The Impending Midnight Cry

By Befekadu Admassu

The world is in great turmoil. Nuclear cataclysm is a real and present danger and the talk of a third world war has become all too common even among the most influential personalities. Political instability is shaking the great nations that once claimed to be bastions of democracy and rule of law. Geopolitical rivalry among the superpowers is ripping apart the institutions that ensured relative peace and stability around the globe for the past several decades. Moral decline is destroying the nuclear family and the fabric of society, particularly in the once-Christian West, as more people abandon faith and traditional family values. Paradoxically we also live in the most technologically advanced age that humanity has ever seen. We have the highest level of material wealth, information and knowledge, governments, global and regional organizations, schools, universities and research centers, hospitals, doctors, and experts in every field of knowledge. We have by far the fastest, efficient, cost-effective and convenient means of communication, travel, production and distribution as well as health care and entertainment than even our most recent progenitors. And yet we are becoming more cruel to each other. Our leaders want to take us somewhere but they themselves do not know the destination. There appears to be a broad realization that the world is not going in the right direction. Many are the calls for change of course and diverse the propositions for direction. Are we humans left to our own devices to extricate ourselves from the quagmire into which we have fallen? Are we condemned to endless failure? Is there a hope for us, as individuals, families, communities, and nations? The Jewish prophets of old who penned the books of the Bible not only foresaw the storms that would billow throughout the many millennia that followed their times but also assured us of a beautiful and lasting final outcome. Their predictions have proved true time and again. The most intriguing promise of the prophets was the coming of the Messiah who will rule the world with truth and righteousness. The Gospels tell us an even more audacious story, that the predictions of the prophets actually came true in the birth of Jesus Christ two thousand years ago. The writers of the New Testament have also penned for us the promises of Jesus of Nazareth, the only Son of God, to come back at the end of the age to establish God's kingdom. Could the turmoil we see today be the very birth pangs that will finally usher in the promised kingdom of God?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 17, 2019
• ISBN: 9781098002459

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The

IMPENDING

MIDNIGHT CRY

The Imperative to Prepare the Church for the Imminent Return of Her Bridegroom

Befekadu Admassu

PhD, DBA, DBS

ISBN 978-1-0980-0244-2 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-0980-0245-9 (digital)

Copyright © 2019 by Befekadu Admassu

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Preface

Introduction: A Brief Résumé of the World in Our Days

The Roots of Humanity’s and Nature’s Predicaments Go as Far Back as Eden

Facts Are Taking Over Some of Our Theology

The World Is Not Getting Progressively Better before Christ’s Return, and the Bible Does Not Teach That Either

The Threat to Humanity’s Existence Foretold in the Bible Is Imminent

Why Does the Christian World Still Find Itselfat the Center of Intractable Conflictsand Ever-Worsening Moral Decay?

Where Is the Influence of the Light of the World and Salt of the Earth—the Church?

Building the Great Tower of Babel through War and Destruction

Sowing Wind and Reaping the Whirlwind

Economic Chaos

Terrorism and the Restive Middle East

Why Is the Christian West So Reticent about the Plight of Millions of Christians?

Spiritual and Moral Wickedness in High Places

Great Babylon Rising

A Rising Global Awareness of Humanity’s Predicaments

Be Fruitful and Multiply, Fill the Earth and Subdue It

The Blessing Still Overrides the Enemy’s Plans

Knowledge Shall Multiply: The Mystery and Paradox of Scientific and Technological Advancements

The Gospel of the Kingdom Reaching All the Nations

Take Heed that No One Deceives You

The Beginning of Sorrows: Signs in the Heavens and upon the Earth

Distress of Nations

Economic Turmoil

Moral Decline and Social Chaos

Natural and Man-Made Disasters

The Looming Great Delusion: Days of Noah Part 2

Where Is the Church?

As Israel Was the Church Has Become

The Word of God Superseded by the Doctrines of Men

Christ Outside the Church Door

Compromising with the World: The Demonic Trap of Political Correctness

The Persecuted Bride

Challenges and the Opportunities

The Impending Midnight Cry: Time to Fill the Lamps Running Out

Bible Prophecy Being Fulfilled Right in Front of Our Eyes: Time to Proclaim the Gospel

When These Things Begin to Happen, Lift Up Your Heads

Bibliography

To my dear wife Simegn T. Mengesha who stood by my side during some of my darkest days;

To my dear children Shilmat, Joel, Sami, Selam, Saron, Yosef, and Goitom who have been constant sources of joy and encouragement;

To all my dear relatives and Christian friends who did not relent in lending me their encouragement in my walk with the Lord Jesus Christ.

