAME AN 11.5
PERCENT SHAREHOLDER OF HARKEN ENERGY CORP ..."
Now stop and think about this for a minute: Is one really prepared
to believe that the son of the then vice president of the United States
and former director of the Central Intelligence Agency wouldn't have
known all about Bakksh and his connection to the bin Mahfouz family
and, ipso facto, to radical Islam? If one is prepared to believe
that, then I would like to meet him. I have some swampland in Florida
I would like to sell him. Brisard and Dasquie persist:
"His (i.e., Bakksh's) representative within Harken Energy is not
unknown either. Talat Othman is a member alongside Frank Carlucci
of one of America's most prestigious think tanks, the Middle East
Policy Council as well as being a leading Arab-American supporter
of the Republican Party. These investors know each other well. They've
been sitting on the same boards for more than ten years, alongside
Salem bin Laden, the brother of Osama bin Laden ..."
JAMES R. BATH
And
now the Christian connection! - James R. Bath, a card-carrying member
of Houston's phony (fake!) Christian community. His connection to the
bin Mahfouz and bin Laden clans and his concomitant connections to Houston's
oil elites and the Bush family is enough to take one's breath away.
Brisard and Dasquie write:
"It is ... not surprising to find James R. Bath on the list of shareholders
in two ... companies controlled by George W. Bush - Arbusto '79 and
Arbusto '80 Ltd. In the late 1970s, James R Bath, a wealthy Texas
entrepreneur, invested ... in these companies to get them off the
ground. At the time, he was the U.S. business representative for Salem
bin Laden according to the terms of a 1976 trust agreement. It came
out later, in 1993, in the official U.S. document, that he was also
the legal representative of Khalid bin Mahfouz. THE TWO ENTITIES
FOUNDED BY GEORGE W. BUSH WERE LATER MERGED WITH HARKEN ENERGY
..."
Interestingly, except for these obscure (but tantalizing) references
to the president's connection to the bin Mahfouz family by way of Harken
Energy Corp., Brisard and Dasquie write that -
"... ALL TRACES OF THESE TRANSACTIONS (between Harken and
the bin Mahfouz family) HAVE DISAPPEARED."
Sounds very much like a CIA "clean-up" operation!
WHAT ALL OF THIS SUGGESTS IS AN INTIMATE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN
RADICAL ISLAM, THE CIA AND THE AMERICAN OIL ELITES - AND WHAT IS
SUGGESTED HERE IS IN FACT REALITY. I repeat: the facts are there
for people to see if they want to see; the problem is, most people prefer
not to see what's happening.
DISCARDING ALLIES THAT ARE NO LONGER NEEDED
Now in all of this, it's important for us to "keep our eyes on the
ball" - it's the only way we can really understand what's happening
here - and that necessitates that we constantly bear in mind what the
alliance between the CIA and the oil companies (on the one hand) and
the House of Saud and radical Islam (on the other hand) was originally
designed to accomplish: TO COMBAT SOCIALISM.
That's it! That's what the relationship has been all about! - and over
the last fifty years, this relationship has served its purpose well.
In the face of what appeared to be an irresistible tide of socialism
that emanated out of the old Soviet Union, the American oil elites cobbled
together an alliance between themselves, the CIA, the House of Saud,
and the Wahhabis that ultimately stopped socialism dead in its tracks
in the Middle East.
BUT NOW THAT SOCIALISM (AND THE OLD SOVIET UNION) IS DEAD AND GONE
- A THING OF THE PAST INSOFAR AS THE MIDDLE EAST IS CONCERNED - THE
OIL ELITES HAVE NO FURTHER NEED OF THEIR FORMER ALLIES (i.e., THE RADICAL
ISLAMISTS) - AND THAT'S WHAT THE WAR IN AFGHANISTAN IS ALL ABOUT.
