The Bible clearly prophesies that the Church of the end times will be characterized by apostasy. Paul said that the Antichrist will not be revealed until “the apostasy comes first” (2 Thessalonians 2:3). Jesus prophesied that “many will fall away” and “most people’s love will grow cold” (Matthew 24:10, 12).

In the book of Revelation, chapters 2 and 3, the Apostle John records seven letters of Jesus to seven churches in the area of modern day Turkey. Among other things, these letters present a panoramic prophetic survey of the Church in history. The last of the churches mentioned, the one that represents the Church of the end times, is the church at Laodicea. It is pictured as a church that is neither hot (healing) nor cold (refreshing), but rather is lukewarm or tepid (Revelation 3:15-16). In short, it is a church that is apathetic. Jesus also pictures it as a worldly church enamored with its wealth (Revelation 3:17). The Lord is so dissatisfied with this church that He declares, “Because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth” (Revelation 3:16).

Clues from the Apostle Paul

Paul supplies us with some strong clues as to why the end times Church will be weak, vacillating, and full of apostasy. One of those clues can be found in 2 Timothy 4:3-4 which says that “the time will come when they [Christians] will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires; and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths.”

Another clue is located in Paul’s famous prophecy about end time society, the one in 2 Timothy 3. After describing in graphic detail how society will fall apart in the end times, Paul adds that the basic reason will be due to people “holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power” (2 Timothy 3:5). There will be no lack of religion, says Paul, but people will deny the true power that is able to transform society for the good, producing peace, righteousness and justice.

What is that power? First and foremost it is the power of the blood of Jesus. It is also the power that comes from accepting the Bible as the infallible Word of God. It is the power of believing in a Creator God with whom all things are possible. And certainly it includes a belief in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Today, these essential beliefs, which constitute the power of Christianity, are being subjected to an unparalleled assault from within the Church itself. The Bible says that in the end times people will mock the promise of the Lord’s return (2 Peter 3:3-4). What is so shocking is that most of the mockery is coming from within the Church!

The Root of Apostasy

How have we reached this crisis point in the Church? It is rooted in the German School of Higher Criticism which invaded this country big-time in the 1920’s. According to the “scientific approach” of this school of skeptics, the Bible is not the revealed Word of God. Rather, it is Man’s search for God, and therefore it is filled with myth, legend and superstition.

Today this viewpoint dominates the seminaries of America. The Bible is studied not to be believed and obeyed but to be analyzed, dissected, and criticized. The result is that the Scriptures have lost their authority.

Apostate Leaders

John Spong, Episcopal Bishop of New Jersey, has written books in which he denies the virgin birth, denies the miracles of Jesus, denies the resurrection, denies the Second Coming, and argues that Paul and Timothy were homosexual lovers. Bishop Spong has become so enamored with other religions that he has announced he will no longer witness to those caught up in the spiritual darkness of pagan faiths!1

Similar apostate thoughts were mouthed by Norman Vincent Peale in 1984 on the Phil Donahue program. Peale announced, “It’s not necessary to be born-again. You have your way to God; I have mine. I found eternal peace in a Shinto shrine . . . I’ve been to Shinto shrines, and God is everywhere.”

Phil Donahue was so shocked that he actually came to the defense of Christianity. “But you’re a Christian minister,” he retorted, “and you’re suppose to tell me that Christ is the way and the truth and the life, aren’t you?”

Peale replied, “Christ is one of the ways. God is everywhere.”2

Look again at Peale’s incredible statement: “It’s not necessary to be born-again.” What did Jesus say? “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born-again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3). Who are we to believe?

Schuller’s Apostate Gospel

Peale’s leading disciple, Robert Schuller, has outdone his teacher with the development of his “gospel of possibility thinking.” In his book, Self Esteem: The New Reformation,Schuller states that the leaders of the Reformation Movement made a mistake in centering their theology around God instead of Man!3

Schuller teaches that the essence of Man’s problem is low self-esteem.4 The Bible teaches it is pride. Schuller says that when Jesus referred in John 7:38 to “rivers of living water” flowing out of believers, He was speaking of self-esteem.5 The very next verse says He was speaking of the Holy Spirit. Schuller argues that sin is anything that robs us of our “divine dignity” (our “divine dignity”?).6 The Bible says sin is rebellion against God.

