Friday, February 7, 2025
My grandfather was born in 1899 and died in 1996. Take a moment to think about the amazing increase of knowledge he witnessed in his lifetime. His father, my great-grandfather, spent his entire life living nearly the same way as did ancient Abraham, Isaac and Jacob described in the Old Testament. My grandfather grew and harvested crops on his farm by horse power, literally. It wouldn’t be until after WWI that gasoline powered tractors would successfully replace horse power with mechanical power. After WWII came a turning point of knowledge and technology that, to this day, has not slowed, but increases with blinding speed. Today we bear witness to the fulfillment of God’s prophetic word to the ancient prophet saying, “But you, Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase” (Dan. 12:4). [My emphasis] We now live in “the time of the end”, and the fact that God foretold that “knowledge shall increase” reinforces the absolute certainty that we live in the end-times. If mankind is left to his own devices, he and AI, will utterly destroy humanity.
Knowledge is good if it’s used for good, but today it’s being exploited for destruction. Nuclear weapons threaten the lives of billions. Why do leaders of nations, the super wealthy and elite globalists build underground bomb bunkers? It’s because man’s knowledge has led to deadly technologies and it frightens them into digging deep holes in the earth thinking they can protect themselves from destructions to come. But their bunkers will not save them, because in the Day of the Lord, God said “the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!’” (Rev. 6:15–16). But in the organized church today little to nothing is preached about “the wrath of the Lamb”, which is Jesus Christ.
In regard to the foregoing one might be inclined to think the increase of knowledge then equally applies to professing Christians regarding their knowledge of God. But sadly the opposite is true. There’s increased ignorance rather than knowledge of God. “In a poll by the Barna Group, half of those who described themselves as Christians didn’t believe that Satan exists, and one-third were confident that Jesus sinned while He was on Earth.” (Source) That’s shocking! It isn’t that these people don’t have the Bible, but rather, many are literally left to their own imaginations as to who and what God and His word says, because leadership has largely cast aside its biblical mandate to preach the whole truth, preaching instead watered down culture pleasing sermons.
With many professing believers being led by emotions, because emotionalism is what’s coming from most pulpits, what will those same professing believers do when “the man of sin … the son of perdition” (2 Thess. 2:3) is revealed? Because that man, Antichrist, will come with knowledge beyond human comprehension; knowledge of a foreign god, a strange god, very likely an AI god brought on the world scene by the false prophet of Rev. 13. Will they question, will they discern? By what do they even now measure the evils of our day? In their biblical ignorance, what do they know about “the time of the end”? Are they trusting in emotional and wishful thinking to guide them in making the right decisions? Because that will not work! Only God’s word in Christ has answers that warn us “beforehand” (Matt. 24:25) of events to come and prepares believers to endure to the end, Matt. 24:13, and leads us to safety and provision in the “great tribulation”.
Please heed the truth that God in Christ is the God of love, grace and mercy, and He is also a consuming fire, the God of wrath and of judgment. The Scriptures are balanced in the attributes of God, but unfortunately the organized church has overplayed its hand in preaching God’s love to the exclusion of His wrath and judgment. There’s a great vacuum of biblical knowledge that’s come out of that watered down preaching and it will devastate the unprepared, those taught only half-truths about God, compounded by a deafening silence about the end-times; neither do they have discernment to check whether what is being preached is in or out of sound biblical context. This is why millions of professing believers have put their hope and faith in the pre-trib rapture which consists entirely of conjecture and assumptions. Not a single Bible verse speaks of a pre-tribulation rapture, but false teachers love to preach it because it tickles the ears and avoids the testimony of God’s Son Jesus Christ. That deceitful lie will not go unpunished in the Day of the Lord as ignorant believers fall to “offense” (Matt. 24:10) in “the falling away” (2 Thess. 2:3).
I strongly encourage every reader of thefridayletter.com to use the KJV or NKJV of the Bible and read God’s word for yourself and never add one single word to it nor take one single word away. Here’s why that’s so important: “Every word of God is pure; He is a shield to those who put their trust in Him. Do not add to His words, Lest He rebuke you, and you be found a liar” (Prov. 30:5–6). And God further said “But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death” (Rev. 21:8). [My emphasis] As it is today, many pastors search numerous versions of the Bible to find the one most culturally friendly and then teach that version. Many versions are corrupted today from the original English KJV and NKJV. If you don’t already know that I invite you to make it your ambition to compare other English versions to the KJV and NKJV. Many Bibles and their footnotes diminish vital truths.
Dispensational Theology mandates and protects, at any costs, the pre-trib rapture which will prove to be the single greatest destructive deception and lie foisted on the church since the mid-19th Century. But thousands of false teachers find favor of many people by preaching their pre-trib rapture lie, having gathered a following who love and approve a false teaching, making for false teachers great sums of money through the sale of thousands of books, videos, movies and through difficult academic theological pontificating about that which is not written in Scripture. False teachers bask in the limelight of the approving majority, delivering their pre-trib rapture promise based solely on false claims by confusing theology, conjecture and assumptions. That cannot be allowed, but must instead be by the “it is written” testimony of God in Christ Jesus.
What’s occurring in these end-times is that worldly technological knowledge is accelerating exponentially while biblical knowledge is exponentially declining. It’s therefore easy to see how superior technological knowledge like ChatGPT, AI language models and more will increasingly replace human knowledge. AI can do computational functions of the highest order impossible for human beings. AI is very popular. Even many pastors use AI to develop sermon preparation. The article says, “Think of them [AI Sermon Generator Tools] as your assistant—one who never gets tired or runs out of ideas.” But for sermon preparation, it’s the Holy Spirit that’s “your assistant” and not a soulless artificial intelligence! AI and its offerings will spiritually decimate Christian churches. Believers must draw the line as to when and how to use AI in these end-times.
Marlin J. Yoder
