Cautionary Words on the End Time from H A Ironside

by Jeremy James 

Like many believers I have considerable respect for Bible scholars of the 19th and 20th century who stuck closely to God’s Word and refused to be distracted by the latest theory, fashion, or political development. They studied carefully what God said and examined real world events from that perspective, even when it was not popular to do so, or when a new ‘scientific’ discovery came on the scene which conflicted with Scripture. They could see that the Jews would shortly return to the land of Israel because the Word of God stated that this would occur as the Age drew to a close. They didn’t allow themselves to be led astray by analyzing exactly how it happened, or the motives of those involved, and foolishly dismissing its crucial role in Bible prophecy. They knew that God often accomplished His will by using those who opposed Him as instruments of His purpose. We strongly recommend the writings of H A Ironside – see Appendix B – because they are based on a sound hermeneutic and are backed by a truly diligent examination of what God recorded for our benefit in His Word. The Roman Catholic prelates have long deplored men like Ironside because they remind them, over and over, that God expressly stated that we are never to add to, or take from, His Word. Successive Popes down the centuries have done just that, issuing Bulls and other theological edicts which add to God’s Word or change the plain meaning of what He said: 2 “Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.” (Deuteronomy 4:2) “What thing soever I command you, observe to do it: thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it.” (Deuteronomy 12:32) “Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him. Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar.” (Proverbs 30:5-6) “For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.” (Revelation 22:18-19) This is a very simple request from our Creator: I have said what I have said for your benefit and well-being; don’t add to it or delete any part of it. But man in his fallen state is incredibly disobedient. He is also cunningly industrious when it comes to finding ways to justify his disobedience. We are witnessing today the culmination of that disobedience, where even those who purport to study and respect His Word are ignoring what He said and following their own opinion instead. They never admit that they have rejected it, but claim rather to have come to a greater understanding of what He really meant. They are often pushed in this direction by alleged prophets and visionaries who have “reimagined” the truths of the Bible or uncovered a special truth which no-one has discerned or understood until now. 3 “If ye love me...” Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). One of these commandments is to believe and honor all that his Father revealed to us in His Word. So, according to Jesus, those who who add to Scripture, or take from it, do not love him. This is a hard message for a great many professing Christians today. If anyone tries to evade the force of John 14:15, let them weigh the significance of two later verses in the same Gospel: “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me...” (John 14:21) “If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love...” (John 15:10) It was made even more explicit, if that is possible, on the occasion where he was surrounded by a great audience and his mother and his brothers sought to get through and speak with him. When he was told of this, he asked rhetorically, “Who is my mother, or my brethren?” (Mark 3:33). In Luke he gives the following answer: “My mother and my brethren are these [i.e. the faithful among his audience] which hear the word of God, and do it.” (Luke 8:21) The Antichrist will leave his audience spellbound. Like the officers sent to arrest Jesus, they will say, “Never man spake like this man.” (John 7:46) But in their case they will say it because they never took Scripture to heart nor lived in obedience to God’s Word. This is why Jesus said he never knew them. After the Church is taken away in the Rapture, the professing Christians who are still on earth will turn in large numbers to the Antichrist when he reveals himself. They will do this because their hearts were not transformed by the Gospel. Where Jesus connected love very firmly with obedience, these professing Christians saw little or no connection. This, in part, is what makes the Antichrist so attractive initially to the masses of humanity. 