Preparing for the Underground Church, Part 1
By Pastor Hal Mayer
Dear friends,
Welcome to keep the faith ministry once again. Have you ever thought deeply about what we are going to face regarding the church when persecution comes upon us as an overwhelming surprise? As we near the time of crisis for God’s people we had better start thinking about how to understand what the church is going to look like during the time of trouble, and how we are going to have to think and act when that time comes. I don’t think we can wait until it’s upon us to prepare for that time. I have been, for years, addressing the biblical principles involved in the lead up to the time of trouble. But it is time to consider how we’re going to have to restructure our lives to meet the very challenging circumstances that we will face in the future. Maybe even begin to do certain things right now.
So, as we begin let us pray. Dear father in heaven, You have provided us with everything we need to face the challenges of our regular daily lives. But You’ve also given us counsel about what to do in the time when every earthly support is cut off and Your people are hated and hunted like wild animals. So, as we study today, we pray that we may have unusual insights from the Holy Spirit and from Your word so that we can start thinking about what we must be and what we must do when there is no human support for us anywhere. We pray for an unusual spiritual blessing today, in Jesus name, Amen.
Turn with me in your Bibles to Matthew 5:10-12. In these famous words of hope Jesus warns us of the fact that the world will hate God’s people. Anybody who is attached, even in the slightest way to the world is going to find themselves with ill feelings, maybe even hatred about God’s faithful souls who will not compromise ever for any reason. Verse 11 is especially poignant.
“Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.
Have you ever been reviled? Is it pleasant? No, it’s not. Jesus is trying to warn us of something that is coming to God’s people that they hardly ever think about, and when they do it’s usually brushed aside as something in the far distant future. But it’s not. It’s already here. People have the attitudes, and the cultivated tendencies, to react very negatively and very strongly to God’s people. They’re just not focused on it yet. The things that have divided them and made them go farther into extremes on both sides of the political spectrum, will eventually be focused on Sabbath keepers. And when it does come it will be an overwhelming surprise. You cannot afford to not prepare your mind for what is coming. Even all the preparation that you can do now, all the reading and thinking that can be done to understand the atmosphere we will face at the time of trouble, is inadequate, but it must be done. Listen to this statement from Great Controversy, page 622.
“The ‘time of trouble, such as never was,’ is soon to open upon us; and we shall need an experience which we do not now possess and which many are too indolent to obtain. It is often the case that trouble is greater in anticipation than in reality; but this is not true of the crisis before us. The most vivid presentation cannot reach the magnitude of the ordeal. In that time of trial, every soul must stand for himself before God. ‘Though Noah, Daniel, and Job’ were in the land, ‘as I live, saith the Lord God, they shall deliver neither son nor daughter; they shall but deliver their own souls by their righteousness.’ Ezekiel 14:20.”
That’s a serious statement, and it speaks to our minds of the magnitude of the crisis that we must face. Most of God’s people are not ready to stand alone, not even close. And I dare say, that we are not ready either. Even with all the preparations that we can and should do, we will not be ready for the magnitude of the hatred that will be spewed out upon the faithful few. It is guaranteed to come because scripture prophecies it. It is more surely coming, than the sun will rise tomorrow morning. The sun may not rise, though that’s not likely. But prophecy will be fulfilled with more certainty. Listen to these important words of Christ Himself in Matthew 24:9-10.
“Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.”
Somehow, we have the ability to think that this time isn’t going to be as bad as it is stated because we have a history of going through crises that aren’t as bad as we anticipated. But not so with the time of trouble. It will be very dangerous, even deadly. God’s true people will have to have a relationship that most have been too indolent to obtain. It must be a relationship that can withstand national and international hatred. It has to be a relationship that can withstand legalized hatred and discrimination and outright persecution on a Global scale. It is hard to imagine. And worldlings, including those in God’s church, are already being conditioned to react that way. You can see what happened during the pandemic. That was a mild, classical example of what God’s people will face. For some people it didn’t seem mild. And many were deceived. The unvaccinated faced enormous pressure and coercion, and even hatred.
