Letters to the Churches Part 18

Okay, we're going to pray and we're going to get into our study today and we're going to cover a large swath of the back end of the book of Revelation, especially in light of the themes that we took a look at today in both

Daniel, Ezekiel, and in the Gospel of Mark chapter 4. I think that working through the back end of the book of Revelation will provide us a little bit of comfort and will look at just a wee bit of the context to keep us anchored in what it is that we have coming as Christians and what we face presently now.

Let's pray. Lord Jesus, as we study your word, we thank you that you have already conquered and that you are king of kings and lord of lords.

We pray that you would come quickly and that you would relieve us from this veil of sorrow and death and bring us into the glorious kingdom that you have prepared before the foundations of the earth.

We ask all of this in Jesus' name, amen. Alright, we've been working our way through the book of Revelation and we noted last week in the portion that we got through, again, looking at the second beast which is then called the false prophet in Revelation 16 and then we see in Revelation 17 is referred to then as the whore of Babylon.

This is false religion created by the devil for the purpose of waging war against the saints.

And at the risk of sounding like some kind of paranoid alarmist, we have to come to grips with the fact that we as Christians are at war and every one of us, male and female, we are combatants in this war.

And the devil has no intention of leaving us alone and instead he's going to harass the church until he's finally done away with at the return of Christ.

And so as a result of it, we must not get caught up in bizarre conspiracy theories but at the same time recognize that there ultimately is a satanic conspiracy and the devil is waging war against the saints.

This is absolutely true. So I wouldn't waste time working on theories regarding like the

Bilderbergs and secret societies and stuff like this that some argue are engaged in satanic worship and things of this sort.

That may be true. It may not be true. The thing is that I've never been a part of these things,

I couldn't tell you. The point is that regardless of what human agents are being used by the devil, ultimately the devil is behind the attacks against the church.

And that's the reality that we are called to see here, that the devil wages war through tyrannical governments which forbid and outlaw and persecute the saints and forbid and outlaw the

Christian faith and then the devil wages war with all the false manifestations of Christianity that are running around the landscape today.

I mean, I'll give you an example. I mean, you want to see an example of like just the insanely ridiculous, okay?

On my Facebook yesterday, and I don't normally go here during Bible class,

I put up a link to an article at Destiny Image Publishing that was sent to me by Roger Monk, and I think

Roger's with us today online. But when I see stuff like this,

I go tongue -in -cheek and speak ironically. And so I ask the question, is it a mortal or a venial sin to deny that angels are handing out glory mantles right now, the month of Tammuz, as part of a pre -promotion happening in the spirit in preparation for the fall season?

And then, of course, you know, being tongue -in -cheek, I said I'm asking for a friend, you know, it's kind of bizarre.

But when you click on the link, okay, a lot of people took a look at this and said, what on earth is that sentence that you just wrote?

Well, consider this. I mean, Destiny Image, which is one of the major publishing houses within the New Apostolic Reformation, on June 9th, so just a few days ago,

Candace Smithyman put out this article and it's published on the Destiny Image website. New mantles are released from heaven.

I saw glory angels releasing mantles this past week, and they were being dropped on God's people.

They were flying through a portal in heaven and bringing these mantles right to us so that we can begin to get ready for what's coming in the fall season.

A pre -promotion time is happening right now in the spirit. The month of Tammuz, which is the fourth month on the

Hebrew ecclesiastical calendar and the 10th month on the Hebrew civil calendar, it begins sundown,

Wednesday, June 9th, 2021, sundown Friday, June 11th, 2021.

It's properly positioning you to receive more from heaven and step into more in heaven.

These are all prophecy bingo buzzwords here. Okay. Why don't we just use this for processing prophecy?

Yeah, I know. Because then I would have to read it, and then I'm afraid I might harm myself if I read any further.

Okay. Now, as goofy as this sounds, here's the thing. We're talking about a significant number of people who call themselves

Christians who believe that this is a legitimate word from God. What is this?

Well, the book of Revelation teaches us that what destiny image is doing is this is one of the weapons of the warfare of the devil against the saints for the purpose of deceiving you because the devil is not content with the idea, well, they belong to Jesus now.

I guess I have to leave them alone. Instead, the devil is waging war against the saints for the purpose of dragging your carcass back into his dominion and ultimately to drag you into the lake of fire with him.

He's not going to leave you alone. And so this kind of nonsense that's being put forward in the name of Christianity, I can't, it's hard to believe that anybody thinks that's real, but they do.

And of course, that was all a promotion because it's $3 off on our book right now if you act now, but... Yeah, yes,

James. Oh, it just was a pretty picture, you know, so that's how that works.

It was just, it was just artwork. Now, I notice here that Roger Monk just put in the chat, he says,

Oh, no, what have I set in train here? What have I set in motion? Oh, Roger, I blame you for everything.

Yeah, Bruce is in here, so you've sent me down the track. Okay. So Stephen Elliot says,

I thank you, Roger, very much. So Roger, no, I'm speaking tongue in cheek. But, you know, the thing is, is that there are people out there who are defending this and who would caution us and say, you know, you shouldn't speak against these things because you could grieve the

Holy Spirit. You might blaspheme God, the Holy Spirit, touch not God's anointed.

