[QUOTE=LouisB]
It didn’t seem at all strange to me that Satan would make a special trip to a small town in Texas just to look through my bedroom window.
I haven’t seen him since, though.
[/QUOTE]
Maybe one visit to Texas was all he could handle.
I thought we had already established that the Beast is Mahmoud Abbas.
[QUOTE=Little Nemo]
In a hundred years, there will be people saying “Now is the endtime. When in the past did we ever face dangers like anti-matter bombs and nanotech plagues and quark probability disrupters?”
[/QUOTE]
Besides which, ** GuyNblueJeans** said “site [sic] for me when there was a time when there were so many atomic bombs floating around.”
There are of course less than half as many atomic bombs today than there were in 1985, at the peak of the Cold War. So even if “great number of nuclear weapons” is an important benchmark, we’ve stepped back from the brink.
Maybe the Beast arrived in the 80s, but failed.
[QUOTE=Fiver]
Maybe the Beast arrived in the 80s, but failed.
[/QUOTE]
“Stop slouching towards Bethlehem!”
– The mother of the Beast
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
Well, I gotta say, your comments do make me feel a “little” better. 
[/QUOTE]
Why? It seems like you have faith in Jesus and an eventual, if not upcoming, Judgement Day. Why would the explanation of a non-believer make you feel better?
I don’t believe in the Bible but there is one thing I don’t get, all these bible thumpers claiming we are in the end times when this verse would seem to contradict that notion:
“But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. 37 For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, 39 and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 40 Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. 41 Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left. 42 Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. 43 But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. 44 Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.
—Matthew 24:36-44
So not even the angels of heaven or the son know the hour, only the father, yet these fundies claim to have higher knowledge, what makes them so privileged?
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
I’d feel better if you used your fine mind and explain away for me how there’s nothing to be concerned about in view of what the Bible says and some of the things I’ve brought up here regarding the person in question. Can you please try (so I can share in your confident certainty)?
[/QUOTE]
Because the Bible is a collection of nonsense written by ignorant primitives.
And besides, if he’s the Antichrist, there would have been a massive explosion as the antimatter composing him interacted with normal matter in mutual annihilation. No gamma ray flash, no Antichrist.
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
Actually – and (hopefully) I may well be wrong on this – I think he tends to go by D-O-C-T-O-R Javier Solana.
[/QUOTE]
Ok, that gives us letters for L-O-R-D-V-O-L-D-E darn, no “M”.
[QUOTE=Der Trihs]
Because the Bible is a collection of nonsense written by ignorant primitives.
And besides, if he’s the Antichrist, there would have been a massive explosion as the antimatter composing him interacted with normal matter in mutual annihilation. No gamma ray flash, no Antichrist.
[/QUOTE]
I tought the anti-christ would only explode if brought into contact with the positive christ.
[QUOTE=Boyo Jim]
I tought the anti-christ would only explode if brought into contact with the positive christ.
[/QUOTE]
Nah, that’s bad Star Trek science. Antimatter is antimatter. As soon as he contacts the air, Antichrist go boom.
Although if we could predict where he’d appear and build a vacuum chamber there and magnetically levitate him, we could use him for an antimatter supply . . .
[QUOTE=Little Nemo]
Fortunately, the Anti-Christ’s powers are declining. Back in the nineties, Solana was Secretary General of NATO so he controlled eighteen countries including the United States.
[/QUOTE]
There weren’t 18 countries in NATO at the time.
Ha, I counted. Solana was Secretary General of NATO through 1999 and there were eighteen members in the alliance then: Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Plus France which is still technically a member of NATO even if it pretends it isn’t.
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
Somewhere in Revelation, and I think other places in the Bible, too, it says something about people not being able to buy or sell unless they have the number of the Beast. The tech things I mentioned are up and running, including the scanners in the grocery stores.
It just seems (to me) like these things are just the sort of tools that would be needed to take control of the world as noted in the Bible. And for myself personally, I am mindful of what I was told during my UFO encounter (which I wrote about in this place some months back) in which I was told, “the entire North American continent is becoming mechanized.”
[/QUOTE]
The last few verses of Revelation 13.
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers]
Maybe one visit to Texas was all he could handle.
[/QUOTE]
Nah. He came back later in government, then moved to D.C.
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
Somewhere in Revelation, and I think other places in the Bible, too, it says something about people not being able to buy or sell unless they have the number of the Beast. The tech things I mentioned are up and running, including the scanners in the grocery stores.
