Spirit and Truth Ministries
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ONE SIGNIFICANT ERROR
Don Hawley
October 6, 2001
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Recently I read a very interesting article on the
Internet. It was well done, and the author made three major points::
1. Before Pentecost there was chaos in the streets of
Jerusalem. "At that time there was a great persecution against
the church." Acts 8:1. But after the shock of Jesus' death,
and the war against his followers, great revival broke out.
2. After WWII we experienced the Charismatic movement, and a
great healing revival. He predicts that "A greater move of God will occur in
conjunction with this tragedy."
3. Jesus wasn't glorified until after he suffered, and the
same applies to his church.
The author anticipates a national revival, and deduces, "The
army of God is being prepared for unprecedented spiritual battle that will
impact the nations and usher in the greatest harvest the earth has experienced
to date."
This all sounds good and reasonable, but I believe there is a
flaw. That last statement suggests that the unprecedented spiritual battle
will merely result in the "greatest harvest the earth has experienced to
date." In other words, more of the same thing we have experienced through the
centuries, just greater. That leaves us wondering if maybe we still have
another 2,000 years to go. I believe there is so much more to anticipate.
In Matt. 13 Jesus is teaching to an immense crowd, and he
shares with them the story of a farmer scattering his seed on various types of
soil. Then he tells another story about an enemy planting weeds in the
farmer's field. When the servants ask, "Shall we pull out the weeds?" Christ
replies:
"No, you'll hurt the wheat if you do. Let both
grow together until the harvest. Then I will tell the harvesters to sort
out the weeds and burn them and to put the wheat in the barn." Matt. 13:29,
30.
The sorting, of course, has to do with end time judgment.
Leaving the crowds outside, Jesus takes his disciples into a house where he
can talk to them privately. There the disciples ask for a clear explanation
of the weeds in the field. Christ says:
"I, the Son of Man, am the farmer who plants the
good seed. The field is the world, and the good seed represents the people
of the Kingdom. The weeds are the people who belong to the evil one. The
enemy who planted the weeds among the wheat is the Devil. The harvest is
the end of the world, and the harvesters are the angels." Vs. 37-40.
The chaos that began on September 11 is going to escalate into
a "time of trouble such as never was." There is no tidy solution to the
problems facing the world just now; we are facing spiritual Armageddon--and
perhaps a physical one as well. What is important is that Christians have the
correct perspective in regards to exploding events. The coming harvest, as
Jesus pointed out, will not be another great revival, but the end of the
world! It is so difficult to grasp that this really is it, that the
Second Coming we have proclaimed for centuries is now upon us. We need to
keep that vision clear in order to face what lies ahead. Jesus closes his
story this way:
"Then the godly will shine like the sun in their
Father's Kingdom. Anyone who is willing to hear should listen and
understand!" Vs. 43.