There's nothing anointed about this. The anointing is from, well, the sulfurous pit of hell. This has nothing to do with Christianity.

So we read then, by way of reminder of our context here.

So in Revelation chapter 17, talking about the great prostitute.

When I saw her, I marveled greatly. But the angel said to me, this is verse 7 to 17. But the angel said to me,

Why do you marvel? I'll tell you the mystery of the woman and of the beast with the seven heads and the ten horns that carries her.

The beast that you saw was, is not, and is about to rise from the bottomless pit and go to destruction.

All right, the beast, we're talking about the devil here. And there are restraining actions by God when it comes to the devil.

And that's an important bit. We talked about this in the Women's Bible study, not this week, but the week before.

That Christ talks about how Satan is bound at his crucifixion, death, and resurrection.

And the apostle Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2 makes it clear that during this time in between Christ's ascension and Jesus' return, that the devil is under restraints, but he is going to be released.

Those restraints are let off as we get closer to the return of Christ. And we like to refer to that as kind of like the devil's little season.

And I have no idea how long that season is. And sometimes I have to wonder if the restraints that were put on the devil and his demons, if those restraints are loosened slowly over time, not all of a sudden.

Because the whole world would be overwhelmed. But the thing is that the activity and the deception that is taking place within the visible church is of such a horrible and repugnant notable amount and character that we need to be extremely careful in these days and realize that we're at war.

We are under attack. I think in human history, when the

United Kingdom recognized that they were at war, everybody in the United Kingdom mobilized.

You had people putting bomb shelters in their backyards, and it wasn't long before the Nazis were flying planes overhead.

But here's the thing. The devil's sorties are flying over our churches as we speak. And those sorties have been going on for a long time.

And everybody who's got their head in the sand, they are in a woeful position to understand the real position that we find ourselves in.

So he goes on. So the beast you saw is not and is about to rise from the bottomless pit, go to destruction. The dwellers on earth whose names have not been written in the book of life and the foundation of the world will marvel to see the beast because it was and is not and is to come.

So this calls for a mind with wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated. And we noted last week that the historical context and the historical understanding of this is always a reference back to Rome, the city that's built on seven hills.

There are also seven kings, five of whom have fallen. One is, another has not yet come. And when he does come, he must remain only a little while.

This seems to be referring to the ultimate manifestation of the man of lawlessness that Paul is referring to in 2

Thessalonians. As for the beast that was and is not, it is an eighth, but it belongs to the seven, and it goes to destruction.

And the ten horns that you saw are ten kings who have not yet received royal power, but they are to receive authority as kings for one hour together with the beast.

These are of one mind. They hand over their power and authority to the beast, which we're talking about the devil here.

And they will make war on the lamb, and the lamb will conquer them.

So, ultimately, we've got to remember, Christ wins the victory.

So, as kind of a good metaphor in recognizing how warfare is fought, is that historians will make the claim that World War II technically was lost on D -Day, for the

Germans. It was technically lost on that day, but that doesn't mean that there weren't battles that had to be fought, including the

Battle of the Bulge and other things. As the Allies took back Nazi -occupied

Europe from the control of the Nazi regime. And that being the case, we then think in this way.

Christ's death, resurrection, and ascension, this has signaled the ultimate defeat of Satan.

Satan is already lost. Every battle that he wages at this point, he's fighting a losing battle.

But the war being lost, he hasn't surrendered at this point, and he's not going to. The devil has to be conquered.

And Christ will ultimately conquer him. And you'll note that the devil, in his posture, is to make war against Christ, and against his church.

But Christ will conquer them. He is Lord of Lords, King of Kings. And those with him are called the chosen and the faithful.

So the angel said to me, The waters that you saw where the prostitute is seated are peoples and multitudes and nations and languages.

And the ten horns that you saw, they are the beast. And the beast, they will hate the prostitute. So the false form of religion here, false

Christianity. They will make her desolate, naked, and devour her flesh, burn her up with fire. For God has put it into their hearts to carry out his purpose and being of one mind and handing over their royal power to the beast until the words of God are fulfilled.

And the woman that you saw is the great city that has dominion over the cities of the earth. And after this I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was made bright with his glory.

And he called out with a mighty voice, Fall in, fall in, is Babylon the great. She has become a dwelling place for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit, a haunt for every unclean bird, a haunt for every unclean and detestable beast.

For all nations have drunk the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality. And sexual immorality is here, is really a reference to idolatry.

This harkens back to the Old Testament picture of idolatry and worshipping of false gods as a form of sexual immorality.

Over and again you see God telling Judah or the northern kingdom to repent of their whorings after false gods.

That's the picture here. And the kings of the earth have committed immorality with her. The merchants of the earth have grown rich from the power of her luxurious living.

So then I heard another voice from heaven saying, Come out of her, my people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues.

For her sins are heaped high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. Bad outcome, by the way.

You don't want God to remember your iniquities. You do not want God to remember your sins. Remember the promises of the cross and the promises of the gospel that God will take our sin and cast it as far away from him as the east is from the west.

