Divine Timeline

If you recorded anything on a 2020 calendar, like me, you likely had to draw a line through most of the Spring activities due to COVID. And now the riotous protests caused by the senseless murder of George Floyd is adding to the unrest of this year. As I sit here and write, I hear on the news that 80% of us feel that America is out of control.

It seems our world is binarily divided everywhere we turn.

Democrats or Republicans; maskers or non-maskers; police officers or black males. These are false divisions we have partitioned ourselves into. Jesus came to break down the walls that divide us.

For He [Jesus] Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall…Ephesians 2:14

I have had this gnawing feeling in my gut since all this craziness started happening that there is something more calamitous streaming under the surface. But I don’t mean in a government conspiracy kind of way. I truly believe we are in a full-press spiritual battle.

I believe Satan is trying to weaken the Church by keeping us “safer at home”. I believe the old Dragon is trying to divide us by keeping racism all too alive in some hearts. I believe the legless Serpent is using divisions in our government to keep people hurling insults at each other. Does Satan employ people to carry out his schemes? Absolutely.

Remember our struggle is not with flesh and blood, “but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Eph. 6:12.

Just read 1 Thessalonians 5.

Paul does partition people into two groups here, but not on the basis of their political beliefs, the color of their skin, or whether or not they wear a mask in public. No, he said there are Children of the Day and Children of the Night. In other words, those who believe in the saving power of Jesus and those who do not.

Paul told those believers in Thessalonica that the Day of the Lord couldn’t be posted on a calendar. However, he also told them, as believers, they shouldn’t be taken by surprise. Jesus is coming – it is inevitable, like a pregnant woman going into labor. Paul told them (and us) to be “alert and sober”.

⁵ For all of you are children of the light and children of the day. We are not of the night or of darkness. ⁶ Therefore, let us not sleep as the rest do, but let us stay alert and sober. 1 Thessalonians 5

How do we live out these last days alert and sober? These scriptures go on to tell us to “put on the breastplate of faith and love and the helmet that is hope for salvation” (1 Thess. 5:8b). Believers must live our lives in faith, not fear! And at no time is the helmet of salvation more important than right now. We have to protect our minds from the constant bombardment of media of all kinds.

But know this…

Maybe, just maybe, our calendars (and our world) being out-of-whack in 2020 is the Master’s eternal timeline being played out before our very eyes. Maybe things are not “calamitous” but are totally happening to hasten the day that we sing about all the time – the Day of Jesus’ Return.

“But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Luke 21:28

Children of the Day, stay ready and alert, not fearful and anxious. Jesus is coming to collect His beautifully diverse Church. For Children of the Day, it will be a day of great rejoicing – the day of our salvation.