“Take
heed, watch and pray; for you do not know when the time is. “It is like a man
going to a far country, who left his house and gave authority to his servants,
and to each his work, and commanded the doorkeeper to watch. “Watch therefore,
for you do not know when the master of the house is coming—in the evening, at
midnight, at the crowing of the rooster, or in the morning— “lest, coming
suddenly, he find you sleeping. “And what I say to you, I say to all:
Watch!” Mark 13:33-37 NKJV
And he
deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do
in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an
image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. He was granted power
to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should
both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be
killed. Revelation 13:14-15 NKJV
It
should be obvious to all who choose to visit this site that my sole intent is
to encourage fellow believers to not only grow in their faith, but to obey the
command to watch for the signs of our Lord’s return. As I often say, Jesus would not have told us
to watch if He had no plan to show us something to watch for. One of the more unbelievable events that the
Bible tells us will occur during the period called the Tribulation is the fact
that an image of the antichrist will be created which appears so real that
people will worship it. Does the preceding
article not make those who choose to watch, stop and consider just how close we
are to Jesus’ return? The following
article is by Terry James, of the Rapture Ready website. I thought it highly appropriate to share with
you today considering current events.
Time of the Signs ::
By Terry James
This
generation of passengers on Planet Earth is passing through a corridor John the
apostle and prophet called “the last time” (1 John 2:18). More to the point, we
are somewhere near the very end of that corridor, and signs the size of
billboards are on either side of the broad way that leads the world’s
inhabitants toward Armageddon. The only way to miss those gargantuan signs, for
the true child of God, is to deliberately ignore them, choosing instead to
focus on things of this world that perspective hides in the distant blackness.
We are, as my
good friend Chuck Missler says, in the time of the signs. They are signs so
dramatic, so blatant, that the whinnying and violent snorting of the four
horses of the apocalypse can almost be heard as they angrily paw the earth with
rage, straining to burst to full gallop, determined to carry their
death-dealing riders on their missions of globe-shattering devastation.
Jesus Christ,
the Creator of all things and the One who holds all of creation together
(Colossians 1:16-17), gave the signs that would be most prevalent at the time
just before His return to earth. These primary signals are found in three of
the Gospels: Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21. We will first look at the
Matthew account of the signs He gave for the final generation of human history,
just before His second advent.
Sign 1:
Deceivers who Claim Christ
Jesus was
directly asked by His disciples: 1) When would the things Jesus prophesied be?
2) What would be the signs of His second coming? and 3) When would be the end
of the world?
He gave the
following answer: “…Take heed that no man deceive you, For many shall come in
my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many” (Matt. 24:4-5).
Jesus gave
“deception” as the first major sign that will alert the spiritually attuned
believer that His second coming is near. Jesus, as recorded a few verses later,
amplified His words on “deception” that would be manifest at the very end of
the age:
“And many
false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many” (Matt. 24:11).
The Lord
begins by saying that Many will come in His name. This means, I think, that
these end-times deceivers will claim to come as true believers in Jesus Christ.
They will use His holy name to convince the undiscerning that the individuals
making the claim are of the Church, the body of Christ.
These are
those who will be among the individuals Jesus condemned, as recorded in the
following Scripture: “But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye
are; depart from me, all [ye] workers of iniquity” (Lk. 13:27).
However, this
prophecy that Jesus gave as the first sign of the very end of the age goes, I’m
convinced, much deeper. These deceivers will be declaring that they,
themselves, will be Christ-like, not in the sense of being a true Christian who
is a Spirit-filled follower of Jesus Christ, but in the sense that they have
powers and abilities like Jesus himself. They will claim to be the special
conduit from God, used by the Almighty to read minds, receive special
telepathic words from Him upon command, and even to raise the dead.
But, it will
all be smoke and mirrors. There will not be a single validated case of any of
these supposed miraculous activities direct from the portals of heaven to the
mortals of Planet Earth.
The question
to ask, then, while considering the time of the signs and whether we are indeed
at the very end of the age as predicted by Jesus is: Do we see today any sign,
any indicator, that there are such “deceivers” among us?
There have
always been deceivers and those specifically claiming to be Jesus Christ. Some
have been certifiable lunatics, some have been proven charlatans, and have
faded into the darkness of the exposed and deposed. Today, it seems, to me at
least, they are announcing their Christ-like powers from the very billboards mentioned
earlier–the ones lining either side of that broad way that leads to destruction
during these troubling days.
We see many
of them as glitzy, projected TV images calling the gullible to give their money
to special programs they proclaim God has told them about, which can make the
members of their audiences healthy, wealthy, and wise beyond their wildest
imaginations.