AND
EVEN MORE OMINOUSLY, THAT'S WHAT ALL THE RECENT, VERY FOREBODING RUMBLING
AGAINST SAUDI ARABIA FROM "CONSERVATIVE THINK TANKS" THAT ARE CONTROLLED
BY THE OIL ELITES IS ALL ABOUT TOO.
AND THE RADICAL ISLAMISTS REALIZE THAT - AND THAT'S WHAT 9/11 WAS
ALL ABOUT.
The very real fact of the matter is, THE AMERICANS ARE ABOUT TO
PERMANENTLY DISSOLVE THEIR RELATIONSHIP WITH RADICAL ISLAM BY
DISSOLVING ISLAM ITSELF - AND IN DOING SO, THEY ARE PERFECTLY PREPARED
TO LIQUIDATE THE PEOPLE OF THE MIDDLE EAST.
To
this end, America has now embarked on its "END GAME"
in the Middle East and Central Asia: which is to gain complete and
total control of the oil fields in that area of the world. And radical
Islam is now seen as an obstacle to that goal. Therefore, it is disposable
- which places not only Islam on America's "hit list," but the people
of the Middle East as well. [Please see our last article, "The Coming
War In Iraq: What's It's Really All About."]
As a result, Noam Chomsky - one of the most sagacious and perceptive
observers of what American has been up to over the past fifty years
- now believes that the populations of the Middle East stand in deadly
peril. Stephanie Reich of the Alliance for Global Justice in Washington
D.C. comments on Chomsky's ideas:
"CHOMSKY NOW BELIEVES THAT THE U.S. WOULD PREFER TO REDUCE IRAQ (AND
THE REST OF THE MIDDLE EAST) TO A SPARSELY POPULATED, POLITICALLY
COMPLIANT, OIL-PUMPING ... (AREA)."
As
we have said previously, the CRIMINALITY of such an undertaking
is BREATHTAKING in its magnitude. Seemingly, it's too
iniquitous an "enterprise" for anyone to take seriously. Nonetheless,
people had better do so! [We urge you here to read, re-read, and
read again our article, "Israel And The Renewed Struggle For The Holy
Land;" it is fundamental to any understanding of what's happening today
in the Middle East.]
You
say that no one could be that cold-blooded? Well, they can - and the
sad thing about it all is that the Bush Administration is involving
Christians up to their necks in its CRIMINALITY - Christians
who perversely, and against the entire thrust of the New Testament,
have been led to measure the vitality of their Christianity by the wealth
they possess; Christians that have been so compromised by the world
that they are no longer able to differentiate between the "Kingdom of
Heaven" and this "present evil world" (Gal. 1:4).
THE PREDISPOSITION OF AMERICAN
CHRISTIANS TOWARDS THE RICH
The truth is, Christians are drawn to la dolce Vitae (i.e.,
the "good life" of this world) and to the rich like a moth to a flame,
and in doing so, they take solace in the belief that their "Protestant
Ethic" supports them in their devotion to the wealthy. This slavish
dedication to the moneyed elite is based on a belief that seems to permeate
the American form of Christianity - a notion that all those who work
hard will eventually "get ahead financially;" a belief in the ability
of individual Christians to control the financial circumstances of their
lives.
And
when their lives do not proceed according to plan, they tend to assume
that the fault lies within, a very convenient proclivity of mind insofar
as the rich are concerned, which all too often - and very sadly - leads
Christians on a fruitless, never-ending search to find that "character
flaw" in their lives that has visited financial failure (or mediocrity)
upon them; all this despite the fact that Christians are very plainly
warned against such thinking. The fact of the matter is, material wealth
INEVITABLY leads believers AWAY from God.
That's what Jesus PLAINLY taught. Jesus said:
"No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one,
and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the
other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon." (Luke 16:13)
CAPITALISM: IS IT REALLY "GOD ORDAINED?"
