One of the readers asked me if we could tell how far away the Lord’s coming for His Christians might be. It is a very valid question, and I thought about “How soon is soon”? That became the title of this article.

In John 14:4 Jesus promised He would go away and then come again. There is considerable evidence the early disciples expected Jesus to return in their lifetimes. Near the end they knew that was not going to happen, especially Paul. John closes Revelation with, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”

In the second century, the church was being racked by persecution. The disciples were hanging in there, and as time went on, there was a door shut on the emphasis of the imminent return of the Lord. In the 4^th century the Nicene Creed just lumped any return into one in this statement – “He suffered, and the third day he rose again, ascended into heaven; he was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried, and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father; From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.”

The Apostles’ Creed ends in the same way – “He ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of God, the Father almighty; from thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.”

Both these creeds had moved away from the Rapture; and things remained that way, with a few exceptions, until about the 1820s when the Holy Spirit revived the hope of the Lord’s coming for His Church. Students of Bible prophecy were gifted by God to understand eschatology (doctrine of the last things), and so we have now a clear understanding of future events. From the early 1800s there was an expectation of the Rapture, and it was generally believed it could be any time.  It is a constant expectation of the Church that the Lord will come to take His Bride away.

Charles Wesley wrote a beautiful hymn called “Lo, He Comes with Clouds Descending” in which he seems to deal with both future comings of the Lord. Stanza 1 is His Second Coming, and stanza 4 suggests the Rapture. I quote both stanzas.

“Lo! He comes with clouds descending,
Once for favored sinners slain;
Thousand, thousand saints attending,
Swell the triumph of His train:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
God appears on earth to reign.

Now redemption, long expected,
See in solemn pomp appear;
All His saints, by man rejected,
Now shall meet Him in the air:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
See the day of God appear!”

Having said that, where do we stand in 2020? Are there any obstacles to delay the Lord’s coming? How soon is soon? I will answer it this way:

1. 1. There are no prophecies relating to the Rapture—ones that have to be fulfilled first. There are hundreds of prophecies relating to the Second Coming. The closest we can get to, with some guidelines, are the “last day” prophecies of the Church age in 2 Tim 3:1-5, and those features we see in our world today. Some people say, “But we have always had those things.” The point is that it is the intensity we have to look at. Are these things getting worse? The answer most assuredly is that they are growing in intensity. The “difficult/perilous times” have worsened so much over the last few years. I am amazed with what has changed in the world just in 2020.
2. I don’t know if you saw my article, “The Signs of the Times: Part 1,” posted previously where I touched on these things, but I will expand on a couple. Christians who lived 100 years ago likewise believed the Lord could come in their lifetime, but there was one essential element missing. Consider this verse – Matt 24:32 “Now learn the parable from the fig tree: when its branch has already become tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near.”

The fig tree in scripture is always symbolic of Israel, a type of Israel, and this is an important verse.  Israel, as the fig tree, has remained leafless for about 1,900 years; but at last it began to sprout, and in 1947/48 became a nation. It has leaves but no fruit. The fruit will not appear until Israel is saved in the Tribulation when this passage will apply (this time another symbol is used for Israel, that of the olive tree):

Rom 11:24 “For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more shall these who are the natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree?” Rom 11:25-26 “Brethren, I do not want you to be uninformed of this mystery, lest you be wise in your own estimation, that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in, and thus all Israel will be saved just as it is written, ‘The Deliverer will come from Zion. He will remove ungodliness from Jacob.’”

Paul speaks of this transition from Jew to Gentile and then back to Jew. The Jews were the olive tree, but its branches were cut off and the Gentiles grafted in. We are right near the end of that when the Gentile branches will be removed in the Rapture and the olive tree shoots out everywhere with saved Jews in the Tribulation.

What I am saying is that the Jewish nation firstly has to be formed and in their land ready for God straight after the Rapture. They have been there for 72 years and in place. That is a strong indication that the Rapture must be very close. Israel is God’s time clock, and currently we are in the times of the Gentiles; but the clock, prophetically speaking, has only a few seconds to go before the alarm sounds, the Church goes, and God again turns to Israel for its salvation.

3. Lawlessness. What we have been seeing all over the world is now uniform whereas it was once spasmodic. It is not just confined to one nation. The World Leader/Antichrist is called “The Man of Lawlessness,” so increasing lawlessness in the world will be the garden he grows in when he comes. That “garden” is here now, and there is so much hostility towards Jew and Christian from people.  Another indication the Rapture must be nearing.
4. The beast/Man of Sin. He is the one who comes with the opening of the first seal in Rev 6:1. The Church is in heaven in Rev 4 and 5; the Tribulation starts in chapter 6 and goes right through until chapter 19. This one (World Leader/Antichrist) comes on a white horse but there is no war, just a bloodless conquest and acceptance by the people of the world.

