When Jesus laid out signs of the end of times, he painted a dark picture. “There will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be” (Matthew 24:21). That darkness will weaken what we today call the institutional church. “Many will fall away” (Matthew 24:10). If the church in our troubled times is to have any confidence, it must come from Jesus and His promise.
The Son of Man “will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the earth to the other” (Matthew 24:31). “Elect” the same word Peter uses when he tells the church, “You are a chosen (or in Greek, “elect”) race” (1 Peter 2:9). Human reason thinks that if God chose some, then logically He did not choose others, but the Bible doesn’t go there. God “desires all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). Understanding ourselves as chosen, elect…and therefore being confident in dark times…comes as a consequence of trusting God’s love to us in Jesus, who Himself “in the sight of God (is) chosen (elect) and precious.” (1 Peter 2:4).
“You are a chosen race” by faith, the sure confidence your Savior will come and His angels “will gather the elect.” “Whoever believes in him will not be put to shame” (1 Peter 2:6). Might the church’s witness today be feeble because we’ve forgotten our utter dependence upon Jesus and His promises? “The one who endures to the end will be saved” (Matthew 24:13).