God’s End-Times Dividing Line
Charlie Kirk’s going to be with the Lord in such dramatic fashion, I believe, is a profound prophetic marker at the end of this quickly fleeting Age of Grace. I believe what happened might indicate that a prophetic division might have been set in motion by the assassination that took place before the eyes of all the world in terms of its aftereffects.
A divine division, it seems to me, was possibly initiated in some prophetically scheduled way with that shot heard and seen around the world. I’ll try to explain.
Evidence of this specific hour in history fits the time Jesus and the prophets described when God will begin bringing the end of one age to an end and the next into being. The end of this age, the Age of Grace, and the start of the next era, the Tribulation, looks to be almost certainly at hand. Jesus could call all believers into His presence at any moment.
Those who are spiritually attuned to all that has been transpiring over recent years, months, weeks, and days sense that Heaven’s judgment is poised ominously above the earth. The evil, the absolute wickedness, cannot be dismissed as simply being things as usual, even though life in general continues seemingly as normal.
It seems to me that the Charlie Kirk murder, witnessed by entire populations of the world through cyberspace platforms, has resulted, through divine arrangement, in dividing those who want God’s order from those who want no part of it.
This divine division, I believe, involves particularly the young adults of this judgment-bound planet. These, I mean, are those of Gen Z. Of course, it involves many more and diverse ages than those, but these are the most vociferous in expressing their emotions following the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
On the one hand, the young continue to cheer in the most hate-filled and vulgar terms imaginable, applauding the bloody death of the man who engaged them in debate about their anti-God beliefs and comportment. On the other hand, there is a sudden, explosive movement by the young in support of all that Charlie Kirk championed—many expressing newfound understanding of and belief in what Charlie taught about His Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
The mainstream news and entertainment media—which was, for a hesitating moment, somewhat unsure of how to report all attendant to the Kirk death—has now recovered its anti-God balance, and I suspect we can expect these to soon return to supportive incitement of the young haters—spewing lies and angry rhetoric against both the godly things Charlie Kirk tried to get across to the young audiences in his reasoned debates with them and, of course, against anything and everything involving Donald Trump’s efforts to govern.
However, there is a growing sense that the evil intended in this assassination of a man who professed Jesus Christ as the answer to all that’s wrong with America and the world, God will use for good.
And it is the divine dividing line, as part of that good God intends, that I think we could be witnessing as the Rapture of the Church approaches.
The Lord has used such dividing in the past to separate those who want His governance from those who want no part of divine order.
Perhaps the most relevant to today’s rebellion against God’s order is found in the book of Numbers.
Moses was leading Israel and was told by God to follow His order in doing things that would move His program for the nation forward. Korah, a man who was charged with bringing the people in line with God’s order, rather than doing so, did all he could to prevent Moses from following what God commanded.
The Lord told Moses to tell Korah to obey or face God’s anger. Korah refused and complained bitterly that God had led the people out of the land of milk and honey to die horrible deaths in the wilderness.
Following Moses’ declaration of the Lord’s command and Korah’s refusal to follow, God’s divine dividing of the obedient from the rebels was executed forthwith.
“And it came to pass, as he had made an end of speaking all these words, that the ground clave asunder that was under them: And the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that appertained unto Korah, and all their goods. They, and all that appertained to them, went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them: and they perished from among the congregation” (Numbers 16:31-33).
It is true that God was dealing with His chosen people in the case of this rebellion against His divine order. But Israel is a Heaven-ordained archetype for God’s dealings with all of humankind. Rebellion against Almighty God will always result in a divine cleavage of the good from the bad—the obedient from the disobedient.
There is coming such a dividing, and I believe we are seeing the beginning of divine preparation for that division. It is God’s dividing line I believe we are seeing being drawn.
In a sense, people today are being told, as Joshua told the Israelites millennia ago: “Choose you this day whom you will serve” (Joshua 24:15).
We are seeing God’s order in the process of being issued to humanity, I believe, in this turbulent time following the bloody slaying of Charlie Kirk. It is particularly being manifested within the great masses of the youth, whose passions are in full-blown turning to God or else turning angrily away from His order in these last days of this Age of Grace. The divine demarcation is becoming clearer by the hour—God’s end-times dividing line.
Whether you are of Gen Z or a different vintage, here is the only Way to be obedient to the God who is on the prophetic verge of having to judge all rebels during the coming Tribulation:
“That if you will confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and will believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart man believes unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Romans 10:9-10).
—Terry
Eraser Theology Obscures Our Hope of Glory
I believe that of all the future events of Bible prophecy, Satan hates Jesus’ Second Coming the most. Because he cannot erase Jesus’ return from Scripture, he fervently attacks the pre-Tribulation Rapture. If he can make that seem ridiculous, along with belief in a seven-year Tribulation with a real antichrist oppressing Israel, he effectively diminishes the spectacular and glorious nature of Jesus’ return, at which time He destroys Satan’s reign on the earth through the man of lawlessness.
