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Former Pope Benedict Writes Paper Blaming Priest Sex Abuse Scandals On 1960’s Hippie Movement, But Records Show Catholic Church Was Rotten From The Beginning

Former Pope Benedict’s “The Church and the Scandal of Sexual Abuse” has the unmistakable ring of a papal document. And it doesn’t come close to the truth.

Published

7 years ago

April 10, 2019

Geoffrey Grider

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Former Pope Benedict’s “The Church and the Scandal of Sexual Abuse” has the unmistakable ring of a papal document. You might even call it a post-retirement encyclical. Or damage control.

Former pope why did Benedict XVI retired under highly suspicious circumstances back in 2013, and we have heard precious little from him since then. But this week, he felt the urge to make his voice known once again with the publishing of a new encyclical aimed at trying to stop the bleeding from the ongoing Catholic priest sex abuse scandals. Benedict makes his case that it was the free love era of the hippie generation in the late 1960’s that was responsible for the catholic priest sex scandals. But as you will see, this is very far from the truth. The free love of the 1960’s only brought an already-simmering and festering boil to the surface.

“Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets; for God hath avenged you on her. And a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all. And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth.” Revelation 18:20,21,24 (KJV)

Below you will find former pope Benedict’s claims and the case he makes summarized below. We recommend that you read the full text of his 6,000 word document here. What follows after that is a short history of Catholic sex abuse scandals over the past 1,700 years. We recommend that you read all of that as well. The Catholic Church has always, from its beginnings in the early 300’s, been a haven for homosexuals and pedophiles, and it has been consistently covered up by every generation of bishops, cardinals and popes.

Former Pope Benedict blames church’s scandals partly on the ‘60s

FROM THE NY POST: When Pope Benedict XVI resigned the papacy in 2013, he vowed to live the rest of his days in seclusion, to serve the Catholic Church “through a life dedicated to prayer.” But the church’s spiraling abuse crisis prompted him this week to return to the limelight.

The retired pontiff has drafted a 6,000-word document in his native German and aims to publish it in a monthly periodical for clergy in his home region of Bavaria. Benedict says the document, an English translation of which I’ve reviewed, is meant to assist the Church in seeking “a new beginning” and making her “again truly credible as a light among peoples and as a force in service against the powers of destruction.”

Former Pope Benedict’s “The Church and the Scandal of Sexual Abuse” has the unmistakable ring of a papal document. You might even call it a post-retirement encyclical. It’s written with his signature precision and clarity of insight and offers a piercing account of the origins of the crisis and a vision of the way forward.

The church’s still-radiating crisis, Benedict suggests, was a product of the moral laxity that swept the West, and not just the church, in the 1960s. The young rebels of 1968, Benedict writes, fought for “all-out sexual freedom, one which no longer conceded any norms.”

Benedict adds: “Part of the physiognomy of the Revolution of 1968 was that pedophilia was now also diagnosed as allowed and appropriate.” This might strike contemporary readers as puzzling. But those who lived through that wretched decade will remember that some of the leading ’68ers also advocated “anti-authoritarian education,” which involved some pretty unsavory interactions between adults and children. Hippie communes weren’t child-friendly places, either.

“I have always wondered how young people in this situation could approach the priesthood and accept it, with all its ramifications,” Benedict writes. “The extensive collapse of the next generation of priests in those years and the very high number of laicizations were consequence of all these processes.”

The church, in other words, was no more immune to the disorders of that decade and its aftermath than the rest of society.

How come? Benedict blames clerics and theologians who, in the aftermath of Vatican II, abandoned natural law — the notion that morality is written into human nature itself and can therefore be grasped by human reason — in favor of a more “pragmatic” morality. READ MORE

Now For The Rest Of The Story…

A more accurate history of the sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church is found here, written by a Catholic priest named Rev. Thomas Doyle, a lettered doctor in Catholic canon law. As you will see, the sex abuse by priests goes all the way back to the beginning of the Catholic Church in the 4th century AD. As with Benedict’s document, we strongly urge you to read this in its entirely as well.

