I've been watching something for a long time, years in fact. It's something that's had an effect on me in no small way, and an effect that I've come to question the healthiness of at times. I don't think that my awareness of it is coincidental. Rather, I think it's by design that it draws my attention. But in what way am I to respond? What purpose drives it? I'm comfortable that the Lord knows well and I've also become comfortable that He also will not let me be overcome by its weight. After all, He won't give us more than He also gives us the means to carry. In this I'm confident, so I plod onward waiting to see His particular purpose in it. Maybe it's just this ...
I've felt drawn to watch what I will call the spiritual pulse of not only our nation, but perhaps with somewhat less inspiring interest, the world as a whole.Ever since I become aware of the new testament and the truth that will reign over the future, I've never felt drawn to doubt it. Honestly there have been times in the past that I've chosen to set it aside in favor of the busy pursuits the world has drawn me to. But the raw truth of our God is a powerful magnet that has always drawn me back. This is something for which my gratitude has grown much larger and acute with the onset of experienced reflection (secret code for- I'm getting older and looking back on life). Some say that looking backward can be a bad thing. I will agree that it can be, but I'd also totally temper that by saying that it depends on what you're looking for (the loving faithfulness of His hand throughout my life from the beginning is something I would have missed if I'd never looked back).
As a child, I along with so many others took great and assuming comfort in the religious freedom we had in our nation then. I always knew without any doubt that in order for foretold biblical truth to come to bear, things would have to change ... someday.(by the way, I do not like using the word religion but it seemed the most familiar reference and sadly in some cases the most applicable. I prefer to think of it as a discipleship rather than a ritual to be practiced. Or as a very dear friend called it recently - an adventure. An adventure in learning and growth planned and led by our Lord and designed to lead us directly to Him - how's that?).
As a youth someday was way off in the far too distant future for me to worry about with any immediate concern. There were other more self enveloping things to be concerned with. Baseball with my brother and all of the neighbor boys was a big deal then. Model cars, bicycles with playing cards attached roaring in the spokes, sports cards and the curiosity that girls evoked were all too important then.
But then something happened and a nagging awareness switched on inside me that has continued to today. I must have been about 15 or 16 years old when I first saw the original movie "A Thief In The Night". I'm sure that some will remember it and I'm sure that some just saw it as a "religious" movie trying to portray the future that the bible predicts. But it sparked a series of terrible dreams that continued for some time and the rubber of reality hit the road for me. It started an earnest search for the truth of the God of that New Testament and a depth of relationship with Him that has weathered so many dark tests throughout the accumulating years of my life.
Don't misunderstand, I didn't live a perfect life from that moment on. There have been more times in life that I've looked up to find the Lord watching me while in the midst of some spiritually self destructive activity than I prefer to have to admit to. But, He's always been faithful to His word and to call me back. Unfortunately He's had to get my attention more than once to bring me back to where I knew I belonged. His having to do that is not something I'm proud to have to have to say, but the truth and fame of His faithfulness to me are so much more important than my own reputation. His faithfulness along with so many other interactions with Him has served well to further set in stone my knowledge that what He's said is the truth of reality.
So where am I going with this? Glad you asked (and if you weren't asking, I'm still glad to tell you). For me, knowing what He's said means that I know what I can count on with certainty. The foretelling of the events of the future yet to come beginning in The Old Testament and continuing in The New Testament aren't regarding events that are in question. We may not know every detail or even necessarily understand everything that's described, but those things are coming and they're coming soon.
Using my own lifetime as a means to measure changes that would precipitate the necessary setting in which the events of the end times would take place reveals some pretty significant progress. In order for the kind of persecution that Jesus described in Matthew 24 to take place in this country (and it will), things would have to change dramatically from the time of my youth. I've since watched it slowly come about bit by bit and issue by issue. Our nation, being at the time of my youth a declared bastion of religious freedom has slowly been reduced from a much more dominant "God fearing" culture to what I would call a striking post semblance of itself. Am I saying that our God no longer is working in America? No, I'm certainly not saying that. He knows where His people are in this country and I'm more than pleased to say that He walks with and cares for them daily. But, with the declining of church fellowship, the erosion of what God has said to create a pass for things that He does not condone, the drive by both government and society to achieve an unprecedented level of truth defying worldly political correctness and the outwardly aggressive and angry attacks against anything related to our Lord - it's clear that times have changed. The clock is ticking and the stage is being set for exactly what Jesus told us would come in the end times.