In Colossians 2, it describes the record of debt, all of that record of all of your sins, that record of debt that's in your book.

It has been torn out. It has been nailed to the cross, which stood against you. The debt has been paid in full, and you have been redeemed by the blood of Christ.

Everybody who is in Christ, God does not remember their iniquities, and the ultimate judgment of God comes when

God remembers iniquity. It's a bad outcome. In this context, and I would throw in as a good cross reference,

Jeremiah 14. In Jeremiah 14, this is the place where Jeremiah first begins to mention the false prophets that are in Judah at the time of his prophesying.

It's important to note here, if we were to do a study of Jeremiah, and I'm really considering doing that after we're done with the

Revelation, because I think the prophet Jeremiah would be one that is as sober and as bitter as this book is.

It's one that is necessary for us to consider in light of the current state of things in our world and of the apostasy.

If you think of it this way, the Old Testament is always, again, the types and shadows which point to the reality, which is in the

New Testament or in the New Covenant. And Jeremiah being the last prophet before God acts in judgment against Judah, the kingdom of Judah, you can see that they have gone into rank apostasy.

That apostasy was brought on by the son of Hezekiah, Manasseh. Manasseh went on an idolatrous, tyrannical tear, and he completely changed everything as far as how the worship worked in Judah and in Jerusalem.

Even going so far as to murder anybody who would oppose him biblically. And the

Bible disappeared. It was under Manasseh's reign that they set up, within the Temple of Solomon itself, worship incense altars to Baal, to Asherah.

And Manasseh himself sacrificed one of his own sons to Molech, the horrible deity that called for child sacrifice.

And it was basically the ancient world's version of a religious abortion. They didn't have abortion like we had, so they had infanticide.

And Manasseh changed everything. And then what happened is that worship continued in the temple, but syncretistically.

And sometime between Manasseh and King Josiah, things had gotten so bad that they actually set up a brothel in the temple with male cult prostitutes.

A few weeks ago when I preached on this, I brought that text in, and I basically said, you know,

I would have loved to have been at that church council meeting. Somebody said, you know, I have an idea. Why don't we put in a brothel in our temple?

So you're thinking, what's going on here? And in Josiah's reign, it was 18 years into it when they rediscovered the

Bible. Josiah, his entire life, never even knew there was a book.

And when they were doing a refurbishing job on the temple itself, that's when they discovered the

Bible. And the priest read it and then gave it to the king.

And after the king read the thing, he tore his clothes and realized we're in deep trouble because we've sinned grievously against our

God. And he set up these reforms that didn't last past his death. After his death, the tide of idolatry swept back over.

But in the time of Jeremiah, Jeremiah began to prophesy in the reign of Josiah long before Josiah ever found the

Bible, so long before his repentance. And in Jeremiah 14, we see the condition of, and I'm going to use this word very loosely, the church.

If we were to think of the church as those who are believers in the Messiah, in the

Old Testament, there's a right way that you can say the true believers who have the same faith as Abraham, they are part of the church because they have the same faith as Abraham.

They're part of the congregation. They're truly believers. So we're using it in that sense because church is really in a

New Testament term, but applying it to the Old Testament, we can apply it to those who have the same faith as Abraham. But the state of the church visible, the state of worship in Israel is absolutely abominable.

And not only do you have people sacrificing their children to Molech, offering sacrifices to Baal and Asherah and the starry host of heaven in the temple, they're not reading the

Bible. They don't even know the Bible exists anymore. Manasseh got rid of it. And on top of that, you have all of these crackpot prophets who are speaking these words that just are just absurd.

God didn't send them, and yet they are running and parroting these words, and God in Jeremiah 14 begins to address them.

And so here's what it says in Jeremiah 14, the word of Yahweh that came to Jeremiah concerning the drought.

And you'll note a drought was sent because of their idolatry. Judah mourns, her gates languish, her people lament on the ground, and the cry of Jerusalem goes up.

Her nobles send their servants for water. They come to the cisterns, they find no water. They return with their vessels empty.

They are ashamed and confounded, they cover their heads because of the ground that is dismayed since there is no rain on the land.

The farmers are ashamed, they cover their heads. Even the doe of the field forsakes her newborn fawn because there is no grass.

The wild donkey stands on the bare heights. They pant for air like jackals. Their eyes fail because there is no vegetation.

If you remember back in 1 Kings when Elijah showed up, there was a long drought in order that God would get their attention and say

Baal doesn't bring the rain, it's Yahweh. So you can see the same pattern here as part of God's ever -increasing punishment for impenitent idolatry and false religion, that drought is part of that cycle.

Well, that's also what we saw in the judgments that God sends out against the people in the book of Revelation.

Yes, Michael, yes.

But where we find the evidence of the faithful remnant, and these are the people who listen to the prophecies of Jeremiah, we see that in the book of Daniel, for instance, and also in the book of Esther.

So here's where the big dividing line comes, and this is an important factor that you have to keep in the bigger context of Jeremiah.

