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We all just took a GIANT step towards the END this year.
COVID-19 has started the ball rolling towards GLOBAL Governance like nothing else. We have had for the first time, every nation on Earth working together to stop the spread. We have had worldwide events like the World Cup, 911, or the Super Bowl—but never anything like this.
God’s Wrath can be held in no longer when the Man of Sin is revealed.
The Man of Sin or AntiChrist is Satan masquerading as Jesus Christ inside a human.
That Beast, called the AntiChrist governs the whole world—and His rise triggers the coming wrath of God.
Beware, the wrath of God is coming–sooner than you think!
Slides
Transcripts
Do you know, we just took a giant step toward the end of the world this year? Did you know COVID-19 has started the ball rolling toward global governance, like nothing else ever has. We have had for the first time, every nation on Earth working together to stop the spread. We’ve had worldwide events in the past, like the world cup, or 9/11, or the Superbowl, or wars, or whatever, but never anything like this. Did you know, God’s wrath can be held in no longer when the man of sin, the Anti-Christ is revealed. The man of sin or Anti-Christ is Satan masquerading as Jesus Christ, inside a human. That beast called the Anti-Christ governs the whole world and his rise triggers the coming wrath of God. We just took a giant step toward that. Beware of the coming wrath of God.
Welcome to our fifth class, as we go through the scriptures and study the book of Isaiah. Now, this fifth class we’re Exploring Isaiah and number five is wrath. That’s the attribute of God. There are 24 different attributes of God. One of them is wrath. Now for most of us, we think wrath is bad. People shouldn’t be wrathful or angry with God. He is perfect. He is Holy. When God has wrath, His wrath is against sin. We’re looking at, when God pours out His judgments on the Earth. Let’s go to Isaiah 13 and see what this whole class is going to be about, as you see on that slide, the coming wrath of God, poured out on the Earth.
Isaiah 13 verse 6, “Wail, for the day of the LORD is at hand! It will come as destruction from the Almighty.”
Look at verse 11, God says “I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity.”
Verse 12, “I will make a mortal more rare than fine gold.”
Look at verse 13. “I will shake the heavens, and the Earth will move out of her place, in the wrath of the LORD of hosts and in the day of His fierce anger.”
Now, this day of the Lord, over here on my chart, this is the day of the Lord, we call it the tribulation. The day of the Lord starts here in this tribulation and it continues all the way through until what Peter calls the day of God, in 2 Peter 3, when God makes a new Heaven and a new Earth. So, whenever you see in any of the prophets in the Old Testament, Joel frequently, Isaiah as we’ll see, often. The day of the Lord, this is what it’s talking about.
So, back at our slides, let’s go on a journey. Beware the coming wrath of God, that’s in the day of the Lord. When, as I read in verse 13 of chapter 13, He shakes the heavens, and it culminates in the destruction and the dissolution of the Earth.
Next slide, I remind you that you’re actually joining us in a series of 15 classes. Class one, the trustworthiness of the scripture. Class two, the description of a dying culture. Class three, how we reach a dying culture, by consecration. Class four, the glory and power of the incarnate name that’s above every name, Jesus Christ. Now we’re in hour five, wrath. When God pours His judgments on the Earth.
Now, look up from your slides for just a second, because I always have to remind you that this class is beamed right into a classroom in East Asia. I’m actually training the next generation, that’s what Bonnie and I do. Bonnie is sitting over there in the control center, running the lights, and all the cameras, and the computers. As we train Asians to reach Asians, we capture these classes and post them, probably you’re watching this on YouTube, and invite you to come along with us in the classes. This is the fifth class and I would encourage you, if you’re just tuning in today, look back at the slide, you should go back and catch up with us in hour one. In fact, there’s an hour number zero. That actually explains how to do all the devotional work.
Continuing to the next slide we’re looking at chapter 13. Chapter 13 is about Babylon. Now, what is Babylon? There are television shows called Babylon. There’s actually a city over in Iraq called Babylon. Yet in the Bible, there is a Babylon that’s going to be destroyed in the Bible. When we talk about Babylon, what are we talking about?
