One of the signs of the end times from the Bible is the undermining of morality in the world.
Walker, Dean of Miami Bible School writes: “One American husband in two has sexual relation outside his marriage and one in four American wives concede to adultery. One American woman in ten is pregnant before marriage”.
Late J. Edger Hover, former director of FBI, gives another description of the situation -
“Only one person in twelve in our country goes to church, seven children in eight give up church and Sunday school before they reach to the age of fifteen. Fifteen-million sex magazines are printed every month and are read by a third of the American population. There are more barmaids in this country than schoolgirls. One million American girls have venereal disease. 100,000 girls disappear every year in the white slave traffic. A million illegitimate babies are born every year and perhaps a million illegal abortions are carried out annually. Every 22-second there is an assault or a rape. Every 40 minutes a murder is committed. 60 suicides take place everyday. Out of 10 who begin as social drinkers three became incurable alcoholics”.
The situation of the world in general is not very different from the one described above. All over the world, immorality is rising to frighteningly high levels. This is one of those signs of the end times from the Bible and it cries out aloud that the end of the world is near and the coming of Jesus Christ is at hand more than ever before.
1. But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days.
2. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy,
3. without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self–control, brutal, not lovers of the good,
4. treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God–
5. having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.
6. They are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak–willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires,
II Tim. 3:1-6 (NIV)
Apostle Paul says in his second letter to Timothy, that the terrible times of the last days would include people who will be unholy, that is, filthy with all kinds of sin.
People will be without self-control, that is, addicted; unable to exercise control on their fleshly desires. Think about it – how easy it is to find people today who are addicted to sex, pornography, nicotine, alcohol, drugs, money, power, television, movies, sports, rock music, etc and it is so difficult to get out of your addictions because all around you have propaganda enticing you to think that it is “cool” to be addicted.
And of course, addictions give rise to immorality. An addict tries to control and manipulate others in order to satisfy his lusts. That’s what is depicted in verse 6 above about people who are swayed by all kinds of evil desires to the extent of losing their discerning ability of what is right and what is wrong.
3. First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires.
4. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.”
II Pet. 3:3 (NIV)
Apostle Peter talks about those people who question the validity of Jesus’ promised second coming and live with the philosophy, “Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die”. They will do everything to “follow their own evil desires” – that is, to satiate their fleshly lusts in every immoral way possible.
8. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars–their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”
Rev 21:8 (NIV)
The ultimate destiny of the sexually immoral is prophesied by Apostle John in the verse above. God has reserved a place for such and that is in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. It is a frightening death from which there is no hope of resurrection.
Thank God for the hope of a blessed resurrection in our Saviour Jesus Christ. If you do not have this hope today, do not delay any longer. I encourage you to get this blessed hope in Jesus.
This is just the fulfillment of one of the signs of the end times from the Bible. Of course, there are a lot more signs and prophecies which are fulfilled in our time. The coming of our Lord is near. Maranatha – O Lord come!