The Final Division
What will be the final division in history? Will it be Communist and capitalist? Will communism resurge and challenge democracy once more? Will it be Jew and Gentile? Will the Jews be all on one side and rest of the world on the other? Or will it be a North-South division with the Two-Thirds World on one side and the industrialized nations on the other?
I don’t think it will be any of these divisions. The Jew and Gentile division was broken down in Christ, Communism is rapidly just becoming another political party and political philosophy, the North-South division is blurring more and more each year as China industrializes and country after country is admitted to the WTO. I believe the final division of humanity will be between an immense, corrupt, lawless global Market ruled by the Anti-Christ and centered on a wicked trading city that Scripture calls Babylon after the ancient city of that name; and a lawful holy and righteous Kingdom of God. This fundamental division of humanity is described in the Bible in the book of Revelation chapters 13 -19.
Can we see any signs of this final great division in humanity emerging? If, at the end of history there are going to be two, and only two, main camps then each of these should be increasing in ‘space” while others are decreasing. If these are going to be the only two destinies available at the end of history we should be able to see some trace of that happening today. Market forces should be getting stronger and stronger, materialism should be increasing, a global economy should be expanding in dominance and in power. Small nations should be terrified of strong market forces and multinationals, then larger and larger nations until governments hardly count. Economic gurus like Allan Greenspan should hold the power of a head of state of a middle sized nation. There should be an irreversible triumph of the power of world trade. Is this happening? I think it is. On the other hand Christianity should be increasing, there should be an age of mission, previously unreached ethnic groups should be hearing about Jesus and believing. If Christianity is to be the only significant opposition to the World Market it should be increasing in strength and wisdom and global reach. There are certainly signs that this is happening. Also all other allegiances need to be decreasing in “market share” with some religions and belief systems disappearing almost entirely – and this is occurring also. For instance many tribal belief systems are either getting secularized or becoming converted to Christ. At the end of history there will have to be only two Grand Allegiances – Money or Jesus, God or Mammon, the temporal or the eternal. In the end people will choose their destiny. They will either follow the Beast - and become wealthy in his marketplace, or they will go follow Christ the crucified - and find eternal life.
According to the Bible this final Babylonian market will not just be dominant, it will be idolatrous and lawless. It will be manifestly wicked. It will be so bad that to participate in it will be to lose one’s salvation. Now world trade is not that bad yet. So if this is really going to happen then a change must be taking place. There must be an ongoing loss of ethics and of conscience in the market. Greed must gradually become the ultimate good. There should be a not so subtle contempt for the rule of law and a conscious ongoing attempt to evade the reach of law and governments. From tax evasion to income protection schemes to keeping two sets of books, there should be widespread evasion of human and divine regulation. Also a lawless environment is ruled by the strong to the disadvantage of the weak. So the market must make protecting the weak seem bad and anti-competitive or a restrictive trade practice. Profit must increasingly come before people and ethics. There should be a steady increase in the lawless and darker areas of trade – such as the drugs trade, illegal arms trade, sex trade, slave trade and illegal wildlife trade. These areas of criminality should prove strangely untouchable. Can we see this gradually happening? I believe we can.
So on one side of the great divide will be a dominant, ruthless and lawless global economy. On the other side, wearing the white hats, will be a bunch of born-again Christians. They will be poor, persecuted, martyred but very loyal to Jesus. At this time there will only be two main religions in the world, the idolatrous Beast religion and the Jesus religion. So if Revelation is right fundamentalist Islam has to collapse at some point in the future. Muslims would never bow down to an idol and there is no indication of a third main faith in the Scriptures. At the same time biblical Christianity should be growing, possibly numerically as well as in depth and strength and purity. All other systems should be weakening their hold on people. They will be swept before materialism or they will be converted to Christianity or weakened to the point of irrelevance. Tribal religions, shamanism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and any other belief that makes itself “absolute” will all go one way or the other - to materialistic idolatry or to the Lord. One by one they will crumble, or they will become hardened and militant, and fight and fall. We have yet to see this but I believe the early signs are there.
