The prophetic cry for peace and safety is almost always seen as involving fear generated by the threat of the breakout of war. Particularly, the prophecy is thought to be scheduled to emerge to the forefront of end-times conditions as Christ’s return nears.

Further, that almost universal cry is believed by many to be centered around the fear of war breaking out because of Israel confronting its immediately surrounding, hostile neighbors.

The following prophecy by the apostle Paul frames the matter:

But of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you. For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape. (1 Thessalonians 5:1–3)

The apostle’s use of pronouns makes it clear that he delineates between the people he is addressing (fellow believers) and “them”—those upon whom sudden judgment is scheduled to fall.

And, incidentally, this is exactly the same pronouncement Jesus makes upon the rebellious generation when He next catastrophically intervenes. (Read Luke 17:26–30.)

This means that the judgment of God is meant for those who don’t know Christ for salvation and who will be crying for “peace and safety” when the “day of the Lord” is introduced by a “thief in the night” intervention.

The question then arises: Why does Paul say that “of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you”?

He then goes on to tell us that we know perfectly well that the ‘thief in the night” experience will introduce the day of the Lord. He says further that this time will be marked by “they” who will be crying for “peace and safety.”

This being a heads-up to us—Paul’s “brethren”; that is, Christians—it is essential to understand the matter of “peace and safety.” This is how we can know the general time frame of the “thief in the night” event.

Folks, that’s the time of the Rapture!

We should, Paul tells us, “know perfectly well” that when they are crying “peace and safety,” the Rapture is at hand. Judgment will then fall on those who aren’t our “brethren,” the lost who will be left behind when Jesus calls to the Church.

We’ve been hearing for decades the “cry for peace and safety.” The efforts to bring about peace in the world, particularly, in the Middle East, are legendary. The effort has been never ending, yet there are wars and rumors of war, and the quest goes on.

I want us to consider this matter from a different perspective for a moment.

There is a cry for peace and safety by the world’s populations at this very time in history. As a matter of fact, the fear of war being waged by the tiny entity called COVID-19 is so great that it shut down the entire movement of earth’s peoples for the most part. It has more than 90 percent of people in America believing they must wear masks to survive the battle against the coronavirus.

Media and governments tell us we must stay sheltered and apart from each other until a vaccine is developed and vaccinations are mandated and injected. The world is crying “peace and safety” in a way never witnessed. They want freedom of fear from an enemy they can’t even see.

Christians are also crying for “peace and safety.” It is, however, for a much more profound sort.

Almost every email I receive from those who look at the world through the lens of Bible prophecy are expressing their wishes for Christ to Rapture His own. They want to escape the things they see about to overwhelm this judgment-bound planet. They want the peace and safety offered by the glory of Heaven. It is a righteous cry for help.

Let’s take heart with great anticipation as we see that day approaching. Let’s look with thoughts of the “blessed hope” of Titus 2:13 at the balance of the prophecy Paul left believers with before he departed for Heaven through the Romans’ sword of beheading.

But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation. For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Wherefore comfort yourselves together, and edify one another, even as also ye do. (1 Thessalonians 5:4–11)

We just returned from a trip to Crane, Missouri, near Branson. The purpose of the trip was to tape four programs for Skywatch-TV, Tom Horn’s up-and-coming television production that covers an ever-widening range of biblical topics. The program concentrates especially on matters as they relate to esoteric things going on behind the scene and to today’s societal and cultural developments.

Their expanding television and ministry facilities are impressive, with much more to come, Tom explained. My traveling companion and great friend, Mike Hile, as always, enjoyed the warm hospitality.

More than that, the conversations, both in private with the Skywatch folks and during actually taping the programs, was stimulating, although profoundly troubling in what the future might hold for the nation and the world in the immediate future.

At the same time, there was the interjection of what is just ahead in the magnificent future that awaits those who believe and trust the promises from God’s Word.

The programs center on two books that are upcoming. The first is a book authored by my good friend Tom Horn and myself with the title Antichrist and the Final Solution. The other is the new book by my good friend, Lt. Col. Robert Maginnis. The title of his book is Collision Course: The Fight to Reclaim Our Moral Compass Before It Is Too Late. Bob is a retired army officer, Pentagon think-tank consultant, and frequent contributor to Fox News.

Many things came from the interview that emerged to the surface as we probed a number of important signals that this generation is deeply into the last of the last days.

The one thing that struck me in our on-air conversations as the single most relevant development was the way many people across America today seem to be in an almost hypnotic state. By that, I mean they seem to have lost the ability to discern—to delineate—between things of fact and fiction in matters that impact how we live and interact.

The one example that strikes me in this regard is the matter of wearing face masks. More and more, this is proving to be more detrimental than beneficial. Breathing one’s own carbon dioxide, for example, can lead to oxygenation problems in the blood as well as bacterial infections. Face masks can also have a cultural ill effect in that they prevent us from seeing facial expressions in our social interaction –something that goes against the freedom to “know” each other as God created humankind to do.

A nation divided against itself cannot stand, as Lincoln put it, based upon Jesus’ words. We have been divided by the insistence of the CDC—in effect, by one doctor within that organization.

People are divided in our nation as never before in this way.

It has caused problems. For example, on numerous occasions I’ve witnessed developing confrontations. I’ve noticed more and more that people wearing masks in public verbally chastise others for not doing so. Total strangers are increasingly at odds over whether to wear the masks or not. It is beginning to take on the same kind of confrontation as is seen in road rage. People are divided in this way, and I’m convinced this is a deliberate part of a master plan.

The master plan, although carried out by those such as the CDC as they insist on mask-wearing, etc., is in fact being orchestrated by Satan. And, it seems to be working.

If there was ever a question of whether an entire population could be brought under a delusion such as that prophesied in 2 Thessalonians 2, there should no longer be much doubt.

People in these days of COVID-19 have been shown to be lemmings in slavish adherence to total shutdown of life’s activities. They will wear the masks, lose their jobs, let their children be ruined by keeping them from school, and be subject to a plethora of other deleterious societal, cultural, and even physiological and psychological dictates.

This is perhaps the primary realization that came from my participation on the programs we taped. We don’t have to wonder whether people could actually be brought under such a delusion as prophesied by the apostle Paul. We are already seeing that delusion taking shape, I think. The master planner is at work. His minions are at work, too.

As we reach the conclusion of human history, we are seeing develop that grand delusion—the big lie—that will eventually enslave the earth’s populations. People are being prepared—being mesmerized, at least in my opinion—for what is to come when the restraining work of the Holy Spirit is no longer in effect as it is prior to the Rapture of the Church.

Lt. Col. Maginnis revealed many things within Washington DC about what is going on behind the scenes. There are dark forces at work that even eclipse what we know from the surface evil perpetrated by what has become known as the deep state.

He also repeatedly offered the biblical prescription for staving off, at least for a time, the onset of the great delusion that is surely coming.

The upcoming election is crucial. That has been said about every election we’ve had, particularly in recent decades. But this one is truly the most critical, Bob and I believe.

The prescription for retarding the progression of that delusion disease as the conclusion of the age nears is the one God has given us to take to heart. That, of course, is 2 Chronicles 7: 14.

Let us all pray that holy prescription at every opportunity in these upcoming days.