Tag: Death

Are these the Last Days? Does it really matter?

There is compelling evidence that the Last Days are upon. Throughout the world, we find it more and more difficult to sing of the lazy, hazy days of summer. Even people who normally don’t outwardly mention such things are wondering what’s really happening. People are becoming scarred. Now, certainly, the world has faced its disasters. Since the early Twentieth Century, there have been two world wars with great loss of life, an epidemic that took the lives fifty million people, devastating floods, earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, and many prolonged, deadly wars and civil conflicts. Crime is endemic. Here in the United States we have armed our local police departments as if preparing for war. And throughout the last 70 years we’ve had the threat of nuclear annihilation hanging over us. But this year is different.

“Nearly on a daily basis, we witness our very earth in what seems like birth pangs— be it nuclear threat, terrorism, hurricanes, earthquakes, or tornadoes—or violence, wars and rumors of war—while most people seem almost oblivious to what is happening (or may see something is amiss but do not turn to Scripture and Bible prophecy to understand the implications). Again, God is sounding out a warning to make ready.

“Even now, while the reality of the Antichrist and a one-world religion is looming closer and closer all the time, preachers and teachers are sitting at their desks inking out sermons that discredit Bible prophecy.” Lighthouse Blog

“The world is moving so fast, and so many devastating things are happening on a daily basis that even serious issues are constantly placed on the back burner to make way for a more serious or a more current piece of bad news.

“Just to name a few, the list includes: ISIS, Ebola, drought, famine, drug cartels, unabated illegal crossings at our Southern border, a house of cards economy, kidnappings, a gridlocked Congress that is more concerned with inflicting damage on the opposing party than serving the people, unaddressed massive government scandals and potential terrorist attacks on the homeland.” Worrisome Things, Charlie Daniels

See that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are but the beginning of the birth pains. Matthew 24:4-8

What’s a Christian to do? First, we are told by our Lord Y’shuaJesus to not be alarmed, all these things are to take place. Despite this, I long for the conflicts to end, for peace in this world to prevail. I feel the hurt of the millions of suffering people, and wish for resolve. I feel powerless to stop the agony. And then there are time in which I sit back and say to myself, “Fine. If there is war and disease and famine, let it be.” For these things are to happen. They happen because we made them happen. G-d didn’t start the wars, didn’t make us suffer disease, didn’t make us starve. G-d didn’t inspire a jihad that destroys rather than builds up. G-d, when He stood as a man looking over Jerusalem said that He’d wanted so much to gather up His people like a hen would gather her chicks. G-d wants us to have peace; we choose conflict. We are guilty. We hate. We sin. We have cried out for justice, and we have gotten it.

The second thing that we must do is summed up on that post from Lighthouse Blog: “If you love Jesus Christ and His Word and if you really want to serve Him, now is the time to be fully surrendered to the Lord without reservation. Whatever the cost. We are invited to the wedding feast, ready to meet our Savior, with wicks trimmed and lamps burning. Now is the time to make ready.” Lighthouse Blog

Lord Bless, Keep, Shine upon you. . .

Death, Then. . .

The other night, standing around the kitchen, my wife told her Mom about a women she’d seen on a news program. The woman had died, she’d said, while kayaking, but came back from the dead with a great tale, er, story. This woman wrote a book about it, to encourage others. My wife relayed the essence of this woman’s message: there are people waiting beyond death, family and friends, and there is so much love.

It’s a common theme. There is life after death. There are families gathered together. There is light, warmth, love. Every thing turns out alright, after all.

My Mother-in-law didn’t follow what my wife was saying. She’s eighty-three years old. How does someone die, and experience that, and come back, is what probably confused her. I interrupted. I had to at this point. I said, “The woman thought she was going to die while trapped under the water. She had a dream. In the dream all the things that she longed for were right there, in front of her.” I went on to say that people want to know there is something after we pass from this life. They want to believe there is something more. And that it’s all available to them without them doing anything at all for it. “That’s basically what Y’shuaJesus said,” I continued on. “It’s a free gift for believing in Y’shuaJesus. But people don’t want to hear about Y’shuaJesus.” My wife said I was right.

Yes! I’m right! Well, more-or-less right. What I didn’t continue with, didn’t say, is that believing is the start, the beginning of salvation that culminates in a walk that is with our LORD.

Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”

“O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

1 Corinthians 15:51-58

Paul tells us that not all will sleep. If not all sleep, that means some will. That’s how death is referred to by these First Century Jewish Believers in Y’shuaJesus as Messiah. Sleep. Not death. Sleep from which we will be awakened. And when we are awakened, we will have new, glorified bodies. Disease-free bodies. Incorruptible bodies. Perfect bodies. And a perfect heart. Tears wiped away, forgotten. And there will be a Central Figure before us when we awake: Y’shuaJesus! Praise the LORD!

And that’s exactly what’s desperately wrong with a woman’s story in which she says she died and found love and friends and family. It’s a tale from a few minutes hanging on the edge of suffocation. The brain without oxygen dreaming.

Y’shuaJesus will be there for Believers and non-believers alike. For the former, to wipe away tears and show His love. To the latter. . . well, it won’t be pleasant. They will see the love. Bow before the King in submission. They will, too late, realize He is The Way, The Truth, The Life. They will confess, too late, that Y’shuaJesus is LORD. And even if G-d, Father G-d, Abba G-d, were to invite them in, they would refuse. They would choose to turn away. They would be angry, hurt, afraid.

Sad! They would choose to turn away because they’d not turned away from their own miserable, sinful ways while on Earth. Repent! is to turn away from one’s sin. But before one can turn away, one must acknowledge sin. And in our society, our culture of liberalism and chaos, we are taught there is nothing Absolute, nothing evil, nothing that is sin. All things are relative. One person’s truth is his or her own truth. Not The Truth. All ways, all roads, lead to Rome AND HEAVEN, or so we are led to believe by the great liar, that devil satan.

We are being led like sheep to a slaughter. There are too many movies in which some human is a great hero, saving the day. There are too many movies depicting aliens coming to Earth to assist it in it’s healing. There are too many academia that are steering young people to believe in their own deity. Humanism is at the core of the United Nations Agenda 21. Humanism is satan’s tool to trick, if possible, even Christians. satan desperately wants to take worship of G-d from Him. He doesn’t want us to feel the warmth of a relationship with our Heavenly Father while we are on Earth. satan doesn’t need our admiration, our love, our praise. he just wants our soul.

We must be ready. We must be prepared. We must keep our eyes upon Y’shuaJesus!

Lord Bless, Keep, Shine. . .