The Response of Christendom

Schuller’s book calling for a “new reformation” caused a firestorm of controversy. The Evangelical magazine,Christianity Today, invited readers to give their opinions of the book, and many people wrote in to denounce it. One writer referred to Schuller as “a modern-day apostle of humanism.”7

The letters continued to pour in for weeks, and they were so critical that Dr. Schuller decided to respond to them. In a long letter published in the October 5, 1984 issue of Christianity Today, he made an incredible comment that has haunted him to this day:8

I don’t think anything has been done in the name of Christ and under the banner of Christianity that has proven more destructive to human personality and, hence, counterproductive to the evangelism enterprise than the often crude, uncouth, and unchristian strategy of attempting to make people aware of their lost and sinful condition.
As a writer for Time put it in an article in 1985, “For Schuller, an acknowledgment of self-worth, more than a confession of sinfulness, is the path to God.”9

Further Evidence of Schuller’s Apostasy

In an appearance on the Phil Donahue show in 1980, Schuller tried, incredibly, to portray Jesus as an egotist! Here’s what he said:10

The Cross sanctifies the ego trip. That’s very significant. In other words, Jesus had an ego. He said, “I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men to me.” Wow! What an ego trip He was on!
What blatant blasphemy — to accuse the One who was the very essence of humility of being an egotist!

Schuller gave a speech at the headquarters of the Unity Church in Lees Summit, Missouri and shared with their pastors his church growth principles. This is a cult that denies the deity of Jesus and which teaches reincarnation! He also dedicated a new Unity Temple in Warren, Michigan, in spite of warnings from a local Baptist pastor not to do so because of the errors of this cult.11

In a recent speech honoring an Islamic spiritual leader named Alfred Mohammed, Schuller said that if he were to come back in 100 years and find his descendants to be Muslims, it wouldn’t bother him!12

An Apostate Seminar

Another modern day apostate is Robert Funk, a New Testament scholar at the University of Montana. He is the founder of the notorious Jesus Seminar which began operating in 1985. The avowed purpose of the Seminar was “to renew the quest for the historical Jesus.”13 The Seminar conducted this quest in a very unusual way. Meeting twice a year for six years, the group voted on each of the sayings of Jesus recorded in the Gospels. They voted by dropping colored beads in a box. A black bead meant Jesus definitely did not make the statement in question. A gray bead meant He did not say it, but it might have represented His thinking. A pink bead meant He probably said something like this, but not in the words recorded. A red bead meant He definitely made the statement.14

As you can see, the very approach expressed contempt for the veracity of the Gospel accounts. What a spectacle this must have been to the Lord as He watched these so-called scholars vote on passages from His Word. “Professing to be wise, they became fools” (Romans 1:22).

The final product of the Seminar, published in 1993, was a blasphemy of God’s Word. It was titled, The Five Gospels.15The title comes from the fact that the Seminar decided to grant the apocryphal Gospel of Thomas equal standing with the four traditional Gospels.

Only fifteen sayings of Jesus made it into The Five Gospels in red! In Matthew’s account of the Lord’s Prayer, the only words that made it in red were, “Our Father.” Only one saying in the entire book of Mark was colored red. It is the statement of Jesus in Mark 12:17 where He told His disciples to “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” Likewise, only one statement from the Gospel of John qualified for the red coloring: “A prophet has no honor in his own country” (John 4:44).

The chilling thing to keep in mind is that the men who produced this spiritual pornography are professors at seminaries across America. They are the ones who are training the current generation of pastors and teachers.

Apostasy in the Denominations

The apostasy is not confined to the seminaries. It is pervasive. It can be found in all denominations. Consider the following examples.

In 1997, on the eve of Lent, the Right Reverend Alan Smithson, the Bishop of Jarrow (Anglican Church in England), held a press conference in London. He announced that it was traditional for Christians to give up something during the forty days of Lent. He then dramatically announced that he had decided to give up Bible reading! He went on to explain that he was going to devote his time during Lent to reading the Koran, because he felt like the Muslim scriptures would make him “more understanding, more compassionate, and more fully human.”16

R. Kirby Godsey, president of Mercer University, a school heavily supported by the Georgia Baptist Convention, “denies the infallibility of the Bible, the unique power and authority of God, the validity of the Gospel’s account of the life and teachings of Jesus, the efficacy of Christ’s atonement, and the uniqueness of Christ as the only Savior.”17

In 1997 the General Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church sponsored a meeting in Kansas City that attracted 4,000 participants from all over the world. Called, “Global Gathering III,” the conference featured a parade of speakers who attacked the fundamentals of the Christian faith. One speaker declared that the crucifixion of Jesus reveals an “abusive Heavenly Father who is not fit for Christian worship.” The speaker urged instead that the Church revere all the world’s children as little messiahs equal to Jesus.18

Apostasy in Local Churches

The spreading cancer of apostasy in the Church is not confined to theologians and church conferences. It can be found at the grass roots level, in local churches.