Look at chapter 13, we’re going to start in verse 1 and will if you look down at your slides, this is so you can actually look over my shoulder, my Bible. I took a picture of it just for this class. You are looking at my Bible.
The burden against Babylon. First thing to understand, and you can look up from your slide, starting in chapter 13 all the way through chapter 23, there are these successive burdens against nations. Now, in the next class we’re going to talk about that, how God actually cares what people do on Earth, and that God intervenes in nations when their iniquity gets to a certain point. When they get so corrupt and the evil is so permeating culture, God does something about it. That’s what’s happened with all the civilizations and all the different nations that have risen and fallen over the generations of human history.
Look back at the slide. This is Babylon. Now, at the time this was written in 740 BC, Babylon wasn’t yet a nation, Assyria was. So, this is actually a prophecy of the coming kingdom of Babylon. Now look at verse 5 it says, “They come from a far country.” Actually, I wrote in my Bible, the Hebrew is the far horizons, they come from the “end of Heaven – the LORD and His weapons of indignation,” look at this, “to destroy the whole land.” Now look up for a second. Now we have, watch I’m going to use my board over here, Isaiah who’s writing in 740 to 680 BC is actually looking. At the whole scope of history, he’s looking at the coming. This is when Babylon, what I just read in chapter 13 when Babylon comes. Look back at verse 5 for a second. “They come from the far country.” They come “to destroy the whole land.” So, verses 1-5 are about this. So, chapter 13:1-5 is predicting a kingdom, a geographic entity, a group of people called Babylon are going to come and they’re going to destroy this.
Now, look at verse 6 on the slide. It says, “wail”. Read it out loud, all of you that have your Bibles, those of you that are at the Institute, and any of you that have your Bible open or are looking at this slide. “Wail, for the…” what? Say it together “day of the LORD is at hand! It will come as destruction from the Almighty.” Now look up, this is the day of the Lord. This is chapter 13, verse 6. Now look, Isaiah is sitting in Jerusalem writing under the inspiration of the Spirit, looking at Babylon, prophesying that within a hundred years they’re going to… see, it was a hundred years between when he wrote it and when they came. He’s predicting they’re going to destroy Jerusalem. Then he immediately goes to that very future event, the day of the Lord time. So, that’s what chapter 13 is about.
Look back at your slides, some other things. “I will punish the world for its evil.” That’s what the day of the Lord is about, the tribulation. The Lord said, Jesus said, in Matthew 24, if he didn’t stop it, everybody would die, which is an illusion to verse 12. Verse 13 says, “I will shake the heavens.”
In the next slide, let’s talk about Babylon. Isaiah 13 and 14, that we’re looking at right here, as well as Jeremiah 50 and 51 talk about the destruction of Babylon. It says it will never be inhabited again. Its building materials will never be reused. It will be like Sodom and Gomorrah. So, that’s one description in the Bible. Now, let’s look at history. See the middle of the slide? In 539 Babylon was destroyed by the Persians without a battle. They came in under the wall. They diverted the river, from history. It became, in the future, Alexander the Great’s capital. It atrophied over the centuries. It’s presently being rebuilt, it’s actually a tourist attraction. So, that’s a second description of Babylon. Look down here at the bottom of the slide, in Revelation 17 and 18 it talks about Mystery Babylon, that is completely destroyed. So, what do we have here? Look up and I’ll explain. There’s a literal physical Babylon. It’s a city that was the Babylonian Nebuchadnezzar, Belshazzar, Daniel was there, the lion’s den, all that. It was destroyed, rebuilt, destroyed, rebuilt, but it’s never, look back at the slide, it’s never been completely uninhabited like Sodom and Gomorrah. When is that going to happen? That’s the bottom of the slide, that is during the day of the Lord, the tribulation.
In the next slide, this is the description of the day of the Lord. It’s 19 times mentioned in the scriptures. Four times in the New Testament and 15 times in the Old Testament, very much here in Isaiah 13.
