Wake Up!

1 Thessalonians 4:14; 5:10

As a father of two, I find that I must occasionally yell, “Wake up!” to my children when they seem a bit lazy getting out of bed on a school morning. Every parent knows that feeling, and every child loathes those words. We want to sleep a bit longer because we are so comfortable, but there are things that need to be done, and they will not get done lying in bed.

One of the things that must be accomplished in our Christian walk is the spreading of light to a dark world. In this final hour, more than ever, saints need to shine as light, and flavor as salt, a world that is in the dark and has no flavor. To do this, we must wake up to who we are in Christ. When you fall asleep as to how God views you, you fall back into the habits that you formed when living for the world. It is for this cause that Paul said to the church at Corinth, “Awake to righteousness and sin not” (1 Corinthians 15:34).

There are two Greek words for sleep that are used in the New Testament. One is ‘koimao’ which means “to fall asleep or to die”. It can only be interpreted within the context of the scriptures surrounding it. For instance the word is used to describe the death by stoning of the Apostle Stephen (Acts 7:60), and it is also used to describe the sleeping disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:45).

The other Greek word for sleep is ‘katheudo’ which means “to fall asleep” and this one never means “to die”. For instance, this word is used when Jesus says of Jairus’ daughter, “She is not dead, but sleepeth” (Matthew 9:24).

When Paul writes of the resurrection at the Rapture in 1 Thessalonians 4, he speaks of those who “sleep in Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 4:16). He uses, ‘koimao’ and we know that he means that they are dead, because the next verse says, “For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep” (1 Thessalonians 4:17). This context proves that the ‘sleep’ is death; as ‘alive’ never means ‘awake’.

When Paul furthers his sermon into the 5th chapter, he makes this statement, “Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep, sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night” (1 Thessalonians 5:6, 7). Here, ‘sleep’ is ‘katheudo’ meaning, “to fall asleep”. Paul is warning us to stay awake as to who we are in Christ. The previous chapter is speaking of death, but this one is speaking of life.

It all comes to a head in the next two verses, as Paul explains that the church must be removed by Rapture in order for God’s wrath to be poured out. Look closely as he describes the kind of people that are going to make it:

“For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ. Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him” (1 Thessalonians 5:9, 10).

‘Sleep’ here is ‘katheudo’ meaning “to fall asleep”. This is not a statement about Jesus taking us whether we are alive or dead, it is a statement about Him taking us whether we are awake to our righteousness or not!

Wake up to who you are, not so that you can make heaven for that is already your inheritance, but rather wake up because you are children of the day, and not of the night (1 Thessalonians 5:5). Walk in the light today!

Denying the Power

2 Timothy 3:1-9

In the last days before the return of Christ, there will be perilous or troublesome and dangerous times. This will be characterized by a “falling away” from the faith (2 Thessalonians 2:3), with various other identifiers in men’s lives as well (2 Timothy 3:2-5). This time period has been preached with great warning for many years, with messages pointing at men’s lifestyles and the lack of holiness that they exhibit as evidence that we are approaching the end.

If you have an understanding of what Paul and the rest of the early church was preaching in the time of the New Testament, it becomes easier to see what they meant by a “falling away” or “perilous times”. Paul preached a doctrine of pure grace, in which man is saved by faith alone, apart from his works and that salvation is a complete justification based upon the finished work of Jesus Christ. Paul considered God only as righteous as His willingness to save man based upon faith in Jesus (Romans 3:26).

For Paul to prophecy of a time when the church would fall backwards or experience perilous times, he was seeing a time when the most accepted message in the church would not be the message of pure grace. That time is upon us, when there is more and more a mixture of pure grace with the trappings of law. Many churches specialize in preaching grace to the sinner and works to the saint in an attempt to “balance out” the message of law and grace. What man calls balance, God calls mixture! (Luke 5:36-39).

“Having a form of godliness, but denying the power therof: from such turn away” (2 Timothy 3:5). I used to interpret this verse to mean that many people speak of holiness and living right but they deny the mighty baptism of the Holy Ghost, thus they are denying the power source. Paul never gives any such indication in his writings, but does in fact give us the answer to this statement. In his letter to Rome, Paul tells us what the power of God is, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16). The power of God is the good news of Christ’s finished work; namely, the message of pure grace. He then goes a step further, showing us true godliness and where it comes from, “For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith’” (Romans 1:17). Within the power of the finished work is where true righteousness grows. If we want godliness, we must want pure grace!

There will always be those who like Jannes and Jambres standing in front of Moses (2 Timothy 3:8), resist the truth. We must not back down from telling others of the wonderful love of God just because there are some who deny salvation could be that simple. Never back down from the message of pure grace, because it truly is the power of God to see men changed.