Consider, for example, The Episcopal New Church Center in Walkersville, Maryland. This church hired a public relations firm to develop a print and television advertising campaign. One of the first ads in this campaign carried a banner headline that read, “To Hell With Church!” It showed a man thinking, “If I want to feel guilty, I’ll eat some cheese fries.” Another ad in the series showed a painting of Christ nailed on the Cross. Scrawled over the painting were the words, “Of course people with pierced body parts are welcome in our church.”19

The Maryland church really went wacky when it moved to producing TV ads. They hired a fellow known for the kinky cartoons he produces for Saturday Night Live. His first ad for the church opened with a father and son tossing a baseball to each other in the front yard.

“Guess what, Timmy?” the father asks. “Tomorrow your mother and I are going to take you to church.” The father continues, “Not only will you be able to learn about the wages of sin and eternal damnation, but you can play fun games like ‘Bible Sword Drill’ and sing inspirational songs like ‘Kumbaya’ and ‘I’ve Got Joy, Joy, Joy Down in My Heart.’”

Dejected by this prospect, little Timmy walks into the middle of the road and holds up his hands in surrender as a semi-truck blows its horn and bears down on him.20

Not only apostate, but sick.

Inter-Faith Apostasy

The big move at the grass roots level these days is interfaith worship services. I’m not talking about inter-denominational — rather, the emphasis is on inter-faith. Christians are inviting Muslims, Jews, Hindus, American Indian practitioners of “native religion,” and others to join in worshiping “the one true god, regardless of the name you may give to him or her.”

Pope John Paul II got caught up in this inter-faith fad in 1986 when he invited the leaders of the world’s religions to come to Assisi, Italy to join him in praying for world peace.21 One hundred sixty representatives came, including the Dali Lama (who considers himself to be a god). Each representative prayed to his own god at the Pope’s request! Did the Pope believe their gods were real? Or did he believe that they were all praying to the same god, but under different names?

The Challenge

Englishman William Booth (1829 – 1912), who founded the Salvation Army, was a man with a great zeal for the Lord and a passion for lost souls. He was also a man of vision. On the eve of the 20th Century when Christendom was caught up in euphoria about how the Church would soon take the world for Christ, Booth predicted that the Gospel would not fare well in the new century. Specifically, he prophesied that by the end of the 20th Century, much of the Church would be preaching:22

Christianity without Christ

Forgiveness without repentance

Salvation without regeneration

Heaven without Hell

That’s exactly where we are today. Because of it, as we begin the 21st Century, Christians are faced with unparalleled challenges from the decay of society and the apostatizing of the Church. Increasingly, many are going to give up hope. Some will express this hopelessness by withdrawing from society and assuming a siege mentality. Others will throw in the towel and adopt the attitude, “If you can’t lick them, join them.”

Considering the magnitude of the challenge, is there any hope for triumphant Christian living? And if so, how then shall we live?

**********

Notes:

1. John Shelby Spong, Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism: A Bishop Rethinks the Meaning of Scripture (San Francisco, California: Harper, 1992). Another revealing book by Bishop Spong is Why Christianity Must Change or Die: A Bishop Speaks to Believers in Exile (San Francisco, California: Harper, 1999). A good summary of Bishop Spong’s views can be found on the Internet in his “Call for a New Reformation,”

http://www.dioceseofnewark.org/jsspong/reform.htm.