4 Who will accept the Antichrist? Drawing upon many passages of Scripture to make his case, H A Ironside stated in his brochure, Who will be Saved in the Coming Period of Judgment?, that anyone who rejects the Gospel before the Rapture will be judicially unable to do so afterwards and will gladly receive the Antichrist. Rather than summarize what he said, we would urge our readers to study it for themselves (See Appendix A). A copy of his paper was kindly sent to me by a regular reader who, like many other believers, is troubled that nominal Christians – the great majority of the visible church today – will be facing this predicament. Dr Ironside expressed a similar view in his book, The Great Parenthesis: “But during the last half of the seventieth week he [i.e. the Antichrist] will deceive the nations by power and signs and lying wonders. Those [among the Jews] who will be preserved in that day are designated in the prophets as "the remnant." This Jewish remnant will become God's messengers to the Gentiles who have not yet heard and resisted the truth, but for those who have heard and had every opportunity to be saved but persisted in refusing the message of grace, there is no possibility of salvation in that awful day. Because they refused the love of the truth when they might have known it, God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe not merely a lie, but, according to the original text, the lie, that is, the lie of the Antichrist, that they all might be damned or doomed to judgment because they believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” – H A Ironside, The Great Parenthesis, p.119 If he is right – and I believe he is – then many professing Christians, and very possibly some who are known to us, will end up accepting the Antichrist. How are we to reconcile ourselves to this? After all, the matter is entirely out of our hands. As ever, we must trust in LORD and His great mercy! We can also reflect on the crucial criterion in Dr Ironside’s paper, namely, that those who are affected by the “strong delusion” (2 Thessalonians 2:11) are those who heard the Gospel before the Tribulation but chose to reject it. Thus, according to this interpretation, those who “came out of great tribulation” (Revelation 7:14) are the saints who heard the Gospel for the first time during the Tribulation and accepted Christ as their savior. These will include a great many Hindus and Moslems, as well as a wide variety of people across the face of the earth who, until then, were unbelievers. 5 We should note what the Word of God states in 2 Thessalonians 2:12: Those who “take pleasure in unrighteousness” are heading to perdition. Who are these people? Many would say they are false believers with a cruel disposition, people who secretly enjoy the suffering of others. But this interpretation is far too narrow. Take the case of Ireland: On 25 May 2018, five out of every seven people of voting age decided to support the murder of unborn children or chose not to go to the polling station and vote against it. How many of these took pleasure in unrighteousness? The modern apostate church has departed so much from the Gospel of Christ that a great many professing Christians today have never heard the true Gospel. This should not surprise us. There is wide gap between the social-ecumenical gospel taught by the Laodicean church and the true Gospel of Christ. This suggests that many professing Christians, who were not part of the Body of Christ at the time of the Rapture, will respond with joy to the Gospel message during the Tribulation. They will likely pay with their lives, but they will be saved. The Word of God seems to be pointing in that direction when it states: “...whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” (Romans 10:13). The Third Temple in Jerusalem A plausible sign of this “strong delusion” will be the importance attached by nominal Christians to the construction of the Third Temple in Jerusalem. Many who will end up receiving the mark of the beast will believe that the Third Temple had been constructed by well-intentioned men to honor the LORD God of the Bible. In reality it will be constructed by Freemasons and apostate, Cabalistic Jews to honor the Antichrist, the false messiah. Artist representation of Solomon’s Temple. 6 The Book of Revelation tells us that, after the Church has departed, God will send two witnesses to replace the Church as His witness on earth. These will appear on the streets of Jerusalem within hours of the Rapture and will begin the mission given to them by God. The Temple may already have been erected by that time or it will be erected very shortly after their appearance. They will take control of the Temple and, having evicted the Masonic-Cabalistic imposters, they will consecrate it to the LORD. This is when Elijah, one of the two witnesses, will “restore all things” (Matthew 17:11). This will include the restoration of the daily sacrifices and the consecration of Aaronic priests. The killing of the Two Witnesses Despite the best efforts by the agents of the Antichrist to evict the two witnesses, they will be unable to do so. The witnesses will have remarkable supernatural powers and will be ousted only when the Antichrist himself goes to Jerusalem and kills them. Their bodies will be left lying in the street and the whole world will rejoice at the sight, having watched the drama unfold over several months on their television screens. After three and a half days the two witnesses will be resurrected from the dead and will ascend into heaven. The world will be in shock. All who follow the Antichrist will be greatly unnerved when they see this amazing event. This was something they had never expected. It will seem to them that their ‘messiah’ has been thwarted in some way. In his rage the Antichrist will enter the Temple and commit the “abomination of desolation” (Matthew 24:15). 