Babylon and Jerusalem

If you would turn to the back of your Bible to the Bible maps, which maybe you don't use too often, the first map may well be that of the age of the patriarchs. And it shows in the version that I have in ancient world where, over close to the Persian Gulf, at the right side of the map, is the little town of Ur. Ur was one of the first capital cities of a city-state that would eventually become Babylonia. That is the area right there where writing was invented and first developed. Ur is where Abraham came from and his family. The towns around it formed the first city-state. And it wasn't long that we read in Genesis 11 that a man named Nimrod began to form a larger group of city-states just a little bit to the north that you might see on your map in a place called Babyl.

In Genesis 11, in verse 4, it says, And they said, Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower. A city and a tower, you notice here, is something they decided. Let's notice these words. They said, Let us build ourselves a city and a tower. That part of the world is very flat. At that time, it was quite swampy. Ur was located on an island. And when you looked across the horizon, you didn't see anything. Just reeds. And so, ziggurat or temple towers were things, man-made towers that were erected. Archaeology has found some 300 of them dotting the landscape from Ur and going north up through Babylonia.

Well, here, Nimrod and his followers are saying, Let us take for ourselves, let us build ourselves a gigantic ziggurat or temple tower. Let us build ourselves a city. And going on, let us make a name for ourselves. What that means is, let's make ourselves people of renown, powerful, so that word will spread and they will know us here in Babylonia. Let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the Earth. And so, in this instance, we find that man takes upon himself to begin civilization there in the area that's called Mesopotamia, which is the Greek word that means, Meso, or between the rivers, the two rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates.

This is often referred to as the cradle of civilization. It's in the fertile crescent that goes across the top of Arabia. This is where the wheel was invented. This is where, as I mentioned, the alphabet, Sumerian Sanskrit, was first invented. People were taking upon themselves the power, the prestige, etc., etc. Let's go to Acts 7, 2 and 4. Acts 7, 2 Here, Stephen is addressing the high priest, and he said, Brethren and Fathers, the God of glory appeared to our father, Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia.

Now, we have two individuals in Mesopotamia. One is Abraham here. And God said to him, Get out of your country and from your relatives and go to a land where I will show you. In verse 7, in the last half, it said, After that, they shall come out and serve me in this place. So we have one individual being led by God. Meanwhile, we have another group of people trying to build themselves a certain city.

The people who are led by God, it just says in verse 7 here, in this place. Stephen is speaking from Jerusalem. God led Abraham to the land of Canaan and eventually established an interim location for his government in a physical Jerusalem. Meanwhile, mankind, just in that same Mesopotamia area, is trying to establish his own religion, his own God, God Nimrod, who would become Isis, Horus, Semiramis, the Queen Mother of Heaven, Tamas, all these other gods that eventually would become known by other names.

This is kind of a rival civilization that's being set up. I'd like to go back to one other scripture in Genesis. That's Genesis chapter 10, verses 8 through 10. And look at the mentality that Nimrod uses. Genesis chapter 10, beginning in verse 8, Kush begat Nimrod, and he began to be a mighty one on the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord, and therefore it is said, like Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord. What that means is the mighty one in place of the Lord, instead of the Lord.

Nimrod became the one that people today worship as a man born of a woman. He was the child in the mother's arms. He was the ancient one, the ancient son, that was born nine months after the festival of Ishtar in the winter, in December. And came as the young boy, man in the branch, the one who was coming to save humanity and bring good gifts.

And so this legend arose of a man who was before or in place of the Lord in verse 10. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel and Arrak, which is another city state down there by Ur, Aqad, etc., etc. And so they began to build this nation, this land in chapter 11 and verse 4. Let us make a name for ourselves. Let us make ourselves into something great. Meanwhile, we come back and we see Abraham. God is going to make something great out of Abraham. Abraham obeyed and followed God and then received blessings.

And God said, I'm going to make you a company of nations. Your seed is going to grow up. You're going to be a blessing to the world. I'm going to give you an inheritance. So one group is forming what would become Babylon. The other group is forming what would become Jerusalem, New Jerusalem. Both have their roots in the same place, Mesopotamia, and both have two totally different mentalities. In Hebrews 11 and verses 13 through 16, we see a little bit about this Jerusalem, this rival country to what Satan through mankind began to create.

Hebrews 11 and verse 13 says, These faithful all died, not having received the promise. But they embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on earth. One says, we are of the earth and the earth is it. And the other says, we're just temporarily here. In fact, we don't even really fit. For those who say such things declare plainly that they seek a homeland. If you look the Greek word up for the word homeland there, it can mean a country, it can mean a homeland. It also can mean a capital city with the inference to the homeland.

