One of the things affecting revival throughout history has been the variety of views of theology. Some theological systems do not allow the seeking or praying for revival and sometimes even the existence of revival itself. We’ve heard the statement, “If God wants to send us a revival He will; it is totally left up to Sovereignty.” With such thinking there is no praying for or desiring for revival in the life or in the church.

In more recent months this periodical has presented the concept of paradigm shifts in both the politics and religion of America as well as the rest of the world. We must now consider how these paradigm shifts are affecting the worldview of humanity, especially professing Christians. To understand this worldview shift, we must carefully consider the changes taking place in the warp and woof of contemporary man’s thinking.

How does one respond to the question, “What do you believe in?” Today it is rare to meet individuals who can articulate their life’s philosophy. Most do not know who they really are; they have never truly faced themselves. In light of our present society and its globalist ideological affront, perhaps this question is inadequate. Life has become increasingly complex and fragmented. We are a society that has scarcely invested time concerning a theology of life.

Living in a philosophical schizophrenic hour, most people tend to embrace several worldviews and yet fail to be truly controlled by any. They live only according to the moment and what accommodates that moment. In one circumstance, they may step forward with what seems to be their worldview; and yet, the next day they find themselves in another circumstance, responding with words and actions of a different worldview.

In the years of his ministry, my dear earthly father often told his students that they needed to know where they were in history and where they were in the light of biblical prophecy. Such knowledge was to enable them to preach the master truths along with the gospel message needed for their times. No one knows exactly how many years history has been in existence since God created this earth. The calendars have changed even in the past two thousand years. But it is interesting to note that following the chronology of Archbishop Ussher, who placed the Creation at 4004 b.c., this present calendar year would place us exactly six thousand years from Creation.

Our present history of human time is marked with dark and foreboding powers of which the Christian must ever be conscious. These powers are filled with moods and influences that can have a profound effect on the Christian’s life if he is not careful. We live in the End Time, a time like no other time. The Devil has come to his most artistic season of wicked existence; he has had six thousand years to experiment on mankind. His arsenal of subtleties for drawing man away from God and love for spiritual things has come to its prime.

Our world is filled, it seems, with so many injustices that one wonders where God is. Society has become like a galley ship with a few on deck enjoying laughter, money, and pleasures, while most of humanity is below, toiling and grieving through life with no vindication. Much of humanity is in misery and sadness, living in the chains of despair all of their lives. While it seems that devils and the godless reign, the cry continues, “Where is God?”

Since the first of 2020, an aggressively growing quantity of written, oral, and debatable materials has flooded the internet concerning everything surrounding the COVID crisis and what needs to be done about it. The public forum presentation on the COVID-19, the Delta variant, and the ever-increasing draconian mandates concerning the vaccination and vaccine passports, all have their voices and collectively have literally created a barrage of information. Whatever perspective one takes, he will find a deluge of data supporting his position about the subject. One thing the flood of information has readily contributed to is the overwhelming state of confusion that now controls the world concerning this subject. It intelligently maintains “the Lie” of this whole pandemic debris that has purposefully propagandized the political, so-called scientific, and pseudo-medical worlds. All this material, carefully orchestrated with the powers of fear, now has brought our society to a state of perplexity. What is the truth about the vaccination, its content, its purpose, its hidden agenda, its side effects, its premature “ramrodding” force upon the populace, and its far-reaching dominating force on future generations?

Since the fall of man, there has been an ever-mutating and growing system in the inhabited world. Over these thousands of years, this system has been intriguingly empowered by the Devil, hoping mankind would join him to overthrow God and His plan for the earth. This growing system has aggressively expressed its philosophical twist and mood seeking to control the world of humanity in each generation. Each generation’s emerging philosophy became its dominating worldview; this worldview was the encompassing contemporary thinking of that generation or age.

Public Christianity is deep into world apostasy. Historic Fundamentalism, a movement that was once raised up by God to stem the tide of the falling away in Christianity, is dead. It has been assimilated into Neo-Evangelicalism, and the only true saints left on the planet are the remnant of God scattered by Him throughout the world.

Both nationally and globally, we live in the most perilous and precarious hour in human history. Truly every compartment of human living has been affected. The paradigms, the foundations, and patterns of living in all compartments of humanity are radically shifting, forcing upon us new perspectives of human existence. Even the ideological powers of the government now have shifted into realms that refuse to acknowledge God and His Word. Epistemology (the study of all knowledge) has entered into a wasteland, where man has enthroned himself as God. In our pluralistic society, truth is no longer believed to be absolute; postmodernism has forsaken reason. All institutions of history are now being abandoned or redefined. The saddest paradigm shift is found in Christianity, as it is being redefined without the inclusion of the deity of Christ and the inerrancy of the Bible. Contextualization is now the norm of Christianity; it seeks to globally accommodate these changes while denying the fundamentals of the historic Christian Faith.