In Christ’s love.

Preface

The world is in turmoil. Unprecedented political turmoil within and between the great nations of the world, a re-invigorated arms race and the menacing threat of a third world war which could inevitably lead to a nuclear cataclysm, trade wars, economic uncertainty, financial instability, social tensions, ecological crises, and an ever-accelerating downward spiral of moral decadence threaten to break the very essence of human civilization. People everywhere wonder what will happen next. Cyberspace is awash with all sorts of doomsday predictions. There are also many soothsayers and self-proclaimed experts on global affairs who divine that a better world is just around the corner if only we take this or that action, change this or that political system, sit down and negotiate or remove everything that divides us and just seek global unity and a one-world government. It was only less than three decades ago that the great powers declared an end to the Cold War era, proclaimed a future of global unity, prosperity, and democracy. They declared that the common enemies facing the world were extremism and terrorism, poverty, and climate change. This was also not the last time that great powers and leaders declared an end to trouble for humanity and the beginning of a brighter future. What is really going on in the world? Where is humanity headed? Are we humans left to our own devices, or is a supernatural power beyond us guiding or misguiding our affairs to a certain end? These are questions of cosmic proportion that perhaps no mortal human could dare propose answers for. We all, however unbeknownst to us, attempt to make one summary or another and make this or that suggestion to enlighten ourselves and others if not to propose solutions.

There is a broad consensus among many Bible-believing Christians, and most particularly prophecy students and researchers, that the second coming of the Jesus Christ is approaching fast. One of the reasons underlying this consensus is the convergence of many Bible prophecy fulfilling events, developments, and trends. This book will seek to briefly examine the spiritual, political, geopolitical, social, and economic states of the world in light of key Bible prophecies relating to the second coming of Christ to determine if the unprecedented convergence of prophetic events and signs being witnessed today warrants this consensus. It also attempts to assess the Church’s spiritual condition in light of the holy Scriptures, its weaknesses in accurately perceiving and grasping the eternal significance of major spiritual and temporal developments in light of Bible truth, and the Church’s preparedness to effectively instruct and lead believers in these perilous times, its readiness to proclaim the Gospel to the lost world one more time, unequivocally demonstrate the Gospel’s indispensability to address the root causes of the problems facing humanity and, guide people to the ultimate source of life, peace and true freedom—Jesus Christ.

The book will also attempt to survey the reemergence in our time of ancient and deadly spiritual deceptions that are resurfacing under new cloaks, the falling away of many believers and churches from the truth, the rise of bold anti-Christian movements in the governments and institutions of nations that once were bastions of Christianity, the rise of massive extra-national technocratic institutions that promote the establishment of a supposedly secular one-world government system by spreading precepts, principles, and man-made laws that not-so-subtly seek to replace and destroy not only Biblical Christianity but every form of morality that makes us humans. Under the disguise of progressive ideologies that purport to care about the poor and the disaffected, such institutions promote precepts that outwardly appear human ingenuity aimed at solving the problems facing humanity but, inadvertently or by design, are increasingly inspired by concepts that openly contradict, destroy, and seek to replace the fundamental precepts and moral laws given by the Creator. These entities work relentlessly to influence and, where possible, indirectly control political power at the national, regional, and global level; dominate the discourse in academic and social institutions, popular media outlets, the entertainment industry, and even religious organizations. They also encourage and facilitate the concentration of economic, financial, and political power in the hands of a very small minority of global elites. The book will also briefly attempt to highlight the impending and inevitable worldwide economic and financial collapse owing to unsustainably high levels of private and national debt as well as the massive geo-political tensions that are boiling between the most powerful nuclear powers of the world, the spread of terrorism, natural and man-made disasters.