And if truly they had called to mind that from which they had come out, they would have had opportunity to return. But now they desire a better, that is a heavenly, capital city, country, homeland, whatever you want to put in there. It's inferred in the Greek. You see it's in italics, so the word doesn't actually appear.

Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God for He has prepared a city for them. There is a city, a new Jerusalem. And new Jerusalem is in direct conflict with Babylon. The two seem similar in many ways.

They both have fathers that came from Mesopotamia. Nimrod was the father of religion of all types today. Abraham was the father of the faithful. Nimrod is the father of those who seek a kingdom, who seek world domination, who seek power, who seek glory, who seek all the things that life can offer. Abraham is the father of those who seek a different city, a new Jerusalem, a different mentality, a new God, who don't seek to take anything themselves, but rather to please a God and be blessed and given the blessings of it. We may live to see in our lifetime the climax of the clash between these two cultures, because the difficulties are heating up. The paradoxes, the contrasts are getting stronger by the day. And today I want to give you an overview of these two great kingdoms and remind us of the importance to have a strong allegiance to new Jerusalem, to the kingdom of God, and not to have any allegiance whatsoever to Babylon, Babylonia, Neo-Babylonia. Right now we are in the fourth revival, the fourth form, I guess, the fourth beast. First you had Babylon, then Persia, then Greece, then Rome, and now we're in the last revival of what is called the Holy Roman Empire. And this is absorbing and pulling together and knitting together and stitching together. And it looks like the only thing that's going to work for humanity. Indeed, it will eventually put itself forward with its own Messiah to be the salvation of the world. And you're either in or you're not. You're either on board and you're going to do well or you're not. So what is your allegiance to? Jerusalem of above or Babylon of below? The interpreter's dictionary of the Bible defines Babylon as a term used for the realm of Satan, as being against God and containing all blasphemies and idolatries. She is a harlot ruling many kingdoms, corrupting kings, drunk with the blood of saints and martyrs, the antithesis of the virgin bride of Christ, the antithesis of the holy city, New Jerusalem, and the kingdom of God. The term Babylon undoubtedly refers not to ancient Babylon at all, but to Rome. That's what interpreters Bible dictionary says. You and I are not of this Romish political, economic system. We just are not. And yet we are in it. We're not of it, but we are in it, and it's all around us. And just like one day God said to Abram, get out of here. Go somewhere else. God is telling you and me to come out of this society. Don't be part of it. And it's important that we understand why. Galatians chapter 4 and verse 26 shows us who and what we are to be about. In the preceding verses we see the fruits of God's Holy Spirit. In verse 25 it says, If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not become conceited. I'm sorry, I'm in chapter 5. I should be in chapter 4. Just back up chapter 4.

The Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all. The Jerusalem of above, God's kingdom, the capital city, new Jerusalem that exists right now, is the mother of us all. It's the one that develops us.

And then we flow into chapter 5 and we see the fruits of God's Holy Spirit and the way that that Spirit is to operate in us. And then in verse 25, if we live in that Spirit, then we walk in the Spirit. But we are not to become conceited ourselves, looking to ourselves, putting together or becoming part of this world that thinks it is great, developing a name for itself. We are subjects of another city, a spiritual kingdom.

It's now in heaven. It is of heaven. It is the kingdom of God. In the 12th chapter of Hebrews, verse 22 through 29, it says, But you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God. Spiritually, we go to Jerusalem, the city of the living God. The heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the General Assembly and the Church of the Firstborn, who are registered in heaven, to God, the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men, made perfect, to Jesus, the Mediator of the New Covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel.

See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. The world has refused God. Everybody from almost cover to cover in this Bible refused God. And there are consequences for doing so, but He's saying, don't refuse God. Don't refuse what God tells us and teaches us.

He says, If they did not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away from Him who speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth, but now His promise saying, yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also heaven. Now, this once more indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, as things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. Will you be shaken? When the time of testing comes on the whole earth, to test and try those who dwell here, will you remain?

See, we have to know which city we belong to. We have to have a strong allegiance. Otherwise, you won't believe the decisions and the pulls that will be extant at that time. Verse 28, Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear.

