We receive reports each day that war is about to burst forth, that the world will change instantly when things suddenly go out of control. Global diplomats and governors will be helpless to assuage the rage into world war once the attacks begin.

For example, one front-and-center story that warns of war involves an ages-long trouble spot that has threatened to initiate nuclear conflict.

Is China “Massing Forces at Coastal Military Bases” in Preparation for an Invasion of Taiwan?

If the Chinese decide to pull the trigger on an invasion of Taiwan, it will instantly become the biggest news story in the entire world.  Because the moment that an invasion of Taiwan begins, the United States and China will be at war and nothing will ever be the same again. (Rapture Ready News, September 15, 2023)

The Russian invasion into Ukraine and the bellicose rants of some of Vladimir Putin’s military and diplomatic leaders make it clear the former Soviet Empire is again about to raise its ugly head. They threaten nuclear war at almost every opportunity. We can see that things are ramping up for the coming war against Israel, according to Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39.

Many pundits—even from the Bible-prophecy perspective—are warning that America might at any moment be invaded from the northern and southern borders by the Chinese and Russian militaries. This is despite the fact that: 1) there is not sufficient evidence to support the supposed threats, and 2) such hyperbole goes against what God’s Word indicates for both the “King of the kings of the east” (Revelation chapters 9 and 16) and Rosh (Russia), as indicated in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39.

Both of these bad actors on the war-making stage are destined to do their dastardly worst in other places of the world. Both China and Russia will be dealt with in the proper places and times by the Lord Himself, we are assured.

If these diabolists attacked the United States, our military would react, regardless of the feared impotence of the presidential administration and top military of the Joint Chiefs of Staff sort. There are automatic reaction forces in place to, through nuclear submarine retaliation alone, make such attacks by America’s chief enemies a suicide mission for the entire world.

This realized and stated, such potential for making a totally destructive war that threatens to end life on earth has its place in Bible prophecy. This truth is wrapped up in the one who will become the world’s last and most powerful evil dictator.

Actually it will be the threat of war that will cause the world to hand this wicked man his dictatorial crown. We are told this by Daniel the prophet:

And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries. And with the arms of a flood shall they be overflown from before him, and shall be broken; yea, also the prince of the covenant. (Daniel 11:21–22)  

Daniel went on to say:

And the king shall do according to his will; and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvelous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished: for that that is determined shall be done. Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all. (Daniel 11:36–37)

This is in reference, of course, to the “prince that shall come” of Daniel chapter 9. This evil prince—the son of perdition, the man of sin, the Antichrist—will come in by offering peace. He won’t have to win victories to achieve the control he desires. People will willingly give it to him.

This, of course, I believe, is verified in the prophecy of the first rider on the white horse of Revelation 6. Antichrist has no arrows, but a bow and crown, which are “given” to him.

And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see. And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer. (Revelation 6: 1–2) 

So this most powerful, evilest despot of all of human history will be, at first, unlike the previous vile dictators on earth. Each of them—like Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and all of the ruthless leaders like the Khans of the ancient past—arose to power by murderous, raw aggression. This final one will come with guile and demonically deceptive powers that will make people beg for him to take the crown of dominion they will gladly offer.

The question is valid: Why will such a man be not only accepted, but hailed and given complete adulation by most of the earth’s population?

The answer, of course, is that he will offer peace. This man, through demonic deceptiveness, will offer to take fear of world-rending nuclear war from the fear-filled thoughts of humankind.

We see that fear building even now, in preparation for the time when people will have lost reasoning guided by the Holy Spirit’s influence. The “restrainer” of 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 will no longer hold back both the madness of humanity and human emotions. The fear will cause hearts to fail, the Word tells us.

This most charismatic geopolitical leader in history will promise peace and prosperity. But it will be “peace, prosperity and the coming holocaust,” as the title of my friend Dave Hunt’s book so marvelously described.

Here is a further description by God Himself—through Daniel’s vision—of the coming world leader that might even now be itching to take the reins of global government:

And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up. And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power: and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper, and practice, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people. And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand. (Daniel 8:23–25)

The fear of all-out nuclear war will clutch the reprobate mindset of most of humanity and will cause them to give Antichrist his crown. He won’t have to fire a shot—at least, not at first. His military firepower and much worse will be used later in his satanically driven holocaust we call the Tribulation.

Antichrist’s great power and authority will come through the false peace he will promise. That delusion that mesmerizes the masses will bring on the worst time of all human history, according to Jesus (Matthew 24:21). Paul the great apostle said the following:

For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape. (1 Thessalonians 5: 3)

You want to escape that time of horror that humanity faces—perhaps in the very near future. Here’s how to go to Christ when He calls God’s family to Himself to escape Antichrist’s dictatorship:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10:9–10)

A very old saying is: “The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.”

This, of course, is a reference to romanticism—a saying that links a woman’s ability to cook delicious food to winning a man’s love for her. I have no idea about the validity of that connection, but I’ve heard the expression many times over the decades—and long before the saying became more or less passé.

Another saying is: “An army travels on its stomach.” By this, it doesn’t mean soldiers crawl on a battlefield to maintain a low profile to prevent hostile fire from hitting them. It refers an army needing to be well fed to maintain top fighting form—in the same way the army’s war machinery, like tanks, must be kept fueled properly to be effective fighting tools in battle.     

A time is coming when food will be the primary commodity that will fuel Antichrist’s machine of control over most of the earth. The unfortunate people alive at the time will comply with the demands of the man of sin’s regime—or face starvation.

Here is the Scripture verifying that this demand is on the prophetic horizon:

And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. (Revelation 13:16–17)

This prophecy, of course, is about the 666 mark those of the Tribulation era must receive—or otherwise be killed, as the prophecy goes on to indicate. It involves the personal pledge of worship to Antichrist that allows people to interact within the economic system of that horrific time.

