Jesus is Lord, A Worshipping Christian’s Blog

Another victory for Pro-Life, although this was pretty cut and dried case of first amendment rights.

The U.S. Supreme Court today ruled for the third time in favor of pro-life activists who were sued by the National Organization for Women for their aggressive demonstrations at abortion clinics.
The high court said federal extortion and racketeering laws cannot be used to ban the protests.
As WorldNetDaily reported, NOW lost its second round in the Supreme Court in 2003 in a decisive 8-1 ruling. The feminist group charged that protests organized by Scheidler’s Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League amounted to extortion under RICO, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.
“Naturally I am gratified to be vindicated once again by the United States Supreme Court,” said Scheidler. “I am mystified that I had to go to the trouble and expense of appearing before the Supreme Court three times.”
Justice Stephen Breyer said in the majority opinion today Congress did not intend to create “a freestanding physical violence offense” in the federal extortion law.
Scheidler and the other defendants were supported in the case by an unusual coalition of about activists and groups that included actor Martin Sheen and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, who argued similar lawsuits could be used to stop their efforts.
Scheidler’s attorney Thomas Brejcha said, “This unanimous ruling is not just a victory for pro-life activists, but for anyone who chooses to exercise his First Amendment rights to effect social change.”
The 2003 decision had reversed the RICO charge against Scheidler’s group and vacated a nationwide injunction and damage award of $257,780 on the pro-life defendants.
Nevertheless, the feminist group – which has stated an intent to crush groups opposing abortion – stood to collect $1.2 million in damages and legal fees from Scheidler and his colleagues.
The Supreme Court returned the case to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals to carry out the 2003 decision, but NOW convinced a three-judge panel to send it back to district court, where the high court’s ruling could be overturned.
NOW’s persistence in the case despite the Supreme Court’s decisive ruling coincided with its stated determination to shut down pro-life groups.
In a 1998 statement that referred to the Scheidler case, NOW’s former president, Patricia Ireland, said, “We will continue our litigation strategy until the terrorists are bankrupt and out of business.”
Ireland also was a NOW attorney working on the case before she became head of the organization.
The Supreme Court said in its 2003 ruling all of the 117 alleged acts of extortion against Scheidler and his group “must be reversed,” including four alleged acts of violence. But NOW attorney Fay Clayton convinced a 7th Circuit panel those four “acts” should be considered separately.
The case was further complicated by the fact the jury in the 1998 trial was not required to reveal which acts it deemed violent. Furthermore, Pro-Life Action League presented evidence, including photographs and news footage, that indicated some of the key witnesses lied.
The case began in June 1986 when NOW filed a federal lawsuit against Scheidler and two other pro-life activists. NOW charged that Scheidler and his colleagues interfered with interstate commerce in an attempt to shut down abortion clinics.
Three years later, NOW incorporated RICO violations into its complaint and expanded the scope to a class-action suit that included every woman in the United States seeking an abortion – past, present or future – and all abortion clinics. Operation Rescue, two members of Scheidler’s group – Tim Murphy and Andy Scholberg – and another 100 alleged “co-conspirators” also were named as defendants.

I ran across this information and found it interesting.

Jesus was not called “Jesus” during his lifetime. Because He and His followers spoke their native Aramanic, His full name, as known to family and intimates would have been Yeshua (pronounced ye-SHU-ach) ben Yusef which translators into Jesus, son of Joseph. “Jesus” is the English form of “Iesous” (pronounced yay-zoose), which is what He is called in the Greek scriptures of the New Testament. This, in turn, is a version of the common Hebrew name “Ieshus” which translates into Joshua. The root meaning of the name is “God help” because it’s derived from two words - God and help.

