THIS WAS THE WEEK THAT WAS.

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This week reminded me of WAR. Visions of wartime welled up in me. I vividly remember May 10 1940, now more than 85 years ago, the day Germany invaded the Netherlands. That day I sat on a low brick wall, on the street corner where the large Reformed Church was situated. I had a beautiful view of the inner city’s skyline, silhouetting its contours, dominated by the 100 meters high Martini Tower.

The weather that day, was picture perfect, peaceful, and a lone single engine plane hovered in the bright blue sky: a German reconnaissance plane, I imagined.

I, a 12 years old boy, was alone there. Nobody else stirred. Everybody was indoors, clustered around the radio, listening for news and expecting the worst. What could tiny Netherlands do to stop Germany’s colossal war-machine?

My reflections on what happened in the Netherlands so many years ago, were kindled by this week’s headline in the Globe and Mail, Canada’s National Newspaper: MILITARY MODELS CANADIAN RESPONSE TO HYPOTHETICAL AMERICAN INVASION.

Will I again experience a foreign occupation in my life-time? I dread the thought, not for me, an old man approaching 100, but for my multiple offspring, numbering scores.

 

Prepared for hardship.

 

I was a child of the Dirty Thirties, the economic malaise that taught us to be frugal, and sparing, and economical, and self-sufficient. In that sense we were well prepared for the hardship awaiting us, already always mending clothes, always watching every penny, always praying, religious to a fault: “Trust and obey, there’s no other way”. The churches were packed. Living next to a large church – not the one my family attended (that one, equally large was more orthodox, also quite close) – on Sunday afternoon, for the second service, me, then a 5 years old, I noticed the many cigarette ends, discarded just before the men entered the church.

 

Back to the war, now known as WWII -1939-45. According Eric Hobsbawm, well-known historian, in his book, The Age Of Extremes :1914-1991, he posed that the WWI 1914-18 war never satisfactory concluded, and simply continued in 1939, ending in 1945.  

 

Back to my youthful observations.

 

When Germany attacked my ‘old country’, the defeat was quick. May 10 1940 followed by May 11. My younger brother, by 3 years, and I, in midmorning – no school, of course – rushed to the city centre – a mere 10-15 walk – and found there a German Army Brass band already playing Teutonic tunes, while long lines of motorized occupation forces – fierce looking soldiers – drove past, on the way west, toward the “Afsluit Dijk”, that long “Closing Dike”, connecting Friesland to the Dutch economic centre, Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague.

 

That occupation lasted 5 full years, almost to the day.

 

This week a turning point?

 

Now more than 80 years later, not only Europe, but the entire world is in an inescapable bind: at war, not so much among each other – that too – but fighting “The War of All Wars: Humanity against God: Technology against Creation”.

 

My mind goes back to the Scriptures, and to Jesus’ observation concerning “The End”.  He said, “Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. ³³ Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door.”

 

Did this week signal the beginning of the End?

 

We don’t like Jesus’ reference to The End. We are too comfortable. Yet Revelation 18 pulls no punches: “All the nations have drunk the maddening wine of adulteries.” We do well to read that chapter, and visualize the luxuries we enjoy – at the expense of God’s creation, which the author of the book calls ‘adultery’, aptly named, as they are abnormal intrusions.

 

Both Jesus and John on Patmos, tell us to be on the lookout for THE end, the Telos, of which the Bible speaks all the time. The signs are everywhere, as this past week’s events show: even the weather participates in the parade of perils.  No wonder the Atlantic Magazine claims: “Americans are entering the most dangerous world they have known since World War II, one that will make the Cold War look like child’s play and the post-Cold War world like paradise.”

 

Everything is connected to everything else.

 

The above law of Ecology, is also an important Biblical given: Our world face tough choices, as we have reached “The Limits of Growth”.

Now a new order has come, the fight for the rapidly disappearing natural resources.

 

Will the church sound the alarm?

 

Data from the 1950s record that over half of Americans were in the membership rolls of a mainline church in 1958. Today 8–8.5 percent of Americans are mainline Protestant, with the average age of about 60 years old. Will the church sound the alarm? Did it “In the week that was?”