To most believers who have deeply considered this future time Jesus said will be the worst of all human history (Matthew 24:21), there is little doubt that artificial intelligence (AI) will play a major part in fulfilling Antichrist’s ability to, for a time, control almost all of the world’s population. That swiftly developing technology will, without a doubt, be used to control who eats and who doesn’t.

Those who accept the 666 mark, signifying that they worship the Beast (Antichrist), will have given their souls over to the satanic realm. They will be lost forever—no chance of redemption, according to Revelation 14.

In this sense, AI will be the way to humankind’s stomach, thus to their heart.

I once heard Dr. J. Vernon McGee say that, in the Tribulation, he wouldn’t blame people for breaking into stores and stealing food, because their little children will be starving and will need to eat.

Well, I would—because of the question of age of accountability—have some contention with this great, old preacher about whether there will be children of any age beyond toddlers on earth at that time (which is another topic for another commentary). And, with the AI lockdowns and surveillance capability no doubt a thousand times greater even than it is now, it is doubtful that it will be possible to break in and steal from the Antichrist regime’s food stores.

While there will be many believing martyrs, the Holy Spirit and God’s direct intervention during those years will doubtless be tremendous, so likely miracles from on high will be almost routine. Many refusing the mark will, we can expect, be supernaturally protected and assisted by angelic activity.

That system of Luciferian control, we believe, is currently developing at a pace that is beyond astounding. We can understand the speed of things going on in AI through reports such as the following:

Customs and Border Protection (CBP), part of the Department of Homeland Security, has bought millions of dollars worth of software from a company that uses artificial intelligence to detect “sentiment and emotion” in online posts, according to a cache of documents…

CBP told 404 Media it is using technology to analyze open source information related to inbound and outbound travelers who the agency believes may threaten public safety, national security, or lawful trade and travel. In this case, the specific company called Fivecast also offers “AI-enabled” object recognition in images and video, and detection of “risk terms and phrases” across multiple languages, according to one of the documents.

Fivecast, according to its mission statement is “used and trusted by leading defense, national security, law enforcement, corporate security and financial intelligence organizations around the world” and “deploys unique data collection and AI-enabled analytics to solve the most complex intelligence challenges.” It claims to work with the intelligence agencies of all five nations that comprise the so-called “Five Eyes” — the United Kingdom, United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Canada.

Among the many red flags that Fivecast claims to be able to detect with its software are the emotions of the social media user. Charts contained in the marketing materials uncovered by 404 show metrics regarding various emotions such as “sadness,” “fear,” “anger,” and “disgust” on social media over time. “One chart shows peaks of anger and disgust throughout an early 2020 timeframe of a target, for example,” 404 reports.

Logistical difficulties of AI assessing human emotion aside, this would theoretically open the door for the government to surveil and censor not just the substance of speech, but also the alleged emotion behind that speech (which could potentially at some point be admissible in court to impune the intent/motive of defendants). It’s almost impossible to overestimate the dystopian applications of this technology, which for obvious reasons governments around the world are eager beavers to adopt. (“Techno-Hell: U.S. Government Now Using AI to Suss Out ‘Sentiment and Emotion’ in Social Media Posts” By Ben Bartee, PJ Media, September 7, 2023)

Food shortages are being reported around the world—much of it deliberately contrived by despotic governmental agents. Severe food shortage of the deadliest kind is foretold in God’s Word:

And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine. (Revelation 6: 5–6)

Starvation is indicated in this prophecy. The pale horse follows the black horse of starvation, meaning the deaths of many will result from food deprivation. This lack of food availability will certainly be a way Antichrist will control the populations of earth by causing many to worship him or die of starvation.

AI, as we’ve seen, is setting the stage for fulfillment of the rider on the black horse.

You don’t want to be on this judgment-bound planet when the rider on the black horse rides across the globe. Here is how to be in the presence of the Lord through the Rapture, and instead be sitting down to the supper of the Lamb, the greatest meal ever served, while billions on earth are starving because of rejection of God’s way of salvation:

That if thou shalt believe with thine heart the Lord Jesus, and shalt confess with thy mouth that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10:9–10)

While walking from my office, passing through to another part of our home, I hear my wife’s music CDs playing. On many occasions I hear the same song, obviously among Margaret’s favorites.

Now I find myself humming that song, which has become much more meaningful and even deeply etched into my mind and spirit.

The song is “Teach Us to Number Our Days.” My wife’s favorite version—and now mine—is by Marty Goetz, a Jewish American songwriter and singer.

The words, as I said, powerfully resonate within my spirit. Perhaps that’s because of my advancing age toward the hereafter. However, I believe it to be more and more a God-prompted reminder of just how near I am to facing the Lord Jesus Christ in that glorious, twinkling-of-an-eye instant of Rapture. It might just be a heads-up alerting us to how near all believers, dead and alive, are to looking into Christ’s omniscient eyes at any second and standing before Him to be judged for rewards and crowns at the bema –the Judgment Seat of Christ.

The lyrics of Goetz’s song, based on the words of the following Psalm, are doubly meaningful to those who look for Christ’s soon return. Scripture indicates we should realize the time is drawing near when we will stand before Him, thus we should ask to be totally aware and living righteously every conscious second of our lives.

So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. Return, O LORD, how long? and let it repent thee concerning thy servants. (Psalms 90:12–13)

The days each of us has been granted are indeed numbered in God’s heavenly accounting system. God’s Word puts it this way:

And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment. (Hebrews 9:27)

The Creator of all things measures everything with unerring precision. We’re told that every star is named. Every hair on our heads is numbered. Each and every created order is accounted for. The heavens are stretched and measured. The Creator intimates that He is aware of each grain of sand. His omniscience is without error; there is no place that He isn’t there.

