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Chanson de Geste pour l'Apocalypse


I often wonder if in coming years I will say to young children around camp fire, "there was a time when you could buy a Bible in any bookstore or download one on to your phones for free, there was a time when you could wear a cross and people smiled, or there was time when there where Christian empires such as the Byzantines, The Crusaders, and The Colonials." With persecution on the rise I believe that we will be telling next generation of Christ followers such tales that they will look in wonder upon shields with crosses from Middle Ages, hymns from the Reformation, and stills of Christian TV stations like TBN (Trinity Broadcasting Network) and CBN (Christian Broadcasting Network) before the Beast took over. Perhaps we will even have to describe to these young impressionable minds what a cathedral was, and how there were once Nativity and Good Friday processions in public, instead of hidden vigils we now have. Will they believe us when we tell them of the magnificent structures that once bore crosses, or the numerous translations of the Scriptures that were at our finger tips? Will they believe us when we tell them there was a time when leaders prayed to Christ publicly and entire armies said The Our Father Prayer before battle?

I imagine a scene akin to the one in Reign of Fire (2002), starring Christian Bale, where Quinn (Bale) and his friend Kreedy (Gerald Butler) are doing a play for kids, they are preforming Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, because there is no movie theaters anymore, no books, and etc. for the children to see it anymore because the dragons have destroyed everything. the dragons are perhaps a great parable because it is the dragon in Revelation who is the devil (Revelation 12:4-12) and who created a world of intolerance (Revelation 13). I imagine we might do plays for the Apocalypse children, plays of the Crusades, the Apostles, and Church history. We might even tell them about the times when there were Christian films, video games, and books; when there were Christian book stores like LifeWay, where you could buy Christian music, Bibles, and other paraphernalia. Will they be wowed when we regale them with the tales of stadiums full of unbelievers coming to Christ like in Billy Graham Crusades and the Ron Luce Battlecry events? That there was a time when your faith could be so public and not be subjected to persecution and the exterminations of the Beast.

Will we have to explain Christmastime, and show them a evergreen tree with candles (since no electricity will be free). Perhaps with our crude instruments of rock, and metal we can recreate Michelangelo's Last Supper, Rembrandt's Jesus, Ecce Homo, and many other masterpieces, and tell of the times when painting Christ wasn't only popular but paid for. Will the children laugh in cheerful disbelief at us saying we once wore dresses and clothing with Bible verses on them as in case of Not of This World (C28)? Will the children marvel when we explain that we had machines that could read the Bible to us out loud, and that we had access to Internet to look up the original Greek New Testament, Church History, and every thing pertinent to Christianity on a whim? I wonder if I will be able to explain this very blog to them, and how I even wrote this post before it all happen (Revelation 13:1-13).

We take for granted these precious moments. Persecution is rearing its head, and in a blink of a moment the Beast will be ruling (Revelation 13:7) and all the access we currently have to Christian videos, music, history, commentary, and the Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic, and Latin translations will be gone; with it only living on in each person who committed it to memory or solitary volumes persevered for posterity. Suddenly we will be thrust from having Bible at one tap on smartphone or tablet, and wishing we had kept our hard copies, and in worse cases wishing we had memorized more when hard copies are confiscated. Call my words paranoid or doomsday prepping, but it happened in Romania, Germany, and even ancient Rome. When persecution hits, we will discover the limits placed on our access to all the things we now take for granted. Everyone smiles now, certain that Christ delays and they will have centuries of prosperity and Network Christianity, but what if this is it? What if the Beast takes over tomorrow, then it will be too late to back up your files, purchase your hard copies of the Bible, and hold on to the tapes of the revivals. For as Jesus said it will happen all suddenly and He will come like thief in the night. It will be business as usual, and then boom! The End will be upon us (Luke 13).

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