 

TRUMP’S THREESOME TRAITS.                                                                      

Three psycho-analysts, this past week, have given their verdict on Trump’s psychic state, and it is devastating. In the New York Times I read that: “From a psychoanalytic perspective, his narcissism is malignant in the sense that it is organized around a profound inner emptiness”. Another suggested that his “Malignant narcissism is a combination of narcissism and psychopathology. Because there is little internal capacity for self-soothing or self-valuation, he requires continuous external affirmation to feel real and intact. Power supplies that affirmation. Visibility, dominance and constant stimulation temporarily fill the void.” A third ‘soul expert’ stated that “He represents what researchers call the dark triad of three interconnected, malevolent personality traits: narcissism (grandiosity, self-centeredness), Machiavellianism (manipulation, cynicism) and psychopathy (impulsivity, lack of empathy/remorse).”

That painfully paints the present US president.

Trump wants to be seen as the greatest president of all time and his make-up causes everything to be about himself (narcissism), viewing the world as only functioning through manipulation and exertion of power (Machiavellianism), making him impulsive, without any empathy: a  psychopath, in other words.

Trump may think his own morality and his own mind are the only constraints on his otherwise limitless power, but if we are dependent on either — not to mention Trump’s lack of empathy, compassion or sympathy for the underdog — we are in deep trouble. The nation, the Western Hemisphere and the world at large need to figure out how to place restraints on this ethically vacuous president, or we will all suffer continued and ever-worsening damage.

Connection to Babylon!

A few years ago, I translated – from the Dutch – a book on ‘Revelation’, that mysterious Bible entry that has baffled so many readers, and still does. It was written by Dr. J. H. Bavinck, a professor of Mission at the (Amsterdam) Free University, some 70 years ago, and published by Cascades Books in 2019, under the Title, “And On and On the Ages Roll”, with as subtitle, Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow.

I mention this, because, curiously, in this book Bavinck describes a world ruler afflicted with the same characteristics as the current US president.

The first episode takes place as narrated in Revelation 17.  Chapter 17: 14 has a brief statement: “They will make war against the Lamb, but the Lamb will overcome, because he is the Lord of Lords and the King of Kings, and with him will be his called, chosen and faithful followers.”

How do I interpret this? I believe – and I write this with a great deal of trepidation – this passage can only be understood at the time it happens, and it is happening NOW. Trump’s triple trouble has a ‘war against the Lamb’ component’. His anti-creation, anti-God, anti-Christ measures, are a human-proud proposition, as the above Bible text clearly outlines, therefore bound to fail, but also bound to involve us all.

Trump, in his overweening pride – the definition of ‘hubris’ – takes on God Himself! His Satan-inspired, his outspoken disregard for man, beast and everything created, in short, his fight against God’s good creation also signals Parousia, and reveals to me a definite sign of Christ’ imminent return.

If that is the case, we are in deep trouble.

Dr. Luke Kemp of Cambridge, in his book, “Goliath’s Curse”, lists three imminent dangers:  Climate Change, AI, and Economic Collapse. I could add a 4^th one: Donald Trump.

We are in deep trouble. Trouble threatens from within, and that same threat also comes from above. God infects Trump’s empire with itself, curses it with insanity. That, in short, is the theme of this amazing Revelation 18, with the telling title: The Fall of Babylon. This world-city, this Babylon, with her constant clamor of human voices, her illuminated squares, her theatres and concert halls, her display of beauty, this amazing human world, still seems to function well.

But…..

Here’s what, I think, is in store, considering Trump’s triple mind-troubles.

Things are not going well politically for Donald Trump. The polls show him underwater on every major issue. And while he insists that these are fake, it’s clear that he knows better. He recently lamented that the Republicans will do badly in the midterms and even floated the idea that midterms should be canceled.

Bavinck has foreseen this. He writes: “The situation of the world empire is quite shaky, much more vulnerable than first suspected. There are riots, and here and there are signs of popular uprisings. The core of the realm is becoming unsafe.”