Most Christians will think that it’s too extreme to be hated by everyone, especially when persecution is government sponsored. They think they shouldn’t place themselves in that position. So, they will try to avoid it at all costs. But they will collapse and be lost because they don’t have God as their fortress and their shield. Oh friends, be sure to make your calling and election sure. Be sure to cement your relationship with Christ at the deepest level of your being. Christ is the only One that will help you stand when the going gets rough. That time is not for the faint hearted or confused. It is not for the weak knee and unconvicted. It’s not for the yellow-bellied and spineless. That’s why Christ is the only One that can stand for you when you are persecuted. You can’t expect someone else to be there for you, only Christ. Christ doesn’t have weak knees. He doesn’t have a faint heart. And He’s not yellow-bellied. He experienced the same hatred and persecution and won the victory. If you try to stand on your own two feet, it won’t take the enemy more than one second to collapse you in one big heap. You will have to have a faith in Christ that will not flinch.
When this time comes, and it’s almost here, even at the door, the church will not stand with you. It probably won’t collapse. The Jewish church didn’t collapse in Jesus day, or Paul’s day. But the true and faithful had to go underground. They couldn’t expect support from the public church. The leaders of the public church today are tasked with the job of protecting it and its assets from all threats. They don’t have their members best interests in mind. They have to preserve the institutional church at all costs. So, God’s true people, the few who will rigidly not compromise, will not find a place among them that is safe. In fact, many of the members of God’s church today will turn on the faithful and become their most dangerous enemies. I hate to break it to you, but somebody has to do it.
Do you know how gut wrenching it is to be betrayed? Betrayal doesn’t come from the general populace; it happens between close friends; your close friends. When it happens, you wonder who you can trust. And that will be the way it is during the time of trouble. Who can you trust? So, in the underground church, you have to set up very important parameters, so it minimizes the chance of being betrayed. You can’t avoid it. But you can minimize it.
Preparing for the underground church, first and foremost, involves the preparation of the mind. And that’s what we’ll explore today. It is necessary to habituate the mind in such a way that it will run to Christ first when there’s a problem, not your best friend, not your spouse, not your church pastor or elder, but Christ. Jesus experienced this. He had to prepare His mind for hatred and persecution and to suffer and die for the human race. His own family did not understand and worked against him. Listen to this from Desire of Ages, page 321.
“The sons of Joseph were far from being in sympathy with Jesus in His work. The reports that reached them in regard to His life and labors filled them with astonishment and dismay. They heard that He devoted entire nights to prayer, that through the day He was thronged by great companies of people, and did not give Himself time so much as to eat. His friends felt that He was wearing Himself out by His incessant labor; they were unable to account for His attitude toward the Pharisees, and there were some who feared that His reason was becoming unsettled.”
You have to be ready for attempts to put you into a facility for the mentally challenged. It will be suggested that you are crazy, literally crazy. You have to be ready for the same things that Jesus went through. So, look at the statements in Desire of Ages as statements about what will also happen to God’s people at the end of time. People will suggest things about you that are clearly wrong. They will actually lie about you. They will say all manner of evil against you. They will make you out to be a terrorist, worse than ISIS. They will make you out to be an enemy of the state. They will not recognize the work of the Holy Spirit in your life but will accuse you of being motivated or actuated by the devil. Even church members will think this way. Why? It is because their own association with you, no matter how loosely connected, is a reproach to them. I’ll read on.
“His brothers heard of this, and also of the charge brought by the Pharisees that He cast out devils through the power of Satan. They felt keenly the reproach that came upon them through their relation to Jesus. They knew what a tumult His words and works created, and were not only alarmed at His bold statements, but indignant at His denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees. They decided that He must be persuaded or constrained to cease this manner of labor, and they induced Mary to unite with them, thinking that through His love for her they might prevail upon Him to be more prudent.”
Persecution inevitably catches even the true church by surprise. The church has historically never expected to be persecuted. It does everything to avoid being accused by the government to preserves it assets, including its reputation. For example, during the pandemic, what if your church refused to give up their liberties by not participating with the government mandates, supported their members who conscientiously declined vaccines, refused and collaborate with the medical dictatorship? Would they have lost money? Would they have been persecuted? Would they have gone bankrupt? Probably some of all of it. That would have been a great opportunity to get some preparation for what is coming on us as real persecution. What a wonderful, missed opportunity!
But instead, God’s church, as did other churches, it did not stand for religious liberty. It tried to convince all of their members to take the vaccines, and even tried to coerce some of them, threatening them with losing their jobs, shaming them by making them feel that they are responsible for the deaths of others, and publishing statements in support of the government. People had to get their exemptions on their own, if they could, without their church to support them. Their medical institutions often refused religious exemptions to their medical workers. What we learned during the pandemic is that each of us will be tested individually, and that there is a crying need for the underground church. Listen to this statement from Great Controversy, page 489.
