There are kinds of trouble in churches today which can go on for many decades. However, right now, there aren’t many decades left. Not much time to clean things up, but if we don’t we can end up in the lake of fire. In the earliest days of churches there was much more time to try to fix things, but also more time for things to go wrong. Back in the very beginning things were pure and innocent, once people, through Jesus, escaped bad ways. But always there were then the corrupters who spoilt it all and also introduced false doctrines. It is no different today. A church or assembly can be going fine, even being blessed with gifts of the Holy Spirit. Then corrupters spoil it all. They get people behaving badly again. They fill peoples heads with erroneous doctrines. They get a kick out of it. The false doctrines they left behind in the past are still here many decades later. Probably this is because they did not only introduce heresies, but they corrupted the people, including the pastors and teachers, turning people back to the bad ways they had given up when they turned to Christ. These then in turn were tempted to derive gain and get kicks out of persisting the falsehoods, and corrupting others. That could account for all the strange doctrines around today, but also all the bad, unchristian behaviour. It all goes hand in hand. Bad corrupted behaviour; bad corrupted doctrines. And there is not much time left, not enough, to fix it before Jesus Christ comes again. What will the Master say and do? It won’t be nice. For some the tribulation might be the opportunity to clean those robes, so to speak: To find that the same devotion needed to endure the tribulation and not take the mark, is the same devotion that helps spur things on with cleaning up behaviour and doctrine before the Christ comes. “Those who have suffered in the flesh have done with sin.” “Arm yourselves with this same attitude.”