I believe the corona virus will weaken the world so much financially and in other ways that it helps prepare the scene for the Antichrist’s arrival. He is seen as the savior of the world and will fix its problems. The current world is sinking in financial problems and debts so huge that no nation will be able to pay them. The world is looking for a person right now to fix all the problems. They will accept the beast with open arms when he appears. In all likelihood he is alive today. Also, when the rapture happens, it will cause a lot of problems like chaos on the roads and in business when people just disappear.

5. The Drug Culture. There is a very significant verse in Revelation – Rev 9:21 “And they did not repent of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their immorality, nor of their thefts.” This summary closes chapter 9, where just before we read – Rev 9:18 “A third of mankind was killed by these three plagues, by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which proceeded out of their mouths.” This is the terrible time of God’s wrath on the earth when mankind is powerless to do anything about stopping God’s wrath. What man needs to do is repent, but note what verse 21 said. They refuse to repent. Do you see the word “sorceries” there? Sadly, all Bible versions have the wrong translation, or maybe they are partly correct. The Greek word translated “sorceries” is φαρμακεία = pharmakeia. It means the use of medicine, drugs or spells and is the word from which Pharmacy comes.

I do not know why translators translate as “sorceries” rather than “drugs.” Of course, in 1611 when the KJV was translated, they had no idea of the pandemic of drugs as we have in the modern world, and they associated drugs (correctly) with the practice of sorcery and casting of spells. Sorcery or witchcraft often uses drugs as part of the enchantment and altered states of mind; so, in a way, it is understandable why the KJV would consider sorcery as the translation.

What we can deduce from this is that the time of the Tribulation will have a drug-functioning culture in its satanic worship of the Beast and False Prophet. Satanism is the religion of the Tribulation. In the world today we have an out-of-control drug epidemic and a great rise in Satanism, paganism, eastern religions and new-age beliefs. You see how close this is to what is coming. The seeds of it are here today, and they have germinated. I suppose one might ask, “How long can this deterioration continue before the Lord intervenes?” But when the restraining influence of the Holy Spirit goes at the Rapture, the depravity of man will explode, and drugs and Satanism will increase exponentially.

6. Communication. 100 years ago, how quickly could you communicate with someone overseas? Well, you could have used Morse Code invented in the 1830-1840s and the subsequent development from that with the telegraph, but only from one sender to a receiver, not to the public universally, or to the whole world. One could use a computer to send things after about 1975, but it was impossible to send messages and pictures to people anywhere on earth before the universal usage of the cell/mobile phone aided by many satellites. In fact, before 2010 only some of the world had this coverage; but today with saturation from satellites, the whole world can send and receive messages one to another.

Why is this important? Well, it has to be because of this passage – Rev 11:3 “I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for twelve hundred and sixty days, clothed in sackcloth.” Rev 11:7-11 “When they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up out of the abyss will make war with them, and overcome them and kill them. And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which mystically is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified.

“Those from the peoples and tribes and tongues and nations will look at their dead bodies for three and a half days, and will not permit their dead bodies to be laid in a tomb. And those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and make merry; and they will send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth. But after the three and a half days, the breath of life from God came into them, and they stood on their feet; and great fear fell upon those who were beholding them.”

This is the record of the two witnesses who will come, I believe, exactly halfway through the Tribulation and witness in Jerusalem for three and a half years. (Some believe they’re here for the first 3 1/2 years; some believe in the middle, overlapping both the beginning and the end.) Enoch and Elijah are those two witnesses. It cannot be Moses because he has died, and the Bible says very clearly in Hebrews 9:27 “Inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment.”

When these two prophets are killed by the World Leader/Antichrist, THE WHOLE WORLD WILL SEE IT IN REAL TIME. In verse 8, “The peoples and tribes and tongues and nations” means all nations and languages (dialects and tribes) – in short, everyone – and this can only be possible because of the universal cell/mobile phone coverage. I read not too long ago in a survey that 68% of people sleep with their phones in the bed or under their pillow. Social media seems to control people’s lives like an addiction. Things go viral all the time.

We are right at the stage now where an event in the city square in Jerusalem in a coming day can be viewed universally and the entire world will rejoice because God’s prophets Enoch and Elijah have been killed. What horrible days! For centuries, skeptics mocked this Revelation passage, scorning the fact that no one could see anything outside of the immediate vicinity. They dismissed the Bible as a fairytale.

