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March-April 2013
Dear Friend, Shalom and blessings! I pray all is well and that you are growing in His great peace and grace. Billy Graham,now 94, nearing the end of his earthly existence wrote a letter to America, a warning of judgment. The following are excerpts taken from that letter and my comments as to its significance.
Some years ago, my wife Ruth...startled me by exclaiming, "If God doesn't punish America, He'll have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah." I wonder what Ruth would think of America if she were alive today. In the years since she made that remark, millions of babies have been aborted and our nation seems largely unconcerned. Self-centered indulgence, pride, and a lack of shame over sin are now emblems of the American lifestyle. Ruth Graham's statement is one of the most famous observations ever made of America in the evangelical world. But it was made many years ago.
Billy Graham brought it up in 2012, to say that if America was in danger of judgment then, how much more so now. In 2012 in a prominent city in the south, Christian chaplains who serve the police department were ordered to no longer mention "The Name of Jesus" in prayer. It was reported that during a recent police-sponsored evert, the only person allowed to pray was someone who addressed "the being in the room". Similiar scenarios are now commonplace in towns across America.
Our society strives to avoid any possibility of offending anyone-except God. Here, the evangelist reveals the other side of the coin. Any society that calls evil "good," and hallows the profane, will end up calling good "evil", and will profane the holy.The same nation which glorifies sin and the sinful, will end up persecuting the godly and righteous. In all these things America is following in the pattern of the last days of ancient Israel. This is the pattern that is revealed in The Harbinger.What happened in Israel in the last days as a nation before judgment, is now happening to America. The ramifications of The Harbinger are that we embark on the same course of ancient Israel's transgression and defiance of God, we can expect to encounter the same fate - national judgment - the signs of which are already manifesting in the land.
My heart aches for America and its deceived people. For Billy Graham to refer to Americans as "deceived people" is a first, is very strong, and very significant. And yet he concludes on a note of hope:The wonderful news is that our Lord is a God of mercy, and He responds to repentance. In Jonah's day Nineveh was the lone world superpower - wealthy, unconcerned, and self-centered. When the Prophet Jonah finally traveled to Nineveh and proclaimed God's warning, people heard and repented. I believe the same thing can happen once again, this time in our nation. The evangelist sees the need for the warning of national judgment to be proclaimed to America. I agree with him.
It was for this reason I wrote The Harbinger. That such a message of warning has now become a national bestseller I believe is another sign of the critical hour in which we live. The prophetic warning coming from Billy Graham, I believe is another. We do well to heed it and ignore it at our peril. Let us pray for America and seek to be a light to spread the Gospel of salvation to as many people as you can.