“There is earnest warfare before all who would subdue the evil tendencies that strive for the mastery. The work of preparation is an individual work. We are not saved in groups. The purity and devotion of one will not offset the want of these qualities in another. Though all nations are to pass in judgment before God, yet He will examine the case of each individual with as close and searching scrutiny as if there were not another being upon the earth. Everyone must be tested and found without spot or wrinkle or any such thing.”
During World War II, Jewish church members who were in Europe, were disfellowshipped and some were betrayed into the hands of the Nazis. And this is the church that was given the virtual monopoly on the message of religious freedom. This is the church that published the American Sentinel, which was edited by A. T. Jones. This is also the church that advocated that its members serve in the military, bear arms, and work on the Sabbath, and then get rebaptized, and I could site case after case.
Do you think that the pandemic gave us a little warning about what to expect from your brethren? Remember every earthly support will be cut off. That means support from the church also.
So, when that happens what are you going to do? What steps are you going to take to keep ministering to people, keep meeting with the assembly of the people of God? You have to take steps now to prepare for then. Now is the time to prepare. What steps must you take now?
The church does a lot of humanitarian work. It helps people that are in difficulty. It unwisely expects to receive the regard of the world in return. It does not perceive itself as a threat to anyone except those who demand its worship, which is reserved for God alone. So, pastors, with a few exceptions don’t preach about the seriousness and the need of preparation for the time of trouble. Thus, it will come upon us as an overwhelming surprise. Here is the statement from Testimonies for the Church, Vol 8, page 28.
“Transgression has almost reached its limit. Confusion fills the world, and a great terror is soon to come upon human beings. The end is very near. We who know the truth should be preparing for what is soon to break upon the world as an overwhelming surprise.”
Are you preparing for the overwhelming surprise? There is another reason many of God’s people will be shocked with an overwhelming surprise. It is because they are united with the world and are compromised with its allurements. They risk actually becoming the ones spoken of who are their worst enemies of the true and faithful. Here it is from Testimonies to the Church, Vol 5, page 463.
“The work which the church has failed to do in a time of peace and prosperity, she will have to do in a terrible crisis, under most discouraging, forbidding, circumstances. The warnings that worldly conformity has silenced or withheld, must be given under the fiercest opposition from enemies of the faith. And at that time the superficial, conservative class, whose influence has steadily retarded the progress of the work, will renounce the faith, and take their stand with its avowed enemies, toward whom their sympathies have long been tending. These apostates will then manifest the most bitter enmity, doing all in their power to oppress and malign their former brethren, and to excite indignation against them. This day is just before us. The members of the church will individually be tested and proved. They will be placed in circumstances where they will be forced to bear witness to the truth. Many will be called to speak before councils and in courts of justice, perhaps separately and alone. The experience which would have helped them in this emergency they have neglected to obtain, and their souls are burdened with remorse for wasted opportunities and neglected privileges.”
What does it mean that “they will do all in their power to oppress and malign their former brethren?” It means that they will be active in their opposition not passive. It means that they will organize coalitions against the true and faithful. It means that they will turn them into the authorities and say all manner of things that are not true about them. When this begins to happen it’s already too late to begin to prepare for the underground church. God’s faithful people will have to meet in places that they never thought would be necessary. They will have to exclude people who they have previously fellowshipped with, and even ministered with. So, let us discuss the mindset that needs to be developed to prepare to take your church underground.
Christians in the free world are already feeling little inklings of the crisis that is coming upon them. Secular culture has already begun to censor and cancel those who speak the truth of the Bible concerning the LGBTQ movement, the Marxist woke agenda, etc. They’re already putting the structures in place that can prevent the truth from being preached on social media, in the public square, and other venues. And the church has already begun to censor and marginalize those that hold distinctive truth among God’s people. They don’t get a hearing in committees; they aren’t welcome especially in large churches. This should be a warning that the day is coming when all men will surely hate them and hate them with a deadly passion.
First, don’t put your faith in the government. No matter who’s in office, it will certainly end badly for God’s people. Don’t put your faith in the courts to protect your freedoms and provide redress against individual attacks. You will not get justice. And don’t put your faith in your church. Don’t expect the church to defend you under any circumstances. They will not go against the politically correct government narrative. The pandemic made that abundantly clear.
All that truly wish to live godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. If you are faithful to Jesus and His truth you cannot regard yourself as immune from persecution. And I’m speaking especially of Western countries who have enjoyed many freedoms, liberties and rights. But you can see those freedoms, liberties and rights being dismantled right before our eyes.
