Daniel 7 | Dominion and Judgment

So, it's good to be back, Sandy and I had one of the opportunities to see God's creation last week. If you go to Wyoming, the valley in the Grand Tetons is called Jackson Hole, and those mountains are so stark and majestic, you can't help but recognize the handiwork of God.

But I had a good substitute teaching last week when I wasn't here, so I had confidence in him. Thank you. He finished us up with the first half of Daniel, we are now in the second half. The first half, the first six chapters, we're talking about Babylon, and then we touch into Medo-Persia, and it's how the history has proven the sovereignty of God.

Daniel 7 and the Sovereignty of God in World History

So that, now having had the sovereignty of God proven, we go into the next part and we're going to be looking more at prophetic proclamations that the book has to make, and if we've already proven the sovereignty of God, we can trust the sovereignty of God for what is to be said.

Daniel 7 is going to take us in a panoramic view of the history to come from Daniel's time, although it touches back into Babylon, but it's one chapter that takes us all the way from the 7th century B .C. all the way into the end times in one chapter.

We know it's true because this is the sovereignty of God. Do you want to open us with a prayer? Absolutely.

Father, thank you so much for your word to us this morning. Thank you that you are faithful to us at all times. As Daniel went into the lion's den and you stayed the mouths of the lions and kept him safe, Lord, we know that you will always keep us as well, that we are to look to you in faith, and now Lord, as we go into the next section of the book, we pray that you give us the spirit of wisdom and insight, of knowledge, Lord, that we would truly see things as you have revealed them, and that it would impact the way we live our lives in light of this revelation, in Jesus' name, amen.

Creation, the Fall, and the Flood

The very beginning of the history of the world, in the beginning, it's a baseball reference, in the beginning, God created the world. And it's God's domain, it has always been God's domain. There was an issue in Genesis 3, and that's when Lucifer convinces Adam and Eve, did God really say that?

He didn't want you to have this knowledge, you could be like your own God. Things change. We get through the flood, which is still an amazing period of time when you think that, I've heard analyses of the number of people that populated the earth at the time of the flood, it's significant.

And then when you realize that of the entire world, just Noah and his family, of the entire world, just Noah and his family. The flood occurs, the rainbow is given, we own the flag, we own the rainbow, LBGTQ does not, we own the rainbow, God owns the rainbow.

But things go crazy again after that. We're going to be looking at a concept of dominion and judgment. The subtitle is that God is sovereign, he is the king of kings. But within the world, and in world history, and in Daniel 7, we have a presentation of kingdoms.

Genesis 11 is a very important chapter, it's where man has accumulated themselves, they've gotten all that, and they said, you know what, let's preserve ourselves for posterity, in fact, let's build a tower to the very, very heavens.

It upsets the relationship in God's, he befuddles their language, and he scatters them. But man, when man gets together, is just going to try to be all that, and it has a lot to do with rejecting God as the sovereignty, and that man is all of that.

We go into 1 Samuel chapter 8, we now have had Abraham and Sarah, we've had Isaac and Jacob, we've had the 12 sons, we've had the time in Egypt, we've had Moses, we've had our first Passover, we've had the wandering in the desert, we've had Kadesh Barnea, we've had them come into the land we've seen in the book of Joshua.

We get into 1 Samuel, and the people are starting to rebel, and they want to have a king so that we can be like other nations. And God says, you know what, they have not rejected you, they rejected me.

And the idea behind having these kingdoms that could be self-governing, they did not have to be in subjection to God, was actually appealing to the Jews at that time. Things go bad, the northern kingdom goes very bad, and so bad that they go into exile, we've never seen them, they're the lost ten tribes.

The southern kingdom has moments of obedience to God, followed by significant times of disobedience to God, and the prophet Habakkuk is looking around, and he is totally distressed at how bad things have gone, God, aren't you even looking that things have just gone so bad?

And God says, you know what, I have been looking, and I am going to raise up the Chaldeans, that horrible nation, Chaldeans, Babylonians. They didn't even exist at the time, but he said that he was going to raise up a kingdom that would come and be in judgment.