There are unmistakable signs of a fast-growing apocalyptic spiritual delusion. A good part of the Christian church appears to be in a state of spiritual torpor while the waking church around the world faces massive challenges ranging from infiltration by false teachers to outright persecution even as it contends to take advantage of new opportunities to take the Gospel to those who have not heard it. There is no doubt that the true church of Christ will triumph in the end. The hour of the impending biblical midnight cry is fast approaching. The five wise virgins who have their lamps full of the divine oil should not be discouraged by the reemergence of the days of Noah and Lot. The foolish virgins on the other hand should rush, while there is still time, to get oil in their lamps before the bridegroom arrives and the door of opportunity to repent and return to the Savior is shut for eternity. As he has always done, God, the Creator and sustainer of the universe who manifested himself in God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, is awaiting each one of us to weigh our ways, determine where we stand at this hour and call upon him with all sincerity and fervor so that we may be counted worthy to stand before the Judge of all the earth, Jesus Christ, at his glorious second coming. As the writer of the small book of Jude concluded at the end of his message, God is able to keep all those who genuinely seek him from stumbling and present them faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy.

Chapter 1

Introduction:

A Brief Résumé of the World in Our Days

And there will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars and on the earth distress of nations with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them from fear and expectation of those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. (Jesus Christ, circa 30 AD¹)

For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now. Not only that, but we also who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body. For we were saved in this hope…(Apostle Paul, circa 56–57 AD²)

The Roots of Humanity’s and Nature’s Predicaments Go as Far Back as Eden

God has spoken and his word is being fulfilled in every minute fraction of time, space, and all other dimensions, such as the supernatural realm that we humans in general have difficulty to perceive. God’s word is spoken in the Spirit but fulfilled both in the spiritual and material world. Man’s privilege and destiny from the beginning of creation was to be the crown jewel of God’s creation and a coworker with God in an environment of innocence and perfect bliss. By coming short of the glory of God, we suspended this privilege and the blessings. Some elements of the authority and power given to Adam to govern his own affairs and the rest of God’s creation were suspended following the rebellion in the Garden of Eden. The history of man has since become inseparably linked with the mischiefs and vicious acts of a perfidious adversary who seeks to thwart God’s plan and destroy man. This enemy, known in the Bible by many names including Satan, the devil, the serpent, the dragon, and the deceiver, has since been lurking behind every major failure of humanity to abide by God’s protective love and guidance. Every aspect of human life on this earth bears the scars of sin.

Death is not the only consequence of sin. Poverty, sickness and disease, hunger, strife, hatred, and greed are all fruits of man’s broken relationship with his Maker. These bitter fruits of sin make the present state of humanity unsustainable. Even those who are, or assumed to be, in a better state compared to others—such as the super-rich, famous, and powerful—do not, and cannot, have the perfect fulfillment of life that was possible in the state of perfect innocence in the Garden of Eden. It is no wonder then that the entire human race lives in groaning and longing. This groaning and longing takes on different forms and seeks various outlets to expresses itself in excessive desire for social acceptance, fulfilling the appetites of the body, quest for more knowledge, power, fame and money, leisure, intoxication with substances, and even seeking spiritual fulfillment from the forces of darkness. Many may claim that they are perfectly satisfied in life. Deep in everyone’s heart, however, lingers a great question to be answered, a puzzle to be solved, and a thirst to be quenched. There is one distinct difference between the Bible believing Christian and others—the former, being born of God’s Spirit through Christ, has a sure hope of the final redemption that will take place with the glorious return of Christ while the latter, despite his favorable state in this life, is like a lost ship floating on the high seas without a map of his origin and destination or a compass.

Facts Are Taking Over Some of Our Theology

Eschatology, the theology of last things, is undoubtedly one of the most complex and potentially divisive parts of Christian theology. At the same time, however, it is not a subject that we can afford to set aside as it deals with the very essence of the hope and future of the believer and nonbeliever alike. It can be safely claimed that there has never been a time in human history when there was so much information, knowledge, technology and communication among individuals, nations, groups, and peoples around the planet. There has never been a time similar to ours when so many people traveled to so many places in the world at such high speeds and comfort, met so many other people and experienced so many new things in a lifetime. And yet, paradoxically, it also appears that humanity has never had as many unanswered questions, and as many unmet needs as we have today.