As you work your way through the prophet Jeremiah, and it gets closer and closer to Nebuchadnezzar's ultimate sack of Judah and the destruction of Jerusalem, where God promises 90 % of the people who are alive at the time of Nebuchadnezzar's campaigns, they are going to die.

The only people who for real live are the people who are listening to Jeremiah.

Jeremiah will give a prophecy and say, if you surrender yourself and turn yourselves in to Nebuchadnezzar and you put yourself under his yoke, you will live.

And so you'll note then that Daniel is part of that group. So are Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah.

They're part of that group who surrendered themselves because they listened to the prophecy of Jeremiah.

And we read in Jeremiah chapter 9, or is it 7? I'd have to look.

It's one of those two. It's either 7 or 9 that Daniel's reading the prophet Jeremiah. And it's in reading the prophet

Jeremiah that he offers up this absolutely beautiful penitential prayer. And you're going to note that it's

Jeremiah who taught him to pray penitentially like this. You'll see this in this text. And so the idea then is that in order to kind of weave it all together, you have to back up a little bit and take a look at the bigger scope.

And we know that for the most part, now there are some scoundrels who escaped because they realized maybe

Jeremiah is right, but God has to prophesy against them as well when they've already got there because no sooner do some of these false prophets arrive in Babylon, they start telling people they'll be back in just a few years.

And God says, nah, you're going to stay there for 70 years. And so God finds a way of weeding them out. But the majority of the people who make it to Babylon, they're the faithful remnant.

And here's how the types and shadows work on this. You go back to Noah and this thing you see throughout

Scripture that before God acts in judgment, he clearly explains what you must do to be saved.

And if you listen to his words and you believe him, you live and you're saved. If you don't, you perish.

So Noah was a preacher of righteousness. For 120 years, he proclaimed that God's going to send a flood and destroy the earth.

Nobody listened to him except for his family, and only his family lived. Had anybody else listened to them, there would have been plenty of room for them on the ark, and they could have survived.

In the days then of Jeremiah, everybody who listens to the prophet Jeremiah and surrenders themselves as God has told them, they live.

What do they have to do? They have to repent of their idolatry. They have to trust the word of God and the prophet

Jeremiah, and by doing so, they're saved. They have to humble themselves.

Well, now fast forward. There's a great judgment coming on the whole earth, and it's going to be a flood like you wouldn't believe, not of water but of fire.

Christ is going to return in judgment, and if you listen to his voice, he calls you to humble yourself, stop listening to these false preachers and teachers and being an idolater, bend the knee, confess him as Lord, trust in him, and you'll be saved.

So when the flood of God's judgment comes on the earth, Christians have nothing to fear, nothing whatsoever, because when

Christ descends, we ascend first. He calls the dead out of the grave. We meet

Christ in the air as he's descending. So before there's any bloodshed by Christ and the angels on the earth against the impenitent world, we're already caught up and we're together with Christ.

The way the scriptures describe it is that when Christ is descending, it's like we're already up in the clouds watching as he's coming, marching through.

For those who are alive when Christ returns, the first time they will see Jesus with their own eyes is him riding on his horse coming in judgment, and it's going to be glorious and horrible, but we're all going to be sitting there going, yeah, right?

That's the picture. So again, the theme is you listen to the voice of God. Man has always gone astray by taking

God's words, throwing them behind them, and going after their own hearts. Yes. Yeah.

They suffered terribly. Oh, indeed. Okay. Let's just say that the march from Jerusalem to Babylon wasn't a cakewalk.

In human history, we know marches like that, people die on the way. But the general concept here is despite the fact that they lost 90 % of the people they knew and loved, which had to be a horrible loss, the terror that they experienced,

I'm sure, aged them all. There's the stress levels that go being under siege and under attack and nearly losing your life, but God gave them a simple way out.

Surrender. It will be in the new earth.

Everything will be perfect. But not yet. Not yet. Yeah, not yet. No, do

I look like a prosperity preacher? Have you noticed I drive a 2006

Ford? Come on. Yes, Duane. Never mind.

Yeah. Right. That'd be exact. I am the epitome of what it looks like to not be healthy or wealthy.

Okay. Ta -da. Prosperity preachers are like whiny kids. They want it now. Yeah, they're like Veruca Salt.

Daddy, I want a goose that lays a golden egg and I want it now.

Anyway. All right. So we continue with Jeremiah. All right. So we'll note that God has sent a drought, just like he sent to the northern kingdom.

History is repeating itself. In the book of Revelation, the waters are afflicted as a result of God's judgment, and things get worse as we get closer to the return of Christ.

And then here's where it gets kind of interesting, and that is this.

And I'll point this out. Since I mentioned it in Daniel, I'll point it out here first, and then, again, this is all kind of cross -reference work we're doing in Revelation.

Watch these words. In Jeremiah, God gives the actual prayers to the people of Judah to pray, to humble themselves.

Listen to this. Though our iniquities testify against us, act, O Lord, for your name's sake. For our backslidings, meshuvah here in Hebrew, could also be apostasies.

That's an interesting word. It's the same word for either backsliding or apostasy. For our apostasies are many.

