The more difficult things become, the more we should continue to expect His Coming. Yes, let us look forward to His Coming in Glory with burning hearts full of expectation! He is coming soon! The same Greek word for ‘quickly’ is used here as at the beginning, when we were told that these things must happen soon, hastily, speedily.1 The waves may be ever so high, but rescue is nigh. The beast, the antichrist may attack the Church and the Jewish people ever so strong, but Jesus is coming!
This final hour of trial and tribulation that will come over the whole world has its purpose to test those who ‘live on the earth’—it’s a time of testing and trial for mankind. When God’s plagues in the Book of Revelation under the seals and by the horsemen and the angels and the trumpets and the woes and the bowls – we will discover – are soon to be poured out, it is sad for us to read that in general: “they did not repent.”2 Although there is sometimes another reaction as well: ‘the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of Heaven’.3 “And in that hour there was a great earthquake, and a tenth of the city fell; seven thousand people were killed in the earthquake, and the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of Heaven.” But ‘Jezebel’ who leads the church with her ‘prophets’ and ‘priests’ into idolatry and immorality is unwilling to repent: ‘And I gave her time to repent; and she does not want to repent of her immorality’.4
It is sometimes said that ‘need, distress’ teaches people to pray. However, ‘need, distress’ can also teach people to start cursing. They raise their fists to the Heavens and to God and start shouting: why did God allow this to happen? I prayed so much! I don’t believe in God anymore! They blame God for the unfortunate things that happened in their lives. They don’t realize that how difficult these things may be, that nevertheless there might be even love hidden in God’s trials and testing. This is apparently the ultimate, most powerful attempt of bringing sinners to their knees. Yet, unfortunately, this seldom happens. And if this does not happen, only more hardening of the heart will be the result. How often do we hear people say: ‘How can God permit all this?’ ‘How can He allow my child to die?’ ‘Why did my wife leave me?’ And then they say bitterly ‘I no longer believe in a God of love!’ or ‘I lost my faith in God and Christ when my loved one died.’ There are no easy answers to why things happen the way they do. Read the book of Job. The only thing we can be sure about is that we can go through the suffering together with God, together with Jesus.
Jesus says: ‘Hold on to what you have, so that no one and nothing—including tribulation—will take away your crown. God disciplines those whom He loves.5 Even Christ Himself had to learn obedience from what He suffered.6 The fiery ordeal that tests us, must not estrange us, for judgment begins with God’s household.7 God did not even spare His own Son.8 “For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings.” 9 How greatly did God’s firstborn son, Israel, experience suffering! How greatly has the Church of Jesus Christ tasted suffering, from the wild beasts, the lions in the Roman arenas to the Inquisition at the time of the Reformation, the persecutions behind the Iron and Bamboo Curtains, the persecutions in several Islamic countries today.
The chosen ones suffer because of their connection with the Name. The Jewish people, Israel, being God’s chosen ones have suffered as no people or nation on earth has suffered. The Chosen One in Israel, Jesus, suffered as no one else on earth. The true Christian Church, the chosen ones from the Gentile world, suffers all over the world. Because the darkness hates the light. Jesus says in John 15:20: “A slave is not greater than his master. If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you.”
How often has the Church proclaimed the tribulation and judgments prophesied in Scripture to be applicable to the Jewish people and Israel while claiming the promises for herself? However, the further the end times advance, the more the increasing pressure will bring us closer together, and bring us all closer to the Coming of Christ. When it ‘rains’ upon the Jews, certainly it will ‘trickle’ upon the true Church as well. Jews and Christians who refused to bow to the right-wing dictatorial Nazi regime were thrown together into the concentration camps. This was also the case under the left-wing dictatorships of Communism. The powers of darkness hate the people of God.10 Jesus is coming soon, however! Time is passing quickly but His Kingdom endures for ever. Let no one take your crown.
• Tribulation is for those ‘who live on the earth’. The expression refers especially to the heathen world in the Book of Revelation, see Revelation 6:8, 8:13, 11:10, 13:8 and 14, 17:8.
• When mankind lives by the principles ‘no God and no master’, they will say: “We decide ourselves about right or wrong. We don’t need God and His Commandments, We make our own laws by what we think is right or wrong and we do not need the inspiration of Jewish or Christian laws or ethics. We are no sinners as the Bible says. We are good as we are. We don’t need God or Church.”
• The children of God are sealed on their foreheads—Revelation 9:4—and the judgments apply to those who follow the beast and who bear his mark, Revelation 16:2. In chapter 7 John will explain more about this ‘sealing’ of the 144.000 and the ‘multitude that no one can count’.
Bible References:
1. Revelation 1:1 2.Revelation 9:20–23 and 16:9–11 3.Revelation 11:13 4. Revelation 2:21 5. Hebrews 12:6 6. Hebrews 5:8 7. 1 Peter 4:12–19 8.Romans 8:32 9.Hebrews 2:10 10. Psalm 83:1–6; Hebrews 11:32–40