These promote
the outward-turning message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ only in a minimal
way, their messages designed to turn thoughts inward to the feel-good message
that God wants them to materially prosper. Viewers are deceived because they
can see through glazed, mesmerized eyes that the wealth message certainly works
for the rich and famous purveyors of the prosperity gospel. Their desire to
obligate the God of heaven to provide overflowing wealth and health, based upon
the TV magicians’ special formulas for success, make the deluded open their
wallets with glee.
Paul the
apostle’s prophetic words ring true for our time: “For the time will come when
they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap
to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their
ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables” (2 Tim. 4:3-4).
Others, appearing
more sophisticated and high-minded, claim to have Christ within their
pontificating, but are turned far from truth found in God’s Word. These
ecclesiastical elitists fit the mold of false prophets/teachers found in
forewarnings of Paul and Peter:
List of 2
items:
“This know also, that in the last days
perilous times shall come…For men shall…[have] a form of godliness, but [deny]
the power thereof…” (2 Tim. 3:1, 5).
“But there were false prophets also among
the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall
bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring
upon themselves swift destruction” (2 Pet. 2:1). – list end
These, though
under the guise of Christian clergy, join the ecumenists who proclaim that
there are many ways to God and heaven. By this heresy, they deny the Lord
Jesus, who said: “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh to the
father, but by me” (Jn. 14:6).
Sign 2: Wars
and Rumors of Wars
The second
sign of the very end of the age given by Jesus is in His declaration: “And ye
shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: See that ye be not troubled: for all
these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet” (Matt. 24:6).
“What is so
different about hearing of wars and rumors of war?” one might ask. Such has
been part of the human condition since history first began to be recorded. The
key to what makes this profoundly different is found in Jesus’ words in Matthew
24:21: “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the
beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.”
The Lord
himself said that the time of the end will be worse than any in history. This
declaration, by its very nature, makes the “wars and rumors of wars” He
predicts well beyond the norm. We see just how far beyond the norm they will
be, as recorded in His next statement: “And except those days should be
shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days
shall be shortened” (Matt. 24:22).
Christ’s
words indicate something of humankind-ending power. This statement follows His
warning of wars and rumors of wars for the very end of the human history
timeline that immediately precedes His second advent. All flesh will die if
Jesus doesn’t return upon His divinely scheduled appointment time!
The question
naturally emerges: Do we see any such power upon the world scene today? I,
perhaps, don’t even need to go into answering that–at least not very deeply.
That power to destroy all flesh has been on the scene as a major sign of where
we are on God’s prophetic timeline since 1945. The first atomic bomb test at
Alamogordo, New Mexico, flashed that sign across the night desert sky in a
stupefying instant. Soon “Little Boy” and “Fat Man” incinerated and blew apart
almost 200,000 Japanese citizens of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The hydrogen
bomb tests, coupled with intercontinental ballistic missile developments, made
the whole world aware that the planet’s inhabitants could well be living on
borrowed time. These weapons, yielding unfathomable power to destroy, continue
to scream from the billboard of forewarning while this generation nears the
denouement of the age. Weapons of such horrific magnitude must certainly be the
subject of and reason for Jesus’ “wars and rumors of wars” sign being issued
for the terminal generation. And this prophetic sign must, it follows, because
of that world-destroying weaponry being ubiquitous today, refer to our present
generation of earth dwellers.
Third-World
powers and terrorist organizations lust after weapons of mass destruction.
Potential for developing atomic weaponry is on the agenda of governments. North
Korea, Iran and other nation-states race forward with nuclear programs, defying
the international community as the G-8 and others try to prevent World War III.
Sign 3:
Nations and Kingdoms in Distress
The most
obvious category given by Jesus that we are in the time of the signs is that
involving the geopolitical disposition of nations. No observer of the world
scene today who believes that God has told the end from the beginning can look
at the way countries are prophetically juxtaposed and not see the end times are
upon this generation. Let’s look more closely at this third end-times prophecy
Jesus put forth while on top of the Mount of Olives, overlooking the Jerusalem
of His time while still in His flesh body: “Then said he unto them, Nation
shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom” (Lk. 21:10).
The Lord
forewarned tremendous ethnic upheaval at the time just before His second
advent. We’ve looked many times at the Greek term used here, translated into
the KJV as “nation.” The Greek term is ethnos, meaning “ethnic” in English.
Jesus said that the end times would be marked by ethnic hatred and strife.
