Steven Clark Bradley  

Have you ever wondered what was here before us? Is the world we see around us all there is? Do you look around and feel the squirming on the inside of your stomach that tells you that everything is not as it seems? Whether we admit it or not, if we sit and think profoundly and look at the dissolving world system around us, we come to an understanding that there are forces at work all around us that mean us woe and seek to rob us of hope, faith and peace.

We all know about the life we can all see, touch and feel. What about a world that is as real as the air we breath; but one which is hidden from our sight and as real as the invisible battles going on around us at every moment for the world, the future and for the souls of men and women? Inside Nimrod Rising will give you visual look into a book that could be one of the most important books you will ever read! War, terror, political upheaval, are these simply random acts of intrigue and violence? Or, is there an invisible war between the forces of good and the forces of evil that soon will not be so invisible anymore?

Read Legion of Ants and witness the transformation of a pseudo man of faith into a true follower of the forces of darkness which fully intend to wreak havoc in this planet that we call home and which Lucia, the prince of the Nadir, who resides and encompasses the darkness of Tenebre. This portion of Nimrod Rising will shock and amaze you and make the hidden forces arrayed before us feel more real than we ever wanted to know. I know this chapter will make you want to read Nimrod Rising to the very end of a book that is as real as it gets, If You Dare!
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Nimrod Rising - Legion of Ants Part One

“I was Alex’s best friend and sometimes his worst enemy. I know he was attracted to me. I was thin, long-legged, big-busted, dark skinned and beautiful. These legs don’t work anymore now, but then, I was a distraction. Elyon has forgiven me, but I knew it too! I was one of those Messianic Jews. That was the mark that made me the chosen vessel of his evil! I know I very often made him have wicked, evil thoughts. I am sure that he had been victorious over his libido mostly, except on rare occasions; he was forced to take things into his hands when he had undressed me far too much in his mind and had always convinced himself that he had had no alternative. It was not sexual. It was something far more sinister and evil. These things I am telling you tonight were related to me by him directly, before he…before he hurt me, robbed me, took me, you know what I mean…”
~~~
“Alex! Come back to us!” Sally cried. Alex was quoting scripture and trying to comprehend what had happened to him during the prayer meeting.

“Temptation is not sin!” Alex told himself.

“I can do all things through Christ who…” Sally interrupted him, “Alex! Are you OK? What happened in there?”

Alex turned his face away from her. He was sure it was covered with perplexity and terror!

“Me? I’m fine. I had a touch of malaria last night. I took some stuff for it. Guess it’s taking its time working.” Alex shook his head in disgust.

“Sickness is of Satan!”

“Yea, maybe?” Sally responded. “But dead missionaries are not very useful to Elyon, Alex! You should…”

“I know! I should take it every day.”

Alex knew that he had been taking it, but he also knew that pills could not cure what he had just suffered, and it was not malaria. He was not even sure that prayer could cure it now. That is unless this was some strange new strain that caused horrific hallucinations. Sally gawked at Alex. She knew it too!

“You need a better place.” Sally insisted.

“Hey, no problem! I’m just roughing it a little.”

“A little! What are you trying to prove, Alex?”

“Hey, Henry Martyn did it! He preached the gospel right here in Lahore!”

“Yea, and then promptly died at the ripe old age of 28 too!” Alex seemed to close himself off from Sally’s words.

“For me to live is Christ and to die is…”

“Stupid!” Sally interrupted.

“Sally, that’s a bad attitude! My times are in His hands!”

“And to rush it up is sinful too!”

“You like me don’t you?” Alex interjected smiling.

“Yea, I do, you over zealous fanatic. I like you a lot! Is there something wrong with that? Alex, you’ve been changing a lot lately. If you have a problem, tell me! I’ll be there for you!”

“I can see the way you feel. You see, what you really need is the world that you cannot see! You know the Vineyard doesn’t allow us to see so much of each other alone.” Alex responded.

“I mean we are human and some of these rules are overbearing. I’m not trying to get you in my bed or anything, but you are in my heart!”

Alex’s face turned red, partly because he had imagined it so many times.

“What did I just say?” Sally turned her head to not reveal her red face. She turned her head back and spoke directly to Alex.

“I, I mean, you’re a man. I’m a woman! A man is attracted, at times transported toward a woman. A lady has already understood that the man likes the woman, you know! Gives him no signals except a certain little flash of the eye; just enough to let him know he definitely still has a chance!”

“So that’s how it is, huh?”

Alex seemed to be looking out of his eyes sideways, simply out of the extreme corners of the eyes.

“You decide, Alex.”

“OK! We can talk on the way back from Islamabad tonight. We can ride back together.”

“Why don’t you go back to your little home and get some rest before the trip and sweat it all off?”

“Why do I have to fall for someone just like my mom?”

Suddenly, Alex’s face was assailed with the look of horror.

“Sally!”

Alex grabbed Sally by her shoulders and shook her.

“I’ve gotta find them!”

“Who, Alex? What’s wrong?”

“My grandparents, Sally! Don’t you understand?” he asked, shaking Sally again.

“Alex! Stop it, you’re hurting me!”

Alex came to himself.

“Sally, I’m sorry. If I told you all about it all, you’d fear for my mind. You probably already do!”

Alex backed away from the girl.

“I really have to go! I want to call them.”

Alex was walking backward still admiring her.

“I’ll see you tonight. Wakely and I are going to Islamabad together.”

Alex waved again, turned around, and trotted briskly to his habitat and Sally prayed.
~~~
The Vineyard was not your run-of-the-mill international mission group dedicated to the propagation of the good news. It was laidback in its approach. The Vineyard didn’t demand that a candidate go out and spend the best years of ones life getting a Masters of Divinity and then a Th.D. It didn’t tell the candidate to spend the next five years after the degrees were accomplished drumming up support for the “Work” so that the servant of Elyon could, finally, get out to the field where Elyon had “so powerfully” called them, afterwards to finally arrive too bruised, battered and worn to set up house, get typhoid and die! No! The Vineyard took you as you were. Long hairs, short hairs, or no hairs at all! You’re qualified!