The use of God's sovereignty, because in Daniel chapter 2, Nebuchadnezzar has had a dream, and he sees this statue, and it frightens him, and he asks his wise people, tell me the dream, and then give me the interpretation, nobody can do it, Daniel prays, God tells Daniel that he is the one that establishes kings, he is the one that removes kings, and Nebuchadnezzar is basically told it was God who gives Nebuchadnezzar the kingdom, it wasn't him, he is not all that, God is sovereign.

And then Romans 13, as we go further into the New Testament, it says that no authority exists unless it's given by God. I gave Jeff a book today, which I had gotten when we were out in Fullerton, read it while we were on our vacation, Caesar and the Church, I think is what it's called.

The bottom line is that God is the one with all authority, he gives authority as he desires, as he deems according to his sovereignty, but kings, rulers, presidents, law enforcement, even pastors, they're not satisfied that God is the only one who delegates authority, and so they take authority on themselves that they don't really have, and that becomes a problem.

Zechariah 14 .9 is going to give a prophecy, and it's going to say, in that day, the Lord will be king over all the earth. This is a really quick panoramic picture of the reality of kingdoms, of man's wickedness, of the fall of man, the influence of Satan, and the thought that because I'm a king, because I have a kingdom, I'm all that, and I can do whatever I think desired, but that's not a true statement, because the only real authority is authority that comes from God, and we know the end of the story, we know the end of the story.

It's going to go through a difficult time for seven years, but at the end of that year, the king of kings, the Lord of Lords, is going to return. We believe the premillennial, excuse me, the premillennial return, the honest, true return of Christ, and he will reign for a thousand years, and then he will reign for eternity in heaven.

Daniel's Dream in the First Year of Belshazzar

So now we have Daniel chapter 7. It's going to come back in the beginning of chapter 7. It's going to say, in the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, Daniel saw a dream and visions in his head as he lay in his bed.

It's not sugar plums, it's some different infusion. He wrote down the dream and told us some of the matter. Let's just do a little bit of placing, if we would, because of recent, we've gone from Nebuchadnezzar through Belshazzar, and chapter 5 was the chapter of Belshazzar, meanie, meanie, teckle, whatever that is.

Parson. Parson, thank you. You are going to die, and that night he died. I thought he was pointing at you. I thank you. His feet were crooked, too. It really wasn't. Do you really know where that finger points?

It's really one of the right ones. It curved back and right. I'm a slugger at that. So last week, you took us into the beginning of the Medo-Persian time, but this now is a pan back, a little bit of history, because again, it goes into the first year of Belshazzar.

Just to understand things, Daniel goes into captivity in 605 BC. It's before the final siege of Jerusalem, but he's in captivity in 605 BC. The first year of the reign of Belshazzar is 553 BC. 52 years he's been in captivity.

We think he was a young teenager at the time, so he's approximately my age, maybe a little bit younger than I am at this point in time. He's in his late 60s, early 70s when he's having this dream. In this dream, a vision by night, he sees four winds, and the four winds are stirring up a great sea, and out of that sea are going to come four beasts.

The Four Winds and the Great Sea

We get to understand a little bit about the application of the sovereignty of God just in this opening thought. In Hebrew, ruach is the word for winds, or spirit, so it can be relative, it can be applied to spiritual truth, it can be applied just to the spirit, it can be applied to wind, it can also be applied to judgment.

We're going to see these in a couple of verses. Sue, if you could get Jeremiah 22, if you could get that. I will talk to Jeremiah 49, and Bob, if you would get Revelation 7, verse 1. When we see the application or the presentation of winds, immediately stop and realize that this is a spiritual, this is a God thing that's going on here.

So for Daniel, in his dream, all of a sudden he sees the winds, the four winds of heaven being stirred up. Do you have Jeremiah 22?