Now move forward to Isaiah 24, and this is called by theologians, the little apocalypse. Look up for a second, the book of Revelation is called the apocalypse. Notice Revelation 6 through 18, 19, 20, 21. Most of the book of the Revelation is the apokalupsis and that is the unveiling of Jesus Christ. That’s what apocalypse means. Apocalypse doesn’t mean destruction of the world, end of the world, Armageddon. Apokalupsis is unveiling of Christ. The book of Isaiah has a little section that is very much similar to this, that we’re going to look at now.
Back in your slides, chapter 24 to 27, the little apocalypse. Here’s chapter 24 in my Bible. “Behold, the LORD makes the Earth empty and makes it waste.” I will make it waste, “distorts its surface and scattered abroad its inhabitants.” The Lord talks about that, this is what He’s going to do. Over here in verses 18 and 19, the foundations of the Earth are shaken. The Earth is violently broken, split open, shaken exceedingly, reeling to and fro like a drunkard. Shall totter like a hut. Look up for a second. Can you imagine what it will be like to be on the Earth at the day of the Lord? During the tribulation? I can’t imagine. It says people are going to be so desperate, they’re going to be crawling on their hands and knees looking for a hole to stick their head in, they’re so afraid of what’s coming. Look back at your slide. So, that’s Isaiah 24.
Now, in chapter 25 and 26, it parallels the book of Revelation as a song, praising God’s salvation. Now, look up for a second, in Revelation 6 to 18: chapter 7 we have choirs singing praises to God. In chapter 14, we have choirs singing praise to God. In chapter 15, we have a circle of saints in Heaven and the elders singing praises to God. In Chapter 17 and 18, we have this voice praising God. So, this whole idea of worship coming up during the destruction of Earth is paralleled by Isaiah. So, look back at your slides. Isaiah 25 and 26, this little apocalypse has a song praising God’s salvation.
Look at chapter 25. “O LORD, You are my God. I will exalt You. I will praise Your name, for You have done wonderful things; Your councils of old are faithfulness and truth.” “For you have been a strength to the poor, […] to the needy […] A refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat.” Now, can you hear these words? “He will swallow up death forever, and the LORD will wipe away tears.” Look up for a second, doesn’t that sound familiar? Yes. That’s Jesus describing Heaven in Revelation 21, quotes this verse. Paul in 1 Corinthians quotes this verse. This is the promise of God. This is the songs of worship in the midst of the apocalypse, the revelation of Jesus Christ, who comes as the wrath of God in the day of the Lord. There’s a multitude of people. Do you remember in the tribulation, in chapter 7 and 14, it describes countless people being saved out of the tribulation, through the ministry of the 144,000, which are saved Jews. Actual, literal, physical, ethnic Jews that come to Christ and go out as evangelists and we see that.
Back to the slides, look at this verse, wow. It’s Isaiah 25:9, “And it will be said in that day: ‘Behold, this is our God; we’ve waited for Him, and He will save us. This is the LORD; we have waited for Him; we’ll be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” Now remember, look up, the first law of textual interpretation is what on Earth does that verse mean, right here? Primarily it’s talking about the people. See, Isaiah is delivering this to the people. He’s looking, see Isaiah is looking across all of this time seeing the ending and each of these events. Isaiah describes all of them in his book, in his prophecy but he’s writing to a group of people that were literally alive at that day. He’s saying, as you see all this judgment coming, this is what I want you to do. Look back at the slide, I want you to turn to God. I want you to say we’ve waited for You, You will save us. You’re the Lord. We will be glad and rejoice in Your salvation. Wow. What a lesson.
The next slide, we’re in chapter 26. As we go to chapter 26, what we’re seeing is more of these songs of praises. Here’s one of the most famous verses in Isaiah. “You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You. Trust in the LORD forever, for YAH, the LORD, is everlasting strength.” Now, look at these two verses. “The way of the just is uprightness; O Most Upright, you weigh the path of the just. Yes, in the way of Your judgements, O LORD, we have waited for you; the desires of our soul is for Your name.” Wow.
