Bruce Collins, Evangelist

The personal website of Bruce Collins

Meditation for the week of April 1, 2007

Revelation 1:3 Blessed (happy or well off) is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand (near or ready).
Revelation 8:13 And I beheld, and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice, Woe, woe, woe, (alas or sorrow and misery) to the inhabiters of the earth by reason of the other voices of the trumpet of the three angels, which are yet to sound!

We all live through miserable days. Recently, we made a trip to California and, through no fault of the airlines, the weather did not cooperate. We waited in the airplane in Cedar Rapids, IA for over an hour waiting for the Dallas airport to give us an invitation to come. Dallas had a lot of storms in the area. When we got to Dallas, we rushed to our connecting flight. However, when we got to the appropriate gate, we found that the plane we were leaving on had mechanical problems. After waiting for about two hours for the plane to be “fixed”, they found us another plane. We got out on the runway and then waited two hours for another Dallas storm to pass over the airport. We finally got to Los Angeles, safe and sound, five hours later than planned. That five hours seemed like eternity. Have you ever been in a plane with about 200 people filling every seat while the stewardess’s pass out little plastic glasses half-full of water to comfort you? That was a miserable day.

However, that was a good day compared to what is in store for those who reject Christ. I believe that the book of Revelation deals with a future period of time that is ready to happen at any time. That time will be a period of judgment on the living inhabitants of the earth who by and large and have turned their back on God and His Christ. I wouldn’t want my friends to be a part of these judgments. I wouldn’t even want my dog, if I had one, to pass through these judgments. It will be a period of misery, of death and of sorrow. While many people will actually be saved during this period of time, those who have rejected Christ during this present period of God’s grace will not be among them (2 Thessalonians 2:10-12).

When faced with sorrow and trouble, many people begin to think about their relationship with God. But this is not the case with most of the people in this period of time when God’s wrath is being poured out. They will have become so hard, so rebellious, and so self-centered, that when the judgments come they will continue to worship demons and idols. They will continue to commit gross sins against their fellow man (Revelation 9:20-21). They will not repent and turn to the Lord. Since they worship demons, they obviously believe there is a god, they just won’t submit to the God Who wants to bless them. They will have been deceived into believing that the worship of Satan and His lies is going to give them power and happiness. It will be a day much like our present day except that the evil will be much more pronounced.

Instead of the future bringing woe’s one after another, our future can bring blessing. We don’t have to be able to understand all of the events of the book of Revelation to know that it is better to worship a God who would rather save than destroy than to worship a Devil who would rather destroy than save. God warns us so we can be saved, Satan lies to us so we can be destroyed. It is better to worship One who died for us than to worship one who wants us to die. It is better to worship one who tells the Truth than one who is the Father of lies (John 8:44). But to be blessed, we have to guard the truth that brings blessing when we read it. That means that we have to turn from idols to serve the Living and True God (1 Thessalonians 1:9).

I am not a risk taker. I am and always have been a risk avoider. I don’t believe that it makes sense to trade the pleasures of time for an eternity of woe. I would not want to wake up in eternity and find out that I had sold my soul to the devil and that I was going to share with him in his eternal punishment. The Book of Revelation tells us that God, not Satan, wins in the end.

Bruce Collins

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