"I am sure that never was a people, who had more reason to acknowledge a Divine interposition in their affairs, than those of the United States."
—President George Washington, 1792
Pamela mentions how on a recent QSO with a ham operator in Saudi Arabia, that the Muslim leaders claim that Muhammad alMahdi has appeared from an Occultation. Pamela said “Michael, a ham that I talked with said that a man there in Medina claims, what would be equivalent to a Christian, claiming that Jesus Christ returns!”
“Oh, some other information the ham mentioned was that alMahdi came from Medina in Saudi Arabia and when he left Medina, an unseen voice from the clouds said: 'This is the representative of Allah, The Mahdi, listen to him and obey him.' All Muslim people pledged their allegiance to Imam Mahdi” said Pamela.
“Wow! Let me look at our BBC online. Since the depression, CNN, Fox News, CNBC are usually not online.” said Michael as he went to their Debian GNU/Linux desktop to look up the bookmark for BBS News. The satellite connection to the Internet still works, so if they can supply power for their computer systems, they can go online. “The BBC has the story on their first webpage.” said Michael.
Pamela looks at the webpage to try to find out if the story from the Saudi Arabian ham operator is the same as the BBS story. “They seem to match what the ham told me. He claims to be Muhammad alMahdi, and they have some additional information. He appears to have extreme power. There was a woman not attired correctly for a Muslim, and he reduced her to dust on the sidewalk! Wow!” said Pamela.
“Hmmmm, all Muslim countries are submitting to his leadership. Be Sunni, Shi'a, Wahhabism, or what, they all are submitting. In addition, he is telling the rest of the world to submit to his leadership. What is he going to do if they don't agree?” asked Michael.
“That BBC picture of him looks like an old Clint Eastwood sort of 'Go ahead, make my day' look, don't your think?” asked Pamela.
“Uhhuh, what'd take for a cue on that? Maybe he started with Eastwood on the 'Good, Bad and Ugly' and watched every flick he made. Maybe his looks CAN kill?” said Michael.
“Oh, OPEC cut all exports of oil to nations that do not submit to his leadership. That is a fairly powerful item there. Let's not get too excited here, lets do some packet on 2 Meters and see if anybody else has a different subject.” said Pamela.
“Well, let me check my workload from my boss, I need to get back to my work. I'll be back later.” said Michael. Michael worked the rest of the day as Pamela talked with some friends on the local digipeater who told her that there was some skip on 6 Meters for some DX to Asia.
The next morning, they both looked at the BBC webpage. It appears that Mohammad alMahdi calls American troops in the Mideast as 'unjust, to be healed,' and wants all nations of the world to submit to his leadership. The European G20 nations met and decided to surrender.
What little petroleum America has cannot be cutoff. And EU does not want to suffer at all.
Michael had done some previous work to find the population percentages for Muslims in Europe. It turned out the U.K. had about 5%, France about 10%, and Germany about 5% Muslim population. The absolute value of the numbers do not seem to have much power.
However, when the small minority of those numbers are in a few positions of power, they seem to be able to change the future.
And now, with the Occultation of Mohammad alMahdi, the Muslims in positions of power all have allegiance to alMahdi whether in the past they seemed to be conservative or liberal.
One day later, Michael and Pamela find out that America has a new leader. Pamela sits back, and as Michael can see, her thoughts are racing. “Michael, somewhere in Second Kings there is a story about Naaman bowing before a pagan god.” Michael grabs his King James Bible to look.
“Pamela, it's in chapter five of Kings II. It is quite a story. Naaman is a great leader of Syria with leprosy. He was directed to Elisha who told him to dip seven times in the Jordan river. He was expecting a great supernatural event, not just dipping seven times in a dirty river! But his servants convinced him to do as Elisha directed. He was clean! He told Elisha that there were no gods but the God of Israel! He would offer no sacrifices to other gods. He said that when he returns to his home, his master will go into the house of Rimmon to worship there, and he leaneth on my hand, and I bow myself in the house of Rimmon. When I bow down myself in the house of Rimmon, the LORD pardon thy servant in this thing. And Elisha said unto him, Go in peace.”
Pamela thought for a moment. Then Pamela said “So Michael, this Sharia stuff can be very cosmetic. It appears to be a few outward appearances. alMahdi didn't say anything about 'knowing' the Qur'an. Just 'appear' to be reading it and them turn east and appear to pray to Mecca. al
Mahdi did not say anything about 'learning' the Qur'an. It sounds like Naaman. We know about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and His Son, Jesus. We just go though the appearance of the Sharia.”
Michael proclaims these words “The appearances can be cosmetic, but if an Imam asks you to say the 'Profession of faith,' we could be in trouble. The ' Shahādah ' amounts to saying this: 'I testify that there is no god (ilah) but Allah, and I testify that Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.'”
Pamela waits to be sure to have Michael's attention. She looks him right in the eyes. She calmly states the words of Revelation 14 versus 12 and 13. They were part of memorization verses in a past Sabbath school class.
“Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus. And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them.”
“Honey, sometimes the Holy Spirit tells you 'stay quiet' and other times it will say 'tell the truth. It's all for the glory of God.' Sometimes we cannot stay quiet. We can't lie to the Imam. Even if your mortal life depends on it.”
Michael keeps his eyes looking in Pamela's eyes. He can see the sparkle of truth there. He reaches to her shoulder and calmly says “You're right. There is no way out sometimes. It's like the Boy Scout motto, 'be prepared.' So let me check some Internet news.”
Michael went over to his Debian GNU/Linux desktop computer to check some BBC news. A large digital photo appeared showing Imam al
Mahdi and the Pope shaking hands. The headline reads: 'We worship the same God!'
However, regardless of what the Pope and alMahdi claimed to be truth, Israel, along with most Sabbath keeping Christians and Messianic
Jews, did not believe a word of what was said. Therefore, alMahdi ordered all EU military forces to prepare to attack Israel.