Purposeful Outreach

“After an incredible kilometer-wide meteor crashes into the earth creates massive havoc on this earth. The president, in complete despair about his own life, takes his own life on television. Now the vice president, who is an alcoholic, takes over the presidency. The new president‘s wife is having an affair with a powerful man from India. This man is so powerful that he gets an individual into the White House as vice president. Shortly after that, they kill the replaced president, leaving a new president in office. This new president, in view of the catastrophic conditions of the world, proposes one world government. Every nation, except Israel, thinks this is wonderful. He then decides to rule the world from the new Babylon, and develops a cashless society, and requires a one world religion, to create unity and tolerance. After a while, those who come to Christ as Savior are persecuted. Then, because of Israel’s unwillingness to cooperate, he attacks.“

Incredibly enough, I have taken these excerpts from a book, entitled The End of the Age, by Pat Robertson. Although this is a fiction novel, plus, it really is not that well written, we can recognize the very real sense of accuracy.

Because of the reality of impending judgment, Christians must maintain a purposefulness in our living for Christ.

Today, the stage is being set in such blatant ways. In the most recent Grammy awards, evil was applauded and presented proudly. Listen to the opening comments from a news report: Kim Petras and Sam Smith have become the first transgender and nonbinary winners of the Grammy award for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, respectively. The duo took home the award for their hit single, "Unholy," which they also performed during the awards ceremony. If this type of blatant, in your face evil is happening today, can you imagine what will be taking place during the tribulation period?

Purpose To Be Light.

Revelation 16:10–11 (NASB95)

Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom became darkened; and they gnawed their tongues because of pain, and they blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores; and they did not repent of their deeds.

The fifth angel pours his bowl of judgment, directly upon the throne of the beast. This seems to be best understood as a reference to his entire evil kingdom. This beast basically has the world under his complete control, so now God will plunge the world into darkness. Now if one looks at the passage closely, we can understand that there is evidence that the darkness is upon only that which is under the beast’s domain. The verse states, “his kingdom became darkened.“ So God now envelops this whole religious system into a complete darkness, which Satan had led people to believe that he would bring a brand new light into the world.. For every individual that thinks that Satan and the world’s religious system can provide hope and meaning, there will be absolute chaos, hopelessness, and meaninglessness.

All of humanity who has worshipped the beast and his image will find themselves in absolute agony. It is unclear whether this is physical agony, or if the moral and bankrupt spiritual condition of humanity has also reached that point of absolute despair. But it’s not going to be pleasant at all.

Again, John points out that “they did not repent of their deeds.“

My friends, Satan has already caused mankind‘s eyes to be covered with scales, as it were, according to the Bible. This has been been happening throughout the ages. He has constantly been working on darkening the hearts and minds of as many individuals as he can. Still, humanity does not recognize that the agony and torture that is happening in their lives right now, or will happen, is a part of God’s judgments. They may say that they do, but by not repenting, it is shown that they don’t believe it to be true. The world goes on its merry journey down the path of life, not realizing that beyond that final bend, lies a Christ-less eternity.

That is where you and I must enter the picture. Right now, all of us, as believers, must maintain a purposefulness in our living for Christ. We must be the light in the dark world. We cannot keep our light hidden, while others are going to be hell-bound because of their rejection of Jesus. If we belong to Christ, we are reminded from the gospels that we are the light of the world. That will probably mean that many will not appreciate us. For the reality is that when you come out of darkness and are presented with light, the natural response is to cover the eyes. However, we must continue to be the light. Some will say yes to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior as a direct result of us, being that light of the world.

Plan Time In the Word.

Revelation 16:12–16 (NASB95)

The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river, the Euphrates; and its water was dried up, so that the way would be prepared for the kings from the east. And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs; for they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them together for the war of the great day of God, the Almighty. (“Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake and keeps his clothes, so that he will not walk about naked and men will not see his shame.”) And they gathered them together to the place which in Hebrew is called Har-Magedon.

The sixth angel’s judgment bowl dries up the bloody Euphrates river. Interestingly, the Euphrates River is approximately 1800 miles long. In addition, consider that this river was the eastern border to the land which God gave Israel. Looking at the map, seeing where Israel currently exists; I believe it’s safe to say that Israel is not the country taking land from other nations. The exact opposite is true.

The purpose of this judgment is to provide a passage for those kings, which are east of Israel to attack Israel. Understand that this is not for the benefit of those kings, just as dividing the Red Sea was not to benefit the Egyptian army. It is basically a part of God’s judgment upon all those who have rejected Christ.

Still, we may ask ourselves, how can they coerce the kings east of Israel to come and attack God’s chosen people? The reality is that Satan, the beast, and the false prophet will combine their demonic efforts and mesmerize the rulers. They will perform miraculous signs, attempting to convince the kings of the world of the necessity of their going to battle. Even though it makes no sense since they will be doing battle with God himself. Again, the stage is being set as history is being rewritten and reimagined. Talk shows and news articles are on board with they lying, as well. When there are such verbal attacks on the Jewish people, suggesting there was no holocaust, stating that any negative which the Jews have experienced has been brought on by themselves, expressing outrage over the nation of Israel defending their own people, it seems very obvious how easy this is going to be during the tribulation period.

