The New Age Movement has become a powerful force in the devil’s strategy to blind the world to the gospel of Jesus Christ. One reason why this movement has been so effective is because many New Age teachings closely mirror the great truths of the gospel, but then carry them to conclusions that are in conflict with the most central of all Christian truths—the cross. Because of the seriousness of this deception, it is understandable that the church has developed a knee-jerk reaction to the very words “new age.” Even so, the way we combat darkness is not to run from it, but to take our stand on the truth, and push it back.
Light is more powerful than darkness. When we open our shades at night, darkness does not come into our rooms, but rather the light shines out into the darkness. We need not fear darkness if we know the Light, Jesus. Neither can we allow the enemy to steal our words, our practices, or our teachings. The very words “new age” do not belong to the devil, but to the Lord, and we must take them back. Much of the success of The New Age Movement has come by stealing from the gospel the high ground of hope for the future. This is the church’s special domain, and we must refuse to surrender a single acre of it to the enemies of the cross.
It is a fundamental truth of the gospel that there is a new age coming. It is an age of peace, righteousness and justice that will prevail over the whole earth. It is the age in which Jesus Christ will rule as the Prince of Peace, the King of Kings, and the Righteous Judge. This is the true message of the new age to come that the enemy is trying to subvert through the New Age Movement. Almost every aspect of New Age teachings is a counterfeit of the true hope of the gospel. However, just as we do not quit using real currency because someone has made counterfeit currency, we must not abandon a single truth of the coming kingdom of God. If there is counterfeit money circulating, we must become more familiar with what is real so that we will be able to recognize the false. We must do the same with the essential truths of the kingdom that the enemy is trying to steal. He would not be after these truths if they were not important.
One primary way that the New Age Movement has been able to steal the crucial high ground of hope for the future is through the church’s tendency to overfocus on the end of the age. This is not just the end; it is the beginning of a new age in which Christ will rule over the earth! For the church to reclaim the high ground of hope for the future, we must not continue to over-focus on the end, but begin to proclaim the beginning, the coming of the kingdom. Hope for the future is central to the power of the gospel. The age that is coming belongs to the Lord, and the message of the new age belongs to Him.
When the Lord came to earth the first time, He came to purchase our redemption with His own blood. As Psalm 24:1 declares, “The earth is the LORD’S, and all it contains, the world, and those who dwell in it.” The price for the entire earth, and all of its inhabitants, was fully paid at the cross. After His resurrection, Jesus could have destroyed the devil and taken His rightful domain over the earth right then. Instead it was the Father’s plan that a people would first be redeemed from the earth to become joint heirs with the Son of God, and they will then rule with Him in the age to come. The Scriptures testify that when His bride is ready, the Lord will return to redeem the earth from all consequences of the fall. Peter referred to this as the “restoration of all things” (Acts 3:21), and this is why all of creation is groaning and travailing (Romans 8:19-22).
The enemy has been trying to preempt this powerful message of hope which the church is called to proclaim. Our message is not one of doom, but of a glorious future as Jesus takes His dominion over the world. Great troubles are coming at the end of the age, but not for those who know the Lord and have built their lives upon His kingdom and His ways. For those who are obedient to the Lord, even the troubles that are prophesied at the end will be a time of great glory. The Scriptures are clear that the end of this age will be accompanied by a time of trouble such as the world has never experienced before. These are biblical prophecies which cannot be changed. We must teach them if we are going to present the whole truth. Even so, the Scriptures are also clear that even the time of greatest darkness will be one of glory for the Lord’s people, as we see in Isaiah 60:1-5:
Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.
For behold, darkness will cover the earth, and deep darkness the peoples; but the LORD will rise upon you, and His glory will appear upon you. And nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising. Lift up your eyes round about, and see; they all gather together, they come to you. Your sons will come from afar, and your daughters will be carried in the arms.
Then you will see and be radiant, and your heart will thrill and rejoice; because the abundance of the sea will be turned to you, the wealth of the nations will come to you.
At the very time that darkness is covering the earth and deep darkness the people, the glory of the Lord will arise. This will cause the nations to turn to the Lord’s people with their abundance. In the end, the church will become all she has been called to be—the pure, spotless bride of Christ. Then her light will be even more brilliant against the backdrop of the darkness that will cover the earth.
