Part 2 The Time Of Trouble.

"They afflict their souls before God, pointing to their past repentance of their many sins, and
pleading the Saviour's promise: "Let him take hold of My strength, that he may make peace with
Me; and he shall make peace with Me." Isaiah 27:5. Their faith does not fail because their prayers
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are not immediately answered. Though suffering the keenest anxiety, terror, and distress, they do
not cease their intercessions. They lay hold of the strength of God as Jacob laid hold of the Angel;
and the language of their souls is: "I will not let Thee go, except Thou bless me."
Had not Jacob previously repented of his sin in obtaining the birthright by fraud, God would not
have heard his prayer and mercifully preserved his life. So, in the time of trouble, if the people of
God had unconfessed sins to appear before them while tortured with fear and anguish, they would
be overwhelmed; despair would cut off their faith, and they could not have confidence to plead with
God for deliverance. But while they have a deep sense of their unworthiness, they have no
concealed wrongs to reveal. Their sins have gone beforehand to judgment and have been blotted
out, and they cannot bring them to remembrance.
Satan leads many to believe that God will overlook their unfaithfulness in the minor affairs of life;
but the Lord shows in His dealings with Jacob that He will in no wise sanction or tolerate evil. All
who endeavor to excuse or conceal their sins, and permit them to remain upon the books of heaven,
unconfessed and unforgiven, will be overcome by Satan. The more exalted their profession and the
more honorable the position which they hold, the more grievous is their course in the sight of God
and the more sure the triumph of their great adversary. Those who delay a preparation for the day of
God cannot obtain it in the time of trouble or at any subsequent time. The case of all such is
hopeless.
Those professed Christians who come up to that last fearful conflict unprepared will, in their
despair, confess their sins in words of burning anguish, while the wicked exult over their distress.
These confessions are of the same character as was that of Esau or of Judas. Those who make them,
lament the result of transgression, but not its guilt. They feel
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no true contrition, no abhorrence of evil. They acknowledge their sin, through fear of punishment;
but, like Pharaoh of old, they would return to their defiance of Heaven should the judgments be
removed.
Jacob's history is also an assurance that God will not cast off those who have been deceived and
tempted and betrayed into sin, but who have returned unto Him with true repentance. While Satan
seeks to destroy this class, God will send His angels to comfort and protect them in the time of
peril. The assaults of Satan are fierce and determined, his delusions are terrible; but the Lord's eye is
upon His people, and His ear listens to their cries. Their affliction is great, the flames of the furnace
seem about to consume them; but the Refiner will bring them forth as gold tried in the fire. God's
love for His children during the period of their severest trial is as strong and tender as in the days of
their sunniest prosperity; but it is needful for them to be placed in the furnace of fire; their
earthliness must be consumed, that the image of Christ may be perfectly reflected.
The season of distress and anguish before us will require a faith that can endure weariness, delay,
and hunger--a faith that will not faint though severely tried. The period of probation is granted to all
to prepare for that time. Jacob prevailed because he was persevering and determined. His victory is
an evidence of the power of importunate prayer. All who will lay hold of God's promises, as he did,
and be as earnest and persevering as he was, will succeed as he succeeded. Those who are unwilling
to deny self, to agonize before God, to pray long and earnestly for His blessing, will not obtain it.
Wrestling with God--how few know what it is! How few have ever had their souls drawn out after
God with intensity of desire until every power is on the stretch. When waves of despair which no
language can express sweep over the suppliant, how few cling with unyielding faith to the promises
of God.
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Those who exercise but little faith now, are in the greatest danger of falling under the power of
satanic delusions and the decree to compel the conscience. And even if they endure the test they
will be plunged into deeper distress and anguish in the time of trouble, because they have never
made it a habit to trust in God. The lessons of faith which they have neglected they will be forced to
learn under a terrible pressure of discouragement.
We should now acquaint ourselves with God by proving His promises. Angels record every prayer
that is earnest and sincere. We should rather dispense with selfish gratifications than neglect
communion with God. The deepest poverty, the greatest self-denial, with His approval, is better
than riches, honors, ease, and friendship without it. We must take time to pray. If we allow our
minds to be absorbed by worldly interests, the Lord may give us time by removing from us our
idols of gold, of houses, or of fertile lands.
