Print This Article“Some years ago, an energetic young man began as a clerk in a hardware store. Like many old-time hardware stores, the inventory included thousands of dollars worth of items that were obsolete or seldom called for by customers. The young man was smart enough to know that no thriving business could carry such an inventory and still show a healthy profit. He proposed a sale to get rid of the stuff. The owner was reluctant but finally agreed to let him set up a table in the middle of the store and try to sell off a few of the oldest items. Every product was priced at ten cents. The sale was a success, and the young fellow got permission to run a second sale. It, too, went over just as well as the first. This gave the young clerk an idea. Why not open a store that would sell only nickel and dime items? He could run the store, and his boss could supply the capital.
“The young man’s boss was not enthusiastic. ‘The plan will never work,’ he said, ‘because you can’t find enough items to sell at a nickel and a dime.’ The young man was disappointed but eventually went ahead on his own and made a fortune out of the idea. His name was F.W. Woolworth.
“Years later, his old boss lamented, ‘As near as I can figure it, every word I used in turning Woolworth down has cost me about a million dollars!’ ”
Missed Opportunities
Most can relate to the regret felt from a missed opportunity. I can still vividly recall a situation when I was younger that I missed the opportunity to go on a float trip with my cousin and his family. I was not quite yet a teenager, and this was going to be my first adventure of this kind, and I was extremely excited to go. I counted the days, but unfortunately for me, I caught poison ivy just a few days before the trip. I caught it so bad that it was in my eye, which swelled shut entirely. No matter how much I regretted the situation I was in and pleaded with everyone, there was no chance of changing the situation—I was going to miss this opportunity!
For some, it may be an opportunity to invest in a company and make a lot of money, as in the original example. Or perhaps it was a missed opportunity to make an eternal difference in a person’s life because we were too preoccupied with something we now realize was of little importance. H. Jackson Brown Jr. said it well when he said, “Nothing is more expensive than a missed opportunity.”
The Scriptures give us numerous examples of those who paid an enormous price for missing the opportunity God provided them to be saved from the looming consequences of their actions.
In Luke 16, Christ describes the chilling events of the rich man and Lazarus: The rich man was in hell [hades] and hoped to have Abraham send Lazarus back to warn his five brothers about the torment to come for those who ignored the warnings of God, but the rich man was told no: “Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them” (v. 29).
Abraham’s point was that God had provided the means for the rich man’s brothers to know the way of salvation, and the choice would be theirs to listen or not. Consequently, by being in hell, we know that the rich man himself did not heed the warnings of Moses and the prophets and thus missed his opportunity to be saved and was now paying the price for all eternity.
While Jesus hung on the cross, two men hanging beside Him took vastly different paths. One would seize his opportunity to get right with God through His Son, and the other refused and forever missed his opportunity to be saved from the judgment to come (cf. Lk. 23:39-43; Rev. 20:12-13).
As much as God wants all to be saved (cf. 1 Tim. 2:4), and as longsuffering and merciful as He is, there is still an end to man’s opportunities to be saved from God’s wrath and judgment. Eventually, the longsuffering of God will be replaced with the judgment of God. Thus, we read the Holy Spirit’s plea through the Apostle Paul to the unsaved:
“For He saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Cor. 6:2).
Here, Paul is applying the words of Isaiah to the present situation. At some point, the promised Rapture of the Church will occur, leaving those who have to that point rejected God’s offer of peace and salvation to their fate—the Tribulation. The end of this day of grace is imminent; we are not promised tomorrow—none have the promise of another day of life on this earth or that God will extend His mercy another day.
Failing to heed Paul’s plea to “be ye reconciled to God” (2 Cor. 5:20) leaves one on a cliff, at every moment on the brink of leaving the time of God’s grace and entering the time of His wrath and judgment—“the great and the terrible day of the Lord” (Joel 2:31). And that will be the worst missed opportunity they will have ever made.
No Excuses – God Said it was Coming
When it comes to the Tribulation, there is much misunderstanding, partly because it is a topic that interests people a great deal. Yet, with all the interest, the Tribulation will still catch many people off-guard, but God warned mankind. God warned that the Tribulation was coming, why it would happen, and most importantly, how to avoid it.
“I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye Me in vain: I the Lord speak righteousness, I declare things that are right. Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, ye that are escaped of the nations: they have no knowledge that set up the wood of their graven image, and pray unto a god that cannot save.
“Tell ye, and bring them near; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath declared this from ancient time? who hath told it from that time? have not I the Lord? and there is no God else beside Me; a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside Me. Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else. I have sworn by Myself, the word is gone out of My mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, That unto Me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear” (Isa. 45:19-23).
Isaiah 45 begins with God addressing Cyrus, a man who would not be born for another one-hundred and fifty years. God would raise him to power, and he would overthrow Babylon and allow those in exile to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple. He says to Cyrus, “I have surnamed thee…That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside Me. I am the Lord, and there is none else” (vv. 4-5).
In other words, in giving Cyrus’ name in advance, He was demonstrating that He, the Lord God of Israel, is God, and there is no God besides Him. By saying that He has not spoken in secret or in a dark place, He reminds mankind that He has openly stated, “Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker” (v. 9), and that He has not hidden the fact that man has one option for salvation: Him.