The
Religious Right claims, and their secular allies in the corporate elites
similarly believe, that capitalism is God's ordained economic system
for this world - almost as if Adam Smith, David Ricardo, and Thomas
Malthus were Biblical figures on a par with Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel,
Nehemiah, and so forth; and that the economic system they devised -
i.e., CAPITALISM - finds its origins in the Bible and
should be adhered to with as much ardor and ebullience as one would
adhere to the injunctions of Holy Writ.
But that's utter nonsense! No where in the Bible can one find even
the smallest suggestion that the "Dismal Science" of Adam Smith, or
the dreary and gloomy economic system that Malthus and Ricardo contrived
are biblically based. This evil and pernicious world of Oliver Twist
that Smith, Ricardo and Malthus conceived is entirely a man-made system;
it has NOTHING to do with God or the Bible! NOTHING!
The repugnant and even vulgar thought - central to the system of capitalism
- that the world should be divided into a management class of "haves"
(i.e., the rich) and a laboring class of "have nots" (i.e., the poor)
simply does not exist in the Bible. The very real fact of the matter
is, the severe and cold "Calvinistic" economic system of Ricardo, Smith
and Malthus - based as it is on the Darwinian maxim of "survival of
the fittest" in which the most productive are supposed to rise to the
top of the economic pecking order and the least productive are supposed
to fall to the bottom - is UTTERLY repudiated by the Scripture.
How you say? - through the device of the "JUBILEE," a
God-ordained mechanism aimed at preventing the untoward accumulation
of wealth - central to the system of capitalism - in Old Testament Israeli
society. You never heard of this? - well, I'm not surprised! It's not
something that the elites of this world or their "toadies" in the Religious
Right would find it convenient to talk about too much.
A TIME OF REJOICING: THE YEAR OF JUBILEE
In the Old Testament (in the Book of Leviticus) the land of Israel
was to be divided EQUALLY in perpetual allotments to its
citizenry. Each family was to receive a roughly equal share of the land.
Now the Bible envisioned that in the course of time, some would not
do as well as others and, as a result, would have to sell their land
and their houses. But every fifty years, the Bible established a "Year
of Jubilee" in which everything had to be restored to its ORIGINAL
owner - WITHOUT COST:
"And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty
throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it
shall be a jubilee (i.e., a time of rejoicing") unto you; and ye
shall return every man unto his possession ... (in other words,
everyman in Israel would have his former possessions returned to
him).
"A jubilee shall that fiftieth year be unto you: ye shall not sow,
neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather the
grapes in it of thy vine undressed.
"In the year of this jubilee ye shall return every man unto his
possession.
"IN THE YEAR OF THE JUBILEE THE FIELD SHALL RETURN UNTO HIM
OF WHOM IT WAS BOUGHT, EVEN TO HIM TO WHOM THE POSSESSION OF THE
LAND DID BELONG (originally)." (Lev. 25:10-11, 13, 24)
HARDLY A SYSTEM THAT THE BANK
OF AMERICA WOULD APPROVE OF
Hardly a system of things that would be approved today by Bank of America
and Wells Fargo, and by the "Captains of Industry." How long do you
suppose modern capitalism would survive under this kind of system? Not
very long I should imagine. And be clear here, this is the only "system
of economics" (so to speak) that the Bible ever actually set up - and
it's certainly not a capitalist system or a system that would be very
much approved by the Rockefellers, the Fords, and the DuPonts of this
world.
Where is there here any chance for the massive accumulation of wealth
by the few at the expense of the many upon which the system of capitalism
is so entirely dependent? It doesn't exist! The fact is, THE PURPOSE
OF THESE REGULATIONS WAS TO PREVENT THE ACCUMULATION OF WEALTH
BY THE FEW AT THE EXPENSE OF THE MANY - even when the wealthy had
accumulated their assets on a legitimate basis!! That was the spirit
behind these regulations and ordinances! - and that is precisely what
the "SUV Christians" of today would no doubt call "Marxist!" Pretty
hard to justify the accumulation of wealth that makes possible the gated
communities of "Yuppie Land-Christians" under that system of things,
isn't it?
