It is late evening, the sun is moving towards the horizon where it will disappear for the night. You hear a familiar sound and look out your window to see the leaves rustling on the tree. You did your due diligence earlier by checking the NOAA forecast app for your location, then a quick look at your weather app for the next 10 days to see what is expected weatherwise. Not a single mention of wind for today. Looking at the inside weather monitor for the outside weather station, the wind velocity specifically. It reads zero wind in the past few minutes but a slight 2 mph currently. The barometer still shows a strong high pressure and all other measurements are as NOAA and the weather app forecast. Yet, the leaves are moving. Not the branches; only the leaves. You return to your Bible reading - Luke 21:11 – ““And there will be great earthquakes in various places, and famines and pestilences; and there will be fearful sights and great signs from heaven.” What? You check your Interlinear and sure enough ‘fearful sights’ means terrifying and signs from heaven the sky where the clouds and our skies are located.
The sound of leaves blowing in a stiff breeze is a beautiful sound in an otherwise quiet moment and your ears tell you ‘every breathing thing PRAISE GOD!’ You’ve always loved that sound because you know moving leaves and branches in a non threatening way is just the trees doing their part to bring glory to GOD. But, as the motion of the ‘breeze’ picks up and branches begin to move – again, NOT part of the forecast – your mind begins to move to a more ominous verse Romans 8:22: “For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.” The foreboding of this verse makes your tummy flip.
You double check all your data, currently, still no mention of winds. You have no clear view of the horizon from inside as the trees obscure the view. Being able to see the horizon provides clues like stormy clouds, lightning and perhaps even a rain squall moving your way. Walking outside you seek an elevated unobstructed view. Your eyes behold a heart stopping vision. Right at the line of the horizon where it blends with the sky, the darkest clouds your eyes have ever seen. NO LIGHTNING! In between you and the clouds a debris field of low lying nondescript matter. ‘Birth pangs’ pops in your mind. Where have you seen birth pains before? Matt 24:8 “All these are but the beginning of the birth pains.”
For months headlines have been appearing via social media and online news sources about ‘wars’ and of course the ‘rumors’, like all of a sudden mutually agreed destruction is no longer on the table with ‘nuclear’, weapons being made, being moved around strategically for maximum impact and nations improving their war arsenals. So, ✓ that ‘sign’. Then, you have new viruses all over the world, and old ones reappearing. Another ✓. Oh, and cannot forget ‘food shortages’, yep definite ✓ on that. Next up in Matthew 24 is verse 9 and the whole putting Jesus followers to death most assuredly a king size ✓ on that one. Where is this leading and what do the leaves and branches portend? If we are seeing ‘birth pains’ then perhaps it is creation’s sort of ‘lamaze breathing’ trying to sort and bear up through the distress. Like a groaning. The Bible uses the word groaning in Romans 8:22 & 23 as a ‘moaning jointly’ or common calamity. What could that mean?
The same Lord, Jesus, who answered HIS followers as to what they could expect to see when the ‘end of the age’ approached at Matthew 24, also gave a very detailed, dare I say vivid, description of what would come about at a specific time in the future. Reading Rev 8:7, anguish comes upon the earth in this very descriptive way: “The first angel blew his trumpet, and there followed hail and fire, mixed with blood, and these were thrown upon the earth. And a third of the earth was burned up, and a third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up.” This follows a harrowing ride of four colorful horses and their riders bring their own torture to humans globally effectively removing peace, causing more food shortages, dragging death and hades through the earth back in Chapter 6. Then from chapter 8 going forward chapter after chapter horror fills the earth in unimaginable ways. Prior in Chapter 6, there are frightful things happening in the skies! The entire population no matter their station in life are “calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb,” verses 12-17. So it starts early in Chapter 6 but by Chapter 8 nothing can stop what continues to come.
Wow! I snapped back to my reality. Musing, things are hastening outside. Except for the movement of trees in my close proximity, the horizon and all the distance between it and myself – while most alarming, I knew innately there was something else that would come before all these things the mind conjured up and it is to happen before “... the wrath of the Lamb,”. Who will be affected by the wrath of the lamb? “But 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.” Luke 21:23
What happens to those who do not fit within the context of justification by the Lamb’s shed blood, the ones saved from the wrath? Clearly, the Bible is very specific and the answer to this question can be found in each of the Chapters of Revelation starting from Chapter 5 all the way to the last verse of Revelation. If you dilly-dally about your commitment to the ONE GOD who put into play HIS plan for all mankind your portion of HIS plan is spelled out with great specificity. Time is ‘not’ on anyone’s side. None of us know when we take our last breath here and step into eternity. Please consider the following portion with intent.
“34 But take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that Day come on you unexpectedly. 35 “For it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth. 36“Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man.” Luke 21:34-36
What is necessary to escape all these things? “Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.” Romans 5:9
Words of hope: “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me.
“In 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. 2 “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. 3 “And where I go you know, and the way you know.” 4 Thomas said to Him, “Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?” 5 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” – John 14:1-6
THERE IS A STORM COMING! The Bible is very clear on this matter from the pages of the Old Testament through the last verse of the New Testament. There is nothing you can do to dodge the effects of the storm EXCEPT being a ‘born again’ Christ Follower. Escaping the wrath of GOD is a thing. Not escaping is also a thing. Please make every effort to be found in the Lamb’s Book of Life by way of the shed blood of Jesus, the Savior, Redeemer and High Priest for those who believe.
“15 That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.16 That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.”--John 3:15-16
For those who do not accept the invitation at John 3:15- 16 – is this you? – There is a different reality: ““He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”- John 3:18
If you too are noticing the atmosphere around you is beginning to change, or you are moaning together what does this mean for you? Your deliverance from the wrath to come is imminent!
