The other is to say "Hey! Meet God!" - and let Him take it from there.

But maybe we've been taking a few things for granted in the previous pages. Like quoting bits from the Bible as if it had some kind of authority. Quoting prophecies as if they actually "came true".

Okay, we could go on at length about the prophecies in the first half of the Bible that predicted Jesus the Messiah. The place of his birth was named, his brief exile in Egypt, his home town from childhood to adulthood. And his death by crucifixion - a form of capital punishment that hadn't been invented when it was foretold - was described in minute detail.

The point we want to make is that the prophecies were crisp and specific. They were precisely fulfilled. There was nothing ambiguous or nebulous about them. Now, we'd like to show you that prophecy is being fulfilled in the same way right here and now on Planet Earth. And it looks like we're living in the most exciting and dangerous time in the whole history of the human race.

D'you think we're exaggerating?

Let's quote a few prophecies that have come true in the last two or three years to show what we mean. We'll put where they can be found in the Bible so you can check them for yourselves.

One word of explanation before we start... Prophecies are sometimes written in a kind of vivid picture-language. Why? Simply because God wanted the writer to say something that might be totally non-understandable at the time, but which would make perfect sense in the era that it's intended for. So here goes.

The first prophecy about the Euphrates drying up has caused a bit of merriment in the two-and-a-half thousand years since it was written. Goodness only knows you can't just dry up a gigantic river which millions of people depend on for crops, drinking and industry. Leastways, not until 1990.

Ask yourself: what's one-and-a-half times the size of Lake Taupo and fulfils prophecy by pulling a lever? Answer: Turkey's Ataturk Dam. Never mind the statistics (covers 817 sq.km, made 132 villages uninhabitable - that's 55,000 people). The point is that when President Ozal grabbed the handle to fill the dam - he diverted 2735 km of Euphrates River. Dried it up for a whole month. And he plans to do it again and again. "There is no longer a river; the Euphrates is dead," wailed the director-general of Syria's own dam, downstream from Turkey's. Foreign Ministry officials quickly said Turkey won't use water as a political weapon - but Pres. Ozal has already threatened to cut the Euphrates (on which Baghdad and Damascus heavily rely for hydroelectric power and irrigation) because of "suspected Kurdish rebel raids from Iraqi and Syrian bases".

Then what about the second prophecy - about paying money for drinking water?

Israel has a desperate water shortage. So, to alleviate it, they have signed an imaginative deal with Turkey to get water from their dam - to have 250 milliom cube metres sent to them in giant plastic barges. Simply setting up the scheme costs $400 million; the water costs 70c a cube metre on top. Another prophecy fulfilled rather specifically.

"Hang on!" you'll be saying. "Even if we agree those two have happened recently; that third one - the crazy bit about a star called Wormwood - that couldn't happen in a million years."

It just did. In 1986, to be precise...

We'll quote the foreign minister of Byelorussia, who announced to the United Nations General Assembly that his nation has a 2,200,000 "sect of outcasts" who will produce deformed children for generations. "They are hostages of postponed hazardous radiation effects," he said in an emotion-choked speech. And one of the three rivers in that area is polluted, perhaps for ever.

Why?

And why does the prophecy use the metaphor of a star? Because God tends to be precise. He only said "burning as if it were a lamp". Stars don't "burn". They are - to use twentieth century jargon - self-sustaining nuclear breeder reactors. Like the one at Chernobyl.

Oh - perhaps we could look at another prophecy. We'll leave it to you to decide whether it's being fulfilled right now.

When Chernobyl went wrong it was known that it would only be a matter of time before the reactor began to melt down - a phase where it eats through the base of its container and corrodes down to the centre of the earth, prior to a massive blow-out that has the potential for releasing tonnes of lethal plutonium dust into the upper atmosphere.

Get the highly watchable video "The China Syndrome" and see what that involves.

So teams of experts encased the reactor in many metres of concrete, above and below, in an attempt to contain its deadly contents until technology developed to the stage where it could be neutralised.

Unfortunately, the melt-down has begun. And radio-active steam is starting to billow from fissures beneath the reactor. The star has begun to open the bottomless pit. The outcome, as we write these words, is still in the future.

