End-Times Violence: Spiritual Warfare in an Age of Outrage
Especially during the first three centuries of Christianity when the Holy Spirit empowered the Early Church to march into the world with the message of the Cross and the Resurrection, …
…a moment eventually came when the Christian community was hit with a hurricane-tempest force that was unpredictable and at times very violent. Satan sent his strongest winds to try to knock the Early Church off its feet and deluge its members with havoc and heartache. The enemy sent his strongest winds to beat down the Early Church, and if anything could have stopped the Church, it would have been the storm that raged against them in those early years.
But Jesus promised that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it [the Church]” (see Matthew 16:18). Although brutal waves of assault came against the Church especially in the first 300 years — and many other times over the past 2,000 years — every turbulent episode has proven that truly the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church!
As we consider what the Church has experienced over the past 2,000 years, let’s continue using the analogy of a hurricane-tempest force to describe the assaults that began striking the Church in the earlier centuries.
As a hurricane approaches, its presence can be felt by a torrent of pounding rain and rising sea tides that precede it. These torrential rains and tides are sufficiently deadly by themselves — but they are merely symptoms of the real storm that is still gathering strength and preparing to hit land. As the massive storm gathers strength, momentum, and acceleration and forces its way toward land, the sea is pushed forward, and the swell of the waves grows higher — usually hitting the land before the fierce, often devastating winds of the actual hurricane. When these rising tides hit, everything in their path is ravaged with catastrophic consequences.
Hurricanes consist of belts of wind that pound the land in sequence, one after another. Individuals who do not understand how a hurricane behaves may wrongly assume the storm is calming down after each punishing “lash” of that belt of wind. But, in fact, more belts of wind are on the way to pelt and whip everything in their path. These storms have multiple bands of wind that strike relentlessly, again and again, with only a brief pause between each strike. This is precisely what happened in the earliest centuries of the Church.
I said all this to explain that, like a hurricane, there were belts of persecution that came against the Church, with occasional reprieves in between, which Christians frequently mistook to mean that the raging storm against them was finally over. But soon, another pagan leader who was antagonistic to the Gospel would rise to power, and once again, the horrific winds of opposition would begin to strike relentlessly again, again, and again, with only brief pauses between each wave of inflicted hardship and harsh persecution.
In fact, history informs us that there were multiple belts of persecutions by Roman emperors against the Church in its formative years. To gain more understanding about the episodic persecutions that came against the Church in those earliest centuries, I recommend you read, “Ten Periods of Roman Persecution” in my book A Light in Darkness, Volume One. Much insight can be gained by the study of this material regarding the ten episodic periods of intense persecution that raged against believers throughout the Roman Empire.
Persecution continued routinely until restrictions on Christian worship were formally rescinded during the rule of Emperor Constantine (circa 306-337 AD). In the year 313 AD, the Edict of Milan — or what is known as the Edict of Toleration — was issued by Emperor Constantine which gave Christianity legal status, and for the first time in nearly 300 years, those of the Christian faith no longer suffered governmental persecution under Roman rule.
Those 300 years were brutal, but eventually, the frontside of that horrific spiritual hurricane seemed to come to an end. Many demonically inspired kings and rulers had put forth their best effort to extinguish the light of the Gospel and obliterate the Church — but no one was ever able, or ever will be able, to resist Jesus Christ and His Church.
The Misunderstood Eye of the Storm
One prominent feature of a hurricane is the eye of the storm. When the front side of a storm passes and the eye of the storm arrives, the sky overhead appears blue and clear and gives the illusion that the storm has completely passed. If the eye of the hurricane passes over at night, one would be able to look up and see the stars in a crystal-clear sky. But it’s true that when one is in the eye of the storm, the skies overhead appear so clear that he or she might wrongly think the storm is over, not realizing that the backside of the storm is yet to come. The temperature would likely be mild, and birds might fly overhead while various animals emerge from hiding with a sense of relief. Because the pressure in the eye of the storm is the least felt, one may wrongly assume all is calm and well, but the backside of the storm is still coming with potentially devastating consequences.
Uninformed people who mistakenly think the storm has passed often emerge from their places of safety, not realizing they are placing themselves in harm’s way. Deaths related to hurricanes are sometimes attributed to people who take the peaceful eye of the storm to mean the storm has passed because they misread the signs and regretfully lose their lives when they are hit by the backside of the storm, exposed and unprepared. They could be carried out to sea by the currents or hit inland by deadly flying debris. If they’d understood that they were merely in the eye of the storm, they could have remained in a place of safety and the backside of the storm would have had less effect on them. But because they failed to properly read the weather, they regrettably suffered loss.
What does this have to do with the history of the Church and the winds of persecution believers suffered in the early years?