We are in perilous times, when people are hearing less and less of the glorious good news of God’s grace, but do not be dismayed believer. You and I are also living in an awesome time, when God is raising up voices all over the world to tell mankind of the love of the heavenly Father and of His awesome finished work. Will you be one of those voices today?

When God Takes Us Out of the Way

2 Thessalonians 2:3-12

Can you imagine the arrival of a world leader who rose to prominence with powerful signs and wonders, bringing peace to rival nations and establishing his own universal religion? Surely the church of Jesus Christ would have a little something to say about that! The church is the very thing that holds something, or someone, like that from coming to pass. With the seal of the Holy Spirit and the power of the name of Jesus, the church is the great dam that holds back so many powerful tricks of the enemy.

Someday, we will be removed, taken away to meet the Lord in the air (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17), while those left here on earth will suffer beneath that “Wicked” (2 Thessalonians 2:8). Prior to this verse, Paul told the church that “only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way”. The word “letteth” is the word “hinder” in the Greek, showing us that something is hindering the arrival of the Wicked One of verse 8. That someone is the Holy Spirit within the church. When we are gone, the floodwaters can come.

The Tribulation of this world is God’s wrath coming down on a world that has long rejected the sacrificial work of Jesus Christ. You and I cannot experience this wrath because we are spared from that wrath by the blood of Jesus Christ (Romans 5:1, 9). Paul’s confirms this in 1 Thessalonians 5:9 when he tells us that “God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ”. We are not appointed to undergo the testing of this earth; we cannot be, for Jesus has already endured wrath for us.

The Wicked One is also called the Anti-Christ, and he will deceive many by using great powers of darkness (verse 9). Notice the terminology of verses 10-12, with all references to believing being in the past tense. Paul is writing of a time when people “received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved” (verse 10). He does NOT say, “They will not receive the love of the truth”, for he is speaking of people who have already had their chance. Many people will be left behind when Christ raptures out His church, and most of them will still not accept Christ because they will live under a strong delusion, believing a lie (2:11).

We have no reason to fear this time period, for we must be removed by God in order for Him to maintain His justice. Paul wrote that in order for God to show forth how righteous that He is, He must justify all of those who place faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 3:26). If He leaves us here and kills us wholesale with plagues and diseases, then He is punishing us along with the lost souls of this world, ignoring our faith in Christ and His finished work, and punishing us twice for all of our sins. Our God is bigger than that, and He is better than that. Pray that He come quickly and take us out of the way!

Wake Up

1 Thessalonians 4:14; 5:10

As a father of two, I find that I must occasionally yell, “Wake up!” to my children when they seem a bit lazy getting out of bed on a school morning. Every parent knows that feeling, and every child loathes those words. We want to sleep a bit longer because we are so comfortable, but there are things that need to be done, and they will not get done lying in bed.

One of the things that must be accomplished in our Christian walk is the spreading of light to a dark world. In this final hour, more than ever, saints need to shine as light, and flavor as salt, a world that is in the dark and has no flavor. To do this, we must wake up to who we are in Christ. When you fall asleep as to how God views you, you fall back into the habits that you formed when living for the world. It is for this cause that Paul said to the church at Corinth, “Awake to righteousness and sin not” (1 Corinthians 15:34).

There are two Greek words for sleep that are used in the New Testament. One is ‘koimao’ which means “to fall asleep or to die”. It can only be interpreted within the context of the scriptures surrounding it. For instance the word is used to describe the death by stoning of the Apostle Stephen (Acts 7:60), and it is also used to describe the sleeping disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:45).

The other Greek word for sleep is ‘katheudo’ which means “to fall asleep” and this one never means “to die”. For instance, this word is used when Jesus says of Jairus’ daughter, “She is not dead, but sleepeth” (Matthew 9:24).

When Paul writes of the resurrection at the Rapture in 1 Thessalonians 4, he speaks of those who “sleep in Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 4:16). He uses, ‘koimao’ and we know that he means that they are dead, because the next verse says, “For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep” (1 Thessalonians 4:17). This context proves that the ‘sleep’ is death; as ‘alive’ never means ‘awake’.

When Paul furthers his sermon into the 5th chapter, he makes this statement, “Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep, sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night” (1 Thessalonians 5:6, 7). Here, ‘sleep’ is ‘katheudo’ meaning, “to fall asleep”. Paul is warning us to stay awake as to who we are in Christ. The previous chapter is speaking of death, but this one is speaking of life.

It all comes to a head in the next two verses, as Paul explains that the church must be removed by Rapture in order for God’s wrath to be poured out. Look closely as he describes the kind of people that are going to make it:

“For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ. Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him” (1 Thessalonians 5:9, 10).

‘Sleep’ here is ‘katheudo’ meaning “to fall asleep”. This is not a statement about Jesus taking us whether we are alive or dead, it is a statement about Him taking us whether we are awake to our righteousness or not!

