The god of this age (10)

2Th 2 “⁶And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. ⁷For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. ⁸And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming.” In this chapter we read several descriptions

of a single character: (the author of) falling-away, the man of sin, the son of perdition, the opponent (who exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped , so that he as God sits in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God), the mystery of iniquity, the Wicked. This character is a mystery because all men are not enabled to unmask him. He already worked in Paul’s time as the "mystery of iniquity." Everyone could not identify him as he was a mystery.

And we have just explained in sufficient detail in the previous nine epistles how this opponent has kneaded the inhabitants of the earth since antiquity, up to entering the church and pretend to be the replacement for the Son of God, whereas in fact he is the antichrist. He was successful because he worked mysteriously, in such a way that the natural man cannot perceive. The Bible says that he deceived and blinded all the inhabitants of the earth, so they are not able to identify him as such. But the children of God, Christ has opened their intelligence and eyes so they can see; that man of sin is a mystery revealed to them because they have eagle’s sight to identify the way of a snake on rock.

This man of sin, who has worked mysteriously since the time of Paul, and today still, will appear one day in his time. As the sons of God are now a mystery that will be revealed in its time to the whole creation (Rom. 8:19), so also the son of perdition must be revealed in his time to all creation: only he who now holds him back must be taken out of the way. Who holds him back? We must know that the manifestation of this son of perdition will be to the earth a beginning of weeping and gnashing of time, which cannot hit the earth as long as the Bride of the Lamb is still there. We find in the Bible several cases of judgments that hit the earth, and God always ensured to remove His own from the scene shortly before the judgment. We find for example that before the flood smote the antediluvian earth, God removed Enock, the seventh from Adam, because he had walked with the Lord (Gen. 5:24). Similarly, the fire and brimstone which judged Sodom and Gomorrah were withheld until Lot and his family were removed from these cities by two angels (Gen. 19).

History similarly records that the Roman generalissimo Titus did not lay his hand on Jerusalem until the very last true disciple of Jesus Christ had evacuated the city on the warning that the Lord had given : Lc 21 “²⁰And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh.  ²¹Then let them which are in Judaea flee to the mountains; and let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter thereinto. ²²For these be the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled. ²³But woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck, in those days! for there shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people.” And revenge or wrath against the people could not befall the faithful and the infidels together. Similarly, before the sudden destruction announced in 1 Thessalonians 5:3 hits the earth, the Lord takes up His Bride first.

Before leaving, the Bridegroom left this promise to His Bride: Jn 14 “²In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. ³And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”  We found an unparalleled intimacy between the woman of Revelation 17 and the dragon, we find similarly a closer affinity between the Lamb and His Bride-Church; in the seventh age after the apostles She is truly Word of His Word and Spirit of His Spirit, as Adam had found the woman bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh. The Bride has found her Groom the fairest among ten thousand to her soul (Song 5:10), and the Bridegroom, on His side, has found Her perfect, in Whom there is no fault, and called Her His fiancée, His love, His dove, His sister, His undefiled… (Song 4:7+9, 5:2, 6:9). Oh, it's a beautiful love story! God give us the grace to explore it one day.

Thus, She is all to Her Bride and Her Bride is all to Her (Song 2:16, 6:3, 7:10) and the Holy Spirit is on earth in Her. Her presence on earth holds back the manifestation of the man of sin. Once She is caught up to the King in His palace, and His chambers (Ct 1:4), then the opponent may work without any hypocrisy. Then what we read in Revelation 12 will be fulfilled, particularly in verse 17 “¹⁷And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.”  Those who keep the testimony of Jesus but have missed out the rapture because they are foolish virgins and the Jews who keep the commandments of God will then be the proven target of the opponent. Preparations of the Lamb are now coming to an end, and similarly the opponent is moving towards the end of his efforts.

The scriptures have told us in advance that: 1 Th 5 “³For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.” We're already there: the new world order swears by peace and safety. On September 21, 2011, on the podium of the United Nations, Barack Obama said, “The United Nations’ Founding Charter calls upon us, “to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security.” Thursday, March 21, 2013 in his address to the Israeli people, the U.S. president Barak Obama delivered with a particular emphasis this phrase: "Peace is the only path to true security." Also, we are following day by day the Vatican efforts to bring closer together views of each other to get to impose "Peace and Safety" in the world.

We see that both processes are evolving hand in hand: when the last elected one enters, the Bride-Church is taken up, and at the same time on the opposing side the global compromise is obtained between Jews and Muslims as a result of steps of the papal authority. "And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the breath of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming." Papal authority will undoubtedly be recognized by all the blocks: by his own followers, by all Protestants through the World Council of Churches, by the Jews and Muslims through this compromise agreement. No one will be able to buy or sell (do business) if they don’t have the mark of the beast. The beast will kill anyone who does not yield him homage, but then will be consumed by the breath of the mouth of the Lord and the brightness of his coming.

Rev. 14 “⁸And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. ⁹And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, ¹⁰The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb.”  The judgment of the beast performs similarly on all those who worship him and those who bear his mark.

Hereupon, Ewald Frank writes, “Whoever will be found therein at that time, including charismatic Trinitarian Pentecostals, and all the other churches united in the World Council of churches, will be without mercy, the wrath of God, fire and brimstone are awaiting them. This shows us how essential it is to have the correct knowledge of what the beast, the image of the beast and the mark of the beast are. This we gather from the incomparable threat. Whoever falls into the trap of these religious deceptions, which do not permit one to see the actual danger, as they are presented in a Christian-like manner, receives the mark and would have to suffer the consequences. God is merciful, His grace abounds, He forgives all things. If we ask Him, He forgives all guilt. But whosoever in this most decisive hour in the history of mankind takes sides with the antichrist system mocks Christ and rejects Him. This He cannot forgive, when people look up to the antichrist who speaks about peace and forgiveness but cannot give, instead of looking and turning to the Saviour who alone gives peace and forgiveness. One must look through this religious decorated matter and know about the immutable consequences which are connected with it for all who participate.”  (Ewaild Frank, The Revelation – A Book with de 7 Seals? p112).

When God judges Mystery Babylon the Great, He will not only avenge the blood of prophets and saints, but also all others who have been slaughtered on earth: Rev 18 “²⁴And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth.”  In fact, people are dying of wars in the world because the kings of the earth are drunk with the wine of that Babylon’s fornication. Thus, the blood shed during the two world wars, the wars in the Gulf, the genocide in Rwanda, the wars in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, let alone the crusades, the Inquisition, etc.; all that blood was found in this Babylon. Seeing this judgment, all the heavenly host will give glory to God because of his righteousness: Rev 19 “¹And after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven, saying, Alleluia; Salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our God: ²For true and righteous are his judgments: for he hath judged the great whore, which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand. ³And again they said, Alleluia And her smoke rose up for ever and ever. ⁴And the four and twenty elders and the four beasts fell down and worshipped God that sat on the throne, saying, Amen; Alleluia.”

God full of goodness, before executing the ultimate judgment on Babylon, is still making this call resound: Rev 18 “⁴And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. ⁵For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.”

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