11 Sep 2023

God’s Measured Judgment

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).

—Terry


 

Will September Be a Month to Remember?

A glance at the UN calendar for September clearly reveals their agenda. I took the following from https://www.un.org/events/81993:

September 7, 2023: International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies

September 16, 2023: International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone layer

September 18-19, 2023: SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) Summit

September 20, 2023: Climate Ambition Summit

The quote below is taken from the UN’s website regarding the upcoming SDG Summit, September 18-19, during which time the globalists at the UN will ask the leaders of the world to commit to a seven-year initiative to achieve all the SDG goals of Agenda 2030:

The SDG Summit in September 2023 must signal a genuine turning point. It must mobilize the political commitment and breakthroughs our world desperately needs. It must deliver a rescue plan for people and planet.

At the center of this rescue plan, Heads of State and Government must recommit to seven years of accelerated, sustained, and transformative action, both nationally and internationally, to deliver on the promise of the SDGs. Leaders can show their resolve by adopting an ambitious and forward-looking political declaration at the SDG Summit and presenting global and national commitments for SDG transformation.

I know the readers of the Nearing Midnight column recognize the agenda behind the UN’s call to action regarding the so-called climate emergency. It’s all about the formation of a one-world government on the wings of crisis, which the globalists claim requires their solution. But it’s all a ruse.

Is it not also revealing that they are thinking in terms of a “seven-year initiative”? Since it doesn’t involve Israel, it’s not the covenant that will start the Tribulation. But wow, they are thinking in terms of a seven-year agreement!

It’s nothing short of prophecy coming to life. The SDGs go far beyond their contrived climate emergency; they point to a world where a totalitarian government enslaves people under a communist regime. The Bible says this will happen during the Tribulation.

Here are just a few of the fallacies that lie behind the power-hungry oligarchs at the World Economic Forum (WEF), UN, and many other organizations telling us that a one-world government is the only answer to the current climate emergency.

They are the ones damaging the environment. The last phrase of Revelation 11:18 aligns well with the deception agenda of the climate alarmists that call for draconian measures to avoid certain doom.

“The nations raged, but your wrath came, and the time for the dead to be judged, and for rewarding your servants, the prophets and saints, and those who fear your name, both small and great, and for destroying the destroyers of the earth.” (Emphasis added)

The globalists are themselves damaging the environment with fires and train derailments spilling hazardous materials. The frequency of these things suggests that an evil motive lies behind most, if not all, of these catastrophes. They start the fires and then tell us that “climate change” is the culprit.

The sight of chemical trails in the sky is not the illusion of conspiracy theorists. One day this past summer, I looked up to see at least fifteen trails left by planes all bunched together in the western sky. They couldn’t be contrails because we never have so many planes flying that close to our home in such a short time, and the pattern in the sky was larger and lasted much longer than with contrails I had seen in the past.

In his book, Spirit of the Antichrist, Volume One, pastor and prophecy speaker J.B. Hixon devoted an entire chapter (pages 111-129) to evidence regarding the geoengineering of weather by the government. He listed fourteen articles from Popular Science magazine from 2005 to 2021, all dealing with the science of changing weather patterns through geoengineering.

Those warning us of the changing weather patterns are the very ones manipulating them so they can claim that they are evidence of the “climate emergency.”

Scientists don’t agree that a climate emergency exists. Just last month, a group of 1,609 scientists from all around the world, including 321 such U.S. professionals, signed a statement stating that there “is no climate emergency.” They said, “The coalition pointed out that Earth’s climate has varied as long as it has existed, with the planet experiencing several cold and warm phases.” (https://www.ntd.com/over-1600-scientists-sign-no-climate-emergency-declaration_938916.html)

The promoters of the climate emergency fraud know it’s a lie. The behavior of those shouting the loudest for drastic action betrays their words. Many of them own multiple mansions (some at sea level), possess multiple cars and yachts, and fly all over the world in private jets. Their multiple failed predictions of doom fail to wake up those deceived by the fallacy of their repeated warnings of doom.

The world leaders who will agree to the seven-year plan of the UN at their meeting later this month are also well aware that there’s no crisis; it’s all about a quest for power and riches. They believe their obedience to the agenda will be rewarded in the future.

This great deception of our day, and it’s certainly not the only one, reminds me of the first words Jesus spoke when asked about the last days. “Take heed that no man deceive you” (Matthew 24:4). Even the lies of globalists reveal that we live in the last days.

The sad reality for this world is that Satan’s deception will get a whole lot worse after Jesus takes us to Heaven, although it’s difficult for me to imagine a greater acceptance of outright lies than what we already see happening today. How close must we be to our homegoing if we are already witnessing such mass deception on such a vast scale?

Will September be a month to remember with the UN furthering its one-world government agenda on the road to unwittingly fulfilling more prophecy? That’s likely to happen.

Could this be the month of our homegoing? Only time will tell. But if our calendars should turn to October and we are still here, please know that Jesus is coming for us very, very soon. He will keep His promise to take us home before His wrath descends on the world.

Maranatha!

-Jonathan