Where do we get the idea that democracy is God’s favorite form of human government? It was a monarchy that God set up for ancient Israel, not a democracy. God’s Son will soon return as the rightful heir to Israel’s throne to rule over the whole world “with a rod of iron” (Revelation 12:5; 19:15). There will be neither polling places nor opinion polls during Christ’s Millennial Reign. As absolute Sovereign, Christ will rule by divine authority, not majority consent, and will execute the divine will, not public opinion. 

In the second chapter of Daniel, the Prophet Daniel interprets the horrifying image haunting the dreams of King Nebuchadnezzar as a panorama of history’s Gentile world powers. Interestingly, each successive Gentile world power decreases in value. Babylon, where the king was supreme, is represented by the image’s head of gold. Medo-Persia, where the law was supreme (see Daniel 6:12-15 and Esther 8:8), is represented by the image’s silver breast and arms. Greece, where democracy was born, is represented by the image’s bronze stomach and thighs. Rome, the representative republic from which our own government was modeled, is represented by the image’s iron legs. And finally, the image’s feet are representative of the end time Gentile world power, which will prove insufficient for the image’s support and incapable of holding together, since it consist of a mixture of iron and clay.

Clay in the Bible represents man. For instance, the name of the first man, “Adam,” means “red.” A fitting name for one created by God from the red clay of the earth (Genesis 2:7). In light of this, we may conclude that the end time Gentile world power will not only be a representative republic, like Rome, but also a worldwide champion of democracy and the rights of the people. Sound like any country you know?

Along with the Gentile world power of the end time, the end time world ruler and apostate church will also be champions of the rights of the people. The end time world ruler is called a “man of lawlessness” by the Apostle Paul (2 Thessalonians 2:3 NIV). Gaining worldwide ascendancy by political intrigue rather than military might (Daniel 8:25; 11:21, 32), the end time world ruler will win the hearts of the people by disregarding men’s laws and championing their causes. Likewise, the end time apostate church will win its converts by championing human rights rather than by fulfilling the Great Commission. This is subtly foreseen in the name of the seventh church of Asia Minor, a nauseating, unregenerate church that symbolizes the apostate church of the end time (Revelation 3:14-22). The name of this church, “Laodicea,” literally means “the rights of the people.”

Far from evolution, the continuing spiral upward, the Bible teaches the world’s devolution, a continuing spiral downward. The great Gentile world powers of human history are degenerative. They degenerate from gold to silver, from silver to bronze, from bronze to iron, and finally from iron to clay. Could it be that America is the long ago predicted muddier of end time waters—the feet of iron and clay? Is our nation the foretold champion of democracy and the rights of the people that will lead the world into its final days of chaos and confusion?

I know that such a suggestion is foreign to the ears of my countrymen. It may even cause you to shrink back in apprehension. How could I propose so preposterous an idea about our beloved country? Still, I must be true to Scripture, which explicitly teaches that “WE THE PEOPLE” have always been wrong; for an example see the account of Korah’s rebellion in the sixteenth chapter of Numbers. As A. W. Tozer warned, “My brother, my sister, beware of the counsel of the multitudes. Throughout the ages, the multitudes have always been wrong.”

Our championing of democracy as the cure-all for all of our world’s ills has resulted in Afghans voting to make their country an Islamic republic, a republic that must be run by a Muslim president and ruled by Shari’ah Law. Likewise, in Iraq, our push for democracy has resulted in seventy percent of Iraqis going to the polls and electing to parliament several candidates with links to the Iraqi insurgency. Although he did not run for a seat in parliament, Muqtada al-Sadr, the radical Muslim imam and leader of the Mahdi Army, will play an influential role in Iraq’s new government, thanks to the election of several of his staunchest supporters. Elsewhere, Palestinian voters recently rewarded the terrorist group Hamas with sweeping victories in local elections, while a majority of Bolivians just voted for a president who promises to be America’s worst “nightmare” by reversing U.S.-backed efforts to eradicate Bolivia’s coca fields.

Forgotten today are the words of our second president, John Adams. According to him, “Our constitution was made for a religious [Christian] and moral people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other.” In other words, no form of democratic government can succeed where human nature is unrestrained by Christian conviction. Only in a Christian nation can the majority be trusted with self-governance. This, contrary to popular opinion, is the secret to America’s success and longevity. Today, however, our nation appears hell-bent on gutting itself of the one thing that has preserved it and made it possible, namely, the Christian faith.

Plato, the famous philosopher, was no fan of democracy. Having personally witnessed its abuses in ancient Greece, which included the execution of the virtuous Socrates, Plato came to believe that all democracies would sooner or later pass into despotism. The U.S. statesman, John Caldwell Calhoun, once warned the United States Senate that democracy unchecked by Christian conviction becomes “the most tyrannical and oppressive” form of government ever devised by man. Is it not such a democracy, one stripped of its soul—the Christian faith—that is now being called for at home and championed by our country throughout the world? And if so, is our country, unbeknownst to it, being masterfully used by the god of this world to usher in end time tyranny that will inevitably lead to unprecedented tribulation (Matthew 24:21)? These are grave questions of our time demanding earnest inquiry.      

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