* * *

We could list prophecies that refer to the seeming impossible event where a people scattered throughout the world would be gathered into their ancient homeland, despite the opposition of many nations and religions. And it is now a dramatic fact of history that on the 14th May 1948, Israel became a nation. But although we ask you to bear that fact and date in mind, we will go on to another prophecy - one that covers some major world events. Follow them carefully, because we believe you are going to see the final part played out in a very short time...

The Messiah is Jesus. (Messiah is the Hebrew word; Christ is the Greek word: both mean anointed.) He was cut off - killed - not because of any wrong he had done, but as payment for the sins of the entire world; that includes your and ours.

When Jesus died and rose again, Jerusalem and the Temple were still standing. Then in 70 AD the Roman Empire sent Titus to destroy both the city and sanctuary.

Now, take a leap forward to the present day. Under the famous Treaty of Rome, the old Roman Empire has been revived in the form of the European Community. And many people have been looking for some form of Treaty that is made "for one week". In prophetic language a day often symbolises a year, so a week represents seven years.

As we write these words, there is a great flurry of diplomatic activity in the Middle East to produce a major peace settlement. Will that be the seven-year covenant?

Or has the seven-year covenant already been signed, and are we in the countdown to the End?

In March 1990 we printed a little leaflet on the subject, called "1991: A Year To Remember?" It stated:

* * *

"Well," you'll say, "that date's been and gone and nothing has happened."

Hasn't it?

Again New Zealand suffers from being a small set of islands on the edge of the Pacific and with a strong reliance on the TV news. Europe and Israel aren't top priority when the All Blacks are winning or losing.

But... On the 14th May 1991 - that date - Israel's foreign minister David Levy - broke off discussions with US secretary of state James Baker to fly to Brussels where he met with all the foreign ministers of the European Community in closed session. There were no press releases. He then flew back and reported to Baker and Israel's prime minister Shamir made reference to "secret accords". "We have agreed on a number of things, but the time is not yet ripe to make them public," he stated. "Everything is secret," cautioned a government adviser to the media.

The next day, Dr. Henry Kissinger said on Israel Radio that if Israel has given too much away, they could review their situation in "three to four years time".

Has the covenant been made yet?

Only time will tell - if the media get any handouts. Just be aware, that's all.

And meanwhile, here's something to watch for: the prophecy we quoted refers to someone who "causes the sacrifice and the meal offering to cease".

If that is going to happen, the Jews have to begin sacrifices on the Temple Mount first. Watch out for that happening. We reckon such an event will make the headlines, even in New Zealand.

* * *

But who is the "someone" with sufficient clout to stand up and stop sacrifices once the Jews have got them going?

The Pope.

Bear in mind that Judaism, the religion of the Jews, revolves around animal sacrifices. (And don't be all greenie and squeamish over that. Remember that most of our mutton in New Zealand is "slaughtered in accordance with Islamic protocol" - in other words, sacrificed to Allah. And our live sheep exports to Saudi Arabia are specifically for ritual sacrifices. They earn good dollars, so nobody protests.)

But since 70 AD the Jews haven't been able to sacrifice on the Temple Mount. And in 1967, when General Dayan captured the Old City of Jerusalem, and with it the Temple Mount, he handed over the Temple site to the Arabs - an unselfish gesture on the part of Israel that Arabs seem to forget in their rhetoric.

Up to August 1991 Jews may not worship on the Temple Mount.

But the situation is changing.

Priests are being trained in ritual sacrifice. Robes have been made. A three-quarter-tonne pure gold Menorah or lampstand is being cast. Rumours say the $70 million bribe paid by Israel to the Ethiopian government the day before it toppled was for the return of the Ark of the Covenant, originally from Solomon's Temple.

And the Pope...

Locally, Catholics are little different from any other brand of Christians. Catholic churches are just another permutation in the seemingly endless choice of religious buildings.

But the Vatican is something else again. It is the only civil service run exclusively by bachelors. It has the right to print money - out of thin air, as it were - valid in Italy, to the tune of between 100 million and 300 million lira annually. And although the 108.7 acres is less than most NZ cockies have in hock to the Rural Bank, it enjoys full diplomatic immunity in most countries including this one, and it attends the United Nations as if it were a State member (without being obliged to accept the rules of membership - like freedom of religion) because it is a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the International Telecommunication Union and the Universal Postal Union.