We have sinned against you. O you hope of Israel, its Savior, in time of trouble, why should you be like a stranger in the land, like a traveler who turns aside to tarry for a night?

Why should you be like a man confused, like a mighty warrior who cannot save? Yet you, O Yahweh, are in the midst of us, and we are called by your name.

Do not leave us. That's a prayer right in the middle of this oracle. And you'll note that God is basically saying,

Pray this. Join your words with Jeremiah here. I've given you the prayer to pray.

And you'll note then, I'll point this out, and I think it's in, I'm going to go to Daniel 7. I think it's 7.

No, it's going to be 9. Give me a second here. I was right the first time. Yeah, check this out.

In Daniel 9. So Daniel, who's in Babylonian captivity, who surrendered himself, and he lived, and now he's working for Nebuchadnezzar, he's working for Darius, and you'll note he's reading

Jeremiah. It's the freshest book of the Bible at the time of Daniel. It's the latest hot -off -the -press book of the

Scriptures because the Bible isn't complete. It says this, In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahusuerus, what a name, by descent

Amid, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans, in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that according to the word of the

Lord to Jeremiah, the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely 70 years.

And so watch what he does here. Prompted by the Holy Spirit through the writings of Jeremiah, now

Daniel, he prays a penitential prayer. And Jeremiah taught him to pray like this.

We see an example of this in 14 that we just read. So I turn my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer, and please for mercy with fasting sackcloth and ashes.

I pray to Yahweh my God, and I make confession, saying, O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, we have sinned, we've done wrong, we've acted wickedly, we've rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules.

We have not listened to your servants, the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, to our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land.

To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness. But to us opens shame, as at this time the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and all of Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, and all the lands to which you have driven them because of the treachery that they have committed against you.

To us, O Lord, to Yahweh, belongs open shame. To our kings, to our princes, to our fathers, because we have sinned against you.

To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him and have not obeyed the voice of Yahweh our

God by walking in his laws which he set before us by his servants, the prophets. All of Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice.

And the curse and the oath that are written in the law of Moses, the servant of God, have been poured out upon us because we have sinned against him.

He has confirmed his words which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us."

Notice, God has confirmed his own words. But he's also shown the false prophets to be what they are, false prophets.

He doesn't confirm the words of false prophets. In fact, a little note when we go back to Jeremiah here, you'll see that God oftentimes will take the very words and the very promises that false prophets give and turn them on their head.

And the thing that they say that will never happen to you, God causes to happen to you in order to prove them wrong.

It's a fascinating thing. So here you see this humble penitential prayer on the part of Daniel.

And I'll leave it to you to finish it yourself because I want to get through other parts of this. But you'll note that Jeremiah is the one who's teaching

Daniel to pray in this way. Here in 14, we see this beautiful penitential prayer.

And you'll note that God isn't going to act concerning this prayer because no one's really praying this except for men like Jeremiah and a few.

Thus says Yahweh concerning this people. They have loved to wander thus. They have not restrained their feet.

Therefore, the Lord does not accept them. Now he will remember their iniquity and he will punish their sins.

Didn't we just hear that in the book of Revelation? Same concept.

You don't want God to remember your iniquity. That's a bad thing.

But in Christ, there is complete forgiveness of all of your sins. Only in him is there redemption.

Only in him is there reconciliation and peace with God. And one of the promises of the gospel is he will remember our sins no more.

So the Lord said to me, don't pray for the welfare of this people. Though they fast, I'll not hear their cry. Though they offer burnt offering and grain offering,

I'll not accept it. But I will consume them by sword, by famine, by pestilence. And then I said, ah,

Lord God, behold, the prophets say to them. And here we have the introduction in Jeremiah, the first real mention of the false prophets that were running around the landscape.

These are the wackerdoodles of the ancient world. If they had YouTube, they would be giving prophetic words every month.

They would be saying, the Lord is releasing suddenlies right now and glory mantles and bizarre things like this.

This is how wackerdoodle they are. But listen to this. Ah, Lord God, behold, the prophets, they say to them, you shall not see the sword, nor shall you have famine, but I will give you assured peace in this place.

The false prophets were prophesying what? God, peace, and prosperity, right?

And here's the thing. While they're prophesying all of this, what's going on in the temple?

Male cult prostitution, offerings and sacrifices made to Baal and Asherah.

Oh, Yahweh too. I mean, we don't want to leave him out. I mean, after all, his temple is the host for all these other false gods.

So you're going to note, they're not turning people away from their sin. They're saying, oh, no, no, no, no, everything's well, everything's well.

No famine, no sword, no pestilence is going to befall you. You are the head, you're not the tail.

Yeah, right? So Yahweh said to me, the prophets are prophesying lies in my name.

I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds.

Worthless. Right? Let me come back to this real quick here. Is this a worthless divination?

Oh, see, there's a pre -promotion time that's happening right now in the spirit, in the month of Tammuz. It's absolutely worthless.

Right? This is absolute nonsense. So the prophets are prophesying lies in my name.

I didn't send them. I didn't command them or speak to them. They're prophesying a lying, worthless divination, the deceit of their own minds.