Where is there here the opportunity for the economic conquest of the
Middle East by the American oil elites? Where would the possibility
be for the accumulation of the massive oil concessions that ARAMCO,
Exxon/Mobil, Unocal, etc. have managed to cobble together if these companies
would have been forced to return to the original inhabitants of these
lands the possessions they had stolen, or even legitimately bought,
after a period of fifty years? - after all, the Bible admitted to no
difference here! The land (and the property) had to be returned! Where
is the prospect that Chevron Oil could have raped the people of Nigeria
and Angola of their oil wealth under such a system?
This is definitely not a system the World Bank or the WTO would very
much approve of! Certainly not Ford, or GM! Certainly not General Electric
or Microsoft! SO MUCH FOR THE THOUGHT THAT THE CAPITALISM PRACTICED
BY TODAY'S SECULAR ELITES AND APPROVED OF BY THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT IS
SANCTIONED BY THE BIBLE!
MAX WEBER AND THE PROTESTANT ETHIC
In his classic study on the theoretical and ideological origins of
modern economic thought (the kind that has led to the vacuous Christianity
so prevalent today in America's churches) - The Protestant Ethic
and the Spirit of Capitalism - Max Weber (1864-1920), a professor
of sociology and economics at Heidelberg University in Germany, traced
the source of this kind of thinking to a synthesis between Christianity
and the "pursuit of wealth" known commonly today in Christian circles
as the "PROTESTANT ETHIC," and in economic circles as
"CAPITALISM."
The syntheses first took hold in Calvin's Geneva, and from their spread
to Holland and then into England; from England it spread to America
with the Puritans. According to Weber, what this synthesis essentially
did was to the hallow the human quest for prosperity, and SANCTIFY
greed as a moral imperative by which one's Christian-life could be measured,
an outcome that could only have taken root in an apostatized form of
Christianity.
By now this ethic - i.e., the "Protestant Ethic" - has so taken root
in the mindset of today's American form of Christianity, that it is
not at all uncommon to treat one's pursuit of wealth as a "calling"
from God similar to (and equivalent with) a calling into the "pastorate"
or into the mission field - and all this despite the fact that there
exists not one shred of Scriptural support for such thinking.
Nonetheless, to most American Christians today, it seems self-evident
that those Christians who possess the finer things of life, for example,
a beautiful house, a successful business, a BMW and so forth, possess
these things as an indication of God's favor, and not necessarily as
the result of the avaricious, single-minded pursuit of wealth that it
all too often is. Indeed, a kind of rough calculus has resulted in most
Christian circles - aided and abetted by a fawning, boot-liking pastorate
- that equates material success in the "here and now" to good Christian
living. For the most part, this calculus goes totally unchallenged
anywhere in American Christendom, and when someone does occasionally
rise up to challenge it, he is smashed with as much vehemence as one
would use when crushing the head of a poisonous snake.
THE REGULARIZED AND CONTINUOUS
ORIENTATION TOWARD WEALTH
Of course, that doesn't mean that the desire for riches didn't exist
before the advent of Calvinism and the "Protestant Ethic." Obviously,
it did! - the DESIRE FOR WEALTH has existed in all times
and in all places. But never before had the quest for wealth been sanctified
and ennobled in quite the way it was here - as a calculated SYSTEM
of economics which involved, as Weber put it, the -
"... REGULARIZED and CONTINUOUS ORIENTATION
toward the achievement of profit."
Wow!! Just think about that!! - the REGULARIZED
and CONTINUOUS ORIENTATION toward economic
aggrandizement; that is to say, an orientation (i.e., an alignment
of one's personality) towards money (i.e., what the Bible calls "FILTHY
lucre" - I Tim. 3:3, I Tim 3:8, Titus 1:7, I Pet. 5:2) that is continuous
(i.e., "never ending," "constant," and "ceaseless") and regularized
(i.e., "disciplined").