As we read on, we might wonder why John picks on frogs? It reads as if something scripted from a horror movie. Besides, the fact that God had divinely inspired him to write this down, frogs were considered unclean animals, according to Leviticus 11. Interestingly, the frog was also a double of a Persian god of evil. John actually identifies this as spirits of demons. They were linked arm and arm with idolatry in its worst forms.

Why would they come from the mouths of these three individuals? It appears that Satan is doing nothing new; lying and deception are the orders for the time. The miracles and signs are a continual counterfeit and mockery of God. In contrast, Christ’s mouth carries His sword, which is the Word of Truth. These workers of evil will be able to gather the world’s rulers together at the hill of Megiddo.

We see a warning which is issued. We must listen carefully to what John is saying, because there is application even today for us. It is so easy to be deceived by Satan‘s lies and schemes. We see it happening, not only in the world, but how it has infiltrated churches. There is much false teaching and counterfeit signs and wonders being presented in order to deceive the people and get them to follow after Satan, thinking they are doing the right thing.

And as we read this, we recognize what a horrible day that will be during the Great Tribulation. If anyone dares to rest, they will be caught completely off guard when this battle begins to take place. Even in our time, our battle, which we are in the midst of, we must also be on the alert. Satan will do all he can to cause the Christian to be disloyal to Christ.

Verse 15 is a word to believers of encouragement. Christians will not be forgotten, for they belong to God, even as the prophet Malachi spoke.

Then verse 16 lets us know that in the hill country, about 60 miles north of Jerusalem, the battle will rage. This will take place just after the seventh judgment.

So what should we do, as Christians, today? One of the primary things which we must do is to be certain we have a regular time of Bible reading. We do not want to read just to accumulate more knowledge. Neither do we want to read just to be able to mark off the passages for the day. Instead, we want to read with the intent that God’s Holy Spirit is going to speak to each one of us through the Word. Read with the expectation that the Bible will either encourage you, convict you, or challenge you. It is essential that we get God‘s Word into us. The more we are into God‘s Word, the less prone we are to sin. The more we allow the Bible to guide us in our lives, the more influence we will have with others who have bought into Satan‘s thought system. Christians must maintain a purposefulness in our living for Christ. I’ve shared before this quote: We should be so full of God’s Word, so full of Christ, that when a mosquito bites us, he should fly away singing, “There is power in the blood.”

Provide a Call To Wake Up.

Revelation 16:17–21 (NASB95)

Then the seventh angel poured out his bowl upon the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple from the throne, saying, “It is done.” And there were flashes of lightning and sounds and peals of thunder; and there was a great earthquake, such as there had not been since man came to be upon the earth, so great an earthquake was it, and so mighty. The great city was split into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. Babylon the great was remembered before God, to give her the cup of the wine of His fierce wrath. And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found. And huge hailstones, about one hundred pounds each, came down from heaven upon men; and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail, because its plague was extremely severe.

Now the seventh angel appears. This final judgment will not be completed in just a few short verses, but we will be introduced to it here. When he pours out the bowl into the air, a loud voice made a declaration such as never before been heard, Yet, it has been awaited for a long time. The voice says, “it is done!“ God‘s wrath will finally be completed. The wording is such that it describes a completed action with continuing results.

“… Flashes of lightning and sound and peels of thunder; and there was a great earthquake,…“ These things are seen, heard, and felt. It is most likely such an earthquake which no seismologist will have ever experienced before throughout the history of the earth. It causes the great city, most likely Jerusalem, to be split into three parts. All of the major cities of the world collapse. This earthquake causes islands to disappear and mountains to exist no longer. It seems that all of this suggests that this planet will be completely reshaped.

Then hailstones of about 100 pounds fall. To give an idea of comparing to hailstones today, the heaviest hailstone ever recorded was about 2 pounds. Remember that there is no shelter to escape since the earthquake destroyed everything else. What did the people end up doing who survived? They curse God.

Sometimes, you and I wonder today what it’s going to take to awaken some people. How much longer will people keep on mocking and cursing God? How can people continue to act as if God is unreal?

Christians must maintain a purposefulness in our living for Christ. We must take advantage of every opportunity which God places before us to present the gospel. We need to look for those “teachable moments.“ During the midst of a horrible situation, may not be the best time to present the gospel. However, shortly afterwards, we can take a crisis and point out to them how God would love to have them become His child. We can present the fact that they have a new Father Who wants to give them eternal life. We can show them what it means to have a living hope. however, we must understand that God will reveal to us when the right time and opportunity comes along.

Conclusion

The Holy Spirit reminds me of who I am, as well as my many inadequacies and failures. Because of what Jesus has done for me, my desire is to present Jesus to as many as possible. I want to live my life in a way that others will know that I belong to Jesus. And as a result of doing this, my prayer is that they will want to know Jesus as their personal Savior.

Recognizing my weaknesses and failures, I am also encouraged to know that Jesus is willing to use me just as I am. I have to submit myself to him and use the resources which he’s given to me. And then I understand that his Holy Spirit will take care of the rest. Yet, I still am reminded, that as a believer in Jesus Christ, we must maintain a purposefulness in our living for Christ.