The only prerequisites were that you be filled with the Spirit, spend ample time in prayer, a standard to which no one could ever quite attain except by exaggeration. You had to read your Bible.

“Meditation on the word was the key! Breathe it! Eat it! Drink it and Dream about it!” as Vineyard founder Rex Wagle used to proclaim in his sermons. The original name of the mission had not been the “Vineyard” but rather “Christ is the answer.” The name originally left no doubt as to what they were about. It had a ring about it and seemed to say it all. The only hang up was that when the first letters in each of words were used as an abbreviation, it spelled out CIA. That never went over well in the Third World when visa time came up. They had even begun to change the acrostic title to C.I.T.A. but that meant HIV/AIDS in the French language, or at least it had the same sound. So, after painstakingly praying and seeking the will of the Lord for a new name, the name “Vineyard” was chosen. Never mind that the new title seemed to imply that they were all drunkards.

“Elyon knows better!” Rex Wagle declared.

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Inside Nimrod Rising
Watch "Inside Nimrod Rising" and take a journey into the spiritual beyond that will make you wonder if "Nimrod Rising" is a book of fiction or of truth. In fact, it is both!

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One would have thought that Elyon also knew better for the original name as well, but no one had ever pointed that out. Unity, prayer! Piety, prayer! Sobriety, prayer! Study of the word and prayer! Fasting and above all, prayer! It was a miracle, but one did have a chance to sleep from time
to time. One was always sure to pray before sleeping!

The days of the Vineyard’s devotees were filled with the distribution of the Gospel and the seemingly never-ending stream of literature to distribute also. That is, of course, only after a profound moment around the Word of Elyon and prayer at 5:30 A.M. The original time had been 5:00 A.M. That change was highly regarded as a compromise on the part of supposed men of Elyon with the inability to conquer their flesh. Some said it was worldly. The dissenters did follow after the others’ carnal ways and sleep another half hour later though! The team’s nights were to be spent in the visitation of “contacts,” as they were called: those who showed more than just the casual interest in either the literature or the message of the gospel or visa to America. Of course, there was the “Around the world night of prayer” every Thursday night. It would usually break up at around 4:00 AM to give everyone a chance to have breakfast and refresh themselves before the 5:30 AM prayer meeting and then off to the daily scheduled ritual that had just become too stale for Alex Maefield. It was to be counted as a day without sleep for the Lord!

Alex had researched many groups before joining the Vineyard. He had received materials about the Vineyard even though he could not recall having ever enquired of them or having ever heard of them. Even more mysterious to Alex was the letter of acceptance he had received from them when he knew he had not even applied. When he had called to ask about the status of his acceptance, the Vineyard officials had never heard of him, but he was accepted nonetheless.