The Early Church survived nearly 300 years of many hard-hitting winds and waves of persecution. Finally, it appeared that the storm ended when the Emperor Constantine issued the Edict of Toleration in the year 313 AD. But just as those in a hurricane may find themselves in the eye of the storm and wrongly assume as the skies clear that the storm is over, that pause was not actually the end of the storm of persecution for the Church. Instead, the Church merely found itself in the eye of the storm after the front side of the spiritual hurricane in those early years passed.
A physical eye of a hurricane can last from 10 or 15 minutes up to an hour or more.6 Due to the reprieve from persecution felt by His Church (especially in the Western world), once the front side of that early storm of 300 years passed, it has seemed to most that the hard-hitting governmental assault experienced by our early brothers and sisters in Christ — like the deceitful appearance of the eye of a hurricane — forever ended.
After those devastating years of persecution, the Early Church finally felt the pressure let up, and the skies overhead became clear. And for the most part, for approximately 1,700 years the Church has freely immersed itself in missionary activity, church growth, and church planting. In fact, the message of Christianity became so entrenched that Western European civilization was built on the principles of Christianity, and its influence for many centuries has affected the arts, architecture, literature, science, philosophy, and technology — every sphere of Western society.
But Jesus declared that difficult times would arise again for the Church in the very last of the last days. So although the Church has lived in general peace for nearly 1,700 years — not that long ago in the mind of God — the backside of the storm has been and is still approaching. Even now, it is garnering strength to make “landfall” with fierce impact that will be felt again by authentic Christians in the very last days of the age.
The Present: The Backside of the Storm is Approaching
While the Church has lived in relative peace for 1,700 years, the climate is changing, and people are waking up to the fact that we are living on the cusp of the finality of the very last days. We are also beginning to experience the fierce backside of this storm as the lawless spirit of the age increases in brazen protest of established moral codes and becomes aggressively opposed to the Church and to the Word of God. Just as the Early Church found themselves living amidst a hostile world, Christians today are finding themselves living in an increasingly antagonistic world, including antagonism from governmental powers that use lawfare to accuse, attack, strike down, and cancel those who oppose their lawless agenda.
Christians who tenaciously stick to their convictions and refuse to bend to the spirit of the age are frequently cast aside as narrow-minded, anti-societal bigots. As morality declines and the line between right and wrong becomes blurred, those who remain steadfast in their commitment to Christ — unmovable in their biblical convictions and sense of right and wrong — will be cast out as obstinate, unbending, and intolerant people.
While I do not want to sound negative in my appraisal of the current landscape, as a leader, I feel the need to prophetically warn that the world will try to push the Church — who once formed the “moral center” of society — out of the center so that progressive, Bible-rejecting, free thinkers can move center stage. One need not be a prophet to see these developments are moving forward at an escalating pace.
As a society, we may experience occasional reprieves from time to time, but whether we like it or not, Scripture clearly teaches that the spirit of lawlessness will increase, not diminish, at the very end of the last days. In such times when lawlessness brazenly gains a greater foothold, society will continue to view Bible-believers with disdain, ridiculing them and charging them with being judgmental. All of this results in discrimination as believers are increasingly put under pressure to conform through cleverly phrased arguments, intimidation, and manipulation. Although it may be hard to believe this could happen, the Holy Spirit foretells in Scripture that the backside of the storm, with winds of fierce opposition, will hit again at the end of the last days as the world morphs into its final phases of modification to receive the Man of Lawlessness, the Antichrist.
Until we are caught away in the rapture of the Church, we must be mentally and spiritually equipped and ready, as we may experience the backside of the same storm that hit the Church in its early days. The backside of the storm may be different from the frontside of the storm that assaulted the Church in its first 300 years. Aggravated periods of assault in our day and in the days to come may be shorter in duration and intensity. Nevertheless, it is absolutely vital that the Church be mentally and spiritually prepared for it.
I have noted multiple times in this book that the Greek word harpadzo — the word that describes the rapture of the Church in First Thessalonians 4:17 — means, for one, to snatch out of danger just in the nick of time. This suggests the divine rescue operation that we refer to as the Rapture will take place in a dark moment when the Church is facing difficulty and hardship. Then, all of a sudden, Christ will descend into the lower atmosphere with a shout and the blast of a trumpet to resurrect the bodies of the righteous dead and to rapture and rescue the authentic Church from peril just in the nick of time.
But the glorious remnant that Christ is coming to retrieve will not be a weak and puny people. Instead, they will have been divinely empowered to steward their call and commission on the earth as God gloriously reveals His power through them in the midst of a sea of gross darkness in the very last of the last days.
A Final Showdown at The End of the Age — Remember Jannes and Jambres
We have seen that a very last days outpouring is prophesied in Joel 2:23-24,28-29. But in Second Timothy 3:8-9, Paul additionally wrote about a last-days confrontation of powers that will occur before the age consummates. He wrote, “Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. But they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest unto all men, as theirs also was.”
