11/5/11
Greetings, After ten months of teaching on the purpose of unity in the body of Christ, my prayer is that the importance of this message is coming alive in you. My passion for unity does not only stem from the fact that it is beneficial. It also comes because I understand that it will be absolutely necessary. The fact of the matter is that very difficult times are coming. Not just economically difficult times, but times during which things will happen that will bend the imagination. In order to stand until the end, unity will not be an option, it will be a requirement.
One of the most difficult things for me to explain to people is that right now Satan is in the process of building an army. “Sure,” one might say, “he’s building an army of evil and corrupt people like he’s always done.” This is not the end of the matter.
Satan wants to build an army of subservient slaves that will conform to his every whim and comprise not only his end-time army, but his entire last day empire. Satan has it in mind to make humanity obsolete by introducing society to a new class of beings. These beings will have no choice but to bow the knee to Satan and submit to his beast (antichrist). They will not be human, but they will have intelligence and consciousness nonetheless. Sound like science fiction?
In order to properly understand this clear prophecy of Scripture we will begin with a passage from the book of Revelation:
“And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him (the beast/antichrist), whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” (Revelation 13:8)
In the last days the beast will receive power, a throne and great authority from Satan (Revelation 13:2). As a result he will be worshipped as a god. Here is the interesting part. It is written that all will worship him whose names are not written in the book of life. This may not seem like anything important at first glance. Why should it? Isn’t it simply pointing out that anyone who doesn’t believe in Jesus Christ will worship the beast?
We must understand how the book of life works in order to truly understand the ramifications of this passage. It is difficult for people to comprehend that Satan is currently in the process of engineering the population described in this passage. However, without telling you how he is doing it (because of limited space), I will concern myself with proving to you why this passage speaks of that activity.
According to the Bible we learn that God knows us before we are formed in our mother’s womb (Jeremiah 1:5). This is because God forms our soul and spirit in the lowest parts of the earth before joining it to our body in our mother’s womb. The Bible clearly explains this in the following passage. It is from this same passage that we learn that the creation and conception of every human born is recorded in God’s book, along with all the days of our lives. This is the book of Life.
“I will confess and praise You for You are fearful and wonderful and for the awful wonder of my birth! Wonderful are Your works, and that my inner self knows right well. My frame was not hidden from You when I was being formed in secret [and] intricately and curiously wrought [as if embroidered with various colors] in the depths of the earth [a region of darkness and mystery]. Your eyes saw my unformed substance, and in Your book all the days [of my life] were written before ever they took shape, when as yet there was none of them.” (Psalm 139:14-16 AMP, brackets in original)
It is absolutely essential that we understand that every person born is initially written into the Lamb’s book of life. This is why it is not the will of God that any should perish but that all should come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). With that said, a word study on the book of life will reveal three populations.
1. Those that are written into the book of life (Philippians 4:3, Revelation 3:5, 21:27)
2. Those that are blotted out of the book of life (Exodus 32:33, Psalm 69:28, Revelation 22:19)
3. Those that are never written into the book of life (Revelation 13:8, 17:8)
In the Bible there is not a single passage that makes mention of names being un-blotted in the book of life. This means that the only time a name gets blotted out of the book of life is when there remains no ability for a person to receive the salvation of Jesus Christ. For most, this point will come at death. Until we die, there is provision for our salvation and this is upheld by the presence of our name in the book of life.
Now we will address the group that is never written into the book of life. As we discussed, if a person is human they are formed by God and knit to their body in the womb. At this time they are written into the book of life. The only way a person won’t be written into the book of life is if they are not human. If someone is never written into this book there is no provision for their salvation.
The population that is never written into the book of life will have no provision for salvation because they will not be human. This is the only way they can fulfill the requirement of “never” being written into the book of life. This makes reference to a new class of beings that will be released into the earth specifically to comprise large portions of the antichrist’s kingdom. This makes sense when we realize that this population only shows up during the antichrist’s rule (Revelation 13:8, 17:8). All of those not qualified as “human” will worship the beast. This is the emphasis of Revelation 13:8. Satan is in the process of creating the population of non-human entities that fit this bill because prophecy must be fulfilled.
This is a major reason why the Bible says that as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of Man (Matthew 24:37). The days of Noah were characterized by the sin and lawlessness that resulted when the world was introduced to a new population. This population was half-human and half-angel. They were called the Nephilim.
“When people had spread all over the world, and daughters were being born, some of the heavenly beings saw that these young women were beautiful, so they took the ones they liked. Then the Lord said, I will not allow people to live forever; they are mortal. From now on they will live no longer than 120 years. In those days, and even later, there were giants [nephilim] on the earth who were descendants of human women and the heavenly beings. They were the great heroes and famous men of long ago.” (Genesis 6:1-4 GNT)
How will a divided, scattered, weak church deal with the reality of these types of circumstances? Yet in spite of these things the Bible says that the people that know their God shall be strong and do exploits (Daniel 11:32)! In order to stand against such remarkable circumstances unity will not be an option. It is imperative that we begin to work towards the destiny God has appointed for His people now.
Discussion
1. Is the need for unity in the body of Christ becoming real to you?
2. What are the three categories formed by the book of life?
3. What is the emphasis of Revelation 13:8?
4. What happened in the days of Noah?
5. Considering what the Bible tells us will come, can unity remain optional?
