Franklin Graham Warns Christians in America 'Persecution Is Coming'

Quote: "I believe we're going to see persecution in this country"

Okay but no message of hope - what is God going to do, how we will he prepare us to face the anti-christ and the persecution that will come with his appearing.

There is some wisdom in that, LMH.

I see and believe persecution is nascent, present, and about to thrive here. So, warning of it is beneficial, IF....IF we are doing so to equip Christians in NT living and enduring as opposed to political posturing.

I have a deep distrust of all things media, and when Graham uses mainstream media like Fox (which opposes Christ as much as MSNBC) it taints his message. Media outlets are political beings and irredeemable. These pronouncements are never warnings to the people of media and politics to repent and abandon themselves to Christ and they always end with a "thanks for having me." They accept the media on media's terms. It is difficult to take any warnings in media from Christians seriously.

But, then, we don't need those warnings to know. Anyone who has their eyes on Christ can see where we are. Let us who are NOT shaking hands and thanking the world say the truth of things.

murrcolr wrote:
Okay but no message of hope - what is God going to do, how we will he prepare us to face the anti-christ and the persecution that will come with his appearing.

Sadly, if we aren’t prepared, we aren’t prepared b/c I believe we will wake up one morning (in who knows how many years) and it be upon us and if we aren’t read up and prayed up it will be too late.

But really, who can prepare you for being tortured?

( I'm here to tell you that the only way, the only hope is not a Republican, it's not a Democrat or whoever. The only hope is that this country repents of its sins and turns once again to the God of our fathers and to His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ ”” otherwise, there is no hope.")

This a portion of the article on Franklin's comments. The call for national repentance runs in his family.

Russell

Richard Wurmbrand insisted not only that we should prepare for torture, but lectured on how. Hard to read, though.

https://theagetocome.wordpress.com/2008/02/10/preparing-for-the-underground-church/

I love Franklin Graham.

Speaking "truth to power", though, by calling on the "country" to repent is futile. Not that repentance ought not be proclaimed. But, I think he stops woefully short by not calling believers to abandon all thought of government as a source of identity, hope, meaning, and even structure. When Christians hear that hope does not rest in parties, they think it is because the people in those parties are unrighteous--they do not see that the truth is that all government and politics and civil law are opposed to Christ. We STILL love to wave the flag, pledge our allegiance to it, and think of ourselves as patriotic. We STILL do not see that this view of life and reality is a satanic deception and illusion.

Franklin Graham has not called us to true repentance. I love him, but he is blinded. He holds a tradition of men -- American patriotism and American theism -- as a mixture of his Christian faith. I am hopeful that he and many others are thisclose to seeing the truth and acting on it, though. When they do, and the church in America repents of mixing its Caesar worship into its Christianity, look out. You think we are being persecuted now? Oh, boy...when we denounce all Americanism, all nationalism , all politics, all civil government as a repository of meaning and as a tool of Satan, we will be killed even by those who think they are doing God a service.

We need more men of God speaking the truth
from the pulpit and warning the Church of
the coming persecution.

I praise God that the Fox News network continues
to do interviews with Christian leaders that are not
ashamed of the gospel of Christ, and are allowed
to share the gospel freely.

The Word of God admonishes us to expose the
deeds of darkness, and that is exactly what
Franklin Graham is doing.

Quote: "But really, what can prepare you for being tortured?"

What kind of torture are you talking about?

We don't torture the vilest of criminals now (other than waterboarding an occasional terrorist) so I am curious what makes you think a Christian who is arrested and imprisoned on some grounds would be tortured (unless of course ISIS conquers the U.S. which would seem highly improbable).

Right now the best practical way you can prepare for persecution in America is to live a modest lifestyle, save and invest your money as much as you can, and have umbrella insurance to protect you from frivolous law suits (as well as to protect the money you've saved). I suggest saving at least 20-30% of your gross income if possible.

Abide,

Please don't take my words about Franklin Graham as disapproval of him. I love the man's heart.

Leo Tolstoy said, "Christianity in its true sense puts an end to the State." I agree fully with that sentiment. In 1 Samuel 8, Israel had no king but chose one and in doing so, God explicitly said that He had been rejected merely by the choice. Prior to that, Israel was not merely a 'state'; they were a people. And, God has a people, not a state, even now.

Jesus tolerated the usurped power of the State. He acknowledged it when He noted the coin bearing Caesar' image and taught, "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's". The rest of that verse, "But render unto God what is God's" begs a question. What is God's? Everything that bears His mark! What bears His mark above all? People. Caesar (State) has no right over you or me or our lives. It may exercise POWER, but is has no AUTHORITY over our lives and deaths.

(What's the difference between power and authority? A man walks into a bank with a check with his name on it and withdraws $100 from his account. He has authority and power over the account and leaves with $100 cash in his wallet. Another man walks into a bank with a pistol in his hand and withdraws $100 from the bank although he has no account there. He has power (the gun) but not authority (right).)

The State does not mark us as its own (and even if it does, we're not its property; God has marked us first with His image).

Now, one naturally responds with Romans 13 here. Paul says that authorities are ordained by God and we must submit. I contend that is a misreading of the text and that you must read Romans 12-13 as a singularity of theme and thought and when you do, it changes the oft repeated mantra about authority and places it in the precise place where Jesus put it in the Sermon on the Mount and with his very life.

