The hostility against Christianity is rising in temperature now as we speak in Europe.
I believe that the wilderness spoken of in Revelation is probably inclusive of places people will flee from the "old world" to get away from the Antichrist, if they can.
At this time I think the North American continent would be included in what John viewed as the wilderness in the day he wrote
Revelation.
Some peoples will be absolutely hostile against the Christians and the Jews. And some people have to heed the supernatural calamities befalling the planet and realize that God is judging.
By that time it may be hard for some to know that there is a New Testament. To wear out the saints of the Most High is too terrible to imagine how the church passing through the tribulation will be persecuted.
But God sovereignly uses this to ripen His crop of believers to be the Harvest raptured in
Revelation 14:14-16.
"And I saw, and behold, there was a white cloud, and on the cloud One like the Son of Man sitting, having a golden crown on His head and a sharp sickle in His hand.
And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to Him who sat on the cloud, Send forth Your sickle and reap, for the hour to reap has come because the harvest of the earth is ripe.
And He who sat on the cloud thrust His sickle upon the earth, and the earth was reaped." (Rev. 14:14-16)
This is the latter rapture of the majority of the saints spoken of in
1 Thess. 4:17 .
The suffering saints are spiritually RIPENED in the heat of the three and one half year great tribulation.