After several days of what I hope came across as a semi-coherent if often fantastical prophetic storyline and series of analyses, today’s post will be a mish-mash of stuff at multiple levels of abstration, none of which I’ve quite fit together yet (if any of it is meant to be fit at all).
In no particular order:
ITEM ONE: If the king of Assyria circa the eighth century BC is a ‘type’ for Obama (for a variety of reasons, and regardless of whether you believe BHO is or is not the antichrist), then what are we to make of Isaiah 10:12-19, which just happened to be on the track of my Bible study regimen this morning?
When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, he will punish the speech of the arrogant heart of the king of Assyria and the boastful look in his eyes. For he [the king of Assyria] says:
“By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I have understanding; I remove the boundaries of peoples, and plunder their treasures; like a bull I bring down those who sit on thrones. My hand has found like a nest the wealth of the peoples; and as one gathers eggs that have been forsaken, so I have gathered all the earth; and there was none that moved a wing or opened the mouth or chirped.”
Shall the axe boast over him who hews with it, or the saw magnify itself against him who wields it? As if a rod should wield him who lifts it, or as if a staff should lift him who is not wood! Therefore the Lord God of hosts will send wasting sickness among his stout warriors, and under his glory a burning will be kindled, like the burning of fire. The light of Israel will become a fire, and his Holy One a flame, and it will burn and devour his thorns and briers in one day. The glory of his forest and of his fruitful land the Lord will destroy, both soul and body, and it will be as when a sick man wastes away. The remnant of the trees of his forest will be so few that a child can write them down.
I have no shortage of theories. I could spend pages deconstructing just the king’s short inner monologue and making comparisons to Obama’s outlook, personality and objectives. Instead, I’ll let y’all comment and draw your own conclusions. Oh, one thing: in light of this, I can’t help but read ‘trees’ as tall buildings, with all the pagan links that go along with that idea. (The paper money that makes NY flow is also green and comes from trees.)
ITEM TWO: Just sat outside to eat lunch in the sunshine and saw something I’ve never seen before: an absolutely huge, gorgeous, persistent and apparently horizontal rainbow along the southern horizon. It was actually the outer (and more prominent) of two large rings formed by what seem like high ice clouds. Wish I’d gotten pictures, but I can’t seem to get them to download from my phone. In light of the impending judgment, I can’t help but assign larger significance to it forming in my direct line of sight this particular day.
ITEM THREE: It was pointed out to me yesterday that July 4th this year will mark three and a half years (aka forty-two Gregorian/modern months) since Ariel Sharon went into a coma. Today (June 17th) marks 42 Hebrew months, or 1260 days (time, times and half-a-time). I don’t know what that means, but in light of current events there and Sharon’s stature within and accomplishments on behalf of Israel, it may be significant.
As the Monty Python players are wont to say, he’s “not dead yet”, though a Google search quickly shows that some don’t know that. Some declared him dead at age 77. Could he be one of the ‘witnesses’ of Revelation that comes back from the dead? Quite a stretch, that one, but I’m not ruling it out. Stranger things have happened.
I’m a dilettante in Israeli politics, but in the current environment, a Netanyahu-Sharon partnership would be formidable to say the least. The Palestinians, on the other hand, seem to buy into the left’s fantasy that a lie repeated often enough becomes a kind of truth and that they can declare Sharon dead unilaterally and thus make it so. In yesterday’s edition of the Palestinian Telegraph, (the readers of which can’t seem to decide if they love Jimmy Carter as a ‘useful idiot’ or would prefer him dead also) we read that:
The start of the outpost acceleration began with the late Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon when he called on Israeli settlers to take control of hilltops and mountains in the West Bank Territory before handing them over to Palestinians in final status negotiations.
As Sharon’s longtime friend and spokesman Dr. Raanan Gissen noted last fall (when the oh-so-fair-and-balanced ABC News offered their own pre-emptively pessimistic pre-U.S.-election take on his fate)…
“His predicament is like a Greek tragedy… He is between life and death. He is neither here nor there.”
Well, in God’s eyes, he is certainly somewhere and, for the record, we could use him back here for a bit. All of which reminded me of…
ITEM FOUR: Two ‘classic’ posts I did around the time of Sharon’s stroke which for reasons still unknown generated one of my biggest traffic spikes ever. They still read pretty current, if I do say so.