The young would not be seduced into sin if they would refuse to enter any path save that upon
which they could ask God's blessing. If the messengers who bear the last solemn warning to the
world would pray for the blessing of God, not in a cold, listless, lazy manner, but fervently and in
faith, as did Jacob, they would find many places where they could say: "I have seen God face to
face, and my life is preserved." Genesis 32:30. They would be accounted of heaven as princes,
having power to prevail with God and with men.
The "time of trouble, such as never was," is soon to open upon us; and we shall need an experience
which we do not now possess and which many are too indolent to obtain. It is often the case that
trouble is greater in anticipation than in reality; but this is not true of the crisis before us. The most
vivid presentation cannot reach the magnitude of the ordeal. In that time of trial, every soul must
stand for himself before God. "Though Noah, Daniel, and Job" were in the land, "as I live, saith the
Lord God, they shall deliver neither son
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nor daughter; they shall but deliver their own souls by their righteousness." Ezekiel 14:20.
Now, while our great High Priest is making the atonement for us, we should seek to become perfect
in Christ. Not even by a thought could our Saviour be brought to yield to the power of temptation.
Satan finds in human hearts some point where he can gain a foothold; some sinful desire is
cherished, by means of which his temptations assert their power. But Christ declared of Himself:
"The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in Me." John 14:30. Satan could find nothing in
the Son of God that would enable him to gain the victory. He had kept His Father's commandments,
and there was no sin in Him that Satan could use to his advantage. This is the condition in which
those must be found who shall stand in the time of trouble.
It is in this life that we are to separate sin from us, through faith in the atoning blood of Christ. Our
precious Saviour invites us to join ourselves to Him, to unite our weakness to His strength, our
ignorance to His wisdom, our unworthiness to His merits. God's providence is the school in which
we are to learn the meekness and lowliness of Jesus. The Lord is ever setting before us, not the way
we would choose, which seems easier and pleasanter to us, but the true aims of life. It rests with us
to co-operate with the agencies which Heaven employs in the work of conforming our characters to
the divine model. None can neglect or defer this work but at the most fearful peril to their souls.
The apostle John in vision heard a loud voice in heaven exclaiming: "Woe to the inhabiters of the
earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth
that he hath but a short time." Revelation 12:12. Fearful are the scenes which call forth this
exclamation from the heavenly voice. The wrath of Satan increases as his time grows short, and his
work of deceit and destruction will reach its culmination in the time of trouble.
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Fearful sights of a supernatural character will soon be revealed in the heavens, in token of the power
of miracle-working demons. The spirits of devils will go forth to the kings of the earth and to the
whole world, to fasten them in deception, and urge them on to unite with Satan in his last struggle
against the government of heaven. By these agencies, rulers and subjects will be alike deceived.
Persons will arise pretending to be Christ Himself, and claiming the title and worship which belong
to the world's Redeemer. They will perform wonderful miracles of healing and will profess to have
revelations from heaven contradicting the testimony of the Scriptures.
As the crowning act in the great drama of deception, Satan himself will personate Christ. The
church has long professed to look to the Saviour's advent as the consummation of her hopes. Now
the great deceiver will make it appear that Christ has come. In different parts of the earth, Satan will
manifest himself among men as a majestic being of dazzling brightness, resembling the description
of the Son of God given by John in the Revelation. Revelation 1:13-15. The glory that surrounds
him is unsurpassed by anything that mortal eyes have yet beheld. The shout of triumph rings out
upon the air: "Christ has come! Christ has come!" The people prostrate themselves in adoration
before him, while he lifts up his hands and pronounces a blessing upon them, as Christ blessed His
disciples when He was upon the earth. His voice is soft and subdued, yet full of melody. In gentle,
compassionate tones he presents some of the same gracious, heavenly truths which the Saviour
uttered; he heals the diseases of the people, and then, in his assumed character of Christ, he claims
to have changed the Sabbath to Sunday, and commands all to hallow the day which he has blessed.
He declares that those who persist in keeping holy the seventh day are blaspheming his name by
refusing to listen to his angels sent to them with light and truth. This is the strong, almost
overmastering delusion. Like the Samaritans who
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were deceived by Simon Magus, the multitudes, from the least to the greatest, give heed to these
sorceries, saying: This is "the great power of God." Acts 8:10.
