The Late Great United States?*

      When Bill Clinton became president, I sent him a letter, and I have continued to send letters to all of the presidents after him. The Clinton letter was based on a message that I gave titled "America's Last Hurrah." That message would turn into a series of messages, and then finally assembled into a book that has yet to be published. The title of the Book of messages is called "The Late Great United States?" Hal Lindsay had written an earlier book titled "The Late Great Planet Earth", which inspired my book's title. 

     The future of this nation is very much on my heart, and has been for many years, based upon what I see happening here. What should we be doing as we see our nation rushing towards catastrophe? The prophet Isaiah wrote this Word of the LORD: "Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return to the LORD, and he may have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD...For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth...that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it. For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and it shall be to the LORD for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off." (Isa. 55:6-13). 

     Walking in God's ways will reverse the curse expressed above and to Adam and Eve as thorns and briars. (see Gen. 3:17-18).

     When Solomon became the king of Israel, he prayed to the LORD for the godly wisdom, with an understanding heart and a discerning spirit, with which to rule God's people. The LORD answered Solomon immediately and concluded by saying: "...And if thou wilt walk in my ways, to keep my statutes and my commandments, as thy father David did walk, then I will lengthen thy days." (1 Kings 3:14). This is the first mention in scripture of "walk in my ways", and it came with a connected promise of long life.

     In the Psalms, the LORD declared: "O that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways! I should soon have subdued their enemies, and turned my hand against their adversaries." (Ps. 81:13-14). There is victory for those who walk in God's ways.

     In an opposite example from the Book of Numbers, the Israelites had listened to the evil report from the ten spies and refused to go into the Promised Land as the LORD commanded them to do, Moses told the Israelites that the Word of the LORD regarding their rebellion was for them to spend forty more years in the wilderness. When the people heard this, they changed their minds and wanted to go up into the land, but Moses told them that it was too late, and they were again transgressing the commandment of the LORD: "Go not up, for the LORD is not with you: that ye be not smitten before your enemies." (Num. 14:39-42). The people presumed to go up anyway, but Moses and the ark of the covenant stayed in the camp and did not go with them: "Then the Amalekites came down, and the Canaanites which dwelt in that hill, and smote them, and discomfited them, even unto Hormah." (v. 43-45).

     Refusing to walk in the ways of the LORD brings defeat before the enemy, rather than victory. The purpose of the prophetic Word of God is to deliver a nation from destruction, not to condemn it.

     When the report came to Nehemiah that his nation and its capitol, Jerusalem, were in ruins, he prayed earnestly to the LORD: "And it came to pass when I heard these words, that I sat down and wept, and mourned certain days, and fasted, and prayed before the LORD of heaven." (Neh. 1:3-4). Nehemiah sought a way with all his heart to help his nation and people, even though he was not a man of great position, but a servant to the Persian king as his cupbearer (taster of food and wine for the king to prevent the king's poisoning).

     Although the book, "The Late Great United States?" was written in 2008, perhaps it was not published then because its time is now. Our nation is in a true state of wickedness. It is time for everyone to fast and pray and repent before God. In my book, I list something called "Seven Rules for Revolution". See if they reflect our nation's current condition:

1. Corrupt the young.
2. Control the media
3. Get the people's minds off of government and on other things
4. Divide the people into hostile groups concentrating on items of no lasting value
5. Destroy faith in leaders, exposing their corruption
6. Preach democracy while seizing power in every way possible
7. Encourage civil disorder

     This list above is from a document found during WWII, believed to have been written by Communist leaders. The American General Douglas MacArthur said that moral decay leads to political and economic decline. Our education system for our children is secularized and full of hidden agendas. Now our children are taught, "If it feels good, do it." Our only recourse is the Word of God.

     Nehemiah was allowed by the king to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the city wall. The people working on the wall, who also carried swords (see Heb. 4:12) by their sides, were spread apart from each other, but Nehemiah gave them this important instruction to prevent the attack of the enemies nearby: "And I said unto the nobles, and to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, The work is great and large, and we are separated upon the wall, one far from another. In what place therefore ye hear the sound of the trumpet (shofar), resort ye thither unto us: our God shall fight for us." (Neh. 4:19-20).

     The shofar trumpet represents the spoken Word of God. Are people paying attention? Christians are separated from each other, like Nehemiah's workers, by many different issues. Let all begin to hear the Word of God and come into unity. It is too easy to be deceived. Instead repent, hear God and unite! Discern the truth or be deceived. One of the great deceptions of our modern republic is that the phrase "separation of church and state" is in the Constitution. The Constitution prevents the government from declaring a national religion, or from interfering with how one worships God, but does not separate itself from God. The phrase "separation of church and state" is found in a letter written by Thomas Jefferson to the First Baptist Church of Danbury Connecticut in support of their right to worship God as they chose because they were being persecuted by their local government. The phrase is now being used as a false secular concept. Our nation's founders were united in their call upon the name of the one true LORD in the founding of this nation. They stressed the connection between the LORD and the country. Proverbs 29:2 says: "When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn." The Christians of America need to wake up and understand who we are, not in the ways of the Christian Nationalism movement that twists Biblical precepts, but in the ways of the LORD. There are many statues of national heroes in Washington, DC, but among those statues is one of Moses as a bas relief, and another of Moses holding the tablets of the Ten Commandments.

     Nehemiah and the people finished repairing the wall around Jerusalem in "fifty and two days...when all our enemies heard thereof, and all the heathen that were about us saw these things, they were much cast down in their own eyes: for they perceived that this work was wrought of our God." (Neh. 6:15-16).

     Our potential as believers is in the fact that it is the LORD who does it. Do it God's way and not in our own way. Psalm 33:1-2 says: "The counsel of the LORD standeth for ever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations. Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance." Proverbs 14:34 says, "Righteousness exalts a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people."

     The Bible and the Commandments have been removed from schools. There is murder of the unborn. Anti-Semitism has risen, with even some Christians wrongly proclaiming that they "have replaced the Jews," which is against the Word of God which proclaims, "All Israel shall be saved." Don't they know that Jesus was a Jewish rabbi?! Politicians stand before the people saying, "God bless America". but God won't bless your mess. Who and what are you believing? It's not just about believing pieces of the truth, but all of the truth which is the Word of God. Our nation is being torn apart by these things and needs a 2 Chron. 7:14 return to God. If you agree that our nation is in danger and needs the truth of God right now, help us in seeing this book, "The Late Great United States?", in print. Please see our contact information below.

 

     *Based upon Dr. Kenneth E. Stevenson, Jr.'s 11/24/24 message to the church. If you would like to hear the complete message, you can find it on Dr. Stevenson's Facebook page. To contact or support this ministry, or to request prayer, you can write to PO Box 154221, Waco, TX, 76705. To find out more about the Shroud of Turin, and to receive a free e-book now available in several languages, go to http://www.theshroudofturin.org/freebook.