Wake up to who you are, not so that you can make heaven for that is already your inheritance, but rather wake up because you are children of the day, and not of the night (1 Thessalonians 5:5). Walk in the light today!

Denying the Power

2 Timothy 3:1-9

In the last days before the return of Christ, there will be perilous or troublesome and dangerous times. This will be characterized by a “falling away” from the faith (2 Thessalonians 2:3), with various other identifiers in men’s lives as well (2 Timothy 3:2-5). This time period has been preached with great warning for many years, with messages pointing at men’s lifestyles and the lack of holiness that they exhibit as evidence that we are approaching the end.

If you have an understanding of what Paul and the rest of the early church was preaching in the time of the New Testament, it becomes easier to see what they meant by a “falling away” or “perilous times”. Paul preached a doctrine of pure grace, in which man is saved by faith alone, apart from his works and that salvation is a complete justification based upon the finished work of Jesus Christ. Paul considered God only as righteous as His willingness to save man based upon faith in Jesus (Romans 3:26).

For Paul to prophecy of a time when the church would fall backwards or experience perilous times, he was seeing a time when the most accepted message in the church would not be the message of pure grace. That time is upon us, when there is more and more a mixture of pure grace with the trappings of law. Many churches specialize in preaching grace to the sinner and works to the saint in an attempt to “balance out” the message of law and grace. What man calls balance, God calls mixture! (Luke 5:36-39).

“Having a form of godliness, but denying the power therof: from such turn away” (2 Timothy 3:5). I used to interpret this verse to mean that many people speak of holiness and living right but they deny the mighty baptism of the Holy Ghost, thus they are denying the power source. Paul never gives any such indication in his writings, but does in fact give us the answer to this statement. In his letter to Rome, Paul tells us what the power of God is, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16). The power of God is the good news of Christ’s finished work; namely, the message of pure grace. He then goes a step further, showing us true godliness and where it comes from, “For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith’” (Romans 1:17). Within the power of the finished work is where true righteousness grows. If we want godliness, we must want pure grace!

There will always be those who like Jannes and Jambres standing in front of Moses (2 Timothy 3:8), resist the truth. We must not back down from telling others of the wonderful love of God just because there are some who deny salvation could be that simple. Never back down from the message of pure grace, because it truly is the power of God to see men changed.

We are in perilous times, when people are hearing less and less of the glorious good news of God’s grace, but do not be dismayed believer. You and I are also living in an awesome time, when God is raising up voices all over the world to tell mankind of the love of the heavenly Father and of His awesome finished work. Will you be one of those voices today?

When God Takes Us Out of the Way

2 Thessalonians 2:3-12

Can you imagine the arrival of a world leader who rose to prominence with powerful signs and wonders, bringing peace to rival nations and establishing his own universal religion? Surely the church of Jesus Christ would have a little something to say about that! The church is the very thing that holds something, or someone, like that from coming to pass. With the seal of the Holy Spirit and the power of the name of Jesus, the church is the great dam that holds back so many powerful tricks of the enemy.

Someday, we will be removed, taken away to meet the Lord in the air (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17), while those left here on earth will suffer beneath that “Wicked” (2 Thessalonians 2:8). Prior to this verse, Paul told the church that “only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way”. The word “letteth” is the word “hinder” in the Greek, showing us that something is hindering the arrival of the Wicked One of verse 8. That someone is the Holy Spirit within the church. When we are gone, the floodwaters can come.

The Tribulation of this world is God’s wrath coming down on a world that has long rejected the sacrificial work of Jesus Christ. You and I cannot experience this wrath because we are spared from that wrath by the blood of Jesus Christ (Romans 5:1, 9). Paul’s confirms this in 1 Thessalonians 5:9 when he tells us that “God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ”. We are not appointed to undergo the testing of this earth; we cannot be, for Jesus has already endured wrath for us.

The Wicked One is also called the Anti-Christ, and he will deceive many by using great powers of darkness (verse 9). Notice the terminology of verses 10-12, with all references to believing being in the past tense. Paul is writing of a time when people “received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved” (verse 10). He does NOT say, “They will not receive the love of the truth”, for he is speaking of people who have already had their chance. Many people will be left behind when Christ raptures out His church, and most of them will still not accept Christ because they will live under a strong delusion, believing a lie (2:11).

We have no reason to fear this time period, for we must be removed by God in order for Him to maintain His justice. Paul wrote that in order for God to show forth how righteous that He is, He must justify all of those who place faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 3:26). If He leaves us here and kills us wholesale with plagues and diseases, then He is punishing us along with the lost souls of this world, ignoring our faith in Christ and His finished work, and punishing us twice for all of our sins. Our God is bigger than that, and He is better than that. Pray that He come quickly and take us out of the way!