The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 99

The First Step in Overcoming

The first step in overcoming the self is to repent of the self.

Christ sent His disciples out to preach that people should repent.

Mark 6 (WEB)
12) They went out and preached that people should repent.

After Pentecost, Peter preached that people should repent and be converted.

Acts 3:19 (KJV)
Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out…

Converted became a religious word, but the Greek word translated converted, “epistrepho, ” simply means to turn.

As in Matthew 9:22.

Matt 9:20-22 (WEB)
20) Behold, a woman who had an issue of blood for twelve years came behind him, and touched the fringe of his garment;
21) for she said within herself, “If I just touch his garment, I will be made well.”
22) But Yeshua turning around [epistrepho] and seeing her, said, “Daughter, cheer up! Your faith has made you well.” And the woman was made well from that hour.

The English Standard Version renders Acts 3:19 as —

Acts 3 (ESV2011)
19) Repent therefore, and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out…

So to repent means to turn – to turn away from disobedience to God’s Commandments. Most of all, to repent is to turn away from the disobedient self.

When can you stop turning away from yourself?

You can’t. Repentance is required before baptism, but repentance is not limited to that time. To avoid returning to your foolish ways, repentance must be continual.Overcoming the self demands continuous repentance of the self. When you grow to be so Christian that you stop repenting, then you stop being Christian.

Repeatedly the New Testament speaks of repenting, the first step in overcoming.

Matt 4 (WEB)
16) the people who sat in darkness saw a great light, to those who sat in the region and shadow of death, to them light has dawned.”
17) From that time, Yeshua began to preach, and to say, “Repent! For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.”

Modern Christianity, however, does not emphasize overcoming, but instead emphasizes –

Just coming on over.

Attendance, not repentance.

First of all, most churches don’t even acknowledge what sin is – the transgression of the law. They look at repentance as just being sorrowful for having done wrong. Repentance, though, is not just sorrow for doing wrong, but a turning away from the self that does wrong.

2Cor 7 (WEB)
8) For though I made you sorry with my letter, I do not regret it, though I did regret it. For I see that my letter made you sorry, though just for a while.
9) I now rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that you were made sorry to repentance. For you were made sorry in a godly way, that you might suffer loss by us in nothing.
10) For godly sorrow works repentance to salvation, which brings no regret. But the sorrow of the world works death.

The Corinthians were made sorry to repentance, and godly sorrow works repentance. Sorrow itself is not repentance, but can lead to repentance and overcoming.

But churches do not teach overcoming, just coming on over. In fact, just the act of attending church is viewed as righteous, regardless of what the church teaches. It’s like God puts a gold star by people’s names each time they attend church. Then they go home feeling good about themselves, just because they went to church, but then keep on doing the same things they’ve always done. The pro-abortion Catholic politicians are prime examples of this. They oppose most of what their church teaches, but religiously attend church and take communion.

And their church lets them do that! Because they just keep coming on over.

Most churches make people feel good about themselves, not to repent of themselves. After all, they’re attending church!

But do those Catholic pro-abortion politicians ever get around to repenting?

Churches say they first have to get sinners to come to church, then they will tell them to repent.

When unrepentant sinners come to a church, what usually happens if the church does teach repentance?

They leave.

Repent means to change what you’re doing, thinking, and being! So if a church dares to tell the new sinners that they have to change –

Most won’t attend any more.

People do not like to be told they need to repent.

Acts 26 (WEB) Paul said to King Agrippa –
20) but declared first to them of Damascus, at Jerusalem, and throughout all the country of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, doing works worthy of repentance.
21) For this reason the Jews seized me in the temple, and tried to kill me.

Paul preached that people should repent and turn, doing works that showed they had turned.

Those Jews did not like to be told to repent. They felt their religion put them above repenting – they attended synagogue every week! – so they tried to kill the guy who told them to repent. They proved they didn’t like to be reproved!

Actually, people like to be told how good they are. I have seen this repeatedly at Feast services, as a ploy to get people to keep coming to those services. To reprove the people is to move the people –

Out the door.

Amos 5 (ESV2011)
10) They hate him who reproves in the gate, and they abhor him who speaks the truth.

