Discernment and Separation in a Time of Judgment

 
"Come out of her, My people, so that you will not share in her sins or receive any of her plagues." - Revelation 17:4, Holman

On the surface, my family and I live a pretty normal American life. We live in the suburbs and have two daughters, two bunnies and a cat. My wife organizes a book club for our daughters' friends and plays tennis on a league. I help coach soccer and enjoy training in martial arts. 

The difference is that we know it is the end of the age and Jesus is coming back very soon. We know America has come under God's judgment for its bloodshed and immorality. The final, irrevocable phase began last summer with the noontime solar eclipse, followed by three destructive hurricanes and the mass shooting in Las Vegas. Please see these posts for more details:

A Basket of Summer Fruit for the Season of the End
Hurricane Harvey Is a Judgment from the Lord, and More Is Coming

More is coming, growing waves of calamity that will culminate in the nation's destruction in World War III. There is no pleasure in saying it, but this is the reality. Particularly watch this summer because of the prophesy in Amos 8.

What gives us hope is that there will be a great harvest for the kingdom of God. The pressures of judgment will break people down, some in a good way and they will repent and believe in Jesus Christ and find the love of God. We get to be a part of this movement and that motivates us. Life is short, but eternity is forever. 

God has been shouting this message from the rooftops for years, even decades. No one will be able to say God didn't tell them, because He has.

Separating from the Mainstream Church

A few years ago when I began to understand how late the hour is, it became hard to continue sitting in church. What my wife and I heard from the Lord did not match what we heard there. We truly believed those things and the Lord confirmed them in so many ways. Our lives changed radically. I saw there were other people around the world who heard these messages too, a small and vocal remnant. Yet at church it was like the sound of crickets.

We reached out to church leaders and pastors, but they were not interested in talking about judgment. I naively thought lots of other people would hear and receive this message and we would come together around it and prepare. I even wrote an article explaining why I believed America is under judgment and sent it to most of the pastors in my area. Few responded and those that did mostly disagreed. What was the disconnect?

I remembered what Jesus said to the religious people who opposed him:

"You pore over the Scriptures because you think you have eternal life in them, yet they testify about Me. And you are not willing to come to Me so that you may have life." - John 5:39-40, Holman

The Pharisees and Sadducees read their Bibles and went to "church," but did not recognize the Messiah standing in front of them. Their hearts were hard. Only a small minority, a remnant, received Him. Hundreds of years before Christ, prophets in Israel like Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel warned about God's judgment and the need for repentance, yet only a minority received the message. The religious and political establishment rejected it and instead persecuted the prophets. They threw Jeremiah in a cistern and sawed Isaiah in half.

I realized something similar is happening in America today. Mainstream churches and Christian leaders are rejecting God's message of judgment and repentance and not telling their congregations. Only a remnant is hearing it.

I felt strongly that I could not continue to participate in this church system. It wasn't a neutral proposition to sit in a church whose leaders were not hearing and speaking God's message to America for this hour. If they are not listening to God, then who are they listening to? Jesus said His sheep hear his voice and they follow Him. There was something anesthetizing or hypnotic about being in a group of religious people who acted like everything is normal. They were put to sleep spiritually and being there might do the same to us.

We stopped attending and have our own family "church" at home. God continues to speak loudly and powerfully to us. It's not that we're perfect or special, but we are willing to hear and believe an uncomfortable message and embrace God's mission for us.

Other Spirits Coming In

As Christian churches and leaders have rejected the voice of the Holy Spirit, other spirits, unholy religious spirits, have come in to fill the void.

One of the spiritual gifts the Lord gave me is discernment. I can discern true and false based on God's word, and sometimes can discern spirits, which is telling what kinds of spirits are operating in or through a person or a place.

The Bible talks a lot about the influence of spirits on people:

"For if someone comes and proclaims a Jesus other than the One we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit than the One you received, or a different gospel than the one you accepted, you put up with it way too easily." - 2 Corinthians 11:4, Berean Study Bible

The Apostle Paul warned that false spirits can come in and speak false messages and false gospels. It is possible for people to receive these spirits, instead of the Holy Spirit of God, and be influenced by their messages and desires. People become vehicles for these spirits' agendas. These unholy spirits are from Satan and part of how he deceives the world.

