11-25-22 Running Out of Normal

Running Out of Normal – Pete Garcia - https://www.rev310.net/post/running-out-of-normal I was at the Prophecy Watcher’s conference this past weekend, and it was a truly amazing experience. Arriving a day early, I was pleasantly surprised when Pastor Tom Hughes and his family also arrived giving us ample amounts of time to talk and reflect on the state of the world. I was also pleased to meet and spend time with Dr. Tommy Ice, Don Mercer, Bob Maginnis, Bill Sallus, Olivier Melnick, Nathan Jones, Lee Brainard, Mondo Gonzales, Ken Johnson, Derek & Sharon Gilbert, and many more. I also got to meet so many wonderful people from all over the US and Canada. All of the presentations were amazing, informative, and very encouraging. But it was during Mondo Gonzales’ briefing, Is the Rapture in the Olivet Discourse? that the title of this article came to mind. It got me thinking of all the earth-shattering, norm-breaking, and life-changing events which have been happening since 9/11. It was then I realized one of the most underrated major signs of the end of the age is the fact that we are running out of normal life. And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed. Luke 17:27-30 Assessment I don’t know about you, but I’ve never considered Luke 17 as referring to the Second Coming, primarily, because during the 70th Week (i.e., the Tribulation), life will be anything but normal. Just consider the fact that during the Seal Judgments alone, a quarter of the world’s population will die. The oceans will be turning to blood. The trees and vegetation will be burned up. An army of demonic locusts will be unleashed upon the earth. 100 lb. hailstones will be cast upon the earth. How anyone can think that is normal is beyond my comprehension. So, we should know without any doubt, that the ‘days of the Son of Man’ Christ is referring to, is not events inside the 70th Week, but those that precede it. For this, I refer back to the title by saying we are running out of normal. The events on September 11, 2001, would come to change life on earth for the next 22 years. Security enhancements at airports. Sweeping government surveillance powers to monitor their citizens in the name of ‘national security.’ Two major military conflicts in the Middle East. Major terrorist groups rising up to challenge said conflicts (Al Qaeda, ISIS, the Taliban, etc.). There was a clear distinction between life before 9/11, and life after 9/11. Next, we had the global economic crisis of 2008, where major banking institutions (beginning with the Lehman Brothers) began collapsing which set off a cascading effect of financial failures within the mortgage industry and banking. Major government financial bailouts (three of them) were put together to ‘bail out’ the banks from collapsing. Where that money is now, is anyone’s guess. But life before this event, and life after, have never been the same. We’ve had the rise of social media, which has not only ushered in the Age of Information but has altered how an entire generation sees itself. This also allowed for the rise of information warfare to occur on an unprecedented scale, where political ideologies became the determining factor in who gets access and who doesn’t. We’ve had a sweeping rise of globalism, where nations’ are increasingly bent on rushing into a global government and governance. Whether we are talking about the UN Agenda 2020, 2030, the Fourth Industrial Revolution, or the Great Reset, the push to implement global government has never been stronger. This seems to be not only unavoidable but forcefully inevitable. We’ve had the most unlikely candidate in the world sweep to power. President Donald Trump and his nationalist platform, while incredibly successful, were viewed by the left and globalists, as THE threat to their promised new world order. Definitely no mistaking life before MAGA and life after the 2020 election heist. There are other technological breakthroughs like the Internet, digital cryptocurrencies, 5G internet service, Starlink Satellites, electronic cars, Mar’s expeditions, congressional disclosure on UFOs/AUPs, advancements in and dependency upon Artificial Intelligence, hypersonic missiles, as well as sweeping shifts in the global society to normalize the LGBTP, Critical Race Theory, weaponized immigration, and Woke agendas, and so many others that it’s impossible to list them all. We’ve had four pandemic scares (Avian Flu, Swine Flu, Zika Virus, and Ebola), as well as one global pandemic (Covid-19). Whether the global economic shutdowns, lock-ins, mandatory vaccinations, and mask policies were necessary or not, there is definitely no mistaking life before and after it. Lastly, there has been an unprecedented and concerted global effort to push environmental alarmism as the crisis du jour as a means to centralize power into the hands of a singular global government, regardless of the actual facts of the matter. I’m only 47 (soon to be 48) and I can definitively say that life before 9/11 was one way, and life after