Never in history has one word so frequently fallen from human lips as has the term “coronavirus.”  

If you Google “coronavirus” you will get about 2,580,000,000 results! As of May 12, there were a reported 1,342,594 cases with 80,820 deaths in the USA.

The pandemic has resulted in the largest number of shutdowns/lockdowns worldwide at the same time in history. A report by Business Insider shows that more than a third of the world population is currently on some form of a coronavirus lockdown, meaning their movement is being actively restricted and controlled by their respective governments.

However, I want to focus on another virus – a spiritual virus - that has been going on for over 150 years and has and will continue until corrected to impact countries and cultures more devastatingly than any biological virus ever has or will.

This complicated virus is called “The Last Day Madness Virus."  The symptoms of this virus cause one to run a high "rapture fever" that leads to "acute, anticipatory, accelerational, abstruse, answerless, spiritual paralysis.

Last Day Madness virus has weakened the Church and caused her to believe that She is going to end up in an apathetic, apostate, peripheral condition, with only a minority of faithful ones to be snatched away when Jesus returns. If one believes that we are living in the "Laodicean" period of church history, and that it is predestined to end in apostasy and abject failure as a whole, then we begin to receive according to that level of our faith and achieve on the same paltry and pathetic level. 

For generations the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, for the most part, (especially in America) has assumed the tail and not the head, the peripheral and not the central, and the belief that our only hope for the future is getting off the planet ASAP.

A vision of the future that doesn’t see Christ the Lord reigning now and the Church co-reigning with him; a vision of the future that doesn’t see the Redeemed People of Faith, the Church, as the center of God’s plan will produce a people who spend more time looking for the Anti-Christ to be manifested than praying for the power of Christ to be manifested. After all we've been taught by prophecy experts that, "the sooner the church gets revival-high, the quicker we go to the rooms in the sky. And the quicker the world corrupts the sooner we will erupt; the quicker the sinner is captured by the anti-Christ, the sooner the saint is raptured to the actual Christ; the sooner the sinner fries, the quicker the saint flies.” Dennis Peacock said, "We're the only team I've ever played on that preaches a victorious Christ and roots for the opposition (the anti-Christ) to win so that we can get off the field!"

For several generations, this spiritual virus has infected the Church with a condition that has caused Her to become blind to the "Great Reign Robbery!” She has imbibed the teaching espoused by John Nelson Darby and spread through the footnotes of C. I. Scofield’s Reference Bible. We have been taught that Jesus tried to set himself up as King of the Jews, but they rejected him and stymied His kingdom initiation, so he had postpone Plan A and go back into Heaven where he sits on a throne reigning in Heaven, but not over the world because Satan reigns over it. This postponement necessitated putting Plan B into force. This view posits the New Testament Church as a parenthesis, a peripheral, an off-centered part of God's plan, implemented when Plan A, the supposed offer of the kingdom by Jesus was rejected by the Jews of His day.

Last Day Madness virus causes its victims, i.e. millions of Christians, to expect to lose in history. It convinces them that Jesus was wrong when he asserted in John 16:7 that it was to our advantage that he goes away instead of being physically present on the earth. It convinces them that they are the reserve army, kept here to hold the fort until the main army from heaven, lead by King Jesus, comes and rescues them from the hordes of hell that have surrounded them and cut them off from the center, and contained them in stained glass forts called worship centers, where they meet, eat, and have retreats. They live in fear of what’s coming on the earth instead of in Who has already come to the earth.

Pay close attention! If you see the Church as the tail and not the head; if you see Her as a fragmented, rag-tag band of losers, so pale, anemic and demoralized that She has to be evacuated before the battle is finished; if you see Her as having no glory and might, no triumph or splendor attached to the Her, because those attributes are all reserved to be lavished later upon national Israel; if you see Her this way instead of as a powerful, love-filled, life-abounding, militant, triumphant Bride, wearing the spiritual boots of the gospel of peace, marching from victory unto victory, then you have become infected with the complicated "Last Day Madness" virus. 

Gary DeMar (author of the excellent book titled Last Day Madness) notes, “A hundred years or more of this type of teaching created a vacuum into which secularism has rushed in to occupy the void. Millions of Christians sat back and watched the world disintegrate around them as they waited for an escape that was always said to be near but never came. We are now paying the price for our neglect.

“The cry continues to be for some apocalyptic “miracle” to save us from the ever-expanding shadow of darkness. The miracle has already come. Jesus lived and died, rising from the dead to sit at His Father’s right hand (Acts 2:32–36) where “He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet” (1 Cor. 15:25).

“The rescue came nearly 2000 years ago in a manger in Bethlehem. The church’s duty is to go into all the world and “make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all” that Jesus commanded (Matt. 28:19–20).”

What’s the Cure for Last Day Madness Virus?

Repent and relearn what the Great Physician, Jesus has to say about His Church. He would have you see that the Church is first, foremost, and forever in His Life. He would have His Church grasp the truth as to Her true identity, authority, ministry, and destiny. Jesus wants His Church to see Herself as believers who are seated now with Him in heavenly places (Eph. 2:6) where She is already blessed with all spiritual blessings (Eph 1:3). We now are heirs to the promises made to Abraham (Gal. 3:29) and heirs of God, joint-heirs with Christ (Rom. 8:17). We now are members of the household of God (Eph. 2:19) and a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation and God's special people (1 Pet. 2:9). We have already been translated into the kingdom of God (Col. 1:13) and we are now kings and priests unto God (Rev. 1:6) and reigning in this life (Rom. 5:17). As Believers we sing "the songs of Zion" (Ps. 137:3) because we alone are: "The children of promise" (Rom. 9:8; Gal. 4:28). "Abraham's seed" (Gal. 3:29). "Heirs according to the promise" (Gal. 3:29). "The Israel of God" (Gal. 6:16). "The circumcision" (Phil. 3:3)."The elect of God" (Col. 3:12). "A people of his own" (Ti. 2:14 - RSV)."A chosen generation" (1 Pet. 2:9). "An holy nation" (1 Pet. 2:9)."A peculiar people" (1 Pet. 2:9). "A royal priesthood" (1 Pet. 2:9)."Kings and priests unto God" (Rev. 1:6). "Heirs of the kingdom" (Jas. 2:5) "The city of the living God" (Heb. 12:22)."Mount Zion" (Heb. 12:22)."The holy city" (Rev. 21:2)."The temple of God" (1 Cor. 3:16).

It's time to get a “Holy Spirit” inoculation, i.e. be filled with the Spirit, that will destroy the “Last Day Madness” virus and replace it with “love, power, and a sound mind” that lives in faith and not fear. This virus killing abundant life clears one’s vision enabling them to see that the prospects of the future are as bright as the promises of God; that the truth of the gospel of the kingdom is more powerful than the lies of the defeated devil; and that the Lamb of God shall have the reward of His sufferings - a people who are as the sand of the Sea in number!