Ordinary Christians and leaders alike are quick to point out the failures of the biblical people of Israel in recognizing God’s times of favor, mercy, and grace and, their refusal to obey God. Nearly two millennia later, however, a good part of the Christian Church also appears to have fallen into the same errors. We, especially those of us who live in the relatively calm and prosperous nations of the West, have failed to accurately perceive the times in which we live—at least until very recently. While it is true that all Christians who have received Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, are saved by the grace of God and destined to inherit God’s kingdom, it is high time that we, Christians, also examined the source of our collective spiritual lethargy and rise up to shine the Gospel truth once more, in deeds and words, so that the world may see the love of God before heaven’s trumpets sound and Jesus Christ returns to judge the world. It is high time that ordinary believers and leaders alike conscientiously and fervently sought to genuinely live and preach the Gospel truth we believe. It is also rather urgent that we re-examine some of the theological frameworks that hinder us from accurately perceiving signs of the times in which we live in light of Bible truth.

The World Is Not Getting Progressively Better before Christ’s Return, and the Bible Does Not Teach That Either

It is truly perplexing, for anyone who cares to ask the question, to note that nations where Christianity was once the dominant faith are not faring any better in many respects when compared to those who espouse non-Christian belief systems or even atheist ideologies. On our first family holiday trip to a popular tourist destination in Asia, my late wife asked me a question that I could not answer to her satisfaction. Although she is now with the Savior where I believe she has all the answers, her question still reverberates in my mind more than nine years later. The trip was her first to that destination where most of the population does not subscribe to any one of the major monotheistic faiths and idols are literally worshipped at every corner of every major city or village—both in the public square and in private dwellings. Even though she was unsettled as to how people in the twentieth century can worship lifeless idols made by human hands, it was easier for her to come to terms with this fact than to accept the intractable wars, fratricide, and endless bloodshed that so-called Christian nations inflicted on each other and non-Christians alike. She had serious difficulty to reconcile the claims of Christian nations with their inability to fare better than pagans, godless people and their civilizations. What intrigued her most at the time was the fact that the nations that worship idols were living in relative peace and harmony even as the most powerful Christian-dominated nations were engaged in endless conflicts and wars in South Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East, Central and South America as well as some parts of Africa. Her question also related to the centuries of wars within Europe, the First and Second World Wars, and the continued bloodshed even after the end of the Cold War was declared at the beginning of the 1990s. None of my attempts to provide rational explanations could persuade her to swallow the failure of Christian nations to ensure peace, security, and harmony even among themselves. In the months and years that followed her departure from this world to the presence of her Savior, I continued to deeply reflect on her questions and sought to find answers from every source I could reach. It is these questions, and many of my own that propelled me to the decision to study the Bible all over again after three and a half decades of believing that I was a Christian who understood the workings of this world and had at least a glimpse of the Kingdom of God that I believed would be revealed in the end of days.

The desire to know the way out of the current quagmire that entraps humanity is not limited to only Christians. The effort to provide comfort and explanations is also not limited to only Christian theology or even the broader set of religious belief systems in general. The search for the meaning of life, the purpose of human existence, and the human quest for a glimpse into the future is not a subject that is exclusively left to the domains of religion and spirituality. This is a matter that mesmerizes philosophers, challenges historians, petrifies mathematicians, political and military leaders, and people from many other walks of life since ancient times.

The multiplication of knowledge, travel, information and technology in the last days, foretold in the Bible millennia ago, is a vivid fact today. These developments have also emboldened many to imagine that humanity has reached a stage where it no more needs any hope for salvation from a source outside of itself. Some do differ and believe that perhaps we need help from outside—even from outside our dimension of existence—citing as an example what they claim to be advanced intelligences that have been visiting planet Earth from other solar systems or galaxies. Others go even further to suggest that the human race was created by superior extraterrestrial entities in the first place and now it requires their help in order to extricate itself from its destructive tendencies and make a transition to a better future. Others believe that man will shortly take its destiny into its own hands and create a better trans-human civilization where man will merge with the rest of nature and with its own handiwork—technology.

