The Church Is Now in a Season of Judgment
Foundational to the real prophetic gospel, especially as the return of the Lord draws near, is the calling out of God’s remnant people from evil wicked systems, so that they would not come under the judgment of God.
God doesn’t just judge individual people; He also judges systems and He will judge the false church systems of man. This is a principle of judgment and what I consider to be a plumb line, end times truth.
Jesus said in Matt. 24:12 that just before His return the spirit of this age, which is lawlessness, will cause the agape love of many to grow cold.
In the American/western context lawlessness is now expressed as “tolerance.” Many espouse to this tolerance gospel by suggesting that the true church is loveless and judgmental toward them, but the exact opposite is true. Purveyors of this false gospel and these religious systems have been blinded and deceived by the spirit of the world that touts the tolerance gospel that is void of all righteous judgment. Whenever you hear the word “tolerance” now, you can be sure that what follows is a sophisticated explanation of why the Bible no longer means what it says.
Please hear me: church systems that have been erected on the wrong foundation must, according to God’s laws, bear the fruit of the unbiblical seeds that have been planted within them. These are false systems that God will allow to continue throughout the church age, which are the tares that grow up with the wheat, which must reach maturity during the final harvest season when there will be a separation.
God is a God of both unity and division. It seems contradictory that Jesus prayed for believers to be united as one (John 17:20-22) while also stating that He came to bring division.
Truth and light separates and divides, but also creates unity. One day all that’s false will be separated from all that’s true. The tares will be separated from the wheat (Matt. 13:38-43). The bad fish will be separated from the good fish (Matt. 13:47-50). The goats will be separated from the sheep (Matt. 13:31-46). And the foolish virgins will be distinguished from the wise virgins (Matt. 25:1-13).
This separation, however, is not all relegated to the future, but it is a principle of judgment that has happened throughout the ages and will intensify as the coming of the Lord draws near. God shakes everything that can be shaken and removes it, so only that which cannot be shaken remains (Heb. 12:27). He does this even within the church.
Yes, included in this principle of judgment is our own Christian maturity and sanctification. God reveals what is false in us and removes it or prunes us (John 15:2), so that only the true and the holy remain. As an analogy, during the wheat harvest time in Israel the farmers would collect the harvest and first lay it out on a threshing floor where it was stomped on and crushed in order to for it to separate the inner grain from the outer husk or shell.
Then they would take the grain/wheat up on the side of a hill when the night winds were blowing and throw the harvested wheat into the air. The wind would then blow away the residue of the chaff that remained, so that the pure wheat could then be harvested and collected. God does that with us.
The Process of Divine Separation Today
I see a great process of this divine separation taking place right now in our day. There will be more intense times now in our personal lives, the church and the nations that will appear violent as God uses circumstances and situations to sort of crush us with godly pressure, and then He will toss us again and again into the wind of the Holy Spirit to separate us from what must be revealed and removed. Our repeated impacts against the pure truth of God’s Word will cause a breaking. It will appear as judgment, but we must remember that His purpose is not vindictive or punitive but redemptive.
God is preparing us for Himself so we can be a more effective vehicle of His love, truth, power, and mercy to the world. It is when the world witnesses the glory of God in the true church that they will have the greatest opportunity to repent and believe the gospel. But judgment must come before the glory, so that God’s people can stand in the glory. {eoa}
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Bert Farias’ books are forerunners to personal holiness, the move of God, and the return of the Lord. They also combat the departure from the faith and turning away from the truth we are seeing in this hour. Bert’s current passion is to promote a culture of the supernatural manifestations and ministries of the Holy Spirit in the church today and to pass it on to the next generation (Cleansing The Temple). His newest release, now available on Kindle and on paperback, The Supernatural Church of Love and Power, is a simple blueprint for what the Lord Jesus is doing in His church today. Other materials/resources are available on his website, Holy Fire Ministries. You can also follow him personally on YouTube (Holy Fire Ministries), Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