If you don't see it, then I would respectfully and in loving care point out that I think you might want to consider taking some time to check the pulse. My advice to those who doubt would be this: Make sure that you have a good grasp of what God has said - not what the world has said, then check out the comments below the content on Christian related websites on the Internet and on YouTube Christian music channels. Don't just look at one or two, sample a range of them and you'll eventually find a taste of what I'm talking about. Understand that these are just the ones that weren't removed by the host. I've been sampling a wide range of them for a long time. Check the offerings of both current American and world literature and the values that they're teaching. Turn on your TV and enjoy the best of today's sex, violence and self gratifying depravity - the commercials alone would have our predecessors screaming. Then look at the condition and moral posture of governments around the world, including ours and don't miss noting the astounding rise of radical Islam among other interests over the past years. If you're young, ask the "old timers" in your life how things have changed and listen to their counsel.
Examine closely the spirit behind the values that much of the world's media pushes in our faces on a daily basis and ask yourself if you see any semblance of the spirit of our God in them. Many of us, myself included at times, have become somewhat numbed by constant exposure to the spirit of world and it has the tendency to make the unchanging starkness of what God has said somehow distant from "reality". But we know that He's not subject to the possibility of saying something wrong and also that He means what He's said. The real truth is that as sovereign God, He makes the rules and defines truth - not us. So we need to be on our guard and aware of the difference between what He's said - the truth, and the spirit of this world we now live in.
Through my constant observations I have often come away angry from the exercise. Angry that anyone could say the things that they do about our God and about His people - my family in Christ. They can be so unnecessarily offensive and so inflammatory. That anger became a mounting emotion that made me want to scream at them and worse ... until I really began to think about it. How I should react? How would Jesus react? I started asking myself some serious questions and began to come to some different thoughts and emotions.
I reached a point where I really made an effort to focus on the spewer rather than the foul spew they spew out and I came to a conclusion - I feel sorry for them. I'm sure that they probably either don't know or don't believe what's going to happen to them - but I do and it's going to be horrific without God's grace to heal their minds. Every one of them is a spirit breathed into existence by our Creator in the hope of intimate fellowship. They represent not only a lost hope once glowing with eternal possibility, but a tragedy that the world hasn't even begun to see the cost of yet. That will come with an earned reward at judgment. This world has not yet witnessed the full horror of God's wrath yet so we have no basis for comparison, but I have no doubt that it will be worse than we can imagine. In further reflection, I then observe also the long standing truth that the biggest primary difference between them and myself - is Christ.
Jeremiah pointed out the truth of possibilities for any of us without Christ's Spirit when he said in Jeremiah 17:9 "The human heart is most deceitful and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?" So, who can say that without His influence and sacrifice that I wouldn't be just as offensive as some that I allowed to make me angry earlier? No, Lord let compassion and compassionate wisdom rule my heart for them instead of anger while they might yet be saved. You are not mocked and your vengeance will no doubt be terrible.
Jesus raised the standard even higher than the Old Testament law in Matthew 5:28(NLT) when He said: "But I say anyone who looks at a woman with lust in his eye has already committed adultery with her in his heart." And James 2:10-11(NLT) reminds us: "10. And the person who keeps all of the laws except one is as guilty as the person who has broken all of God's laws. 11. For the same God who said "Do not commit adultery" also said "Do not murder." So if you murder someone, you have broken the entire law, even if you do not commit adultery."
To my mind this means that even just our thoughts can bring the full condemnation of sin - and not just lustful thoughts, but any thoughts contrary to our God's values and righteousness. So, with that in mind I know that without the acceptance of Christ's payment for my own sin, I would be unquestionably just as guilty and just as "bad" as any other in our God's eyes. Under James' truthful evaluation, any one of the multitude of my own past sins is equally as bad as any that I might choose to revile when committed by someone else. Where am I going with this now you ask?
Where do the previously mentioned truths leave me? On equal footing with them before the Lord - except for one oh-so-very-important difference: I made the choice to believe that Jesus is the Son of God and accept His sacrifice as payment for my own many sins. Just a choice, it's as simple as that. Other than having made that choice, I have no claim to my credit to justify myself above any other I might examine. Jesus took it from there and any changes that have occurred since are to His credit by means of His Spirit, counsel and guidance. And that choice? - It was His alone to offer and we'd all be lost without His choice to offer it. So, as Paul said in his letter to the Galatians: (Galatians 6:14 NLT) "As for me, God forbid that I should boast about anything except for the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of that cross, my interest in this world died long ago, and the world's interest in me is also long dead." I pray that this becomes ever more increasingly true of me and proven by example in my own life.
