Behind the Curtain

The Veil of Twilight

One night, while taking a walk at nightfall, I saw an object in the field that I identified as a coyote.  Having to walk past that ghostly creature to get back to my house, I cautiously and fearfully, continued my walk.  I kept my eye on the critter the whole time. The more I watched I realized the animal was not only a coyote but also a coyote that was intently tracking me.   Needless to say, this was unsettling.  When I got right up on the animal, I was shocked; what I had moments before been certain was a coyote was not even an animal.  Though I was certain of what I saw, the quickly spreading veil of darkness had obscured reality to the point that I believed a lie. The lie led to fear and the fear almost led to irrational behavior – calling my wife to pick me up.   I Corinthians 4:3 speaks of a similar curtain of darkness. It is a covering that leaves spiritual reality hidden and a lie substituted for truth.  

2 Corinthians 4:3–4 (NASB95)   ³ And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, ⁴ in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

The Veil of Hurricane Sandy

As ‘Sandy’s’ aftermath is contemplated, discussion has again permeated the world as to the cause and meaning of such storms.  Once more surfacing among the powerful politicians, agnostic scientists and persuasive media is the hypothesis that all this is caused by ‘global warming.’  This premise that has gained traction over the last 20 years proposes that we as human beings have destroyed our planet by using or misusing our natural resources in such a way that catastrophic changes have taken place in our atmosphere.  These changes have caused warming to our atmosphere that consequently have triggered dangerous changes in our weather patterns.   After experiencing Sandy, Michael Bloomberg, the mayor of the world’s most powerful city, endorsed a presidential candidate based on this hypothesis. An election that never really spoke of climate change is being altered in the last week by this single concept. But it is not global warming or the effects it has on the election, that are the veil.  It is something much more sinister.   

The Veil of An Interactive God

It is a veil that removes the supernatural from consideration and seeks a natural answer to everything.   It is a veil that sees man as the cause and the solution to problems formerly understood to be acts of God.   The veil covers the thoughts that there could be a God who notices and cares about human actions. It hides the fact that this God could be angered by our actions and could act in judgment.   It veils that He says He created and sustains our earth.   The veil is so thick that even the possible consideration that these storms could be related to God, are laughed to scorn.  When religious leaders such as Pat Robertson, Chuck Colson, and Hal Lindsey (no endorsements intended) suggested that God’s judgment might be involved in Hurricane Katrina, they were attacked as Christians who were not merely lacking in credibility but also were verging on dangerous insanity.   The veil is falling fast and the veil is being dropped by, ‘the god of this world.’

Here are the facts! The climate is changing. It was predicted to change long before the global warming theory came to be.   Natural storms are growing in frequency and strength.  But they are very much connected to God.  The Bible makes clear that nature is both controlled and directed by the Lord (Col 1).  Matthew 24 speaks of the divine plan to increase earthquakes ahead of Jesus Second coming.   Revelation describes the judgment of God that will be unfurled during the tribulation. Natural disasters are among those judgments.  Listen to these words from Revelation 6:12–14 (NASB95)    ¹² I looked when He broke the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth made of hair, and the whole moon became like blood; ¹³ and the stars of the sky fell to the earth, as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when shaken by a great wind. ¹⁴ The sky was split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

Not only will our world be shaken by earthquakes but huge atmospheric changes will occur that will dramatically alter our exosphere and the weather we are used to.  All of these things will come from the hand of God as judgment to the world.  

The Veil of God's Purposes

 

What is the point of this judgment?   God will send this pre-judgment to mankind with mercy in his heart.   His merciful goal: to show a preview of His eternal judgment so that we would repent and trust Him as our salvation from this certain judgment ahead.  He desires us to detour from our human answers to His divine truth. 

While we cannot know certainly what God had in mind with Sandy, there is one thing we can know with certain.   God is involved in ‘natural’ disasters.  One of his goals in every one of these events is to awaken us to the reality of our spiritual condition.  Veiling the source of major storms is Satan’s plan to hide the truth of an interactive God, the truth of our sin, the truth of God’s wrath and the truth of the gospel.  

Rather than turn to Jesus when this veil falls, people will again follow after the god of this world’s deception that eliminates God from their memory.   In this day, when the veil labeled ‘natural’ disaster obscures our world’s view of God, be courageous in telling the truth of God’s connection to nature.   Don’t be muzzled.   If you allow yourself to be muzzled, you are allowing God’s mercy to be muzzled.  God intends these events to mercifully unsettle and warn our world so that they turn from their sin, their humanistic tendencies and to Jesus who wishes to be their Savior and Lord.   May God lift the veil on those around us so that they can know the Savior that we have been privileged to see.