Scripture for Today, 11-1-19: The Evil Day

The Evil Day
“Be very careful, then, how you live-not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the LORD's will is.​ vs 12 We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.”

Ephesians 5:15-17, 6:12-13
 
10-30-19, * -- Is there a limit to how evil the world can get before Christ returns? Perhaps a better question is, how evil did God allow Noah’s world to become before the flood came? In what we call the Antediluvian Age (the time before the Flood), God allowed men to live for centuries [Methuselah was 969 years old Genesis 5:27; Noah was 600 years old when the rain began Genesis 7:6], which naturally contributed significantly to the population explosion of the human race. Being omnipotent, God of course already knew that should man live for centuries, this would come to a predictable outcome. So why did He allow it?

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First of all, when God created Adam and Eve, they were made perfect. That means that they were created with perfect mental faculties, perfect physical attributes, which means they were created genetically perfect. Even though they rebelled, causing sin and death to enter into the human race, physically and genetically, they were still far superior (physically and genetically) to any of their descendants (save Jesus). However, after they sinned, instead of remaining immortal, their bodies were now allowed to age and die. Although this process would take much, much longer than would their succeeding generations. The only way that God could have immediately shortened man’s lifespan after the fall of Adam & Eve, would have been to create physically and genetically inferior humans from the outset…which of course, could not happen.
 
Jesus stated that before His immediate return, the world would be like the days of Noah [Luke 17:26], although, we don’t have a lot of specific information about those days. Jesus also said the days before His return would be like the days of Lot [Luke 17:2-30], that we do have some specific information. Bible experts have long wondered how big the earth’s population was before the Noahic Flood; some believe:

1. It was relatively low; the Bible explains that people were extremely corrupt [Genesis 6:11] and violent prior to the Flood with the earth being filled with wars, diseases and other factors that would keep the population in check.
2. The growth rate in the pre-Flood world was equal to the growth rate in 2000 (0.012), there could have been about 750 million people.
3. With humans’ extremely long lifespan prior to the Flood, the growth rate could have been close to four billion at the Flood.

One of the decision points God made after the flood with Noah (the Noahic Covenant) was in reference to corruption & violence [Genesis 6:11]. We know that after the flood when a civilization became so corrupt that murder and violence were not dealt with that civilization was in its final stage of collapse.

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Thus far, life in the 20th-century has been the bloodiest century on record. In fact, more people died in the 20th-century due to war and violence, than in all the wars previously combined. Violent crime impacts every nation on earth, and formerly peaceful societies are quickly being inundated with violence due to most nation’s liberal immigration policies bringing in peoples from the war-torn regions of the Middle East, Eastern Europe and Africa.
 
Currently in the past 40 years the level of overall wickedness has dramatically risen.

• Abortion on demand in most western nations is the single biggest source of bloodshed on the planet.
• Crime and criminal networks are rampant in every nation on the planet.
• The entertainment industry is producing the most violent, vile and pornographic movies and television shows of any era.
• Divorce (based on convenience) has wreaked havoc on the traditional family unit.
• the LGBT [homosexual] movements have sprung up in almost every nation, with most of the western nations capitulating to the normalization of this behavior. While not saying that all LGBTQ persons are evil and violent, what the homosexual lobby is demanding is the redefinition of the foundational norms for marriage and family. When God’s perfect plan of marriage -  one man & one woman - the family unit is deconstructed that allows for every evil imaginable.

Looking at the context of Genesis 1:26, along with other corroborating scriptures Jude 1:6 and 2 Peter 2:4 and match the justification for the type of judgment God issued out [to Noah & Lot’s generation]. [..snip] In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. And the rain was on the earth forty days and forty nights. Genesis 7:11-12
 
When the fountains of the great deep were broken up, this must-have caused huge geological changes to the earth’s surface. Before the Flood, there were likely little to no mountain ranges. After the flood, as the scriptures state, Noah’s ark landed on Mount Ararat (what was known as Ararat in Moses’s day).
 
As far as we know, there were no previous forms of human government prior to the flood, as everyone did what they thought was right in their own eyes [Judges 17:6, 21:25]. This allowed for great wickedness and violence to prevail upon the earth. It wasn’t until after the flood, that God gave Noah the mandate should human blood be shed, the person (or animal) that shed the blood would be required as payment. This puts the onus on humans to police other humans as a punitive measure for committing murder. [Genesis 9:6] This is largely how things have operated ever since. However, when a civilization gets to the point where it can no longer manage to contain the violence or chooses to ignore it, that civilization is on the verge of collapse.
 
Some of the pre-history architecture (megaliths, ziggurats, temples, drowned sites, etc.) that have been found around the earth this past century, were very likely built prior to the flood. (Ex. Atlit Yam, Baalbek, Great Pyramid at Giza, etc.) How many remain from that era we cannot say for certain, but there is enough to assume that what the Antediluvian world lacked in modern technology, they made up for with supernatural help and the advanced human condition (i.e., they were stronger and lived longer).
 
Our technological advancements have really only come about in the past two-centuries beginning with the harnessing of the power of water. Prior to that, man was limited to the speed of horse for the previous 4,000 years. Since the late 1700s, we have undergone four technological revolutions:
 
We are now in the age of information; and are bombarded by messaging 24/7 from every possible venue. Which interestingly, ties directly into the exact warning Christ gave us (along with the apostles) that in the last days would be the greatest time for deception that ever existed. [Matthew 24:4-5, 11, 24] [..snip]

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Genesis 5:24; 2 Kings 2:11; 1 Thessalonians 4:17; Acts 1:11; 8:39; 2 Corinthians 12:2-4,

Returning back to the original question of how much worse it will have to get before God Raptures [snatches out] His Church remains unanswered. The truth is, we don’t know exactly how bad it got before God flooded the world the first time. However, we have a general understanding that the entire world was evil, and that man’s thoughts had become evil continually. [Genesis 6:5] Although things have grown considerably worse since 2001, as long as the Church [born again believers in Christ] remains on the earth; who will always act as a restraint against evil preventing it from completely taking over.

The world without born again Christians would be a world of people who would be given over almost immediately to the basest desires. [Matt. 16:19] Almost overnight, the world would descend into a cesspool of anarchy and lawlessness. It will, at that point, become just as wicked as that Antediluvian world prior to the flood in Noah’s day.
 
Although we cannot know specifically when … we can see the storm clouds gathering overhead as the evil day approaches. This is exactly the time that the Apostle Paul warns us of, to gird up our loins, [1 Peter 1:13] and to fight, stand strong, and to be cognizant of the spiritual battle escalating all around us. All we can do at this point is to endure to the end. [Matthew 24:13-15]
 
Are you ready?
Even so, Maranatha!
​[Luke 21:28; Revelation 22:20]
 
*Excerpted and adapted full original report from Pete Garcia here
https://rev310.com/2019/10/the-evil-day

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