And here is where Trump’s Triple Trouble shows its fatal flaw: the November elections may become a Congress and Senate turnaround, deeply curtailing his authority.

Bavinck, the prophet, writes: “There is only one solution, one radical and total cure: a nuclear bomb. For the sake of preserving the realm, the capital must be sacrificed. All these grand buildings and its beautiful squares, all its magnificence has to go. It takes a while before they dare to make that decision, but in the end the world ruler, in consultation with his ten governors, is not afraid to execute this extreme edict. During the night one single plane, from a remote airport, flies high in the sky over the sleeping city, never to wake again. A bomb is released, slowly a mushroom cloud ensues, and a rebellious Babylon – read Washington – is abolished forever.”

Is there where TRUMP’S THREESOME TROUBLES will lead us?

Stay tuned.

ON THE MERITS OF READING BOOKS.

I take a break from global insanity.                                                               

Going back 86 years.

When I was 11 years old, I contracted a bladder infection. Nowadays, almost any illness is treated with penicillin with quick results, but then, in 1939, this wonder drug was still a few years in the future, so, the cure described was bedrest – 6 weeks – and some dietary directions, precisely what, I forgot, not being in charge of my food preparation.

My doctor, whose father, a retired minister, lived next door, visited me a few times each week, driving a big car, probably took my temperature, and, perhaps looked at my urine.

So, here I was, in front of a large window on the third floor, overlooking the street, always teeming with activity: kids playing hopscotch, kicking a ball, rolling a steel loop, skipping ropes, while vendors on their three-wheel freight-box bikes, loaded with fresh bread, made the daily rounds of their customers. Horse-drawn vegetable wagons displayed fresh produce, and, in the summer, ice cream hucksters shouted: “large cones for a nickel”.

I remember that in those prewar days – May 1939 – a large store was about to open, some Walmart type, down town Groningen, with the curious name of T.A.N.T.E: no idea what the acronym stood for. The day before the Grand Opening, it went up in flames, and, while my older siblings rushed to see the spectacle, I remained bedridden.

However, I had my distractions: books. The corner tobacco store also had a lending library, and my older sisters kept me bringing books, while fetching my father’s daily supply of cigarettes and cigars. Yes, he died of lung cancer at 79, but then the slogan was: smoking is manly.

My mother calculated that I had read 100 books in my convalescence, books about the Boer War, books about the American Indians – Old Fire-hand and old Shatter-hand and that wonderful Indian chief, Winnitou, or something like it.

My grade 5 teacher – the school was just around the corner – would bring me homework, so, really, I was never bored: books were my life, even now.

How times have changed!

Forward to today, and a section from the Toronto-based ‘Globe and Mail’.

“In a world where the internet teems with content and people generate millions of AI prompts daily, it could be argued that the act of reading is alive and well. Unfortunately, there’s a malady hidden by that apparent health.

“Although there are Canadians who read avidly, and some of our authors are world-famous, we are not a nation of readers. Not of books, anyway.

“In 2022, only one-third of Canadians picked up a book every day. And a 2024 survey found that even self-identified readers didn’t read very much. Barely half of them read more than five books annually.

“There’s an important distinction to be made here between the sort of browsing done online and sitting down with a book. An artificial intelligence-generated summary can tell a person what happened in The Odyssey – spoiler, he got home – but that doesn’t replace the value of actually reading the epic poem.

“Reading helps us focus and makes us reflect. It stretches our intellect even as it nourishes it. And the private act of reading can, ironically, help make people better citizens.

So, let me begin with the personal benefits that reading brings. Because they are plentiful.”

Why read books?

Books have the power to transport. While reading about another country is not as illuminating as travelling to it, a book offers a much more affordable sort of visit than a plane ticket. Books are an escape that open the world as they open the mind. And they are the only way that people can journey through ages past.

Reading can educate and inspire. Knowing that others have faced similar situations provides comfort, or solutions. The sense of being part of a greater whole prompts action and promotes humility. Open-minded reading is the antidote to misanthropy.