Endtime Perplexity

Believers in Jesus Christ, in terms of the majority, don’t recognize the crucial prophetic times in which this generation finds itself. To prove this, just ask almost anyone you know –outside of the very few Christians you know who might consider prophetic issues– and watch the blank stares, the smiles, with accompanying gesticulations that indicate they don’t worry, or even think about these things. Observe, while they quickly go onto other subjects, like “what’s for dinner,” “who’s getting married,” “who’s getting a divorce,” “who’s living with whom,” or a thousand and one other more generationally appropriate topics –in their view—than where we are at present on God’s prophetic timeline.
When the Christian who is truly a student of what God has to say about things to come stops to analyze the flood of prophecy-laden matters deluging this generation, he or she quickly realizes that we are at the very door that will open into the tribulation. But, he or she knows – if prayerfully diligent in studying God’s prophetic Word, (i.e., is led by the Holy Spirit to truth) and is thus discerning in analyzing world conditions– that another door is about to swing open. That is the door that leads through the fabric of space and time. The door that will be opened by Jesus Christ. As a matter of fact, Jesus Christ IS that door! After all, He said”…I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh to the Father, but by me” (John 14:6).
And, the things for the discerning Christian to consider are staggering in numbers, and in prophetic relevance.
Of these many things of prophetic import we could think upon, none is more glaring at this moment –in my view—than signals of Christ’s coming again wrapped up in the title of this commentary article: “Endtime Perplexity.”
The prophecy was given by Jesus in His Olivet Discourse, as recorded in the following:
“And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring” (Lk. 21:25).
Review, for just a moment, the dynamics shaping up endtime world conditions while this generation rages toward Daniel’s 70th week –the seven years of tribulation, when God’s wrath will begin falling upon incorrigibly rebellious mankind.
Israel is at the very center of the last-time perplexity, just as Jesus and the Old and New Testament prophets foretold. Think of it! Everything of great significance, so far as world conditions are concerned, points right back at Israel!
1) Hamas is in control of the Palestinian drive for statehood. The terrorist organization is on record, determined to expunge Israel from the region. These are blood-vowed to kill every Jew they find.
2) Iran’s leadership is threatening to develop (might already have) the ability to produce nuclear weapons. The purpose is to annihilate Israel –and any other nation that gets in Iran’s path.
3) The U.S. is in turmoil over the Bush Administration’s wanting to approve United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) purchase of American seaports. (A truly profound issue that has created great perplexity, both within the U.S. and abroad.)
4) Islamic hate-filled doctrinal differences perplex American military planners in Iraq, while the Muslim madmen kill each other and bomb centuries-old religious sites in reprisal for perceived inequities and wrongdoings. The seas and waves of humanity are indeed “roaring.”
5) Islamic fascist-like, rage-filled terrorists protest by the hundreds of thousands, inciting millions to attack and destroy even their own possessions in Europe and other places. Christ’s words “nation (ethnos –or ethnic entities) shall rise against nation…” have been fulfilled to some extent in our time. Certainly, there can be no doubt that this is happening en masse across the world.
Again, Israel is the chief reason for the incitement. Anyone who supports Israel in any fashion comes under the radical Islamic threat of sword applied to the neck. Then there is the cry for “peace and safety.” But there is total disregard for the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ. At the risk of being castigated as “touching the anointed,” I must say that even the major players among pastors and leaders of churches in this Laodicean era have a P.E.A.C.E. plan for saving the world from perplexity.
It won’t work, of course. Peace –even if used in clever, marketing terms of acronym—will fail. Only the Prince of Peace, and His godly, Heaven-sent peace will bring the raging seas of humanity under control, like He did the storm-driven waters on the Sea of Galilee those millennia ago.
Christians, it is past time to awake from the slumber under which the Church of Jesus Christ has –for the most part— been put, since allowing Satan and his minions to pull their deception over the spiritual eyes of many individual believers. We are at that point–in attitude–at the end of the age, about which Jesus forewarned:
“Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.” (Matt. 24:44).
To me, this is among the most foreshadowing of the perplexities about which our Lord prophesied: the question of why Christians will not awake in this endtime era, and look around at all that points directly at the truth that we are, as a generation of earth dwellers, on the very cusp of the apocalypse, of tribulation. This should make us, rather than be filled with only thoughts of earthly things, busily engaged in activities spiritually ripe with great anticipation of the “blessed hope” of Titus 2:13. He could come at any second, and all of the things of this fallen world instantly will no longer matter to the Christian of the Church Age. We will stand before Him, and see Him face to face, and give account for our attitude toward Him, and activities for Him, when back on Planet Earth.

