The Daily Word of Righteousness

Glorified in His Saints, #5

But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God (II Timothy 3:1-4 NIV)

The majority of the believers of the last days will not serve Christ fervently enough to be able to resist the abundance of sin, as is true of the believers in the wealthy nations of our day. Such lukewarm believers are part of the world system. They are not cross-carrying disciples of Jesus but are living as part of the present world. They will not be included in the appearing of Christ.

How to avoid becoming part of the world system is an individual matter. We cannot be specific because God leads each individual differently. We would counsel the Christian to pray much, obey the Lord Jesus strictly, meditate constantly in the Scriptures, and gather together with the most fervent saints he can find.

The Laodicean churches are preaching that Christians should be happy, content, and prosperous in the present world for they by grace (lawless grace!) will soon be carried away to the paradise in the sky. This is how we can recognize a Laodicean assembly.

The true churches are warning the believers to prepare their families for the days of judgment that are ahead; to get ready to stand in Christ in the midst of great tribulation; to seek the Lord with all their might; to arm themselves mentally (I Peter 4:1) so when trouble comes they are not dismayed. Deception is here now! Only the most sincere will not be deceived.

After the Levitical Day of Atonement comes the feast of Tabernacles.

So it is that after we have been purified by various tribulations and persecutions the Lord enters us in the spiritual fulfillment of the feast of Tabernacles.

First, the Lord gives us the desire and the ability to engage in spiritual warfare, to become a part of the army of the Lord. This is the spiritual fulfillment of the Old Testament memorial of blowing of Trumpets (Leviticus 23:24).

Second, we enter the Divine judgment. We wrestle with the Lord and confess our sins as God deals with our love for the spirit of the world, the lusts of our flesh, and our self-rule and self-love all of which are part of our personality. The working of God to deliver us from spiritual darkness and to reconcile our personality to Himself is the spiritual fulfillment of the Old Testament Day of Atonement (Leviticus 23:27).

Daniel speaks of the time of purification, of judgment and cleansing, of atonement (reconciliation to God) that will come to the Church during the reign of Antichrist:

And they that understand among the people shall instruct many: yet they shall fall by the sword, and by flame, by captivity, and by spoil, many days. Now when they shall fall, they shall be holpen with a little help: but many shall cleave to them with flatteries. And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time of the end: because it is yet for a time appointed. (Daniel 11:33-35)

"To purge, and to make them white."

To be continued.