I have been feeling an urgency that we, the people who are called by His name, ought to WAKE UP to the times and seasons we are living in… and to RISE UP to the positions Yeshua is calling each of us into.

It is a year of SERIOUS PREPARATION OF THE HEART.

In Asia, current affairs really started to catch my attention when the Myanmar military coup d’etat happened in 2021. A slew of events then unfolded in the tail end of 2025 – Fires, flooding, violence, earthquakes. Not an isolated event, but a pattern.

Closer to home in 2026, an earthquake that rocked in Sabah caused shakings in various parts of Singapore in February this year. The US-Israel’s attack on Iran also threatens oil spikes to an unsustainable level.

This isn’t new.

Jesus and His disciples were living in tumultuous times when God’s people, the Israelites, were groaning under immense oppression by both the religious elites and the Roman Empires. God had not spoken through His prophets for almost 400 years.

It almost seemed like God had forgotten about His covenanted people.

The ache was real.

A people left broken and hopeless – in grief but holding desperately to hope.

When Yeshua came, He proclaimed His kingdom with such authority. People everywhere whispered, questioned, and debated. They uttered with a faint hope that He could be Messiah, the One prophesied to save.

Against this context, the disciples asked an all-important question… 

“As he sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?”

Matthew 24:3 ESV

The disciples were asking Jesus when He would restore the kingdom, and when He would restore all things.

Jesus then went to speak of the signs that the disciples should look out for:

• Many will come in Christ’s name to lead many astray (24:3)
• Wars and rumours of wars, nations against nations, kingdoms against kingdoms (24:6-7)
• Famines and earthquakes (24:7)

These are only birth pangs pointing to His coming. When we watch the world today and see of these, we can respond in two ways:

• PREPARE: the wise virgins in Jesus’ parable brought extra oil in their lamps and trimmed the lamp’s wicks. They were ready for the Bridegroom, even though they had fallen asleep with the foolish virgins.

• NEGLECT: the foolish virgins were also called of the Lord, but they neglected the work of preparation in their own hearts. Outwardly they looked the same, devoted (hence a virgin) and waiting for the Bridegroom, but when He came, they were unprepared and missed Him altogether.

Let us remember this…

That to follow Him means to suffer.

That His kingdom and ways look nothing like this world.

That it is in the hidden inner life where we truly find the Kingdom of God, which is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

God is turning the pages of history. Jesus came, He has come, He is coming back for His bride. But before all that, if we think we can escape the persecution of our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world for their faith in Christ, then we are in grave danger of not taking heed to God’s word in Matthew 24:

“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake.”

Matthew 24:9 ESV

We can’t have both Kingdom and Babylon.

Are there excesses in you that give place to the world? Are you still desiring the fruit of the tree of good and evil because it looked good? Are you wanting to make it to heaven and yet indulging in the sins of your flesh? Or are you feeling safe because the war afar does not affect your day-to-day?

Wake up.
Trim the fat. Trim your wicks.
He is closer than you think.