The trouble with reading the lectionary is that you have to consider parts of scripture you would rather leave shut. And I include revelations in that collection. I worry about the teaching of prophecy: at times I have read it — starting with the dispensationalists (and Will S is correct, they are heretical). I became allergic to end times prophecy for quite a while. So why am I doing this? Why does my blog have photos of cemeteries I am recycling?
Jesus once said that the people of his time could read the weather but not the signs of the times. I am no prophet, but what is happening in the West cannot continue. There will be reformation or revolution: you cannot enslave a people in the spirit of the age forever. And Christ came to set us free.
But the ruler of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, said to the people, “There are six days in which work ought to be done. Come on those days and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day.” Then the Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to water it? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?”
(Luke 13:14-16 ESV)
But the wrath of God is being held up. God is angry with us. We have abandoned the truth, proclaimed to us by generations before us. We have left our bibles on the shelf, gathering dust, and gone chasing myths, which we have called truth, science. (Psychoanalysis was the first example of this, but there have been many since, from Lysenko to the current Green theology).
And I have bad news for those of Christ. If this continues, your blood will be shed: it will be a binary decision: lose your life, or lose your integrity, and your soul with it. For that will reach a point where it is only just to intervene, and nature itself will be the collateral damage.
Then I heard a loud voice from the templetelling the seven angels, “Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God.” So the first angel went and poured out his bowl on the earth, and harmful and painful sores came upon the people who bore the mark of the beast and worshiped its image. The second angel poured out his bowl into the sea, and it became like the blood of a corpse, and every living thing died that was in the sea. The third angel poured out his bowl into the rivers and the springs of water, and they became blood. And I heard the angel in charge of the waters say,
“Just are you, O Holy One, who is and who was, for you brought these judgments. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. It is what they deserve!”
And I heard the altar saying,
“Yes, Lord God the Almighty, true and just are your judgments!”
The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and it was allowed to scorch people with fire. They were scorched by the fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God who had power over these plagues. They did not repent and give him glory. The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom was plunged into darkness. People gnawed their tongues in anguish and cursed the God of heaven for their pain and sores. They did not repent of their deeds.
(Revelation 16:1-11 ESV)
I am not seeing a society that is trying to repent: I see the new generation of reformers being silenced by the very church that should be supporting them. For to repent, one has to confront. And confrontation is never easy.
People want advocates. They want to be allowed to be foolish, to place their lives at risk, and take no responsibility for the consequences. Therefore the state becomes more intrusive, more demanding on those who are responsible, and more liberal to the protected classes.
If you subsidize fecklessness you will get more of it: and in a liberal culture elections merely stem the tide.
If revelations is true, and it was added to the canon by the church fathers, who were guided by the Spirit, and knew who wrote what (they may have lived in ancient times. That makes them long dead, but not stupid) then the earth itself will suffer grievously as the times move to the end. But people will not repent. Their hearts will harden, and they will curse God: regardless of their actions.
They will demand mercy, but mete out injustice.
They will demand accountability, but not for them.
And they will kill. The blood of believers will stand against them.
Now, there are many in the alt-right and neo-traditionalist groups who want the collapse to come. They hope that what Hobbes called WARRE will purge the corruption from society, and we may be left with something more functional. I’m not sure: I see the second half of the great deleveraging of the Boomer’s debt binge happening at sometime (watch for when the US dollar is no longer a reserve currency, and the USA becomes as relevant as Argentina. It is happening, and Obama’s Democrats are not trying to stop it), and one of the reasons I live in the more empty part of NZ is that the (soon to be shut) Woodpile Report is correct, for in crisis do not be where the crowds are, and where food arrives in a just-in-time manner.
And the Greens? Pretending that we can change the variation in the climate, or the variation of weather between season and the next year’s season? Hubris. Overweening pride. We neither have the knowledge, nor the technology, nor the wisdom to use it properly.
But the suffering of such a time will be immense, particularly for the simple, the mad, and the poor. Most of whom do not deserve to pay for the sins of the elite. Let us instead pray for revival, and that we repent, and beg God for mercy for the sins of this generation.
My End Times theology tends to be Misslerian (unsurprising, since he and I are in the same non-denominational denomination).
On one hand, you get that desire for cleansing fire. On the other… it’s not going to be pretty. I pray for lots of conversions during the dark hours. That’s the real point, right? More souls saved.
Do I believe that the fire will bring perfection? -laughs- No. I believe it will bring AntiChrist, and Tribulation, and then our Lord will come and clear things up. *That* is what the signs point to, that’s what our world is preparing its heart to embrace. I believe in the Rapture of the saints… although I don’t argue about it, because it’s not as if you’re going to miss the boat if you disagree and I’m right. I also don’t worry about it, because if the Lord chooses not to Rapture us out, no worries, it won’t be that long and we’ll be dead as martyrs or the Lord will come back to reign. He’s good for it, you know?
All that said… maybe we can see a temporary return from the edge, but I don’t believe it. And I don’t think we get another cycle of revolution-reformation-renewal, and I don’t think that stupid sinful humans are going to make the world a perfect place so Jesus can come back to a bed of roses.
But it’s all good. Jesus has control. I’m in for the ride…………
The cleansing fire will fall, agreed. And it will hit the church as hard as anyone, for much of the church is apostate. I don’t see, for instance, all Papists or Orthodox being left behind while the Baptists meet the returning Christ in the air. And I tend towards a post tribulational rapture rather than pre-tribulation.
What I see is the end of a secular cycle — a bit like Alte talked about when she read the Fourth Turning. We had a period when we could have reformed: if the Jesus Freaks had reformed the hippies we would have had three generations of righteousness. Instead that generation went simultaneously mystical and materialistic: its hero is that Buddhist billionaire, Steve Jobs, And we are paying now for the consequences of the last two generations wilful disregard of the laws of nature and of God.
We may be called to repentance and revival: such has been the cycle in the past, and that is what I am praying for. However, there has been a great falling away… and the end is getting closer each year.
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I do think that over interpreting this season and this time is an error. Four moons? Dunno. It is like the prophecy of St Malachi — part superstition, part correct, hard to tell. As humans we deceive ourselves by making patterns out of what is random.,
Where I agree and want to reinforce is that unless there is repentance, the next revolution will not lead to righteousness but evil, and that society will be destroyed. Consider the worship of the Aryan tribe leading to National Socialism. Or, more local to you, the destruction of the cults of human sacrifice that the Mayan and Aztec civilizations had.
I agree about the over interpretation of the seasons and times. I got into that for a few years, and then thrown out for not being quite as intense about it (err.. cans do math, not four horsemen yet). But the POINT of watching the sky is if you see the dust cloud on the horizon, you make preparations. You don’t just stand there, you do something. In my case, that’s been more intense prayer for conversion and general friend-pestering, and taking my Christian witness extremely seriously. Should I think that we have another 50 years for my friends to get around to converting? What if my hypocritical moment turns them away from the truth? Will they have time to get right again? Things that keep me up at night. If you only had six months to live….
Agree about Fourth Turning too – if we don’t see Jesus, we’re gonna see something. I’d rather see Jesus.
Agree also that it’s not going to be Baptists without everyone else – IMO it’s about relationship with Christ, being real, being tight, being true to Him. Most professing will be “left behind”, which is, again, something to stay up at night weeping over.
You are a better soul than I am. I weep not enough