Now, look up for a second. People that were alive in the time of Isaiah, that were facing the onset of the Assyrians and later the Babylonians, people that would be alive during the destruction of Jerusalem, as well as people that will be coming to Christ during the tribulation, all of them equally are going to have that perfect peace. It talks about, see in the slide right there in verse 3, “keep him in perfect peace.”
Look at what it says down here in verse 12, “You will establish peace for us.”
Verse 13, “O LORD our God, masters besides You had dominion over us; but by You only we make mention of Your name.” Wow.
Now, look at verse 19. “Your dead shall live; together with my dead body they shall arise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in dust.” Wow. Look up, that’s Isaiah talking, and he says, I know this is all coming, and I know I’m going to die sooner or later, like all of us but I am going to, look back at that slide, I am going to awake and sing to You because, even though I dwell in the dust, I have resurrection.
Now let’s go to chapter 27, chapter 27 of Isaiah.
This next slide, here it is, is right out of my Bible and is about the restoration of Israel. Do you remember, in chapter 5 we talked about Israel being the vineyard? This is God again, going back to working with the nation of Israel. This is a future event. I’ll show you on the board in just a second but look at verse 13. “So it shall be in that day: the great trumpet will be blown; they will come, who are about to perish in the land of Assyria, and they who are outcasts in the land of Egypt, and shall worship the LORD in the holy mount at Jerusalem.” Now, what is that talking about? Look up at the board again, Isaiah’s talking about events near and far. So, doesn’t it get confusing sometimes? How do you know which is which?
Let me show you another chart. This is a quick chart that just graphs everything that I have on the marker board. I’ll walk through these 12 steps, from now to eternity.
- Right here is where we are today in 2020, it’s the church age. The first event God has planned, right here, is the resurrection of the church or the rapture. That’s when the dead in Christ will rise first and we, which are alive and remain are caught up together with Him.
- The next event that will follow that is right there. A world ruler makes this treaty with Israel. That’s the Anti-Christ who I told you about. The COVID-19 has started us in global governance.
- Israel is restored. The 144,000 believers are sealed, they become evangelists. The Earth plunges into the day of the Lord. The seven-year tribulation.
- The Anti-Christ breaks the covenant he makes with Israel. Israel sees the handwriting on the wall and Zechariah says as the tribulation worsens.
- They start calling on the Lord.
- Jerusalem is surrounded. We know this is Armageddon and it’s attacked.
- Just as the Anti-Christ is about to exterminate the Jewish people right there, that’s the second coming.
- So, this is the rapture. All of these events have to take place, and this is the second coming. Immediately following the second coming is what Jesus described in Matthew 25:31, the sheep and goat judgment.
- Then there’s the resurrection of Old Testament and tribulation believers. That’s revelation 20 verse 4. That starts the Kingdom Age, the thousand years.
- Then the first universe at the end of the thousand years is burned up. That’s what Peter talks about in 2 Peter 3:7 & 10. God creates new heavens and a new Earth. That’s what Peter describes.
- Satan’s final judgment. Great white throne.
- Then we go into new heavens and new Earth. Wow.
Now look up from your slide. Basically, Isaiah covers all of that. As we go through this book, we’re going to see him going back and forth between the destruction of Jerusalem and the day of the Lord. The day of the Lord is climaxed by the second coming of Christ. He establishes His kingdom. He actually rules on Earth. We’re going to see that the Earth is going to have the curse rolled back. People are not going to be sick. Diseases rolled back, people’s lives are extended, Isaiah says, to live the whole thousand years. They’ll still have homes and they’ll still be gardening and farming and having children and living for a thousand years. Not the saints, that’s right here. See, just before the tribulation, right here is the rapture. So, all the people that are raptured are not living during the kingdom, having children, and farming. We’re actually with the Lord up here in Heaven, but we do come to Earth. Then all of those already resurrected in glorified bodies and those in the kingdom are reunited and live forever in Heaven.
Now, in the next slide, I want to show you how this plays out in everyday life. Let’s go to Matthew 24. Take your Bibles, turn to Matthew 24 and look at this slide; God gives the details. Probably the most frequent question I have is, how do we know how soon all this is going to happen? So, the answer I give is right here and I’m going to read most of this to you. God gives the specific details on the end of the world. What He describes right here in Isaiah 13, is repeated right here in Matthew, where we’re going, chapter 24. Then it’s really expanded and all of the different parts of the scripture, all the prophecies are united in Revelation 6 to 19.