Go ahead. I spoke to you in your prosperity, but you said, I will not hear. This has been your manner from your youth, that you do not obey my voice. The wind shall eat up all your rulers, and your lovers shall go into captivity.

Surely then you will be ashamed and humiliated for all your wickedness.

When God uses the four winds, it can be used for proclamation of truth, but it can also be an indication that God's judgment is coming down, and that's clearly given in there. In Jeremiah 49, he's talking about, I will bring upon Edom the four winds.

Now the four winds, again, shows up in Revelation, if you've got that one, Bob.

Yeah, after this, I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth to prevent any wind from blowing on the land, or on the sea, or on any tree.

Read judgment from God, read power from God. The four winds does not mean that there are only, but it's basically all the winds. The north, south, east were the four corners of the earth, and in that verse in Revelation, the angels holding back the four winds until God's appointed time.

But this is an indication that something great is happening, something God-centered, something God-provoked is happening, and something that has to do with God's sovereignty and his judgment. And he says that it is stirring up the great sea.

And the picture there is all of humanity and all of creation.

From Revelation 17, five, I think. Go ahead. In many borders are many peoples. Yes, yes.

Of all the peoples, of all the nations, of all humanity, this is being stirred up by the four winds that are God's sovereign judgment, his righteousness, and his truth. It's an opposition to kingdoms that think they can stand up and be all of that.

The vision starts out with God breathing down the power of who he is, breathing down upon it. Out of the great sea come four great beasts. These are representative of the four great kingdoms of the world.

Nebuchadnezzar had already had a dream very similar to this in chapter two. Nebuchadnezzar had a dream of a statue, and there were various portions of this statue. And the beauty, the strength, the majesty is what's emphasized in Daniel's dream, that which made them stand out.

But what we're going to see here in these four beasts is really more of their power and their vulnerability, if you would. It's more of an indictment about they think they're great, but here's who they really are.

Babylon, Medo-Persia, and Greece in Daniel's Vision

So the first beast, John, would you give me verse four, please? I'm just going to let you read a little bit at a time out of Daniel 7. Give me verse four.

The first was like a lion and had the wings of an eagle. I kept looking until its wings were plucked, and it was lifted up from the ground and made to stand on two feet like a man. A human mind also was given to it.

This is Babylon.

The first great beast is Babylon. And in fact, more specifically, this is Nebuchadnezzar we're talking about. He's great. He's powerful. But what happened to Nebuchadnezzar when he stood up and went too far?

His talons, hairy, ate the grass of the fields. Can you see that in here? His wings were plucked off. What he thought he could fly, if you would, as a great ruler, as that man that everybody would be afeard of, his wings were plucked off, and he was sent out into the wilderness.

To eat grass like an ox. To eat grass like an ox. Long fingernails.

Long fingernails. He did not have it well. But then what happens to him at the end of Daniel 2? Nebuchadnezzar, in the midst of this wilderness, abandonment, banishment, he proclaims, he confesses and professes God.

What happens to him? He's restored. He's restored. And he's allowed to stand up again like a man. And he's allowed to rule again like a man. Do you see that? The first was like a lion. He had eagle's wings.

Then they were plucked off. And then he was lifted up from the ground and allowed to stand on his own two feet and given the mind of a man. It was restored to him. The first beast that he sees is Babylon and the kingdom of Babylon, which we know falls in 626, I'm sorry, in 539 BC.

It falls because of Belshazzar's arrogance in holding a great feast. And taking the vessels from the temple and basically going against God in that way. The second beast, give me five, John.

And behold, another beast, a second one resembling a bear. And it was raised up on one side, and three ribs were in its mouth between its teeth. And thus they said to it, arise, devour much meat.

Medo-Persia. Now, they're the ones that took down Babylon. And they were powerful like a bear. They were ferocious like a bear. The three ribs refer to the three main dominions that they conquered. And in history, the three main kingdoms that they conquered were Babylon, Libya, and Egypt.

And this was the history of Medo-Persia. But their time was going to come to an end, too, because after this, I looked and beheld, and give me verse six, John.

