Many Adventists are spellbound as they watch world events, and try to give each worldly political maneuver some biblical significance. For example, every move that the church of Rome makes is carefully analyzed. Many of our members are deeply concerned about the prospects of a Sunday law. These are events which are significant, but a Sunday law cannot come until there is a people willing to face such a law. The Lord must wait until they are ready.
In the meantime the four angels are fulfilling their assigned task of holding the four winds (Rev. 7:1). Even as the entire world becomes "the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit," drunken and rich through corrupt practices, so the angels fail not to fulfill their assignment (Rev. 18:2). No matter how rebellious the world may become, the integrity of these heavenly messengers must hold until they "have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads" (Rev. 7:3).
This is not a postponement of probation's close, but it is the ultimate outworking of the mystery of godliness, vanquishing the mystery of iniquity. These two mysteries come to fruition simultaneously, while the overcomers of the end-time will be claimed as God's property and sealed as His for eternity. Until that sealing takes place, the depths of sin can know no bounds. The world may face a thousand whirlwinds of conflict and global confrontations, but all these, terrible as they may be cannot precipitate the second advent. This planet can only become progressively worse until there is a people who can stand in the glory of the Lord's righteousness which is a consuming fire to sin (2 Thes. 2:8).