So, let’s read Matthew 24, and the next slide, this is what it says starting in verse 8. “All these are the beginning of sorrows.” “So you also, when you see all of these things,” notice this repetition, all of these things, “all these things, know that it is near – at the doors!” What’s that? The second coming of Christ. “Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place.”
All what things? Look at the next slide. This is a chart of what God’s word says is going to happen. Notice this chart follows the order of the book of Revelation. So, let me just take you on a journey right now.
- We’re right here, we are the church on Earth and that’s what Revelation 1 through 3 is about.
- Then what happens next is the rapture of the church. The rapture of the church is John 14, Luke 24, Acts 1, 1 Corinthians 15, 1 Thessalonians 4. We go to Heaven.
- What happens there is we get the bema seat judgement, where our life passes through the fire. Everything done for Christ is our reward and we offer it to Christ.
- Then on Earth is the tribulation, which we’ve talked about – chapter 13, all those horrors.
- Which is culminated by the second coming of Christ.
- Who sets up His kingdom for 1000 years.
- Then the rebels are judged at the great white throne.
- God lets us dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
So, that’s a thumbnail view of everything that is planned. When Jesus said all these things, He was talking about, and you can look up from your slide for a second, the whole Matthew 24 passage.
This is what it looks like. Matthew 24 is a drone view of what’s going on, on the Earth. So, here’s the drone and the drone is looking down from a high up view and seeing what the Earth looks like, listen, when Jesus returns in this second coming. So, this second coming to Earth, Jesus said all these things will be happening on Earth. What things? We have this mark of the beast. We have the Anti-Christ himself. We have all these horrible judgments going on. We have demons coming out. All these things. See, the Bible describes is not when Jesus comes. It does not say when Jesus returns, what does it say? What is going on, on the Earth. So, what is going on, on Earth when Jesus returns?
Let’s go through these slides. Number one, revelation 11 says on the Earth, the second coming of Christ, will be global. See, this is the emphasis right here, this is so important. There has always been communication and people have seen things, but there’s going to be a global scene Revelation 11 says. “Those from the peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations will see their dead bodies.” Peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations is code for everybody. For three and a half days everybody on Earth is going to see the same event. They don’t “allow their dead bodies to be put into graves. And those who dwell on the Earth,” it’s a global event, “will rejoice over them, make merry, and send gifts to one another.” Wow. Earth dwellers.
Look up, has there ever been a time in history where you could send a gift to people all over the world? No. Now Amazon, you can order Amazon in Japan, you can order Amazon in the UK, you can order Amazon anywhere you want. China has their own version of Amazon. Do you see, we live in a time, look back at the slides, of global telecommunications and television.
This slide you see next is what Facebook live looked like yesterday. You know what? Facebook live is anybody on Facebook that turned the camera on. The green dots, you see this cluster of green dots, the East and West Coast, Western Europe, East Asia, Southeast Asia. Do you see that? Some in South America and just a little bit in Africa. Those green dots are broadcasters, the blue dots are Facebook users the blue dots are people watching the people broadcasting. Do you notice that every continent, every part of the world is watching? That’s global television and telecommunication.
The next slide, Jesus said in Matthew 24, something else is going to be global. The gospel is going to go into all the world, to all the nations. So, when we have global evangelism going on, it’s time for Christ to return. Do we?
This map is from the IMB, International Mission Board. That is the consortium of evangelical Americans in the Baptist churches who have worked with all the other mission boards to look for this. Do you see what all these red dots are? These are the unreached people groups. These are people all over the world who need the Bible in their language. They need someone to share and witness. In other words, every one of those red dots, there’s no scripture in their language and there’s no person that speaks their language that is born again. This is the focus of world missions, to reach the world. Now, I don’t know if we’re going to reach the world before the tribulation starts, but I do know that during the tribulation, God does reach every single person.