In Romans 12-13, Paul follows the same track of thought of Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount: love, sacrifice, overcoming evil by doing good, willingly laying down one's life in persecution. In that last point, Paul's overarching theme is that love extends to our enemies not just our friends and family. It is what Jesus said ("love your enemies"). Then, Paul gives what the prime example of our enemy is and how that love looks --- the enemy is the governing authorities. We love our enemies by submitting ourselves to their evil, and this is most readily apparent and most pervasive as we face public enemy #1 -- the government. So, Romans 13 is not a statement about the legitimacy of government; it is a command to love our enemies and a practical demonstrative example what that love will look like in its most common form: loving those who hate us and oppose Christ in the arm of government, which from 1 Samuel 8 is always depicted as a rejection of God.

The only legitimate call to the opposition of Jesus Christ is the apostolic call, the commissioned call, "Repent and be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved." Repent. Mark yourself as dead to all of the elements of this world and make that a matter of accountability by a public baptism that identifies you with His Kingdom and no longer with Man's Government. Leave your kingdoms for His kingdom.

Our subversion of the world is through submission to its tactics of persecution because we, too, will rise again in Christ. Our lives are not our own, as Christ considered His own life not dear to Himself. We belong, body and soul, in life and in death, to God and our Savior Jesus Christ; this is our only hope in life and death.

America already has a persecution, which is having everything in abundance. Sodam and Gomorah had this problem of abundance. Hence the purished. Many in US do not need God because they think they are self sufficient. Even many Christians.

Now coming to the remark by Franklin Graham. He is wrong when he wants Christians to run politics. All apostle Paul wanted Christians to do regarding government is to pray that we have our freedom to worship in our way. He did not say that we should have laws that pleases our God. He did not say if your freedom is taken then get into politics and make sure you get your freedom. If such a thing is possible then why should we first of all pray?

The problem with many Christians in US is, they keep thinking that their nation is a Christian nation. I am sorry it is not. There cannot be any Christian nation. No nation can be run by Sermon on the mount. Sermon on the mount is given for individual disciples of Jesus not to nations.

Is abundance evil in Gods eyes?

Franklin Graham is doing what every pastor in
the country should be doing, and that is being
light and salt to a Church and a nation that has
gone astray.

The enemy is gaining ground in this nation
because of a sleeping church that is neither
hot or cold and over the past 50 years we have
seen prayer taken out of schools, abortion
legalized, and homosexuality embraced in many
denominations and accepted by the majority of
the American people. The influence of Islam is
growing in this nation at an alarming rate, and yet
there are many Christians that believe that we
should remain silent, because these are political
issues.

There are some on these forums that believe
that we
don't have any business bringing God into the
government, and much of the Church would agree
with you, and because of this belief what we have
is a government without God.

It is time to wake up and cry out for revival and
awakening in this nation while we still have
a nation.

I do not pray that God will preserve America. I pray that Americans will repent and obey the gospel.

This nation's government has always been without God. There is now nor never a government of men on Earth that "has God". They are all godless.

You and I will agree that the church in America has sold out to American culture. Prayer was taken out of homes before it was removed from schools, or it never would have mattered what the courts said about prayer. Abortion was in hearts in America before it was ever legal. Homosexuality, with every other deviancy, was rooted deeply in American lives, homes and churches before it was not taboo anymore and the always godless government made it a preferred status.

The church was not silent when these issues reached critical mass in the public mind. The church lobbied government on all of them and it accomplished nothing. The church did not cry out in prayer nearly so much as it cried out in protest and based on policy. If the church of Jesus is empowered to act politically, it is a colossal failure and worthy for the scrap heap. It is Ichabod, if you, sir, are correct.

But, No, sir, I do not think you are right at all. The church of Jesus is not the guardian of Americanism. It never was. America fails because America is fallen, and was conceived in sin like every other nation on Earth planted by men. The failure of the church is, in part, because it HAS solicited the earthly powers for a seat at their table. You are right that we are lukewarm, because we are drunk on the toxic, stagnated waters of politics and civil government that is inherently antiChrist.

Let us wake up and pray for forgiveness! Let us repent of our wicked support of Babylon America. Let us dry ourselves of her tepid toilet water ways and be cleansed in the Well of Life. Let the nation itself crumble and blow away with the rest of the chaff. Let us be the holy nation of God wherever we are. You want to fight Islam? We better learn now more than ever to pray because a reckoning is coming. That evil power of Islam is sweeping the earth under the hand of God as He readies His last judgment, and He will then judge it.

Quote TMK : Is abundance evil in Gods eyes?

Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy.They were haughty and did an abomination before me. So I removed them, when I saw it. Ezekiel 16:49-50

"I do not pray that God will preserve America. I pray that Americans will repent and obey the gospel."

If America repents and and obeys the gospel, then God will preserve America. He will heal our land as His Word says that He will.

I am not talking about Americanism. I am talking about saving a society from sin and moral corruption.

When true revival come, the society changes for the better, so you can't tell me that God is not interested in this.

God allows us to see the activity of the enemy in our land so that we can pray and turn the tide.

If God didn't think that our governmental leaders were not important, He would have never said through the Apostle Paul that we ought to pray for them so that we would live quite and peaceable lives in all godliness.

There was a time in this nation when our leaders honored God. They had reverenece for God, and they even prayed together for guidance from God.

We are exhorted in the Word to expose the evil deeds of darkness. The devil is going to take every inch of ground that we give him whether it be in the Church, the family, the government, or in the school system.

My prayer is "Lord, let your Kingdom come, let your will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

Abide, we pray together that His will be done.

We just disagree and I do not expect many to agree with me on this. But, we agree on what matters most.