Alex just took it as a sign from Elyon. The Vineyard, more than all the other mission groups or boards, offered Alex his best chance to be radically spiritual and to “one-up” everyone around him, in spiritual terms. Alex never missed a meeting, consistently read the book and held a good check on his libido. Before venturing out into this land of dark magic and demonic activity, Alex had not spoken to any churches or mission boards. He decided to just trust the Lord to meet his needs the same way C.T. Studd, Henry Martyn and Hudson Taylor and many others had done in their new-life endeavors. Every month, Alex’s grandparents sent him faithfully a meager stipend of $100 out of their savings, ever determined to let their adopted son, Alex, mightily do the will of Elyon. The Vineyard director had warned Alex several times that the will of Elyon just might be changing for him if he didn’t have his support coming in more regularly and in larger denominations. Alex never worried. Alex hardly ate, fasting three days a week! He never drank Coke or Pepsi, even in the sometimes 45-degree Celsius temperature of Pakistan, and he lived in a one room rooftop-closet sort of place. Alex’s comfort level was hardly above that of the common city street dwellers of Lahore, and only a half-step below those who lived in cardboard boxes on the streets of Bombay.

Alex had told himself that he was trying to relate to the people of Pakistan, Lahore in Particular. In reality, it was all he could afford! It consisted of one window, which barely opened, a plastic, fold up hanging closet, a desk with the drawer missing, a wobbly chair, and one washed-out paint container, which Alex used as his toilet. It smelled rancid whenever he forgot to empty it. There was an overhead fan fastened to a hook which made Alex wonder if it might come tumbling down spinning some night as he slept and make mincemeat of some of the most prized possessions attached to his body! Alex would often watch the most amazing phenomenon as he lay in his broken down mattress. Day or night, from the wall to his left, over the ceiling above him, down the wall on his right and across the floor under his bed and up the left wall again, was a steady stream of ants. At first, Alex was afraid that they would fall into his gaping, snoring mouth as he lay sleeping at night. After a while, Alex had become accustomed to his thousands of friends, even grateful for their presence. He watched them as they marched in military-style unison, going about their business of doing the same task day in and day out. When Alex first started watching them, they had seemed daring, busy, loyal, even zealous! Now, though Alex still went to great pains not to step on any of them, they seemed boring, ritualistic, robotic and numb. Alex speculated to himself that they were a whole lot like him, a perfect picture of himself. He was doing the same thing these ants were: going out daily, gathering the tidbits and crumbs that he knew would be to the Master’s liking and only told to go right back out and do the whole thing all over again!

Alex had lost his vision. He found it impossible to persuade himself anymore of the rationale for even being there. The hallucination, aberration, vision or whatever it was didn’t help him. It had actually crushed him! He called home but there was no answer. The answering machine was turned off, broken or possibly blown to bits by bullets shot by a man wearing Alex’s face! He was scared, frustrated and angry! Alex got off his bed and walked over to the legions of ants streaming up and
down the walls. He had returned home to get some rest before his trip to Islamabad in the afternoon. There was a Sunni Muslim festival parade there today. It would be a bit of interesting and potentially dangerous evangelism!

“Fanatics are always dangerous,” Alex thought.

The statement caused him not to trust himself. He wondered if Elyon’s perspective toward man was like his own toward these bugs pacing up and down his walls. They were so small compared to Alex’s foot. He placed his foot three or four inches over a small section of this assembly line of vermin. Hundreds of the tiny creatures ran for cover as if amazed that their giant, humanoid friend
would be so rash as to frighten them.

“Elyon can crush us with his foot!” Alex remarked.

Was Elyon about to step on Alex? The thought had struck Alex’s mind as many times as the blood of Christ prevented it! Did Elyon hold the momentary last few days of doubt, lust and fear against him? Alex feared so. He removed his foot from over top of the ants. They all regained their positions again. He fell backward onto his bed. He needed to rest before the trip. The bed conformed nicely to Alex’s body. It was more of a hammock than a mattress. He looked up at the ceiling. The ants were marching to and fro in their vain, endless routine that literally would lead them to an early death, having worked themselves so hard. Often, while nodding off to sleep, Alex would lay and wait for the voices. They were those latent replays of things that one’s brain heard during the day but the ears had filtered out and refused to hear. The ants moved in formation above Alex’s head. Some seemed to be at battle stations. They seemed to make formations of battle in the hazy, dreary vision that was taking him into never-never land. They seemed to Alex, as his eyes folded slowly, like an approaching menace ready to die in war, if need be, and taking up their positions! In the far distance, Alex heard the wailing, soothing cry of the Mosque calling the faithful to late-morning prayers,

“Allah Wakbar! Bismila Rahman Rahir Irahim.”

Alex liked the sound. It stretched his religious bones. Closer by, a three-wheeled rickshaw sort of rumbled and clattered close by and the smell of the curry-infested air bit at his nose. He was tired. He was weary and afraid. He was tired and it was understandable. Ants could work themselves to death. Humans were of a more frail nature. There are those interplays between feelings, motives, emotions and drives. He remained unconvinced.

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