–Terry

The March to May Donation Drive

In the time since our last donation drive, we have achieved a number of major accomplishments. The site’s ranking among other prophecy ministries is the most noteworthy.
According to a service that tracks all web activity, Rapture Ready has now become the #1 prophecy site. We were able to achieve this goal despite having two of our main functions on different domains - RR News and the RR Message Board.
The media continues to show interest in the site, and there has been an amazing amount of attention from Great Britain, where RR has caught the eye of four media outlets. In December, a film team from BBC filmed Terry and me for an April documentary. In January, RR was mentioned in a British documentary called “The Source of All Evil.” BBC radio stopped by last week to interview me for a March program. And another company is in the early stages of production of a documentary it is putting together.
On this side of the Atlantic, the Dallas Observer asked for my input for an article that appeared in mid-February. A & E has been running a program that talks about the Rapture Index.
As we add new web pages to the site, the search engine keeps pointing people to our domain. The lack of free end-time related information on the internet shows that there is plenty of room for us to expand the site.
We are progressing towards our goal of translating articles into Japanese. I have to admit, it has been quite a challenge to accomplish this task. We had thought the project would cost around $4,000 to translation 10 articles. The size of some articles has bumped the price tag up to around $7,000. Because the translation service calculates fees by word count, the first article, which was short, came to around $400. The next one translated was just over $1000. Rather than cough up the money all at once, we’ll just take our time and eventually get all ten articles translated.
When I last mentioned our plans to add Japanese articles to the site, few people asked me why I didn’t consider using programs that automatically translate English text into other languages. I’ve tried a free version of this software at Altavista.com, and I the found translation to be of such poor quality we could never use it on the site. You can’t tell people something like, “Me think Jesus you need savior repent go now.”
Another costly project is going to be the reformatting of thousands of pages on the site. Now that the average screen width size is larger that 1000 pixels, the pages containing the RR stripe in the left column have presented a major problem. This background image repeats across the screen, making it difficult for some people to read the text.
Over the years, the look of the site has been updated dozens of times. When we had just a few hundred files on the site, it was easy for me to make the changes. Now that we have more than 11,000 files, an update will require us to hire a web design firm to help make all these changes.
Every major project we take on requires us to ask for assistance from dozens of people to cover the cost. For example, the $1000 Japanese article would require 20 people to donate $50 each.
Because we constantly lose supporters, I have to make these regular appeals to maintain a balance in our funding. Even though we have a base of more than 100,000 visitors, we’re lucky to receive help from a fraction of that number.
The opportunity to contribute to the Kingdom of God is not a constant thing. Over the years, we lost supporters to death, poor health, and financial reversals. We’ve even lost a few supporters from the area affected by Hurricane Katrina.
Rapture Ready didn’t get to be the top-ranked site by accident. This site is the result of people realizing that they are part of the Great Commission.
An easy way to support RR is with an automatic monthly donation. The PayPal subscription service and allotments set up through a bank are convenient ways to send funds to the site. If you’re interested in signing up, you can find the link on the Donation Depot page. Donations can also be sent to our PO Box at:
Rapture Ready Min.
PO Box 125
Bellevue, NE 68005

– Todd

Our Christian brothers and sisters in Nigeria are still undergoing persecution at the hands of the peace loving muslims, as the violence over the so called “blasphemous” Danish cartoons, spreads from the northern parts of Nigeria to the central regions. Of course the Nigerian government is “powerless” to stop this type of thing and the death of ten Christians isn’t news worthy enough to make it into the MSM’s (main stream media).