Thinking on asking this great God to teach us to number our days brings to mind, in considering His dealing with rebels down throughout the millennia, His judgment against disobedient humankind.

The thing that stands out to me is that His judgment is measured. We see this truth time after time. He always shows divine patience. He never changes His mind about not being willing for anyone to perish, but wanting all to repent.

Consider the time of Sodom and Gomorrah and the Lord talking with Abraham about measuring the sins of the people of Sodom. The Lord had obviously been patient, but now came down Himself to assess the wicked city’s sins. Finally, when not even ten righteous people could be found, His judgment fell—after He removed Lot and his daughters to safety.

Consider how He dealt with Pharaoh in the days of the great Exodus. His judgment was measured. Each succeeding plague became more punishing until the Israelites were free to go.

Think of Babylon and the wickedness there. God had finally had it after years of Belshazzar’s evil doings. God’s divine measurement system was on full display—and was visible for all to see as His own hand wrote on the wall.

And this is the writing that was written, MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN. This is the interpretation of the thing: MENE; God hath numbered thy kingdom, and finished it. TEKEL; Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. (Daniel 5:25–27)    

Almighty God measures and numbers everything. All is under His all-seeing eye and His omnipotence. We are made in His image. He wants us to number all things in our lives and measure our actions so we will be accounted worthy when we stand before Him in judgment.

We’re told to judge ourselves in this regard so we won’t have to be deemed unworthy by Him:

For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. (1 Corinthians 11:31)

The prophetic application is that God’s measured judgment system is weighing all that is going on at this very moment. We are witnessing warnings of coming judgment because this world of rebels is being “weighed in the balances, and…found wanting.”

Still, the heavenly assessment is measured slowly, deliberately. God is still not willing for anyone to perish, but He wants all to come to repentance.

But judgment and wrath are on the way, make no mistake. And when they come, it will be the most destructive justice ever delivered:

For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. (Matthew 24:21)   

Even during that most horrific time of all human history, the judgment and wrath will be measured carefully and precisely.

There will be twenty-one specific judgments to call humanity to repentance, while devastating those filled with anti-God rebelliousness. The seven seals, seven trumpets, and seven bowls of God’s wrath will incrementally rain down God’s holy and righteous anger in measured degrees.

You don’t want to be on this fallen sphere when that judgment falls. God wants us to number our days and live them through Holy Spirit-indwelt righteousness. This means you must be reconciled—made righteous under God’s way of salvation. Here again is how to make sure you go to Christ when He Calls, whether through death or in the Rapture—which we believe can happen at any moment, considering all the signs that are manifesting.

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10: 9-10)

The end-times scent is in the very ambience that surrounds us. Something profound is about to bring change in ways that we can’t fully anticipate. I believe what’s about to change things in this world forever is the great Rapture event.

The Rapture will be the sudden disappearance of people from the earth. Only those who are righteous will vanish. All who are left behind will, at that moment, be unrighteous in God’s holy eyes.

Again, I believe the key prophecy involving the timing of the Rapture is given in the words of Jesus:

Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. (Luke 17:28–30)

So it is essential that we understand the righteous and the unrighteous. Who exactly are these? To get to the heart of what’s involved, I repeat here what I wrote in a previous article.

To begin, we must first consider God’s words to Lot’s uncle, Abraham.

The Lord said He would tell Abraham about things to come, because He knew Abraham would do righteously. God wanted him to know His plan to deal with Sodom’s wickedness, once He determined that action was necessary. The Lord, Himself, stood with Lot, then, and discussed Sodom’s fate, while the Lord’s angel-representatives headed down toward Sodom and Gomorrah.

And the LORD said, because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grievous; I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come unto me; and if not, I will know. And the men turned their faces from thence, and went toward Sodom: but Abraham stood yet before the LORD. And Abraham drew near, and said, Wilt thou also destroy the righteous with the wicked? (Genesis 18:20–23)

There was then a profound back-and-forth between the Lord God and a lowly human being—Abraham. God answered each of the old man’s questions. Abraham was appealing to God to have those in the wicked cities spared from destruction. He asked if God would relent if 50 were found to be righteous—then 40, then 30, then 20.

Finally, after Abraham asked if God would spare the cities if the Lord could find even 10 righteous and 10 couldn’t be found, Sodom and Gomorrah’s fate was sealed.

God had said to Abraham before the countdown began—following Abraham’s initial question about the possibility of the cities being spared:

That be far from thee to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked: and that the righteous should be as the wicked, that be far from thee: Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? (Genesis 18:25)

It was almost as if the Lord was mildly indignant to be thought of as being so unjust that He would condemn the righteous with the unrighteous.

Alas, there were not 10 righteous left in the city of Sodom. There were only Lot and his small family. God’s Word calls Lot “righteous,” even though Lot dwelt among perhaps the worst culture and society biblically recorded in such detail. The detail was so graphic it made the level of unrighteousness unmistakable.

It was business as usual during daylight hours, with the cities being apparently prosperous—buying, selling, building, planting, etc. But when the sun went down, they became a habitation of every sort of evil—particularly of debauchery, with homosexual rapaciousness leading the wickedness. The lustful males came even against the angels who visited Lot.

The raging men of the city threatened Lot with the worst possible attack if he didn’t go along with them and send out his visitors. They were on the verge of tearing down the door to get at their would-be victims. The only ones God considered righteous in the city at that moment were hated and threatened by the rest, who were the unrighteous.

And this is the angle I would like us to consider for now.

Jesus said in Luke 17:28–30 that it will be for those alive at His next revealing like it was at that time for Lot when he was hated and threatened by the wickedness of that society.