Churches of all kinds value attendance above all. They think that if they have more people attending, then they must be pleasing God. Especially if they build a new building! If churches offend people by telling them to repent, and those unrepentant people stop attending church, then how can the church serve those people?

This puts churches are in a pew-pickle.

The church needs people to fill its pews just to be a church. But if the church exhorts, reproves and rebukes, as Paul told Timothy to do, then the churches’ pews will be empty and it may no longer even be a church!

So then, what keeps people from repenting and overcoming?

1. Churches do.

Gather a bunch of people together who are not serious about their calling, not repentant, and as long as nobody upsets the apple cart – nobody exhorts, reproves and rebukes! – then they all think they’re doing great. No need to repent when part of such a wonderful church.

Even churches that know the Ten Commandments are to be obeyed as God’s “royal law” stop preaching repentance and instead teach complacence – which the dictionary defines as “contented self-satisfaction.” Over and over the people will be told how blessed they are to be in that church.

The Pharisees thought that because Abraham was their father, they didn’t need to personally repent. They were the “true church.” People in “God’s true church” don’t really need to repent, do they? So churches almost always keep people from personally repenting.

What else keeps people from repenting?

2. Involvement in the world

Being too involved with the world makes you think like the world. How does the world think?

2Pet 3 (WEB)
3) knowing this first, that in the last days mockers will come, walking after their own lusts,
4) and saying, “Where is the promise of his coming? For, from the day that the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.”

The world’s attitude is that God is irrelevant – “all things continue on as they were from the beginning.” Get comfortable in the world, because things are going to go on just as they have been. No need to repent. Just relax.

But when Paul told Timothy to rebuke, he told him to be urgent.

2Tim 4 (WEB)
2) preach the word; be urgent in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with all patience and teaching.

We cannot be the salt of the earth and the salt of Sodom. The salt of Sodom was Lot’s wife. She gave up her life because she didn’t want to give up the world.

1John 2 (WEB)
15) Don’t love the world, neither the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the Father’s love isn’t in him.
16) For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, isn’t the Father’s, but is the world’s.

At the very end time, people of the world love the beast. What is the beast? It’s the worldwide economic system developing today.

Rev 18 (WEB)
15) The merchants of these things, who were made rich by her, will stand far away for the fear of her torment, weeping and mourning;
16) saying, ‘Woe, woe, the great city, she who was dressed in fine linen, purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls!
17) For in an hour such great riches are made desolate.’ Every shipmaster, and everyone who sails anywhere, and mariners, and as many as gain their living by sea, stood far away,
18) and cried out as they looked at the smoke of her burning, saying, ‘What is like the great city?’
19) They cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and mourning, saying, ‘Woe, woe, the great city, in which all who had their ships in the sea were made rich by reason of her great wealth!’ For in one hour is she made desolate.

The people of the end time are made rich by the beast power, and they love it.

So love of the world keeps us from repenting of ourselves. We’re too busy in the world to repent of being like the world.

And then what else keeps us from repenting?

3. Self love

The great deception of the human heart is conceit. After all, almost all drivers are above average!

The most common mistake in life is to underestimate life and overestimate yourself. An overestimated self does not repent of itself.

Why didn’t the five squeaky virgins repent?

Matt 25
1) “Then the Kingdom of Heaven will be like ten virgins, who took their lamps, and went out to meet the bridegroom.
2) Five of them were foolish, and five were wise.
3) Those who were foolish, when they took their lamps, took no oil with them,
4) but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.

Why were the five squeaky virgins squeaky? They didn’t have enough oil.

Why didn’t the five squeaky virgins repent? They didn’t think they needed to.

So churches, the world and self-love can keep us from repenting.

The Passover/Unleavened Bread Feast is a beloved observance of continuous repentance.

1Cor 11 (WEB)
28) But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread, and drink of the cup.
29) For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy way eats and drinks judgment to himself, if he doesn’t discern the Lord’s body.
30) For this cause many among you are weak and sickly, and not a few sleep.
31) For if we discerned ourselves, we wouldn’t be judged.
32) But when we are judged, we are punished by the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world.

Each year that festival requires humble repentance, remembering the blood of the Lamb. After the Messiah overcame Satan and the world, He totally overcame Himself when He gave Himself. That is our standard of overcoming, and that’s humbling.