But the people of God will not be misled. The teachings of this false christ are not in accordance
with the Scriptures. His blessing is pronounced upon the worshipers of the beast and his image, the
very class upon whom the Bible declares that God's unmingled wrath shall be poured out.
And, furthermore, Satan is not permitted to counterfeit the manner of Christ's advent. The Saviour
has warned His people against deception upon this point, and has clearly foretold the manner of His
second coming. "There shall arise false christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and
wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect. . . . Wherefore if they
shall say unto you, Behold, He is in the desert; go not forth; behold, He is in the secret chambers;
believe it not. For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall
also the coming of the Son of man be." Matthew 24:24-27, 31; 25:31; Revelation 1:7; 1
Thessalonians 4:16, 17. This coming there is no possibility of counterfeiting. It will be universally
known--witnessed by the whole world.
Only those who have been diligent students of the Scriptures and who have received the love of the
truth will be shielded from the powerful delusion that takes the world captive. By the Bible
testimony these will detect the deceiver in his disguise. To all the testing time will come. By the
sifting of temptation the genuine Christian will be revealed. Are the people of God now so firmly
established upon His word that they would not yield to the evidence of their senses? Would they, in
such a crisis, cling to the Bible and the Bible only? Satan will, if possible, prevent them from
obtaining a preparation to stand in that day. He will so arrange affairs as to hedge up their way,
entangle them with earthly treasures, cause them to carry a heavy, wearisome burden, that
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their hearts may be overcharged with the cares of this life and the day of trial may come upon them
as a thief.
As the decree issued by the various rulers of Christendom against commandment keepers shall
withdraw the protection of government and abandon them to those who desire their destruction, the
people of God will flee from the cities and villages and associate together in companies, dwelling in
the most desolate and solitary places. Many will find refuge in the strongholds of the mountains.
Like the Christians of the Piedmont valleys, they will make the high places of the earth their
sanctuaries and will thank God for "the munitions of rocks." Isaiah 33:16. But many of all nations
and of all classes, high and low, rich and poor, black and white, will be cast into the most unjust and
cruel bondage. The beloved of God pass weary days, bound in chains, shut in by prison bars,
sentenced to be slain, some apparently left to die of starvation in dark and loathsome dungeons. No
human ear is open to hear their moans; no human hand is ready to lend them help.
Will the Lord forget His people in this trying hour? Did He forget faithful Noah when judgments
were visited upon the antediluvian world? Did He forget Lot when the fire came down from heaven
to consume the cities of the plain? Did He forget Joseph surrounded by idolaters in Egypt? Did He
forget Elijah when the oath of Jezebel threatened him with the fate of the prophets of Baal? Did He
forget Jeremiah in the dark and dismal pit of his prison house? Did He forget the three worthies in
the fiery furnace? or Daniel in the den of lions?
"Zion said, The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me. Can a woman forget her
sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget,
yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of My hands." Isaiah 49:14-16.
The Lord hosts has said: "He that toucheth you toucheth the apple of His eye." Zechariah 2:8.
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Though enemies may thrust them into prison, yet dungeon walls cannot cut off the communication
between their souls and Christ. One who sees their every weakness, who is acquainted with every
trial, is above all earthly powers; and angels will come to them in lonely cells, bringing light and
peace from heaven. The prison will be as a palace; for the rich in faith dwell there, and the gloomy
walls will be lighted up with heavenly light as when Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises at
midnight in the Philippian dungeon.
God's judgments will be visited upon those who are seeking to oppress and destroy His people. His
long forbearance with the wicked emboldens men in transgression, but their punishment is
nonetheless certain and terrible because it is long delayed. "The Lord shall rise up as in Mount
Perazim, He shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, that He may do His work, His strange work;
and bring to pass His act, His strange act." Isaiah 28:21. To our merciful God the act of punishment
is a strange act. "As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked."
Ezekiel 33:11. The Lord is "merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and
truth, . . . forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin." Yet He will "by no means clear the guilty."
The Lord is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked." Exodus 34:6,
7; Nahum 1:3. By terrible things in righteousness He will vindicate the authority of His
downtrodden law. The severity of the retribution awaiting the transgressor may be judged by the
Lord's reluctance to execute justice. The nation with which He bears long, and which He will not
smite until it has filled up the measure of its iniquity in God's account, will finally drink the cup of
wrath unmixed with mercy.
