Dear friends:

"Why do the heathen rage?" asks the psalmist (2:1).  (Rage: Hebrew ragash, variously translated, similar meaning.)

It recently occurred to me that this is a prophetic passage, written some 3,000 years ago, pointing to the end of the age.

Why?

Because the rage we are constantly seeing is almost always in the Muslim world, with little or no provocation, and it is unique to the times in which we live.

Why?

Because most of the rage we see is orchestrated for the Western TV cameras, something only recently available.  Those who rage and those who organize them know that their contrived rage will immediately be flashed to living rooms and other live audiences all over the world, especially in the West.  They are raging for propaganda purposes.  They are raging for the America haters and Israel haters among us and elsewhere.  Muslims are basically having tantrums, for our viewing.  They scream, pump their fists, and burn and stomp flags -- always looking into the cameras, of course.

Naturally, our esteemed news media, always willing to accommodate evil and glorify our enemies, are there on the spot.  If they could, they would give the devil an audience to tell his message.  In fact, they do daily.

Such rage is unique to our times, and another sign of the times.  In all human history, only in the past few years would such rage have a worldwide TV audience. 

I doubt if large crowds "raged" in the Middle East 2,000 years ago, or 100 years ago, or even 25 years ago.  There were no cameras.  There was no audience for their performance.

Thus, I believe this is another sign of the times.

But continuing in the same passage above, God has the last word.  "He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure" (vs.4-5).

Jim