That, dear Christians, is the "Protestant Ethic!" - straight
from the mouth of the person who invented the term! - and not so much
as an opprobrium or as an infamy, but as a description of fact. The
sad thing about all this, is that today countless numbers of Christians
wear this term around their necks, as it were, as a badge of honor rather
than as the DISGRACE it really is.
It is precisely here - i.e., in the fact that the so-called "Protestant
Ethic" SANCTIFIED, ENNOBLED, and even DEIFIED
the human pursuit of affluence by lending to it the mantle of godliness
and virtue - that Christians today can say "... I am (materially)
rich, and increased with (material) goods, and have need of nothing
..." (Rev. 3:17a) Sadly, however, these are the kind of people to whom
God said -
"... Thou FOOL, this night thy soul shall be required
of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?"
(Luke 12:20)
And why are they fools (a term God hardly ever uses)? - because they
are unable to comprehend what their real spiritual condition is in the
sight of God - that they are in His sight "... (spiritually) wretched,
and (spiritually) miserable, and (spiritually) poor, and (spiritually)
blind, and (spiritually) naked ..." (Rev. 3:17b)
It is exactly these kinds of Christians that Christ says He is going
to "spue" (i.e., VOMIT) out of His mouth. (Rev. 3:16)
Pretty heavy!
Nonetheless, it is SPECIFICALLY this kind of Christianity
that undergirds the theology of George Bush, John Ashcroft, Don Evans,
Karl Rove, etc. - and not only these politicos, but Christian leaders
like Charles Stanley, D. James Kennedy, Tim LaHaye, the late John Wimber,
Juan Carlos Ortiz, C. Peter Wagner, Beverley LaHaye, Ern Baxter, Kenneth
Copeland, Kenneth Hagin, Oral Roberts, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell,
Chuck Colson, Jack Hayford, David Yonggi Cho (yes, even Cho who isn't
an American, but a Korean), Robert Stearns, Mike Bickle, Reuven Doron,
Che Ahn, Frank Hammond, Cindy Jacobs, Bill Hamon, John Eckhardt, Bobbie
Byerly, Dutch Sheets, Jim Goll, John Paul Jackson, James Ryle, Frank
Damazio, Ed Silvoso, Carlos Annacondia, Claudio Freidzon, Roger Mitchell,
Ted Haggart, Paul Cain, Chuck Pierce, Rick Joyner, Kingsley Fletcher,
Jim Laffoon, Barbara Wentroble, ad infinitum.
GET OUT WHILE YOU CAN!
Listen to me, dear brothers and sisters of the Lord; YOU MUST GET
OUT OF THIS KIND OF CHRISTIANITY while you still can. To allow yourself
to be connected to the elites of this world in the way that all those
Christian leaders listed above are attempting to do, is to open yourself
up to be betrayed by them someday - AND THEY WILL BETRAY YOU JUST
AS SURELY AS THEY ARE ABOUT TO BETRAY THEIR ERSTWHILE ALLIES, THE ISLAMISTS.
The
very real fact of the matter is, just as the American elites are prepared
now TO PERMANENTLY DISSOLVE THEIR RELATIONSHIP WITH ISLAM
BY LIQUIDATING THE PEOPLE OF THE MIDDLE EAST, THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT THEY
ARE GOING TO CHRISTIANS SOMEDAY (AND ALSO TO ISRAEL). These kinds
of people have no permanent alliances; no permanent friendships! Once
your usefulness to them is finished, they will dispose of you just as
quickly as one would dispose of a dirty handkerchief. [Again, we urge
you here to read, re-read, and read again our article, "Israel And The
Renewed Struggle For The Holy Land;" it is fundamental to any understanding
of what's happening today in the Middle East.]
