My dear readers,

Overcoming the End of the World!

Calvary Pandan BPC is celebrating her 45^th Anniversary by the grace and mercies of God. Will there be a 46^th Anniversary? Only if the Lord tarries. But the world is ending!

“Global warming” or “climate change” is on the lips of almost every nation. Conversely, the solution is the elephant in the room that many cannot agree on. What or who caused the “climate change” that has devastated the earth? One group blamed man’s burning of fossil fuels. If man can reverse fossil fuel burning, the earth’s temperature might fall a few degrees; otherwise, the world will soon become unliveable! Our children’s children will suffer the consequences of our reckless and impudent follies. Man is running out of time, according to the proponents of this solution to climate change. The time to stop the rise in temperature on the earth’s surface was yesterday! On the other hand, others argue that this present climatic phenomenon is a cyclical event of nature. Volcanic eruptions, solar radiation and tectonic shifts, including small changes to the earth’s orbit over a long period, are the causes of global warming.

What if man cannot stop global warming, and soon the earth will become unliveable? Will man go mad out of a sense of hopelessness and abject terror?

God has prophesied the destruction of heaven and earth, and there is absolutely nothing man can do to stop it. Revelation 20:11: “And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.” God wants all inhabitants on earth to know and acknowledge their helplessness. Man is not God. Man did not create the heaven and the earth. Based on man’s arrogance and blindness, he is an ungrateful dweller on God’s earth! With the revelation of the end of the world, will man take heed to where he will go after the world ends?

Only the Creator of heaven and earth can save and help man. The way to overcome the world's end is to leave this heaven and earth for another world. Man’s way and hope of living in another world is in outer space. Exploring outer space and looking for a living planet like Earth is another foolish attempt by man to save himself from destruction. There is no life out there except life in heaven with God. Heaven is not outer space. Outer space is where God hangs the sun, moon, and stars which are creations for man to know the greatness of God and His existence. Did man receive the message of God that is declared loud and clear, day and night? Psalm 19:1-3: “¹ To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David. The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork. ² Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge. ³ There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard.”

Sadly, man rejected and replaced God and insulted Him by making Him into the image of His creation. Romans 1:19-23: “¹⁹ Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. ²⁰ For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: ²¹ Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. ²² Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, ²³ And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.”

The signs of the end of the world are beneficial to man, for God could have destroyed the world the way He did Sodom and Gomorrah within one day! These signs are for man to acknowledge his helplessness and his urgent need for God.

Knowing the world will end sooner or later, what should God’s people do? He must stop pursuing after mammon. He must seek God and love Him with all his heart, soul, strength and mind so that he can love his neighbour as himself. To do this, he needs to follow Christ in everything all his life. To follow Christ all his life, he must first deny himself to carry the cross that Christ has designed for all His disciples. Mark 8:34-38: “³⁴ And when he had called the people unto him with his disciples also, he said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. ³⁵ For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it. ³⁶ For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? ³⁷ Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? ³⁸ Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

Loving God and hating mammon is clear evidence of one’s salvation as taught by Christ in Matthew 6:24: “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” To serve mammon is utter foolishness, like a man emptying his rubbish bin filled with smelly, decaying food and discarding them into a bank vault for safe-keeping!

No believer in his right spiritual mind would ever do that! Do you?

The first thing to note in overcoming the end of the world is to acknowledge our sins and impotence to save the world and ourselves before God and receive Christ as Lord and Saviour into our hearts. God will overcome the end of the world by taking His children to heaven. The world’s destruction is God’s judgment on man’s sins that will be full in His holy sight; it is not by man’s burning of fossil fuel or natural disasters. Only the Creator can save the world. If the world bows its knees and acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, the world may be saved – like what the king of Nineveh and all his citizens did in humble repentance and begged God for mercy and forgiveness, and the city was not destroyed.

Will the world humble itself before God in Christ? But the individual sinner who humbles himself can be saved in Christ.

The second thing is to serve God faithfully. Now that the believer’s salvation is assured in Christ, he needs to serve the Lord, knowing that the days to serve Him are numbered. His work in the world might be destroyed when the world ends, but what he does for Christ, constrained by His love, will last for eternity and will be remembered by God. Such work includes bearing a holy witness for Christ so that the unbelievers may see the powerful impact of Christ’s death on the cross. Working with holy, diligent, helpful, honest, truthful sons and daughters of the Most High God is an experience unbelievers never did before. They can experience a holy life when a wrong is done and admission and repentance follow sincerely, and the consequences are borne with heartfelt remorse and a desire to not repeat the same mistake. Such a daily holy witness for Christ will follow the believer when the Lord Jesus returns to catch him up in glory.

If you are in Christ, your Lord and Saviour, you should not be afraid when the world ends. Serve Him faithfully to the end; Christ is waiting to receive you into glory and His loving arms! But if you are not born again in Christ, be very afraid when the world ends, for judgment, hell and ultimately the Lake of Fire that burns without end await!

Make sure of your salvation with fear and trembling. Philippians 2:12: “Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.”