With that power, it sponsored a resolution in the United Nations calling for Jerusalem to be taken out of the hands of the Israelis and put under a "governor" who was neither Israeli nor Palestinian. This resolution is still part of international law today, and accounts for why the Israelis don't want the United Nations at the peace talks - they know what the UN demands would be.

Now - the Israeli government may be clutching on to Jerusalem, but one little-known fact is that they have already agreed that the United-Nations-appointed governor can have control of the holy places. These include the controversial Temple Mount.

Okay - watch events! If the Pope becomes governor of these holy sites, then he'll give the Jews the right to sacrifice on the Temple Mount as the Old Testament of the Bible demands.

That'll get the approval of Jews all round the world, and lead to a massive return of Jews from near-atheism to old- fashioned orthodoxy.

Then watch for the sudden stopping of these sacrifices. The reason will be an excellent one: that the death of the Lord Jesus took away all need for such things - and that reason will (quite correctly) get the applause of Christian churches worldwide.

But then comes the sting... The Pope will claim that he is God's representative; that he has an exclusive line upstairs; that he is the messiah the Jews have been looking for. In other words - he takes the place of Jesus. He becomes the person the Bible calls the Antichrist.

Don't take our word for it: watch events.

Among religious folk, this kind of book is known as "End-time". The label isn't quite correct - because we're not really getting to "the end of the world" and the Great Judgement Day. That's still around a thousand years off.

We're really getting to the Beginning. Where things start over again as they were meant to be before Adam and Eve blew it.

This is why, in the Bible, Jesus is sometimes called "the second Adam". He sets things back on the rails. Which is only fair, if you stop and think for a bit. After all - no matter how bad you or we might be, we were all born into a world that had been going for quite a while before we arrived. And we absorbed automatically the prejudices and sillinesses of our family, our tribe, our nation, even our planet, without being able to do much about it, or even recognise where we're bent.

So this is a great time to be around. As long as you're prepared for events.

Okay. How do you respond to "End-time" information?

There seem to be only three responses.

The first response is the dangerous one.

Granted, some churches have laboured the end-time thing. They think they've got the events totally sussed and can prove exactly why all other scenarios are up the Khyber. So folk who've sat through it all time and time again are tired of the subject.

Understandably.

And others are equally tired of a speaker whose enthusiasm stirs them. For at least a day or two. Then - because nothing happens - there's a feeling of being let down.

"Wolf, wolf", like in the fable.

But if there's a shape slinking through the forest that looks like a wolf, moves like a wolf, howls like a wolf and even smells like a wolf - calling out "wolf" is not only a kind action, in God's book it is compulsory. To wait until it's too late is to be charged with criminal negligence. By God.

And right now there is a move - not just in New Zealand, but across the world - to phase out hard cash and introduce plastic cards for all. (When former Minister of Finance David Caygill commented on the closure of Bradbury Wilkinson's "money factory" in Whangarei, he said: "We move further towards a cashless society".)

There is a move to give everyone an ID.

And there is a move to combine the ID with the bank card with the medical record card with every form of license and permit and piece of information. Until you can neither buy nor sell without the eye of some central agency watching you.

And because cards can be stolen or lost - there is the implant.

And few people in government are putting in laws to say "Hey! Progress stops here! There have to be limits, now!" Few top people are saying that.

One day - in the future - some wise old historian is going to look back at events and write that "In such-and-such a year, a numbering system was forced on the world that exactly fulfilled Biblical prophecy". The only people who'll be around to read it will be those who were prepared before it happened. If you shrug and hope it'll all turn out to be a bad dream, you'll have problems. Maybe big problems.

But what about feeling scared?

That's okay. Not the best. But not the worst, either. Fear has only one bad aspect - it can scare us rigid. Literally. Rescue workers comment that some people are killed needlessly in disasters because they immobilise.

Shock.

Cop-out.

Whatever.

If you want to make fear work usefully for you...

Try fear of the Lord.

It's the beginning of wisdom, says the Bible. Sure, another verse says that perfect love casts out fear. But it's more profitable to fear God than to fear events, or people, or death.

No - fear of the Lord doesn't contradict all that we've written in the past about God as Daddy. The simple thing is that you mustn't grab the "Daddy" title and use it as a catchphrase. You've got to live with him as your Dad. And if you do, then nothing else has the power to get to you.