When Christ ceases His intercession in the sanctuary, the unmingled wrath threatened against those
who worship the beast and his image and receive his mark (Revelation 14:9, 10), will be poured out.
The plagues upon Egypt when God was about to deliver Israel were similar in character to those
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more terrible and extensive judgments which are to fall upon the world just before the final
deliverance of God's people. Says the revelator, in describing those terrific scourges: "There fell a
noisome and grievous sore upon the men which had the mark of the beast, and upon them which
worshiped his image." The sea "became as the blood of a dead man: and every living soul died in
the sea." And "the rivers and fountains of waters . . . became blood." Terrible as these inflictions
are, God's justice stands fully vindicated. The angel of God declares: "Thou art righteous, O Lord, .
. . because Thou hast judged thus. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and Thou
hast given them blood to drink; for they are worthy." Revelation 16:2-6. By condemning the people
of God to death, they have as truly incurred the guilt of their blood as if it had been shed by their
hands. In like manner Christ declared the Jews of His time guilty of all the blood of holy men which
had been shed since the days of Abel; for they possessed the same spirit and were seeking to do the
same work with these murderers of the prophets.
In the plague that follows, power is given to the sun "to scorch men with fire. And men were
scorched with great heat." Verses 8, 9. The prophets thus describe the condition of the earth at this
fearful time: "The land mourneth; . . . because the harvest of the field is perished. . . . All the trees
of the field are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men." "The seed is rotten
under their clods, the garners are laid desolate. . . . How do the beasts groan! the herds of cattle are
perplexed, because they have no pasture. . . . The rivers of water are dried up, and the fire hath
devoured the pastures of the wilderness." "The songs of the temple shall be howlings in that day,
saith the Lord God: there shall be many dead bodies in every place; they shall cast them forth with
silence." Joel 1:10-12, 17-20; Amos 8:3.
These plagues are not universal, or the inhabitants of the earth would be wholly cut off. Yet they
will be the most
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awful scourges that have ever been known to mortals. All the judgments upon men, prior to the
close of probation, have been mingled with mercy. The pleading blood of Christ has shielded the
sinner from receiving the full measure of his guilt; but in the final judgment, wrath is poured out
unmixed with mercy.
In that day, multitudes will desire the shelter of God's mercy which they have so long despised.
"Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of
bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord: and they shall wander from sea to
sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Lord, and
shall not find it." Amos 8:11, 12.
The people of God will not be free from suffering; but while persecuted and distressed, while they
endure privation and suffer for want of food they will not be left to perish. That God who cared for
Elijah will not pass by one of His self-sacrificing children. He who numbers the hairs of their head
will care for them, and in time of famine they shall be satisfied. While the wicked are dying from
hunger and pestilence, angels will shield the righteous and supply their wants. To him that "walketh
righteously" is the promise: "Bread shall be given him; his waters shall be sure." "When the poor
and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear
them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them." Isaiah 33:15, 16; 41:17.
"Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labor of the olive
shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall
be no herd in the stalls;" yet shall they that fear Him "rejoice in the Lord" and joy in the God of
their salvation. Habakkuk 3:17, 18.
"The Lord is thy keeper: the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by
day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil:
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He shall preserve thy soul." "He shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the
noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with His fathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust: His
truth shall be thy shield and buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the
arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that
wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall
not come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked.
Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the Most High, thy habitation; there
shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling." Psalms 121:5-7; 91:3-10.
Yet to human sight it will appear that the people of God must soon seal their testimony with their
blood as did the martyrs before them. They themselves begin to fear that the Lord has left them to
fall by the hand of their enemies. It is a time of fearful agony. Day and night they cry unto God for
deliverance. The wicked exult, and the jeering cry is heard: "Where now is your faith? Why does
not God deliver you out of our hands if you are indeed His people?" But the waiting ones remember
Jesus dying upon Calvary's cross and the chief priests and rulers shouting in mockery: "He saved
others; Himself He cannot save. If He be the King of Israel, let Him now come down from the
cross, and we will believe Him." Matthew 27:42. Like Jacob, all are wrestling with God. Their
countenances express their internal struggle. Paleness sits upon every face.