Look Up and Lift Up Your Heads

Introducing my newest book, releasing January 31

You’ve heard me mention it and I’ve written about it several times over the past month, but it’s time to make the official announcement: I have a new book coming out on Tuesday, January 31!

It’s called Look Up! Awaiting the Rapture and Our Final Redemption. It includes a foreword from Dr. Mark Hitchcock and goes a step further than much of what you read here at Tipping Point. Beyond what is happening right now, my upcoming book is about what will happen when all of this is over.

This is a book about what God has planned for you in eternity. Your future is brighter and better than you can even imagine. The best day of your life is coming, and I believe it’s coming soon!

You can order the new book here.

January is almost over, but it’s still the early part of 2023. During a new year, most of us spend time thinking about the future, with excitement. Maybe we make resolutions and are hopeful about losing weight or starting new habits. Maybe we are thinking about family vacations a few months away, or the start of a new school year. We think about the months to come but with a lot of eager anticipation.

Most of us don’t always think about the end times at the beginning of the year, or even at the end of the year, during the holidays. I was thinking about this reality during the Christmas season, a little more than a month ago.

My guess is that you didn’t hear much about the Second Coming at your Christmas Eve candlelight service. That’s a shame, because Christmas isn’t just about celebrating the coming of a baby who was born 2,000 or so years ago. For Christians, Advent is a time to recognize that the Christ who came once is soon coming again!

Sadly, many believers have forgotten that fact. In some churches, preachers never mention it. Those who do talk about the future talk about it in discouraging or negative terms.

But the early Church talked about the future with great and abiding hope. They knew God had invaded the world once as an infant born to a young virgin in a small Middle Eastern village.

They also knew that was not the end of the story. The early Church celebrated the birth of Jesus not just because of the past, but because of the future. They knew Jesus would come once again to right all wrongs in the world and call His people unto Himself.

Why? Because when Jesus came to earth the first time, the Jewish people had been under foreign occupation for almost 400 years. They needed relief. God had promised it, but while they had hope He would fulfill His promise one day, very few thought it would be in their day. Even more, they didn’t understand or believe God would do it in the way that He did. For the most part, they had simply given up hope.

God’s promised Messiah seemed like a vague shadow lost in the mist. When they considered their current humiliating situation under Roman occupation, despair was more comfortable than disappointment.

Living in the Spiritual Doldrums

It’s no longer the Christmas season, but we are living in a similar moment of despair. That might surprise you to hear, but despite the way civilization has progressed over the centuries, much in our society is not so different than the first century. Perhaps you grew up in the Church, and you heard many times that Jesus was coming again.

At first, you were both excited about that promise and maybe a little scared. But then days turned into weeks, months, and years. A few people in the Church kept preaching and teaching about the Rapture and the end times. But maybe you stopped listening to the message. Maybe it didn’t carry the impact it once had.

Over the years, you heard fewer and fewer sermons and experienced less teaching about Jesus’ return. Even more, you know people who were once burning white-hot for the Lord, but now they live as though Jesus never came in the first place, never rose from the dead, and is never coming again.

These are the spiritual doldrums. In the United States, many people, including Christians, have ended up here. Europe reached that sad stage many years ago, and America is headed in that direction quickly. Many people have left the Church. In the U.S. in particular, fewer than half of all adults attend a place of worship, Christian or otherwise.

Truth hangs in the balance in our nation. Sexuality is in rebellion. Immorality is being celebrated. Technology and medical science—while neutral and helpful in the right hands—are being coopted for questionable and unethical purposes. As I wrote in the book that helped launch this community, we have reached a tipping point in our society, and it really seems there is no going back.

We pray for revival while we prepare for the worst.

I know it’s not true for this community, but I understand why some pastors and a lot of churchgoers have shied away from focusing on the end times. They may have heard extremely specific predictions that never came true. Some people set specific dates, and when it doesn’t happen, those who listened to that message are disappointed. Others might have friends who did or said some outlandish things because they had a faulty view of the Lord’s return.

Personally, I am always the first to admit that I have heard and read some things that make me uncomfortable. But this is the point where I want to stop and caution you—because God did not leave you without hope. Why do I still teach and preach about the return of Christ? I do it because it is in God’s Word, it is central to the Good News shared by the early Church, and I really do believe we are in the end of the end times.

And I tell you these things because I love people and I want every person I know—and those whom I have not yet met—to find hope and courage in the promise of Jesus’ return.

What Happens When This is All Over

My message is always a hopeful one: That Jesus will return just as He promised, and that we are closer to that return than we have ever been.

The signs are incredible and undeniable, and I want people to know what is happening in the world in the context of what God is doing for His people. That’s why I write so many articles and record so many videos here on Tipping Point.

But in my new book, I want to take readers a step further—beyond what is happening right now. I want you to know what will happen when all of this is over. I want you to know what God has planned for you.

Remember what Paul wrote to the Church at Corinth:

But as it is written:
“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,
Nor have entered into the heart of man
The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”
—1 Corinthians 2:9

Jesus told His followers that, when they see the first stages of the beginning of the end, they should really pay attention:

“Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near.”—Luke 21:28

That is not dreadful news or stressful news. That is good news! Our redemption is near.

So as you prepare your heart for the future—or at least for the rest of 2023—continue to be watchful and ready. We are closing up the first month in a new year.

It could be the best year of your life. And it could be the best year in the history of humanity.