Jan. 5, 2006: Fasten Your Seatbelts: Sharon, Israel, Iran, and…
Sharon’s decline invites the wolves to circle closer. Wolves don’t sit in salons and write essays and sip lattes and debate. They act. It doesn’t matter whether or not we think that’s civilized. It’s just the way it is… Ron Graff and Lambert Dolphin write of Armageddon in the appropriately designated Chapter 13 of their book ‘Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will Be Done…’:
…it might be better to speak of the “campaign” of Armageddon, since it is not one single battle but a series of events in which all the nations of the world are drawn in as participants…
[Armageddon, aka Megiddo] is actually a series of inter-related disasters…
[Satan], realizing that his power is waning, manages to unite all the forces of earth together against their common enemy…
[emphasis and links added]
January 6, 2006: The Only Story That Matters [I would probably change this title if I had it to write over again. This is the only story that matters.]
I won’t claim to be unique in having believed for some time that Iran would become the problem facing the world – the undisputed hub on the all too real Axis of Evil. The sudden eruption of Iran into the early stages of what may be a nightmare scenario seems to have happened overnight. It has not…
Evil sneaks. Evil persuades. Evil disarms. Evil seeds its falsehoods with tantalizing grains of truth. Evil seeks allies in the vast numbers of unconvinced who have come to hold tolerance of all things as the gauge of the goodness of all things. A world view that is never ever black and white cannot see through Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s slick exterior to what lies beneath…
Many who today have a ‘hinky feeling’ about Mahmoud Ahmadinejad simply cannot process it. They cannot walk down the thought path to where his words and actions lead and come back feeling whole enough to pick up the kids from soccer, grab some dinner at the supermarket, go to the gym, finish the presentation for the boss for tomorrow and get to sleep tonight. Ghastly possibilities – the world at war, the world aflame, the world as it has not been for sixty years – just don’t seem… real.
Until they are.
ITEM FIVE: This should probably be a post unto itself, but I’m committed now. 
I had a fascinating call with a client this morning. He’s a high-tech visionary. Not someone most readers would know, unless they’re in the industry, but he has real stature… gets around a lot… has influence… talks to lots of folks and lots of folks talk to him. People take him seriously because he’s right about a lot of things. This guy is a serious globe-trotter who’s lived on several different continents; he ought to know. He went into some technical details that convinced me. (Btw, he’s not at Google.)
What he told me (and you could hear it in his voice) was that he’s ‘high’ on Google’s trajectory for their language translation engine. Apparently it’s pretty good and getting better almost exponentially.
I don’t think he used the word ‘revolutionary’, but as he described how it is beginning to affect international business and how far those implications extend my mind began spinning…
Babel. The tower. About to be undone. By man. Nimrod. Arrogance.
This cannot be good. Not good at all.
ITEM SIX: There is no item six. 
[...] Winter know I was already tentatively on this page. I’ll include links throughout for those who need to catch up on the previous circumstantial evidence, though I probably won’t get to all of them. There’s a [...]
By: Ron Reese (17 July 2009) “Did the Revealing of the Antichrist take place in Ghana on July 11th???” « Twelve Books on July 17, 2009
at 1:44 pm
[...] 10:12-14 (a passage I treated more fully here, in the context of OBH as the Assyrian): When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and [...]
By: The Sound of Man’s Plans Crashing to Earth « New Wineskins on July 14, 2009
at 1:21 pm
[...] know I was already tentatively on this page. I’ll include links throughout for those who need to catch up on the previous circumstantial evidence, though I probably won’t get to all of them. [...]
By: It’s Him « New Wineskins on July 13, 2009
at 10:44 am
Reference the arrogant one, this was provided by member “Kendall” at Prophezine:
Subject: Dr.Charles Krauthammer
A friend went to hear Charles Krauthammer. He listened with 25 others in a closed room. What he says here, is NOT 2nd -hand but 1st. You would do well to read and pass this along to EVERYBODY that loves his country. This is VERY serious for the direction of our country. The ramifications are staggering for us & our children.
[I'm leaving this in because it has a strong ring of truth to it and because, if true, it is vitally important. That said, there is an irony. Anyone reading this here is, by definition getting THIRD-, not first-hand information. Kendall may be a primary source, however I've not had a chance to run that one to ground. Caveat emptor -ed.]