Lot and his two daughters were the only people who escaped the total destruction that descended upon Sodom and its sister city Gomorrah following their removal from those doomed cities. Thus they were the only people God considered righteous.

Now this is a point of considerable questioning of God’s Judgment, in thinking about Lot and those two daughters.

Lot…righteous?

How can a man who offers his daughters up for rape to a town full of sexual deviants be considered “righteous”?

As a matter of fact, how can those two daughters be considered “righteous” when they got their father drunk then had sexual relations with him once they were safely away from Sodom?

Yet Lot and those daughters were considered “righteous,” they were, therefore, the only ones who escaped God’s devastating judgment.

Here is how Peter confirmed Lot’s righteousness:

And turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly; And delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked: (For that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds.) (2 Peter 2:6–8)

So Lot and his daughters and their comportment are presented as proof that salvation—and the saving out of Sodom—was not because of their good works. They were obviously, in some ways, as corrupt in behavior as the culture in which they were immersed. What, then, made them “righteous”?

We go again to the story of Abraham to discover the answer. Here it is, the answer to what makes anyone righteous—thus able to escape God’s wrath against the unrighteous.

Moses said of Abraham, under Divine Inspiration: And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness. (Genesis 15:6) 

When a fear-filled jailer asked the Apostle Paul, “What must I do to be saved?” Paul said, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house” (Acts 16: 31).

In other words, Paul was saying that the jailer, those of his household, or anyone else can be saved only through belief in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus is the way, truth and life (John 14:6). He is the only way to reconciliation with God the Father.

This was true looking forward to the cross during Abraham and Lot’s days. It is true today, looking back to the cross on which God’s Only Begotten Son died for the sins of humankind.

Belief in Christ is the only way to escape from this doomed planet when Jesus calls believers to Himself in the Rapture. Belief in Jesus as God’s designated route to salvation is the only way to be considered righteous.

The story of Lot and his daughters answers the question: Will only Christians walking perfectly with God and looking for the Rapture go to Christ when He calls?

Good works will not get anyone to Heaven. Only Christ, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world–the only righteousness God recognizes—will put the believer in the presence of Christ when He says: “Come up here!” (Revelation 4:1).

Again, here is how to make sure you hear that call and are taken out of the Tribulation that will devastate the rebels of earth, just like God’s judgment and wrath destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10: 9-10)

*********

Just a note here to say again how pleased we are that Jonathan Brentner has joined us in writing for Nearing Midnight. He’s not only a colleague, but a Christian brother and friend I value very highly.

—Terry

A couple of weeks ago in my blog article, “Looking Up While Locking Down,” I attempted to foster a bit of comfort. I tried to make the point that while we see the powerful and wicked minions, both human and demonic, going all out to bring all people on the planet into global gulag, we can know that Jesus’ call to believers in the Rapture must certainly be drawing near. Surely we are in the time of Luke 21:28, because we’ve been seeing “all these things come to pass” for quite some time.

Jesus said when we see all of these things, we are to “look up,” for our Redemption–Jesus, Himself—will be drawing near. Paul told us we should “take comfort” in anticipation of that glorious event.

For those who are “watching” as Jesus admonished (Mark 13:37), the evidence is literally in every direction on the prophetic horizon. All of the signals are converging—in a proliferation of end-times signals that hasn’t happened before.

So there is every reason to be “looking up” as Jesus instructed those two thousand years ago when He was sitting atop the Mount of Olives.

And now the ominous reports are beginning to come forth, as if they’re paving the way to prepare for the minions’ next major attempt at bringing the populations of earth under the lockdowns that are obviously a part of the blueprint for the Great Reset. It is all within the Luciferian scheme the World Economic Forum and other Ephesians 6:12 powers and principalities intend to implement in establishing their New World Order.

Apparently, this September through December is the time they plan to again bring about the lockdowns that were successful in their previous such wicked, freedom-robbing test to see who would and would not comply.

The following somewhat gives a heads-up on what we might be facing before this year is out.

The Biden regime is preparing to reinstate full COVID-19 lockdowns, beginning with masking mandates for TSA and airport employees reportedly as early as mid-September, Infowars first to report.

A high-level TSA official reached out to Infowars, detailing a Tuesday meeting where TSA managers were informed of new memorandums and policies that would reimplement mask-wearing.

These policies will reinstate the mask mandate for TSA and airport employees starting in mid-September.

According to the TSA official, further details on how the policy will escalate will be provided next week.

The official added that by mid-October, mask-wearing will be mandated for pilots, flight staff, passengers, and all airport patrons…

[A trusted Border Patrol source] corroborated the directives, confirming that similar measures were being planned for Border Patrol personnel.

“They were told it was not a matter of ‘if’ but ‘when’ official Covid numbers will go back up and they expect by mid-October a return to forced-masking policies that the Biden administration previously only reluctantly ended after massive pressure. (“Biden Regime to Reinstate COVID-19 Restrictions Beginning with Mask Mandate as COVID Cases Rise, Say TSA and Border Patrol Whistleblowers,” Jim Hauft , Gateway Pundit, August 19, 2023)

The lockdowns are apparently going to be used to again influence the US presidential elections in their favor—i.e., steal the election. As we’ve said many times, America must be brought into compliance with the globalists’ plans. This nation is the holdup to their Great Reset blueprint implementation. They can’t allow an administration that believes in national sovereignty and borders to win as did Trump in 2016. Their plans were upset then, and they are doing all within their power to prevent Mr. Trump or anyone who puts national interests above globalist interests to again attain power.

So, while they think they are locking down America and the world’s populations, they are, in nautical terminology, battening down the hatches for a storm, the likes of which they cannot survive. It will be that great Tribulation storm Jesus said will be the worst time in human history.

