Total Electric Antichrist

Returning from a conference in Montgomery, I made a pit stop at a service station across from the Air National Guard.  I always stop there, and I saw some folks from Forest Hill, one of the churches I serve, stopped there also.

As I drove into the parking lot, I noticed that there were several people at the gas pumps, a tanker truck was filling the store’s holding tanks, and people were doing as I was.  I noticed one of the clerks standing in the door talking with a customer.  It’s nothing out of the ordinary, I witnessed this before at this particular station.

As I approached her, I say excuse me.  She said, “I’m sorry the station’s system is down.”  I thought she was referring to the gas pumps because the external gas tanks were being filled.

I told her that I wanted to buy a Coke and a Snicker.  She said she could not make any transactions because the system was down.  I told her that surely, she could figure the cost of a soft drink and a candy bar.  She said she couldn’t.

All of a sudden, my mind raced back some thirty plus years earlier at a Sears Department store in Vestavia, Alabama.  On that day, there was a thunderstorm and the electricity had been off for just a few moments.  I was in the check out and the clerk said she could not check me out because the register was not working.  Now remember, this was when scanning items was in its infancy.  I noticed that the old cash register was still at the checkout counter.  I asked the clerk if she could use the old register or a calculator.  Her answer shocked me.  She said she did not know how to use them.

Another thought I had was an episode at the old Food World in Demopolis.  For years I would do grocery shopping late at night.  Being from “the sticks” in Chilton County, we had to travel thirty-five miles to the Food World in Pelham.  Not getting out much, we would make the trek about once a month throwing in an opportunity to eat at Quincy’s Steak House.  We just got into the habit of going at night.

At the Demopolis Food World, we were in the checkout line around ten pm when the Food World central office in Birmingham shut down all computers to do a recalculation or calibration.

It was mass chaos.  Some folks were in the process of checking out.  All open registers were two to three deep with buggies and no one knew when the system would reload.  Several people got irritated, left their buggies, and went home.  The system came back up just as some were exiting.

When I wrote this article, Pam, Bethel Baptist Associational Secretary, was having trouble with logging church letters.  The Adobe Reader system continuous shuts down.  I spent thirty minutes with her trying to update or reinstalling the Adobe Reader.  Our office work depends on the system working.  The process of updating and adding programs to the system never ends.

After the system shut down in Montgomery, I read this statement in the October 1, 2012, issue of Time Magazine: “Technology makes us forget what we know about life.”  Our technological know-how is preventing us from the everyday know how of living.

These system shutdowns remind me of predictions of the future from preachers, writers, and old folk in the past.  They said that the Bible speaks of a time when there will be plenty, but no one can buy.  The service station had plenty of merchandize, but no one could purchase it.  It is frightening see how easy the world as we knew could quickly shut down.  With each passing day and each advancement in technology, we become more vulnerable to system shutdowns.  When one thinks of that possibility of vulnerability, how easy would it be for a person or group to disable and dismantle life as we know it?

Life is not about systems.  Systems fail.  We must remind ourselves that we cannot allow systems to uneducate or dumb down us about life and how to survive.  The Scriptures remind of a time when systems fail:

 

And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine (Revelation 6:6 KJV).

 

And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:  And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.  Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six (Revelation 13:16-18 KJV.)

 

These verses show us that in the future there will be plenty to buy, but most will not have the resources or opportunity.

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse says the above verse means, “The poor are getting poorer; and the rich are still able to retain their luxuries.”  He continues, “One of the great criticisms of the present time is there is scarcity in midst of plenty.  This is the situation which will be accentuated a thousandfold when the Antichrist begins his reign.  It is social maladjustment.”

Dr. M.D. DeHann says that the oil and the wine are symbols of wealth, and the wealthy will have sufficient food for a time.  The poor will give a day’s wages for wheat and barley and the rich will be left untouched until the money is gone. 

Dr. DeHann wrote these words in 1948.  Dr. Barnhouse wrote his in 1971.  We are witnessing seeing signs today.

Just a thought. With government forcing electric vehicles down our throats, think of all the chaos when electricity fails.  TOTAL SHUTDOWN and forget getting a Coke and Snicker.                 

"Work In Progress"

My last position at the cement plant in Calera was electrical and instrumentation trainee.  It took sixteen years to get it, but I was finally doing a job I enjoyed.  I had a machinist background, but I would have never gotten that position.  I was too far down on the seniority totem pole.

I heard some interesting tales while working the kilowatt crew.  It seems that an electrician, Hamm, was returning from the north substation of the plant.  He saw two men operating a drilling machine.  The federal government mandated that the cement plant harness the dust, clean the air, and build aqueducts to control the flow of water used to cool machinery.

Hamm interrupted the men who had just engaged a drilling rig  to dig the aqueducts.  Hamm said you cannot drill there, stating that the main electrical line that furnished the plant was located underneath the drill.

The two educated rednecks shut the drill down, retrieved some electrical schematics, and told Hamm that there were no electrical lines there.  Hamm said all right and returned to the electrical shop to drink coffee.

Hamm entered the mill room when suddenly there was a loud boom and the cement finish mills slowed and went silent.  In fact, the whole plant shut down.  The sonic boom shook tons of dust down in the mill area and covered Hamm.

When Hamm got to the electrical shop, coffee drinking electricians were scurrying like rats on a sinking ship.  They were oblivious to the real reason the plant went down.

As Hamm poured a cup of coffee, Snuffy, the electrical foreman, told Hamm there was no time for coffee that plant lost power and thought that the substation blew a transformer.

Hamm said there was no need to be in a hurry.  Snuffy was bumfuzzelled.  Hamm said the contractors drilled into the main power line.  All the electricians loaded in and onto the electrical truck and went to survey the situation.

Sure enough, there were two men in the state of shock standing beside a huge hole.  They had walked way from the drill to pour themselves a cup of coffee and let the drill run on automatic.  Otherwise, they would have been killed.

Snuffy asked the pale and trembling men if Hamm told them that they were drilling on top of the main line.  They say he did, but the schematics did not show it.  Snuffy said there were no plans and that Hamm was a young electrical when helped put the line there in 1948.  They should have listened to the voice of experience instead of relying on a set of electrical schematics.

Aaron, my youngest son, worked with Culpepper Electric in Demopolis.  Most every evening he would say that he could not understand why more houses did not burn in Demopolis.  When I asked why, he said that customers would want larger breakers or fuses for their electrical control boxes.  Customers would say they need a thirty-amp to replace a twenty-amp because the twenty-amp kept blowing.  Well, if a twenty-amp is blowing, here is your sign.  There is a reason it is blowing.  Increasing the amps multiplies the problem and increases the chance of fire.

I am reminded of two coon hunters from Arkansas.  One night they blew a fuse in their old pickup truck.  Noticing that a twenty-two rifle cartridge is about the same size as the fuse, they replaced the fifteen-amp fuse with the twenty-two cartridge.  Instead of repairing the problem, they intensified the heat to the shell that discharged and shot the driver in his private area.  They had a difficult time explaining it in the emergency room.

Do you realize that if we knew everything about ourselves that God wanted to change, we would blow our circuit breakers?  We cannot handle knowing how God sees us all at once.  He is still working me.  I am a work in progress.



Jesus said, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.”  There is a moment of surrender and a process of surrender.  The moment of surrender is that moment of faith that happens in an instant of time. The process of surrender is a lifelong, crucifying of the will of the flesh.

The will of the flesh is an ugly ogre.  It is a monster that lurks in the shadows and has lackeys that put poison our hearts.  For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man (Mark 7:21-23 KJV).