2. Dave Hunt, “Revival or Apostasy,” The Berean Call, October 1997, p. 2.

3. Robert Schuller, Self Esteem: The New Reformation, (Waco, Texas: Word Books, 1982), p. 39. An insightful review of Schuller’s writings can be found in an article by Joseph P. Gudel entitled “A New Reformation?” It was published in Passport Magazine, January-February 1988. It is available on the Internet at

http://www. issuesetc.org/resource/archives/guide12.htm. There are other excellent summaries of Schuller’s thought that can be found on the Internet. One is an article by David W. Cloud entitled “Evangelicals and Modernist Robert Schuller”

(http://cnview.com/on_ line_resources/evangelicals_and_modernist_robert_schuller.htm).

Another good analysis is entitled, “The God of the Bible Versus the God of Multi-level Marketing: Positive Thinking,” (http://www.users.fast.net/~gospeltruth/positive.htm).

4. Ibid., p.19.

5. Ibid. p. 80.

6. Ibid. p. 14.

7. Hugh Cantelon, “More on Schuller,” (letter to the editor), Christianity Today, October 19, 1984, p. 11.

8. Robert Schuller, “Dr. Schuller Comments,” (letter to the editor),Christianity Today, October 5, 1984, pp. 12-13.

9. Richard Stengel, “Apostle of Sunny Thoughts,” Time, March 18, 1985, p. 70.

10. The Phil Donahue Show, transcript 08120, August 12, 1980, p. 10.

11. Rick Miesel, p. 5. Schuller’s support of the Unity Church is also documented in an article by Dave Hunt published in the CIB Bulletin,January 1988. In a letter to the author, dated January 24, 2000, Dave Hunt states that he has a tape recording of the speech that Schuller delivered to the Unity pastors about church growth principles.

12. Dave Hunt, “What’s Happening to the Faith?” The Berean Call, May 1998, p. 1.

13. “The Jesus Seminar: The Search for Authenticity,”

http://home.fireplug.net/~rshand/reflections/messiah/seminar.htm.

14. In April 1996, Time featured the Jesus Seminar on its cover under the title “The Search for Jesus.” The cover article presented a comprehensive survey of the seminar’s organization, methodology, and conclusions. See David Van Biema, “The Gospel Truth? — The iconoclastic and provocative Jesus Seminar argues that not much of the New Testament can be trusted. If so, what are Christians to believe?” Time, April 8, 1996.

15. Robert W. Funk and Roy W. Hoover, The Five Gospels (San Francisco, California: Harper, reprint edition, 1997). A good review of this book can be found in an article by D. A. Carson entitled “Five Gospels, No Christ.” The article appeared in Christianity Today, April 25, 1994, pp. 30-33.

16. “Bishop gives up Bible for Lent” unsigned article, Daily Mail, London, England, February 14, 1997, p. 31.

17. Dave Hunt, “What’s Happening to the Faith?” The Berean Call, May 1998, p. 1. Dr. Godsey’s views can be found in the book, When We Talk About God, Let’s Be Honest, (Macon, Georgia: Smyth & Helwys Publishing Co., 1996). The Georgia Baptist Convention adopted a resolution of censure in November 1996 in which it asked the trustees of Mercer University to consider whether Dr. Godsey should be continued as president of the institution. The trustees voted to affirm his presidency.

18. Mark Tooley, “Church Gathering Features Radical Speakers,” AFA Journal, June 1997, p.19.

19. John Kirkpatrick, “Ads fish for churchgoers with irreverent approach,”Dallas Morning News, April 18, 1998, p. 1F.

20. Ibid., p. 11F.

21. Richard N. Ostling, “A Summit for Peace in Assisi,” Time, November 10, 1986, pp. 78-79.

22. Joseph Revell, “The Salvation Army Revisited,” Report from the Wall,(an Internet daily devotional message sent from yosef@gulf.net), December 18, 1998, p. 2.

Have you noticed how almost everything in life seems to be accelerating in growth? Knowledge has exploded. We are traveling faster and farther than ever before. Instant, world wide communication has become common place. And the power at our disposal is mind boggling.

A Sign of the Times
The Bible teaches that this acceleration of technology which we are experiencing will be a sign of the end times — a sign that will signal the soon return of the Lord.

Consider Daniel 12:4. In this verse the Lord tells Daniel that one of the signs of the end times will be an acceleration of travel and knowledge. Here’s how the verse reads in the Living Bible paraphrase:

Daniel, keep this prophecy a secret . . . Seal it up so that it will not be understood until the end times when travel and education shall be vastly increased.