Christians are supposed to be alert to this reality and carefully test the spirits:

"Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to determine if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world." - 1 John 4:1, Holman

Once I was visiting a conservative Baptist church and felt a spiritual presence of confusion and joylessness so strong I wanted to run out the back door. Honestly I could hardly think straight in that place and had to pray afterwards to the darkness off of me. I have had similar experiences around religious people, even while they are talking about God! As Christians have rejected the voice of the Holy Spirit, they are being infiltrated right and left with unholy religious spirits. It is toxic and spiritually dangerous.

I need to warn you. These religious spirits will one day animate people to persecute God's true remnant. Jesus said persecution will intensify in the end times:

"You will even be betrayed by parents, brothers, relatives, and friends. They will kill some of you. You will be hated by everyone because of My name." - Luke 21:1-17, Holman

For Jesus, the greatest persecution came from the religious establishment. The Pharisees and Sadducees harassed and opposed Jesus more than anyone else, and it was the Sanhendrin, the council of priests and rabbis, who consigned Him to death. Fast forward to the future portrayed in Revelation 13. There you see the second beast, the false prophet, will force everyone to worship the image of the beast and take his mark or be killed. The second beast represents the one-world religion that will align with the Antichrist during the final years of this age. The Vatican is the center and it will include all the Christian denominations and other religions that align with it. This is the real 

meaning and ultimate intention of the popular symbol "COEXIST." In the end it will mean "assimilate or else." All real Christians they get their hands on will be put to death and everyone else will receive the mark of the beast which alters their DNA and turns them into humanoid biological robots under control of the beast system. This is what it means in 2 Thessalonians 2 where it say the man of lawlessness "sits in the temple of God, showing himself as if he were God." Human bodies are the temple and the mark is seat of control for Satan and the Antichrist.

My point is that we need the Holy Spirit's discernment about who to associate with and who to avoid, because the times are becoming more dangerous. Like Jesus said, be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves. God will protect us if we draw near, hear his voice and do what He says.

Separation for God's Protection

In a previous post, I wrote about an unexpected conflict with a group I was fellowshipping with. The conflict was about a woman prophesying by a false spirit that others believed was of God. After a period of expressing concerns and confronting this spirit, the Lord used a curious passage in 1 Kings 13 to let me know that I needed to break fellowship.

The story is about a man of God from Judah who traveled to the Northern Kingdom of Israel to pronounce a judgment from the Lord because of its idolatry. God told the man to go straight there, return by a different route and not to "eat bread or drink water in this place." However, an old prophet deceived him by saying an angel said the man should come back to his house to eat and drink. The man of God did, and then the old prophet prophesied for real and said that because he did not keep the Lord's command, his life would be forfeit. On the way home the man was killed by a lion.

A strange story indeed. Note that eating and drinking at the prophet's house was fellowship. The Lord impressed on me that I too needed to break fellowship or would suffer a judgment, like the man of God. I don't know what the equivalent of being killed by a lion would be for me, but I didn't want to find out.

The man of God was to sent proclaim a message during a time of judgment. God wanted him to get in, deliver the message and get out. It seems there are special requirements for separation during a time of judgment. As another example, during Korah's rebellion against Moses in Numbers 16, Moses told the people, "Get away now from the tents of these wicked men. Don't touch anything that belongs to them, or you will be swept away because of all their sins."

Looking back, there were two occasions while confronting the issue of the false spirit when I became persistently ill for weeks. I heard of others involved in the group who also experienced health problems and one a financial problem. That spirit was a curser! Fellowship was an open door for spiritual attack. Separation was God's way of protecting me, as well as pressuring the people involved in the spirit to repent:

"Therefore, brothers, stand firm and hold to the traditions you were taught, either by our message or by our letter... And if anyone does not obey our instruction in this letter, take note of that person; don’t associate with him, so that he may be ashamed. Yet don’t treat him as an enemy, but warn him as a brother." - 2 Thessalonians 2:15, 3:14-15

Conclusion

I believe the Lord has a handful of missions or battles He wants each of us to engage in. Discernment and separation are important tools for making sure we don't run into harm, fall into traps or expend our energy unnecessarily. Otherwise we won't have the strength for the missions that are His will for us. 

The only way to do this is to stay in a close relationship with God - praying, worshiping, studying His Word - and following His instructions only.