After yesterday, Revelations gets into the Beast: the key passage is apropos to the main text, so I am going to double quote. We are going to persecuted. If revelations is correct, at some point the West will lose, and tyranny take over the world: worse the West may win, and go all SJW upon us, and tyranny take over the world.

If anyone has an ear, let him hear:

If anyone is to be taken captive, to captivity he goes;
if anyone is to be slain with the sword, with the sword must he be slain.

Here is a call for the endurance and faith of the saints.

(Revelation 13:9-10 ESV)

I would rather it was not my people and my tribe who persecute the people of God, but that is not the way to bet. Yet, we are not to worry.

Instead. we are to count all we have in this life as fungible: things we can walk away from. Everything. Our possessions, certainly. Our spouse, our children, our grandchildren if needed. For they may be the ones who give our names to the authorities, if we have not done it ourselves.[1]

And that means we do not need to worry. We should be cautious, we should protect: but prepping a huge storehouse just in case, closing our eyes to charity, saving for a future that may not come — we should not fall into those traps.

Yes, be prepared, but do not make your plans too rigidly. The assumptions of our society, even the ground we are upon, may change instantly [2].

Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.” But he said to him, “Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?” And he said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”’ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

And he said to his disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds! And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? If then you are not able to do as small a thing as that, why are you anxious about the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass, which is alive in the field today, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith! And do not seek what you are to eat and what you are to drink, nor be worried. For all the nations of the world seek after these things, and your Father knows that you need them. Instead, seek his kingdom, and these things will be added to you.

(Luke 12:13-31 ESV)

The straight question was “tell my brother to divide his inheritance with me”. Locally that means “Let me inherit the farm”, or “I deserve half the family farm in my divorce”. Neither are now happening: the farm is in a trust, and that trust is closely held among family, measured by blood.

Because we have institutionalized income transfers to the lazy, the feckless, and those who consider being a locust a human right. This is driven (once you get through the fine words about income equality) by greed — covetousness — and jealousy.

Which I have difficulty preaching on, for I tend to be happy when I see another prosperous, and with a new set of toys, a new house: being happy in this life. When times are peaceful and we have to go to the gym to keep our weight in check, and history is boring, I am quite cheerful.

For these times never last for more than a generation: a life. Winter is always coming.

So let us not watch the financial news and their talk of panic. Let us look at the markets, see how they function — and if they are dishonest (which they are) let us find honest ones. It is far better to live quietly and not have to swim in the sewer. If pride is a besetting sin for some, and lust is for more, then greed attracts a certain kind of weasel who will lie, cheat and steal on the assumption that a fast car, a big house and a trophy wife is what life is about.

As if. Life is not that trivial.
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1. I am fairly certain this blog would put me on the SJW hater list. my only safety is obscurity — I live on a small island in the South Pacific (where it is cold) and I get at most a couple of hundred views a day.

2. Dunedin is seen as geologically inert by NZ standards. It is merely set around a caldera. We are planning (nationally and locally) for global warming — but it is cooling. Far better have enough to get through a tough time, and a functional community, than be an isolated prepper — for the very ground you think is secure can collapse, as it did in Christchurch a few years ago.