The Gospel of Hope
In a recent prophetic experience, I found myself in the radar room of a warship, and the Lord was standing right next to me. As I looked at the radar screen, a single, small blip appeared. It was straight ahead and getting closer. Instinctively, I ordered the ship to turn to the right, but the blip stayed right in front of us and kept getting closer. I then ordered the ship to turn to the left. The blip still appeared directly in front of us, and was drawing closer. Finally, I braced for the impact. Nothing happened. There was not even a jolt, and the blip was gone. I asked the Lord what this little blip had been. He said that it was the great time of trouble. It is coming, and there is nothing we can do to avoid it. However, it is only a little blip on the screen of all that He is about to do, and as long as we stand with Him we will not even feel it. I was astonished, but I know this is true.
Against eternity, the entire great tribulation is but a tiny blip on the screen of all that God is doing. Weighed against the awesome power of our God, the great time of trouble is not enough to even register on the scale. Why do these consume so much of our attention? We do need to understand coming troubles and be prepared for them, but by no means should the coming troubles dominate our attention or our message. Our preparation for coming troubles is simple—we are to stand with Jesus. There may be some practical things we can do, but if we are abiding in Him, we will have the wisdom and understanding we need, when we need it. In order to abide in Him, we must prepare for any future troubles in faith, not in fear. No other religion or philosophy in the world has a hope that can compare to the hope we have been given for the age to come. As I prayed for the wisdom to build our Moravian Falls community, the Lord gave me three basic instructions. He said that He had designed the land for us, so we needed to build structures that would fit into the landscape, and “not offend the land.” He also said we needed to consider our neighbors, because love does no harm to a neighbor. The Lord then said that what we build will need to last for a thousand years! He said that we were to build with future generations in mind because He was returning to reign over the earth, and we needed to build for the age to come, not the one that is coming to an end.
We have received detailed plans in a number of dreams that will enable us to prepare for very specific problems coming to our region. One thing we are not to do is hoard. Everything we do we are to do with our neighbors in mind. We are not building a survival community, but a mission base. If we have a storehouse, it is so we can help as many people as possible through future difficulties, whether it is the great tribulation or not. How could Christians hoard anything if their neighbors were starving? We are seeking the Lord for a very specific understanding of the coming troubles, but we are doing this out of love, not fear.
Even so, we know that the Lord is about to judge the earth. As Paul wrote, “Behold then the kindness and the severity of God” (Romans 11:22). God is both severe and merciful, and His judgment will be both severe and merciful. It will be severe to those who resist Him and merciful to those who seek Him. He is a righteous judge, and we can always depend on His fairness. All His ways are perfect, and even His judgments are for redemptive purposes, as we read in the following Scriptures:
But the LORD abides forever; He has established His throne for judgment, And He will judge the world in righteousness; He will execute judgment for the peoples with equity.
The LORD also will be a stronghold for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble,
And those who know Thy name will put their trust in Thee; for Thou, O LORD, hast not forsaken those who seek Thee (Psalm 9:7-10).
Say among the nations, “The LORD reigns; indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved; He will judge the peoples with equity.” Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; let the sea roar, and all it contains;
Let the field exult, and all that is in it. Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy
Before the LORD, for He is coming; for He is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness, and the peoples in His faithfulness (Psalm 96:10-13).
At night my soul longs for Thee, indeed, my spirit within me seeks Thee diligently; for when the earth experiences Thy judgments the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness (Isaiah 26:9).
The judgments of God are to be sought, not resisted. His judgments are always righteous, and always exactly what we need. Many have a distorted view of His judgment, automatically assuming that it means destruction. God’s judgments should never be feared by the godly, but they should be feared by the ungodly. If we are living in obedience, we do not need to fear even the greatest times of trouble that will come upon the earth. The Glorious Hope
The message that the church has been entrusted with is a far more glorious hope than any utopia or Age of Aquarius that the humanists or spiritualists have been able to come up with. Our message is the kingdom of God. Like every great biblical truth that is the foundation of our trust in God, this one has come under a major assault of the enemy. His diabolical strategy has been to blur the truth, weaken our faith, and cloud the message. The Lord is about to make the truth clear, strengthen our faith, and release the true gospel of the kingdom which will have power to dispel even the enemy’s thickest clouds of darkness.
The message Jesus preached was not the gospel of salvation, although that was contained in His message. Neither was His message about the church. In all of His messages He only made a few brief references to the church. His message was the kingdom, and this is the message we have been given to preach. This does not belittle the importance of our salvation, nor negate the high place of the church in His plan. However, the message of the kingdom is bigger than these. Great truths are included in the message of the kingdom, but they are never intended to eclipse it.