There is something sinister going on in the western world. Satan has taken over many, if not all, aspects of government, politics and social systems. There is a wellspring of principalities and powers working against God and His truth at the deepest levels of free world governments that are now colluding together in an obvious way. These hidden principalities and powers are working to remove freedom from the free world and enslave it under Satan. You can see this. They are in deep personal rebellion against God and all true Christian values. These principalities and powers don’t have anything to do with governments, or economics, or the military power at all. These agencies are simply the vessels by which these principalities and powers exercise their controlling influences. Ephesians 6:12 says,
“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
Satan is causing major change, chaos and political corruption, to destroy everything that was known to be stable, dependable, and consistent, especially in the economic and political realm. His mantra is that it is forbidden to forbid. Anybody who goes around forbidding anybody to do anything is shut out from society. The Bible and its “restrictions” are the enemy. So are those who hold to the Bible as the rule of faith and practice. The Christian voice is very rapidly being eliminated from society. You will eventually, maybe soon, have to meet out of sight behind unmarked doors.
Why do we have so much identity politics today? It is Satan’s plan to use identity confusion to foist his system on the free world and spread confusion everywhere. It is his way of running counter to scripture. That’s why you see so much gender confusion, or dysphoria. That’s why we are seeing a dramatic increase in violence and lawlessness. That’s why it seems that nothing is dependable anymore. It is being done through means and methods that only a few short years ago had not been foreseen or even imagined.
The enemy has used education, science, entertainment and even “spirituality” in his quest to become the ruler of this world. He has used the sexual revolution, which is now championed by LGBTQ+, to level a conclusive blow against the church, indeed painting it as the greatest forbidder in history. Even the mere existence of the church has been cast as oppressive, unless the church compromises and accepts the politically correct narrative. Many churches and denominations have compromised their principles and their teachings have been changed in order to continue to live freely in western society. But that has only pushed or coerced them to become more like the world. If the church hadn’t been so anxious to get money from the government and keep money coming from the government, or pursuing other advantages provided by the government, it could not be coerced into compliance with the politically correct narrative.
But why is the sexual revolution being used two fight against Christianity. Differences in sexual understanding go much deeper than questions about economics or politics. They go to the heart of our understanding about God and human beings. Christianity does not need a particular political or economic understanding or system for it to function. But it does require a particular understanding of sex and sexuality, a biblical one. An alliance between sex, science and atheism, creates an opportunity for absolute independence from God. And don’t we have that today?
Instead of a “struggle against repression” of capitalist oppressors that communism taught, now the western world is calling people to join in the “struggle against repression” at the hands of their sexual oppressors, including men, but especially the church, because of the Bible’s teaching. Much of politics today is driven by this underlying concept. While sexual identities are prominent, almost hidden from view are the reasons for these perverse sexual identities in the first place. Sexual revolutionaries turn sexual morality inside out. Ideals like modesty, purity, and restraint are now seen as repressive and abnormal. We’re not supposed to use the phrase “sexual perversion” Because it is judgmental. And anything that is perceived as judgmental is forbidden. Thus, Paul’s statement and prophecy comes true in 1 Corinthians 6:10.
“Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.”
Notice that of the first three types of sin that are mentioned, two of them are sexual sins. The Bible puts a strong emphasis on correcting the sexual identity of the converted. It has to! And you have to have that straight in order to survive the coming crisis. If you don’t, you’ll be confused.
In preparation for the underground church there has to be a deep repentance. That preparation is not to protect our Christian way of life, but rather repenting of our failure to live it ourselves. The world and church members that are of the world want freedom to live the way they want in this modern age. That is, they want the freedom to live without restraint. Ultimately, they will choose to live without God. And we have seen many of the world’s ideas come right into the church and its institutions, like its universities and medical institutions. There are even members of God’s remnant church that run large abortion clinics. How are they going to stand in the day of judgement, I do not know.
But in true Christianity true liberty comes when we have freedom from sin, not freedom to sin. The apostle says in 1 John 3:2.
“Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.”
The goal, therefore, is to be like Jesus. If you want to see Him as He is, you have to emulate His character. And that’s the chief characteristic of the underground church. It can be no other way. Notice Jesus words from John 15:19.
“If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.”
