The things which we must do to ensure our salvation are the same things we must do in preparation for the end times.
True. We must listen to what God says and follow the steps He tells us to take. Whether it is instruction about accepting the Gospel or instruction about what HE calls the "everlasting Gospel" in Rev 14:7 or instruction Christ gives in Matt 5 or instruction that we find in the "Revelation of Jesus Christ" in the book of Revelation.
The step of "ignore what God tells you and all will still be well" is not there.
Furthermore, they are irrelevant to this thread.
As long as we are actually paying attention to what God tells us in His Word, paying attention to the warnings He gives about everyone being duped at the end of time etc. Ignoring those warnings is like the Jews ignoring the warnings of John the baptizer and then saying to themselves "still -- all will be well".
It makes no sense.
What you and the Adventists liking your posts are ignoring is that the OP is not complaining about preparing for the Parousia
Everyone here - "including Adventists that post" are agreed on the basics of accepting the Gospel. The topic we are dealing with is all the Bible warnings for Christians at the end of time as found in Christ's words in Matt 24 and in the "Revelation of Jesus Christ" in the book of Revelation. IT is about the fact that the "rapture" event that you see in Matt 24 is preceded by a world wide delusion where even the elect would be taken in by it if they were not paying very close attention.
Christ had very devoted followers in John 6 and in other places - who had "left ALL and followed Christ" even when it was not popular with church leaders - but even THEY abandoned Christ at His arrest. Even THEY said in Luke 24 on resurrection sunday evening "we trusted that this was the one who would deliver Israel" - they were on the wrong side of the issue right down to the wire and even on resurrection Sunday evening.
This is not a trivial topic according to Jesus. Jesus said the delusion would be so strong it would deceive if possible "the very elect". He knows what He is talking about.
2 Thess 2 says it deceives those who do not have a LOVE of the truth -- It does not merely say "it deceives those who have no truth"
, but rather the tendency of Christians to be distracted from the repentence
No need to be "distracted from repentance" just because one reads and studies the words of Christ in Matt 24.
No need to argue that if you pay attention to Christ in Matt 5 you must ignore what He warns the saints about in Matt 24.
I don't see how that even gets to be "a thing"
I should think this would be particularly evident to Adventists given that in your innovative eschatology there is no intermediate state of Heaven or Hell before the Last Judgement, but rather anyone who dies, the next thing they know, will have awakened to face the dread judgement seat of Christ.
Well that is not what we teach.
We say that when one dies they are immediately awakened either at the resurrection and rapture event in Rev 19 and 1 Thess 4:13-18,... OR ELSE they are the the Rev 20 event that gets to the great white throne judgment in that chapter. In either case - for them it is immediate because in 1 Thess 4 and in 1 Cor 15 and in John 11 the intermediate state is a dormant state where the soul records no time passing... it is an instant.
in any case, if you suggest that what we must do to prepare for our own death (or, a point in our life where it becomes exceedingly difficult for us to repent and develop a true living faith and join the Church, for example, if we become mentally disabled as a result of a stroke, or traumatic brain injury, or Alzheimers or other forms of dementia one might broadly attribute to senility) is different from what we must do to prepare for the parousia
I did not write Matt 24 - it is Jesus speaking and what He does not say is "ignore all Bible warnings about the end of time -- just accept Me as your Savior".
as I noted in post #4 Jesus said in
Matt 24 "I have told you in advance" when warning against the massive fake second coming that is going to happen. He says that those who heed His warning, His clues -
need not be duped at the end. It looks like you are arguing that ignoring the warnings of Christ - and being duped at the end - is really not all the bad. Where do you get that from?? Are you thinking that if someone accepts Christ as Savior today then ignores all the warnings of Christ about not jumping off a cliff and so they jump anyway - that all will be well with them as they are "not" following Christ?
IN
Matt 7 Jesus said a certain thing about those who hear His words but do not follow them.
21 “Not everyone
who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven,
but the one who does the will of My Father who is in heaven
will enter. 22
Many will say to Me on that day,
‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’
"24 “Therefore,
everyone who hears these words of Mine, and acts on them, will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock."
Matt 4:4 But He answered and said, “It is written:
‘Man shall not live on bread alone,
but on every word that comes out of the mouth of God.’”
Matt 24:23 Then if anyone says to you, ‘
Behold, here is the Christ,’ or ‘
He is over here,’
do not believe him. 24 For
false christs and false prophets will arise and will provide
great signs and wonders, so as to
mislead, if possible, even the elect. 25
Behold, I have told you in advance. 26 So if they say to you, ‘Behold, He is in the wilderness,’ do not go out;
or, ‘Behold, He is in the inner rooms,’
do not believe them.
2 Thess 2:8 Then that lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will eliminate with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; 9
that is, the
one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and false signs and wonders, 10 and with
all the deception of wickedness for those
who perish, because they did not accept the love of the truth so as to be saved. 11 For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence
so that they will believe what is false, 12 in order that they all may be
judged who did not believe the truth
Rev 13:13 He
performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down out of the sky to the earth in the presence of people. 14 And
he deceives those who live on the earth because of the signs which it was given him to perform
2 Cor 11:14 even
Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.
========================
A lot of folks in Noah's day living thousands of miles from the Ark could have been saying "I am just trusting God.. why pay attention to those warnings Noah has been giving for 120 years... when I can just trust God". Trusting God by faithfully ignoring His warnings is not the best kind of "trust" that there is.
A lot of folks in Israel would cry out "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord" Jer 7:4 -- yet it was destroyed.