And anyway, don't worry about physical reactions. They're deceptive.

Sure - be scared. But do what you're supposed to do about it - now.

Suggestion...

Write letters to your local paper. Write to your MP.

You (not only folk with a printing press) have a duty to tell others what's going on. Give out copies of this book, even (advert). Just realise that - if you are convinced - then you have the responsibility for informing the folk around you.

We haven't yet found anyone - like nobody - who isn't interested. As in "life and death".

Hiding lights under bushels was a neat game backalong. Don't get caught playing it when the King returns, that's all.

Don't wallow in a pointless orgy of self-pity and get all sentimental about your children and what would happen to them.

Do something - now.

And the first thing to do is to get to know God. Personally.

Don't try and get round that one.

That's playing games. Religious games. They may have been fun in the past; they don't work any longer. (If you didn't know - hundreds of thousands of families - ministers included - are simply walking away from church because it isn't relevant to them.)

Get to know God. Talk to Him. You have the right to. Jesus made it possible. That's why he said he is "the Way, the Truth and the Life - and that nobody gets to God as Daddy except through him." Forget how good you think you've been - or how bad, for that matter - and talk to God.

Forget, too, all the lists of don'ts that you've heard from religious organisations. Some were just damn stupid. Some were okay - after all, if you're skulling a bottle of rum a day and inhaling two packs of fags likewise, that's not exactly brilliant. But equally it's not relevant to getting to know God.

And getting into His family, where He's your Dad and you're His kid. Kids with snotty noses and dirty nappies are loved by real parents just as much as the squeaky-clean variety, eh. And to continue the metaphor, it's the parent's job to clean 'em up, not the kid's, right?

So, okay, your Dad may have some startling changes to make in your life. Negative, even - if you've been a bit busy destroying yourself. But whatever, He doesn't bark a command and leave it for you to struggle as best you can. He gives the oomph you need to do the job.

Now, the question we get thrown at us a fair bit is: "How d'you know what God wants? How does He speak to you? Are you super-spiritual or something?"

Last question first. No. We are NOT super-spiritual or anything. But it's the job of the parent to get through to the kid; so it's God's job to get through to us.

But how do you know?

Practice. "My sheep know my voice; they won't follow a stranger," said Jesus. Talk to Him. Proper talk, the way you talk to mates. Then, sometime, you'll be aware of an answer, perhaps something you should do. Quite quiet. Never, ever compulsive.

Okay - try it. Do it. See how it works out.

And go on from there.

Let's give you a technical term. It's worth memorising. It's...

Let's start by saying what it isn't. It's not willpower. It's not positive thinking. It's not magic, where you snap your fingers and decide what's going to happen. It doesn't have to have any emotional overtones whatever. Then - what is it?

Faith is a specific thing that ensures that if God tells you something, it'll happen. And if you've a part to play, you'll have the ability to do it. (Remember the no emotion bit in the last paragraph? You may not feel confident or anything. That doesn't matter.)

This is an area where organised religion has swindled (maybe unconsciously, but swindled, nevertheless) millions of people for almost a couple of thousand years. Jesus never started a religious organisation. One of his jobs was to fulfil the requirements of the only God-given religion: Judaism. Once he'd done that, his message was, in effect: "Okay, now you're free to enjoy life without burning your fingers. Get to know God as Daddy in real life."

But religious organisations teach a list of do's and don'ts. They have extensive programmes and activities. You are expected to believe that they know best - for you! You are expected to believe that they've been told by God what you should be doing.

Obey them and you're not using faith. Faith is given by God, from God direct to you. And it can be for the most ordinary aspects of life - for every aspect of life, not just the "spiritual" bits.

Look - us two, we've been in religion. Mostly we've had a good time, met some great people. And there have been times when we've known God's been at work in some church or other.

But time after time after time we've found that the amount of effort and expense of organised religion is out of all proportion to what it achieves. And too often the plans that Dad has are baulked or modified by committees and traditions and pressure of other activities.

So we could start our own church. After all, every man and his dog (women too, in these days of equality) has a go in Whangarei. There's every possible permutation of doctrine, music and permissible behaviour you could wish for. Plus elders badges for those who like position.

So why don't we start one ourselves?