As soon as you sin, you become at least a little bit like the world. The world doesn’t hate you anymore, because it knows that you will continue to become more like them if you don’t repent. And if the world can make friends with you, it will feel so good that you won’t want to go back to true godliness.
The world and politics, economics, the media and social affairs will become so hostile to faithful Christians who have overcome the world that it will become impossible to worship or conduct church business openly among them. When God’s people are so united to Christ that they renounce all sin, this creates the problem. So, we are told in Isaiah 26:20
“Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast.”
Notice this from the Review and Herald, November 19, 1908.
“What are the chambers in which they are to hide?—They are the protection of Christ and holy angels. The people of God are not at this time all in one place. They are in different companies, and in all parts of the earth; and they will be tried singly, not in groups. Everyone must stand the test for himself.”
The protection of Christ has physical manifestations. The underground church is one of them. When persecution comes to the flock, and they are bewildered and not sure what to do, the underground church provides the comfort, solace and guidance necessary to witness your faith in those trying times.
Before persecution comes, we must try to understand the underground church in our DNA. We usually think of the underground church as a band of people hiding together, moving about furtively in darkness to evade detection by the public. And in our minds, it involves worship services in the forest, or in caves, or whispering hymns and reading the Bible by candlelight in someone’s home or barn. These are not totally false, they do happen, but they do not define the underground church. The underground church does not owe its existence to persecution. Persecution only reveals the underground church; it cannot create it. There should be an underground church even when there isn’t persecution.
If you have been cast out or disfellowshipped; if you have been cancelled, or not allowed to speak in church or at a church meeting; if you have not been given opportunities to work for the church, you are a likely candidate for the underground church. Those who are not politically correct, who take the Bible as it reads, and who live according to the instruction of the Bible will be excluded from any depth of participation in the public church.
The underground church is the manifestation of God’s work that is revealed when the public church can no longer sustain itself, either due to devastating attack, collapse from within, or compromise. It is created when true Christians jointly submit to death, death to the world. Jesus’ words in John 12:24 are relevant.
“Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.”
The underground church is like a seed planted in the ground, it is that part of the church which has already died to the world, and therefore it is impervious to the world’s attacks. There is another fitting parable the suits the underground church. It is the parable of the two houses that are built, one on the rock and one on the sand. Let’s read about it in Matthew 7:24-27.
“Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.”
Persecution is represented by a storm. Any church that is not built on the right platform of the rock Jesus Christ will collapse, in terms of its principles and power. If they are built on acceptance with the world; with government grants and other advantages from the world; or tries to be politically correct with society, it will not stand, but will sacrifice its mission and fall when the storm comes. And great will be the fall of it. Jesus wasn’t kidding. He wasn’t soft-pedaling. He was telling it straight as an arrow so that no one could misunderstand Him. And it’s true for us too. If we live like Christ, we will have to say things pretty straight too. We can’t downplay them. We can’t soft-pedal them. We have to speak straightly and clearly. We can’t distance ourselves from uncomfortable connections with the true people of God or separate from sinners who long for Jesus. Then our spiritual “house” will remain standing when the rain comes down, the streams rise, and the winds blow and beat against that house.
That says a lot about the underground church. The public church responds to persecution like a public organization. In the face of attack it protects its interests, it’s assets, it’s rights, its way of life and its beliefs. It acts out of a very real sense of fear of losing these things. That’s why many churches collaborated with the government during World War II. That’s why churches collaborated with the government during the pandemic to promote vaccinations and subvert freedom. They were afraid of losing the money that they get from the government to the tune of millions and millions of dollars for their medical and educational institutions.
The public church has skirmishes with the world, court cases, protests and demonstrations, attempts at public persuasion and education. And it compromises itself to maintain its public functions. This process is very well developed in America and other western countries. And now that the sexual revolution is becoming more demanding, the public church and its institutions whether educational or medical, can hardly withstand the blitzkrieg onslaught and infiltration of the sexual revolution that catches it unawares, or puts enormous pressure on it to comply with its demands. And it goes into all areas of life.
But this is not the way of the underground church, with its disciplined love of Christ and its fellowship of suffering in Christ. It does not seek to defend or preserve itself, because as the seed that’s planted in the ground is dead, the underground church is dead to itself and doesn’t need to defend itself. It remains solely focused on hearing and doing the whole word and will of God, nothing added, and nothing neglected. It does not operate out of fear because it has the Lord’s consolation that perfect love casts out all fear. Also, in John 16:33 Jesus makes a statement that is of great courage to the underground church.