The same concept of end time acceleration is found in the New Testament. Jesus spoke about it when He talked with His disciples about the signs of the end times that would herald His return (Matthew 24:5ff). He mentioned a great variety of signs — spiritual, natural, societal, and world political — and then He said these signs would be like “birth pangs” (Matthew 24:8).

As the birth of a baby approaches, the birth pangs increase two ways. They increase in frequency and intensity. Thus, Jesus was saying that the closer we get to the time of His return, the more frequent and intense the signs will become. There will be more earthquakes and more intense ones. Likewise things like famine, pestilence and war will increase in frequency and intensity.

The Mathematical Concept
In mathematics this acceleration is called an “exponential curve.” This term comes from what happens when rapid growth is plotted on a chart. When graphing the growth of something, the growth is considered to be on an exponential curve when the plot line starts moving vertically because the growth is so rapid. You can see a classic example of this principle in the illustration on this page of the growth of the Internet company, America Online.

Now, the point is that the Bible indicates that the exponential curve will be one of the signs of the end times, and my thesis is that we are living in the midst of the exponential curve. Therefore, we are living in the end times.

Examples of the Curve
The 20th Century has been the century of the exponential curve. Let’s consider some examples.

1) Population — Demographers estimate that the population of the world at the time of Christ was only 200 million. It took 1,650 years for the world’s population to double! But thereafter it began to double very rapidly because the Industrial Revolution produced modern medicine, which, in turn, reduced infant mortality rates and increased longevity. As the statistics below indicate, the rate of doubling has now reached exponential proportions.

Time of Christ
— —
200 million
1,650 years
1650 AD
500 million
200 years
1850 AD
1.3 billion
100 years
1950 AD
2.5 billion
30 years
1980 AD
4.5 billion

2) Power — Throughout most of recorded history, the maximum power at man’s disposal consisted of bows and arrows, spears, and catapults. Even at the beginning of this century, war was still primitive. World War I turned into a stagnant war of attrition because neither side had sufficient power to break out of the trenches.

Eighty years later, we have air power, armored power, nuclear weapons, and sophisticated bacteriological and chemical weapons. We have ICBM’s that can deliver a nuclear payload half way around the world. We have laser guided missiles that can guide a bomb down a smoke stack. And we have nuclear submarines that can circle the globe without surfacing. Incredibly, just one of those subs today has more firepower than all the bombs dropped in World War II! It is no wonder the Bible says that in the end times “men will faint with fear” over the expectation of “the things which are coming upon the world” (Luke 21:26).

3) Transportation — In 1900 the major means of transportation was what it had always been throughout history — namely, walking and riding a horse. Bicycles had been invented, and the steam engine had been applied to ships and trains. But steam powered transportation was too expensive for most people.

I have photos that were taken in my home town of Waco, Texas in 1912, and they clearly show that most people were still getting around in horse drawn wagons and carriages.

Today we have automobiles (usually two or more to a family!) and airplanes. We have bullet trains that travel 150 miles per hour and planes that travel faster than the speed of sound. And then, of course, there are rocket ships that take people into orbit around the earth.

In 1866 Mark Twain traveled to the Holy Land. It took him three months to get there. Today, a group can get on a jet plane in New York and be in Tel Aviv in 13 hours (and most will complain about how long the trip took!).

In 1900 the average number of miles traveled per year by a person inside the United States was 1,000. Today it is 25,000 miles per year, and many of us put twice that much mileage on an automobile in a year’s time.

4) Communications — At the beginning of this century the telegraph had speeded up communications considerably, but the fundamental means which most people used to get information was still the newspaper.

Today our communication resources are overwhelming. We have telephones, radio, and television. We have exotic devices like fax machines, pagers, and cellular phones. And we can communicate world wide through satellites.

I never cease to be amazed when I see someone use a credit card in an Arab shop in the Old City of Jerusalem. The shop may be nothing but a primitive hole in the wall, but over in some dark corner there will be a machine where the merchant can swipe the card. A few moments later he receives an authorization. During those few moments, the card number has been transmitted to Tel Aviv, from Tel Aviv to New York by satellite, from New York to the credit card processing center somewhere in the States, and then back to the Arab shop in Jerusalem!

I am equally amazed at the way I can sit down at a computer at my home or office and use the Internet to send a letter in seconds to almost any place in the world.