Books encourage valuable focus in a world trying hard to distract. Research shows that attention spans are dropping. A study published in 2023 found the average adult had an attention span of barely longer than a minute. The ability to focus is like a muscle that can atrophy unless exercised. Reading is a great way to make it stronger.

Reading is also good for the brain. It improves memory and allows for better sleep. It reduces stress and promotes relaxation. It may slow cognitive decline.

Finally, digging into a book is one of the few remaining socially acceptable ways to be quiet and alone. In a loud and busy modern life that demands connection, reading is a reprieve. It is a licence for solitude.

Today we live in crazy times.

Rather than trying to live within the boundaries of creation, rather than adhering to ‘the limits of growth’, we pursue war, and disregard environmental rules. Reading can create awareness and teach us God’s directives.

And those directives are? Prepare our lives for eternity.

THE AGE OF THE ANTICHRIST.

Human nature.                                                                  

By some quirk of history, the Antichrist is in power because ‘Christians’ have put him there. Just as Jesus was arrested, tortured, sentenced to death by the church of his day – motivated by ‘religion’ – so, in like manner, the Antichrist too, has been placed in power by ecclesiastical entities.

What has shaped my thinking?

I admit that my views are heavily influenced by the writings of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a brilliant theologian, born in Germany in 1906, who had a double doctorate in theology before he was 23. He was executed by the Nazis weeks before the war ended in May 1945. During the years he was in prison – he sensed that his life would end soon – his writings had an apocalyptic propensity, deeply reflecting the New Creation.

Dr. Sabine Dramm wrote a book introducing his thoughts. Toward the end, she summarized his thinking as follows: “What Bonhoeffer presents as specific to the Christian faith is the perception of God and the world as one, and the perception of life that has its wellspring in this world in God, and in turn proceeds from this world back again to God.”

I have not quite fully digested this formulation. To me its suggests that, just as Shakespeare’s writings portray his being, so God’s acts in and through creation show us his utmost essence.

I realize that my explanation is inadequate, but I also rely on Karen Armstrong’s book “Sacred Nature”, in which she argues that, because of ‘nature’s holiness’, we must start and feel, experience and believe differently about the world in which we live, and treasure the world as God’s direct Word.

Dr. Dramm in her Bonhoeffer-book, devotes an entire chapter to “Love the World”, using the Latin heading, “Amor Mundi”. She writes, “Love for the world springs from the midst of his faith. It is the basis for the Christian existence in the here and now of the world. It embraces the person as a whole.”

Dr. Stefan Paas, a professor of Christian Mission at the Amsterdam Free University, in his (Dutch) book, Vrede op Aarde (Peace on Earth), writes – and I translate – “Our life is not directed to be saved ‘from’ this world, but be part of the salvation ‘of’ this world”. A few lines later, he writes, “To be lost really means to live in a way that lacks the New Creation goal.”

Take your time to absorb that! It’s revolutionary!

In other words: Not the Bible is God’s direct Word, but Creation is! Living within creational means, and loving it – see John 3: 16 – is an integral part of our faith-life. Believing that Christ died for its restoration, is the key to eternal LIFE. In creation, I might add.                                                         

And that brings me to the Antichrist.

We all live in God’s creation, and, as I have shown, multiple writers, quoting Scripture, regard Creation as Holy, because it directly originates from God. A sin against Creation is a sin against God.

Jesus, in the Lord’s Prayer, starts with “Hallowed (holy) be God’s name.” Karen Armstrong in her book Sacred Nature, lists 50 names for God. God cannot be named. God’s name represents God, as any facet of God points to his totality. When Jesus asks us to regard God’s name as Holy, it really means that everything that God created is holy, and thus a sin against Creation is a sin against God.

The current president of the USA, in his position of power, has become the Antichrist by purposely revoking all measures enacted to save creation, and promoting the increased use of environmentally harming substances. Here is what the apostle John writes (2John 8):

Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour.

I know, we too harm creation daily, as our current ‘carbon-generated’ lifestyle, is ungodly, affirming Psalm 51: Surely, I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

However, there are different kinds of sin, and God will graciously forgive them. But one kind is unforgiveable: The sin against God’s Holy Spirit, where we purposely, for the sake of greed and self-interest, exploit his creation, and thus God himself.