An obvious question that one would raise with people who promote the concept of interstellar or intergalactic beings as the creators of life on earth would be how can they, people who trust nothing else but only evidence-based science, come to accept such preposterous propositions as the existence of extraterrestrial beings superior to man. There are of course many in their ranks who would rush to respond and provide supposedly scientific evidence in the form of data, however subjective or flimsy, gleaned from supposedly scientific projects, ancient folklore, and mythology to back up their propositions. The truth in fact is that most such groups, while publicly claiming that their positions are solely based on science, they actually work their public positions backward from special and esoteric knowledge that has supposedly been revealed to them by the powers (or gods) they follow in secret. It may be surprising to many to assert that the Bible clearly and repeatedly refers to those powers or entities as malevolent and deceptive entities that are closely linked with powers of darkness—i.e. demonic spirits that masquerade as extraterrestrial or even extragalactic intelligences.

The Threat to Humanity’s Existence Foretold in the Bible Is Imminent

There are now in the world a large number of esoteric, occultic, and trans-humanist movements whose proponents openly declare that humanity has commenced the process of steering his own evolution into a better existence without any intervention or help from God. Scholars, experts, and scientists of every size and shape have long rejected, to one degree or another, the Bible’s truth regarding creation and God’s authority and power to sustain, control, and steer creation to a meaningful destiny. Many such individuals and groups are now openly asserting that there is no room for the divine, not at least the God of the Bible, in the scientific model. They further assert that what remains for humanity is to complete its self-discovery at all levels—especially the workings of the human brain, the mind, identity and the rationale behind morality, emotions, and human behavior. Massive data gathering and computing systems have been designed and deployed to build data and knowledge bases which could be used to train and perfect artificial intelligence systems that will overtake and potentially replace human intelligence in many areas of life. These groups claim that once we fully know the avenues of evolution that brought humanity and nature to its current state, we will be able to choose our own course, determine the trajectory, speed, and content of our future evolution, and determine our destiny at all levels—biological, emotional and even spiritual. Such people have no qualms about playing God or stating that the value of the human being lies primarily only in its intelligence and the biological, chemical, and mechanical processes that support and sustain that intelligence. For many a trans-humanist, human intelligence is not up to par to deal with the problems facing humanity and nature—thus the need to steer our own evolution by upgrading ourselves with modern technology—supposedly the works of our own hands.

The following excerpts taken from a 2005 book entitled The Singularity Is Near, written by trans-humanist, famed inventor, author, entrepreneur, futurist, and Google’s director of engineering Ray Kurzweil, are very clear on the views, plans, and activities of some of the most influential people and corporations of our day. This is not an isolated view of a shady nerd in a dark corner of the world. Such are the people that are frantically working to control who we are, what we should know and do, who we should be tomorrow under the disguise of providing us with useful and supportive technologies to improve the quality of our lives. Interestingly, this is not the only or the first ungodly plan that depraved humanity, has attempted in rebellion against God. We are only coming back to the days of Noah or Babylon 2.0. The following is an excerpt from Kurzweil’s book:

Although impressive in many respects, the brain suffers from severe limitations. We use its massive parallelism (one hundred trillion interneuronal connections operating simultaneously) to quickly recognize subtle patterns. But our thinking is extremely slow: the basic neural transactions are several million times slower than contemporary electronic circuits. That makes our physiological bandwidth for processing new information extremely limited compared to the exponential growth of the overall human knowledge base…

The singularity will allow us to transcend these limitations of our biological bodies and brains. We will gain power over our fates. Our morality will be in our own hands. We will be able to live as long as we want (a subtly different statement from saying we will live forever). We will fully understand human thinking and will vastly extend and expand its reach. By the end of this century, the nonbiological portion of our intelligence will be trillions of trillions times more powerful than unaided human intelligence.

We are now in the early stages of this transition. The acceleration of paradigm shift (the rate at which we change fundamental technical approaches) as well as the exponential growth of the capacity of information technology are both beginning to reach the knee of the curve… Shortly after this stage, the trend quickly becomes explosive. Before the middle of this century, the growth rates of our technology—which will be indistinguishable from ourselves—will be so steep as to appear essentially vertically…

The singularity will represent the culmination of the merger of our biological thinking and existence with our technology, resulting in a world that is still human but that transcends our biological roots. There will be no distinction, post-Singularity, between human and machine or between physical and virtual reality. If you wonder what will remain unequivocally human in such a world, it’s simply this quality: ours is