After this, I kept looking, and behold, another one like a leopard, which had on its back four wings of a bird. The beast also had four heads, and dominion was given to it. And this is Greece.

She was swift to the battle, like a leopard. And she was unstoppable, she was dominant. But what happens then, it says, and the beast had four heads. What happens to Greece to basically start to break apart the empire?

And it breaks up into four pieces, and they're headed by Alexander's four leading generals.

That's it. Alexander the Great is out, and his four generals take over. And it's those four, and the dominion was divided into four pieces. This is Greece. Greece came in in 331 B .C., and in 65 B .C., we have, after this, I saw in the night visions, chapters, verses seven and eight.

After this, I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrifying, and extremely strong. And it had large iron teeth that devoured and crushed, and it trampled down the remainder with its feet.

It was different from all the beasts that were before it. And it had 10 horns. While I was contemplating the horns, behold, another horn, a little one, came up among them. And three of the first horns were pulled out by the roots before it.

And behold, this horn possessed eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth uttering great boasts.

This is Rome. And Rome comes into power in 65 B .C. It's interesting what happens in these two verses. It comes to play later on as we get into the vision, the 70 weeks of Daniel. The 70 weeks of Daniel, what happens in the 70 weeks of Daniel?

What's the end of the 69th week of Daniel? The tribulation. Messiah's cut off. At the end of the 69th week, Messiah is cut off. We have Christ crucified. Right, right, right. That is the end of the vision of the Jewish history that Daniel sees.

Because the 70th week starts when? After the rapture. Good, quite good answer. We don't know. It hasn't happened yet. We're in this massive pause between the 69th week and the 70th week. Parenthesis. It's a parenthesis.

It's the age of the Gentiles. It's called many things. But it resumes for seven days, seven years, the tribulation. We believe in the literal presentation of the tribulation as validated in Daniel as presented in Revelation and elsewhere.

But this gap in between isn't really a vision. And if you think about the history of the great kingdoms of the world, Rome was the last great world dominant kingdom. There has not been a world dominant kingdom since then.

Russia tried it. Hitler tried it. Charlemagne. Charlemagne. There have been those who've tried to be world dominant. But nobody has been world dominant. So the history of the four beasts is really true.

Because now when we get into Revelation, and he presents it here, it's the picture of the return of the Roman world dominance.

And these later men called it the Holy Roman Empire.

Well, then we have the religion of the world, the Holy Roman Empire. But in Revelations, we do get to a one world economy. We get to a one world religion and all of that. But Revelation 13 .1, I'm going to ask Rod if he would pull that one out, please.

The fourth beast comes out. He's different from the others. He has 10 horns. Coming up, there's a little horn. What do you got there in Revelation 13 .1?

And the dragon stood on the sand of the seashore. Then I saw a beast coming up out of the sea having 10 horns and seven heads. Notice his horns were 10 diadems. And his heads were blasphemous names.

The 10 horns were coming out of the new Babylon, if you would. And one of them, it's a new horn, it's a little horn that comes out. We're now seeing our first picture of the Antichrist. There are going to be specific judgments for the Antichrist, even presented here in the book of Daniel.

But the four beasts, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome, all the way into the time of Revelation. Daniel gets this panoramic vision of the kingdoms of the world that think they are all that. They're swift, they're fierce, they're ferocious.

The Ancient of Days, the Court, and the Books Opened

But in reality, they may not accept it, but they are under the sovereign rule of God. Sandy, give me verses 9 and 10 in Daniel 7, please.

I kept looking until cranes were set up, and the Ancient of Days took his seat. His vesture was like white snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool. His throne was ablaze with flames. Its wheels were a burning fire.

A river of fire was flowing and coming out from before him. Thousands upon thousands were attending him, and myriads upon myriads were standing before him. The court sat, and the books were opened.

I love the juxtaposition of the first eight verses and these two verses. In the first eight verses, we've got the great kingdoms of the world, and then we get into these two. There's thrones in the Ancient of Days.