Therefore, thus says Yahweh concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name, although I did not send them, who say, sword and famine shall not come up against this land.

Well, by the sword and famine, these prophets will be consumed. Every year here in the

United States, when Kat Kerr sees that a hurricane is heading towards the eastern seaboard somewhere in the

United States, either Florida or Georgia or South Carolina or North Carolina, this weird, wacky woman who claims that she travels to heaven regularly, daily, weekly, and she could tell us all about what heaven is like because she's been up there so many times, she pulls off her

Gandalf stick and when a hurricane's barreling down the highway, she goes, I command you to go out to sea and I command the millibars to raise, or just weird nonsense like this, right?

Okay. And then Florida gets pounded. Okay. All right.

Yeah. And then you remember, again, I keep coming back to this. I have not milked this thing dry yet.

There's Ken Copeland, March of last year. COVID -19, I blow the wind of God on you.

I command you to burn. You know, all this nonsense, right? And I feel like telling these people, shut up.

Okay. If you hadn't said anything about COVID -19, we might have been done with this thing last year. Right.

You know, it's like fellow prophets, could you please prophesy the guy from the other party to win?

Anyway. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, I doubt they will have learned their lesson. They can't help themselves. So notice they prophesied those sword or famine is going to befall you.

So God's going to kill them by sword and by famine. And the people to whom they prophesied noticed this, that God not only consumes the false prophets by, uses their words to pick the means by which

God will judge them. He also uses those same words to judge the people who listen to them. So the people to whom they prophesied, they shall be cast in the streets of Jerusalem, victims of famine and sword with none to bury them, their wives, their sons, their daughters.

I will pour out their evil upon their own head. And so you get the picture here. And so this, this is an

Old Testament type and shadow of the apostasy before the return of Christ.

So coming back then we note that notice the themes, how they're working together. I heard another voice from heaven to come out of her, my people out of the, out of the false prophetess out of this false religion, lest you take place in her sins, lest you share in her plagues for her sins are heaped high as heaven.

And God has remembered her iniquities run away, flee, don't have anything to do with false religion that is masquerading as Christianity.

He will pay her back as she herself has paid back others and repay her double for her deeds.

Mix a double portion for her in the, in the cup that she mixed as she glorified herself and lived in luxury.

So give her a like measure of torment and mourning. And here you see that the, the, the pronouns are running feminine because the false prophetess, the whore of Babylon is referred to as an effeminate thing.

But here note that, that those who participate in this false form of Christianity, one of the things that they're said to do is live in luxury.

So when you look at somebody like Kenneth Copeland, who is a multi -billionaire, multi -billionaire who lives in absolute opulence, multiple private jets, plural, right?

This hearkens to what God's judgment will be of men like this, that God will give them double for their luxury.

Every dollar that they stole in the name of Christ will increase their torment in God's judgment on the last day.

That becomes the measure that they receive back from Jesus. And Christ will take their, their luxury and their idolatry, and he will pay them back double.

So however many billions of dollars were built out of the kingdom of Christ stolen from Christians in the name of Jesus, you know, however many billions are sitting in his bank account, that will become the measure that Christ will pay him double back for God's judgment is real.

And he has a real sense of irony when he does act in judgment. So she glorified herself, lived in luxury.

I will give her a like measure of torment and mourning since in her heart, she says, I sit as queen.

I'm no widow and mourning. I shall never see for this reason. Her plagues will come in a single day, death, mourning, famine, and she will be burned up with fire.

The almighty is the Lord God who has judged her. And the kings of the earth who committed sexual immorality and lived in luxury with her, they will weep and they will wail over her when they see the smoke of her burning.

They will stand far off in fear of her torment and say, alas, alas, you great city, you mighty city,

Babylon for in you a single hour, in a single hour, your judgment has come and the merchants of the earth, they weep and they mourn for her since no one buys their cargo anymore.

Cargo of gold, silver, jewels, pearls, fine linen, purple cloth, silk, scarlet cloth, all kinds of scented wood, all kinds of articles of ivory, all kinds of articles of costly wood, bronze, iron, and marble cinnamon, spice, incense, myrrh, frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour, wheat, cattle, sheep, horses, and chariots, and slaves.

That is human souls for the fruit, the fruit for which your soul longed has gone from you and all your delicacies and your splendors are lost to you never to be found again.

You know, when God acts in judgment, it is swift, it is immediate, that the overthrow is irreparable, and while the measure of judgment is what you've counted so important, is the thing that he uses to measure out his wrath against you.

The merchants of these wares who gained wealth from her will stand far off in fear of her torment, weeping and mourning aloud.

Alas, alas, for the great city that was clothed in fine linen and purple and scarlet, adorned with gold and jewels with pearls.

For in a single hour all this wealth has been laid waste. All the shipmasters and the seafaring men, sailors, and all those who trade is on the sea stood far off, and they cried out as they saw the smoke of her burning.

What city was like the great city? And they threw dust on their heads as they wept and they mourned, crying out.

Alas, alas, for the great city where all the ships, all who had ships at sea grew rich by her wealth.

