“And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed… saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.” (Revelation 13:11-14)
Forced worship is what awaits the Constitutional republic of the United States, according to Bible prophecy. It has a lamblike profession, but it speaks through it’s legislation in the most contrary manner to the lamb. Notice what the lamblike beast does with fire: “And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men…”. This brings to mind the scenes of Elijah when the king of Israel’s soldiers knew and tried to take captive a “man of God”. However, this power is not of God, but of the dragon, that is, of Satan (Revelation 12:9), despite claiming to be the bastion of freedom and independence it once was, it will, like the zealous disciples who wanted to avenge the supposed rejection of Christ, seek to destroy rather than save. “And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elijah did? But he turned, and rebuked them, and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them…” (Luke 9:54-56)
A lamb that speaks as a dragon claims to save men’s lives through intolerance and threatening persecution. We’re told the characteristics of the dragon in Revelation 12:17: “And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.”
Like John and James, America will become decidedly hostile towards the commandment keeping people of God, and towards “the testimony of Jesus Christ, which is the Spirit of prophecy.” (Rev. 19:10)
Because this prophecy testifies against them, they will desire smooth words, of whom it is written, “That this is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the LORD: Which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits…” (Isaiah 30:9-10) This means that America, in furthering the interests of the Evangelical Protestant churches, will become professedly Christian, professedly followers of the Lamb, yet in works, they shall deny Him. Against His law and against His prophetic message, the church in America are “rebellious children”.
We are told that America’s lamblike beast will speak as a dragon, saying that they should make an image to the first beast, which is the Papal church and state that soaked the soil of Europe in the blood of Christians for centuries. In order to control the consciences of the people, the early church sought the support of the secular power. The result was the papacy, a church that controlled the power of the state and employed it to further her own ends, especially for the punishment of “heresy.” In order for the United States to form an image of the beast, the religious power must so control the civil government that the authority of the state will also be employed by the church to accomplish her own ends.
ERASING CHURCH/STATE BARRIERS: THE IMAGE OF THE BEAST
This image of the beast, that is, church and state power working together to further the ends of the churches is now vividly on display in the White House, via a recent executive order signed by Trump. President Trump in his Rose Garden ceremony Thursday announced an executive order he said would expand government grants to and partnerships with religiously-affiliated groups through a new faith-based office — a move described by one of his top faith advisers as aimed at changing the culture to produce fewer discussions about church-state barriers with “all of these arbitrary concerns as to what is appropriate.”
Donald Trump in May 2018 announced the “Faith and Opportunity Initiative”. It is a faith based office directly located in the White House, composed of predominantly Evangelical Protestants, the only advisory faith-group that has open access to the President.
TO CREATE FAITH POLICIES
This office is very clear on why it was established. “The faith initiative will help design new policies that recognize the vital role of faith in our families, our communities and our great country,” Trump said Thursday, the National Day of Prayer, in the White House Rose Garden. “This office will also help ensure that faith-based organizations have equal access to government funding and the equal right to exercise their deeply held beliefs…Faith is more powerful than government, and nothing is more powerful than God.”
What is this office in the White House for? It’s to help design policies, laws, for families, communities, and the country. While it claims to be friendly towards all faiths, the Evangelical stance has done everything it can to breathe life into the image of the beast. Intolerance is largely the very air that the Evangelical Protestants have been breathing as Trump’s advisors. While saying it promotes the interests of religious liberty, by Trump’s actions and the advisory board’s counsels, it is becoming increasingly clear to all that the interests are furthering the church’s agenda to employ state power in the United States.
Daniel Mach, director of the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief has already made a hardline statement on Trump’s “religious liberty” policies. “Trump’s action and policies turn religious liberty on its head,…Through his Muslim [travel] ban, the president has shown outright hostility toward an entire faith. At the same time, his administration has embraced the deeply troubling idea that religious freedom is a blank check to discriminate and to harm others.” In Mach’s comments regarding the Faith and Opportunity Office to NBC News when he said the following: “This administration has continually promoted the troubling notion that religious freedom is a blank check to discriminate and harm others…This new initiative creates a bureaucratic regime and adopts policy preferences that will worsen that disturbing trend.”
Members of Trump’s evangelical advisory council celebrated the news of the new faith-based office in the White House. “I could not be more proud to stand with President Trump as he continues to stand shoulder to shoulder with communities of faith,” evangelical preacher and advisor Paula White told news source RNS, “This order is a historic action, strengthening the relationship between faith and government in the United States and the product will be countless, transformed lives.”
Another Evangelical advisor, Johnnie Moore, the spokesman for the president’s Evangelical Advisory board, made more startling comments from the White House. Moore told the Washington Post’s Michelle Boorstein that Trump’s office would worry less “where the church-state barriers are,” allowing government-religious partnerships to function “without all of these arbitrary concerns as to what is appropriate.”
Other faith leaders were more cautious. “We don’t consider respect for the First Amendment to be ‘arbitrary,’” said Rabbi Jack Moline, president of Interfaith Alliance, in a statement emailed to journalists.
Alongside Rabbi Jack Moline is Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers of the United States. He believed the barriers between church and state mattered highly. “Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church and State.” (Letter of Thomas Jefferson, Jan. 1, 1802)
If that wall were maintained, no image of the beast could be formed. But now that the wall of separation is being taken down, it will be, and now is, formed. Will we realize that it is time to sound the third angel’s message against the beast and his image? (Rev. 14:9-12)
A SPECIAL ADVISOR TO BE ANNOUNCED
A special faith advisor will also report any faith-based concerns to Attorney General Jeff Sessions, that their concerns will be both addressed and the legislation enacted under Trump’s administration for Evangelicals may be especially executed. According to the new order, this advisor is to “identify and propose means to reduce … burdens on the exercise of religious convictions and legislative, regulatory, and other barriers to the full and active engagement of faith-based and community organizations in Government-funded or Government-conducted activities and programs.” In short, this means nothing is to prevent the full government sustained institutions of the Evangelical Protestant churches.