On the one side, man's presumed authority and power and dominion, and on the other side is the truth of God's sovereign power and dominion. Judy, I'm going to ask if you would get Isaiah 43 ready for me, Isaiah 43, 13, and Candy, I'm going to ask if you would get Revelation 1.

There's going to be a verse 8 and a verse 17 if you would get those ready. The vision takes us into a throne room again. Now, this throne room is going to have the Ancient of Days seated. We've seen this type of picture before, Isaiah 6.

The prophet is somehow translated into the throne of God, and the angels and everybody else adoring him, he goes, whoa, it's me, I'm a man of unclean lips. And for Isaiah to actually see this throne room.

In Revelations 4 .2, John gets this vision of a throne room in heaven and one sitting on there. Psalm 90 verses 1 and 2 is going to talk about from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God. The Ancient of Days, the eternal, always I am, is the one that is actually on this throne.

Isaiah 43, do you have that?

Yes, I am God and also henceforth I am he. There is none who can deliver from my hand. I work as a contender.

There's a twist of two words the pastor loves to use. Can you see it in there? Lego my ego. Otherwise, no one has ego with me. I am, I am he. This is God's proclamation of who he is, juxtaposed on top of the great kingdoms of the world.

Lego my ego. I am he. Now around this throne, there are thousands. Those are the angels serving him. And around that are 10 ,000 times 10 ,000. Myriads, that's the saints, worshiping and adoring behind him.

This is the great throne of God with all his created angels and all the saints from all eternity sitting before him in adoration of who he is. And what else is happening at this throne? Not only is it the most amazing worship service that can ever be experienced, but what else is happening in this throne room?

The last couple of phrases in verse 10. The courtroom is in session. The court is in session. The court sat in judgment. And the books were opened. Revelation 1, Candy, if you'll give me verse 8.

I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.

And then verses 17 and 18, please.

When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me saying, fear not, I am the first and the last and the living one. I died and behold, I am alive forevermore. And I have the keys of death and age.

He is the judge, the keys to death and Hades. And we know that what's going to happen to the Antichrist, we know what's going to happen to all who have taken on the mark of the beast, for all have died not submitting to God.

But he owns the keys to death and Hades. He is the great judge. Then it says in verses 11 and 12, I looked because of the sound of the great words the horn was speaking. Just stop and think for a minute, and we know this from the picture in Revelation, how arrogant and blasphemous the Antichrist will become in proclaiming his own position which is not his, in desecrating the abomination of desecration, in setting himself up, in setting, worship me, I am he.

The great words that the horn is speaking, and as a result, the beast was killed. God wins at the end of it. The apostasy is foretold in Daniel 9, 27, if you want to pull that one out, but of all the things that have happened in creation, in opposing God, the manifestation of what the Antichrist will do is by far, go ahead.

He will make a treaty with the people for a period of one step of seven, but after half his time, he will put an end to the sacrifices and offerings. Then as a climax to all his terrible deeds, he will set up a sacrilegious object that causes desecration until the end that has been decreed is poured out onto this defiler.

God wins.

This is Daniel speaking now. Okay, and again, he's seeing this vision at some time in the first year of the reign of Belshazzar, somewhere around 553 B .C., and eventually John in like 95 A .D. on the Isle of Patmos will have a vision and he will write, this is absolutely word for word for what Daniel's vision is, what John's saying, and because we know the sovereignty of God, we gotta believe that this is actually gonna happen.

To him. Revelation 19 talks about a white horse, and the one who rides on it is faithful and true, and as the white horse comes, the beast, the false prophet, will be seized and thrown into a lake of fire.

Amen and hallelujah to that. We get concerned about deviations that are even occurring in the church. Some churches accepting the culture of the day and we should be concerned, and we should be praying.

Somebody should write a book. I got a great title for it. Blood Red Church. Sounds like a book I read. The Antichrist is gonna go even deeper and deeper and deeper than all of that, and the Antichrist, the one who rides on that white horse is gonna seize him, throw him in.

