Spiritual Inspiration
What Will the Last Days Look Like?
Before we can answer the question of whether we are in the Last Days, we need to take a look at what the Bible tells us about the Last Days.
"But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I should write to you. For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night. For when they say, “Peace and safety!” then sudden destruction comes upon them, as labor pains upon a pregnant woman. And they shall not escape. But you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this Day should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness." (1 Thessalonians 5:1-5) From this we learn that the end times will not come unexpectedly upon believers who are watching and waiting for them. However, they will come as a complete surprise to those "of the night," meaning non-believers and perhaps those believers who are not watching and waiting for Christ's return. The end times will begin in a time where "they"--meaning non-believers--will be saying "peace and safety." Therefore, we know it will begin at a time when things haven't gone to Hell yet--literally. There will be the widespread appearance of peace and safety. Whether this peace and safety is real or illusory is irrelevant; it will seem real enough to the majority of people. Then the end times will begin, with the Rapture of the Church followed an unknown period of time later by the beginning of the Tribulation when antichrist signs or confirms a peace covenant with Israel and the many.
Similarly, in Luke 17 Jesus tells us that the last days will be like the days of Noah and Lot. "And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed." (Luke 17:26-30) In other words, immediately prior to the Rapture of the Church, there will be a time of relative normalcy where people will be eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building, and marrying. It will be "business as usual" until the Rapture happens and all the sudden it is no longer business as usual but sudden destruction which overtakes them during the Tribulation period.
It is worth digging a bit deeper into Jesus' words that the end times will be like the days of Noah and Lot. What did the days of Noah and Lot look like? In Noah's case we have to go back to Genesis 6:1-13. "And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose. And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. There were giants [Nephilim] in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth."
So here we have a picture of what the days of Noah looked like, and boy is there a lot to unpack. The words translated "sons of God" are in the Hebrew bene ha elohim. This term is only ever used of a direct creation of God; in the Old Testament it is used clearly and exclusively to refer to angels. Although some scholars who are uncomfortable with the "angel view" of this passage have tried to make it say that the holy sons of Seth intermarried with the unholy daughters of Cain, there are too many problems with this view of the passage. Just to list a few, it assumes that all the sons of Seth were the good guys and all the daughters of Cain were the bad guys, religiously speaking. The text does not support this at all. Furthermore, it does not explain how a union between humans, no matter how holy or unholy, produced a race of giants--in the Hebrew Nephilim, meaning fallen ones, also translated as giants because the word in the Greek is gigantes--that were the mighty men. Nor does this explain why this union only produced men.
As is the case with the rest of this site, I choose to take the text seriously. The bene ha elohim were fallen angels who contrived to have sexual relations with whichever women they chose--notice from the text that the choice did not seem to be particularly consensual on the part of the women. This method of gene pool corruption was likely instituted by Satan in his attempts to ensure that there was no uncorrupted human line left for the prophesied Savior to descend from--see Genesis 3:15, "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”
The Nephilim were the mighty men of old, the men of renown, and according to the text they were exceedingly violent. These beings are immortalized to this day in mythology; Hercules is one such example of a mighty man, a demigod, half human and half divine. This corruption of the gene pool is the reason God sent the flood. We get the impression that this corruption was quite widespread by the time God took action; "all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth," and only Noah and his family, along with choice specimen of every other creature, were chosen by God to be saved. Noah was a just man and "perfect in his generations," meaning he had none of this corrupt fallen angel DNA.
So from this we gain a good idea of what Noah's day was like. The earth was exceedingly wicked and violent because of the Nephilim, the half-human half-angel offspring of fallen angels who polluted the gene pool with their DNA. Much, if not most, of humanity and other living creatures were corrupted by the genes of these fallen angels. It grew so bad that God sent a flood to wipe out all but nine human beings alive at that time--Enoch, who was "raptured" prior to the flood, and Noah and the seven members of his family.
Do we see something similar happening, or beginning to happen, today? In fact we do. Scientists have unlocked the mysteries of DNA and are actively working on how to "improve" our DNA to cure us of illness, disease, death, and other aspects of what makes us human. They are learning to combine the DNA of various animals. Do we really believe that somewhere, in some secret laboratories that the public doesn't know about, scientists aren't using current technology and knowledge to tamper with human DNA in order to make supersoldiers and superhumans? I believe that, after the Rapture of the Church, there will be breakthroughs in this arena that will lead to the Mark of the Beast. One aspect of the Mark, I believe, will be that it changes human DNA and splices in fallen angel DNA; that explains why those who take the Mark of the Beast cannot be saved, because they are no longer fully human, and Jesus' sacrificial death and resurrection was specifically to save humans.
Additionally, we can take a look at the transhumanist movement. This movement is tied together with a belief that once AI achieves the "singularity", or gains consciousness, rapid advances will be made that will allow humans to live indefinitely by combining humans and technology together.
As for the days of Lot, Lot is of Sodom and Gomorrah fame. He lived among them but was not corrupted by the evil of their society. We learn from 2 Peter that God, "turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)." (2 Peter 2:6-8) Lot is considered righteous by God, and that is why God delivered him from Sodom before destroying Sodom and Gomorrah.
