HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, July 14, 2022 – The angels who visited Lot in Sodom just before that city’s destruction were not on a revival tour. They weren’t preaching repentance in advance of the fire and brimstone; they weren’t warning that if the Sodomites continued their evil ways, time would be up for them soon. The angels weren’t wagging their fingers and thumping Bibles.

No.

They didn’t engage with the locals at all, other than to strike them blind when they came too close to Lot. The time for engaging was over. God let the Sodomites carry on their merry way, as they were at that point beyond repentance.

It’s worth noting that once the point beyond repentance is reached, destruction comes soon after.

Western cities are now nearly a mirror image of Sodom just before its destruction. I include mainstream Christianity in that description. God has withdrawn his preaching forces and is letting the cities wallow in their filth. Anyone still preaching in the mainstream churches is not God’s prophet. Oh, there are still preachers aplenty, puffed up with pride and adorned with rainbows, but God hasn’t sent them. There is no God in any of the churches that go by his name, any more than God was in the temple during Jesus’ ministry years or in the few decades afterwards before the temple’s (and Judaism’s) final annihilation.

Just before God delivers his judgement, he withdraws his preaching forces. Sometimes this lasts for a few days and sometimes for a few decades. Scripture talks about the half-hour of silence in Heaven. During the silence, the Word is not spoken and mercy is withdrawn. The angels talk among themselves, just as those in the Kingdom talk among themselves, but they leave off talking to outsiders. The Word doesn’t belong outside themselves anymore. This signals that the time for mercy and conversion is over.

When God called Noah to build the ark, he didn’t also tell him to warn the locals about the coming destruction. It was too late for that: Their time was up. They had made their choice, siding against God, just as Noah had already made his choice, siding with God. God didn’t have Noah rush around begging and pleading with the locals as the first raindrops fell. No. The time for begging and pleading was over. God kept Noah busy with the animals and the final details on the ark. The sinners who had chosen sin were given over to the sin they so sorely demanded.

The chaff is separated from the wheat at harvest time, and there’s nothing that any of us can do to change that.

I have long made my peace with those I know who have sided against God. I don’t preach to them; I don’t try to intervene. I just let them be and frankly avoid them. Whatever common touchstones we once had are all but gone. They have their world of sin, and I have my world of God, and I will not budge one inch to appease them.

I have cried for them, but I cry no more. If they were looking for Truth – if they were rejecting the world – then I would do everything I could to guide them towards God. But they love the world. They embrace the lies and demand more lies, safe and effective lies.

If God has given them up, then I have to, too. I let them go like so many helium balloons, buffeted and pushed along by the winds. They are no longer my concern, any more than the Sodomites were Lot’s concern or anyone outside his family was Noah’s concern.

At some point, you just let them go, like Jesus let Judas Iscariot go.

You respect their free will, and you let them go.