If Christianity is to be left standing in the field while all other faith systems collapse or are severely weakened to the point of irrelevance then Christianity must find a resurgence in strength and distinctiveness. It must somehow be able to stand uncompromised by the world system. As other faiths are conquered by the dollar on one hand or the gospel on the other we should see a “century of mission”, the gospel should be spreading and new groups should be claiming allegiance to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Tribal religions should be vanishing and the Church should be being accused of “destroying cultures” as various religious allegiances pass away and old gods are not worshipped as much any more. Allegiance to Jesus will take precedence to all other allegiances and Christians will discover what it means to be distinct from the world. Strength, power and authority will be rediscovered along with a love of the cross and the development of strong communities that can support believers in tough times. Is there any sign that Christianity will be the one world religion left standing? Yes, I think so, it certainly is growing while most others are shrinking.
Thus for this final division to occur two forces must sweep all before them – the Christian missionary with the gospel and the ruthless trader with money and guns. This has been happening for centuries and the East India Company with its opposition to missionaries probably understood this better than most. Since the earliest of colonial days the missionary and the trader have been the symbols of Empire but spiritually they have always been rivals. Where I was in Papua New Guinea the mission compound would be at one end of the village and there people would behave, at the other end would be the trade area with its bar and it would be considered the domain of darkness. For an interesting literary exploration of the darkness of colonial trade read Joseph Conrad’s “The Heart of Darkness”.
How bad will this be? Scripture says it will be very bad for a relatively brief period of time between three and a half and seven years depending on interpretations (probably three and a half years). During this time the Global Market will become openly and totally idolatrous and worship the Anti-Christ. The market will then give up any attempt to be just and fair and will dominated by ruthless forces that will exclude Christians from being able to buy or sell.
(Revelation 13:15-18 NKJV) He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. {16} He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, {17} and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. {18} Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666.
The Beast, whoever he is, engages in enforced worship of an idol in his image. Worship of such an idol is of course is forbidden to Christians. Those who refuse to do so are killed - so many Christians will become martyrs. Also people are to be marked with the name or number of the Beast as a sign of allegiance. Obviously Christians cannot wear a sign of the allegiance to the Anti-Christ. Elsewhere in Revelation it is made clear that this mark is totally forbidden to Christians and those who receive the mark forfeit any hope of eternal life while those who refuse it and suffer receive a great reward. (Revelation14:9-11, 15:2, 16:2, 19:20, 20:4)
However only those who receive the mark can participate in the Market. The mark of the Beats puts you in the World Market but out of the Kingdom. On the other hand refusing the mark is part of being in the Kingdom but means you are unable to participate in the Market. At that point the Global Market and the Kingdom of God will be totally separate entities with the Global Market ruled by the Anti-Christ, and the Kingdom of God by Jesus Christ. If you are part of the Market, you will be excluded from the Kingdom. If you are part of the Kingdom, you will be unable to buy and sell and therefore not part of the Global Market. This separation will be both temporal and eternal. If you choose the idolatrous Global Market you will not have eternal life. If you want eternal life then you will be unable to be part of the Global Market. At that point Christians will be warned to flee the world economic system:
(Revelation 14:9-11 NKJV) Then a third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, "If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand, {10} "he himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out full strength into the cup of His indignation. He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. {11} "And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever; and they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name."
(Revelation 18:4-5 NKJV) And I heard another voice from heaven saying, "Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues. {5} "For her sins have reached to heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities.
Thus the final division in history will not be between Jew and Gentile or between Communist and Capitalist. The final division in history will be between Christians and Materialists, between God and Mammon, between those who are in Christ and those who are in Babylon. Eventually idolatrous Babylon will fall, and the merchants will stand far off and watch the smoke of her burning. (Revelation 17:1-19:6). The final defeat of evil will follow swiftly and the Kingdom will triumph.
The Present Situation
The present situation is a prelude during which both the Market and the Kingdom are trying to rush toward their final destinies. The pieces are being positioned on the board and there are quite a few moves left to go. The antagonism between the Market and the Kingdom is not open yet, no Anti-Christ has emerged the gospel has global reach but still has some way to go. The two great global systems of capital and religion are still overlapping. Churches invest in the market and people buy shares in Christian publishing companies. Billionaires go to church and denominational officials get MBA’s. We are not yet at the end of history – but it is approaching. The lawlessness of trade is increasing. The vigor of Christianity is also increasing. Christian denominations are among the main critics of globalization and the Market wants Sunday trading and disdains religious claims to holy times and places. The divorce is not yet final but the Market and the Kingdom are not talking to one another very much. What do stockbrokers have to say to theologians or theologians to stockbrokers. This book is an attempt to get some talk happening.