has been another. In fact, it has only ever gotten weirder, more confusing, and more stressful. Although I suppose this is a subjective statement, I can't help but wonder how much more can we as a human population endure before life is no longer normal. For instance, if you live in North Korea or Iran and life has always been miserable, then this push towards global totalitarianism probably seems just more of the same. But for much of the rest of the world, this Orwellian push is not. Even in places like China where there has always been a strong government over-watch of their citizenry, the recent brutal lockdowns in Wuhan, Shanghai, and Beijing, are extreme even for them. This barbarism was not just on display in normally totalitarian states, but in what was long considered “Western Civilization” in places like Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. Places we used to think of as democratic and “freedom-loving” governments, exposed just how necessary a Constitutional Bill of Rights and impartial judicial system was to the functioning of a healthy democracy. But even in the United States (the dominant economic and military power of the last 70 years), there have been abuses of our Constitution in primarily blue (Democrat) states which have begun shaking the foundations of our Constitutional Republic. And given the increasingly ‘global’ nature of all our coming crises’, I would say we are not only inching toward the days of Noah and Lot (global wickedness, violence, and normalized debauchery), we are already there. How much longer will Jesus’ description of normal life (as depicted in Luke 17’s marriages, buying/selling, planting, and building) be apropos? Understandably, the push to make all of the aforementioned, ‘the new normal,’ is all underway, but just saying so doesn’t make it so. Governmental totalitarianism is still tyranny. LGBTQP (the P stands for pedophilia in case you were wondering) is still sinful moral depravity no matter how normal they want us to believe it is. Violence is still violence. Murder is still murder. Also understandably, is that this unprecedented spike in wickedness, to the world, is for them, normal. They don’t view LGBTQP as lawlessness, but it is lawless against God’s preordained order for the world. They don’t view abortion on demand up to and through birth, as lawless, but it is to God. They don’t view global government as lawless, but it is to God. There was a good reason why God separated mankind at Babel because He knew if He didn’t, mankind would have fallen under global tyranny millennia ago and would have destroyed themselves long before any of us would have ever been born. Conclusion Nevertheless, here we are in 2022, a small, remnant community of watching believers increasingly all asking the same question…how much longer Lord? What else is going to happen that shakes our understanding of normal life? I mean, at this point, nothing is really surprising anymore. I suppose the only thing left that would really shake people up and get them to question reality, is the public and unmistakable arrival of extraterrestrials to the skies above our earth. As the world keeps goose-stepping towards global tyranny using any and every excuse to do so, nothing is really surprising anymore. How can life be normal when normal was thrown out the window? Personally, I really can’t think of anything else that’s left that would surprise me. I mean, we’ve had Russia invade Ukraine in the first major military European provocation (nation on nation) since World War II. We are confident that in the weeks to months ahead, China will retake Taiwan. We are confident that Israel will strike down Iran’s nuclear ambitions in a massive military strike. We are equally confident that the governments of the world will continue pushing us towards a global famine, economic crisis, and new pandemic, in order to reinstitute global vaccine mandates, food rationing, and all the other necessary prerequisites for their Great Reset. I mean, we can see all that stuff coming a mile away. So to me, it’s not a matter of if, but when all of these things come to pass. So how can we be surprised when we see it coming? How much longer can we buy and sell when the world’s currencies are on the verge of collapse and are presently experiencing skyrocketing inflation? How much longer can we marry, and be given in marriage, when marriage itself is being profaned and unprecedented crises continually rob the world of normal life? How much longer can we plant and build, when the price of building materials is through the roof, and planting is increasingly being taken over by corporate monstrosities like Bill Gates, Monsanto, and Blackrock? To me, at least, this all begs the question I proposed in the title- that we are running out of normal. When Jesus addressed the disciples' questions regarding the end of the age, He give a litany of signs both general and specific but concluded in Luke's account with this encouragement; Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near.” Luke 21:28