A Review of Tom Horn's Book, APPOLLYON RISING 2012

Are You Prepared To Suffer Great Tribulation?

     [Following is a review of Tom Horn's book, Appollyon Rising 2012,The Lost Symbol Found and the Final Mystery,by Joe Ortiz, author of The End Times Passover (Etymological Challenges to Millenarian Doctrines) and Why Christians Will Suffer "Great Tribulation (The Sequel to The End Times Passover).]

     Tom Horn has written probably the most informative book to date about the diabolical machinations that have lurked behind the shadows of humanity since the beginning of time, concerning what we believe is cognitive reality.

     It is this author’s opinion (which has been proven by many other authors besides Horn) that there exists a dimension few are aware of, where Satan and his minions have been manipulating the human mind since the beginning of time, in an effort to thwart the perpetual mission of God to reunite with His creation. Obviously, this was accomplished by the glorious act of Jesus Christ, on the cross, who sacrificed His life for us in order that we can spend an eternity with Him in His soon to come Kingdom.

     After Satan rebelled against his own creator, he began the most clever plan ever to drive a wedge between Christ and His creation through a myriad of efforts, beginning first with altering the DNA of God’s creation, resulting in a spiritual hybrid many of us recognize as the present demonic forces we struggle with on a daily basis, Ephesians 6:12

     My interest in this subject matter that Horn so masterfully reveals to the reader goes back to the early 70’s, after first reading Erich von Daniken’s book Chariots of the Gods. This book and a subsequent one by Hal Lindsey, The Late Great Planet Earth, actually planted the seeds for my conversion from Catholicism to becoming a Born Again Christian in1975. While after my conversion I spent the majority of the time with extensive Bible studies, I concurrently stayed in touch with the subject matter Horn deals with in Appollyon Rising 2012, by reading thousands of books and articles on the Illuminati, Freemasons, Bielderbergs, Nephilim, UFOs and numerous cults, and recognized how they connected with Bible truth.

     About ten years after my conversion to Christianity, I began writing my two books in 1984 (originally one manuscript that has since been published into two volumes), dealing primarily with the subject of the Pre-Tribulation Rapture. After 25 years of research, I finally published my manuscript in 2007, which in essence out right refutes all premillennial and dispensationalism notions and its Left Behind progeny. Simply put, there will be no pre-tribulation escape to heaven!

     More importantly, after many years of studying and trying to connect all the dots together (theology with mysticism), I have to agree that Tom Horn’s book Appollyon Rising 2012 provides information that confirms (for me, at least) that we are one day closer to the return of Christ, but it doesn’t confirm for me his solution to the crisis facing each person who claims to be a child of God and a disciple of Christ. While I stayed riveted to all the information that Horn unveiled, as I came to the end of his book I was jolted by the reality that the percentage of writers who deal with this topic, more than often are seeking something else. Not necessarily how to get Christians closer to God, but to sell survival equipment and marketing other suggestions as to how to protect oneself from the impending horrors spoken of in the book of Revelations.

     Nowhere in the Bible have I ever read about any suggestions as to how God’s children should protect themselves from tribulation. Paul, and others always tell us to glory in the persecutions we are suffering, and that we (Jesus’ disciples) will be rewarded in ways we cannot even begin to fathom.

     After reading Horn’s book, many Christians will rush to stores and will seek the latest survival accoutrement of some kind to protect themselves from these horrors. But what Horn and other writers who see and brilliantly write about the diabolical schema in place, they seldom or never warn the disciples of Christ what Paul told us in Acts 14:22…… and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.

     None of these writers ever provide the scriptures that the disciples need to be made aware of, which is to warn and encourage the flock to trust in God as we prepare to experience such tribulations, because these modern-day prophets all believe in the Pre-Tribulation Rapture to Heaven. They believe they will be whisked away to Heaven to avoid any suffering. Their solutions are the soothing gospel that Timothy warned us about in 2 Timothy 4:3-4

     They don’t tell you about verses like Matthew 23:9-14 where we are told that anti-Christians forces will deliver up Christians to be afflicted, and shall kill them; that we shall be hated of all nations for Jesus' sake. They don’t mention scripture like Luke 21:12-19 which contain the fact that disciples will face ersatz Christian tribunals on charges of treason; that we shall be betrayed both by parents, and brethren, and kinfolks, and friends; and some who shall actually and directly be responsible for putting many of us to death. They don’t show you examples (Acts 7:1-60) where the first martyr Stephen was stoned to death for telling the church of that day that they failed to recognize the true Gospel of Christ.

     The disciples of Christ are not being prepared to deal with this impending doom the way Christ would have it. The apostle Paul, whom many viewed (and still do) as a crack-pot, boasted how we should feel about Christ, and be willing to even die for Him as He did for us. As we read in Philippians 3:10-11, Paul was not concerned for His life but more so with preaching the Gospel to those who hate us and, more importantly, about knowing the sufferings of Christ. He so wanted to intimately experience the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; and if, by any means, that he might attain unto the power of the resurrection of the dead.

     But, we (especially American) Christians are too skittish; we want no part in such suffering, not for anyone! No one tells them that the only true way to survive the impending holocaust (if it be in the year 2012) that it will not be with high tech survival gear but, but by what we read in Revelation 12:8-11, which is adopting a willingness to lay our lives on the line for Christ as millions did during the Crusades, the Inquisitions and throughout history.
     These true believers that Christ seeks as we get closer to His return will not need survival gear or saftey camps to escape tribulation; these forever grateful servants will overcome the devil and his attacks by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they will not love their lives even unto the death.

     If anything, what these great prophecy writers should do, as intellectually and gifted as they are in providing answers as to who the enemy is, they should encourage at the end of their books not for their readers to buy their survival wares (as if they can truly provide them any protection from Satan's attacks), but to trust God and He alone in all things. But Most of all, to tell their readers they need to get over their fear of death, Hebrews 2:14-15!

For more information about this blog and the author's two books, The End Times Passover and Why Christians Will Suffer Great Tribulation, please click on Joe Ortiz.