I’m reading a novel now, called “The Last Seven Years” by Carol Balizet. It was written in 1979. The author novelizes the time immediately prior to the rapture and goes through the next 7 years of the prophesied Tribulation. I am about a third of the way through and I am enjoying it very much. I find it so interesting that despite being published 33 years ago, and perhaps written some time before that, the events she is showing as the status quo on earth prior to the rapture are exactly the conditions we are experiencing now. It is spooky, really. She even nailed the colony collapse disorder. Though CCD was known beginning in 1972, the proportions of bee disappearances didn’t reach drastic levels (with attendant impacts) until 2006.
It is interesting to read such conditions as an extended and inexplicable heat wave, that, combined with astronomically high utility bills people cannot pay, means people are suffering in heat and tempers are short. That the inflation of food is so high that grocery stores are fairly empty and robbers wait in the parking lots to steal housewives’ bags. That the police are so overwhelmed with crime that vigilante ‘protective agencies’ are springing up. That nudity, drugs, and immorality are such a part of the landscape that people barely detect it any more. That parents are hesitant to discipline their rebellious teens because the public schools have a powerful agency called Student Rights Services where parents can be arrested on the basis of child complaints.
It takes a special author to be able to project ahead the conditions from three decades ago. Her book was written before even the strong emergence in the US of the homosexual agenda, but the book shows the ill effects of a culture adopting and accepting all manner of perverse lifestyles.
I liked the way she handled the rapture itself. A giant meteor hit the island of Cyprus, and causes global earthquakes and tsunamis. It was during the height of the impacts that the people disappeared. Some were seen leaving, by having a white glow just before disappearing, others were simply not found when the rescuers came to clear rubble. In that way, the disappearance of millions were just part of the general havoc and in some cases, not even the primary news.
It was interesting to read that in the aftermath the officials were writing a news report, and were developing theories on where the disappeared people went. The usual theories that we are familiar with were discussed. The one that was discussed the briefest amount of time and given the least credence was the rapture. It was stated that there were a good many clergy remaining, along with their congregations, so a Christian rapture couldn’t be the answer. Sad!
The book is out of print but available through sellers on Amazon and of course your local Inter-Library loan would be able to get it for you. It is my kind of book.
What is NOT my kind of book are most Christian novels. I’m not a sentimental person and usually avoid books with quilts on the cover, or sisters, or sunsets. I loathe triteness. An essay I’d read this morning linked from Challies titled Master craftsmen 2012 Books Issue talks about how Christian novels are not all treacly or badly written, that they can deal with mature themes and have a gritty undercoating but remain moral and sensitive. A list was offered of recommended books. You can click on the master Craftsmen link for that reading list and synopses of each book. I haven’t had much luck with enjoying a recent Christian book lately, except for the classics that are on his list, such as CS Lewis, John Bunyan, Tolkien, and several others. I remain skeptical. But the list is there for you to check out, it’s a long one, and likely there will be something on it for your quality summer reading.
I do recommend John Grisham, who doesn’t write Christian legal thrillers but his Christian background produces a moral book clean of language and sexuality. They’re just good stories. I’ve enjoyed Frank Peretti’s This Present Darkness. Actually one book with a sunset on it was pretty good. It was authored by Tracie Peterson and Michale Landon Jr called One More Sunrise. It was very well written. Another good series is the Tides of Truth Series by Robert Whitlow. They are slow moving but then again, in the summer, it is a slow moving time anyway 🙂
A non-Christian series I really enjoyed was the Barker and Llewelyn novels starting with Some Danger Involved by Will Thomas. They are clean but gritty underbelly detective novels of the early Victorian era. Thomas promises his next Barker and Llewelyn is due out soon!
As I finish Balizet’s “Last Seven Years” I’ll let you know if the later portions hold up with continued good writing and good theology. Don’t settle for bad theology! I know it is a struggle these days, and women are swooning over Justin Bieber and watching Magic Mike. Stay pure.
A while ago someone kindly sent me a link to a website that keeps track of landslides. If you follow this blog for very long, you know that I often state that Jesus graciously answered the disciples’ questions in Matthew 24:3 “Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?” by presenting a lengthy answer in the rest of Matthew 24.