“These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
The underground church obeys Christ’s admonition to put down the sword, so it doesn’t take up the world’s “swords;” it’s courts, its media, its politics, but instead it is armed with only two things which are found in Revelation 12:11.
“And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.”
Therefore, the underground church is like Christ. When reviled, it reviles not again. When cursed, it curses is not again. When persecuted, it blesses. When murdered, it forgives. It does not entrust itself to the world because it knows the world’s heart is untrustworthy. It does not hide. It conducts its work in full awareness of the opposition of the world, and it strategizes accordingly.
If you think about it, there are some lessons in what I just said that are profound and need some contemplation. When you’re accused, abused and attacked, the natural reaction of our hearts is to defend ourselves. But that’s not what Jesus did. He was just silent. And that simple silence was a powerful testimony to His innocence and to His dignity as the Son of God. And if you want to be a son or daughter of God you will do the very same thing. You will emulate Christ in all things. You will keep silent when abused or mistreated. The only thing that you must speak up for, is for the honor of God and for winning souls to the kingdom. Self is dead. There’s no defending oneself. You don’t have to remain in an abusive relationship if you can get out of it. I’m talking about when you mistreated for being a Christian.
The underground church is that part of the church which has learned that it is not called to defend buildings, denominations, assets, ways of life or its own interests. To prepare for the underground church, then, does not mean to prepare to fight against the church or the world, but rather to prepare not to. It means to prepare for the removal, the collapse, the dissolution or the absorption of the public church by the world.
To prepare for the underground church means to be fully Christian in the full heat of the day when every vestige of honor has been stripped from us by the world and there is nothing to clothe our nakedness but Christ’s own righteousness, His glory.
The time of preparation for the underground church is at hand. God’s remnant people are the impediment to the Sunday law. The sexual revolution is not the issue on which true Christians in general choose to make their stand, but rather the issue on which the governments and the secular people of the free world have chosen to make their stand against them. In the same way God’s remnant people do not choose to make their stand against the religious establishment on the Sabbath, rather it is the issue on which the religious establishment takes its stand against the remnant.
We are not accustomed to choosing between the Sabbath and the religious establishment, including the government. And we are not accustomed to being painted as repressors of freedom or of being criminals and lawbreakers. The world has always been hostile to the things of God. So, when the world, even the free world, moves to make freedom to sin by restricting the freedom not to sin, we realize that even in free countries, God’s people will be persecuted.
So, we cannot look for a pleasant place to live. We have to look for the place where God wants to reveal Himself and be there. Whereas governments in the free world have been seen by the public church as allies, this cannot and will not continue. They will become hostile to God’s remnant people; in fact, they already are. When the church views the government as its ally and participates in the benefits that it receives from the government, the government expects that the church will be its ally in return. It will ask the public church to compromise principles to support its agendas, including its religious agendas brought upon it by the religious establishment.
In this way, freedom of religion becomes reduced to freedom of worship for those who dissent from the orthodoxy of the official narrative or whatever the state demands. Freedom of worship only means that we may say what we wish inside our church buildings provided that does not impact anything we do outside of our church buildings. To cite a recent example, the church adopted the narrative of the government regarding the vaccine. It pressured people to remain silent and to cooperate with the government vaccine program. If you disagreed, you were cancelled. You were not given any platform or opportunity to speak of your dissent. Everything was geared so that nothing would lead to public criticism of the church. That is the bargain, or compromise, that the church made with the government. It suppressed every sentiment that disagreed with the official narrative. This is also true in society.
So, if you are going to be faithful to God, eventually you will not be able to worship in your public church buildings. And perhaps that’s why the underground church is more often found in the homes of its members rather than in the public worship places. If the government is going to place boundaries on the church, which it inevitably will, and which are under construction right now, you will have to meet for worship in alternative places. Christian liberty requires our preparation for religious life in the underground church.
Are you ready for the underground church? I think not. We need a lot of reforming of our spiritual mindset. We need a walk with Christ that accounts for suffering. Our emotions must be reformulated so that we can understand the hatred of the world. We need deep repentance so that Christ can make us ready. These first steps are essential so that we can understand in our DNA how to act and what to do when it becomes necessary for us to form the underground church.
Let us pray. Father in heaven, please help us understand the requirements of the underground church. Help us prepare for persecution and abuse. Please make us strong, we pray. Please stand by our side and let nothing come to us that you haven’t ordained. Thank you for this opportunity to think about these things. In Jesus’ name, amen.