7 Remember, in order to constitute an abomination in the eyes of God, the Temple itself must be consecrated to God. This can only be done by a true prophet of God. If Elijah and his fellow witness did not do this it would remain a secular building constructed by the enemies of God for their own purposes. (For a more detailed study of the role of the two witnesses see our earlier paper, #164.) Anyone who supports the construction of the Third Temple, whether financially or in other ways, is actually facilitating the arrival of the Antichrist. The Temple is being built for him. It is by this means that Satan intends to achieve his third ambition, the third “I will” in chapter 14 of Isaiah: “I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:” (Isaiah 14:13) See also Psalm 48:2 – “Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.” A secular Zionist admits the Temple is definitely not for Jesus In Lecture 15 of his commentary on the Book of Revelation, H A Ironside recounted the following episode: “...when Dr. Mosinsohn, of the Hebrew College of Jaffa, was touring America in the interests of the same Zionist movement [i.e the Zionist Congress], I had the privilege of hearing him give an address at the University of California. In the course of his remarks, he said, “Think of all the great religious leaders who have come out of the East. Moses arose in the East, Buddha, Confucius, Jesus, and Mahomet all arose in the East. And we say to you people of the West, with confidence, that if you will restore the Jew to his ancestral home it will not be long until we will give you another great religious leader who will perhaps transcend all who have gone before.” A Christian physician and I, who had gone there together, looked at one another in amazement. We felt that we were listening to a “John the Baptist” of the Antichrist, so startling was the announcement. And with the light that the prophetic word throws upon the now very near future, who can doubt that this Hebrew leader’s declaration will indeed seem to an unbelieving world to be fulfilled in the willful one who is to be raised up in the land of Palestine, and whom apostate Judaism and apostate Christendom alike will acknowledge as the Christ – the coming man. Toward this awful end all modern cults and -isms are tending, and when the personal presence of the Holy Spirit has been withdrawn from the earth, his manifestation will not long be withheld.” [p.142] 8 Dr Benzion Mosinsohn, pictured in an article about Zionism in The Sunday Star, Washington DC, 9 October, 1927. His surname is also spelt ‘Mossinsohn’. His tour of America took place in 1937. He was a member of the Zionist Actions Committee, a leader of the General Zionist Party, and a delegate to most of the World Zionist Congresses. When he died in 1942, all Hebrew schools in the Holy Land were closed for his funeral. Dr Ironside was issuing a warning to all who cared to listen. The apostate leaders of Israel were knowingly heading into a future where they hoped to produce a great religious leader like those listed – or who would even “transcend all who have gone before”! The leaders of secular Zionism are preparing the way for the Antichrist, as are the leaders of apostate Christianity. It was insightful of Dr Ironside to see this so clearly, even before the state of Israel had been established. He wasn’t buying the sales pitch delivered by a high-ranking Zionist. He knew exactly where all of this was leading. Spokesmen for the Temple Institute in Jerusalem have long boasted that preparations for the construction of the Temple are well advanced. It is believed that the Temple may even have been erected in the Negev Desert on a trial basis from prefabricated components and that, when the time comes to erect it on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the project will take only a few months to complete. 9 Evidence that the Temple Project is far advanced We were recently given evidence that preparations for the Third Temple are well under way. In February 2020 Israel’s Transportation Ministry announced that it was moving ahead with plans to build an extension to the Tel Aviv–Jerusalem high-speed line that would directly connect Ben-Gurion International Airport to the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Last week the Airports Authority for Israel announced that a new, ultra-modern terminal would open at the airport in 2023. This is intended to cater for the anticipated increase in international visitors coming to Jerusalem. The proposed high-speed line, linking the airport to the Western Wall, will operate from this terminal (Estimated travel time: 28 minutes). Current rapid rail link between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, introduced in 2019. Steps are also being taken behind the scenes to keep the Islamic world on side. For example, Israel recently signed normalization agreements with neighboring Arab countries which have increased the number of air routes available and made it easier for Arab tourists to visit Israel. Despite the rhetoric in the press, the nations of Islam are run by Freemasons, so negotiations like this are easy to arrange. The Monotheism Trap It should be remembered also that Judaism and