Considering that all flesh except for Noah, his family, and the animals aboard the Ark was completely destroyed in the Flood of Noah’s day, Jesus’ description—followed up by His presentation in Revelation, is indeed a terrifying forecast!

Jesus said:

For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. (Matthew 24:21)

There will be no battening down of the hatches…no place to find safety during that future Tribulation storm on earth. You don’t want to be here during those seven years of hell on earth. Here is how to go to the safety of Heaven when the Lord Jesus calls His own from this judgment-bound sphere:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10:9–10)

“There are a lot of people coming against the pre-Trib Rapture,” a friend I was on the phone
with said.

I asked him to name names, and he said, “Guys like Joel Richardson and Walid Shoebat.”
These and many others, my friend said, are saying things like those of us who believe in and
teach a pre-Trib Rapture are heretics. And some are saying worse, like we’re leading people to
Hell with our false teaching.

I, of course—as reported in these commentaries—have heard those invectives and worse
against those of us who believe in and teach the pre-Trib Rapture of the Church. However, I’ve
met both Joel Richardson and Walid Shoebat. Mr. Richardson never came across as a man who
would make such strong condemnation. And I haven’t heard much about Mr. Shoebat, an
admitted former Mideast terrorist who is now a Christian, since we met at a prophecy
conference some years ago. He was passionate, to be sure, and I knew he didn’t believe there
will be a pre-Trib Rapture, but I never heard from him any such diatribe accusing us of being
heretics, as my friend said he and others were declaring.

So I did some research to see, in particular, what Joel Richardson (not his real name for his own
reasons, I’ve heard) was saying.

I could find no written documents of significance by Joel on the subject, so listened to his in-
depth discussion with a podcast host as they dealt specifically with Joel’s opposition to the pre-
Trib Rapture of the Church.

I totally disagreed with all of his reasons the pre-Trib view is unbiblical. I found them so weak as
to wonder why anyone should even worry about his view making inroads against the truth
regarding the timing of the Rapture.

I did agree with him on one thing, though. The pre-Trib view is diminishing amongst believers.
But it is not, in my view, Richardson and others providing anti-pre-Trib Rapture teaching that is
causing the diminishment. Rather, it’s a part of the end-times falling away from the faith in
general that is caused in part by the lack of biblical prophetic truth being preached and taught
in churches.

That said, however, when I met Joel Richardson, I found him to be a gentleman and a gentle
man, as Paul Harvey used to say about those he found to be so. And, upon listening closely to
him and the podcast host who was of the same anti-pre-Trib Rapture mindset, I heard the same
gentleness in his presentation.

As a matter of fact, he lamented that some within the pre-Trib prophecy preacher camp had
called him a heretic and much worse. Someone who had hosted, or cohosted, a seven
thousand-attendee prophecy conference had said these things about him.

Mr. Richardson said when he confronted the Christian brother, the conference host admitted
he was wrong, but had just “needed a scapegoat” to make his point while speaking at the
gathering.

I don’t know of any prophecy conference of that size, or what the man meant by “needing a
scapegoat” in this case, but I believe Joel Richardson to be a brother in Christ in every respect,
and one who tells the truth as he understands it. (It’s just that, after listening to him and the
host of the podcast, neither understands the truth in the matter of when Christ will call the
Church to Himself.)

Another anti-pre-Trib Rapture Bible-prophecy proponent I find to be otherwise quite accurate
on the way things are trending toward the Tribulation is Michael Snyder. He is excellent at
gathering information and reporting news of developments in the Ephesians 6:12 minions’
attempts to bring in Antichrist’s regime of control.

He wrote a book with the title The Rapture Verdict, in which he attempted to tear apart
evidence from God’s Word for the pre-Trib Rapture. His “verdict,” of course, was that he had
managed to prove there will be no pre-Trib Rapture.

Neither Mr. Richardson nor Mr. Snyder denies there will be a Rapture. But they lump Israel and
the Church together, so to speak. Their verdict is that both Israel and believers who comprise
the Church will go through the Tribulation. Mr. Richardson, at least—I can’t remember the
position of Mr. Snyder—denies that God deals with people in dispensations. They both put
forth that the Rapture will take place within the Tribulation, as I understand. Their belief is
based upon the “last trump of Revelation,” to a large extent.

Mr. Richardson, as I heard him in the interview—and the host agreed wholeheartedly—said the
best we pre-Trib Rapturists could come up with was Revelation 3:10. He admitted it did seem to
indicate believers will escape God’s wrath. However, he said that Scripture didn’t mean we will
not go through the seven years of Tribulation, but that we will be kept “through” that time,
which will be, according to the Lord Jesus, the worst in all of human history.

To me, Mr. Snyder and Mr. Richardson’s “Rapture verdict” is overthrown–overturned—in one
simple word in the following promise from our God:

Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of
temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth.
(Revelation 3:10)   

As I understand, Joel Richardson believes the word “wrath” means in the eternal sense, not in
the sense of the physical—i.e., we won’t suffer the eternal wrath reserved for the lost, but must
be here for the physical punishment phase.

But even more confusing is the that he said, if I heard him correctly, that this Scripture says we
will be kept “through” this period of horror during which God judges and makes war on
unbelievers and on Satan and his angelic hordes. I find this to make little sense, as millions of
new believers will die during that era.

But one word totally overturns the Rapture verdict of the anti-pre-Trib argument, in my view.
That term is the simple little word “from.”

It is the Greek word ek, which means “out of,” not “through.” We will be kept “out of” that
hour that will come upon the whole world of rebels during the Tribulation.