We are not to compare ourselves with each other.

2Cor 10 (WEB)
12) For we are not bold to number or compare ourselves with some of those who commend themselves. But they themselves, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves with themselves, are without understanding.

We are not to compare ourselves with each other. True repentance comes from –

Comparing ourselves to God.

Job is a monumental lesson in repentance.

Job 1 WEB)
8) Yahweh said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant, Job? For there is none like him in the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil.”

None like Job in the earth!

But what did Job need?

Job needed personal repentance.

How did God bring Job to repentance?

By comparing Job to Himself.

Job 38
1) Then Yahweh answered Job out of the whirlwind,
2) “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge?
3) Brace yourself like a man, for I will question you, then you answer me!
4) “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if you have understanding.

Well, where was Job when Yahweh laid the foundations of the earth?

Job wasn’t.

Job was not even a glimmer in old man Job’s eye. Job’s old man wasn’t around then, either, or Job’s grandfather, or great-grandfather, or…

When Yahweh laid the foundations of the earth, Job and all his predecessors all the way back to Adam and Eve were not. Strike one on Job.

Job 39 (WEB)
26) “Is it by your wisdom that the hawk soars, and stretches her wings toward the south?
27) Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up, and makes his nest on high?

Job raised animals, but he did so by working with the way they were already made. Job never made the hawk soar, or the sheep bleat, or the goats jump. God did, and Yahweh made the eagles nest the way they do, way up high. Like us, Job just watched them, like us: “Oh, look! There’s an eagle!”

Strike two on Job.

Job 40 (WEB)
6) Then Yahweh answered Job out of the whirlwind,
7) “Now brace yourself like a man. I will question you, and you will answer me.
8) Will you even annul my judgment? Will you condemn me, that you may be justified?
9) Or do you have an arm like God? Can you thunder with a voice like him?
10) “Now deck yourself with excellency and dignity. Array yourself with honor and majesty.
11) Pour out the fury of your anger. Look at everyone who is proud, and bring him low.
12) Look at everyone who is proud, and humble him. Crush the wicked in their place.
13) Hide them in the dust together. Bind their faces in the hidden place.
14) Then I will also admit to you that your own right hand can save you.

This is the great error of human nature. We know we will die at some time, and we know we might die at any time, but we act like we will never die, and that somehow we can save our lives by our own efforts.

Job’s right hand could not save him. God’s could.

Strike three.

Job 42 (WEB)
1) Then Job answered Yahweh,
2) “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be restrained.
3) You asked, ‘Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?’ therefore I have uttered that which I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I didn’t know.
4) You said, ‘Listen, now, and I will speak; I will question you, and you will answer me.’
5) I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you.
6) Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.”

Job was the most outstanding man on earth in his time, “none like him in the earth.” The story of Job is the repentance of Job when he was compared, not to other people because there were none like him, but compared to Yahweh God Almighty. With that comparison, Job abhorred himself, and that was probably an overestimation.

Job is kind of a picture of the old covenant-new covenant. Job did certain things; in fact, he did everything he knew to obey. But all that did not make him righteous as God is righteous. Only God is righteous as God is righteous.

Here is an astounding fact –

Religion can sometimes work against itself. Amazingly, the human heart is so treacherous than even doing good can lead to doing bad.

As with these fine men.

2Chr 26 (WEB)\
4) He [Uzziah]did that which was right in the eyes of Yahweh, …
5) He set himself to seek God… and as long as he sought Yahweh, God made him to prosper.

16) But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up, so that he did corruptly, and he trespassed against Yahweh his God; for he went into the temple of Yahweh to burn incense on the altar of incense.
17) Azariah the priest went in after him, and with him eighty priests of Yahweh, who were valiant men:
18) and they resisted Uzziah the king, and said to him, “It isn’t for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to Yahweh, but for the priests the sons of Aaron, who are consecrated to burn incense. Go out of the sanctuary; for you have trespassed; neither shall it be for your honor from Yahweh God.”
19) Then Uzziah was angry; and he had a censer in his hand to burn incense; and while he was angry with the priests, the leprosy broke forth in his forehead before the priests in the house of Yahweh, beside the altar of incense.
20) Azariah the chief priest, and all the priests, looked on him, and behold, he was leprous in his forehead, and they thrust him out quickly from there; yes, himself hurried also to go out, because Yahweh had struck him.
21) Uzziah the king was a leper to the day of his death, and lived in a separate house, being a leper; for he was cut off from the house of Yahweh: and Jotham his son was over the king’s house, judging the people of the land.

