(“God will invade. But I wonder whether people who ask God to interfere openly and directly in our world quite realise what it will be like when He does.” – C. S. Lewis, Beyond Personality)

Imagine you are a German living in Berlin in 1943. The car plant at which you’ve worked for 12 years has been repurposed to produce Panzer tanks. Each day, you make weapons of destruction. Each night, you go home to your family and try not to think about the war. You go on picnics, review your children’s schoolwork, and try to be a good parent.

Two years from now, the Soviets will surround the city, east and west. They will pound it with artillery. The Fuhrer will take his own life. On May 2, German commanders will surrender to the Americans. It was, despite the propaganda, inevitable.

When the Americans drop their bombs, and the Soviets march into your city, your neighborhood, your factory, you can reassure yourself that you are a good person, a loving parent, and a faithful spouse – which might be true – but it doesn’t change the fact that you are on the wrong side. You may receive clemency. You may be granted amnesty. But you can’t go on doing what your doing – making tanks – as if nothing has happened.

Earth, like Berlin in 1945, is going to be invaded. It is called the second coming. All of us (Jews, Hindus, Christians, Muslims, atheists, Westerners, Easterners, young and old) assume that we are on the right side. But we have misunderstood our situation.

Imagine that an alien race makes war on the earth. Their forces land in the United States and no one can resist them. On their sweep of your city, they come to your house to take you away. But you say, “But … but … I am a Republican. I go to church. I give to the United Way.”

And they say, “I don’t care if you are a Republican, a church-goer, or a philanthropist. You are on the wrong side.”

Because we look at this backwards, we come to the wrong conclusion. Humanity – not this or that part of it, not religious or irreligious, gays or straights, Democrats or Republicans, but humanity itself – is on the wrong side. We were born on the wrong side – the losing side – and we don’t even know it.

We listen to the propaganda. We take for granted that we are the good guys and don’t even consider what God thinks or says. We leave him out of the picture. Or if we bring him in – as many people do – it is to be our supporter.

Imagine that you’ve invited a family into your home because the parents lost their jobs and were being evicted in the middle of winter, with no place to go. You tell them the house is theirs to use, right down to the food in the refrigerator. You’re going to be spending four months in Florida and that should give them plenty of time to find jobs and look for housing.

When you come back from Florida, your key no longer works because their is no longer a keyhole. Your “guests” have installed a keyless entry system. So, you knock; but no one comes to the door. You try calling, but your call goes straight to voicemail. The next time you call, it doesn’t even do that. They have told themselves that the house is theirs so often that they have come to believe their own lie. They’ve also told their friends the house is theirs, and they believe it too.

You send letters, entreating them to talk to you. You try reason, display patience, extend the deadline, but they act like you don’t exist. At some point, for the sake of truth, for the sake of the neighborhood, even for the sake of their squatter souls, you will take back what is rightfully yours. When you do, they may say, “But I am a Republican!” Or, “I give to United Way!” Or even, “But I go to church!” Maybe so, but they are on the wrong side.

If they will acknowledge your ownership of the house, their relationship with you might be restored even now because you are merciful and kind. But if they continue to disregard you and yours, this simply cannot end well for them.

When humans stopped acknowledging God’s ownership of the planet, they became squatters. When they refused to submit to his rule, they became rebels. At some point, for the sake of truth, for the sake of the neighborhood (humans are not the only ones living in the neighborhood), and for the sake of our own souls, God will take back what is rightfully his. It won’t matter then if we are Republicans or Democrats, churchgoers, or charity benefactors, if we are on the wrong side.

The good news (the gospel) declares that, even though we have acted like God doesn’t exist, even though we have used the planet that belongs to him as if it were ours to do with as we please, even though we have misused the people who live on it as though they were not the heavenly Father’s people, the relationship can be restored. It is not too late. Forgiveness has been extended. God is more merciful and kinder than we can imagine.

When we realize that we have been looking at this backwards, when what is really happening finally becomes clear to us, it becomes possible to adjust our lives to a reality – the reality – of a world in which God is not only active but is the axis around which all things revolve. But this needs to happen before the invasion begins; afterwards, it will be too late.