The court sat in judgment and the books were opened. This is the story of the ancient of days. Then I looked because of the sound of the words, the beast was killed, body destroyed, given over to be burned with fire.

Now the rest of the beast, their dominion was taken away, but their seasons were prolonged for a time. They're judged, but not as intently. They are going to eventually go to eternity in hell, but there is special judgment given to this Antichrist.

The Son of Man, the Kingdom, and the Saints

Verse 13, we continue on in the vision, but instead of seeing the ancient of days, the vision now introduces with the clouds of heaven there came one like the Son of Man. We know this to be Jesus. So this throne room has had the ancient of days, that's God the Father.

And now the vision goes on and in the clouds of heaven, we see one like the Son of Man and he came to the ancient of days. The clouds of heaven are basically interpreted one of two ways. In Matthew 25, 31, there is a description of the Son of Man coming with all the angels with him in the clouds of the heaven.

That is the angelic host is one interpretation of the clouds of heaven. But another one just flat out comes out from Acts 1 .9 when Jesus ascends into the clouds, basically into the heavenly realm. Either one is fine, either one is fine.

But what we have here now is Jesus coming before the ancient of days.

There's also Hebrews 12. Jesus comes with a great cloud of witnesses.

Yes, yes, okay. So the saints are another interpretation. That's excellent. He comes before the ancient of days and he's presented to him and he's given dominion over all everlasting. Psalm 2. Carol, you've got it already, right?

Yes. All right, Rich, if you would get Psalm 2. Psalm 2? 2, verses 6 through 9. And if you want to give me Matthew 24.

I'm sorry, what verses? 2, 6 through 9. 6 through 9. Psalm 2, 6 through 9. Yet I have set my king on my holy hill in Zion. I will declare the decree the Lord has said to me. You are my son. Today I have begotten you.

Ask of me and I will give you the nations for your inheritance and the ends of the earth for your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall dash them to pieces like a potter's vessel.

Now therefore be wise, O kings. Be instructed, you judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the sun lest he be angry and you perish in the way.

The reality is that God has established kings and kingdoms here on earth. He gives authority according to his sovereign will. The fact that kings and kingdoms are used as his tool of punishment as in Habakkuk, they're told that I will raise up the Chaldeans at Asteon or Galatia.

He does raise them up. But they're going to be held accountable for everything they do. And their kingdom is only temporary. Yes. It's quite a warning to the leaders,.

A statement of who's really in charge and what the consequences are of not having a godly kingdom, not leaving with godly wisdom.

Frank? Yeah, I think, yeah, there's a lot of wisdom in what you said there. And while you were saying that, my mind, it did drift a little bit because this is, you're speaking specifically about kingdoms.

You could be thinking about Trudeau up in Canada. You could be thinking about whoever the guy is in England now. I saw a news clip last week, I think it was, Netanyahu is praising President Biden and the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia because President Biden is bringing us quickly to peace.

Okay. Gotcha. I was sitting across the street last night at a school board meeting. And there are times that I need to speak up. I need the wisdom of God and how to deal with it. But even that is just an authority given by God.

It's temporary. But we, all in our own little realms, we do sit in areas where there is God-given authority and we are told to act accordingly. But we know this one truth, and that truth is that he has installed his son to be the king and ruler over all nations.

Amen.

John, questions that are asked to me of younger and even myself is, why not now? Why not immediately after your resurrection? Why all this history that has to happen? All the anger, all the death, all the, just everything bad has to happen before the good.

And... Yeah. The only, I've read, and I'm not sure where I read it, but you're not going, you're not going to relish the goodness of God until you've experienced the evil, the potential of evil and the necessity of keeping yourself in the world.

Yeah, that's powerful. We do know that scripture teaches us that God is patient and enduring, not wanting that any should perish, that all should come. This doesn't say that because not everybody's coming, God's not all-powerful and sour.