Here’s another one of the signs that we’re at the end. It says in Daniel 12:4, “shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end.” So, here’s the code. You know you’re at the end, the Matthew 24 time, when two things happen. The first one, there’s global travel.
Now I want you to think about history 3000 years ago. Jonah got on a boat and sailed from the port of Jaffa to Tarshish, which would be modern Spain/ Morocco area. 2000 years ago, the apostle Paul got on a very similarly built boat and sailed all over the Mediterranean. 500 years ago, Christopher Columbus got on a boat and discovered the new world. 200 years ago, Ben Franklin got on a boat that was not much different than Jonah’s boat, Paul’s boat, Columbus’s boat. This is Ben Franklin sailing to ask the French, he went across the Atlantic to help America. Everything was pretty much the same throughout human history, 3000 years ago, from that time. So, 100 years ago everything started changing. Look how it is today with the advent of the steam engine and then the airplane. Then the rocket.
Look at this, 4.59 billion people flew in 2019. Now, COVID-19 has shut down a lot, but almost 5 billion people. They’re going to run to and fro at the end of the world.
Here’s another one, Daniel says at the time of the end there’s going to be knowledge increasing, exploding knowledge. What is Daniel talking about? Daniel is talking about what I could say in one word.
Have you thought about the fact that right now in your pocket, if you have a cell phone, you have the sum total of all the knowledge that’s been known throughout all of history. Look up for a second. I can type into Google, and you can type into Google, and that algorithm searches the Google project. Remember the Gutenberg project? Do you remember what they did about 10 years ago? Google went through, with permission, every library in America and every international library that would let them, and they took these advance scanners, and they scanned every book in the libraries. They also have offered to every university and to every graduate school that they will put into their memory banks, all the research and everything NASA and the European Space Consortium, and everyone else that will feed in, and almost everybody has. Right now, in fact I was reading the National Geographic, that they took the journals of Leonardo DaVinci. Do you remember Leonardo? He wrote backward and obverse. He would look in a mirror and he would write his special writing. So, for centuries people have had trouble reading Leonardo’s writing and all of his journals as he looked, and invented things, and speculated, and had so much knowledge. They even have translated Leonardo’s journals and everything else they can find. Look back at the slide, we would be at the end of the world, the Bible says, when knowledge increases. What does that mean? The sum total of everything known at this time is instantly available. Do you know what’s really flourishing? Sin. It used to be, if you wanted to know about witchcraft you had to go to some dark bookstore somewhere, now it’s all online. Think about it. It used to be that Sodom and Gomorrah were little cities out in the desert that only a caravan passing by every so often would know about. Now, all sin is everywhere, instantly available. Jesus said knowledge would increase.
Next slide. Now only the sum total of all knowledge but look what else Jesus said in Luke 21. He said, this is what the Earth looks like at the end. Here, back on the slide, remember what we’re looking at is a drone view of what the Earth looks like at the second coming. Back to the slide, Jesus is describing the second coming, He describes it in Matthew 24, He describes it in Mark 13, and He describes it right here in Luke 21. He says the same thing in all three little variations. The same event. He said, “there will be signs in the Sun, and in the Moon, and in the stars, and on Earth distress of nations, with perplexity.” Why? Because of global weather gone wild. “The sea and the waves roaring.” Look at verse 26, “men’s hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the Earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.” Look up, what does Isaiah 13 say? We read it a while back. It says the Earth is going to convulse. Do you know what else it says in Revelation 11? Everybody’s watching, because there’s going to be these global telecommunications. Now, what does Luke 21 say? Interesting word, the Greek word that Jesus uses is the word. Apopsychō. Psychō, you all know that from English. Psychology, psychosis, psychosomatic. You understand, it’s something to do with our nonmaterial part of us. Like our breath within us. The word Apo that’s appended to that psychō is the word out of. So, out of spirit. Psychō or breath or inner person. Look back at Luke 21 verse 26, men’s hearts failing, psychō from fear. Look up, people are going to be watching their digital devices, and they’re going to see this tidal wave coming or a tsunami coming and they’re going to die of fear before the wave gets to them. That’s what it says.