In His answer, and also in many, many other New and Old Testament verses, geo-physical storms and changes are part of His warnings that the end will be near. Weather, earthquakes, volcanoes, celestial signs, etc. all indicate the end of the age. Though those things have always occurred since the Fall of man in Genesis 3, His constant use of the metaphor that the signs will be as birthpangs tells us that the majority of noticeable warning signs (and then actual judgments) will crowd the latter part of the Church age.
So being interested in end time warning signs, to see if the things happening are indeed unusual in number or type, I have a lot of bookmarks that immediately lead me to information about current news of meteor sightings, volcanoeruptions, earthquake activity and the like. So I placed the landslide bookmark within that list…and then forgot about it.
Until a few days ago. I clicked on it…and was immediately struck by the number of rain-driven landslides and the disruptions they are causing. Wow! The first story on the top of the list was from June 30 and the opening lede goes like this:
“Yesterday more details emerged of the landslide incident on the West Highland line in Scotland that derailed a freight train. The incident came during the exceptional rainfall associated with thunderstorms that passed across northern Britain – a final hurrah for the wettest second quarter of the year on record in the UK.”
“Flood warning: UK faces a month’s worth of rain today. Today is forecast to be the wettest day of the summer so far with the UK facing a month’s worth of rain in 24 hours, bringing a severe risk of flooding and chaos.”
Flooding and chaos…chaos seems increasingly to be a component of weather forecasts these days, doesn’t it?
Here is some other news for you today.
Another small earthquake shakes Johnson County (TX) “Yet another minor earthquake shook Johnson County overnight. The 2.7-magnitude quake struck shortly before 3:30 a.m. between Cleburne and Alvarado, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. No injuries or significant damage was reported. Generally, it’s tough to feel anything below magnitude 3. It was the fourth temblor in three weeks in the county and the latest in dozens in that area.”
I saw that there was a small one in GA a few days ago too! In Deepstep, GA 66 miles from where I live, a magnitude 2.7 at 9:51 PM EDT on July 3. As a matter of fact, a few days ago, not July 3 but before that, I was sitting quietly at my table, reading the bible. The bookcase next to my table began to shake and the coaster skittered, making a jiggle on its notepad. A truck was not going by and a train was not going by and I do not live near a quarry and no one was using an auger or drill. “Hmmm, this is an earth tremor,” I thought. I discovered that about 50 miles away, a temblor had occurred at only 1.7 mile depth. Perhaps that was what I had felt. Though earthquakes happen in Georgia USA, I had never felt one. Now, perhaps, I have.
Anyway, I read stuff like that and worse, in just the headlines, even, and I pray more fervently for the rapture so the children will be safe at last. Those in the womb, the neglected, the abused, the molested, the hungry, the enslaved…all safe!!!!
There have been fish kills in Georgia USA, South Dakota, South Carolina, Dexter MO, Delaware, etc. but in this case, unlike the fish die-offs in 2011 and 2012, the experts say that the excessive and successive heat has sucked the oxygen out of the water and the high temps are just too much for the fish. Which makes sense.
I hope you’re staying cool today. I am, but it is a struggle. I went out to the Dollar Store for my weekly stocking up , this time choosing the store location a mile from me instead of 7 miles, because I wasn’t also going grocery shopping at the same time. Even with that minor trip, which included the bank, veggie stand, and the Post Office, when I came home I was hot, cranky, sweaty, and hot. Did I say I was hot?
Ahhh, but the mercies of Jesus continue. He gave me my daily manna, and I have food and fresh fruit & veggies, a comfortable home, and pleasant days in which to study His word. Here is a great essay from Jesse Johnson. He is a DC pastor, who was affected by the terrible storms that occurred the other day in our nation’s capital. He compares the inconveniences of that storm to the one that is coming that will be far, far greater. “Storms come and Storms Go“. May it bless you and may we all have perspective in these perilous times that we dwell in His hand and He is in control.
Scientists say that they are 99.999999% sure they have found the elusive Higgs boson particle, AKA their dubbed “God” particle.