Islam are both monotheistic. Both reject the Trinity. Both strenuously deny that God has a Son. Considerable efforts are being made, for example through the ‘Abraham Accords’, to convince the Islamic world that Allah and the LORD God of the Bible are one and the same. It is claimed, for example, that if there is only one divine being, then the God of Moses and the God of Muhammad must be the same Person. The Roman Catholic Church is preaching the same message. Article 841 of its modern Catechism states: 10 841 The Church's relationship with the Muslims. "The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day." Plainly, the masterminds behind New World Order are planning to create a One World Religion comprising members of the ‘Abrahamic faith’. The proposed new Temple on the Temple Mount will probably be presented to Muslims as a ‘House of Prayer’ that will be pleasing to Allah. Medal commemorating the Abraham Accord signed by the US, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates in August 2020. Parakaleō As true believers, we trust in the Word of God and lean on His promises. This includes the Pre-Tribulation Rapture of the Church. We don’t ‘deserve’ heaven and nothing we have ever done merits our inclusion amongst those who will enter heaven. But we live in the strength of this blessing, this heavenly assurance, because of what Jesus, our Savior, did on our behalf. The Word of God tells us that living believers will be taken from the earth on the same day as the resurrected dead: “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.” (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18) 11 Why are Christians told to “comfort one another with these words”? Because they are immensely important! The Holy Spirit is telling us that this news, this revelation of divine truth, is about the most reassuring intelligence we could ever receive. The word for comfort in the Greek original is parakaleō. In the KJV this word is translated as “beseech” 43 times, “comfort” 23 times, “exhort” 21 times, and by other words 22 times. We are asked to ensure that all believers get this message. Why else would we “beseech” and “exhort” our fellow believers to understand and become familiar with this truth unless it was of immense importance? The Pre-Tribulation Rapture of the Church is a fundamental Bible doctrine. Before the Lord comes to judge those who have rejected the Gospel – “In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ:” (2 Thessalonians 1:8) – he must come for those who received it. These are two separate events. He will meet the Church in the air on the first occasion and will descend to the surface of the earth on the second, and only on the second, to exact judgment. The Holy Spirit is on earth today in a special way We need to remember that the Holy Spirit is on earth at this time in a special way. He was not present in this way during Old Testament times, and He will cease to be present in this way after Resurrection Day. Once He leaves, the Church must depart from the earth as well since all of her members, as living stones, collectively comprise the Temple wherein He dwells. The Word of God tells us that, once He enters our hearts, He never leaves – “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever” (John 14:16). In the same Gospel account Jesus also referred to something which many believers seem to have forgotten: 12 “Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.” (John 16:7) Jesus and the Holy Spirit cannot both be here on earth at the same time! If Jesus is to descend to the Mount of Olives (Zechariah 14:4) the Holy Spirit must already have departed. The time gap, at his first coming, between the departure of Jesus and the arrival of the Holy Spirit was ten days. The time gap at his second coming, between the departure of the Holy Spirit and the arrival of Jesus on earth, will be 2520 days. This period is known as the Tribulation or “the great day of the LORD” (Zephaniah 1:14). During this awful time, the LORD’s wrath will be poured out upon the earth. The ‘great day’ of His grace and mercy will have ended before this starts – as it must! The Church cannot be here. Those who contend that the Church must endure all or part of the Tribulation are greatly mistaken. The Church, the Bride of Christ, is a stunning creation. Jesus went to Calvary “for the joy that was set before him” (Hebrews 12:2). She cannot be anywhere on earth when his Father pours out His wrath in great fury on all mankind. His anger is directed solely at those who have rejected His Son. The Flood, the last great Judgment, afflicted every square inch of the earth; so too will the wrath of God during the Tribulation. “And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.” - Revelation 11:9-10 The Beast attacks the Two Witnesses (from the Bamberg Apocalypse, 11th century). The whole world rejoices at the news that the two witnesses have been killed. Why? Because they prevented the New World Order from using ‘their’ Temple for a considerable time. 13 Date setting and the Rapture There is much talk today about the timing of the Rapture. Many commentators are making what they believe to be a sound hermeneutic connection between the Feast of Trumpets