“Kingdom”
against “kingdom” can be interpreted nation-state entities or countries will be
at war or about to go to war. These wars and rumors of war will present
unprecedented levels of danger to the peoples that inhabit the “kingdoms,” is
the implication. We have looked at why this is so. The nuclear and other
threats from weaponry of mass destructive capability brings our time to this
level of concern.
Jesus, when
considering the Luke account of His Olivet Discourse, goes on to express this
fact in expanding upon the time of the signs: “And there shall be…upon the
earth distress of nations, with perplexity…” (Lk. 21:25b).
Threat of
calamitous destruction, should there be all-out nuclear war, is obvious. Worry
about such potential catastrophe certainly fits Jesus’ prediction of end-times
perplexity and distress among the nations. The causes of this Armageddon-like
potentiality, however, seem to be now coming into focus.
During the
Cold War, there seemed little rhyme or reason why kingdom should rise against
kingdom and want to destroy each other and the rest of the world with
thermonuclear warfare. The unofficial doctrine termed “Mutually Assured
Destruction” (MAD), in fact, kept the superpowers, with their potentially
world-ending nuclear stockpiles, from doing the unthinkable–attacking each
other just for the sake of empire building or stopping empire building. Again,
there was no rhyme or reason–at least not enough–that convinced the leaderships
of the superpowers to pull the nuclear trigger. Warfare on such a horrific
scale was absolutely a no-win scenario for all concerned.
The Catalyst
Now, in this,
our generation’s time of the signs, a reason to go to Armageddon-like war might
just be in view. The catalyst that just might be a large part of galvanizing the
nations of the world into a collective mindset that throws MAD out the window
of sanity, thus bringing all into the valley of Jehoshaphat (Joel 3:2), isn’t
so far-fetched to contemplate.
The thirst,
thus the lust, for petroleum looks more and more like a potential reason to
cause all to gather at Megiddo on the plain of Jezreel. The nations in
distress, with perplexity, exactly describes the industrialized nation-states
of Planet Earth while they scramble to secure for themselves the black liquid
gold that can fire their engines of wealth production.
While there
is talk of alternative fuels, none of practical development and implementation
looks to be in view for decades ahead. The oil-rich Middle East is the logical
place to look first in the attempt to secure energy-producing fuels. Oil in the
region surrounding God’s chosen nation, Israel, is the quickest, most
accessible such arena of supply.
The Nations
in this Time of the Signs
The alignment
of the nations pertinent to Bible prophecy, as they are presently positioned
and are dynamically rearranging, are eerily similar to the configuration Jesus
and the Bible prophets forecast for the time just before Christ’s return to put
a stop to Armageddon, and to prevent the end of all flesh on Planet Earth.
Rosh (Russia)
sits due north of Jerusalem. The nation who will produce the evil leader called
“Gog,” those of us who hold to pre-trib rapture eschatology believe, struggles
internally and externally to become again a superpower to rival the United
States. To do this, that prophetic nation will need energy to fire the engines
of its industrial base.
Iran, the
area where ancient Persia largely sat, is in the throes of international
turmoil while it seems inalterably determined to produce nuclear weapons. At
the same time, it is allying in many ways with Russia, in keeping with the
Ezekiel 38 and 39 prophecy that foretells its joining forces with Gog to attack
over the mountains toward Israel. All the while, its leader declares his desire
is to erase all Jews from the Middle East.
Nations of
the area of the ancient Roman Empire have put aside centuries of disputes and
warring to form a reviving Roman Empire. The EU looks more and more to fit the
prophetic Daniel 9:26-27 template in a way that can be denied only by those who
refuse to acknowledge that Bible prophecy is to be interpreted as literal.
The great
dragon nation, China, is perhaps the oil-thirstiest of all of the industrial
giants. The prophetic scenario is not difficult to embrace that this behemoth,
which by itself could field the astonishing, prophetically stipulated
200-million-troop force, will move toward the Middle East at some point yet
future.
Despite
recent attempts to slow the use of petroleum a degree, this emerging industrial
titan, with its one-and-a-half-billion people, looks to be developing into
becoming the king of the kings of the East of Revelation 9 and 16.
Modern
Israel, the greatest sign in this time of signs, is positioned almost precisely
where the prophet Zechariah foretold, as recorded in Zechariah 12:1-3. Most all
of the distressed, perplexed nations of the world seem focused on God’s chosen
people as the key to war and peace in the Middle East, thus the key to world
peace. Again, modern Israel sits at the center of the region where the planet’s
greatest pools of petroleum reside beneath what the world calls the Holy Land.
It is a land destined for man’s most destructive war, then to become the heart
of Christ’s glorious 1,000-year kingdom.
Keep
watching.