CONCLUSION:

In my article, “The Signs of the Time: Part 2,” some extra points on the nearness of the Lord’s coming were explored. 50 years ago when I was speaking on these prophetic subjects, I remember saying, “There is not one thing that has to be put in place before the Lord can come for us. Everything is ready.” Now, in hindsight, I see that was not the case. Just to cite two items from the material above – the drug culture and phones! I think now I can say there is nothing whatever now. It is just a matter of how quickly conditions might continue to decline and how bad and depraved it might become before we hear, “Come up here!” and the Lord takes us home.

The virus has damaged the world. Financial problems are now a concern. Violence is increasing. The world seems incapable of repairing itself. False prophets and liberalism and humanistic theology are very widespread, along with “easy believe-ism.” We must be right at the end of the Church age. The Rapture is most certainly close, but how close? How soon is soon? We are not to worry about that.  We keep our eyes on the Lord and patiently wait.

 

Editor’s note: This was written by Jack Kinsella in 2004, but still applies today.

A culture war has been raging in the United States for years. Unlike traditional wars, it cannot be won by military action, but it is a real war being carried out on US soil by US citizens against one another.

For example, when San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom defied state law by allowing same-sex marriage licenses, a New York Times profile reported him sporting “a wide grin,” “describing his motives as pure and principled,” and cited his “business acumen, money, good looks and friends in the right places.”

But when Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore also defied the law — by installing a Ten Commandments display in his public building — a Times profile said that “civil liberties groups accused Justice Moore of turning a courthouse into a church,” while allowing that he had also become “an Alabama folk hero.”

On the editorial page, the Times criticized Moore, likening him to George Wallace standing in the schoolhouse door, but supports Newsom’s protest and gay marriage.

America’s culture war can be defined as conservative vs. liberal, Right vs. Left, rich vs. poor, Democrat vs. Republican but in reality, the war is between believers in Christ and believers in the world system, both inside and outside of mainstream Christian culture.

It isn’t really a war between cultures so much as it is a spiritual conflict. For example, while polls show a majority of Americans oppose gay marriage, some of the country’s top editorial pages support it.

“Same-sex marriages pose no threat to anyone but rather affirm a commitment of love, an emotion that is universal,” says the Boston Globe.

“We believe that extending the benefits and responsibilities of marriage to same-sex couples would be fair and beneficial; we understand that many Americans feel otherwise,” says The Washington Post.

“Clearly those who claim that it signals the end of civilization need to get their outrage odometers adjusted,” says the Los Angeles Times.

Polls demonstrate that the culture war between Christ and the world is taking casualties within mainstrean Christian culture as well: A poll conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life suggests that opposition to same-sex marriage is widespread among white evangelical Protestants (84 percent) and blacks (65 percent).

Other mainline Protestant Christians showed a 20-point drop in opposition to same-sex marriage (from 64 percent to 44) and a 19-point drop among white Roman Catholics (from 60 percent to 41 percent) but only a 1-point decline among white evangelical Christians and African Americans. Do you see a pattern developing?

Another front in the culture war is the battle raging over Mel Gibson’s movie, “The Passion of the Christ.” Before it was even released, it had ignited passions across the country.

“Too gory!” exclaimed movie reviewers. The same movie reviewers loved Quentin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill” and “Pulp Fiction.” Not to mention “A Nightmare on Elm Street,” “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” and “Natural-Born Killers” all of which have achieved ‘cult film status’ and are immune to criticism. The same reviewers who criticized “The Passion” for its gore cheered the historical accuracy of the first thirty minutes of “Saving Private Ryan.”

The culture war isn’t over the movie, but rather the subject material — namely the Salvation of the human race. The world system doesn’t like to think that it needs salvation, and it doesn’t like to be reminded of the historical Jesus.

If the Passion of Jesus is real, then hell is real. And if hell is real, then it becomes decision time. And to the world, ‘decision time’ means giving up all the ‘fun stuff’ — something they would rather not do.

So rather than admitting outright that their real objection is to Christianity in general, they fall back on whatever seems safe.

Antisemitism, or too much gore, or historical ‘inaccuracies’ that didn’t seem to bother anybody when reviewing “The Last Temptation of Christ” or “Jesus Christ, Superstar.”

Abortion is another example — recently the Los Angeles Times corrected a review about a play that celebrated fertility (a favorite subject of the world) in which the reviewer called the play ‘pro-life.’ Although the play had NOTHING to do with abortion, the LA Times’ editors changed ‘pro-life’ to ‘anti-abortion.’