[/QUOTE]
You’re looking for Revelation 13:11-18
So, if Solana survives an otherwise fatal assassination attempt by a sword, then a beast comes out from the sea with two horns, and makes the whole world worship a speaking idol of Solana, under penalty of death, calls fire down from heaven, and starts tatooing numbers on people’s hands and foreheads, then you should worry. Until that, not really.
[QUOTE=Lumpy]
Ok, that gives us letters for L-O-R-D-V-O-L-D-E darn, no “M”.
[/QUOTE]
It’s L-O-R-D-V-O-L-D-E-N-O-R-T, silly–Voldemort’s little known second cousin. He specializes in obscure references, unclear predictions about vague, harmfu- sounding events, and lots of passion and vehemence.
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
Somewhere in Revelation, and I think other places in the Bible, too, it says something about people not being able to buy or sell unless they have the number of the Beast. The tech things I mentioned are up and running, including the scanners in the grocery stores.
[/QUOTE]
First, I need to explain to you where I’m coming from: I’m a lifelong Conservative Evangelical American Protestant. I have been teaching First Grade Sunday School for 14 years. My husband of 34 years is currently a part-time interim pastor at a tiny Conservative Evangelical American Protestant church in the Central Illinois boonies (as well as being a full-time letter carrier–and yes, they were desperate to fill the pulpit ).
So I’m not some SDMB atheist.
So please do not brush this off as a “technical quibble”. 
Part the First:
As Captain Amazing has pointed out, the relevant passage is Revelation 13:16-17. And it says that no one will be able to buy or sell unless they have the mark of the beast on their forehead or hand.
So the existence of scanners and bar codes in modern society don’t signify. They do not signal the imminence of the Second Coming, because they do not read bar codes installed on your hand or forehead. And because, last time I looked, you could still walk into Wal-Mart and buy a gallon of milk without having to flash a barcode on your forehead.
When modern civilization starts mandating (and notice I said “mandating”, not “putting”, because yes, I am aware that they can put a chip under your skin, but it’s not mandated, is it?)…anyway, when they start mandating bar codes on your hand or forehead, then you can start worrying about the Mark of the Beast.
And I will worry right along with you, not because it means the Rapture is near, but because it will mean that America has been conquered by aliens from outer space, and I’ll be out in the hills fighting along with the guerillas.
Part the Second:
As Pool has pointed out, Matthew 24:36, in Jesus’ own words, says that no one knows the day nor the hour of Jesus’ coming. In other words, it’s a waste of time to even be wondering whether this person or that person is the Antichrist or the Beast or whatever. We’re to concentrate on the task at hand, which is saving souls and looking to our own salvation, and not worrying about when the Big Day is.
Part the Third:
To reiterate what I said before, there is no Antichrist mentioned in Revelation, and thus this whole discussion is pretty much moot.
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
I beg to differ. On every level things are different and more sinister than they’ve ever been. And just because the things discussed in this thread haven’t occured yet doesn’t mean that they won’t.
Only a blind person could look at this world and what’s going on … and say, “Don’t worry, everything’s fine.”
[/QUOTE]
Those who lived through WWI or II would beg to differ. Survivors of the Holocaust and the Rape of Nanking would certainly do so. So would those who lived through the Russian Revolution, or survivors in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
jayjay is right on the money-life has ALWAYS been this bad.
Tell me, who is more sinister than Hitler, or Stalin? Cromwell or Robespierre? Ivan the Terrible? Nero?
No, everything is “not fine.” But, it never HAS been. Life has always sucked. There’s ALWAYS crap in the world.
I’m going to blunt. I have a degree in history. Yet, you, a janitor, claim to know better. I’m not knocking janitors. However, this is MY area of expertise. And I’m telling you, you’re dead wrong.
:dubious:
[QUOTE=Der Trihs]
Nah, that’s bad Star Trek science. Antimatter is antimatter. As soon as he contacts the air, Antichrist go boom.
Although if we could predict where he’d appear and build a vacuum chamber there and magnetically levitate him, we could use him for an antimatter supply . . .
[/QUOTE]
Well, the aniti-christ should be able to levitate himself, so no problem.
[QUOTE=GuyNblueJeans]
With all due respect, please site [sic] for me when there was a time when there were so many atomic bombs floating around
[/quote]
The number of nuclear warheads on the planet at the moment is significantly less than previously. Cite. The US has 1/3 the number they did in 1965 and Russia 1/3 of what they had in 1985.
So what? ALL times are unlike any other times in human history. As previously mentioned, these times seems more significant to you because you happen to be living in them. Had you lived 100 years ago with your current mindset you’d think the same thing: “please cite for me a time when there was a time when there were so many dreadnoughts floating around”.