The message of the kingdom is essentially one basic, but all encompassing truth—Jesus is the King! He reigns, and His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom. When He returns to set up His kingdom on the earth, He will not just do away with war: He will bring the whole creation into such harmony that the lion will lie down with the lamb, and children will be able to safely play with cobras. No man or beast will do harm to another in the kingdom. Not only will sickness and disease be removed from the earth, but even death will have been abolished. The nations will drink from the River of Life, and eat the fruit of the Tree of Life.
The following are just a few of the Scriptures that reveal the nature of His coming kingdom:
For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; and the government will rest on His shoulders; and His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.
There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this (Isaiah 9:6-7).
Then a shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse, and a branch from his roots will bear fruit.
And the Spirit of the LORD will rest on Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD.
And He will delight in the fear of the LORD, and He will not judge by what His eyes see, nor make a decision by what His ears hear;
But with righteousness He will judge the poor, and decide with fairness for the afflicted of the earth; and He will strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips He will slay the wicked.
Also righteousness will be the belt about His loins, and faithfulness the belt about His waist.
And the wolf will dwell with the lamb, and the leopard will lie down with the kid, and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little boy will lead them.
Also the cow and the bear will graze; their young will lie down together; and the lion will eat straw like the ox.
And the nursing child will play by the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child will put his hand on the viper’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy in all My holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.
Then it will come about in that day that the nations will resort to the root of Jesse, who will stand as a signal for the peoples, and His resting place will be glorious (Isaiah 11:1-10).
And he showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb,
in the middle of its street. And on either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
And there shall no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His bond-servants shall serve Him; and they shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads.
And there shall no longer be any night; and they shall not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God shall illumine them; and they shall reign forever and ever.
And he said to me, “These words are faithful and true”; and the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, sent His angel to show to His bond-servants the things which must shortly take place (Revelation 22:1-6).
If we are going to have the true message of the kingdom, it must contain both the kindness and the severity of God. When the Lord comes to set up His kingdom, He will destroy both wickedness and the wicked who do not repent of their ways. He is coming to bring peace, but He is also coming with a rod of iron to strike the nations. In the true message of the kingdom, both the Lion and the Lamb must be included.
The darkest and coldest time of night is just before the dawn. For a little while, it may get colder and darker, but then the day of the Lord will surely dawn. There will be no more mourning, no more pain, no more hunger and no more disease. No child on earth will ever again be abused, and no one will ever again try to injure or defraud a neighbor. Truth will prevail over every lie, and love will prevail over the whole earth. Our glorious King will return. His kingdom is coming, and He will perform His will on earth as it is in heaven.
We are getting closer to the greatest times of trouble the world has ever known. However, we must see the light that lies beyond the darkness. In the midst of the time of darkness, we will know that the time of our redemption is getting closer. Then it will be even more important for us to walk in the light, pointing to the light that is coming. As we read in the text from Isaiah 60, it is when the darkness is covering the earth that the glory of the Lord appears on His people. His glory is not just coming upon us so we can look good! His glory will appear upon us because we will be living in the reality of the age to come, experiencing His glory that is to come.
The greatest hope the Lord gave us in His kingdom was that it was “at hand” (Mark 1:15). This means that those who hear and believe Him can live in His kingdom now! Even though we walk on the earth, we are also seated with Him in the heavenly places (Ephesians 2:6). The miracles He performed were evidence that the kingdom was available to any who could see it by faith. When He cast out demons He said, “But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you” (Matthew 12:28).
The last trumpet, or message, in the Book of Revelation is, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He will reign forever and ever” (Revelation 11:15b). The message of the kingdom will be preached by those who live in the reality and power of His kingdom now. We do not wait for the millennium for Jesus to reign over us. His kingdom is already “at hand.”
Those who have the Holy Spirit of God have more power abiding in them than in all of the demons combined. We are not to be ignorant of the devil or his schemes, but we do not need to fear the devil, or anything that he will try to do. When we walk in the light, the demons fear us. John wrote:
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God;
and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; and this is the {spirit} of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.
You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world (I John 4:1-4).
It is easy to distinguish the true from the false. Every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God, but is of the antichrist. As John stated in the text above, we have already overcome the antichrist if we know Jesus. We must also be aware that our gospel will cease to be true to the degree that we compromise the centrality of Jesus. Even heaven would not be heaven unless He was there. Our hope is in the King, not just the kingdom. Satan will try to offer all the elements of the kingdom of God without Jesus, which is the essence of the New Age Movement. Our message of the kingdom is that Jesus is King!