In a sense, we all are little Anti-Christs. We have, over the years, especially in the last 2 centuries proudly built our carbon-driven economy, culminating in AI, our attempt to equal God.

I fondly remember both my grandparents, basically living in climatic purity, having a lifestyle independent from oil-pollution. A daily update on global heating, suggests to me that, with a 3C increase – by some measures we have topped 2C already – all human life will die. By our hands, I should add: this has nothing to do with God.

To sum up:

The Antichrist is here: sinning against creation sums up his government. In an ironic twist, however, he speeds up the coming of the Kingdom, the very God’s reign he tries to prevent from arriving.

ANOTHER ‘TOWER OF BABEL’ EVENT IS AT HAND.

The New God.

The old world is dying,” Antonio Gramsci once wrote. “And the new world struggles to be born.” In such interregnums, the Italian Marxist philosopher suggested, “every act, even the smallest, may acquire decisive weight”.

The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language, they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.

Genesis 11: The Tower of Babel Story

I greatly admire Ezra Klein, columnist in the New York Times. He interviews knowledgeable people, and is a master in eliciting interesting information.

This past week his topic was AI.

Here are his words.                                                                      

“Let me zoom in on that. I’ve covered these A.I. companies for a long time. I covered the Anthropic guys when they still worked at OpenAI.

And that is how they all used to talk about it — that it is a race to build superintelligence, the one A.I. that will rule them all. (That refers to The Lord of the Rings, I might add)

Alloway: To build God.         

Klein: Yes, to build the machine God.

So far this dialogue.

Alienated from this earth, the world needs a new God.

Let me quote again The Tower of Babel verdict.

The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language, they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.

My question: the Lord stopped the building of the Tower of Babel. How about AI? Will the Lord tolerate competition? No. Then what?

A bit of a detour.

I am rereading BRAIDING SWEETGRASS. When I reread a book, I always discover items, overlooked in my first reading. In this book, written by Robin Wall Kimmerer, an indigenous woman and professor of environmental biology, she records how a question to her 200 students, revealed that they consider humans and nature to be a bad mix. Asked whether they know about any positive interaction between people and land, their response was ‘none’. (This question was directed to third year students in an environmental protection course.)

That brings me to Christianity. Throughout the Scriptures, when God is referred to, God is described as ‘Creator of Heaven and Earth’. I am writing this in the days leading up to Christmas and New Year, and the newspapers I daily read have their pious pieces, outlining the views on Christianity, invariably seeing ‘heaven’ as the goal. Even the most devout among the many Christians I encounter, share that view.

However, this anthropocentric – human oriented – view grew directly from the philosophy of Aristotle’s teacher Plato, who focused his philosophy on separating humans from nature while popularizing the feel-good notion that humans have immortal souls. Basically, this makes the ‘heaven’ faith a pagan notion, exploited by the most godless of humans in power today, Donald Trump, who daily advocates ‘sins against creation’. In my opinion this is equivalent to ‘the sins against the Holy Spirit’, for which there is no forgiveness.  

When God finished creating, he called creation ‘good’ seven times. That’s why God wrote: “you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for earth you are and to earth you will return.” Genesis 3: 19.

When my wife of 67 years was buried in the Anglican cemetery, overlooking the Village of Tweed, now more than 5 years ago, the only words I spoke, were: “Earth we are and to earth we shall return”.

How do I tie these yearend ramblings together?

We today live in a new ‘Tower of Babel’ event. The God/Creator has become an unknown quantity. The time of ‘one language rules them all’ has reappeared: AI- Artificial Intelligence – is the new God. That God has revealed itself in Creation – John 3: 16 – is ridiculed: heaven is the preferred destination, giving us licence to destroy the earth which God called ‘good’ seven times. Religious movements thrive, the one more charismatic than the other. The BIBLICAL truth is that Jesus died to restore creation: this means that salvation of the now universally polluted cosmos and our personal salvation, go hand in hand, are the two sides of the same coin.