WE MUST QUIT OURSELVES OF THIS KIND OF CHRISTIANITY (WITH ITS RELATIONSHIP
WITH THE WORLD) AND BECOME LIKE A PEOPLE WHO -
"... look for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and
maker is God." (Heb. 11:10)
RECKONING OURSELVES AS DEAD TO THE WORLD
In this great passage of Scripture (Hebrews, chapter 11), Paul describes
in unmistakable terms the attitude toward the world (i.e., the "here
and now") that all those who wish to serve God must have if they are
to please Him; there’s no ambiguity here. Paul declares that all
those who wish to serve God must consider the world as alien territory,
and they themselves as only "sojourners" in it - people who
are merely transiting through it on their way to another land - a heavenly
country whose "builder and maker is God" (Heb. 11:10);
and that while here on earth, there is a necessity laid upon them to
continually remind themselves of their "alien status" by -
"... confessing (both in word and in the way they live) that
they are strangers (foreigners) and pilgrims (travelers, wanderers,
wayfarers) on the earth ..." (Heb. 11:13);
And that they must not only accept this fact, they must "embrace"
it; they must be "persuaded" (convinced) by it, and by doing
so to DEMONSTRATE to those around them that they are actively
-
"... seeking another country ... a better country, that is,
an heavenly (one)." (Heb. 11:14) ... wherefore God is not ashamed
to be called their God: for He hath prepared for them (a heavenly)
city." (Heb. 11:16)
Listen, brothers and sisters: the Bible says:
"My kingdom is NOT of this world; if my kingdom
were of this world, then would my servants fight ... but ... my kingdom
(is) not from hence." (John 18:36)
and
"DO NOT LOVE THE WORLD, , or ANYTHING
in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is
not in him. For EVERYTHING in the world ... comes NOT
from the Father ..." (1 John 2:15-16)
and
"The WHOLE world lieth in the evil one."
(1 John 5:19)
Brothers and sister, the church is a calling OUT FROM
the world (John 15:19; 17:14-16; Gal. 6:14; James 4:4) - she is called
out to witness that she is not of this world, but of heaven; that she
is united to a glorified Christ in heaven (Eph. 1:18-23; Eph 2:6), and
not of this world, even as He is not of this world (John 18:36).
ANSWERING THE CALL OF GOD ON YOUR LIFE
Listen dear brothers and sisters: God is calling you - in this troubled
time, He is asking:
"Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" (Isaiah 6:8a)
And we must answer:
"... Here am I: send me." (Isaiah 6:8b)
But - as Oswald Chambers has said - whether or not we hear God’s
call depends upon whether or not we are daily IN THE PRESENCE
OF GOD. Many are called but few are chosen, that is, few prove
themselves the chosen ones. The chosen ones are those who have come
into the PRESENCE of God and, as a result, hear the still
small voice calling all the time, "Who will go for us?" It is not a
question of God singling out a strong man or woman and saying, Now,
you go. Isaiah was in the PRESENCE of God and because
of that he overheard the call, and realized that there was nothing else
for him but to say, in conscious freedom, "Here am I, send me."
OH, THAT I MAY NEVER FEEL ASHAMED
How we answer this call will determine whether we feel ASHAMED
at His appearing or not. Paul says,
"My eager desire and hope is that I may never feel ashamed,
but that now as ever I may do honor to Christ in my own person by
fearless courage - whether that means life or death, no matter! (Phil.
i, 20-21 (Moffatt)
Again, while we admit that standing up against what is happening in
the church is easy to suggest, but difficult to do - still, it's not,
as we suggested in the Antipas Papers, an impossible task,
at least not yet. What it probably will mean, however, is ostracism
from your circle of friends, and maybe even your families. But the fact
is, if you can't face that, then you have no right to call yourself
a "Christian." Jesus said,
"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send
peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against
his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter
in law against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall be they
of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more
than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more
than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his
cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. He that
findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my
sake shall find it." (Matt. 10:34-39)
God bless you all!
S.R. Shearer
Antipas Ministries