Can We Survive These Times?

The faithful are pondering more seriously during these times, "Are we in the very last years of human history?" Any thoughts on this subject are mere speculation. One thing is for sure, world events are accelerating.

According to biblical revelation, the earth is not heading for rejuvenation or better times but toward total ruin. "The earth is utterly broken apart, the earth is split open, the earth is shaken violently. The earth staggers like a drunkard and sways like a shack. Earth’s rebellion weighs it down, and it falls, never to rise again..." Isaiah 24:19-20).

About the earth's occupants "But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived" (2 Timothy 3:13). Yet those of the world point to a hope of a man-made utopia. "He feeds on ashes. His deluded heart has led him astray, and he cannot deliver himself or say, “Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?” (Isaiah 44:20). They have the inability to ask if they are believing in a lie where they have become a seduced child of the liar.

During this time, what will happen to true followers of Jesus? "Indeed, all who desire to live godly lives in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.." (2 Timothy 3:12) is one certainty. If we are to go through calamities beyond our imagining-- will God take care of us?

We are promised we are going to be preserved by the spoken word of God. It is a word of deliverance announced from the very foundation of the world. Indeed, This plan is something God determined before the world was created. This word does not assure we will not perish physically at the hand of the enemy, but that we can have confidence about our present and the hereafter. "Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul" (Matthew 10:28a).

The Father of creation foresaw all things, and he spoke into existence a word of preservation that is as eternal and unshakable as his own essence. Moses shared this understanding with the Israelites as he reminded them of God's faithfulness. "So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the LORD" (Deuteronomy 8:3).

This word is the will of God, which human nature may be restrained by the influence of divine power, without the use of ordinary means. Through it, we depend upon God, submit to his will, and wait for the issue of providence. Through this "Word" with which believers are nourished, it upholds and sustains all things in being, which He has created.

Israel could have called together their princes and leaders to plan and strategize how they might be fed. No one would have ever conceived that God would cover the ground with small, white, round seeds, a new kind of food that humankind had never seen before. God will preserve his children during hard times by speaking a new word beyond human perception or reasoning, by creating all we need by the power of his word.

We are told to "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you" Matthew 6:33. This eternal predetermination was established as a promise in heaven long before humanity was created.

"So when God wanted to make the unchanging nature of His purpose very clear to the heirs of the promise, He guaranteed it with an oath. Thus by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be strongly encouraged which we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and unshakable and entering into that within the veil, where Jesus our forerunner has entered on our behalf." Hebrews 6:18-20

Those in Christ, we read in the Revelation, survived great suffering and experienced divine intervention that stunned their very beings. They came out shouting a very deeply realized testimony. "Blessing and glory and wisdom, thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever." (Revelation 7:12). We will not only survive, but we will also overcome!

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