“Because of the actions of the Holy Spirit, and the angels, and particularly the message ‘lifting up Jesus’ instead of us, shortly before He returns, lukewarm people will disappear. This mass polarization (everyone going either cold or hot) will be a major movement before the end of the world. When Jesus returns, He brings only two rewards: one for the ‘hot’ and one for the ‘cold (or the sheep and the goats or the tares and the wheat or the good and the bad or the righteous and the wicked or the wise and the foolish). Scripture describes these final groups in different ways – bur there are always only two groups.
“Anthropologists tell us that morals in San Francisco slipped more in one year than in all fifty years before combined [this was written in 1999]. And the Bay area is probably not alone. One of these days you’ll be walking down the street and suddenly you realize that the people around you are either ‘very, very good’ or they’re ‘horrid.’ Only the two extremes.
“What would cause this shake-up or ‘shaking’? It’s the result of the Holy Spirit withdrawing from those who aren’t interested or serious about their relationship with Christ. There is also the rise of a message some call ‘the loud cry’ (a message emphasizing the righteousness of Christ instead of our own filthy rags. History reveals that whenever Jesus is lifted up, people go one way or the other. Wherever the apostle Paul went, determined to know nothing save Jesus Christ and Him crucified, there was either a revival or a riot. No one stayed the same. And that’s still true today.” -- Morris Venden, Nothing to Fear: Devotions for the End Time, 1999, p. 40.
“But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.” – John 12:32