This increasingly unjust world market is creating increasingly angry people who are the victims of that injustice. And those people are hijacking planes and blowing up buildings. The terrorists are the messengers, the “prophets” of a world that is being crushed by the excesses of globalization and which is sickened by the secular. They are trying to say to the Market, particularly that section of the market known as global trade, that it is unjust.
This book will examine how and why global trade is going wrong and how and why Muslims are being radicalizes and becoming terrorists. Then it will look at how we as Christians can enter into the battles both for fair and just trade and for a peaceful world that is worth living in.
A Few Terms Defined
Whenever I have discussed this topic people have thought I was anti-business or anti-prosperity. That is not the case at all. I am an advocate for a godly prosperity based on productivity - not speculation. So to avoid confusion lets define a few terms to start with:
The Market is a place of exchange where things are bought, sold, and traded, where there is lending, money-changing, banking, investment and risk management and asset protection amongst other activities. In the Market the goods are bought and sold, not produced or consumed. You produce your fat pig on the farm, you take your fat pig to the market, someone pays you money for your fat pig at the market, then they take it home and consume it for dinner. The Market is not itself a producer or a consumer, the Market exists solely as a place of exchange between producers and consumers. The Market is to be a righteous place of fair exchange. God’s law for the Market is that it should be just and fair, that people should not exploit one another (Lev 19:13, Ezekiel 22:13,27) and that the scales, balances and measures used should be honest (Deut 25:13-16). God wants people to get a fair and honest deal in the Market. When the Market operates according to His principles He is delighted when it is dishonest and predatory it is considered an abomination. (Proverbs 11:1 NKJV) Dishonest scales are an abomination to the LORD, But a just weight is His delight.
There is some confusion over the difference between the Market and the business world. Honestly earning your living through hard work and diligence and selling a good product at a reasonable price is commended throughout the Scriptures. However businesses work in the Market, which can make or break them. When the market becomes dishonest it exploits both producer and consumer alike. In a fallen world the Market is often exploitative and this book will maintain that that exploitation has become pervasive, sophisticated and international in scope. The targets of this book are the traders and merchants rather than the producers; the currency speculators and the more ruthless investors and multinationals as well as the lawless aspects of trade such as the drug trade.
The Kingdom: Is the Kingdom of God, the place where God rules, this may be in the heart of a Christian, in a local church that is obedient to God, in a bible study group or even in a neighborhood or city that experiences revival. The Kingdom as a whole is the sum total of all the born-again believers in the world; including those outside the established church and is inter-denominational and international in scope. It is primarily a spiritual Kingdom and Jesus said it was “not of this world”. (John 18:36)
The Terrorists: According to Webster’s Dictionary a terrorist is “an advocate or practitioner of terror as a means of coercion”. In the context of this book I will be mainly referring to terrorist attacks on Western nations by Islamic extremists and the events following on from the September 11th attacks in the USA.
Radicalization: Is the rather long process a “normal’ person takes in order to become extreme in their beliefs and responses and even perhaps to become a terrorist. It can be briefly summarized in the “Four R’s – Resolve, Resent, Reject, Revenge. That is if the issue is not resolved it becomes a resentment which if not dealt with turns into rejection and eventually leads to revenge. I will argue that unjust economics has a lot to do with why people gradually become radicalized and angry towards the West.
Injustice: Occurs when something unfair is done, especially when it is done by a more powerful person to a less powerful person. Injustice is the absence of justice and a removal of legitimate rights by force. I will argue that this often happens unintentionally as well as intentionally. For instance poor communication can cause a bad decision to be made that causes an injustice to occur. Whether it is intentional or unintentional does not matter much to the person who is unjustly imprisoned, fired or executed or whose firm is sent into bankruptcy. To say that injustice is occurring is not the same as saying that the perpetrators of the injustice are very wicked people. They may just be careless, busy or ignorant of the consequences. I will argue that world trade is, often unintentionally and ignorantly, causing a lot of injustice.