Of course, there is an overwhelmingly extensive body of evidence that could be brought into
play that proves the pre-Trib Rapture is truth. And that evidence has been presented over and
over, beginning with the great Apostle Paul’s words that we should “take comfort.”
No “comfort” can come from knowing you are going through the worst time of all human
history. Here are Paul’s words of comfort:

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the
archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we
which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet
the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one
another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:16–18)

Wickedness is flooding this generation in America and around the world, as we try to document in these commentaries each week. Our purpose is to make people aware that the stage is being set for the fulfillment of Bible prophecy according to God’s Word. Truth comes only from the mind of a Holy God and is counter to all the deception that is rampant while the seven years of Tribulation draw ever closer.

Jesus said there would come a time near the end of the age when deceivers, even using His name in their declarations, would come on the scene:

“And he said, Take heed that ye be not deceived: for many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and the time draweth near: go ye not therefore after them” (Luke 21:8).

There would be a time when deceivers would say their credentials came from Him, the Lord said, in effect. He warned His listeners not to be deluded into thinking their false teaching and false prophecy came from Him. In other places, Jesus said all such deception came from the deceiver’s father, the devil, who is the “father of lies.”

Apart from the actual declaration that there are many ways to salvation other than through Jesus Christ (see John 14:16), I can think of no greater deception than that foisted upon America and the world today than the lies intrinsic within the evil of abortion. This practice sheds the blood of the innocent, one of the things God has stated He hates. As many as sixty-five million unborn children—maybe as many as seventy million by now—have been murdered in the wombs of mothers in America since the Roe v. Wade ruling in 1973.

Jesus’ prophecy that there would be deceivers claiming to be speaking and acting at His prompting seems to be manifest glaringly in the following story:

A female pastor who is also a Planned Parenthood advisor delivered a sermon in which she said she felt “God’s presence” when she aborted two pregnancies, and she blasted Evangelicals for their “toxic theology” on the subject.

In a sermon delivered July 9 at The Community Church of Chapel Hill Unitarian Universalist in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, the Rev. Rebecca Todd Peters spoke candidly about her own experience with abortion and how she views Scripture through that lens.

Wearing a pink stole emblazoned with the Planned Parenthood logo, Peters opened her message bemoaning the state of pro-life Evangelicalism, with its “talking fetuses, aggressive bumper stickers and saccharine billboards quoting Scripture and invoking God’s wrath.”

Peters, who is also a professor of religious studies and founding director of the Poverty and Social Justice Program at Elon University in North Carolina, referenced the state’s recently passed law banning most abortions after 12 weeks. She said the bill’s passage is an example of Evangelical culture setting the political tone on abortion.

“When it is primarily Catholics and Evangelical Christians who talk about God and faith and abortion, they define the narrative anti-choice Christians have so effectively shaped,” she said…

Peters, invoking the language of decolonization ideology, went on to claim this narrative “has colonized our minds, traumatizing many people with its toxic theology and shaping a culture of stigma and shame that has silenced millions of women and people who have had abortions, erasing their voices, their stories, and their witness from the public sphere.”…

In one of the more shocking moments of the sermon, Peters referred to pre-born life as a “zygote” and criticized the “anti-choice” position that life begins at conception.

She revealed that, as a mother of two, she had previously aborted two other pregnancies.

“I, too, feel that I am known by God in these ways, as a woman who has borne two children. I can affirm that I felt something sacred happening in my gestating body during those pregnancies,” said Peters. “I can also attest that I felt God’s presence with me as I made the decision to end two pregnancies, and I felt no guilt, no shame, no sin.” (Ian M. Giatti, “PCUSA pastor teaches on Psalm 139, says she ‘felt God’s presence,’ ‘no sin’ after 2 abortions Sermon alleges ‘anti-choice’ Evangelicals have ‘colonized our minds’ with ‘toxic theology,'” Christian Post, Rapture Ready News, August 6, 2023)

To be clear, this abominable theology is not the position of the mainline Presbyterian Church. This comes from an offshoot of that denomination which, like in the case of a number of denominations as of late, suffers from what I believe to be apostate incursion. And that satanic incursion was, I believe, part of the Lord Jesus’ warning. The end-times deceivers are declaring their theology comes from God. Jesus, of course, is God, but the deity that inspires such thinking represented in the story of this “pastor” comes not from Him but from the father of lies.

While witnessing the ramping up of such evil, be assured that God will soon judge the wickedness that says He approves of the killing of unborn babies. I’m of the strong conviction that the Lord will make His statement on when life begins by taking every child–even those just conceived—from the earth at that moment of Rapture.

Rather than condemning those who are under this deception, we want to bid them to accept God’s only way to salvation. Thus, the fallen mind that cannot see the truth in the matter of abortion and all other matters antithetical to God’s will can, through a reborn and renewed mind and spirit, know truth from the true Deity in Heaven.

Here is how to come to that salvation:

“That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Romans 10:9–10).

Every significant prophetic signal is appearing every hour, indicating that Christ will at any twinkling-of-the-eye moment call believers to Himself. God’s Word offers great comfort to those who have accepted His grace gift of salvation to those who believe Christ died so they, personally, can be redeemed from the sin into which we’re all born.

I think it’s good to use this column this week to post the Scriptures that promise the stupendous rescue from this world of growing wickedness.

We are told to take comfort from thinking about and believing the stupendous promise of the Rapture.

