One Thousand, Nine Hundred & Fifty Five Years Ago...

One Thousand, Nine Hundred & Fifty Five Years Ago...
Brad Reiches
Apr 24 2006 02:20AM

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Monday, April 24, 2006

GodThoughts Wired!

"One Thousand, Nine Hundred & Fifty Five Years Ago..."

Some of My Notes from 2 Thessalonians

"The apostasy comes first..."

2 Thessalonians 2:3

Apostasia:  Rebellion, backsliding, apostasy, departure.

Well, the 2nd coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ may be closer than any of us realize.  Of the return of Christ the scripture is quite clear, "Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first..." (2 Thessalonians 2:3).  In this instance, I like the commentary of the Amplified "Bible:"  "For that day (the return of Jesus) will not come except the apostasy comes first [unless the predicted great falling away of those who have professed to be Christians has come]. 

WOW!  A great "falling away"...of the church!  Apostasy!  Twenty years ago I couldn't have imagined it!  But I can today.  In George Barna's latest book, Revolution, he updates us on the current status of the "body of Christ" in the United States of America.  On pages 32-33 he writes:

Only 9 percent of all born-again adults have a

biblical worldview-meaning that less than

one out of every ten Christians age eighteen or older

believes that absolute moral truth exists, believes

that such truth is contained in the Bible, and

possesses a handful of core bliefs that reflect such truth.

Barna goes on to say that 91% of professing "Christians" no longer believe that "Jesus lived a sinless life."  91% do not believe that "Satan is real," nor do they believe that "the only means to salvation is through God's grace."  He goes on to say that more than 9 out of 10 "believers" no longer trust that "God is the all-knowing and all-powerful creator of the universe who still rules today." 

Accordingly, the twenty-first century American church possesses what Barna refers to as a "patchwork theological view."  The very thing that God warned us about in 2 Peter 1:20-21:

"But know this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture

is a matter of one's own interpretation..."

In A.D. 51 a gentleman by the name of Paul wrote his second letter to the church at Thessalonica.  In it he predicted that a great "falling away" of the church would take place at some point in the distant future.  In other words, approximately one thousand, five hundred and fifty one years ago, the apostle Paul documented the current events of the twenty-first century American church.

Hmmm...

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