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###### Times of Great Affliction

{Since the Heavenly Trade Is the Best Trade…

Exhortation to Good Traders in Christianity

Advice: Lay In for Bad Times

Times of Great Affliction}

Times of great affliction and distressing calamities are spending times and will test your store of grace and your strength to bear it and get through it. And such you may live to see. The cross is the usual way to the crown, and affliction is the lot of those who desire to live godly lives in Christ Jesus. “After they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying, ‘Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God’” (Acts 14:21–22 NASB). “The refining pot is for silver and the furnace for gold, But the Lord tests hearts” (Proverbs 17:3 NASB). And the fan is for the wheat. The condition of believers in this world cannot long bear prosperity without loss to their spiritual part. Christians under settled comforts in this world are like standing pools that soon gather mud, and as it is said of Moab, so it is with the people of God: “Moab has been at ease from his youth; He has settled on his dregs, And has not been emptied from vessel to vessel, Nor has he gone into captivity. Therefore his taste remained in him, And his scent has not changed” (Jeremiah 48:11 NKJV). Dr. Harris said, “The sweetest nights that Jacob ever spent were in the field, and so with Peter in prison. And David had those large affections to rise at midnight, and God’s Word was sweet to him when his trouble was bitter.” But by afflictions, the Lord refines His people from their dross. Mr. Bradford said, “Though the wisdom of the world thinks of the Cross according to human senses and therefore flees from it as from a most great ignominy and shame, yet God’s scholars have learned to think otherwise of the Cross, as the factory where God makes His children like Christ, His Son. The Cross is the furnace that refines God’s gold, the highway to Heaven, the suit and uniform of God’s servants, and the earnest and beginning of all consolation and glory.” If you want to be Christ’s disciple, you must expect tribulation. If need be, you will be in heaviness for a season. God’s fire is in Zion and His furnace is in Jerusalem. Prepare for afflictions, by which God prepares His people for Himself. Bernard said, “He is not fit for the reward in glory who is not ready to ascend the gibbet [gallows] as the way to it.” We have fallen on the last times,1532 which are times of abounding iniquity and sinning (Matthew 24:12),1533 and therefore likely to be suffering times, called perilous times and cruel times (2 Timothy 3:1).1534 Beza renders it “troublesome times,” Tremelius, “hard times.” The word is χαλεποί and it comes from χαλεπός,1535 to bring damage or to overturn. They will be overturning times, times of destruction, as Christ prophesies of them: “Therefore when you see the abomination of desolation which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand)” (Matthew 24:15 NASB). “Because these are days of vengeance, so that all things which are written will be fulfilled” (Luke 21:22 NASB). “For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will” (Matthew 24:21 NASB). It is called the great and terrible day of the Lord, when the sun will be turned into darkness and the moon into blood. “The sun will be turned into darkness And the moon into blood Before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes” (Joel 2:31 NASB). Cocceius thinks this time falls under the sixth seal (Revelation 6:12),1536 under which it is said, “I said to him, ‘My lord, you know.’ And he said to me, ‘These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb’” (Revelation 7:14 NASB). I rather think that the sixth seal reckons with the enemies of God’s people and brings redemption to the saints under great tribulation. Thus that which we may clearly gather is that those last times will be times of sore calamities, both personal and public, to nations and to the Church of God. And what portion of those amazing troubles may fall on the people of this age we do not know. But this is certain: God seems to give His call from Heaven, as well as out of His sanctuary, to prepare to meet with Him (Amos 4:12),1537 to gird up the loins of our minds (1 Peter 1:13),1538 to keep our garments on (Revelation 16:15),1539 to have our vessels filled with oil, our lamps burning, count on sitting up at midnight, and be as people who look for the coming of their Lord (Luke 12:35–36; Matthew 25:6).1540 “But stay awake at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are going to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man” (Luke 21:36 ESV).

1532There exists considerable confusion as to what Scripture means by last times. Much of this is due to dispensationalism, now discredited due to unfulfilled predictions, and an erroneous way of interpreting Scripture. The last times or last days is simply all the time between Christ’s ascension to Heaven and His second coming. Throughout history, many Christians, including some of the most learned and godly, have interpreted events of their own times as fulfilling specific biblical prophecies actually related to either the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD or times near to the second coming. These include John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards, and many other Reformers and Puritans. So Ashwood is correct about his living in the last times, but for the wrong reasons, and wrong in good company. A careful reading of 2 Timothy 3:1, below, will show that subsets of the last times, in which we are living, will be times of difficulty. Clearly also, times of difficulty depend on geography, as well as time.

1533“Because lawlessness is increased, most people’s love will grow cold” (Matthew 24:12 NASB).

1534“But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty” (2 Timothy 3:1 ESV).

1535[khal-ep-os], meaning hard, harsh, difficult, painful, etc.

1536“I looked when He broke the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth made of hair, and the whole moon became like blood” (Revelation 6:12 NASB).

1537“Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel; Because I will do this to you, Prepare to meet your God, O Israel!” (Amos 4:12 NKJV).

1538“Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:13 NASB).

1539“Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who stays awake and keeps his clothes, so that he will not walk about naked and men will not see his shame” (Revelation 16:15 NASB).

1540“Be dressed in readiness, and keep your lamps lit. Be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast, so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks” (Luke 12:35–36 NASB). “But at midnight there was a shout, ‘Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him’” (Matthew 25:6 NASB).

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