5) Computers — Computer technology has contributed to the rapid acceleration of many aspects of life, but it is interesting to note that the exponential curve applies to the development of computers as well. Anyone who tries to stay on the cutting edge of what is new in computer equipment knows that it is a never ending battle that requires a lot of money. Advances are so rapid that equipment is out of date within a few months.

In 1970 I was a professor at a college where we bought an IBM computer for $100,000. The computer filled a room and generated so much heat that we had to have the room equipped with additional air conditioning. The computer’s memory was 64K!

Now, if you are not a computer buff, that may not mean much to you, but keep reading because I’m going to make it understandable; and in the process, I’m going to illustrate how rapidly computer technology has developed.

Ten years later in 1980, this ministry bought one of the first desk top computers made. It was a Tandy TRS 80, Model II. It cost $4,800. When I turned it on, I was astounded by the first thing that appeared on the screen: “64K Memory.” In ten years time we had gone from a computer that weighed more than a ton to one that sat on a desk top, and the price had dropped 95%. But the memory was the same!

Ten years later in 1990, I went to Radio Shack and bought an electronic Rolodex small enough to fit into the palm of my hand. It cost $90. And when I turned it on, guess what? The first message that appeared on the screen was “64K Memory.”

The first floppy disk that we used in the TRS 80 was 8″ in size. It held 300,000 bytes of information. A few years later the 5¼” disk appeared. It would hold 700,000 bytes. Then came the 3½” disk. Its capacity was 1.4 million bytes! Now the hottest thing going is the CD Rom disk. I recently read an advertisement for a CD Rom disc that contained 134,000 pages of theological documents, the equivalent of 1,400 pounds of books!

6) Knowledge — The prophet Daniel was specifically told that knowledge would vastly increase in the end times, and it has. In fact, we have become so overwhelmed with the flood of new information that it is difficult to find wisdom anymore, because wisdom comes from reflection on knowledge.

When I was in graduate school in the early ‘60s, there were only two or three major academic journals in each field of study. Today there are dozens in each field, and they cannot begin to publish all the academic articles that are being written. Many have to limit the articles to one page abstracts, and even then most articles are rejected for a lack of space.

Encyclopedias are out of date before they can be printed. And I read recently where a research organization had determined that one Sunday issue of the New York Times contains more information than the normal person in the 19th Century was exposed to in a lifetime!

The most amazing thing to me in the area of information is the World Wide Web that can be accessed through the Internet. Using it, I can access the documents of the Vatican in seconds, and then in a matter of moments, I can go to the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, or I can dart back to the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. In short, I can access information all over the world without ever leaving my office.

7) Violence — I don’t think I have to emphasize that violence and lawlessness have been increasing. But it is hard to comprehend how rapid the increase has been in this century.

It is estimated by experts that the number of people killed in all the wars fought from the time of Christ until 1939 totals 50 million. In the next six years (1939 through 1945), 57 million people died in World War II. Since that time, almost 60 million have died in armed conflicts, either in wars between nations or civil wars within nations. This has been a century of unparalleled carnage.

Within the United States, violent crime has increased 500% since 1960. During the same period, the country’s population increased only 41%.

8) Society — The disintegration of society has multiplied in speed as violence, wickedness, and immorality have increased exponentially. Jesus prophesied this would happen when He said that end time society would be like it was in the days of Noah (Matthew 24:37-39).

I have witnessed the decaying of society with my own eyes. I was born in 1938. When I was born, abortionists were sent to prison. Pregnancy out of wedlock was thought of as scandalous. Homosexuals were considered queer. Pornography was despised as a sickness. Marriage was sacred. Living together was taboo. Divorce was a disgrace. Homemaking was honored, and day care was provided by mothers in their homes. Child abuse was unheard of. Ladies did not curse or smoke. “Damn” was considered flagrant language in a movie. (A recent film featuring Jack Lemon had the “f-word” in it 170 times in 120 minutes!)

I could go on and on about the many ways in which our society (and societies around the world) have decided to “call evil good and good evil” (Isaiah 5:20). But the most dramatic way I can think of to illustrate how rapid the deterioration of society has become in America is to consider the results of a poll concerning public school discipline problems. Consider the differing results between the ‘40s and the ‘80s (and weep!):

The Top Public School Discipline Problems
Mid-’40s
1) Talking
2) Chewing gum
3) Making noise
4) Running in the halls
5) Getting out of turn in line
6) Wearing improper clothing
7) Not putting paper in wastebaskets
Mid-’80s
1) Drug Abuse
2) Alcohol Abuse
3) Pregnancy
4) Suicide
5) Rape
6) Robbery
7) Assault
(Source: Time Magazine, February 1, 1988)
9) The Gospel —But not all the exponential curves are bad. Modern technology has made it possible for the Gospel to be preached to billions of people through the use of such media as short wave radio, motion pictures, and satellite television.