For in a single hour she has been laid waste. Rejoice over her, O heaven, and you saints and apostles and prophets, for God has given judgment for you against her.

So, you know, this is a picture, this is a word picture. You don't take the, you have to kind of unpack it using, you know, to figure out what the symbols are.

But you're going to note, while the world laments and cries and goes, ah, the saints go, yeah, finally.

Yes, James. They have these prophetic reality and they should be like, yeah,

God's rid the earth of this abomination. Yeah, the problem is they've participated in her abominations and they've become wealthy through it, you know.

Built idols and statues to it. Yep. Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea saying, so will

Babylon the great city be thrown down with violence and will be found no more.

And the sound of harpists, of musicians, of flute players, and trumpeters, and disco balls, and skinny jeans.

Sorry. Sorry, I was reading a different translation. Just saying to pay attention.

Sorry. Sounds like the praise man from hell here. Anyway, will be heard no more.

And the craftsman of any craft will be found in you no more. The sound of the mill will be heard in you no more. The light of the lamp will shine in you no more.

The voice of the bridegroom and the bride will be heard in you no more. Your merchants were the great ones of the earth and all the nations were deceived by your sorcery.

And in her was found the blood of the prophets and of the saints and of all who have been slain on the earth.

And this is kind of the important bit. With false religion, the devil is waging warfare against the church.

And over and again, you'll note that it is those who embrace these false and demonic doctrines, they wage war for real against the real saints, and these saints oftentimes are martyred and lose their life.

And so you'll note that false religion isn't something that comes to us as being neutral, innocuous, something that isn't dangerous.

It's extremely dangerous. In fact, it's in this context I would note, I'm super tempted to do this, that there are certain notable churches that call themselves

Lutheran, and during this month of June, they are flying a rainbow flag to show their solidarity with rank sexual immorality.

And I would note this, that Kongsvinger doesn't fly that flag and never will, as long as I'm the pastor.

But in the future, what is seen as an act of solidarity, the churches that refuse to fly that flag in June, in the future, they will face serious persecutions.

Serious. Right now, everything's voluntary and they're just showing solidarity. In the future, it will be a badge as to whether or not you are on board with their apostasies, and if you refuse to fly that flag, there will be hell to pay.

Note my words. I am not a prophet. I'm not a son of a prophet. I can just see that the pot's going to be boiling, and you can see the direction this is all going to.

Connecting the dots, it's very easy to see. After this, I heard what seemed to be a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, crying,

Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, for His judgments are true and just.

Note the saints. When God acts in judgment, they don't sit there and go, Well, that's really unkind of you,

God. How dare you judge us? You're just a mean old oppressor meany head,

God. No. The saints say, Way to go! Your judgments are true.

They are just. He has judged the great prostitute who corrupted the earth with her immorality and has avenged on her the blood of His servants.

Huzzah! God does act in vengeance. Once more, they cried out, Hallelujah! The smoke from her goes up forever and ever.

This one's a little bit of a tough pill to swallow, but note that our mindset as the saints, when we finally see

God's judgment go down, and those rightly sent to hell who persisted in sin and unbelief and have perverted

Christ's gospel and His teachings, that we will rejoice that they're in the lake of fire.

Seems a little odd. In other words, Rob Bell was wrong. There are people actually in hell.

Despite his slogan, Love Wins, we recognize that God is loving and just.

So the 24 elders, the four living creatures, fell down and worshiped God who was seated on the throne saying,

Amen. Hallelujah. And from the throne came a voice saying, Praise our God, all you

His saints, you who fear Him, small and great. Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters, like the sound of mighty peals of thunder crying out.

Note, great multitude. The kingdom that Christ is building, the kingdom that we have been brought into, the kingdom of forgiven rebels, it is such a vast kingdom.

It's a great multitude, practically innumerable. What started off in the

Garden of Eden as husband and wife, Adam and Eve, has grown to such a mighty multitude, the number of those who are saved, that when they cry out in praise and adoration to our

God, it sounds like the roaring of many waters, like the mighty peals of thunder.

It's like the whole earth shakes as we, the saints, cry out, Hallelujah. For the

Lord our God, the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and exult and give

Him the glory. For the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His bride has made herself ready.

And it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure.

For the linen is the righteous deeds of the saints. So then the angel said to me, write this.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he said to me, these are the true words of God.

Now watch what John does here. And hearing this praise and adoration, hearing the multitude, hearing that they are granted to clothe themselves gloriously, write these.

Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb. By the way, we're all invited. What does

John do? Well, he fell down at the angel's feet to worship Him. Stupid. So the angel said to me, you must not do that.

I'm a fellow servant with you and your brothers who hold to the testimony of Jesus. Worship God, for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.

Those are important words. Never lose sight of those words. Anybody who comes to you claiming that they have a word from God, the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.

All the Old Testament prophets wrote of Christ. All of the apostles of the New Testament wrote of Christ. If anyone's talking to you about glory mantles and weird nonsense like this, that's not the testimony of Jesus.

