The apostle Paul warned Timothy the son of faith, “There will be terrible times in the last days.” (2 Timothy3:1) How painful will it be in the last days that Paul warned him like this? We can find the answer in the word of Jesus who answered the question the disciples asked “when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age? (Matthew 24:3)
4 Jesus answered: “Watch out that no one deceives you. 5 For many will come in my name, claiming, “I am the Christ,” and will deceive many. 6 You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 7 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of birth pains. 9 ”Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. (Matthew 24:4-11)
When such pain is upon us and some people tempts us saying “I am Christ.”, “I will save your lives. You should follow me,” showing miracles, and wonders, who can’t be deceived by their lie? That means there will be many false prophets that deceive people. Therefore, you must beware of the false prophets not to be deceived.
When we are filled with the Holy Spirit, we can overcome, not to be deceived, no matter how much terrible pain and hardships are upon us. Therefore, we need to tell clearly what is not true while we are full of the Holy Spirit with the words of the Bible. We have to watch out till the end not to be deceived by people thinking with the wisdom given by the Lord until we meet the Lord coming again no matter what the pain we will suffer.
Pastor Seok-Jeon Yoon
Extracted from Yonsei Newspaper #689