The Bible speaks of a trilogy for the times in which we live. It is now the last days (2 Tim. 3:1); it is the time of the end (Dan. 12); it is the last time or (in the Greek) the last hour (1 John 2:18; Rev. 3:10, a crisis hour in the earth where many antichrists appear prior to the Antichrist). We are witnessing an explosion of powerful personalities rapidly rising in the earth. More and more they are pressing for the emergence of a global government. Only the providence of God can bring about any hindrance to their evil designs.

In 1962 Thomas Kuhn coined the phrase “paradigm shift” in his influential work The Structure of Scientific Revolution. Kuhn mainly focused on paradigm shifts in science. He observed the shift from Newtonian physics (which holds time and space to be the same everywhere for all observers) to Einsteinian physics (which holds time and space to be relative to the observer’s frame of reference). A paradigm shift, according to Kuhn happens when the anomalies (deviations from what is standard, normal, or expected) and shortcomings of a current paradigm are repeatedly pointed out. Proponents of any new paradigm often boldly and assuredly promote it while garnering influential public positions. Their constant influence eventually presses new converts among those who are more likely to be open-minded to the change. Although Thomas Kuhn (a physicist) applied the term to science, his terminology now applies to any powerful shift from an established system (scientific, governmental, socioeconomic, etc.).

As the shadow of death continues to fall upon the United States of America, we grieve over the emboldened assassination of all truth and natural righteousness in the concourse of human living. In 2020 we witnessed the mandate powers of draconian governors shut down an entire nation under the guise of a pandemic promoted by the social media as well as by fake science. Almost daily we were bombarded by a unified repetitive voice announcing the darkness and looming power of this unknown virus as it crept across the world. Rarely any other news item was broadcast; a captivating obsession was heralded growing fear and panic throughout much of the nation. Our president warned us that the power of fear could be worse than the virus itself. Nonetheless, those controlling the news media took advantage of the crisis promoting an inconsistent and hypocritical public voice of so-called scientific and medical authorities while the nation was forced to its knees.

One of the great and precious truths that steps forward at this season of the year is the story of the coming of Messiah. The title Messiah is a most profound title that portrays Jesus, the Son of God. Its origin and conceptual mutation in the Old Testament is truly a powerful revelation of the divine appointment of our Lord by His Father.

In Genesis 1:11, 12, there is a divinely-ordained law declaring that everything which possessed life should bring forth after its kind: Like is to bring forth like. Within that law, the power of reproduction is ordained in the seed, a “seeding yielding seed.” This principle was not altered at the fall of man; life within the seed is to bring forth after its kind.

Luke 2:7 states, “And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.” Ancient tradition places the birthplace of our Lord in a cave, for caves were used as stables in most countries with rocky terrain. The Greek word for inn is kataluma, denoting the simplest of inns. It is similar to a Syrian khan—a refuge from thieves, a shelter from the heat and dust, a place where a man and his beasts may lodge, where a trader may sell his wares, and a pilgrim may slake his thirst. However, in such inns the visitor had to do everything for himself.

One of history’s great conspiracies is found in the story of the birth of Christ. In Matthew 2 when the Magi came to Jerusalem, they had an audience with Herod, the Roman-appointed King of the Jews. They inquired of where the Christ-child should be born. When the Sanhedrin gave the prophecy of Micah to him, Herod proceeded to speak kindly to the Magi saying, “Go and search diligently for the young child; and when ye have found him, bring me word again, that I may come and worship him also” (Matt. 2:8). Herod claimed a desire to worship the baby born king, convincing the Magi that his motive was sincere. Because of his guile, they knew not the conspiracy he cleverly had plotted against the Christ-child. They did not read his evil heart. Nevertheless, through a dream God warned the Magi to go home another way.

To know through Scripture where we are in history is a great strength to the heart. While this is the greatest hour to be a Christian, it is also the most difficult hour to be a Christian. Every Christian throughout history has been divinely appointed to live proving God’s grace in his unique generation. We are to live this Christian life with and for the Saviour to His glory. At the same time, we are called upon by God’s grace in our appointed generation to be light to this world and salt to this earth. Being a light to our generation is not simply sharing the Gospel in evangelism; we are to be a light against sin, error, and the apostasy. Accompanying light is salt; we must be a restrainer of all evil and wrong against God.

American history will mark the year 2020 as its most crucial year yet. This year has seen state powers manifesting mandates that literally have altered the living of its citizens, even boldly attacking many churches through heavy fines or closings (comfortably ignored by the media). These mandates also extended to closing or limiting attendance to small businesses in many states. Some governors confined travel and even dictated what could or could not be purchased. With all their mandates, still well over one thousand cities were subjected to burnings, riots, and destruction from so-called “peaceful demonstrations” by Marxist organizations (and financially sponsored by billionaires who sympathize with America’s overthrow).