What was so bad about Sodom and Gomorrah? The scriptures don't provide a full list of the crimes for which God judged Sodom and Gomorrah. However, from what the text does focus on, we understand that the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah that God most objected to was homosexuality--more specifically, the legitimization and widespread acceptance of homosexuality in that culture. The impending judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah is first revealed when God says to Abraham, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grave, I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry against it that has come to Me; and if not, I will know.” (Genesis 18:20-21) From this we learn that God considers their sin "very grave" and that by sending his angels into the city he will find out whether the reports are true or not. Of course, God in His omniscience already knows that they are true, but for the sake of fairness and so that we would have a record of it, he nevertheless sends two of his angels into the city to prove the truth of the reports. And the people of Sodom do indeed live down to expectations. The angels agreed to stay with Lot, and "before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both old and young, all the people from every quarter, surrounded the house. And they called to Lot and said to him, 'Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may know them carnally.'" The men of Sodom, not just some but ALL of them, came to Lot's house, surrounded it, and demanded that Lot bring them out so that they could have sex with them. This is what God knew would happen when He sent in His angels; the implication is that this widespread acceptance of homosexuality was the sin that caused the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Do we see parallels in our own society today? I think that we do. While the prevalence of homosexuality is not as widespread as it was in Sodom, where every single man wanted to have sex with the two angels, the acceptance of homosexuality as a lifestyle is becoming as widespread in our culture as it was in Sodom. Outside of the Church, few are opposed to homosexuality. Many nations have legitimized homosexual marriage through the legal system, which is certainly a barometer of acceptance; the only notes of protest seem to come from conservative Churches who take the Word of God seriously and understand that the widespread acceptance of homosexuality is a sign of a rotting society.
The story of Lot is not the only place in the Bible where homosexuality is portrayed as a grave sin. In fact, the Scriptures tell us that the acceptance of deviant sexual practices is a good measuring stick of a society's moral decay. This is a long passage from Romans 1:18-32, but worth reading: "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man—and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them." Doesn't this sound like a synopsis of our world today? This passage is one reason to believe we are rapidly approaching the End Times; it is reflective of much of the world today, and to paraphrase Billy Graham, if God doesn't judge us soon then he will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.
One of the great passages that tells us what to expect from the Last Days is Matthew 24, a private discourse Jesus gives to, we learn from Mark's account of the same conversation, four of His disciples; Peter, James, and John are consistently portrayed as being in the inner circle, and in this case Andrew joins them. They ask Jesus, privately--as opposed to his public version of this talk, which is recounted in Luke 21--about what He had told them, that the Temple would be totally destroyed.
“Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” Notice that even at this point in time, His disciples--who are very slow on the uptake in realizing that Jesus must suffer and die and then be raised in glory--are anticipating that the official coming of Jesus as Messiah will herald the end of the age. Even though they still expected Jesus to usher in a worldly kingdom while He walked the earth the first time, they understood enough to know that when Messiah came in His power and glory, everything would change.
It's telling that the first thing Jesus says in response to His disciples questions is, "Take heed that no man deceive you." From this we know that the Last Days will be characterized by lies and deception as a key feature. That is certainly true of our modern culture in ever new and inventive ways, with trust in the old media trending towards zero and "fake news" one of the bywords of the day. Few trust what they hear from their governments or from other institutions. With the rise of AI, you can't even trust pictures and videos to be true.
The next thing Jesus says is "you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are but the beginning of the birth pains." There are more wars going on right now than at any time since World War II. There are rumors of wars daily in the news, many of them centered around a tiny little nation called Israel. The Greek word translated "nation" is actually ethnos; it really means that ethnic group will rise against ethnic group. We see ethnic tensions rising throughout the world. In the West especially we see citizens and immigrants at odds; Israel and certain Arab groups are increasingly belligerent; Muslims have infiltrated countries throughout the European Union and are increasingly trying to dictate their views to non-Muslims in those countries;
The rise in the number of earthquakes is harder to pin down. According to the USGS, the commonly perceived rise in earthquakes is actually a result of better measuring devices and improved communications making information about earthquakes more widely available. As a result, this indicator is perhaps less reliable than others. As for famines, there is no doubt that famine is increasing.
“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold."
In many parts of the world, followers of Jesus are absolutely being delivered up to tribulation and put to death. In areas like China, Africa, and many Muslim nations, being a Christian results in persecution, incarceration, even death. In the Western world, we still have at least a semblance of religious freedom but it is quickly eroding in many western nations which have been infiltrated by large Muslim populations who are placing great pressure on the existing societal fabric of these nations. In America, we currently face mostly social and peer pressures as Christians, but that can certainly change as America continues its turn away from God and Christianity.
"But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.
“So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains...
For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be. And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short. Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand. So, if they say to you, ‘Look, he is in the wilderness,’ do not go out. If they say, ‘Look, he is in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather.
“Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
“From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see all these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates. Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.
“But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left. Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect."
"Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." (2 Peter 3:3-4)
"But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!" (2 Timothy 3:1-5)
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