Billy Graham’s recent broadcast from Puerto Rico was carried by satellite to 185 countries and territories in a total of 116 different languages!

In 1800 the Bible was available in 71 languages. By 1930 the count had risen dramatically to 900. Today, the Bible has been published in 1,700 languages, with 1,000 more in progress. Computer technology has greatly speeded up the translation process.

10) World Politics — The exponential curve also applies to world events. Habakkuk 1:5 is as relevant today as if it were written yesterday: “The Lord replied, ‘Look, and be amazed! You will be astounded at what I am about to do! For I am going to do something in your own lifetime that you will have to see to believe.'”

I took a Sabbatical in 1987 and wrote a book called Trusting God. Seven years later, in 1994, I took another Sabbatical and completely rewrote that book. The exercise gave me an opportunity to reflect back over the seven years between the two Sabbaticals. I was astounded — even overwhelmed — by the rapidity and “stupendity” of world events.

Who could have dreamed in 1987 that within the next seven years any of the following events would have occurred? —

The tearing down of the Berlin Wall
The peaceful liberation of Eastern Europe from Communism
The collapse of the Soviet Union
The reunification of Germany
The resurgence of Islam and its emergence as the greatest threat to world peace
The sending of 500,000 American troops to the other side of the world to defend a country most Americans had never heard of (Kuwait)
The handshake between Rabin and Arafat that has led to Israel surrendering its heartland to the PLO
In 1987 if you had predicted any of these developments, you would have been written off as “nuts.” The rapidity of these events and their radical nature is breathtaking. They underscore the possibility of the impossible. And they certainly reveal that man is not in control.

The Significance of the Curve
So, what does all this mean to you and me? I would mention at least three things.

First, the exponential curve is proof positive that Bible prophecy is true. The Lord has told us what He is going to do in the end times, and we had better pay attention to it.

Second, the fulfillment of prophecy related to the exponential curve shows that God is in control. Even when it appears that everything on this earth is out of control, we can be assured that God is orchestrating all the chaos to the ultimate triumph of His Son in history (Psalm 2).

Third, the exponential curve is very strong evidence that we are living on borrowed time. It points to the fact that Jesus is at the very gates of Heaven, waiting for the command of His Father to return.

A Warning
I want to conclude by issuing a strong warning against taking time for granted.

Many people are doing that today. They are saying, “I’m going to get serious about the Lord when I get out of school;” or “after I get a job;” or “after I’m established in my job;” or “after I get married;” or “after I get my children raised.” Time is precious. There is very little left. Now is the time to get serious about the Lord.

Let me illustrate how critical the timing is by returning to the exponential curve. Suppose you put one bacterium in a jar, and assume it doubles every second. How many bacteria do you think would exist in the jar at the end of 30 seconds? The answer, incredibly, is 1,073,741,824. That’s more than a billion in thirty seconds! That’s the ferocity of the exponential curve.

Now, let’s carry the illustration a step further. If at the end of 30 seconds the jar is half full, how much longer will it take for the jar to become full? The answer is one second (because it will double in the next second). That is the suddenness of the exponential curve.

That’s what the Bible means when it says that people will be saying, “Peace and safety!” when “sudden destruction” will come upon them (1 Thessalonians 5:3).

Are you taking time for granted? Don’t do it. Non-Christian,now is the time for salvation. Christian, now is the time for holiness.

A Postscript:
The exponential curve illustrated is the one that could easily lead to the destruction of the United States. It took over 200 years for the nation’s debt to reach one trillion dollars. Then, in only ten years, during the decade of the ‘80s, the debt more than tripled!

As of April 1, 1996, the debt totaled 5.1 trillion. With a population of 264 million, that means every man, woman and child in American now owes $19,182.84. The debt continues to run at the rate of one billion dollars per day. Some experts estimate that by the year 2000, all taxes collected will barely cover the interest due on the debt. In short, America is bankrupt.