Secretary of Defense James Mattis said that if the situation escalates into war with North Korea that it would be a "catastrophic war"....and this as the United States is deploying its third carrier based Naval Strike Force to the western Pacific. President Trump had laid it on the line previously when he described this potential war as a..."major, major conflict."
All of America was on edge during those thirteen days of October 1962, I remember it as a twelve year old, yet today with a similar and even more intense situation we hardly give serious thought to what is going on with the Korean Peninsula. Now it's conjecture here but I expect that pulpits around America in October of 1962 spent considerable time in prayer on what was happening in and around Cuba. I doubt if many pulpits even mentioned North Korea yesterday.....in what is supposedly a much more religious climate and America than a half century ago.
We have become accustomed to a North Korean leader doing something rash followed by a tense week or two and then a return to 'normalcy' for a few years before the Korean dictator decides for whatever reason to cause trouble again. Staying on the same 38th parallel but moving to a different part of the world, George W. Bush was faced with a very similar but somewhat less immanent crisis in 2008 when Iran escalated their nuclear weapons program. The feeling at the time was that dealing with Iran might hurt John McCain's chances in the election. McCain would deal with it after he won....but he didn't win. Barack Obama told Israel to give him until December to work out something with Iran. That was December of 2009! He then spent the next seven plus years not only not dealing with Iran but bolstering their nuclear program!
So here we are.....2017! North Korea is close if they aren't there already to having the capability of exploding a nuclear device either over America, in one of our ports, or actually reaching our mainland with a missile! Yet we as a people are almost in ho-hum mode. The liberals are too concerned with possibly impeaching Donald Trump to worry about a silly thing like a nuclear catastrophe, while others are almost looking forward to bombing somebody....anybody. Much of the Christian church almost nonchalantly says...'God has it all under control'
It's been reported on a few times over the years in various newspaper and magazine articles....the United States Third Fleet faced two typhoons consecutively in 1944 and 1945. In one of them three destroyers were lost in the storm along with almost 800 lives.....and this without a Zero in sight! God does indeed control the destiny of nations. He controls the waves of the sea, the undulations of the earth, the course of asteroids and even the men who plan wars. He has everything under control....just as He had everything under control in the many sacks of 'Christian' Rome, the Peasant's War during the Reformation and every other period of unmitigated chaos.
Is there nothing that will wake us up short of calamity? Are we that confident that our nation will continue to just roll along like Ol' Man River. We can watch with great anticipation as the ping pong balls are sucked into a tube on a $100 million lottery but barely ponder let alone meditate upon a 'catastrophic war' that has a 50/50 chance of occurring...using here man's familiarity with the word 'chance.'
Iran and North Korea are only two very potential catastrophes to Western Civilization that we have deconstructed into a babbling suicidal toga party. There are others. My point in these posts centered on the 38th parallel on the Korean Peninsula is that it is impossible for this North Korean crisis to just go on as it has in the past! Kim Jong-un will wither totally give up his nuclear program or there will be a conflagration....or a catastrophic war as General and Secretary of Defense Mattis described it. One more cooling down and just going on period would be just add insanity to absurdity! Which do you think it will be?
I write this on Memorial Day, for tens of thousands of our military will eventually fight this our battle, one way or another. It is far too late to avoid the consequences of our rebellion to God, but it is not too late to humble ourselves before Him and seek His steady hand in the approaching whirlwind, of which He has control....not us. May God have mercy upon us so that our pulpits will wake up from their dreamy state to preach not only our King...but our coming King....not only glory but woe....and not only rejoicing but introspection and repentance.
All of America was on edge during those thirteen days of October 1962, I remember it as a twelve year old, yet today with a similar and even more intense situation we hardly give serious thought to what is going on with the Korean Peninsula. Now it's conjecture here but I expect that pulpits around America in October of 1962 spent considerable time in prayer on what was happening in and around Cuba. I doubt if many pulpits even mentioned North Korea yesterday.....in what is supposedly a much more religious climate and America than a half century ago.
We have become accustomed to a North Korean leader doing something rash followed by a tense week or two and then a return to 'normalcy' for a few years before the Korean dictator decides for whatever reason to cause trouble again. Staying on the same 38th parallel but moving to a different part of the world, George W. Bush was faced with a very similar but somewhat less immanent crisis in 2008 when Iran escalated their nuclear weapons program. The feeling at the time was that dealing with Iran might hurt John McCain's chances in the election. McCain would deal with it after he won....but he didn't win. Barack Obama told Israel to give him until December to work out something with Iran. That was December of 2009! He then spent the next seven plus years not only not dealing with Iran but bolstering their nuclear program!
So here we are.....2017! North Korea is close if they aren't there already to having the capability of exploding a nuclear device either over America, in one of our ports, or actually reaching our mainland with a missile! Yet we as a people are almost in ho-hum mode. The liberals are too concerned with possibly impeaching Donald Trump to worry about a silly thing like a nuclear catastrophe, while others are almost looking forward to bombing somebody....anybody. Much of the Christian church almost nonchalantly says...'God has it all under control'
It's been reported on a few times over the years in various newspaper and magazine articles....the United States Third Fleet faced two typhoons consecutively in 1944 and 1945. In one of them three destroyers were lost in the storm along with almost 800 lives.....and this without a Zero in sight! God does indeed control the destiny of nations. He controls the waves of the sea, the undulations of the earth, the course of asteroids and even the men who plan wars. He has everything under control....just as He had everything under control in the many sacks of 'Christian' Rome, the Peasant's War during the Reformation and every other period of unmitigated chaos.
Is there nothing that will wake us up short of calamity? Are we that confident that our nation will continue to just roll along like Ol' Man River. We can watch with great anticipation as the ping pong balls are sucked into a tube on a $100 million lottery but barely ponder let alone meditate upon a 'catastrophic war' that has a 50/50 chance of occurring...using here man's familiarity with the word 'chance.'
Iran and North Korea are only two very potential catastrophes to Western Civilization that we have deconstructed into a babbling suicidal toga party. There are others. My point in these posts centered on the 38th parallel on the Korean Peninsula is that it is impossible for this North Korean crisis to just go on as it has in the past! Kim Jong-un will wither totally give up his nuclear program or there will be a conflagration....or a catastrophic war as General and Secretary of Defense Mattis described it. One more cooling down and just going on period would be just add insanity to absurdity! Which do you think it will be?
I write this on Memorial Day, for tens of thousands of our military will eventually fight this our battle, one way or another. It is far too late to avoid the consequences of our rebellion to God, but it is not too late to humble ourselves before Him and seek His steady hand in the approaching whirlwind, of which He has control....not us. May God have mercy upon us so that our pulpits will wake up from their dreamy state to preach not only our King...but our coming King....not only glory but woe....and not only rejoicing but introspection and repentance.