The first Tower of Babel resulted in world-wide development. The second Tower of Babel has led to THE MACHINE, Man the Machine.

The time is short. Another “Tower of Babel” event is at hand. This time the earth is saturated with people. This time we are ‘over-developed’ to the point of overheating. This time the only solution possible is outlined in Revelation 21:1:

Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.

DON’T SHUN WORDLY WISDOM: Test all things.

Dr. Barry Commoner defined the four laws of Ecology some 70 years ago. They have stood the tests of time. To me they rate as biblical.

These four laws are easily understood, and memorized. I see them as ‘gospel truth’.

Here they are:

1) Everything is connected to everything else (interdependence),

2) Everything must go somewhere (conservation of matter/energy, no “away”),

3) Nature knows best (human intervention often causes harm), and

4) There is no such thing as a free lunch (all actions have consequences). 

So, what is so biblical about them?

These principles highlight the interconnectedness, their cyclical nature, their limits, and costs within ecosystems. Actually, they emphasize that humans are part of God’s Creation, and that we must believe and confess and experience its holiness.  

Total Interdependence.

J. H. Bavinck, in his The Riddle of Life, points out, years before Dr. Commoner formulated his laws, that “We live in an interdependent world, in which the butterflies serve the flowers as much as the flowers serve the butterflies”. He writes: “These little plants cannot think beyond their nature. They have no inkling that they serve just as much as they are served by others. They serve the miniscule seeds they now carry and that later will form new plants. They serve the animal, looking for food, or they need to help other plants using them as a crutch to climb higher.”

In manifold ways they serve other creatures that require support or shade or nourishment or moisture.

God’s entire creation serves this way.

The entire creation is all about serving. Jesus himself said that “the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve.” (Matthew 20:28).  Writes Bavinck: “The law of serving is at the heart of every creature: it is the overarching purpose for every being. That law makes it possible for the entire world to exist. Without that law nothing else can be. This serving, therefore, is not a sacrifice, is not a duty, but an inborn act, without compulsion, without intent. Each single creature is there according to its nature, but everything together is so oriented that the existence of the one supports the other and maintains it.”

That’s what the first law tells me. How about the second one?

2) Everything must go somewhere.

In other words: Nothing ever disappears. It will take on another form, show up in a new combination, but we live in a closed system.

Take our beloved automobile, and the fuel it needs to propel it at a good speed, making long distances disappear. That same fuel is burned, and then re-appears, broken into GHG, the abbreviation of Green House Gases. The same happens to what we do and think, and write: Nothing disappears: All our actions are written in God’s book, and someday – soon I should add – we will have to give account when God reminds me – written on black on white – what we have done or failed to do.

3) Nature knows best.

There is an important text in the Bible, pointing to God’s Primary Love. I cite – again I should add – John 3: 16: “God so loved the World”. The Greek word for ‘world’ is COSMOS, the all-comprehensive entity, including everything we experience and observe, often through giant telescopes.

It is ruled by God’s grace, and it is our task to love it, with God’s example – God so loved – always in mind.

Basically, this world represents God for us, in the same way Shakespeare’s plays portray him to us. (We are what we do). That is why we must listen to “Nature”, now, in agony, because we have compromised its divine origin.

4) There is no such thing as a free lunch (all actions have costs/consequences). 

Again, the similarity with biblical givens. The Bible pulls no punches: “The wages of sin is death”, says Romans 6: 23. The word ‘judgement’ appears numerous times in the Bible. All our actions are recorded: a celestial camera follows us wherever we go: an instrument far beyond AI, because this divine instrument also records our thoughts and intentions. It does all this stealthily, without us having an inkling.

Revelation 20: 12 says at all:

And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books.

Now that we are approaching the End Times, it also signals the zenith of human achievements, both positive and negative, witness our engineering marvels, but also our cosmos destroying devices. The Bible is quite explicit that not God, but we will cause the ultimate holocaust.

Don’t shun worldly wisdom: Test all things and hold fast to what is good.

(1 Thessalonians 5: 21)