Deep respect of God. We have these two kingdoms. One is Babylon and the beast represented by the feet, by the image of Daniel going all the way down to the feet. And the second is the kingdom of God, New Jerusalem, which is also represented by the stone that's cut out without hands and comes and crushes that first beast. And these two are going to come into a dramatic contest as to who's going to survive. The 7 trumpet sounds in Revelation 11, verses 15-18.

Revelation 11, beginning in verse 15, Then the seventh angel sounded, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever. So there is coming a time when God is going to intervene. Verse 16, The twenty-four elders who sat before God on their thrones and on their faces worshiped God, saying, We give you thanks, O Lord God Almighty, the one who is and who was and who is to come, because you have taken your great power and reigned.

The nations were angry, and your wrath has come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that you should reward your servants, the prophets and the saints, and those who fear your name, small and great, and you should destroy those who destroy the earth. So the time is coming when these two cities, the great city of heaven and the great city of this earth, Babylon, the great kingdoms, are going to duke it out, as it were.

The climax of this is found in Revelation 18, verse 2, where it says, Babylon the Great has fallen, has fallen. And it tells us a lot about Babylon in that chapter, in that her luxuries, the necessities of life, along with a very good economic system, were extant during the time of the end. And when human beings need things in order to survive, if they pull together and serve their own needs, they can usually do pretty well.

And that's really what the modern Babylon is all about, is a uniting and a pulling together in order to survive and then to richly feed itself and its friends and those who have the mark of the beast. And if you're not in that club, you don't survive. And once again, with all of the miracles and all the luxuries and all the wonderful things, what's a human to do? What's a human to choose? We need to have our allegiances very clear in our mind.

Now, so far, I've kind of just mentioned some historical and some prophetic events on a timeline. Kind of gives us a backdrop of what's going to happen, a little bit of why. But what it really comes down to is, will you come out of Babylon and will you be part of New Jerusalem? It's really what your life boils down to. Your whole life could be encapsulated in that one thing. Will you come out of Babylon? Will you come out of sin? Will you truly repent of anything to do with the breaking of God's law and come totally out of that no matter what the cost?

And will you be loyal to God? Or do you want to double-dip, play games, cover your bases, kind of be like a Balaam? Well, I want to obey God, but I want the money. So I'll try to do both. It's the object of prophecy. God lets us know what's going to happen so that we can choose. We must choose. Modern Babylon is something that we need to come out of. What is it exactly? What's the lure that we have to fight?

Why is it attractive? In Matthew 24, I won't turn there, but Jesus warned us that false Christs and false prophets would be coming, rising up and showing great signs and wonders, if possible, to deceive the very elect. Why? How does that happen? Well, I don't know that anyone knows, but just stop for a minute. The time that he said is going to be the worst time that has ever happened, and it anytime or ever will happen in the future, puts a lot of people in harm's way. When Revelation talks about possibly two-thirds of all humanity dying, just struggling to survive is going to be a problem, isn't it?

Now, when you throw in great signs and wonders, I don't think it's just fireworks going off. Oh, that was nice. Let's see another one. You know, great signs and wonders and miracles that involve you as a person, me as an individual, our lifeline, as it were, to staying alive would be very, very compelling, wouldn't they? Very compelling.

In Revelation 13, verse 13, it says, He performs great signs so that He even makes fire to come down from heaven on the earth and the sight of men. This is the religious beast at the end time, the head of the religious arm of Babylon. And He deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which He was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast. He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image would speak, and would cause as many as would not worship the beast to be killed. It comes down to survival, you see. And not only that, He causes all both small and great and rich and poor and free and slave to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads. That's their belief and their action. The things that they do with their mind and their body, that no one may sell or buy except one who has the mark or the name of the beast or the number of his name. So it comes down, doesn't it, to miracles, to requirements, and the opportunity to stay alive and to be part of this club, this economic powerhouse. And you have a religion that really seems to work with signs and wonders. There is something about this individual we find in Revelation 17 that's a mystery. It's not necessarily so clearly defined as you and I might think. Because there's an attraction here that's very strong, and Christ warned you and me that it might even take us away. Revelation 17, then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and talked with me, saying to me, Come, and I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters. So here we see a woman. A woman prophetically is a religious body, a church, but she's called a harlot. She's not just a woman. She's not your librarian. She's not just a statistic. She's a hooker. She's a good-looking, working girl that turns her tricks and magic to allure people. That's the way the Bible defines her. So there's something pretty good-looking about this religion. And it's working in verse 2. With whom the kings of the earth committed fornication. They were drawn to this. Kings, noblemen, countries, leaders, they're not dumb people. They know an opportunity when they see one. It looks good. Along with the inhabitants of the earth, and they were made drunk with the wine of her fornication, this system is powerfully alluring, and everybody is brought in.