Muslim rioters killed 10 Christians and set ablaze nine churches in Kontagora, Niger state on Feb. 23, Christian sources said.
The militants in the central Nigerian town of Kontagora joined their counterparts in northern Nigeria to protest what Muslims regard as blasphemy of the prophet of Islam, Muhammad, in cartoons published by a newspaper in Denmark.
“The Muslim fanatics attacked Christians and burnt churches throughout the night,” Joseph Bawa, a Christian resident of Kontagora, told Compass by telephone.
The militants clubbed Bawa and his family, he said. “I was beaten up by these Muslims, it is only God that saved me - I would have been killed,” he said.
The Rev. Samuel Ayuba Shaba, secretary of the Niger state chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), confirmed the destruction of the churches and the attack on Christians.
“Nine churches have been burnt by Muslims in Kontagora, and Baptist pastors who were attending a conference there were also attacked,” Rev. Shaba said.
According to Rev. Shaba, the pastors of the Niger/Kebbi Conference of the Nigerian Baptist Convention were attacked as they were in a worship service on Thursday night.
Muslim protests against the caricatures of Muhammad turned violent in Maiduguri, Borno state, and in Katsina, Katsina state, over the weekend, leaving more than 50 Christians dead. Muslims also reportedly killed 25 Christians on February 20-21 in the northern city of Bauchi over an alleged blasphemy of the Quran. Rioting in the northern city of Gombe reportedly resulted from the alleged death by torture of a young man.
The Muslim violence in the north sparked fierce reprisals from Christians in southern Nigeria, where attacks last week in Onitsha and surrounding towns in Anambra state left at least 80 people dead.
On Feb. 24, another outbreak of violence was reported in Potiskum, in the northern state of Yobe. Yobe, like Niger state, has implemented sharia, the Islamic legal system. Muslim youths reportedly burned churches and houses belonging to Christians in Potiskum, and 65 rioters were arrested.
In Enugu, of the southern state of the same name, Christian reprisal attacks reportedly resulted in the deaths of at least seven Muslims. According to Reuters, the attacks were rumored to have been sparked by a Muslim policeman killing a Christian boy.

This puts a little different light on things.

The parent company of a Dubai-based firm at the center of a political storm in the US over the purchase of American ports participates in the Arab boycott against Israel, The Jerusalem Post has learned.
The firm, Dubai Ports World, is seeking control over six major US ports, including those in New York, Miami, Philadelphia and Baltimore. It is entirely owned by the Government of Dubai via a holding company called the Ports, Customs and Free Zone Corporation (PCZC), which consists of the Dubai Port Authority, the Dubai Customs Department and the Jebel Ali Free Zone Area.
“Yes, of course the boycott is still in place and is still enforced,” Muhammad Rashid a-Din, a staff member of the Dubai Customs Department’s Office for the Boycott of Israel, told the Post in a telephone interview.
“If a product contained even some components that were made in Israel, and you wanted to import it to Dubai, it would be a problem,” he said.
A-Din noted that while the head office for the anti-Israel boycott sits in Damascus, he and his fellow staff members are paid employees of the Dubai Customs Department, which is a division of the PCZC, the same Dubai government-owned entity that runs Dubai Ports World.
Moreover, the Post found that the website for Dubai’s Jebel Ali Free Zone Area, which is also part of the PCZC, advises importers that they will need to comply with the terms of the boycott.
In a section entitled “Frequently Asked Questions”, the site lists six documents that are required in order to clear an item through the Dubai Customs Department. One of them, called a “Certificate of Origin,” “is used by customs to confirm the country of origin and needs to be seen by the office which ensures any trade boycotts are enforced,” according to the website.
A-Din of the Israel boycott office confirmed that his office examines certificates of origin as a means of verifying whether a product originated in the Jewish state.
On at least three separate occasions last year, the Post has learned, companies were fined by the US government’s Office of Anti-boycott Compliance, an arm of the Commerce Department, on charges connected to boycott-related requests they had received from the Government of Dubai.
US law bars firms from complying with such requests or cooperating with attempts by Arab governments to boycott Israel.
In one instance, according to a Commerce Department press release, a New York-based exporter agreed to pay a fine for having “failed to report in a timely manner its receipts of requests from Dubai” to provide certification that its products had not been made in Israel.
The proposed handover of US ports to DP World has provoked a political storm in Washington, where Republicans and Democrats alike have expressed hostility to the plan, citing national security concerns.
In an attempt to stave off opposition, DP World agreed over the weekend to a highly unusual 45-day second federal investigation of potential security risks.