A Short History Of Clergy Sexual Abuse In The Catholic Church

FROM CRUSADE AGAINST CLERGY ABUSE: The Catholic Church was officially recognized by Emperor Constantine in the early 4th century. With this recognition the religious leaders, soon to be known as the “clergy” gradually evolved into a separate, privileged class, the most exalted members of which were the bishops. Although celibacy did not become a universally mandated state for clerics of the western Church until the 12th century (2nd Lateran Council, 1139) various church leaders began to advocate it by the 4th century. The earliest recorded church legislation is from the council of Elvira (Spain, 306 AD). Half of the canons passed dealt with sexual behavior of one kind or another and included penalties assessed for clerics who committed adultery or fornication. Though it did not make specific mention of homosexual activities by the clergy, this early Council reflected the church’s official attitude toward same-sex relationships: men who had sex with young boys were deprived of communion even on their deathbed.

In spite of claims to the contrary, the canonical history of the Catholic Church clearly reflects a consistent pattern of awareness that celibate clergy regularly violated their obligations in a variety of ways. The fact of clergy abuse with members of the same sex, with young people and with women is fully documented. At certain periods of church history clergy sexual abuse was publicly known and publicly acknowledged by church leaders. From the late 19th century into the early 21st century the church’s leadership has adopted a position of secrecy and silence. They have denied the predictability of clergy sexual abuse in one form or another and have claimed that this is a phenomenon new to the post-Vatican II era. The recently published reports of the Bishops’ National Review Board and John Jay College Survey have confirmed the fact of known clergy sexual abuse since the 1950’s and the church leadership’s consistent mishandling of individual cases.

The bishops have, at various times, claimed that they were unaware of the serious nature of clergy sexual abuse and unaware of the impact on victims. This claim is easily offset by the historical evidence. Through the centuries the church has repeatedly condemned clergy sexual abuse, particularly same-sex abuse. The very texts of many of the laws and official statements show that this form of sexual activity was considered harmful to the victims, to society and to the Catholic community. Church leaders may not have been aware of the scientific nature of the different sexual disorders nor the clinical descriptions of the emotional and psychological impact on victims, but they cannot claim ignorance of the fact that such behavior was destructive in effect and criminal in nature.

The Protestant Reformation of the 16th century was sustained by much more than the controversy over the sale of indulgences. Luther and the other major reformers such as Zwingli and Calvin, all rejected mandatory celibacy. The rejection was motivated in great part by what the reformers saw as widespread evidence that clerics of all ranks commonly violated the obligations with women, men and young boys. In reference to life in the monasteries on the eve of the 16th century Protestant Reformation, Abbott says that the monks’ “lapses” with women, handsome boys and each other…became so commonplace that they could not be considered lapses but ways of life for entire communities.” Up to this time the Church’s leaders continued to advocate the long-standing remedies of legislation, spiritual penalties, physical penalties and warnings, none of which worked. Living in the midst of a clerical world of non-celibate behavior, the reformers believed that this supposedly celibate world caused moral corruption: The sexual habits of the Roman Catholic clergy, according to reformers, were a sewer of iniquity, a scandal to the laity, and a threat of damnation to the clergy themselves.

In spring, 2003 the American media drew attention to an obscure Vatican document issued in 1962 which prescribed special procedures for processing cases of an especially vile form of clergy sexual abuse: solicitation of sex in the confessional. The Pope and various regional bishops issued a series of disciplinary laws against solicitation, beginning in 1561 and extending to 2001. Papal laws were promulgated in 1561, 1622, 1741, 1917, 1962, 1983 and 2001. In addition to the legislation itself, the church courts prosecuted individual cases in great numbers. The most complete records have been found in the Spanish and Mexican tribunals and reveal a shockingly high volume of complaints from women and men, accusing priests of solicitation and sexual abuse in a variety of forms. The most complete study of cases from the Spanish tribunals revealed that between 1723 and 1820 3775 cases were completed and sentences handed down. The author concluded that this number represents a small portion of the actual cases in that it reflects only those completed and not the total number started and later abandoned. READ THE FULL DOCUMENT HERE

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Free Bible Program

Bibles Behind Bars Gets Open Door At Williamson County Jail To Send Cases Of King James Bibles After One Mother Asked For Just One Bible For Her Son

Published

16 hours ago

May 12, 2026

Geoffrey Grider

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The Lord Turned One Mother’s Request For One King James Bible Into An Open Door For Hundreds Of Inmates At The Williamson County Jail in Tennessee

What began as a simple and heartfelt request from the mother of an inmate has now become a wide-open door for the word of God inside the Williamson County Jail in Tennessee. A mother reached out to Bibles Behind Bars asking if we could send her son a King James Bible while he was incarcerated. I told her that we would be happy to do that, but making a connection there was much harder than I had anticipated. It took many phone calls, over many weeks, more than a few emails, and no small amount of persistence, but at last we were able to connect with the right person at the facility and obtain permission to send that Bible. Then the Lord did what He so often does, He kicks the door wide open and now we are supplying Bibles to the whole facility!