Why do they want to know if the Higgs boson exists? Because:
A picture with a zoom effect show a grafic traces of proton-proton collisions events measured by European Organization for Nuclear Research in the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experience on May 25, 2011 in the search for the Higgs boson.
“The Higgs boson has long been thought the key to resolving the mystery of the origin of mass. The Higgs boson is associated with a field, called the Higgs field, theorized to pervade the universe. As other particles travel though this field, they acquire mass much as swimmers moving through a pool get wet, the thinking goes. “The Higgs mechanism is the thing that allows us to understand how the particles acquire mass,” said Joao Guimaraes da Costa, a physicist at Harvard University who is the Standard Model Convener at the LHC’s ATLAS experiment. “If there was no such mechanism, then everything would be massless.”
The origin of mass is no mystery. Read Genesis 1:14-19. Even better read Genesis 1:1. Scientist Herbert Spencer said that “all reality, all that exists in the universe can be contained in five categories…time, force, action, space and matter. Time, force, action, space and matter. That is a logical sequence. And then with that in your mind, listen to Genesis 1:1. “In the beginning,” that’s time…”God,” that’s force, “created,” that’s action, “the heavens,” that’s space, “and the earth,” that’s matter. Everything that could be said about everything that exists is said in that first verse.” (source).
I’ve always thought that the Large Hadron Collider and the activities around the search for the God Particle are one of the best benchmarks for where we are in the prophetic timeline nearing judgment. This is because in my opinion, the LHC is a post-Shinar Tower of Babel.
In Genesis 11:1-9 we read the story of the dispersal from the Tower of Babel.
“Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built.”
“And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” So the LORD dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of all the earth. And from there the LORD dispersed them over the face of all the earth.”
The people had been told to go forth and multiply and fill the earth. But instead they “settled” at Shinar, rebelling against the Lord’s command. There, they determined to deepen their rebellion by building a city for themselves, (so they could be socially satisfied) and to make a name for themselves (to satisfy their pride) and to build a tower that will touch the heavens (to satisfy their false gods).
There is no excuse for them. There still lived the people who had lived before the flood, Noah’s sons. They estimate the Tower was built a mere 100 years after the flood, so rebellion again began quickly. They could still listen to first hand accounts of life pre-Flood and know what a Wrathful God would do. They suppressed the Truth in unrighteousness (Rom 1:18) and determined to build a monument to touch the heavens so their false gods would be honored. But instead of God judging them via flood again, which He said He would not do, He judged them by separating them.
The Large Hadron Collider is the world’s most expensive science experiment, costing about 10 billion dollars. The aim is, according to the article here, five-fold:
1.The origin of mass “This discovery bears on the knowledge of how mass comes about at the quantum level, and is the reason we built the LHC. It is an unparalleled achievement,” Caltech professor of physics Maria Spiropulu, co-leader of the CMS experiment, said in a statement.”
Let us make a name for ourselves.
2. The Standard Model The Standard Model is the reigning theory of particle physics that describes the universe’s very small constituents. Every particle predicted by the Standard Model has been discovered — except one: the Higgs boson. “It’s the missing piece in the Standard Model,” said Jonas Strandberg, a researcher at CERN working on the ATLAS experiment. “So it would definitely be a confirmation that the theories we have now are right.”
Man seeking to confirm himself through his own wisdom? “Whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom will be delivered.” (Proverbs 28:26)
3. The Electroweak Force “A confirmation of the existence of the Higgs boson would also help explain how two of the fundamental forces of the universe — the electromagnetic force that governs interactions between charged particles, and the weak force that’s responsible for radioactive decay — can be unified.”
“And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.” (Gen 11:6)
4. Supersymmetry Another theory that would be affected by the discovery of the Higgs is called supersymmetry. This idea posits that every known particle has a “superpartner” particle with slightly different characteristics. … “If the Higgs boson is found at a low mass, which is the only window still open, this would make supersymmetry a viable theory,” Strandberg said. “We’d still have to prove supersymmetry exists.”
