The Harbinger again. Or why I am defending it.

Been listening to Brannon Howse's latest radio shows on The Harbinger, in which he's interviewing David James, whose book critical of The Harbinger has just come out (I'm waiting for it to arrive), and T. A. McMahon who published James' critique. It's all more of the same, but the book should be the definitive treatment of the critics' views so I'm looking forward to it in an odd sort of way.

On the morning of 9/11 I had a dream about being in the back seat of a small plane and demanding to be let out because I had a forboding about ... something. The pilot was a little girl and some time before 9/11 there had been a big story in the news about a father who let his eight-year-old daughter fly his plane alone. Sadly she crashed the plane and died. At the very least in my dream I assume she would have represented the threat of a crash. There was a man in the front passenger/co-pilot seat, however, who supposedly could have saved us, but I still wanted out. He shook his head disapprovingly at me. I was on the ground watching them fly away when I woke up to the news that the first WTC building had been hit. I was watching the TV when the other was hit.

I'm not going to say that was a prophetic dream but it's sure suggestive of something in that direction.

It has nothing to do with the dream as far as I know, but I recognized that 9/11 was God's judgment when it happened. I don't know how others could fail to recognize it. Or I've more or less figured out how, but it's still astonishing to me. Getting others to take it seriously was just about impossible. I'd talk about it on political internet forums and even conservative blogs and get denounced for it. By people who consider themselves Christians as much as by anyone else. Some Christians still aren't sure that was God's judgment or that America is under God's judgment at all. David James for one according to some things he's said.

I remember a "humorous" picture being sent around the conservative circuits of a supposed plan for a rebuilt World Trade Center, with five buildings side by side, the buildings on the ends the shortest the two next to them a bit taller and the one in the middle quite tall. All intended to show defiance to our enemies but I knew it really meant "giving the finger" to God, not just our enemies. Which is exactly the same attitude that the harbingers of Isaiah 9:10 are all about. Did anybody want to hear that? Few then for sure, I wonder how many now.

What happened to the America whose leaders would on occasions of crisis or threat call for a national time of fasting and prayer for God's forgiveness and protection? Long gone. We couldn't muster a National Christian Anything any more. If Christians these days are going to act on behalf of the nation it's going to be in spite of the nation's leadership -- though no doubt with an exception here and there in the lower ranks. We certainly don't need all the ecumenical stuff that includes the false religions, the Mormons, the Muslims, the Catholics. (Yes, the Catholics.) The crew that Glenn Beck is trying to pull together on behalf of his Mormon view of America. Much the same motley crew that Bush assembled in the National Cathedral to pray for the nation after 9/11. That set off my alarm bells for sure. That's like ASKING for further judgment against us.

At the time my impression was that a huge majority of American preachers were refusing to accept that 9/11 was God's judgment. Remember how the very few who did know it was judgment got hooted down? Like Robertson and Falwell. Wilkerson preached on it too, though as far as I recall I don't think he got attacked for it. None of these guys are among my own Christian favorites, and I have some specific theological problems with a couple of them too, but they knew what ALL the preachers in the nation should have known and didn't.

When I first learned about the Harbinger at the beginning of this year, it occurred to me that this could be God's way of making Christians notice that 9/11 was His judgment after all. It seems to be making quite a bit of headway in that direction, but it's also stirred up quite a hornet's nest among some ministries against it, not for its message of judgment though it has the effect of derailing that message anyway. For no good reason either, as I've been arguing here. Of course they think their reasons are damning and I'm not going to say they're not sincere, I'm sure they are quite convinced they are right.

Again the message of judgment comes from an outpost of the Church that wouldn't be among my favorites, but God didn't ask me. If David Wilkerson were still alive he'd no doubt recognize the truth of The Harbinger. Jerry Falwell might too. Pat Robertson has recognized it. There are some conservative evangelicals who are recognizing it as well.

God often doesn't do things the way we think He should.

God's will be done.