Here are a number of those scriptural promises:

• John 14:1–3: “Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it werenot so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”
• Romans 8:19: “For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.”
• 1 Corinthians 1:7–8: “So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may beblameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
• 1 Corinthians 15:51–53: “Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal mustput on immortality.”
• Philippians 3:20–21: “For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.”
• Colossians 3:4: “When Christ, who isour life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.”
• 1 Thessalonians 1:10: “And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, evenJesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.”
• 1 Thessalonians 2:19: “For what isour hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming?”
• 1 Thessalonians 4:13–18: “But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive andremain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.”
• 1 Thessalonians 5:9: “For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.”
• 1 Thessalonians 5:23: “And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray Godyour whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
• 2 Thessalonians 2:1–3: “Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and byour gathering together unto him, That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.”
• 1 Timothy 6:14: “That thou keep thiscommandment without spot, unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
• 2 Timothy 4:1: “I charge theetherefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom.”
• Titus 2:13: “Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.”
• Hebrews 9:28: “So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.”
• James 5:7–9: “Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the judge standeth before the door.”
• 1 Peter 1:7, 13: “That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ….. Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
• 1 John 2:28, 3:2: “And now, little children, abide in him; that, when he shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his coming…. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.”
• Jude 21: “Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.”
• Revelation 2:25: “But that which ye have alreadyhold fast till I come.”
• Revelation 3:10: “Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth.”

Remember, with the privilege of the great promise of Rapture comes the responsibility of each of us to witness of His soul-saving sacrifice on the cross so many will join God’s family before their death or before that seven years of Tribulation that is awaiting those who reject Jesus, the only hope for lost humanity.

Here, again, is the Scripture in witness to Christ’s saving power:

Romans 10:9–10: “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”

It is the thing termed “iniquity” that bends our finite minds beyond understanding, the infinite mystery that makes one ask: How can a God whose every facet is framed by perfection have allowed such a thing as iniquity to exist?

That mystery brought into the world sin, thus death and all the subsequent evil involved in the separation of people from their Creator. Iniquity is on the rise in this world now, operating as powerfully as it did when it engendered rebellion in the Garden of Eden and during antediluvian times.

The introduction of its appearance is found in the following:

Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. (Ezekiel 28:14–16)

God’s Word further chronicles the effects of iniquity upon the once-magnificent created being called Lucifer:

How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. (Isaiah 14:12–14)

Throughout the eons, this creature–perhaps the most glorious of all creatures before God made humans in His own image—has infected all of the created order we’re aware of. Iniquity runs rampant amongst the globalist, would-be gods–the human minions within the “powers and principalities” of Ephesians 6:12.

These, under Lucifer’s (Satan’s) guidance, are striving with all the wealth and power they have to, like that old serpent himself, usurp God’s authority. They’re attempting to change God’s order of things at every turn.

They are at the center of the rebellion found within the entities that want to change the biological order—i.e., they say a person can be the gender of their choice rather than the one they were born. These declare that man can relate to man and woman to woman sexually just as during the days of Lot in Sodom. Such anti-God thinking promotes more and more the sexual exploitation of children in ways too egregious to detail here.

This is what I term “the Lucifer syndrome.” They are of their father, the devil, as Jesus put it. They believe and practice the lies Lucifer still foists upon humankind just as he has done since he, as a serpent, entered the pristine Garden of Eden and told Eve and Adam they could be like God Himself.

The Lucifer syndrome is infecting and affecting all who want to assume authority over this judgment-bound planet. They have invented the term “climate change” in pursuit of establishing their control. We’ve witnessed their nefarious doings, especially over recent months and years.

Their Agenda 30/Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) is currently scheduled to be put on the fast track to implementation this September. Climate change, is, of course, at the heart of their plans to create crises sufficient to cause global panic. Thus, they intend to force all to come within their Great Reset blueprint, thereby bringing about changes of their own making rather than keeping things as God has determined.

There are reports that they’re doing things like putting a screen of sorts between the sun and the Earth to cut down on global warming and other “harmful effects,” as they believe.

In reading reports of weather-induced disasters, it seems God is allowing the geophysical elements to feed their frenzy. The SDG sorts, in their Lucifer-syndrome, reprobate thinking, believe all the volatile weather is caused by such things as an increased carbon footprint wrought by people’s abuse of the planet.

However, I’m convicted it is the Words of Jesus that are being played out with all the truly ramped-up, weather-related events we are seeing. (A quick review of Rapture Ready News and the reports from around the world bears this out, to be sure.)

Jesus said the following to the Judaizers who tried to get Him to silence those who were praising Him as He entered Jerusalem on the donkey:

And he answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out. (Luke 19:40)

We are witnessing, I’m convinced, much of humankind turning their backs on God. The very elements–the created order—therefore are speaking out in witness to His glory.

The anti-God forces–those infected by the Lucifer syndrome—want to usurp God’s throne. They, whether wittingly or not, are, like their father, the devil, spreading and perpetuating the lie that man-made climate change will destroy the planet. They want all people to follow their lies down the broad way that leads away from the Savior.

This all means, I believe, the Lord is quickly setting the stage for the man of sin and his regime of control. –Thus to, through God’s judgment and wrath, bring about the end of the rebellion that began long ago when iniquity first entered the thoughts of Lucifer. It means, more importantly for believers of this Age of Grace, that the Lord Jesus is about to call His Church into the clouds of glory in the twinkling of an eye.

Here is how to go to Jesus when He makes that call:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the lord Jesus, and shall believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10:9–10)

Powerful forces are at work beneath the relative tranquility that masks the true state of our nation and world. Our society boils with turbulence beneath a crumbling veneer of sophistication. It is a culture mirrored by soap opera-type fiction and hedonistic movies that have, in turn, mesmerized much of the American public. Life has indeed imitated art, while year after year, morals have degenerated and the very concept of morality has been turned upside down and inside out.

Those who don’t know Christ for salvation are given a thrill-a-minute fix to satisfy insatiable cravings for instant gratification. All too many among the saved are caught up in the lures of worldly pursuits. Americans are, for the most part, sadly, all the while descending deeper and deeper into depravity.