2Chr 32 (WEB)
21) Yahweh sent an angel, who cut off all the mighty men of valor, and the leaders and captains, in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned with shame of face to his own land. When he had come into the house of his god, those who came forth from his own bowels killed him there with the sword.
22) Thus Yahweh saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib the king of Assyria, and from the hand of all others, and guided them on every side.
23) Many brought gifts to Yahweh to Jerusalem, and precious things to Hezekiah king of Judah; so that he was exalted in the sight of all nations from thenceforth.
24) In those days Hezekiah was sick even to death: and he prayed to Yahweh; and he spoke to him, and gave him a sign.
25) But Hezekiah didn’t render again according to the benefit done to him; for his heart was lifted up: therefore there was wrath on him, and on Judah and Jerusalem.
26) Notwithstanding Hezekiah humbled himself for the pride of his heart, both he and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the wrath of Yahweh didn’t come on them in the days of Hezekiah.

2Chr 35 (WEB)
18) There was no Passover like that kept in Israel from the days of Samuel the prophet; neither did any of the kings of Israel keep such a Passover as Josiah kept, and the priests, and the Levites, and all Judah and Israel who were present, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
19) In the eighteenth year of the reign of Josiah was this Passover kept.
20) After all this, when Josiah had prepared the temple, Neco king of Egypt went up to fight against Carchemish by the Euphrates: and Josiah went out against him.
21) But he sent ambassadors to him, saying, “What have I to do with you, you king of Judah? I come not against you this day, but against the house with which I have war. God has commanded me to make haste. Beware that it is God who is with me, that he not destroy you.”
22) Nevertheless Josiah would not turn his face from him, but disguised himself, that he might fight with him, and didn’t listen to the words of Neco from the mouth of God, and came to fight in the valley of Megiddo.
23) The archers shot at king Josiah; and the king said to his servants, “Take me away, because I am seriously wounded!”
24) So his servants took him out of the chariot, and put him in the second chariot that he had, and brought him to Jerusalem; and he died, and was buried in the tombs of his fathers. All Judah and Jerusalem mourned for Josiah.

Uzziah, Hezekiah, Josiah – along with Asa and Jehoshaphat, were the very best kings that ruled over the kingdoms of Judah and Israel. Yet their doing well set them up to fall, when they stopped being personally repentant. For a short while, they stopped overcoming.

How does that apply to us?

After being in the truth for years, after being in the “church” for years, after following God’s way for years, we can reach a point where we stop being personally repentant.

This is the end time, the last days, the final epoch of this age of humanity. Humans are now even reversing Babel.

Gen 11 (WEB)
6) Yahweh said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is what they begin to do. Now nothing will be withheld from them, which they intend to do.

This is the end time, when nothing will be withheld from them which they intend to do, except they’re not allowed to destroy all humanity. For however long it lasts, we are now in the last part of this age of humanity.

Rev 18 (WEB)
21) A mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and cast it into the sea, saying, “Thus with violence will Babylon, the great city, be thrown down, and will be found no more at all.
22) The voice of harpists, minstrels, flute players, and trumpeters will be heard no more at all in you. No craftsman, of whatever craft, will be found any more at all in you. The sound of a mill will be heard no more at all in you.
23) The light of a lamp will shine no more at all in you. The voice of the bridegroom and of the bride will be heard no more at all in you; for your merchants were the princes of the earth; for with your sorcery all the nations were deceived.
24) In her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been slain on the earth.”

This end time revival of the old Roman economic system is now shaping up. With her sorcery all the nations will be deceived. Only overcomers will endure through this. Repentance is a never-ending attitude, admitting to yourself that you need to overcome yourself. Always admitting it. If you abhor yourself in dust and ashes, then you will repent of that self.

The first step in overcoming is personal repentance. The last step in overcoming is personal repentance.