“For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” Luke 19:10 (KJB)

This is why Bibles Behind Bars exists. Not to promote a program, not to build a brand, not to make men religious, and not to hand out motivational literature. We exist to get the King James Bible into the hands of men and women behind bars because “faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” The Bible does not need government approval to have power. It doesn’t need academic endorsement, and it doesn’t need modern revision. It needs only to be opened, read, believed, and obeyed. Paul wrote some of his most powerful words from prison. Joseph went from a prison house to a throne. The Philippian jailer met salvation in the middle of the night after an earthquake shook the prison doors open. God has never been intimidated by bars, guards, locks, rules, wardens, court systems, solitary confinements or government facilities. When God wants His word to go in, it goes in. This is the mission of Bibles Behind Bars, this is what your prayers work to accomplish, and this is what the donations you send in are spent on to produce. Come join us in this very important last days work, we need you!

HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

If God has prospered you, please take a moment to click on the donate button to help us in this monumental task of providing King James Bibles, New Testaments, scripture portions, gospel tracts as well as Spanish Bibles to inmates in jails and prisons from Florida to Alaska, and every state in between. We need your prayers, we need your generous financial support, and we need you to stand with us in the closing days of the Church Age. Thank you so very much, TO THE FIGHT!!!

NOTE: If you need a 501 C3 Letter of Donation for tax purposes, please send your donation to:

NTEB Ministries
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Ste. 1272-129
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Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

Donald Trump

The Opening Of The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room In New York City Shows The American People Demand Justice For The Victims

Published

23 hours ago

May 12, 2026

Geoffrey Grider

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The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Reading Room Turns 3.5 Million Pages Of Buried Elite Corruption Into A Midterm Weapon Against Trump

The timing could not be more explosive. America is watching a sitting president entangled in a Middle East war, gas prices are biting voters at the pump, the midterms are coming like a freight train, and right in the middle of it all sits a pop-up shrine to the Epstein files in New York City called The Donald J Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room.That is not just an exhibit. it’s a political omen.

“Then was the part of the hand sent from him; and this writing was written. And this is the writing that was written, MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN. This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it.” Daniel 5:24,25 (KJB)

The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Reading Room reportedly contains roughly 3.5 million pages of Epstein-related Justice Department files, bound into 3,437 volumes, with a display on the long-running relationship between Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein. CNA reports that public access to the actual files is limited because DOJ failed to properly redact some victim names, but the visual impact is unrelenting and unmistakable – row upon row of Epstein Files bound records, a public spectacle of what the ruling class would rather keep buried.

If Donald Trump thought that starting a war with Iran would get people to stop talking about the Epstein Files, he was way off. Take a look at what just opened in New York City – The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room. And no, it’s not AI, it’s goodbye. pic.twitter.com/71l4xOUdWc

— Now The End Begins (@NowTheEndBegins) May 12, 2026

And here is the problem for Trump and MAGA:Epstein was supposed to be their issue. For years, the Epstein files were held up as proof that an elite network of predators, fixers, financiers, politicians, intelligence assets, media gatekeepers and untouchable power brokers had operated above the law. MAGA voters were told that Trump was the man who would expose the rot. But now, with Trump back in the White House, the files are not functioning as a weapon against the Deep State nearly as much as they are becoming a mirror held up to the entire system — including Trump’s own proximity to it. That is politically devastating, beyond politically devastating, actually.

