Surviving the end times - what do I need to know?

There is one verse that distinctly answers these questions in the negative. The Lord says to His own, “Because thou hast kept the word of My patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth” (Rev. 3:10).

Much tribulation lies before each disciple—each true believer. It is this through which we must all pass; not, however, through the “great tribulation” spoken of, for instance, in Revelation 7:14, because, ere that comes, every saint of this dispensation, whether dead or living—all that are Christ’s—shall have been caught up to be for ever with the Lord (1 Thess. 4:13-18), far removed, therefore, from a judgment which shall be as special as it shall be “great.” But “much tribulation” is continuous. It may assume various forms; it may be Satanic; it may arise from the hatred of the world, or from false brethren in the way of persecution; or it may come from domestic trial, as in the case of Job.

Those who receive the mark of the Beast in their foreheads and hands and worship his image, will not receive it, but those who refuse that delusion of the devil will; and by this testimony, not only the nation of the Jews, but all nations will be sharply divided, And as those who will be for the Beast and Antichrist will at that time be in the ascendancy, those who are for Christ will suffer great persecution. Many will be martyred, and have a heavenly reward, for they will have part in "the first resurrection and shall live and reign with Christ a thousand years" (Rev. 20:4). Others will be preserved and sustained by the Lord through the tribulation and will endure to the end, and they shall be saved for the Millennial Kingdom (Matt. 24:13). We must bear in mind that Matthew 24 has this time of tribulation in view and does not apply to the present time.

The disciples were admiring the grandeur of the Temple (verse 1 and Matt.24:1), and the Lord tells them it was doomed to complete destruction. But not only that, there would be “great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people” (Luke 21:23), a time of great persecution—of apostasy on the one hand, and of faithfulness toward God on the other. (Compare Matt.24:8-13; Mark 13:6-13; Luke 21:22-24.) Those who will faithfully refuse to worship the Beast, remaining true to God, shall be “saved”—kept for, and have their place in, the Lord's earthly kingdom. Rev.7:1-8 points them out to us, in Israel, and verses 9-12 show the multitude from among the Gentiles also; all these are preserved through “the great tribulation,” and shall enter and have part in the kingdom when the King returns to establish it upon the earth, Matt.5:1-10 refers specifically to these.

"The end" in this passage is not the end of this or that individual life, but the end of the whole time of persecution, trial and sorrow, which end will be brought about by the second coming of Christ. Endurance is the supreme virtue which is to mark these saints, for their salvation is sure when Christ appears.

Besides the external sufferings of the remnant, their trials from within will be poignant. Under the strenuous temptation of the time, there will be treacherous defections from their ranks, with all the mortification and disappointment which such lapses must cause. There will be, too, the rending of ties and severing of friendships, as we read, "Then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And because lawlessness (dvopcia) shall abound, the love of the many shall wax cold" (Matt. 24:12). The "many" here must mean of the remnant. It could not mean of Israel at large; for they will, as now, be hardened in estrangement from God. Those, therefore, whose loye cools must be those in whom there was love that could be cooled. So while some will desert and betray, many will become half-hearted, to the grief, no doubt, of the zealous and true. Then follows a text which has troubled the peace of many a Christian, but which really belongs to the Jewish remnant of a future day — "But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved." It refers to salvation when the Lord appears in judgment. Many will fall away under the influence of the delusions of the time, but there will be a discriminating judgment when the Son of man appears. Then, there may be two in the field, and one may be taken and the other left. That is, one taken in judgment, and the other spared or "saved" to pass into eternal life on the earth under the Son of man in the millennium. Besides these things there will be to the godly remnant as to Christians now, all the dangers arising from personal unwatchfulness. "Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man" (Luke 21:34-36). Here, what is in view is clearly not the catching up of saints out of the world, but an escaping through judgments, and passing, saved, into the millennium.

The "end" will bring judgment upon the habitable world, and all the tribes of the land shall wail at the coming of the Son of man. But the faithful followers of Christ will be preserved throughout this great tribulation, and will be delivered at His coming from all their sorrows.

Peter tells us that we are “kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:5). When the Lord comes for His saints He will save them completely by taking them out of this evil world to be with Himself in heaven. But this promise also holds good for His earthly people who will be passing through the time of Jacob’s trouble, when antichrist is reigning in the holy land. Jerusalem will be surrounded with armies, the city will be taken, and when things have come to a head and all looks hopeless for His saints, the Lord will appear from heaven for the salvation of the remnant of the godly, and to execute judgment and establish His millennial kingdom.

Revelation 3:10, one of God's key prophetic verses, does not say we will be kept safe through that hour of trial which is coming to try those earth-dwellers who prefer earth to heaven. Noah was saved through God's flood judgment and finally deposited on a cleansed earth (Heb. 11:7; Gen.7-8). So he is a picture of the Tribulation-saints who will be kept safe through the Tribulation and deposited on a millennial earth. Yes, there will be people saved after the Rapture, as we will see.

But besides this, and apart from martyrdom (of which the Lord does not here directly speak), there will be also a preserved remnant, who, passing through the trial of this time, will have a special link with heaven; such as all will not possess (Rev. 14:3-4).*