Do you know what this says? Not only is there going to be global weather events? Look at the slides, look down here. God says inescapable climate change is coming. If someone asks you if there’s climate change say yeah, and it’s really going to be bad, inescapable.
Here’s just one headline I clipped from last year. Bonnie and I were teaching in hungry and this was the headline. Record, never in history, ever in recorded history, has it been 108 degrees in Paris. They let all the people in the fountain by the Eiffel Tower.
Look at this one, 2013, seven years ago, a relatively small asteroid exploded in the atmosphere near a Russian city in Siberia. Just the air blast, it blew up in the air, injured 1500 people. Unbelievable.
Here’s the next one? Jesus said, this is what it looks like when I return. The sign, remember He said, said, how do you know I’m coming? All of these signs will be present on Earth. Digital money, global tracking and positioning, Revelation 13, the Anti-Christ, the beast, the one masquerading as Jesus Christ “causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.” Remember the 666? What is that talking about?
Look at the next slide. You want to talk about your right hand and your forehead, and you want to talk about something that’s very current? Look at that slide. What is that? That’s facial recognition. What is the facial recognition doing? Why it’s looking at your forehead and your face, and it’s looking at these points and between them. All those points around your face, you can get into your iPhone, we already have it. What it’s saying is, look at the slide, there’s going to be digitalized money. You can’t buy or sell without a number. Do you catch that? We’re already there. Look up from your slides. I’m not worried, honestly, I don’t believe that the COVID-19 vaccine has something in it that’s going to be part of the mark of the beast. The mark of the beast is not surreptitiously foisted upon humanity. It is a mark of allegiance.
To the New Testament world, every Roman citizen, once a year, had to come before the city clerk. Now, this is Roman history and the way to understand the scripture is to understand the context of Revelation 13. Every Roman citizen had to come. They stood in line. There was a clerk. There was a bowl of incense. There was a little fire, coal fire, burning in a little urn. They had to, the citizen had to take incense, sprinkle it on the fire, so it puffed in smoke, and say Caesar is Lord. It took one, two, three seconds, Caesar is Lord and you walked by and the clerk handed you a libelli, it was called. It’s a little piece of paper saying you’re a loyal citizen. That was the mark of allegiance to the emperor. There is going to be sometime in the future, whether it’s biometrics, look back at the slides, do you see right now with all the COVID-19 testing, they’re getting the DNA. Do you understand that? Look up for a second, you understand every time they swab someone, they don’t just get the virus, they’re getting the DNA. They’re building a global database of all DNAs. They’re merging it with facial recognition right now. What you see on the slide in front of you, all airports are slowly getting in almost every major city, and all the universities have their cameras up, they are doing biometrics there. They’re doing files, students willingly are not wanting to carry around, look up from your slide and think about it, they don’t want to carry around their wallet and their ID. So, if they could walk up to the dorm and the camera sees their face and biometrically looks at them, it opens the door that is digitalized. They put a number with each student. They put a number with each citizen. They put a number with each traveler. They’re matching those numbers with the DNA from all this testing. That is not the mark of the beast. The mark of the beast is when, like the Roman citizens, the government that knows exactly who you are asks you, will you be loyal to the supreme ruler? That’s going to be the mark of the beast, that you accept it and say, I will be loyal. Then you can, on the right hand or forehead, then you have the freedom to buy and sell.
Let’s keep going, or we’ll never get through all these. Here’s another sign that Jesus talks about in Matthew 24, I call the sign of weapons of global destruction. You’ve heard of mass destruction. This is global. This is what Jesus said, for “there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved.” What’s He talking about?