The pali terrorist are at it again. Now they are threatening to blow up the only Bible distribution center in Gaza. This shouldn’t surprise anyone. Quite frankly I’m amazed it’s lasted this long. What else should we expect from a bunch of pali terrorist RoD (religion of death, aka islam) cultist?

(AgapePress) - Terrorists in Gaza have threatened to blow up the building of the only Bible distribution center in the Palestinian-controlled area by the end of the month. Last week terrorists distributed flyers warning the building’s landlord to evict the Bible Society by February 28 or they would blow up the property.
Al Janssen, Chairman of the Board for Open Doors USA, is an expert on the Middle East. He says the Bible Society plays a vital role in the region, particularly since it is “the only place in Gaza where anybody can get a Bible.”
There are 1.3 million Muslims and only 2,000 Christians in the region the Bible Society Center serves, Janssen points out. “If anybody wants a Bible, that’s the only place they can go. There’s also a little Bible church, Gaza Baptist Church, that’s very closely tied to that Bible Society. We would like people to be praying for that — that this ministry of the church and the Bible Society will continue and that it will continue to be a light in the midst of the darkness in Gaza.”
Earlier this month, terrorists detonated a bomb at the Bible Society Center, causing minor damage. However, the Open Doors USA spokesman says the Society has been forced to close for the time being. Meanwhile, he notes, Open Doors has been calling on Palestinian officials to ensure that the terrorists’ violent plans do not come to fruition.
“We’re working through back channels to basically say to Hamas, ‘Now that you’ve been elected, this is something you need to be responsible for,’” Janssen notes. “Now, we don’t believe that Hamas is behind this threat; there are a lot of little fringe groups in there as well. But we do believe that Hamas can make sure this doesn’t happen.”

How do the Israelis think they can actually have peace with people like these? See my emphasis highlights as you read the article.

Palestinian Authority (PA) controlled television is still broadcasting human interest pieces highlighting parents’ support for their children’s decisions to become suicide bombers.
In spite of PA pledges not to incite, an interview broadcast last week featured the mother of Wafa Al-Bas, the 21-year-old Arab woman from Gaza who was arrested at the Erez Crossing in June 2005 wearing a 20-pound (9 kg) bomb under her clothes.
The PA TV interview with Al-Bas’ parents, which aired on February 20th, features her mother saying the event was hard for her - not because her daughter was on a suicide mission, but because she was arrested on her way to carry it out.
Al-Bas intended to bomb Be’er Sheva’s Soroka Hospital outpatient clinic, where she had been receiving regular treatments for serious burns on 45 percent of her body resulting from a gas stove explosion in her home.
The failed bomber later told Israeli television that her greatest wish was to kill 30 to 50 Israelis, including children. The hospital attack would likely have killed or maimed the very Israeli doctor who had saved her life.
Al-Bas’ mother said in the PA TV interview that she knew that her daughter had wanted to be a martyr since she was a little girl, but had not encouraged her - not because she opposed the idea of suicide bombing, but because Wafa was female. “If it was a boy, I would have supported, but since she is a girl I discouraged,” she said.

Read the rest of the interview here.

An interesting opinion piece from The Jerusalem Post.

