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He's over there!
The Gazette receives an average of 60-70 pieces of mail daily. Subscription payments, newspaper subscriptions, the same bills that plague every household and business in America, and of course, press releases from across the nation, all dutifully picked up at the post office and then distributed to the proper departments within the building.
Most of the press releases affect the public in our immediate area, but a fair number are mass mailings, undoubtedly sent to every known news outlet.
A lot of those end up on my desk. Is there a local connection? Is this information we can use? Or are we simply adding to File 13 or the recycle bin?
I didn't think too much about the first one the paper received from Share International. I read through it, referenced the Web site (www.Share-International.org), and discarded the release. After all, there was no local connection and the premise sounded just a bit flaky. Over the holidays, however, I saw the same graphic from my earlier Web site perusal in a TV advertisement. The information shared there was an abbreviated version of what had come out in print form.
Another release landed on my desk this week. It gives a somewhat disjointed vision of a coming large, bright star "visible to all throughout the world -- night and day" which will be followed around a week later by the emergence of one called the Maitreya.
According to the press release, this emerging one is "the Christ to Christians, the Imam Mahdi to Muslims, Krishna to Hindus, the Messiah to Jews, and Maitrya Buddha to Buddhist," all in one. He is reportedly going to bring a message summarized as "share and save the world," and "will seek to inspire humanity to see itself as one family, and to create world peace through sharing, economic justice and global cooperation."
Now, to a Bible-believing Christian, those are ominous words. The literature about this teacher seeks to dismiss those fears through the claims that Jesus, the Christ, is one and the same in this incarnation, and so there is no reason for Christians to fear his emergence, nor the "Masters of Wisdom" that are to accompany him.
I most heartily disagree. The thought that immediately came to mind was Jesus' warning in Matthew 24:23 "'At that time if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or 'There he is!' do not believe it. For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect -- if that were possible."
Perhaps this Maitreya is only one of many who will appear, making this bold statement, or perhaps he is the one who will deceive the world and cause it to come under his total authority. In fact, from the Frequently Asked Questions section of the organization's Web site, this claim is made by Benjamin Creme, who is the principal source of information about Maitreya:
"Q. How do we know 'your' Christ is who you say he is and how do we know he is not someone who is trying to obtain some form of powerful position in the world with the purpose of world domination?
"BC: This is a question often put to me by fundamentalist Christians. A tree is known by its fruit, and the Christ must be known by his words, his deeds, and, above all, his energy. If one man could achieve world domination (which, in today's world, I very much doubt) then it could only be someone of the stature of the Christ. The fundamentalists, of course, are afraid that Maitreya might be the anti-christ, with which fallacy I have dealt many times, here and elsewhere. On the Day of Declaration, I submit, everyone ― even the fundamentalists ― will know, through the overshadowing of the minds of all humanity ― a Pentecostal experience for all ― that Maitreya is the Christ."
Any serious student of Scripture will easily recognize that this dismissive answer is blatantly condescending in its simplistic form. But what of those who have failed to arm themselves with Scripture? What of those who, though seeking Christ, have not yet wholly committed themselves to him and to his teaching? And what of those who are wholly unprepared for the emergence of one such as this Maitreya because they believe that by the time he or someone like him arrives on the scene, they will be long gone, having been raptured before his arrival?
Do not misunderstand me. I know that Scripture is true and I know the words of promise and comfort found. I know that one day Jesus will return and his angels "will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other." (Matthew 24:31) And as Paul elaborates, "Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed -- in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet." (I Corinthians 15:51-22)
That this will happen one day is largely undisputed among believers. The when of the event is another matter entirely. There are those who maintain that this harvest of believers will happen prior to the emergence of the antichrist and prior to the wholesale death and destruction frequently referred to as the Seven Year Tribulation. And I can understand the temptation to embrace that teaching. But I see a danger there as well.
Long ago, Jeremiah gave the word of the Lord to those exiled in Babylon. And it was a disheartening word indeed. In a letter penned to the elders and to the priests in exile, he told them that the Lord said for them to settle into their exile, because it would last 70 years. This was in direct opposition to another prophet who had proclaimed that the Lord had promised that he would break the yoke of the king of Babylon and that Jerusalem would be restored in two years time. (Jeremiah 29)
Between the two, which was more palatable? Two years? Or 70? Many of them knew they wouldn't see 10 more years, nor 15 or 20, to say nothing of 70. That would mean they would be buried in the despised land of their exile, and never see beloved Jerusalem again.
But it was what it was. Their deliverance would not, could not, come before its time. Nor can ours. Scripture is full of warnings of the dangers that await the unprepared, and is full of admonitions to stand, to endure, even to the point of death. Because no man can know the hour, when "one man will be taken and the other left" (Matthew 24:40) each must be prepared for the trials that will come. Each generation of Christian has endured trials of one form or another. From the first century Christians put to death for the faith, every successive generation, in some part of the world, has suffered grave tribulation, even to the point of death. Why would the terminal generation escape? Why should it?
"This calls for patient endurance on the part of the saints who obey God's commandments and remain faithful to Jesus." Revelation 14:12 (NIV)
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