Look at the next slide. Humanity’s aware of it, the doomsday clock’s most dire warnings are right now. Why is that? Because of the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Look at everybody that has them. We have almost 7,000. Russia has almost 7,000, but everybody else is building up fast. Right now, Iran is trying to get one. Saudi Arabia is presently working on a nuclear reactor. So are so many other places. We know about North Korea and everything going on. Look up for a second, do you know what’s worse than nuclear weapons? Biological weapons. Think about how we’ve become so aware of how vulnerable we are. Do you know what the Lord says? It’s the end of the world, when it’s possible to infect or blow up everybody. Jesus said, if I don’t stop the tribulation with the second coming, Jesus said, during the seven-year period everybody will die if I don’t intervene. That’s how we know we’re at the end. Was that possible in Bible times? No. Did you know, in the Bible times you could either arrow somebody or spear them, or you could sword them. Maybe shoot a rock at them or catapult something. While you were shooting your catapult that way, people would run that way. Do you understand, they didn’t have any way of delivering global destruction until now? Until what’s rapidly building for the last two generations. Unbelievable.
Next slide, the sign of global desire for peace and prosperity. This is really what’s going to usher in the Anti-Christ. God says people are going to come to the point where they say enough is enough. There’ve been too many riots and wars and terrible things. Everybody is going to want peace and safety, so that there can be peace, prosperity, and we can all enjoy ourselves. That’s what the world is coming to. That’s why there’s the desire for global peace.
Every time I see this co-exist bumper sticker, I think about that. Because, as soon as you have global peace, then the global holocaust begins, as the Anti-Christ unleashes his horrors.
Here’s another one, talk about timely. Jesus said there will be famines and pestilences. What are pestilences? Global diseases.
Did you know the first truly global event in history, we have lived through in the last seven months? 2020 will go down in history as the beginning of the end. We have all witnessed the very first global event. Nation’s locked down. Global travel locked down. Entire cities quarantine. We’ve watched China put 20 million people behind barriers and not allowed to travel. There have been worldwide events like the world cup, 9/11, the super bowl, and so on, but never anything like this. Nations are shaming and excluding other nations that don’t comply. This is the first step to a global ruler called the Anti-Christ. As every COVID test also gets DNA and the ongoing pandemic is the best way to identify everybody to make sure they’ve been infected or not infected. That global event, that virus you see on the screen, that is what’s kicking off the rise of the Anti-Christ.
The next slide and the final of all of these different global travel, global explosion of knowledge, global weather gone wild, global telecommunication, evangelism, pestilences, but the worst is right here because this is what brings Jesus back. Zechariah 12:3 says on that day, Jesus is speaking, “I will make Jerusalem a very heavy stone for all peoples;” all who lift up will hurt themselves, and “all nations of the Earth are gathered against it,” Jerusalem. What is that?
Look at this next one, a top Iranian general says forces in Syria waiting orders to destroy Israel.
God says this, when you put Iran plus Russia against Israel, you have Armageddon. That’s the simple math of prophecy. What should all this do for us?
This next slide says a quote from Martin Luther, the great reformer. He said, I have two days on my calendar, today and the day I stand before Christ.
My question to you is, are you living like Jesus was coming to get you today?
Next slide. Why? Because the wrath of God is coming. Here on the board, I remind you that the scriptures tell us, that Heaven is preceded by a thousand year reign of Christ on Earth, is proceeded by the second coming, is proceeded by the rise of the Anti-Christ, and all of those things are proceeded by this, the rapture of the church taken out of this world to stand in front of Jesus Christ and have Him ask us; what did you do with that one precious life I gave you? I left you and told you exactly what I wanted you to do while you were on Earth. I wanted you to go into all the world and share the good news. I wanted you to find my word and eat it, like I had written here at the beginning of the class, and to rejoice. Is that what you’re doing? Or are you living like the rest of the world, for fleeting pleasures? The purpose of prophesy is to get us ready to stand in front of Jesus Christ.
Let’s bow for word of prayer and ask Him to help us.
Father in Heaven, I thank you, that You’ve told us what’s going to happen. We’re so excited. We see the drone view from scripture and everything You said was going to be on Earth is here now. So, that means You’re closer than You’ve ever been before. You’re standing at the door, as James says. I pray that we’d live ready to step in front of Your throne and to give an account for how we lived our one and only life that You gave us, our precious life lived for You. That’s our desire, in the name of Jesus we pray. And all God’s people said, Amen.
Check Out All The Sermons In The Series
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