To my Friends & Associates:
Last Monday was a profound evening, hearing Dr. Charles Krauthammer speak to the Center for the American Experiment. He is brilliant intellectual, seasoned & articulate. He is forthright and careful in his analysis, and never resorts to emotions or personal insults. He is NOT a fear monger nor an extremist in his comments and views. He is a fiscal conservative, and has a Pulitzer prize for writing. He is a frequent contributor to Fox News and writes weekly for the Washington Post. The entire room was held spellbound during his talk. I have shared this with many of you and several have asked me to summarize his comments, as we are living in uncharted waters economically and internationally. Even 2 Dems at my table agreed with everything he said! If you feel like forwarding this to those who are open minded and have not drunk the Kool-Aidf, feel free.
Here is his resume from Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ Charles_Krautham mer
A summary of his comments:
1. Mr. Obama is a very intellectual, charming individual. He is not to be underestimated. He is a cool customer who doesn’t show his emotions. It’s very hard to know what’s behind the mask. Taking down the Clinton dynasty from a political neophyte was an amazing accomplishment. The Clintons still do not understand what hit them. Obama was in the perfect place at the perfect time.
2. Obama has political skills comparable to Reagan and Clinton. He has a way of making you think he’s on your side, agreeing with your position, while doing the opposite. Pay no attention to what he SAYS; rather, watch what he DOES!
3. Obama has a ruthless quest for power. He did not come to Washington to make something out of himself, but rather to change everything, including dismantling capitalism. He cannot be straightforward on his ambitions, as the public would not go along. He has a heavy hand, and wants to level the playing field with income redistribution and punishment to the achievers of society. He would like to model the USA to Great Britain or Canada.
4. His three main goals are to control ENERGY, PUBLIC EDUCATION, & NATIONAL HEALTHCARE by the Federal government. He doesn’t care about the auto or financial services industries, but got them as an early bonus. The cap and trade will add costs to everything and stifle growth. Paying for FREE college education is his goal. Most scary is his healthcare program, because if you make it FREE and add 46,000,000 people to a Medicare-type single-payer system, the costs will go through the roof. The only way to control costs is with massive RATIONING of services, like in Canada. God forbid.
5. He’s surrounded himself with mostly far-left academic types. No one around him has ever even run a candy store. But they are going to try and run the auto, financial, banking and other industries. This obviously cannot work in the long run. Obama’s not a socialist; rather he’s a far-left secular progressive bent on nothing short of revolution. He ran as a moderate, but will govern from the hard left. Again, watch what he does, not what he says.
6. Obama doesn’t really see himself as President of the United States, but more as a ruler over the world. He sees himself above it all, trying to orchestrate & coordinate various countries and their agendas. He sees moral equivalency in all cultures. His apology tour in Germany and England was a prime example of how he sees America, as an imperialist nation that has been arrogant, rather than a great noble nation that has at times made errors. This is the first President ever who has chastised our allies and appeased our enemies!
7. He’s now handing out goodies. He hopes that the bill (and pain) will not become due until after he’s reelected in 2012. He’d like to blame all problems on Bush from the past, and hopefully his successor in the future. He has a huge ego, and Mr. Krauthammer believes he is a narcissist.
8. Republicans are in the wilderness for a while, but will emerge strong. We’re pining for another Reagan, but there’ll never be another like him. Krauthammer believes Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty & Bobby Jindahl (except for his terrible speech in February) are the future of the party. Newt Gingrich is brilliant, but has baggage. Sarah Palin is sincere and intelligent, but needs to really be seriously boning up on facts and info if she’s to be a serious candidate in the future. We need to return to the party of lower taxes, smaller government, personal responsibility, strong national defense, and states rights.
9. The current level of spending is irresponsible and outrageous. We’re spending trillions that we don’t have. This could lead to hyper inflation, depression or worse. No country has ever spent themselves into prosperity. The media is giving Obama, Reid and Pelosi a pass because they love their agenda. But eventually the bill will come due and people will realize the huge bailouts didn’t work, nor will the stimulus package. These were trillion-dollar payoffs to Obama’s allies, unions and the Congress to placate the left, so he can get support for #4 above.
10. The election was over in mid-September when Lehman brothers failed. Fear and panic swept in, we had an unpopular President, and the war was grinding on indefinitely without a clear outcome. The people are in pain, and the mantra of change caused people to act emotionally. Any Dem would have won this election; it was surprising is was as close as it was.