Everybody's going to get what they deserve. And if you have chosen God, you're going to get what you don't deserve, which is Him. But we get what we deserve because we deserve it through the blood of Christ.

My father died without Christ. That's tough for me, especially when I came to the Lord. That was, that was... Yeah, totally. It's something that I struggled with and the Spirit helped. Just finally got me through it and found a wonderful woman who led me away.

That's awesome.

There is a time coming which is called the Tribulation. We know it as the 70th week of Daniel. We know it in many ways. Matthew 24 is going to proclaim that after the Tribulation, the Son of Man will appear in glory.

There is not a doubt about that. Reality.

I have a question. Yeah. How do we know when the Tribulation actually starts? Who'll be gone? The Rapture. You got a week? Well, if you believe you're gone first. Some don't believe that. I'm one that wants to go first.

But, um, how, what... I mean, we've got people who think they're God now. I mean, how do we know? Go ahead, John.

Why don't you answer that? We're going to approach it slightly different, but I'll let you do that.

Well, I do think that we will get raptured first. But even the birth pangs that lead into the Tribulation can bear resemblance to the point where they'd be almost indistinguishable. If you were, even in the first century, being lit up like a torch by Nero, you would be wondering if you're in the Tribulation.

And in practice, it wouldn't be that much different. So I think we need to be ready to suffer whatever it is the Lord allows into our lives, but having that great hope of the coming of Christ. We're not looking and waiting for the Antichrist.

We're waiting for Christ to come rescue his bride. We're not waiting for him to come destroy the Antichrist and the beast system. That will come in time. But first, he takes the bride to the wedding supper of the Lamb.

So we're looking for Christ. And I think we keep our eyes to the clouds where Christ ascended and where he's coming back again, but realizing that until he comes, we will have trouble. And so we don't need to know.

Did it start? You know, maybe I'm wrong and the rapture happens pre-wrath or mid-trib or post. If that is the case, no matter what, we have to be faithful with what we have been given to steward.

And that might include suffering. So Joe Foch gave an interesting... Joe Foch said, you know, the church, he doesn't believe will go through the tribulation at all because he says the Lord wouldn't beat up his bride just before he was going to marry her.

Yeah, well said. You could live with this assurance that it could be post-trib or pre-trib, but it will be Pantrib.

Okay, now I'm out. Yeah, that's true. I'm going to jump on what you just said there. If the concern is, are we in the midst of, are we going to be there during the tribulation? And there's a guy by the name of Mark Rosenthal who you mentioned in pre-wrath, and he identifies the great tribulation as basically towards the second half, tribulation as towards the first.

And we're not going to be in the great tribulation. Let's just put this on the table. There is nothing that says we're not going to go through birth pangs before the first tribulation starts. I've never delivered a baby.

I have. I think rats and hicks can be pretty nasty. The expectation that somehow we're going to be given a get-out-of-jail-free card from persecution and prosecution and all that other kind of stuff, I think it's a bad approach.

Whether we're going to actually be in the seven years, not in the seven years, time leading up to it is going to be on a constant escalation. Now, let me say this. If it turns out that it isn't pre-trib, there are certain things that are going to be almost unmistakable.

An individual who will be so charismatic and accept that he can unite the world together in peace, that would be a pretty good clue that this could be the Antichrist. If we get to the point of the Antichrist setting up abominations of worship in the temple to himself and we haven't been raptured for some reason, we're there.

There are certain things in Revelation that are unmistakable. If we see two witnesses who nobody can touch, we're there. But the reality of suffering and tribulation, I mean, it's all throughout Scripture that don't think that because you're mine, in fact, rejoice that you're enduring these things.

And then it says, nobody knows but the Father. Dr. Jake Dwight Pentecost in his book, Things to Come, says the first reference of something usually gives you its purpose. And he said, the first reference of the tribulation is in Deuteronomy chapter four, verse 30, it says, when you are in tribulation and these things come upon you, referring to Israel, in the latter days, then you will turn to the Lord, your God, and obey his voice.