Note 58 — THE “TEACHING OF THE TWELVE APOSTLES”

Chap. XVI.—Watch for your life; let not your lamps be gone out, and let not your loins be loosed, but be ready; for ye know not the hour in which our Lord cometh. But ye shall come together often, and seek the things which befit your souls; for the whole time of your faith will not profit you, if ye be not made perfect in the last season. For in the last days the false prophets and the corruptors shall be multiplied, and the sheep shall be turned into wolves, and love shall be turned into hate; for when lawlessness increaseth they shall hate one another, and shall persecute and shall deliver up; and then shall appear the world-deceiver as the Son of God,58 and shall do signs and wonders, and the earth shall be given unto his hands, and he shall commit iniquities which have never yet been done since the beginning. Then all created men shall come into the fire of trial, and many shall be made to stumble and shall perish. But they that endure in their faith shall be saved from under even this curse. And then shall appear the signs of truth; first the sign of an opening59 in heaven, then the sign of a trumpet’s voice, and thirdly, the resurrection of the dead; yet not of all,60 but as it hath been said: The Lord will come and all the saints with him. Then shall the world see the Lord coming upon the clouds of heaven.