We already know that the universe is orderly. “For God is not a God if disorder but of peace.” (1 Cor 14:33). James 3:16 says that disorderliness is of every evil work. To come that close to acknowledging the harmony, symmetry, and orderliness of God but not acknowledge that it IS God, is the height of blasphemy.
5. Validation of LHC “The Large Hadron Collider is the world’s largest particle accelerator. It was built for around $10 billion by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) to probe higher energies than had ever been reached on Earth. Finding the Higgs boson was touted as one of the machine’s biggest goals.Finding the Higgs would offer major validation for the LHC and for the scientists who’ve worked on the search for many years.”
It’s an achievement if man can validate man? The Tower’s ends were to feed on itself, too. Of the Tower of Babel affair, “The contrast in this brief text is between what man desires to achieve directed at self glory, self fulfillment, and what God does to show man’s impotence and emptiness before him. It is man at his best and his noblest trying to achieve his greatest anti-God act and God steps in and undoes the whole thing.” MacArthur
Listen to physicist Michio Kaku on the implications of the God Particle’s discovery with an ear to the aims of man in building the Tower of Babel. It is an end to feed on itself:
The difference is that when comparing the LHC achievement to the United States’s original moon shot achievements, particularly on December 24, 1968, in what was the most watched television broadcast at the time, the crew of Apollo 8 read in turn from the Book of Genesis as they orbited the moon. Bill Anders, Jim Lovell, and Frank Borman recited verses 1 through 10. They acknowledged God, and took one giant leap for mankind- as His witnesses.
The people who are active in and who are around and who report on the doings in the lab under the Alps at Switzerland, use God language, refer to God’s creations but do not acknowledge God. Here is one example:
Lisa Randall wrote a book called “Knocking on Heaven’s Door: How Physics and Scientific Thinking Illuminate the Universe and the Modern World” and in it she refers to the LHC — “Despite my resistance to hyperbole, the LHC belongs to a world that can only be described with superlatives. It is not merely large: the LHC is the biggest machine ever built. It is not merely cold: the 1.9 kelvin (1.9 degrees Celsius above absolute zero) temperature necessary for the LHC’s supercomputing magnets to operate is the coldest extended region that we know of in the universe—even colder than outer space. The magnetic field is not merely big: the superconducting dipole magnets generating a magnetic field more than 100,000 times stronger than the Earth’s are the strongest magnets in industrial production ever made.”
Isn’t man great!! We can do things!
Algernon Swinburne, English poet, wrote a poem in 1871 called Hymn of Man. In the book, Swinburne and His Gods: The Roots and Growth of an Agnostic Poetry we read this quote about why Swinburne wanted to make a poem called “Hymn to Man”: to sing the human triumph over ‘things’, the opposing forces of life over nature, and over the God of his own creation. It might end somehow thus with a cry of triumph over the decadence of a receding deity:
“And the love song of earth as thou diest sounds over the graves of her kings, Glory to man in the highest, for man is the master of things.”
Yet the bible says, “We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. However, as it is written: “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him” but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 1” (1 Cor 2:6-10).
The lesson of the Tower of Babel, and I suspect the LHC also, is that when man searches the deep things of God without and apart from the Spirit, worshiping the creation and not the Creator, look what happens:
“For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.” (Romans 1:21-23)
“They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.” (Romans 1:25)
Today in the United States it is the Independence Day AKA the Fourth of July. This is a national holiday where we gather together and celebrate the birth of our nation and celebrate all that she stands for. We do this by assembling at community spots where we applaud parades, have family or community cookouts, wave flags, proclaim all that is good about our nation by speeches, declarations and songs, and we honor veterans dead and alive who fought to keep us free.
I love America. I thank God that He allowed me to be born here. My great-grandparents and my grandparents, all 4, were immigrants. They took advantage of the wonderful opportunities America affords to create a good and comfortable life. That life was passed to the next generations and is still ongoing with the little ones in my family coming up.
But if we are truthful we know that America, once great, is still great but not quite so shining from sea to sea as she once was. We’re tattered, a bit downtrodden, faltering. We are not a juggernaut any more. This is because we are under the Wrath of Divine Abandonment. We forsook God and He is forsaking us. He gives individuals over to their sin and He gives over nations, too. (Romans 1).
