The Shaking of the Earth- Part 2

     After the five months of torment and gloom end, a 6th angel sounds the second woe. It likewise shakes the earth, releasing a Satanic army that brings more of the devil’s ways on the earth. It is led by the ruling demonic spirit behind the Middle Eastern empires that oppressed ancient Israel.  
      The onslaught is described in the rest of Chapter 9 using figurative language as plagues and warfare. John is seeing things in the spiritual realm that have not yet been seen in the natural realm in his time. He is doing his best to describe it. We can only imagine the shock he must have felt watching this unfold. The bottom line is that this “warfare” destroys one third of mankind on the earth.
      End-Time Lesson: Here we get a better picture of why God’s judgment is necessary. You would think after the first two world wars in our own history that mankind could find a way to settle our disputes. Our best-laid plans and ideas, such as the United Nations, have failed because every worldly institution is established by fallen people. Apart from God, our best intentions always fall short.
       Deception is hard to expose because it works overtime to bury the truth. As this 7th Day draws near, the technology that was designed to make our lives better has also served to make it more deceptive. With AI applications so rampant, we can’t even believe what we see in pictures and videos anymore, let alone online. Teachers can’t even tell whether or not the work submitted by their students is their own.
        It is interesting that  those in the Department of the Treasury who are assigned the task of identifying counterfeit monies do not study the counterfeits. They study the real thing. This way it makes it easier to spot the inconsistencies in the false money.
        Probably the greatest falsehood undermining our society in our time is the false doctrine of relativism. It preaches that there is absolutely no absolute truths. Hopefully you recognize the fallacy and absurd idea of saying this “fact” of no absolute truths is absolutely true!
        The best way to inoculate ourselves against the deceitfulness of this age, especially the false doctrine of relativism, is to study the real thing. That is, God’s eternal, established, absolute truths recorded in His Word.  The biblical truths we know—both in terms of knowledge and practice—are what set us free from Satan’s traps and protect us against his deceptions (Jn. 8:32).
          Sadly, the same cannot be said of many of the people in the age to come. Chapter 9 ends with this indictment: “But the rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk. And they did not repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts” (vs. 20-21, emphasis added).
       Now perhaps you have a better idea of God’s unfathomable and patient mercy toward mankind. He is perfectly loving, yet He is also perfectly just. He and He alone knows the point of no return, when He has given mankind every possible chance to realize the error of their ways. Needless to say, these trumpets are a clarion wake-up call to mankind.
       So when someone tells you they cannot believe in a loving God who would allow such horror to happen, you now have an answer. God is trying to remove the blinders of deception so people can make the right choice. These horrors are the consequences of evil and the evil one. God is not a spiritual kidnapper. It would be unfair of Him to give us a choice and then remove the consequences of those choices. Yet He longs for us to see clearly and choose life in him. He has given us His Word.