Everyone knew it was coming; Hamas, following its surprise victory, would attempt to appear moderate in order to retain the flow of Western financial assistance. If there is a surprise now, it is that Hamas’s nod toward moderation is so imperceptible that it barely qualifies as a “charm offensive.”
In an interview with the Washington Post on Saturday, Hamas prime minister-designate Ismail Haniyeh was repeatedly asked whether Hamas would abide by the Quartet’s conditions, such as recognizing Israel, renouncing terrorism, and accepting previous agreements. “Which borders and which Israel?” was the best he could manage. “Israel has to recognize first the Palestinian state and its borders and then we will know what we are talking about.”
According to the Washington Post, when pressed, Haniyeh added, “If Israel withdraws to the 1967 borders, then we will establish a peace in stages.”
But Haniyeh on Sunday distanced himself from even such purported relative moderation, the kind that might signal that Hamas has limited demands which might be fulfilled and still leave room for Israel to exist. “I did not say anything about recognizing Israel,” he stressed. He had been misunderstood. And he had not spoken about peace, either, only a “political truce” with a host of pre-conditions.
In fact, Hamas is not trying particularly hard to give those who want to believe in its potential moderate credentials enough to hang their hat on. And its leaders are also happy to explain in Arabic to Arab audiences precisely what its stands for strategically.
On February 14, Al Jazeera broadcast an interview in Sudan with Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal - the one who recently met with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Teheran. “We say to the Islamic nation: You want neither to pay charity nor to wage jihad?… How are we supposed to liberate Palestine? How are we supposed to regain the Al-Aqsa Mosque? How are we supposed to be a great nation facing the world? By Allah, we have no choice but to sacrifice our property and our souls… There is no other way.”
In another interview in Arabic on Dream TV 2 (Egypt, February 13), senior Hamas leader, Moussa Abu Marzouk, also didn’t mince words, stating “We say that all of Palestine, from the [Jordan] River to the [Mediterranean] Sea, belongs to the Palestinians.”
The interviewer then pointed out, “That’s the voice directed at your own people, while the voice directed outside speaks about 1967.”
Abu Marzouk responded: “We use one voice in all forums. But we also say that we are dealing realistically with the current phase - an independent Palestinian state with full sovereignty over the West Bank, Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip. That is what we presented to our people in our election platform.”
Probing further, the interviewer asked, “Is this a partial or phased solution?”
Abu Marzouk confirmed, “Yes, it is a temporary and phased solution. This is not the permanent solution.” (All translations by www.memri.org.)
In other words, Hamas is happy to play along to a minimal degree with the West’s desire to support the Palestinians, on the assumption that the Palestinians have sincerely accepted a two-state solution that includes Israel. But Hamas leaders continue to explain, to anyone who is willing to listen, that their talk of the 1967 borders has nothing to do with an intention to live in peace with Israel.

Read the rest here.

For those who are still in doubt of islam’s goals, this iman spells it out very plainly.

Sheikh Ismail Nawahda, preaching to Moslem masses on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on Friday, has brought it out into the open: the call to restore the Moslem Khalifate, or, “Genuine Islamic Rule.”
A plan for the “Return of the Khalifate” was published secretly in 2002 by a group called “The Guiding Helper Foundation.” The group explained that it wished to “give direction to the educated Muslim populace in its increasing interest in the establishment of Islam as a practical system of rule.”
This past Friday, Feb. 24, however, the plan went public. Sheikh Nawahda called publicly for the renewal of the Islamic Khalifate, which would “unite all the Moslems in the world against the infidels.”
The Khalifate system features a leader, known as a Khalif, who heads worldwide Islam. Assisted by a ten-man council, his decisions are totally binding on all Moslems.
According to the Foundation’s vision of the Khalifate, significant punishment can only be meted out for 14 crimes, including “accusing a chaste person of fornication,” “not performing the formal prayer,” and “not fasting during Ramadan.”
The Foundation recommends working to restore the Moslem dictatorship using a system of small groups around the world. The purpose is so that the “enemies of Islam” who “will definitely try to stop us” will have a “much harder task, if not impossible, if they are faced with a myriad of small groups of differing locations, ethnicities,” etc. This method also “ensures that if one group… is found and cut off, other similar groups will remain undetected.”
Sheikh Nawahda reminded his Temple Mount audience that the first step taken by Muhammed in stabilizing his rule was to form the nucleus of the first Islamic country in the city of Medina. Nawahda also said that the status of Moslems around the world has dropped drastically ever since the collapse of the last Khalifate in 1924, after Turkey became a democratic republic.
Nawahda called upon the Arabs of the Palestinian Authority to rise above their personal and party interests, and said that Moslems must return to Islam and join forces in the struggle against the West. He praised the worldwide protests against the anti-Muhammed cartoons, and encouraged the Moslem public to continue such activities. He implied that those who insulted Muhammed are liable for death. The Sheikh designated the Moslem masses as a strong point that can be utilized in the fight against the West.