If you are in the path of a tornado, you want to know about it as soon as possible so that you can seek appropriate shelter. Fortunately, meteorologists have gotten better at predicting these destructive storms that drop down from the sky and create swaths of destruction. In 1980, tornadoes were reported four minutes after they touched down, on the average. In 2013, due to Doppler Radar and high-powered computers, tornadoes were usually identified 13 minutes before they touched the ground. This difference of just 17 minutes is crucial. The ability to give more of an advanced warning has saved many lives.
If you live in the central or eastern United States, chances are you have first-hand, personal knowledge of these storms, and you respect and fear them.
What if you had advance warning right now that a dangerous tornado was headed your way? What would you do? The reasonable course of action would be to take steps to assure your safety. Well, there is a different type of tornado or whirlwind headed in your direction, and the reasonable thing to do is to seek safety. A storm of judgment, so fierce that it is compared to a whirlwind, is headed towards souls who have never repented and believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. If they don’t humble themselves and take warning from God’s Word, this tornado is sure to disrupt their lives, obliterating everything they hold dear.
God may let those who distance themselves from Him through sin and unbelief go on for a time, as if all is well, in the hope that they come to their senses and return to Him. But sooner or later, if they go on in their sins, His anger, fury and wrath will fall on them. It will certainly catch up to them. “Anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil” (Romans 2:99Tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile; (Romans 2:9)). Talking about the future the Bible says, “These shall go away into everlasting punishment” (Matthew 25:4646And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal. (Matthew 25:46)).
The thing to do is not to act as if this storm will never arrive, but rather to seek shelter now. The lowest part of a basement is a good place to take shelter from a tornado. But the only place to take shelter from the judgment to come is the Saviour of sinners. This is because no fault nor sin was ever found in Him. Yet, to save lost souls, He became sin for them and paid its awful debt while He hung on the cross. Because of His suffering on the cross, all who come to Him by faith will receive the forgiveness of sins and the gift of eternal life. “The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:2323For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 6:23)).
The Bible gives advance warning about the judgment that, like a whirlwind, will fall on sinners. Will you seek shelter in the Lord Jesus that you might be saved?
We really don’t know when our “storm” is coming. Being prepared, as Sudden Death shows, is essential.