When He says that He has sworn to Himself that “every knee shall bow, every tongue swear” (v. 23), He is openly declaring that one day or another, in this life or the next, all of mankind will acknowledge the fact that He alone is God, and they will at some point bend the knee to Him. The Tribulation is one of the means by which God will accomplish that.
“The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. For the day of the Lord of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and lofty, and upon every one that is lifted up; and he shall be brought low” (Isa. 2:11-12).
Oh, how those who think they are mighty shall, through the Tribulation (Day of the Lord) and the Great White Throne judgment to follow, learn their lesson and finally fall to their knees and acknowledge the truth that “the Lord that created the heavens; God Himself that formed the earth and made it,” He is “the Lord; and there is none else” (Isa. 45:18).
It is by God’s mercy that He warned, “For the day is near, even the day of the Lord is near” (Ezek. 30:3), “Alas for the day! for the day of the Lord is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come” (Joel 1:15), “…let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand” (Joel 2:1).
And at Pentecost, it was indeed “nigh at hand,” for Peter “standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice, and said unto them… be this known unto you, and hearken to my words…this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel; And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God…I will shew wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath; blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke: The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come” (Acts 2:14-20 cf. Joel 2:31-32).
By associating the time with the prophecies of Joel, Peter was at Pentecost, making it known that it was then “the last days” and that the Day of the Lord was about to begin. Though Peter and the other eleven apostles would offer the Kingdom to Israel if they would accept Christ as their Messiah, the nation rejected Christ once again.
The remedy for the situation and the next thing on the agenda, according to prophecy, was the coming Tribulation in which God would protect Israel from the Antichrist and certain destruction, thus wooing the nation to Himself. But first, God had a secret.
Grace Abounds
As the Twelve Apostles preached to Israel to repent, little did any of those unbelieving Jews realize that they were about to enter the worst time this earth would ever see. Indeed, those in Rome, Greece, and all across the world had no idea what was about to take place. As Stephen, in a judicial manner, convicts the nation for their repeated rejection of God, even Christ, their Messiah, and is physically attacked, the Lord stands up from His seated place next to God the Father and is now ready to judge His nation and bring His wrath upon the world (Acts 7:56 cf. 2:33; Heb. 10:12).
What Amos describes as a day of “darkness” (5:18,20), Joel “a destruction from the Almighty” (1:15), Isaiah the “day of the Lord’s vengeance” (34:8; 61:2) is ready to come. Isaiah goes on to describe the Tribulation, saying, “Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and He shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it… And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity” (13:9,11).
Most had no idea what was about to happen, and God was fully justified to make it happen. But God! Instead, God turned to His greatest earthly enemy and made him His example and tool of grace (cf. 1 Tim. 1:16)—“where sin abounded, grace did much more abound” (Rom. 5:20). He took Paul, who persecuted the name of Christ like none other and made him His greatest witness and an apostle of an entirely new program. Instead of the Tribulation, God would bring about a day of grace—A “Dispensation of Grace” given to the new apostle, Paul (Eph. 3:1-11; Col. 1:25-27). Instead of making war with man, God would offer man one more chance of peace before bringing His wrath.
“Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: By Whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God” (Rom. 5:1-2).
“Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: By Whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God” (Rom. 5:1-2).
As some might foolishly look around and believe mankind deserved another chance, even peace with God, let us not forget this peace was offered to the very ones who lied, falsely convicted, and killed the Son of God. The ones who nailed Him to the cross. Yes, another chance was given to Caiaphas, the high priest, and all those who took part and were still alive.
Those in the Tribulation will still have an opportunity for salvation; however, they must “endure until the end” (Matt. 24:13; Mk. 13:13). They must “overcometh” (Rev. 3:5) the worst time imaginable. It will not be as simple as believing that Christ died for their sins, was buried, and rose again. That offer will be off the table; that gospel will be replaced by the gospel of the kingdom and the need to endure the torments of the Antichrist and the world who will hunt down and try to kill anyone who fails to worship the false christ.
But now, man has an opportunity to avoid all of that. God has told us precisely how to avoid this great and terrible day: “For God hath not appointed us [the Body of Christ] to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him” (1 Thes. 5:9-10).
There will be no excuses for anyone who enters the Tribulation, and the Dispensation of Grace is the reason for it. It should not escape our attention that it was just before God’s wrath was to begin that He ushered in something He kept secret since “the world began” (Rom. 16:25)—a time which allows all people to avoid it, even those who had just spent four years rejecting Christ.
The timing is indeed perfect and is certainly one more chance for man to escape God’s wrath. Some argue that God is unmerciful in bringing His wrath, regardless of when, but they fail to recognize that God has done all He could to help each and every one of us to avoid it; it is He who gave mankind the means to avoid it: He gave the world His Son so we could avoid His wrath, and He allowed man to kill Him so that we might live. All we must do today is believe the gospel.
Children will be raptured with the Church; thus, every single person who enters the Tribulation will be someone who has rejected the gospel: the good news of God’s grace offered freely to all who would believe that Christ died for their sins, was buried, and rose again.
“And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of
the Lord, and from the glory of His power” (2 Thes. 1:7-9).
God has warned everyone that His wrath is coming. He has told everyone why it is coming. And most importantly, He has told everyone how to avoid it. God is right now offering the world one more chance to avoid the great and terrible Day of the Lord. To miss the opportunity presented to us would be one of the worst missed opportunities ever given to man.
“Precisely because we cannot predict the moment, we must be ready at all moments” –C.S. Lewis.