Simply because there's no time to play religious games.

King Jesus the Messiah is coming back - soon - and we know that for ministers interview. Ask a few questions. Promote a few; tell a few to go wait outside for a while, style of thing.

So our priorities are to introduce people to Him. Make sure we don't form some kind of personality cult around us or an organisation. And leave it to Him to take it from there.

Either Jesus died for you or he didn't.

Either God's real and wants to get in touch or He doesn't.

Either He can do a follow-up job better than us or He can't.

It's up to you to find out. And between you and Him, to take it from there.

Look - we may have painted a bit of a scarey picture about the events that are about to take place. If you know God as Daddy, they aren't scarey. For one thing, it's a darn sight better to know in advance than to be caught with your pants down. For another thing...

It's all a lead-in to the return of the King. And that's good news. Like a bride doesn't mind all the hassle of planning and ceremony that leads up to the great moment when she and her husband are alone at last on their honeymoon, so all the turmoil that's going to rock the world over the next few years is just the prelude to the greatest event on this planet's calendar.

* * *

Okay - here are a few short hints on living in a relationship with God that works.

Quite simply, it's the rulership of God over you on a daily, personal basis, tailormade for you; a bit more challenging and demanding than you might expect; and leaves any political system for dead. Get into God's Kingdom, accept His standards of what's right, and everything else clicks into place. (Matthew 6 v 33) No, it won't make you a millionaire. God doesn't pay much attention to our status symbols. But he'll make life work for you even when there's disaster all around.

There almost certainly won't be any flashes of lightning or heavenly choirs when you tell Him. This is where you start lesson one in living by faith: you've got to believe that God is, and that He's going to reward anyone who goes looking for Him - i.e. you. (Hebrews 11 v 6)

* * *

We believe the King - Jesus the Messiah, God's Son, the Saviour of the world - is coming back very soon. Events across the planet point to that. We and you need to be prepared for his return.

But even if we're 100% wrong and Jesus doesn't come back for a long time, the world events are still bad enough to make us need a close and workable relationship with God.

We're not pushing some religious club. What happens from now on is between you and your Dad. All we want to say is that there are a great many people who have dropped out of playing religious games to get it together with God - and found that He's for real.

So... Over to you.

And Him.

Specification: 8 bit CMOS microcontroller. 40k bits of memory, split into: 24k bits of execute-only ROM containing the operating system, application programme loader, personalisation routine, encryption algorithms and common card procedures; 16k bits of reusable memory for data storage. Plus 1024 bits of volatile memory as stack for intermediate results and communication buffer. Range of operation defined by size of active surface on scanner. All non-RAM memory is non-volatile; information is typically retained for 10 years and 10,000 rewrites. Time to write data is typically 10ms.
Acknowledgements to GEC Avery; details relate to Smart Card Type CTC-41.
(Note: k=1024; ms=thousandths of a second.)

Every number in bar code style consists of two lines and two spaces of varying widths, occupying a total width of seven units. In the tables below, each unit is represented by a "O" - a blank - or an "X" - a black line. Several "O"s represent a wide space, several "X"s represent a wide black line.

Value of first digit, and order in which styles run on left of barcode

*New Zealand's number 94 begins with 9 so all numbers on the left of the bar code are coded with styles in the order ABBABA.

TABLE 4.

N.Z. Product Number Association Ltd, P.O. Box 11-&110; 193 Vivian St., Nashua House, Wellington, ph (08) 84 666 9.

Paxus Corporation Ltd. Group Head Office, P.O. Box 859, Auckland 1.

GEC Avery (NZ) Ltd., P.O. Box 44-155, Lower Hutt

International Infopet Systems; 5137 North Clareton; Suite 110; Agoura Hills; CA 91301; USA.

Infopet Systems Inc., 570 Alden Rd., Unit 1, Markham, Ontario LR3 8N5, Canada.

Destron IDI; Denver/Boulder; Colorado, USA.

Animalcare (formerly Vet Drug); York; UK. Premier Farmkey Ltd.; P.O. Box 42; Southam Rd; Banbury; Oxfordshire OX16 7EU; UK Gary Burch: AVID System. National Central Animal Registry, PO Box 15-679, New Lynn, Auckland 7. Ph (09) 820-0009; Fax (09) 880-455