Unfortunately, there are alleged men of God who deliberately set out on a pathway to frighten people just so that they can make money.

Even though he has been gone a number of years now, there may be some out there who are going to remember the late and great Barry R Smith.

Even though I was never ever privileged to have known him personally, I had the occasion to go to one or two of his meetings when he came to the area.

I have read the whole of the series of his books and have watched a fair portion of his DVDs. That being the substance of the matter, therefore, one could say I had quite a good understanding of just where he was coming from relative to the end times as he revealed the keys to eternal salvation at the same time?

There was a time when he had mentioned in one of his DVDs when he had been offered the opportunity to sell end times food with the prospect being that if were able to do that there would be a very strong possibility that he would come out of doing so a self made millionaire.

The idea was that he was simply to carry on as he was preaching about the end times and there at the end of his meetings there would be someone at the door ready to sell those who came out of BS meetings the aforementioned end times emergency food.

The idea was that as there always was a message of doom and gloom, or the end of the current system as we know it on this day, the idea was that there would be those who were sufficiently frightened they would then buy his end times food.

He later on went to reject this idea, but there are still those out there who did not and are using their own messages of doom and gloom to frighten people so that may profiteer out of the process by selling those they sufficiently frighten enough products they claim are going to assist the purchasers when the crunch time really comes and the final seven years here on the earth begins.

Even though I still believe it is not really being a Christian to go and talk about someone behind their backs, there are still a couple of very well names that are coming to mind who are doing this type of thing. TM of the power of prophecy website and author of several books and DVDs readily comes to mind, just as AJ of the info wars website name also does.

Both of these men are becoming extremely wealthy by fleecing the unsuspecting of their hard earned cash.

AF of the free press online is just another one that readily comes to mind. Even though he is not directly selling end times food what he is doing is frightening those who come to his website with visions of a Greater Depression in 2011. At the same time he has an advertisement on his website for GOLD which seems to suggesting that if what he had predicated in 2011 were ever to come to pass then gold would be the safest investment to give the greatest return for those who had chosen to invest in it as a hedge fund against further financial collapse if that were ever to come to pass in the forthcoming year?

However the facts of the matter are completely different, as there could be nothing which is further from the truth.

Even though there are very clear indicators within the Holy Scriptures that says there will be an economic collapse sooner or later, there is still nothing whatsoever within the Bible that says it is going to be in 2011.

Also, within the scriptures there are several verses that says that that GOLD is not an infallible investment at all. In fact, the Bible says that Gold is going to be cankered and that it is going to be worth absolutely nothing at all.

I would assume there are more around the place than those two men mentioned above who are frightening those who will listen, and then as a consequence trying to make money out of doing so. These are only a couple that I am able to think of, but there are still more than likely numerous others of whom I do not even know about.

So even though it may be alright to set out on a deliberate pathway to alarm and frighten in the vain hope that by doing so it is going to lead some to eternal life, there is a direct difference between doing so to try and lead others to eternal life -- and deliberately setting out on a pathway to try and frighten people just to profiteer out of doing so.