“the Lord shut him in”

Friday, June 23, 2017

Deceptions and apostasy now flood the church. God’s Word has been overturned by many as outdated. The end-times are upon us and what you believe about it has eternal consequences.

“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 all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death” (Rev. 21:8).

God further warned: “I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book” (Rev. 22:18–19).

The pre-trib rapture belief is a hostile addition to God’s Word of something that’s NOT there. It’s a scourge against the very character of God. He does not snatch His people off the earth to spare them from tribulation. Never has. His character is to lead His people through tribulation; that is, His holy people who actually know and believe Him, for they are counted worthy.

“Then the Lord said to Noah, ‘Come into the ark, you and all your household, because I have seen that you are righteous before Me in this generation’…and the Lord shut him in” (Gen. 7:1, 16). [emphasis added] Noah’s faith actually believed God, and thus built the ark which preserved him and his family through God’s global judgment of that apocalyptic day.

God to ancient Israel: “You shall dwell in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near to me, you and your children, your children’s children, your flocks and your herds, and all that you have” (Gen. 45:10). By Joseph, the great grandson of Abraham whom Pharaoh made ruler, God shut His people into Goshen and kept them through that tribulation, ten plagues and judgments.

The time came when God delivered His people from Egypt. “And in that day I will set apart the land of Goshen, in which My people dwell, that no swarms of flies shall be there, in order that you may know that I am the Lord in the midst of the land” (Ex. 8:22). And, “Only in the land of Goshen, where the children of Israel were, there was no hail” (Ex. 9:26).

When the time came for the tenth plague, the death of every firstborn in Egypt, God instituted Israel’s salvation by the Passover. Only if His people obeyed, would their firstborn be spared. The Passover required the death of a sacrificial lamb, a foreshadowing of the death of Christ.

“And you shall take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. And none of you shall go out the door of his house until morning. For the Lord will pass through to strike the Egyptians; and when He sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over the door and not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike you” (Ex. 12:22–23). [emphasis added]

As with Noah, twice, God shut His people behind His door of safety and provision, from there to await the end of God’s wrath and judgment against the ungodly. But note that God’s protection was only valid IF His people believed Him and then by faith acted upon that belief. The same holds true for the time of the end, during the last 3 1/2 years of the great tribulation.

In ancient Israel’s walk with God, the time came for her to inherit Canaan, the Promised Land, the land God swore to Abraham “as an everlasting possession” (Gen. 17:8), literally, the eternal dwelling place of all God’s saints from both the Old and New Covenants, for there is only “one body” (Eph. 4:4) of God’s people, not multiple bodies as dispensational teachers purport.

When Israel came to Canaan, however, she fell into unbelief and rejected what God said when they saw “the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants)” (Num. 13:33). And the people said, “Why has the Lord brought us to this land to fall by the sword, that our wives and children should become victims? Would it not be better for us to return to Egypt?” (Num. 14:3).

Then God said, “How long will these people reject Me? And how long will they not believe Me…?” (Num. 14:11). God said to those who did not believe Him, “The carcasses of you who have complained against Me shall fall in the wilderness…until your carcasses are consumed” (Num. 14:29, 33). Today, it must again be asked, how long will the church not believe God?

Be reminded that God said “I am the Lord, I do not change” (Mal. 3:6). And we see the same on the New Covenant side, for, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever” (Heb. 13:8).

Be reminded also that God said, “That which has been is what will be, that which is done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun” (Eccl. 1:9). The question is do you believe?

Be reminded too that “the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment” (2 Peter 2:9).

Likewise, at the beginning of the last 3 1/2 years of this age, the great tribulation, Jesus tells us, “when you see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (whoever reads let him understand)” (Matt. 24:15). Why – the time has come to flee to the safety and provision of God. But those in their pre-trib rapture lie will not know it.

Then, as it was outside Canaan, so will come to pass Jesus’ Words, that, “wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together” (Matt. 24:28 and Luke 17:37). For unbelief, false church tradition and hardness of heart, many Christians will know nothing of God’s safety and provision during Antichrist’s crushing rule and many will perish.

Antichrist of the end-times is the equivalent of the giants of Israel’s day which caused great fear and sudden offense and unbelief among God’s people, and they perished outside their otherwise intended eternal inheritance, and their bodies literally became food for carrion birds. Jesus said of that day, “Then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another”.

At the time of the great tribulation there is again a place of safety and provision for saints who believe God as the ancient prophet said, “Come my people, enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourself, as it were, for a little moment, until the indignation is past. For behold, the Lord comes out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity; the earth will also disclose her blood, and will no more cover her slain” (Isa. 26:20–21).

God will again shut His people in behind His door of safety and provision, but it will only be available to those who believe His Word and live a holy life, for Jesus said, “Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man” (Luke 21:36). Now is the time to live a holy life set apart unto the Lord Jesus. Now is the time to know and believe God’s Word. Planning to wait until the fateful day to then start living holy, will likely fail you, for deceptions will be great.

When the tribulation begins, and giants of Noah’s day return just as Jesus said, and Antichrist breaks his “covenant with many” (Dan. 9:27) mandating “that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or name of the beast” (Rev. 13:17), will it be true of you that, “the Lord shut him in” because you are of the “freewoman” (Gal. 4:21–31) who “fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, that they should feed her there one thousand two hundred and sixty days” (Rev. 12:6) because you believed God and were thus prepared?

Next Friday will mark ten years that I’ve been writing TheFridayLetter.com, defending the righteous end-time teachings of Jesus Christ, and showing that faith in Christ must necessarily include believing and acting upon “the testimony of Jesus Christ” (Rev. 1:9) for the time of the end, because “faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” (James 2:17).

Much of the church is now in the big business of making itself a friend of the world by accepting cultural immorality to escape ridicule and rejection, but in that very context God said, “Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God” (James 4:4).

Though signs abound, the church largely ignores “the testimony of Jesus Christ” for the times of the end, which is contempt for God and fellowman. The pre-trib, mid-trib, and pre-wrath rapture lies reject Jesus’ testimony for the end-times; that there’s nothing to see here; that Jesus gathers His elect “Immediately after the tribulation” (Matt. 24:29–31) is just fearmongering, and has no impact on present-day Christians. But the days of Noah and Lot are indeed increasingly upon us!

After 6/30/2017, TheFridayLetter.com is considering resting. I’m praying daily about that now and want to be led by the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. I ask for your prayers, that God’s will, and not mine, be done. The great and sudden “falling away” (2 Thess. 2:3) and that “many will be offended” (Matt. 24:10) is near, yet most church leaders are silent. God help the church.

Marlin J. Yoder