I’m so glad that I was born in 1960. I remember the moon landings, the thrill of all the new inventions the latter half of the Twentieth Century offered (internet, CDs, VHS, cancer advances, satellites). I stood amazed at the pace that inventions were popping out that made our lives easier. I loved seeing America’s military might police the world. You know that the world does need a policeman, right? Just as communities do. And without one, there would be global anarchy. Well, we stepped up. I was proud.
But I am also grateful because I am now seeing the vivid and unmistakable decline. The Lord is stripping away my clinginess to earthly things, including patriotism, and He is gently turning my head to the heavens, where there is a better country.
“These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.” (Hebrews 11:13-16).
Christians are already residents of a better country, and we have prepared for us a place in a heavenly city!
If you are reading this and you’re in America, let’s celebrate our God-blessed heritage, our veterans, and our communities today. We have so much to be thankful for and proud of. But let’s temper that with celebration and honor of and to our God who has in reserve for us a better country, one where we are truly free- in JESUS.
The Herodian version of the model shows visitors how excavators believe the Temple Mount site appeared prior to its destruction by Roman troops in the year 70 CE. The focus is on the southern portion of the enclosure, and includes reconstructions of Robinson’s Arch (an early overpass linking the top of the platform with the major city street below), the Hulda Street gates and passages onto the platform, the Royal Stoa, and the Second Temple. The reconstruction is based on the excavations at the Temple Mount under the direction of Ronny Reich and regional archeologist Gideon Avni. On view at the Davidson Center.
This week’s super derechos are still wreaking havoc over a large portion of the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states. Though derechos are not common but do occur once per year in the Midwest, in the Mid Atlantic states and northern states they do not. In those areas, what happened is an extremely rare occurrence, as this meteorological story says: “Derecho’s are pretty rare in this area to begin with; a “Super” Derecho is almost unheard of. And, they are even harder to forecast than tornadoes because they are so rare.” (Left, birth of the super derecho that affected millions this week.)
The Duluth Weekly’s headline tells the story pretty starkly: ” Super Derecho “The Land Hurricane” Slams 700 Miles of the US“. “AccuWeather.com reports a “super derecho” of violent thunderstorms left a more than 700-mile trail of destruction across the Midwest and mid-Atlantic on Friday, cutting power to millions and killing thirteen people. … States of emergencies have been declared in Virginia, West Virginia and Ohio. With 2.5 million in the dark, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell stated that his state experienced its largest non-hurricane power outage in history.” (Above right, derecho in Nebraska).
Power outage. Now there’s a problem. Just a few weeks ago I posted a blog essay titled “Our fragile electrical grid.” I’ve published several articles in the past about how God is stripping away our infrastructure to reveal our helpless condition in the face of the Creator.
For example, in this essay from February 2012 I wrote about the futility of prepping for Armageddon in the way the secular media presents it, and the only secure location is in Jesus. I mentioned the book, One Second After by William Forschten. The blurb summarizes:
“New York Times best selling author William R. Forstchen now brings us a story which can be all too terrifyingly real…a story in which one man struggles to save his family and his small North Carolina town after America loses a war, in one second, a war that will send America back to the Dark Ages…A war based upon a weapon, an Electro Magnetic Pulse (EMP). A weapon that may already be in the hands of our enemies. Months before publication, One Second After has already been cited on the floor of Congress as a book all Americans should read, a book already being discussed in the corridors of the Pentagon as a truly realistic look at a weapon and its awesome power to destroy the entire United States, literally within one second.”
An EMP fries every electronic chip within its pulse. That means no banking or ATM machine so no access to money, no gas pumps, no lights, no heating, no cooling, no refrigerator, no working vehicles, tractors, combines, or harvesters, no elevators, no cooking, no business transactions, no stock market, no traffic lights, no water pumps, etc. No nothing. Nada.