The White House position, as reported by WIRED, is that Trump has been “totally exonerated” on anything relating to Epstein, and Trump has denied wrongdoing. That distinction matters. But politics is not a courtroom, and the midterms will not be decided by evidentiary standards alone. They will be decided by perception, turnout, trust, anger, fatigue, gas prices, and whether the base believes the man they followed is still the outsider taking on Babylon — or has become another administrator of it. The Iran war makes this much worse. Reuters/Ipsos polling reported by Military Times found that 66% of Americans said Trump had not clearly explained the goals of U.S. military involvement in Iran, including one in three Republicans. That is a brutal number heading into a midterm year, because wars become political poison when voters cannot answer the simplest question: Why are we there?

Marist’s May 2026 polling is even more dangerous for Republicans: 60% disapprove of Trump’s handling of Iran, 61% say U.S. military action in Iran has done more harm than good, and Trump’s overall approval sits at 37%, with Democratic congressional candidates holding a “healthy lead” on the generic ballot. FiftyPlusOne’s May 11 generic ballot average showed Democrats ahead by 5 points, 47.3% to 42.0%. There’s your ‘midterm trap’, right there.

Trump won by turning politics into a loyalty test. But midterms are not presidential rallies. Midterms are about intensity, annoyance, protest, and whether your voters are still willing to stand in line for you when your name is not on the ballot. If even a small slice of MAGA voters stays home because they feel betrayed on war, the Epstein files, inflation, or “America First,” Republicans could lose the House in a wave that becomes a referendum on Trumpism itself.

IT’S MATH TIME: In 2024 Donald Trump Jr. said that the “only people who would want to stop the Epstein Files from coming out are people who are protecting pedophiles”. Today his father the president stopped the full release of those same files. Do the math. @POTUS @PressSec pic.twitter.com/5pQilqOF1M

— Now The End Begins (@NowTheEndBegins) December 19, 2025

And this is where the Epstein files cut deeper than ordinary scandal. Epstein is not just a name. Epstein is a symbol. He represents the black heart of elite corruption: money, sex, power, secrecy, intelligence shadows, compromised politicians, and a justice system that seems to protect the powerful while crushing the powerless. The average MAGA voter does not need a law degree to smell a cover-up. They have been trained for years to distrust official narratives. So when the files come out slowly, awkwardly, incompletely, or in ways that appear politically managed, the base does not simply blame Democrats. Some of them begin asking the forbidden question: Why isn’t Trump blowing the whole thing open? That question is radioactive, to say the least.

The Iran war may rally the most loyal parts of the base for a season, but it also exposes the contradiction at the heart of modern MAGA. “America First” was supposed to mean no more endless Middle East wars. No more nation-building. No more blank checks for foreign entanglements while Americans suffer at home. Yet now the movement is being asked to defend another Iran conflict while gas prices, war fatigue and unresolved Epstein questions all collide. A Quincy Institute/TAC poll of 2024 Trump voters found 58% opposed sending U.S. troops into Iran, 55% were worried about rising gas prices from the war, and support among younger Trump voters was far weaker than among older ones.

This is exactly how the world system works. It doesn’t matter which party is in power, the machine protects itself. The faces change, the slogans change, the color of the hats change, but the machinery of deception keeps grinding. War abroad, scandal at home, files released but not fully usable, truth displayed but not fully accessible, and the people told to keep clapping for the show.

So yes, if the Iran war was ever intended by anyone in Trump’s orbit to draw oxygen away from the Epstein files, it may do the opposite. It may fuse the two stories together into one larger indictment in the minds of voters: a president who promised to drain the swamp now presiding over war, secrecy, rising costs, and unanswered questions about one of the darkest scandals of modern American life. That is the danger for MAGA heading into the midterms. Not that Democrats suddenly become beloved, they absolutely are not. The danger is that Trump’s own voters begin to feel that the revolution became another rerun, another managed production, another deal cut behind closed doors. And once a political movement built on exposing betrayal starts feeling betrayed itself, the reckoning can come fast. And indeed, that reckoning may already be here.

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

HOW TO DONATE: Click here to view our WayGiver Funding page

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

End Times

The Amazing End Times Connection To Gold Melting At 1,948 Degrees, Israel Being Regathered In 1948 And The Jews With The Mark Of The Beast Under Antichrist

Published

2 days ago

May 11, 2026

Geoffrey Grider

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Gold melts at 1,948 degrees and Israel was regathered in 1948, and both these things are connected to the Mark of the Beast and Antichrist in the end times

Israel’s rebirth as a nation in 1948 was not the forthcoming and prophesied spiritual redemption of Israel. It was the prophetic regathering of a people brought back to the land in unbelief, exactly as the prophets said would happen before the Lord would deal with them in the fire of Jacob’s trouble. The modern State of Israel is a miracle of Bible prophecy, yes, but it is not yet a saved nation. They are back in the land, but they have not yet looked upon Him whom they have pierced. They have a flag, a military, a capital, a government, and a homeland, but nationally speaking, they still reject their Messiah.