Gleam, glitter, and unparalleled techno-gadgetry have procured Americans hours upon hours of time for pleasure-seeking and, it is more than abundantly obvious, for mischief-making. While the moguls of science do provide great benefits for human health, wealth, and achievement, to see the direction all of this is sweeping us, we only have to consider the news. We’re not a society that’s getting better and better every day and in every way, like the New Age evolutionary thinkers would have us believe. Feeding our voracious appetites for more exciting thrills and greater pleasures has only generated phenomenal growth in criminal activity. Those who perceive themselves to be the have-nots ravenously want the material things the propagandists flash before their lusting eyes. Because Big Brother government has, in effect, destroyed the work ethic through give-away welfare programs (but can in no way give this dependent class the shimmering lifestyle it lusts after), the rip in the fabric of society widens daily as the ungovernable elements engage in the only occupation they believe can secure for them the thrills and pleasures they seek. As a result, gang members as young as seven live and often die in their unattainable pursuits.

Last-Days Scenarios

Can there be any doubt that the end-of-the-age conditions and activities God’s Word predicts are now being played out before our eyes? The similarities between the biblical descriptions and the news reports are stunningly evident.

Human atrocities against fellow humans are pandemic. Stories of debased behavior are so numerous that news articles that would have formerly been front-page headlines now are relegated to pages farther back because even more heinous stories overshadow them.

Jesus Himself prophesied about the generation on earth at the time of His Second Advent: “But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be” (Matthew 24:37). He said, while talking with His disciples on the Mount of Olives, that generation, like the pre-Flood society of Noah’s day, will be “eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage” (Matthew 24:38). Like in Noah’s day, society will be conducting business as usual, desensitized to the perversities going on around them and even more desensitized to any consideration of the things of God and divine judgment.

Daniel the prophet said: “And the end of it shall be with a flood” (Daniel 9: 26), meaning a flood of wicked behavior and of God’s wrath and judgment pour upon the unrepentant, blasphemous people of the apocalypse. Jesus said the generation alive at the end of the age will be totally immersed in doing what is right in their own eyes, as were the folks of Noah’s day. The people of that earlier generation were getting married, going to parties, and engaging in commerce while their perversions, debaucheries, violence, and blasphemies were simply well-accepted, even welcome, ingredients in the culture and society of the time. Jesus said they were carrying on as usual “until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away, so shall also the coming of the son of man be” (Matthew 24:28–39).

Jesus was saying that people living at the time of His return will have become so rebellious as to have rejected the notion of a Creator God. Their thinking will have become so reprobate, their consciences so seared, that many will even forget that such a God was ever said to have existed! Christ’s coming will be so swift and startling that it will be like the horror of that long-ago, worldwide deluge that destroyed all but those who were found righteous in God’s eyes. Just prior to that Flood, Enoch disappeared, having been translated into the presence of the God with whom he walked righteously (Genesis 5:24). Noah and his family were supernaturally preserved upon the raging sea that engulfed the entire earth (Genesis 8).

Jesus also drew the parallel between the time of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and the days that will immediately precede the consummation of the age. “Also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed” (Luke 17:28–29).

Peter the apostle wrote about Lot’s days of interaction with the people of Sodom: “For that righteous man [Lot] dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds” (2 Peter 2:8). Peter then went on to imply the type of behavior that greatly disturbed Lot—the sort of behavior that inevitably brings on Almighty God’s indignation and judgment:

But chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness, and despise government. Presumptuous are they; self-willed, they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities…. But these, as natural brute beasts, made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things that they understand not, and shall utterly perish in their own corruption, And shall receive the reward of unrighteousness, as they that count it pleasure to revel in the daytime. Spots they are and blemishes, reveling with their own deceiving while they feast with you. Having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin; beguiling unstable souls; an heart they have exercised with covetous practices; cursed children, Who have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray…. These are wells without water, clouds that are carried with the tempest, to whom the mist of darkness is reserved forever. For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that are just escaping from them who live in error. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption; for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage. (2 Peter 2:8–19)

God’s Word speaks powerfully of His opinion about the vile activities that were commonplace during Lot’s day warning all generations that His righteous judgment must and will fall on those who engage in ungodly enterprises:

Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. In like manner also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities…these speak evil of those things which they know not; but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves. Woe unto them! For they have gone in the way of Cain…. Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. (Jude 7–13)

The Holy Scripture then rolls before the mind’s eye of our imagination the awesome truth within the words, “it is a fearful thing to fall in the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10: 31). As the book of Jude continues:

And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, To execute judgment upon all, and to convict all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him. These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts; and their mouth speaketh great swelling words, having men’s persons in admiration because of advantage. But, beloved, remember ye the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ; How they told you there should be mockers in the last time, who should walk after their own ungodly lusts. These are they who separate themselves, sensual, having not the Spirit. (Jude 14–19).

Apologies to Sodom and Gomorrah

Ruth Bell Graham said, in surveying the growing wickedness in our nation, that if God did not judge the United States, He would surely have to apologize to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Many years have passed since Mrs. Graham made that (in my opinion, very correct) assessment. Does the fact that the United States has not been obliterated by fire and brimstone, consumed in a thermonuclear holocaust or by supernatural fire, mean our conduct is improving enough that the Almighty will not judge us like He did those ancient cities? Or does it mean Mrs. Graham was wrong?

One thing is sure. God is never wrong and thus never needs to apologize for His actions. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8.) His immutability is perfectly consistent. Thankfully, and praise His holy name, so is His quality of mercy, His slowness to anger and wrath—else the little, though tremendously prideful, creature called man would have ceased to exist long ago.

The reason God has not yet brought about the removal of His Church and hasn’t yet let Daniel’s end-times flood of evil deluge a judgment-deserving world of rebels is found in the following:

But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night. (2 Peter 3:8–10a)

Don’t let the day of God’s wrath being poured out on a judgment-deserving world be part of your future. Accept Christ this moment and be assured of being lifted to the safe harbor of Heaven for all of eternity. Here is how:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (Romans 10:9–10)