The novel was written in 2009 and is realistic in the scenarios it depicts. The end of the book talked about the likelihood of a given population’s survival after an EMP with all the societal collapses. The Wiki on this book states, “Refugees from the cities show up looking for food and shelter and the fight over scarce resources leads to confrontation, home invasion, and more violence-related die-offs. The community becomes an inviting target for free prisoners and organized gangs and more violence-related die-off. Ration cards are issued to conserve the little remaining food; regardless, the community slowly starves with the elderly the first to die off. Next parents starve themselves to save their children. Throughout this period suicides are common. After a year, approximately 20% of the initial population has “survived”. It was stated in the epilogue section from actual sociologists and scientists that such a die-off rate (80%) in the aftermath of an EMP is likely….but also optimistic due to the favorable location of the ‘lucky’ survivors. Some scientists put the survival rate at a mere 5%.
The super derechos downed power lines, blew transformers, and greatly impacted the electrical grid itself. Our favorite doomsayer, Michael T. Snyder at the Economic Collapse blog asked the question yesterday:
Our “civilized” world is relatively new. The industrial revolution’s impact was not felt for the average American until the early part of the 1900s, when the ‘labor saving’ gadgets started becoming available. Automobiles, telephones, cross-country train travel and freight delivery, canned and frozen goods transported mass distances, electricity…all new. Only the last one hundred years, really, have been one of ‘civilization’ and ‘ease’. It takes relatively little to turn us back to barbarians. (Illustration source- Wikipedia)
But in the industrial age, we relinquished that tie to the land for what was believed to be a superior way of life, and in that supposed superior way of life, there was no need for a higher power, because it seemed like we had tamed the earth.
We haven’t.
It has been four days, and yet “Frustration Grows as Heat, Power Outages Persist“. The Governor said “recovering from Friday’s rare derecho storm is, in some ways, harder than hurricane recovery:”Unlike a polite hurricane that gives you three days of warning, this storm gave us all the impact of a hurricane without the warning of a hurricane,” he said.” Imagine the suddenness of an EMP.
We ask again, ‘If one storm can turn D.C. dark for several days, what would a massive EMP burst do?’ The only safe harbor is Jesus.
“The name of the LORD is a strong tower; the righteous man runs into it and is safe.” (Proverbs 18:10 ESV).
The Lord is showing us just how foolish we are to depend on our own power.
“The LORD is slow to anger and great in power, and the LORD will by no means clear the guilty. His way is in whirlwind and storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.” (Nahum 1:3 ESV)
“[God] will drag away [these] mighty men by his power. These people may prosper, but they will never feel secure about life. [God] may let them feel confident and self-reliant, but his eyes are on their ways. [Such people] may be prosperous for a little while, but then they’re gone. They are brought down low and disappear like everything else. They wither like heads of grain.” (Job 22-24 GWT)
He is coming, The only refuge is to be ready: that means repented, making Jesus your Lord, and living by His rules and ways thereby producing fruit for His name.
“Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by giving heed to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, through the pretensions of liars whose consciences are seared, who forbid marriage and enjoin abstinence from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving; for then it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.” (1 Timothy 4:1-5 RSV).
The Spirit says, so this is a true saying. He also says it expressly. Other translations use the world clearly or explicitly.The Spirit wished to impart a clear and pointed teaching, not in metaphors or parables or symbols but in clear words, for emphasis. He expressly says some will depart from the faith. Not that they ever were true Christians (though many would have thought they were) but that they would leave the doctrines that undergird our faith and give expression to it. How would they do this? The Spirit continues: they gave heed to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons.
They gave heed. This means that they yielded some small part of their mind or their heart to some small portion of untruth, even for a moment. But that is all it takes. Remember the first words of satan in the bible, Genesis 3: “Hath God said?” This is a direct attack on His word, and Eve gave heed to it. You know the rest.
“But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of stress. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, inhuman, implacable, slanderers, profligates, fierce, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding the form of religion but denying the power of it. Avoid such people.” (2 Timothy 3:1-5 RSV)
These who fall away from the faith have a form of religion. The outward appearance is one that fools people -for a while- that they are true believers.