“And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.” Zechariah 12:10 (KJB)

I find it fascinating that gold melts at exactly 1,948 degrees farenheit and Israel was brought back to the Land in 1948. What’s the connection? Plenty. The Mark of the Beast, as we have shown you many times, is a human-implantable biometric device that will allow the user to engage in buying and selling in the coming global economic sytem under Antichrist, and it will need pure gold to operate. Jesus warns in Revelation 3 to “get the right gold”, the gold that Jesus alone provides and that doesn’t canker, rust or corrupt. Why is that important? Because James tells us that the day is coming, in the Tribulation, when God is going to change the molecular structure of pure gold into something that can and will rust and corrupt. Imagine what that will do to the insides of the bodies with the Mark of the Beast, it will be brutal.

“Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.” James 5:1-3 (KJB)

There is a massive difference between national restoration and spiritual redemption. Israel’s return to the land is prophetic, but redemption cannot come until the Second Advent. Ezekiel saw Israel restored physically before the Spirit of God entered them. The bones came together first, the breath came after.

“Thus saith the Lord GOD unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live: And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the LORD.” Ezekiel 37: 5,6 (KJB)

The Jews are physically back in the land, but their full spiritual awakening comes by the hand of the LORD. Modern Israel is not the fulfillment of Romans 11:26, not yet. It is the stage being set for it. God had to bring the Jews back into the land so that the prophecies concerning them being scattered one last time under Antichrist could come to pass. Regathered to be scattered is strange thought, I’ll grant you that, but that’s exactly how Isaiah sees it.

“For the LORD shall rise up as in mount Perazim, he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act.” Isaiah 28:21 (KJB)

For a brief moment, it will appear that Israel has finally secured her future. The temple system restored, sacrifices resumed, and the world celebrating a new age of peace in the Middle East. Isn’t that what Donald Trump’s Abraham Accords are all about? Isn’t that what Donald Trump’s Gaza Board of Peace is all about? Amazing how many things that are connected with the Antichrist in the near future are also connected to Donald Trump right now. But I’m sure that’s just a coincidence. Halfway through that final seven-year period, the mask comes off. The peacemaker becomes the persecutor. The covenant-maker becomes the desolator. The man Israel thought was protecting them will demand worship from them. Then, lights out. God rains down judgment from Heaven, and only the remnant will make it through.

“And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.” Revelation 14:9-11 (KJB)

That is the essence of Antichrist: he does not merely oppose Christ, he replaces Christ. He offers peace without repentance, security without redemption, worship without God, and a kingdom without the King. Modern Israel is therefore not awaiting utopia, she is awaiting Jacob’s trouble. That trouble will be the furnace through which God purges the nation. The same people who returned to the land in unbelief will be driven into the fire of the time of Jacob’s trouble, not because God has abandoned them, but because God is going to finish what he promised. The Antichrist will deceive many, but he will not destroy the covenant purposes of God. There will be a remnant.

“And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, The LORD is my God.” Zechariah 13:9 (KJB)

That remnant will be refined, broken, awakened, and brought to national repentance. Israel’s redemption will not come through the United Nations, American foreign policy, Donald Trump, military strength, rebuilt temple worship, or a peace treaty with the Beast. Israel’s redemption comes when Jesus Christ returns at the Second Advent as the Deliverer from Sion. That is the prophetic bottom line.

“And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.” Luke 1:31-33 (KJB)

Israel in 1948 was restored nationally, but not redeemed spiritually. They are back in the land, but still blind to their King. They have returned to the geography of prophecy, but not yet to the God of prophecy. And because they rejected the true Messiah, they will fall prey to the false one. But the false messiah’s reign will be short. The Beast will rise, deceive, persecute, and demand worship, but Jesus Christ will return and destroy him. The gold will melt, the lies will burn, the remnant will be redeemed, and King Jesus will take the throne of His father David in Zion.