Amazing collection of thoughts and reflection on God’s word to us during these last days…
Remember, the darker it gets, the brighter and farther our little light shines!
Maranatha, Lord come quickly!
myblessedhope
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God’s Final Message Applied to Today’s Churches
By Joe Southerland
In Revelation chapter fourteen while in the midst of Daniel’s Seventieth Week (the seven-year long Tribulation period), God sends forth an angel to deliver his final message to rebellious, god-denying Man, just prior to unleashing His final seven judgments.
God’s final message cuts to the point and blows through all the superfluous drivel most lost souls are enduring in today’s dying pulpits. We would do well to take heed and make God’s last message the central theme being preached in our churches today.
“And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters” (Rev.14:6-7).
God will use an angel to supernaturally complete the church’s Great Commission, to preach His Good News to the ends of the earth (Matthew 24:13-14). The angel’s good news that Man’s salvation is solely accomplished through faith in Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection (John 3:16, Ephesians 2:8, John 14:6), is prefaced by God’s final message to mankind which focuses on three critical points concerning God’s relation to Man.
First, people must fear and glorify God. In our fallen world (and most modern churches), people have lost their fear of the Lord. There was a time in society when being called a God-fearer was a prized complement to strive for; now it is an archaic and often pejorative term.
The god that is being promoted to the world by most churches has been redefined as an anything-goes-love-daddy or a cosmic Santa Claus. What is there to fear? God is all sunshine and lollipops! Any mention that God is a god who should be feared is considered highly, highly offensive.
“Evolved” churches see such thoughts as quaint, at best, and at its worst—just plain evil. Modern churches believe fearing God is an artifact from that embarrassing part of the Bible, the Old Testament, which has no true significance in modern progressive Christianity.
Too many churches fail to understand the fear that Christians are to bear for God is not a phobia- type fear concerning God, but rather a fear of reverent fall-on-your-face awe and unequalled respect for the all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present God.
Before Man can have a personal relationship with the Father as discussed in Romans 8:15 (“For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father”), Man must humble himself and realize who he is in relation to God. The Scripture is clear:
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding” (Proverbs 9:10).
“And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell” (Mathew 10:28).
Man must be made aware God is to be feared and subsequently glorified.
Second, the hour of his judgment is come. You have to give Satan his due. He has diluted God’s message of coming judgment to the point where most of society envisions a disheveled man walking around with a sign around his neck which reads: THE END IS NEAR. And that is completely understandable considering most churches, and the media-anointed Christian leaders see a God of judgment as an unfortunate carry-over from our less enlightened Christian past.
Their basic flawed Aristotelian logic is this: God is love, judgment is not love. Therefore, God cannot judge. They refuse to take God at His Word which is written in the Bible. Instead they redact Scripture and even entire books to make a no-judgment-god of their liking, which is lapped up by those who want to carry-on in their self-centered, sin-filled lives (2 Timothy 4:3). But God’s Word is clear.
In Luke 4:16, Jesus stood in the synagogue and read from Isaiah 61 to announce the purpose of his First Advent ministry as the Good Shepherd, and sacrificial Lamb of God (John 3:17, 12:47). But then he stopped reading Isaiah 61 mid-verse and sat down. The second half of Jesus’ earthly ministry will begin where it left off in Isaiah 61:2b, as he returns as the vengeful Lamb of wrath (Rev. 6:16).
In Revelation 6:9-11, God promised to avenge those martyred in His name, and God keeps His promises. The day of His judgment speaks to the Lion of the Tribe of Judah who will return as the righteous judge of the world:
“And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war”(Rev. 19:11).
Eventually, all those who ever rebelled and denied Jesus’ name shall answer for their actions at God’s Great White Throne judgment.
Man must be made aware of God’s judgment is coming.
Third, worship the Creator. This goes to the root of the pagan world’s unanswerable question of how man and everything in this universe came into existence (Ecclesiastes 3:11).
To counter God, Satan has created a tremendous barrier for the vast ego of self-centered Man to see God’s glory. Today, from birth, our lives are constantly bombarded by a godless education system, an entertainment industry and media that tell us that all Man sees is just the result of trillions of fortuitous random collisions of basic molecular elements.
They proclaim, “We evolved, we were not created” and “A truly educated man must dismiss any consideration that a creative being made anything at all, as an ancestral fable, or a tribal truth story.” Accordingly, belief in a Creator labels you as a duped, uneducated dolt.
Most modern churches malleably blend right in with the evolutionist cultural norm and have exchanged the glory of our immortal God’s creation with images of mortal Man evolving from other creatures (Rom 1:18-23). These churches have exchanged the Holy Spirit’s firsthand account of creation in Genesis (2 Timothy 4:4), for the ever-shifted, grasping explanations of godless men.
Like the Pharisees of John 12:43, they love the praise from men more than praise from God. For diminishing God’s Word in the face of the mere theories of man, churches only heighten the barrier man must overcome to understand who he is in relation to God.
God’s teaching on creation was presented upfront and is crystal clear, “In the beginning, God created…” (Genesis 1:1). And God amplified his revelation in John 1.1-3, saying Jesus and God are one:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.”
Man must be made aware God is to be worshipped as their Creator.
God’s final call to awaken rebellious, sinful man is a message just as relevant to lost souls today:
Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.
Until the Lord calls us home in the approaching Rapture, Christians have been given this final message to accompany the good news to counter the false messages being preached by today’s false prophets.
May God bless you as you execute the Great Commission and send forth His final message in these last hours.
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Click on the article title for a link to full original referenced article.
In Romans 10 Paul lays out how salvation is open to all, Jew and Gentile. He writes:
“For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.” – Romans 10:4-5
What he is saying is now it is not about works or how closely to a “T” you follow the law. But that it is through God’s gift of grace through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ. It is really that simple, and yet a hard step for some of us.
“That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” – Romans 10:9
Christ is the narrow gate (Matthew 7:13-14), through faith in Him you will be saved. It is the only “works” that God requires for eternal salvation.
It is The Gospel of Jesus Christ. To learn more check out the following link.
myBlessedHope 