From James

[Murph]

My Sunday School class is studying the book of James. While reading a commentary by John Philips, "Exploring the Epistle of James,"(pgs. 163-65) I ran across this and thought it was very good.

It might take several frames to get it all in...and it is a fore-shadowing of things to come.

The section begins with chapter 5 and deals with boasting...

***

...A person might not be so much inclined to boast about his plans, perhaps, as he is to boast about his prosperity. Rich people often like to display their wealth. Let them beware, James warns. Rich people are a ready target for the thief, the environs, and the oppressed. Indeed James now becomes somewhat of a prophet: "Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you." 5:1

It was the abject proverty, misery, and despair of England's working class that kindled the fires of fury that burned in the souls of Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx and led them to write the "Communist Manifesto" and caused them to call upon the workers of the world to unite. The rich were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer. The Industrial Revolution was creating a new class of people, the "nouveau riche," the great tycoons of business and commerce.

About the same time that the steam engine changed the world, a new economic invention came along too--the joint-stock company. Suddenly, family businesses dicovered that they could acquire vast amounts of captial by issuing stocks and shares. Enormous business enterprises could be launched with an independent life of their own. Impersonal investors put money into impersonal companies run by boards of trustees responsible to only the stock holders, who had only one concern--prophets! these new, giant business enterprises had an independent life of their own. They were legal entities in themselves, but they were business institutions that had no soul, no conscience, and no obligation to be fair to their workers. They existed only to produce goods as quickly, as effeciently, and as cheaply as possible and at as great a prophet as possible.

cont...

[Murph]

Books have been written on the plight of the new poor. They were serfs forced to work for their new masters on starvation wages for endless hours and without regard to their health , safety, or well being and without regard to their age or sex. They slaved at monotonous and dangerous tasks. They were exposed to toxic substances and placed in peril of their lives amid thundering, throbbing belts, wheels, and rollers driven at full speed from early morning until late at night. They dug for coal in dark, satanic mines, where no regard was paid to their safety. They worked harder than the brute beast that were harnessed alongside them, were treated with less consideration, and were paid starvation wages. If they failed to produce their quota or if they were injured or became sick they were sacked and thrown out to starve. They were drafted by this great industrial Moloch at a tender age, and they grew old and died before their time.

They lived in squalor in frightful hovels with not enough to eat and no time for proper rest. Open sewers, where rats and disease found a congenial breeding ground, ran down the middle of their narrow, cobbled streets. They were crowded into dismal dens, where they sought to drown their sorrows in debauchery and drink.

Such were the scenes that inspired Charles Dickens to write his famous novels and Marx to issue his call for a radical, violent, godless change.

cont...

[Murph]

The ideas of Marx and Vladimir Lenin took root. The oppressed workers of the world, bullied amd defrauded by a system that favored the rich and crushed the poor, took heed and found hope. Communism gave them a weapon with which to avenge themselves upon the rich. Communism and socialism were twins, born of dispair, that grew rapidly and changed the face of the world.

What the world saw in the next 75 years was a dress rehersal for end-times events, a forshadowing of that coming catastrophic collapse of the world economic system foretold in Revelation 18. Babylon, the Antichrist's coming economic capital, is to be overthrown violently, bringing about the final ruin of the unscrupulous and oppresive business tycoons of the world. James saw a similar, if not the same, collapse of the world's economic system in the end-times.

With astonishing speed, the ideas of Marx, honed and sharpened by the genius of Lenin, took over Russia. The Bolshevik Revolution sliced away all opposition. The Czar and his family were murdered. The worker triumphed. The state seized all land, all property, and all businesses. The state collectivized the farms and factories. The "workers paradise" was born. "From each according to his ability; to each according to his need" was the promising slogan.


Cont...

[Murph]

In the West, change was less violent but equally successful. Trade unionism gave birth to socialism. Socialism became a political power. It arranged for a gradual, "legal" massive transfer of wealth from the rich to the poor. Its theories took firm root in the universities, where much sympathy was generated for Marxist ideas and passed on to successive waves of students from home and abroad.

The world's infatuation with communism spread. The Soviet Union was born. By means of force, aggression, adroit planning, and clever propaganda, communism spread from country to country. It seemed to be invincible. At one period, right after the Second World War, the communist were actually conquering territory at the rate of 44 square miles and hour. The communist took over China, and more millions of people were added to the fold of Communism. Then, as suddenly as it had arisen, the Soviet Union collapsed. The poor of the world discovered that the system did not work. It simply bankrupted countries that embraced it and gave rise to a new breed of tyrants, the elite party members who ran things. Nevertheless, despite the impressive demonstration of the bankrupsy of communism, it still flourishes. Some people in Russia and some of the former satellites of the former Soviet Union would like to give communism another chance. In China, communism is still in vogue. In Western Universities, a die-hard elite still promote communism. The poor are still poor. The rich are still rich. The world awaits a new messiah, a new siren call. It now awaits the Antichrist.

James's warning still stands. He advises the rich man to weep and howl. The word for "howl" is ololuzo. It is described as an "onomatopeic" word--a word that expresses its significance in its sound. It was a word commonly used for crying aloud to the gods. The word for "miseries" is talaiporia. It conveys the idea of distress. The word suggest hardship, suffering, and wretchedness.

[Murph]

This passage from James and brother Philip's commentary helped me to see where all this is headed and gave me, as odd as it might seem, a sense of peace about it all.

Sometimes when we are in the middle of something we are unable to see either end and the way seems endless. This passage and commentary helped me to locate us and we are closer to the end, it would seem

Amen?

[Keith]

Amen. It's as if James lived next door and wrote a dissertation on today's society.

[Murph]

The other thing, and correct me if I am overlooking something, is that James is the only one who addresses wealth, greed and power as it concerns or applies to business and industry in the End Times.

There are more references in Chapter 5 of James...to that in the "last days."

one of the interesting things to note is the description of how the workers are treated...just like they are today. There is no care, concern or regard for the workers just for the money...they can produce.

Consider the plight of the workers oversears...where all the factory jobs have been shipped...

Just "going by the book" as the man said...

but it is so sad that people only mean money to those with the money.

[Murph]

but then there is always the Great White Throne...and what good will their wealth be to them then...

James says it well testify against them on that day.

[veterinarian]

Aug 24, 2009 19:46:29 GMT -6 Murph said:

James's warning still stands. He advises the rich man to weep and howl. The word for "howl" is ololuzo. It is described as an "onomatopeic" word--a word that expresses its significance in its sound. It was a word commonly used for crying aloud to the gods. The word for "miseries" is talaiporia. It conveys the idea of distress. The word suggest hardship, suffering, and wretchedness.