Those who say Jesus’ Second Coming is the next event on God’s prophetic calendar quash the earthshaking impact of how the Old Testament prophets and John describe it. An end-of-the-age return is exceedingly bland compared to the words of Revelation 19:11-20:4 or even Psalm 96:7-13.
That’s why I refer to such amillennial beliefs as “eraser theology.” For them, the proclamation of the Gospel far too often stops with the forgiveness of sins. They portray eternal life as a nondescript gathering of family members in the sky by and by. Absent from their preaching is the Lord’s comforting promise of resurrected bodies, warnings of the coming Tribulation, and our hope of reigning with Him.
Eraser theology cannot change what God’s Word says about Jesus’ glorious future as King over all the nations, but it does keep many saints from rejoicing in the wonders of all that lies ahead for them.
Amillennialists Erase the Awesomeness of the Day of the Lord
Amillennialism changes the awesomeness of the Day of the Lord into something rather ordinary by comparison. They dismiss the Old Testament prophecies of this day by characterizing its words as symbols that signify a reality far different than what the prophets intended at the time they wrote.
Through the prophets of old, the Lord spoke about a day when He would judge the world in real time; He repeatedly warned of the terrible devastation of this still future time. The descriptions of its horrors have never occurred in the history of the world (see Isaiah 13:6-16, 24:1-23; Joel 2:30-3:3; Zephaniah 1:14-18). One has to greatly change the meaning of the words in these passages to say this day occurred in the past or that the words have a spiritual connotation rather than a literal, futuristic meaning.
Jesus also spoke of this coming time of judgment in Matthew 24:21-22:
“For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be. And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.”
Those who say that the Lord’s words in these verses have already reached fulfillment reflect their disbelief in the Old Testament warnings about the Day of the Lord. Sadly, their effort to sanitize God’s Word of His wrath keeps believers in the dark regarding the future of the planet, muffles the Lord’s warnings for our day, and keeps focus of the saints earthbound rather than heavenward.
The Day of the Lord culminates with Jesus’ victorious return to the earth after His judgments have vanquished antichrist’s reign of terror. He returns as a conquering hero to inherit His kingdom.
Amillennialists Erase the Many Glories of Jesus’ Thousand-Year Reign
The adherents of eraser theology, the amillennialists, tell us that the church age is the promised millennial rule of Jesus over the nations. Please notice how just a few of the biblical depictions of Jesus’ earthly reign radically differ from our current experience on Earth where pain, suffering, and death prevail:
- Jesus reigns over all nations for one thousand years (Psalm 2:7-9; Revelation 20:1-10).
- The Lord rules with a “rod of iron,” signifying that justice will prevail everywhere on the earth (Psalm 2:7-9; Isaiah 11:1-5; 32:1). Injustice ceases to exist on planet Earth during His rule.
- An angel places Satan in a “bottomless pit” from which he cannot escape, oppress the saints, or oppose the Lord’s agenda for one thousand years (Revelation 20:1-4).
- Wars cease to exist throughout the duration of His rule; peace prevails in every corner of the planet (Psalm 46:8-10).
- Christ rules from Mount Zion (Psalm 48:1-8).
- People enjoy long lifespans such that they consider death at age one hundred a premature death and attribute it to sin (Isaiah 65:20-25).
- “All peoples, nations, and languages. . . serve” the Lord Jesus (Daniel 7:14).
The above descriptions of Jesus’ rule do not in any way match the church age. Pastors who teach that this vale of tears, where lawlessness and wickedness prevail, is Jesus’ kingdom obscure both the Savior’s glory and ours as coheirs of this spectacular realm. Please read the above list again if you think the church age in even the most minuscule way matches Jesus’ future reign as depicted in Scripture.
Amillennialists Erase the Preeminence of Jesus from His Return
In my book, Invitation to a Lavish Feast – Wisdom’s Path to the Pre-Tribulation Rapture, I explain how Colossians 1:15-20 verifies our belief that what the Apostle John wrote about in Revelation 19:11-20:10 is both literal and future. The popular views of the Second Coming, listed below, make it appear far less powerful and victorious than how the Bible describes it, and obscure the glories of His future rule over the nations.
- Preterists say that it happened in AD 70 either spiritually or with a clash of chariots in the sky that only a few people saw.
- Those who adhere to Dominion Theology say Jesus returns after the church inaugurates millennial conditions on the earth and rules without His physical presence.
- Amillennialists place Jesus’ return after the current age, which is His Kingdom.
The words of Revelation 19:11-20:10 shout with the message of Jesus’ preeminence and negate all the above beliefs. They all fall far short of exalting the Savior in the way that Colossians 1:15-20 does. Only the belief that Jesus returns to earth after abolishing the reign of Satan via antichrist and sets up a thousand-year rule over the nations exalts Him in a way fitting with His preeminence and glory.
Those who say there is no Rapture, no Tribulation, and no Millennial reign of Jesus perform a great disservice to the body of Christ. The Bible says that someday we will return with Jesus in great glory and we will reign with Him in His earthly kingdom. The scoffers say no; the Bible says yes!
Maranatha!!
-Jonathan