11. In 2012, if the unemployment rate is over 10%, Republicans will be swept back into power. If it’s under 8%, the Dems continue to roll. If it’s between 8-10%, it will be a dogfight. It will all be about the economy.
By: El Gallo on June 19, 2009
at 10:37 am
Concerning Item two, have you seen the video of rainbow clouds which appeared in China prior to the earthquake?: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8OnEnzz_ow&feature=PlayList&p=63B1F91857CE7F36&index=51
[Ooh! Very cool... both deeply comforting and deeply foreboding as only a perfectly just and perfectly gracious God can combine those things. Thanks for sharing, Joan.
Now, looking at this, "a rare, optical phenomenon", I'm wishing I'd taken pictures. What I saw covered an even larger portion of the sky than the Wikipedia picture -- perhaps 30+ degrees of arc... and thus, perhaps, presaging a larger event than the China earthquake... -ed.]
By: JOAN on June 18, 2009
at 11:18 am
I’m new here, but becoming slightly addicted to your blog. Much like Adry, it’s giving me a lot to think and pray about. You are challenging me to seek the Lord more through prayer and his word and just ask more questions.
My compliment I would like to give is that I appreciate your heart in the presenting of your thoughts and opinions. You never come across as “I’ve got it all figured out and you all need to listen up.” Be blessed today my brother!
-Clint
[Sounds like you're addicted to our Lord, not my blog -- which is as it should be!
Glad to be a catalyst, though. Thanks for the kind words, Clint. -ed.]
By: Clint Fiore on June 18, 2009
at 9:41 am
My blog has a photo of a rainbow I took shortly after praying about my vocation. (Note the LITERAL sign beneath the rainbow.)
Ever since, I’ve been trying to listen for what I call “The Holy Spirit’s marching orders”. A couple of weeks ago, God put it on my heart to donate books to the library. I’ve got the Bible (both copies), guides to writing (?!) and a few theological books on my shelf in the office right now. Sinner that I am, it’s hard to give up my collection, rather like the rich young man (except he went away sad). But I’m plugging away at it.
I have a lot of sympathy with Abraham right now. I talked about this with a friend of mine who looks forward to the Coming of the Lord. I hope there’s enough time for a massive repentance.
By: Jean on June 17, 2009
at 9:56 pm
It is so good to see you back on line, writing expository items regarding current events and linking them to the Bible and Our HOPE (i.e., the return of our Lord). I also check every morning to see what kind of meat you have thrown out for gnawing and digesting and ruminating over. What a plethora of ideas to mull and work out. This is certainly meat and not the milk of the Word!
I cannot but agree that we are waiting for Something! I pray that we are strong enough to endure the event, and that we will recognize it for what it is when we see it.
Bless you, and continue, please!
Virginia
By: Virginia Missouri on June 17, 2009
at 8:26 pm
I cannot recommend strongly enough that you obtain Perry Stone’s America 2010 prophetic message on CD from his website http://www.voe.org/
This is not a spam to get sales. I just listened to the hour long presentation 3x while driving to Los Angeles and back, (it’s incredibly dense-packed material) and while I’m a proficient and competent Biblical scholar, Perry dug out and presented things I had no knowledge of, backing it up with scripture rather than What If and speculation. The message has to do with cycles and patterns and personally I believe it is critical for Christ-centered Christians to know what he’s preaching. As an evangelist he may not be your flavor of Christianity, but what’s on that CD is beyond any argument about doctrinal differences.
Please, get it.
By: Michael Geer on June 17, 2009
at 3:35 pm
I just wanted to thank you for today’s post and all the other stuff you’ve been putting up–the maps and numbers and links to all this prophetic activity going on around us. I don’t have anything profound to add to the discussion, but I want you to know that I check your site every day for stuff to pray through and take before the Lord in intercession. Thank you for taking the time and energy to blog. It DOES matter….A LOT! Right or wrong, your insights give me things to chew on and pray about. More importantly, they send me running to the Lord’s feet. Keep up the good work!
[If praying and running to the Lord's feet aren't profound things to add then I don't know what is!! You inspire me, Adry. Thanks for sharing. We are in this together. -ed.]
By: Adry on June 17, 2009
at 2:15 pm