The words ‘pro-life’ are forbidden by the Times’ editorial board because it might give the impression that if those opposing abortion are ‘pro-life’ then those who favor it are ‘pro-death’ or ‘anti-life.’ ‘Anti-abortion’ strikes the right semantic ‘balance’; who wants to be ‘anti’ something? Especially since the opposite of pro-life is, by definition, anti-life?

Last week, the UC Student Senate passed a bill to give $2,400 to send 10 buses of students to a pro-abortion rally in Washington. That is considered ‘education,’ but you won’t find public universities shelling out funds to send students to a pro-life rally.

Cincinnati’s Xavier College ponied up $30,000 to pay lunatic left-winger Michael Moore to address the student body. Some students wanted to hear from conservative columnist Walter Williams. They even put up $10,000 of their own money. Xavier refused to kick in the balance of $3,000.00 — about ten percent of what they paid Moore.

That the world is well aware of the spiritual conflict is easily seen by the automatic assumption that anybody who is pro-life must be a Bible-thumping born-again Christian, so financing such a student trip would violate the alleged ‘Separation Clause.’

Polls show the majority of Americans are pro-life, but the world system equates being pro-life to Jesus Christ. And hates it.

The spiritual war raging in America is taking place at the same time that a larger spiritual conflict has gripped the whole world. Unlike America’s war, this one IS being fought using bullets and bombs. That war pits Muslims against Jews and Christians, which is what brought it to America’s shores. Because America is rapidly becoming one of the last strongholds of Christianity left in the world.

While there are more Christians in China than there are Americans on earth, no nation on earth has more Christians per capita and no nation on earth exerts more global influence than ‘Christian’ America.

The culture war raging in America represents the opening skirmishes in the coming War of Armageddon that rages throughout the Tribulation Period.

Consider what would happen to America if, suddenly, there were no Christians remaining to continue the spiritual conflict with the world system. What if the only worldview left in America were the ones espoused by the liberal left and the God-haters?

What would it mean to America’s global status? What if there was nobody to restrain Ted Kennedy or John Kerry or Jay Rockefeller’s doctrine of internationalism?

What if there were no Christians left for Islam to fight?

One of the spiritual wars taking place in America right now concerns whether or not America is really a Christian country to begin with. In America, pledging allegiance to one nation ‘under God’ is already illegal. So is displaying the Ten Commandments on public land.

If there were no Christians, America’s culture war would be over and the stage would be set for the War of Armageddon to begin in earnest. The Armageddon War isn’t against the Church; it is against Israel and the Tribulation saints.

What would happen if, suddenly, Christianity disappeared from the face of the earth as outlined by the Apostle Paul. Paul had taught in his first Epistle to the Thessalonians of the coming Rapture of the Church.

“For this we say unto you by the Word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4:15-18).

In his Second Epistle, Paul is specifically addressing a heresy that was being taught in Thessalonica that the Lord had already returned for His Church and that they had been left behind.

“Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto Him, That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition” (2nd Thessalonians 2:1-3).

Paul outlines the spiritual conflict, saying that “the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only He who now letteth will let, until He be taken out of the way.”

The NIV translates this same verse, “For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the One who now holds it back will continue to do so till He is taken out of the way.”

The One Who ‘holds it back’ is the Holy Spirit of God indwelling the Church. The Holy Spirit is God. God is omnipresent, meaning He is everywhere. The Psalmist wrote; “If I ascend up into heaven, Thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, Thou art there” (Psalms 139:8).

It is only AFTER the restraining influence of the indwelt Church is removed, Paul says, that the Antichrist can come to power. “And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the Spirit of His Mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming” (2 Thessalonians 2:8).

Note that the text makes ‘that Wicked’ a proper noun, and that he will be destroyed by the 2nd Coming of Christ at the conclusion of the Tribulation Period. The identification of ‘that Wicked’ as the antichrist is obvious from the context.

After the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is ‘taken out of the way,’ Paul explains the ‘strong delusion’ that will cause the secular world to embrace the antichrist.

“And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2nd Thessalonians 2:11-12).

The Rapture would decimate the United States, hand victory to the internationalists, the liberals, the homosexual movement, the God-haters and the abortionists in a war they undoubtedly will think they have won.

It is obvious that the only thing restraining evil today is the believing Church. For those to be left behind, the conditioning process has already begun.

The Rapture is at hand. That means there isn’t much time left for us to fulfill our commission as watchmen on the wall.

The King is coming! Tell somebody.