and the Rapture. They interpret the reference to “the last trump” (1 Corinthians 15:52) as a reference to the final extended trumpet blast at the close of the Feast of Trumpets. The trumpet or trumpet ensemble allegedly sounded 100 times during this Feast, with the last being much longer than the previous 99. This very long final note is sometimes called the Tekiah Gedolah or ‘great reverberating blast’. H A Ironside does not agree. Here is what he says: “I have no doubt that those expositors are right who understand the expression "the last trump" to be an allusion to the third trump of the Roman legions. When the first trumpet sounded, whether it came in the night or in the day, the soldiers sprang to their feet and struck their tents. When the second trumpet sounded, they fell into line. At the last trumpet they marched away. And so we who believe have heard the first trumpet, awakening us when we were asleep in our sins. The second trumpet has called us to recognize the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now we await the sounding of the last trump when we shall be caught away to be with Him forever. Then those who are living in their natural, mortal bodies will suddenly put on immortality. That is, the body will be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, and made like unto the glorious resurrection body of our Lord Jesus Christ. Those who have died and whose bodies have corrupted in the grave, will be raised to incorruptibility, and in their new bodies will be with and like Christ forever. This is our hope. For this we are called to wait. At any moment the Lord Jesus may return to fulfill these Scriptures. How blessed to be ready to hail Him with joy at His Advent!” – H A Ironside, The Great Parenthesis, p.109 What a glorious promise the LORD has made! As Harry Ironside says, “This is our hope. For this we are called to wait.” And we are privileged to do so! 14 We should take careful note of what he says about the Roman army. The Emperor had military garrisons and forts all over the Middle East. The sight of these legions marching from one location to another was familiar to all. Smaller groups would also be seen walking from town to town, carrying their weapons and heavy equipment. This was arduous work in the heat of the day. When Jesus said, “And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.” (Matthew 5:41) he was referring to the authority exercised by the Roman legionnaires, who could compel a citizen to walk a mile with them and help carry their equipment. Every mile was marked by a milestone, so it was easy to determine the distance. Metaphors and images derived from the ubiquitous presence of the Roman armies crop up frequently in Paul’s writings. Perhaps the best known is “the whole armour of God” in his letter to the Ephesians. He also refers to disciplines associated with the Greco-Roman games, where athletes competed with one another for the prize or laurel wreath, the stephanos or crown which he exhorts all believers to keep continually before them. The ‘tuba’ or trumpet used by the Roman military to issue orders to their troops. It could be heard distinctly over a wide area. So, when Paul speaks of a trumpet call, he is almost certainly referring to the three clarion calls that were familiar to everyone across the Middle East, both Gentile and Jew. At the first call, the Roman soldiers broke camp and assembled their equipment into handy loads for the march ahead. At the second call they all fell into marching formation, ready for inspection. And at the third call, they set off. This “last trump” was a universal message in effect, telling everyone in the locality that an orderly contingent of soldiers was about to march through the town or village, a sight which would invariably have attracted a large throng of onlookers. 15 It was easy to see why Paul used this term. Everyone understood what it meant, especially the Gentile readers of his letters. As the Apostle to the Gentiles he was wont to use expressions which were readily understood by non-Jews. The Tekiah Gedolah at the Feast of Trumpets would have been unknown to most Gentiles. They would neither have heard it nor heard of it! The Rapture can occur at any time The Jewish feasts were given by God to the Jewish people to mark major phases in their plan of redemption. The first four spoke of the First Coming, and the last three spoke of the Second Coming. The Rapture of the Church is not bound up in any of them. We are grafted into this plan and enjoy something which the Jews as a people have yet to experience – the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Paul had the difficult task of explaining the mystery of the Church to both Jews and Gentiles. The former had been called and found wanting, clinging rigidly to what had previously been revealed and refusing to receive the additional revelation granted by Jesus and his apostles. The End Time significance of the last three Jewish feasts is as follows: 1. The Feast of Trumpets: The righteous remnant among the children of Israel will be jarred into wakefulness by a series of shocks or “trumpets”. The departure of the Church will likely be one of these, along with the military attacks on the Holy Land, the work of the two witnesses, the death of the two witnesses, the abomination of desolation, and the miraculous preservation of a great many Jewish refugees by the Archangel Michael and his army of angels. 