That's something different. And the name by which

He is called is the Word of God. Ah, in the beginning was the

Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. That's Jesus. He has a name written

King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Look at that. Jesus even wears designer clothes, man.

He's got his own logo. It's awesome, right? And then

I saw an angel standing in the sun with a loud voice. He called to all the birds that fly directly overhead.

Come gather for the great supper of God to eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains, the flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses and the riders.

Remember what Daniel saw, the interpretation for Nebuchadnezzar's dream. This rock strikes the empires of the earth, the governments of the world, and they become like chaff that blows away.

And Christ's kingdom grows and grows and grows into a mighty mountain. This is what this is picturing then.

Another picture of that same thing from Daniel 2. Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth with their armies gathered to make war against Jesus.

That's not going to go well. Who was sitting on the horse and against his army.

And the beast was captured and with it the false prophet who in its presence had done the signs by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped its image.

These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur. Didn't sound like much of a fight, did it?

And the rest, they were slain by the sword that came from the mouth of him who was sitting on the horse. And all the birds were gorged with their flesh.

Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit. And a great chain, he seized the dragon.

Now here's the important bit here. And this is where we've got to pay attention to something here.

And that is that here in Revelation 19, remember one of our governing principles here is that the book of Revelation, these are word pictures.

And so you're going to note here, this is an important aspect of Revelation 19.

At the end of 19, where does the devil and the beast and everybody end up? The lake of fire.

So note, the world has ended here. This is a picture of God's judgment.

What happens in 20 is not what chronologically happens next.

What happens at the beginning of 20 is a picture again of the time from Christ's ascension until his return.

This is a picture of the restraining of the devil that takes place during the period from Christ's ascension until his return.

And a lot of dispensationalists and crazy people who read the book of Revelation linearly, they miss this fact.

And as a result of it, this becomes the misinterpretation that leads to millennialism.

Now if you don't know what millennialism is, millennialism believes that Christ is going to reign physically from Jerusalem for a thousand years after his return.

And we know exegetically that's an error. It's not an error that puts you outside of the kingdom, but it does end up making you so that you're subject to loony conspiracy theories and stuff like this.

So the idea here is that the millennium, as mentioned in Revelation 20, is a symbolic picture from Christ's ascension until his return.

And what the millennialists have failed in their exegesis to recognize is that at the end of 19, the world has ended.

Satan has been judged. He's been thrown into the lake of fire. And you have this picture of what?

The marriage feast of the lamb and all this kind of stuff. But then Revelation 20 verse 1 picks up a different word picture, which is shorter in its picture, but it's a picturing of the restraint that the devil is under during the intertestamental period.

Not the intertestamental, but the time of Christ's ascension until his return. And then it talks about how he's let loose near the end of that time period to deceive the nations.

And so Revelation 20 verse 1 is not a chronological thing that happens after Christ returns.

It's a different picture altogether. And this is where a lot of people have erred. So Revelation 20 then verse 1 says,

I saw an angel coming down from heaven holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain.

He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years and threw him into the pit, shut it, and sealed it over so that he might not deceive the nations any longer until the thousand years were ended.

After that, he must be released for a little while. And this is referring to then the great deception and the great apostasy which is demonically created that is on the earth immediately before the return of Christ.

This is not a secondary thing. Instead, the devil, he was already thrown into the lake of fire up above.

And so this is a different picture altogether. So you make an exegetical error, and an easy one to make, by the way, if you think that Revelation 20 verse 1 and that picture then of the restraining of the devil is after the return of Christ.

It's not. It's the restraining of the devil during the time from Christ's ascension until his return.

And it's a picture then of those restraints that are lifted once we get near the end.

And I would throw into that mix then, I'll duplicate the tab here, 2 Thessalonians is a good cross -reference in this, concerning the coming of our

Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him. We ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed by either a spirit or a spoken word, or letters seeming to be from us to the effect that the

Lord has already come. Let no one deceive you in any way that they will not come unless the rebellion, apostasy, comes first and the man of lawlessness is revealed, who is the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so -called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be

God. Do you not remember that when I was still with you, I told you these things, and you know what's restraining him now, that he may be revealed in his time.

So, note, here's the mention of the restraint. The devil is already restrained at the time of the Apostle Paul.

And Christ in the Gospel of John makes it clear that that restraint of the devil takes place at his crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension.

So, by the time the Apostle Paul writes 2 Thessalonians, the devil is already restrained.

He's already bound, and he isn't released until the days immediately before the return of Christ.

For the mystery of lawlessness, though, is already at work, only he who restrains it will do so until he's out of the way.

And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming.

So, you get the idea here. So, when we get to Revelation 20, and this is where we're gonna end today, and we'll pick up in a couple of weeks if I arrive back alive after our trip.

You never know. You always, pray for me, pray for my wife. We're traveling, so, you know, always if the

Lord allows. But this is where we'll do a little bit more deeper study on Revelation 20, verse 1. But, again, there's a break here.

This is a complete vision at the end of verse 21, 19, and chapter 20, verse 1 is a picture, then, of, again, that time from Christ's ascension until his return and the binding and the restraining of the devil until near the end when he's released to deceive the nations.