In these verses, Paul declared a final confrontation would occur between the powers of darkness and the power of God before the age consummates. Exactly as there was a confrontation of powers that occurred between Moses and Pharaoh’s sorcerers Jannes and Jambres in the past, there will be a similar confrontation in the very last of the last days. To prepare ourselves for victory in the face of this end-times conflict, we must first answer the question, “Who were Jannes and Jambres?”
The identities of Jannes and Jambres were well documented by Jewish intellectuals who lived in the ancient city of Alexandria, Egypt. According to these Jewish historians, Jannes and Jambres were the two leading sorcerers in the book of Exodus who attempted to“withstand” Moses. As residents of Alexandria, these Jewish historians and intellectuals had access to Egypt’s historical records, and by studying ancient archives, they authoritatively identified Jannes and Jambres as the two primary sorcerers who opposed Moses in the land of Egypt (see Exodus 7:11,22; 8:6-7).
As a matter of fact, these two sorcerers were so well known in the ancient world that Pliny the Elder, the historian Eusebius, and the noted theologian Origen each wrote about these two men.7 In addition to these respected sources, the names Jannes and Jambres appeared frequently in other Jewish, Christian, and pagan sources in Arabic, Aramaic, Greek, Hebrew, Latin, Old and Middle English, and Syriac.8
In the days of Moses, Jannes and Jambres took a stand against Moses and the power of God. But Paul told us that in like manner, at the end of the age, there will be a contest of emerging evil powers — religious and apostate, occultic, social, and political — that will oppose the Gospel and present an alternative message. It will be a part of the end-time, worldwide mutiny that Paul prophesied about in Second Thessalonians 2:3 (see pages 108-110).
Paul declared that just as Pharaoh’s sorcerers were unable to compete with the power of God, so, too, these end-time contenders will be unable to compete with God’s mighty power that will manifest among at least a remnant of the Church. Herein, in Paul’s words in Second Timothy 3:9, we find a prophecy of a final showdown at the end of the age — one in which the power of God will prove to be unbeatable in the face of evil as evil shall be met with God’s mighty power and “…their folly shall be manifest unto all men….”
In Second Timothy 3:8 and 9, Paul prophesied that just as the power of God worked through Moses to confront the powers of evil in his day, God’s divine power will once again flow mightily through a remnant in the last-days Church. As the Holy Spirit moves mightily in the last of the last days, this divine power will confront the folly of warped ideologies.
And just as Moses’ rod “swallowed” the rods of Jannes and Jambres (see Exodus 7:12) there will be a demonstration of God’s power in a remnant that will reveal the uncontestable power of God in a glorious Church.
In Moses’ confrontation with Jannes and Jambres, for a short period of time, these sorcerers’ perverted powers went head-to-head with the power of God operating through Moses, matching miracle for miracle the supernatural demonstrations of God through His chosen representative. Moses had thrown down his rod, which miraculously turned into a snake by the power of God. Jannes and Jambres, as magicians in Pharaohs’ court, did likewise, also manifesting a snake in place of a rod.
But the final moment of truth came when everyone present witnessed the magicians’ snake being swallowed up, completely engulfed, by Moses’ snake (see Exodus 7:10-12). This was further emphasized for Pharaoh and his army when the ten plagues ended with the death of all of Egypt’s firstborn. Pharaoh continued to harden his heart, chasing the children of Israel into the Red Sea, where the same mighty waters that stood congealed to allow God’s people to escape completely engulfed the Egyptians who tried to cross behind them in pursuit.
And, friend, God will always have the last word against the enemy on behalf of His people. Even the grave could not hold Jesus when the enemy surely, for a brief moment, thought he had won a final victory against the Messiah. Christ’s decisive resurrection proved otherwise — and, likewise, we will see the power of God in the last days continue to prove that Satan’s power is no match for Almighty God. For this reason, we should expect a mighty end-times outpouring of the Holy Spirit to come with signs, wonders, and mighty deeds as we near the conclusion of the last-days time frame in which we live!
And as time marches on — during a moment when it seems the world has lost its moral mind, and darkness seems to abound on every side as the backside of this storm rises to assault the Church with sporadic and ever-increasing belts of opposition — Christ will descend to rapture, or snatch, His people out of harm’s way. Those who are spiritually living, spiritually robust, spiritually thriving, spiritually vibrant, and spiritually vigorous will escape just before the trigger is pulled and the time of troubles (the Tribulation) begins on planet Earth. In this last-days showdown, Christ will indeed gather His saints to Himself in the resurrection of the righteous dead and the catching away of those vibrant remaining ones who were carriers of His glory during the mighty latter rain of His Spirit on the earth.
When Jesus steps into the lower atmosphere with a shout and a blast of the mighty trumpet of God, we will escape just before divine wrath is poured out on the planet during the seven-year Tribulation period. If this powerful series of events is what you call escapism on the part of the Church, then the answer is yes — we plan to escape the wrath that is soon coming on the earth!