2. The Day of Atonement: This signifies the agonizing realization by the righteous remnant that they rejected their Messiah, Jesus Christ, at his first coming. The prophet Zechariah describes this deeply emotional occasion as follows: “And the land shall mourn, every family apart; the family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Levi apart, and their wives apart; the family of Shimei apart, and their wives apart; all the families that remain, every family apart, and their wives apart.” (Zechariah 12:12-14) 16 The shock will be so great that they will hardly be able to look at one another. They will retire individually to their rooms and grieve bitterly for their faithless betrayal of their glorious redeemer. 3. The Feast of Tabernacles: This speaks of the immense joy that will come upon all Israel – which will comprise only those Jews who accept the Messiah – when the Lord takes up residence among them. This will manifest the prophetic meaning of his name, Immanuel – “God with us”! – “Therefore my people shall know my name: therefore they shall know in that day that I am he that doth speak: behold, it is I.” (Isaiah 52:6) Their joy will be fully reciprocated. Jesus will embrace his people, rejoicing with them and singing among them: “The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.” (Zephaniah 3:17) Avoid the trap Those who identify the Feast of Trumpets with the Rapture of the Church are falling into a trap. Firstly, they are refusing to accept that the harpazo can occur at any time. Many will claim they are not, but this is a hollow claim. They are setting a date, albeit one which rolls over from one year to the next. The second and more serious error is the risk that Paul alludes to in his first letter to the Thessalonians. These believers were greatly troubled by the possibility that the Rapture/Resurrection had already taken place, and seemingly had received one or more counterfeit letters claiming that Paul himself or one of his senior aides was teaching this. Paul wanted them to understand why and how they had been deceived. Please note this carefully! The Word of God sets out for our benefit a patent example of deception and confusion surrounding the date of the Rapture. Paul had given these believers very clear guidance in this matter and yet they were taken in by a trickster. If it happened to them, it could happen to us. We must be careful. 17 The Enemy is quite capable of staging a false ‘rapture’ to bolster his own End Time deception. The professing Christians who are most likely to believe it are those who are already anticipating its occurrence on the Feast of Trumpets or another specified date. Given that the public today are deeply conditioned to believe virtually anything they are told by the mainstream media, the deception – if it took place – would have a profound effect on millions of people. What would the Enemy gain from this? Well, apart from its greatly demoralizing effect on nominal Christianity, it would set the stage for the coming One World Religion. Many members of existing world religions and cults would feature among the ‘raptured’. If they included the Pope, the Patriarch of Moscow, the Dalai Lama, prominent Hindu gurus, and well-known Imams, Pirs and Ayatollahs, along with many New Age teachers, mystics and ‘masters’, the public would want to know why. The pundits would claim that their inclusive beliefs and inter-faith dialogue, combined with their exemplary works and religious zeal, were greatly pleasing to God. Moreover, if the fundamentalist, evangelical Christians are still here on earth then it can mean only one thing – the Reformation was a disaster for Christianity and salvation by faith alone through grace alone is a false teaching. The public would start to believe that all religions are one, or branches of the same Truth, and that they all worship the same God, while born-again, Bible-believing Christians – who teach nothing of the kind! – will be portrayed as narrow minded bigots, extremists and hatemongers who deserve to be locked away. A counterfeit Rapture would also prepare the way for a counterfeit Tribulation, or a period of war, famine and turmoil across the world which the politicians and the media, along with the Laodicean church, could describe as the Tribulation. The ramifications of this are difficult to fathom and we won’t attempt to explore them here. *** CONCLUSION The Church is a truly astounding creation. The masses of humanity will not realize this until she disappears from the earth and the void is filled with the spirit of lawlessness. The shift will be immediate, setting off a cascade of events which, in their destructiveness, will seem almost unreal. Christ took upon himself the wrath of God on Calvary. He did this for each one of us, namely those who come to him in faith and true repentance. He paid the price. Since the price has already been paid in full, the Church cannot be here on earth when the LORD pours out His wrath on disobedient humanity.

Zephaniah