I'm not trying to tell you in this protracted discourse that I know when Christ is coming back. That would be a lie. Jesus Himself said that only the Father knows. It could be today, tomorrow, next year, in 100 years or 500. I don't know. But Jesus in response to His disciples gave them and consequently us, signs to look for as a warning that the end was coming and I believe very strongly that we're seeing that stage set in front of us. Many prophecies have been counted as fulfilled already in regard to the end of times by those who are wiser and more studied than I. And I won't argue with you about the details of those end of time prophesies or the details of the events described in them. I'm just not that smart and quite frankly I'm not all that concerned about the details. I'm looking at the bigger picture and holding onto God's promises with all that I am. But perhaps because of the nature of a movie that I was meant to see, and while I've noted those prophecies, I've also been drawn to focus on a spirit among men that was painted by the words Jesus spoke describing signs that the end of days was drawing near in Matthew 24;
Matthew 24:3-25 (NLT)
3. Later, Jesus sat on the slopes of the Mount of Olives. His disciples came to Him privately and asked, "When will all of this take place? And will there be any sign ahead of time to signal your return and the end of the world?" 4. Jesus told them, "Don't let anyone mislead you. 5. For many will come in my name saying, "I am the Messiah." They will lead many astray. 6.And wars will break out near and far, but don't panic. Yes these things must come, but the end won't follow immediately. 7.The nations and kingdoms will proclaim war against each other, and there will be famines and earthquakes in many parts of the world. 8. But all this will be only the beginning of the horrors to come." 9."Then you will be arrested and killed. You will be hated all over the world because of your allegiance to me. 10. And many will turn away from me and betray and hate each other. 11. And many false prophets will appear and will lead many people astray. 12. Sin will be rampant everywhere and the love of many will grow cold. 13. But those who endure to the end will be saved. 14.And the Good News about the Kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, so that all nations will hear it; and then, finally the end will come." 15. The time will come when you shall see what Daniel the prophet spoke about; the sacrilegious object that causes desecration standing in the Holy Place" - reader, pay attention! 16. "Then those in Judea must flee to the hill. 17. A person outside the house must not go inside to pack. 18. A person in the field must not return even to get a coat. 19. How terrible it will be for pregnant women and for mothers nursing their babies in those days. 20. And pray that your flight will not be in winter or on the Sabbath. 21. For that will be a time of greater horror than anything the world has ever seen or will see again. 22. In fact, unless that time of calamity is shortened, the entire human race will be destroyed. But it will be shortened for the sake of God's chosen ones." 23. "Then if anyone tells you, 'Look, here is the Messiah," or "There he is," don't pay any attention. 24. For false messiahs and false prophets will rise up and perform great miraculous signs and wonders so as to deceive, if possible even God's chosen ones. 25 See I have warned you."
The seed of such spiritual corrosion has existed for a long time. Jeremiah 17:9 spoke of it. But the climate in our country in the past wasn't right for it to grow here. The climate however has been slowly changing over a long period of time. Now that seed has germinated and is sprouting. With the current volume of spiritual manure around, spread regularly by our media, I expect it will do quite well here eventually.
So what do we do now? Well, we can sit back as we have as a nation and watch it grow, or we can fight it. If it is indeed the end of times and the events are unfolding according to the Master's plan, we'll not succeed in eradicating it. But if we fight with His help, we will succeed by our efforts within our God given sphere of influence in preparing our own hearts and hopefully those of our children and grandchildren. We might even make some destined to meet God's wrath aware that they have a choice - and a way out. On the other hand, if it's not yet time for Christ's return, we could still experience the likelihood of succeeding in those things and at the same time send this nation of ours into a Holy Spirit led revival. If it meets with our Lord's will, we as a nation could find our way back to being one nation under God and back to being a nation whose actions and spirit allow His precious blessings.
The number of those who reject our Savior will not dwindle by themselves and the possibility exists that we are beginning to witness something foretold a long time ago. The stage hands of our enemy have been somewhat quietly and slowly setting the stage in readiness for a long time (toward their own demise I might add - God will not be mocked!). I believe that we may now already be involved in the playing out of the end of times. If I'm wrong in my observations, we still have opportunity to participate with our God's help to right the spirit of our nation. But if I'm right, we as God's children still have a call to action because we may be witnessing the approach of ...
The End.
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