But Paul makes it clear in 1 Thessalonians 5:1-6 that Jesus' statement does not apply to believers: "But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day should overtake you like a thief. . ." He then proceeds to explain why: "for you are all sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night nor of darkness; so then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober." Paul is referring, of course, to the light of the Holy Spirit who indwells all true believers and who can enlighten us through our study of Scripture to know the season of the Lord's return (1 John 2:27).

God's Attitude
As a matter of fact, God is obligated by His character to warn the world of the imminent return of His Son. The reason is that Jesus is returning in great wrath to "judge and wage war" (Revelation 19:11), and God never pours out His wrath without warning.
God does not wish that any should perish, but that all should be brought to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). Therefore, God always warns before He executes His wrath. He warned the world through Noah for 120 years. He warned Sodom and Gomorrah through Abraham. He sent Jonah to warn the pagan city of Ninevah, and He sent Nahum to the same city 150 years later.

Likewise, God is warning the world today that His Son is about to return. He is calling the world to repentance. The message of the hour to unbelievers can be summed up in these words: "Flee from the wrath that is to come by fleeing into the loving arms of Jesus now." Jesus came the first time as an expression of God's love; He came to die for the sins of Mankind. But when He returns, He will come in vengeance to pour out the wrath of God on those who have rejected God's love and grace.

The soon return of Jesus also carries with it a message for believers. Lukewarm Christians and carnal Christians are being called to commit their lives to holiness: "The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts." (Romans 13:12-14)

God's Method of Warning

God is alerting believers of the soon return of His Son through what are called "signs of the times." These are prophecies concerning world events that we are told to watch for, prophecies that will identify the season of the Lord's return.
The Bible is full of these signs. There are about 500 prophecies in the Old Testament that relate to the Second Coming of the Messiah. In the New Testament, one out of every 25 verses is concerned with the return of Jesus.

In fact, there are so many signs that it is difficult to grasp all of them. The best way I have found to do this is to put them in categories:

1) The Signs of Nature — We are told to watch for earthquakes, famine, pestilence, and signs in the heavens (see Matthew 24:7 and Luke 21:11).

This is the least respected category of signs for several reasons. For one thing, many people simply shrug their shoulders and say, "There have always been natural calamities, so what else is new?" Note that Jesus says these signs will be like "birth pangs" (Matthew 24:8) — that is, they will increase in frequency and intensity as the time draws near for His return. In other words, there will be more intense earthquakes and more frequent ones. That is exactly what is happening today.

Another reason these signs are given little respect is because most Christians are so rationalistic that they do not really believe in the supernatural, and they therefore find it difficult to believe that God speaks to the world through signs of nature. Yet, the Bible teaches this principle from start to finish.

God dealt with the world's sin through a great flood in the days of Noah (Genesis 6). He called the nation of Judah to repentance through a terrible locust invasion (Joel 1). In like manner, He called for the nation of Israel to repent by sending drought, wind storms, mildew, locusts, famine and pestilence (Amos 4:6-10). The prophet Haggai pointed to a drought as evidence that God was calling the people to get their priorities in order (Haggai 1:10-11).

The New Testament begins with a special light in the heavens marking the birth of the Messiah (Matthew 2:2). On the day that Jesus was crucified, there was three hours of darkness and an earthquake (Matthew 27:45-51). And when Jesus returns, the earth will experience the greatest earthquake in its history as every mountain is lowered, every valley is raised, and every island is moved (Revelation 16:17-21).

God has always spoken through signs of nature, and He continues to do so today. We had better pay close attention to them.

2) The Signs of Society — Jesus said that society will become increasingly lawless and immoral as the time approaches for His return. In fact, He said it would become as evil as it was in the days of Noah (Matthew 24:12,37-39).

Paul paints a chilling picture of end time society in 2 Timothy 3:1-5. He says it will be characterized by three loves — the love of self (Humanism), the love of money (Materialism), and the love of pleasure (Hedonism). He then points out that the payoff of this carnal lifestyle will be what the philosophers call Nihilism — that is, a society wallowing in despair. Men's minds will become depraved (Romans 1:28), and people will call evil good and good evil (Isaiah 5:20).

We are seeing these prophecies fulfilled before our eyes today as we watch our society reject its Christian heritage and descend into a hellish pit of lawlessness, immorality, and despair. Even worse, we are exporting our nihilism around the world through our immoral and violent movies and television programs.