Paul wrote about Demas three times. Demas was a co-worker alongside Paul for many years. Demas was with many wonderful men of the faith: Luke, Epahras, others. He had traveled, witnessed, prayed, served for many years.
We see Paul mention him in Colossians- 1. Our dear friend Luke, the doctor, and Demas send greetings. (Colossians 4:14)
We see Paul mention him in Philemon: 2. Mark, Aristarchus, Demas, and Luke, my co-workers. (Philemon 1:24)
We see Paul mention him in 2 Timothy: 3. for Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica. (2 Timothy 4:10)
Worker, worker, gone. That’s it. He’s gone. How? Why? Because Demas loved the world. Obviously the Father had not been in him, because you can’t have the world AND the Father in you. (1 John 2:15). One or the other will win out, and it will be whichever one you give heed to.
So did Demas leave suddenly? Physically, probably yes, his departure was probably abrupt. But how long had the apostasy been in him? All along. You sink slowly. Let’s look at an incident that I believe illustrates this. Peter was not apostate, but the metaphor here is interesting because of the physics of it. Remember when the storm was tossing the boat, and Jesus walked over to the men in the boat on top of the water? Peter asked the Lord, if that is really you, then I will walk on water. And Peter got out of the boat, and for a minute he walked on water too. But when he noticed the stormy circumstances and took his eyes off Jesus, is when he lost it. Most people teach that passage as an illustration of how we have to keep our eyes on Jesus, and it is true, we do. But I’m interested here in the phrase, began to sink:
“But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, “Lord, save me.” (Matthew 14:30).
Every translation records the same, “began to sink.” Think about it. Peter was a burly guy: using his body and his hands to make a living fishing. He had muscles. He was probably 175-200 pounds. Solid muscle. If you toss a 200 pound boulder in the water, does it begin to sink? Or does it sink? Plunk, gone? The latter, it just goes under. But here the bible records Peter sinking incrementally.
That’s what happens in apostasy, you slowly sink under the waves of sin, until you’re completely covered. Apostasy is an incremental departure. It is like in Hebrews where it says:
“Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. (Hebrews 2:1)
The Greek word pararrhyéō (“drift away from”) only occurs in Heb 2:1 where it refers to going spiritually adrift – “sinning by slipping away” (from God’s anchor). 3901 /pararrhyéō (“gradually drift away”) means to “lapse” into spiritual defeat, describing how we slowly move away from our moorings in Christ. (source)
How can you make sure you love Christ and not the world, that apostasy has not crept in, that you are not drifting away? Of course our wonderful bible has the answer:
“Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!” (2 Cor 13:5)
So…how do we examine ourselves? Here is one page using scripture that helps guide us through the common tests:
Are You A Christian? TEST 1: Gospel Belief and Confession of Faith 2) Born Again / Sonship / Correction; 3) Repentance / Deliverance from Sin; 4) Good Works by Grace, and 5) The Fruit of the Spirit.
Don’t sink, don’t leave, don’t drift. Examine yourself and stay in the faith!
Iran issues new threat to Israel “An Iranian military official threatened to “wipe” Israel “off the face of the earth” if the Jewish state attacks, a stark new threat coinciding with the start of a European Union oil embargo to put pressure on Iran’s nuclear program, Reuters reported. Revolutionary Guards General Amir Ali Hajizadeh reportedly issued the warning as he announced new missile tests to take place in the coming week.”
“If they [Israel] take any action, they will hand us an excuse to wipe them off the face of the earth,” Hajizadeh said, according to state news agency IRNA.
They say, “Come, let us wipe them out as a nation; let the name of Israel be remembered no more!” (Psalm 83 ESV)
When prophecy meets the news, and the news meets prophecy… the convergence really gives me chills
“Freelance Meteorologist Aaron Justus worked as the Weekend Meteorologist at WTVR CBS 6 in Richmond, Virginia for just over four years. A clip of Aaron giving a wild forecast released this week and is one of the most watched videos this weekend. The forecast includes soaring temperatures to above 300 degrees from a volcanic eruption, a global super storm dropping 1-200 inches of rain and Godzilla.” (source)
Weather is getting so crazy… what else is there to say?
