The Final Hour

31 Dec

Children, it is the last hour;
and just as you heard that the antichrist was coming,
so now many antichrists have appeared.
Thus we know this is the last hour.
They went out from us, but they were not really of our number;
if they had been, they would have remained with us.
Their desertion shows that none of them was of our number.
But you have the anointing that comes from the Holy One,
and you all have knowledge.
I write to you not because you do not know the truth
but because you do, and because every lie is alien to the truth.  (1 Jn 2:18-21)

We come to the final hours of 2014.

I often wonder if John were alive today what he would write.  He would probably look at the things he wrote about two thousand years ago and end up saying that, compared to today, things were not so bad after all.  For, it seems, the world just gets worse day by day, year by year, generation by generation.

And that’s the problem.

Because we live in the midst of all the spiritual turmoil in this world, we often do not notice the subtle changes.  It is very much like the story of boiling frogs.  If we put frogs into boiling water, they would do everything they could to get out of it.  However, if we placed frogs into cool water and then heated the water up, they would not notice until it was too late and they were consumed by the heat of the boiling waters.

We will not notice the “heat” in today’s world if we accept the lies that the world speaks to us.  You know what they are.  The lies that tell us that we should do whatever we need to do to get ahead, even at the expense of other people.  The lies that tell us that it is all right to hurt other people as long as we make out okay.  The lies that we are first and that no one else matters.  The lies that we do not need God, but we can find everything we need right here.

Those lies are alien to the truth.

God speaks His truth many different ways.  He speaks through the beauty of nature that surrounds us.  He speaks through the voices of others in our lives.  He speaks through various experiences in which we find ourselves.

We need to learn to listen for His truth rather than to be swayed by the “truths” of the world.

Do not allow yourselves to be deceived today.  Ask the Lord to reveal His truth to you so that you may reject the lies of the world.

FAITH ACTION:  Do you best to review the past year in terms of your spiritual growth and make some resolutions on how you can become closer to the Lord in 2015.