3) The Spiritual Signs — There are both positive and negative spiritual signs that we are to watch for. The negative ones include the appearance of false christs and their cults (Matthew 24:5,11,24), the apostasy of the professing church (2 Thessalonians 2:3), an outbreak of Satanism (1 Timothy 4:1), and the persecution of faithful Christians (Matthew 24:9)

These negative spiritual signs began to appear in the mid-19th Century when Christian cults started forming. First came the Mormons, then the Jehovah's Witnesses, and then a great variety of spiritualist groups like the Church of Christ Scientists and the Unity Church.

The apostasy of the mainline Christian denominations began in the 1920's when the German school of higher criticism invaded American seminaries and undermined the authority of the Scriptures, teaching that the Bible is Man's search for God rather than God's revelation to Man.

During the 1960's Satanism exploded on the American scene and has since been exported worldwide through American movies, books, and television programs. Dabbling in the occult has become commonplace in the form of astrology, numerology, crystal gazing, transcendental meditation, and channeling. The whole trend ...[Message truncated]

Get a life Russ, get a girl, get married, start a family and this whole thing will drop into the proper perspective !!

You're obsessing, get help, take your meds.

1) The Signs of Nature — We are told to watch for earthquakes, famine, pestilence, and signs in the heavens ... that is, they will increase in frequency and intensity as the time draws near for His return. In other words, there will be more intense earthquakes and more frequent ones. That is exactly what is happening today.

If you search past posts you will see a number of links to natural disaster and weather sites where you will find information showing that this is not happening.

At the supposed time of Christ, the life expectancy of the most well off classes was comparable to that in third world countries today.  Famine and pestilence has decreased, not increased. 

2) The Signs of Society — Jesus said that society will become increasingly lawless and immoral as the time approaches for His return. In fact, He said it would become as evil as it was in the days of Noah

To which society to you refer?  In the US crime rates have decreased over the last 25 years.  We have changed our definition of morality so that now acts that were moral in past centuries is now unacceptable.  Child and spouse abuse; stoning of those who sleep with the wrong partner; child labor; etc., all these were once accepted behavior but are now condemned.

While it is true that the media, whose goal is to sell their product, and governmental agencies whose continued power is dependent upon a belief that lawlessness is increasing, try to convince us that it is increasing, the fact is that it is not.  Search prior posts; links are given for those statistics also.

But, even if it were true that lawlessness is increasing in the USA, what does that have to do with the Biblical prediction?  The USA is merely one society among hundreds, if not thousands.  How does one determine which one of those is the one to which the Biblical prediction refers? 

The most frequently repeated prophecy in the Old Testament is the prediction that the Jewish people will be regathered from the "four corners of the earth" in the end times. ... The Bible states that a consequence of this regathering will be the reestablishment of the state of Israel. ... The Scriptures say that once the Jews are back in their land, the land itself will experience a miracle of reclamation.  The desert will bloom and people will exclaim, "This desolate land has become like the garden of Eden"

While a state called Israel was formed in 1948, in a portion of the lands the Bible describes as belonging to the Israelites this was neither a "reestablishment" of the State of Israel nor a regathering of the Jews from the "four corners of the earth."

Outside the Bible there is no evidence that a State of Israel ever actually existed before.  There is some evidence that two small 'kingdoms' existed in the area, but for the united state there no evidence.

And only a small portion of world Jews reside in Israel.  In fact less than 30% of the world's Jews live in Israel.  20% of the world's 15 million Jews live in the US; so there are almost as many Jews in the US as there is in Israel.

The population of Israel is about 5.5 million, but only about 80% of those are Jewish.

So, we are a long way from seeing the fulfillment of the requirement that the "Jewish people will be regathered from the four corners of the earth." 

The positive spiritual signs include the proclamation of the Gospel to the whole world.

This is another requirement that is centuries or more from fulfillment.  There are millions in North Korea and China who have never heard the name "Jesus Christ".

Even if your end-time requirements were correct, they are no closer to being fulfilled today than they were in 30 CE.  Given the continued dispersement of the Jewish people and the millions to whom the Gospel has not been proclaimed, it must be said that your imagined end-times could not begin during your lifetime, or even during that of your children.

Like "Delta Dawn" of the song of the same name, you stand, wilted flower pinned to your breast, in wait of a long lost lover.  But the moment of your death will find you still in this world, and no closer to your dream of the suffering of 2/3rds of the world's people (as promised in Revelations).  How disappointing that must be; not to get to see all us heretics burn. 

No, Russ isn't great, but right now he's keeping the place going.

Relax, enjoy the holidays :-)

Know the symptoms !!

:-)))

then the most loving thing they could do is to KEEP THEIR MOUTHS SHUT!!! Every time a fundamentalist mentions Jesus to someone who doesn't 'accept' that message, they have condemned that person to an eternity in Hell.

Excellent point!!!!