When the World Ridicules Your Faith

Wake up. Be alert. And understand there will be scoffers in the last days.

It’s been an interesting month for me. Many of you only know my writing and videos here at Tipping Point, but of course I’m a pastor with my own channels for communicating with my church members, readers of my books, and others. One of the videos I posted a few weeks ago has attracted a lot of attention.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine, which began on February 24, terrified a lot of my friends and community members. So many of them were seeing the march of a newly aggressive Russia on the heels of a worldwide pandemic and asking, “Are these signs of the end times? Could we see the return of Jesus in our lifetime?”

I wanted to encourage them, so the next day I recorded a brief video. I released it to my followers on Facebook and YouTube. It was less than 4 minutes long. I used it to summarize the situation in Ukraine, cite several scriptures, and challenge Christians to pray.

I said this in the video:

“There are signs of the times the Bible tells us to be looking for. And in fact, Jesus likened it to labor pains in a woman who is ready to give birth. The idea being, the closer they get together, the closer you are to the birth. And we see more signs—more things happening—that remind us that Christ is coming back again.”

I also talked about the words of Jesus in Matthew 24, “wars and rumors of wars,” and how some scholars believe that Russia is one of the nations mentioned in Ezekiel 38.

The content of that video would have been very familiar to all of you here at Tipping Point. But the video ended up reaching a much larger audience than I expected because a few news agencies picked it up. Almost all of them responded with scorn and incredulity. The video was cited by major outlets like The Washington Post, ABC News, The Boston Herald, The Times of Israel, The Jerusalem Times, and the Houston Chronicle.

The UK’s Daily Star called the video “bizarre,” scoffed at the idea of any “prophetic significance,” and identified me as a “radical Christian.” Rolling Stone referenced my message and said, “for millennia, end times Christians have tried to shoehorn current events into proof of Jesus’ imminent return.” It quoted a writer who speculated I was “hoping for nuclear holocaust” and thought I was excited about war. The magazine—a music and culture magazine, for the record—even said my beliefs about the end times weren’t “particularly sound” from a biblical perspective.

Scoffers in the Last Days

But enough about me. This isn’t a “woe is me” post. I’m fine. In fact, it doesn’t hurt my feelings at all for anyone to identify me as a “radical Christian.”

What I do want to point to is how the world reacted to my perspective—which is also the viewpoint shared by my pastor friends Jimmy Evans, Mark Hitchcock, and almost all of you who subscribe to Tipping Point. We take the Bible seriously. We believe Jesus will return someday. We believe that day is closer than ever before.

The apostle Peter warned us that there would be scoffers in the last days. There would be people ridiculing the Bible’s warnings about the end times and ridiculing those of us who take them seriously:

“Most importantly, I want to remind you that in the last days scoffers will come, mocking the truth and following their own desires.”—2 Peter 3:3, NLT

These are people who have closed their eyes and ears to God’s Word. They don’t understand and they never will understand.

But why wouldn’t a follower of Jesus Christ be searching diligently for signs of His return? Why wouldn’t a Christian who believes the Bible be taking note of world developments and comparing them with what Scripture says about the Second Coming? Didn’t Jesus promise that He would return?

Yes, He did. Over and over.

And didn’t the apostle Paul speak clearly about the Lord catching away His Church before the end of all things? Yes, as clearly as can be. What kind of mental gymnastics would it take to interpret 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 any other way?

Keeping Watch

What’s more, the New Testament positively rings with calls to “be ready,” to “wake up,” to “be alert,” and to “watch” for the Lord’s return. Jesus said it Himself:

“Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come…. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”—Matthew 24:42,44 

The Greek word used for “watch” in this passage means to keep awake and be vigilant.

How does that work? How does a person who believes these words of Jesus stay vigilant? How does a Christ-follower stay alert? By taking careful note of the signs of the times that Jesus Himself gave us. In Mark, Jesus told a group of skeptics, “You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times” (Matthew 16:3).

In other words, they were willingly blind to what was unfolding right before their eyes.

We live in a world right now where Christians are wrongly portrayed as wanting to see Armageddon happen. You know that’s not true, of course. We don’t long for suffering or violence. We aren’t hoping for conflict or catastrophe because we think it fulfills Bible prophecy.

In fact, we are told in Scripture to pray for peace and pursue peace. “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem” (Psalm 122:6). Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers” (Matthew 5:9).

My message to Christians last month—and all the weeks following, and for most of my career before that—was that we be wide-awake and alert to world events. Unfortunately, the world sees this as radical thinking or bizarre beliefs.

On Guard and Alert

I’m grateful for this community, because I know you are here because you are being obedient to Jesus:

“But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come.”—Mark 13:32-33

Bible prophecies are being fulfilled in our lifetime, but the world doesn’t see or understand this, so they scoff. Don’t be discouraged by the world. Don’t be surprised by the scoffers.

Instead, join me in praying for the vulnerable. Pray for peace. Pray for our leaders to have wisdom and for God to change the hearts of the wicked.

Then look up, and remember that God is in control.