There are abominations and the filthiness of her fornication. While this woman is very alluring, and on her forehead was a name written, Mystery, Babylon the Great. There's a mystery here. It's not so clear. It's not so cut and dried. But one thing should stand out to those in the know. And that is, there's abominations and filthiness. In other words, it's not godly. It works. It's working for everybody. Everybody is really doing well. But there's something wrong with it. It's not godly. And so she is Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots, and of the abominations of the earth.

People may be doing well themselves, but others are being hurt. Others are being harmed. There's a wrong mentality. It is not edifying. It's not worshipping and honoring God. It is some thing, some organization, some group, some leaders taking upon themselves what Nimrod did. Let us make a name for ourselves. Let us make a city for ourselves. Let us provide those things for ourselves. And consequently, it is all wrong. Verse 6, And I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of martyrs of Jesus.

And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement. See all that's wrong with this? And John says, I marveled with great amazement. This is a mystery, and it's going to be tempting, if possible, to draw away the very elect. The mystery Babylon has been an evolving, changing entity since the days of Nimrod through Nebuchadnezzar and down beyond. In verse 9, it says, Here is the mind which has wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. We drop down to verse 15.

Then he said to me, The waters which you saw, where the harlot sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues. And the ten horns which you saw in the beast, those will hate the harlot and make her desolate. There's a lot of things going on there.

Verse 18, And the woman which you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth. Something alluring and yet very wrong. Today, we have quite a call going out among religious circles for unity. Some churches and church leaders want to be together. They want to pull together. There's a term called ecumenism. It's a Latin term and it means living together of many people. Ecumenism is a desire to stitch for unity because if you have things broken apart, you cannot have a common goal and all pulling together for a common goal.

And so the idea is, let's pull this back together. There's plenty behind projects and goals of churches that are seeking to do things in common. Joint aid programs, educational programs, common political objectives, common philosophies, even joint worship services. These have tried for a long time to bring an ecumenical movement, a coming together of people that has so far escaped or not been successful. There's a book called The Mother Church, Ecclesiology and Ecumenism, and its author is a leading Lutheran.

And in this book, he makes this statement. After the reforms of Pope John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council, it becomes increasingly difficult to see whether there is still a need for Protestantism as an independent movement criticizing the Mother Church from outside rather than working from within.

That's a pretty big statement. Ecumenism has values and goals, tract of ideals. They can even seem good. But the concept is, the more we pray together, the more we be blessed by God, etc., etc. The goal is unity. However, it's a unity other and different from the type of love that God has and certainly something God doesn't recognize. And the purpose is the re-innovocation of religions in order to feed back into the power of that Babylonian system, where people tried to come together and build a single tower, not just the 300 individual religions, but take them all and build one religion out of it.

That is what will happen in the end time. The three fronts of unity are, first of all, religion, which I've just mentioned. The second one is politics. Politics for a new social government order. That's what the EU is partly about. It's a political union, a European union, to where ultimately all countries will be governed by the same laws. And there is a set of laws being developed right now that probably will pass in the near future that will begin to require all countries to begin to do what the EU says.

Currently, the EU has 27 current member states. This gives them also no borders. It's curious, whenever you travel in Europe, there's a passport line for those with EU passports and pretty much it's just go. You walk through. Because from one EU country to another, there's no borders anymore. You don't drive up and have to show your passport and do all this stuff. It's just more of an open society where once you're in the EU, you're in the EU.

It varies a little bit in some of the newer border states or some of those that are not full members yet. The next thing is, we see, as was reported in the news yesterday, the military, a common military, an EU immediate response force is being developed. So what you can now have is the politics and also the power. And the third aspect of unity is the economy, the economic benefits of a new economy.

You have a single currency in the EU. You have essentially no taxes. You don't get taxed from one country to another with customs charges or various import duties. And so it is good economically for everybody within the economic union.

Unity is a means to an end. You've got to understand that unity, just to be unified, is not the desire here. But humans unite to get more of what they want. Rome is a united system with a Christian name, but it doesn't have a Christian spirit. Greed is the spirit. Greed has been the spirit of the Babylonian system from its inset. James 4 asks the question, from whence come wars and fightings among you?

They come because you want, you lust, and you do not have. And when people set out to get into a block to obtain more, they lust more. And that brings them in contact with others who also want. And so the legacy of the image of Daniel has always been war. Babylon, war and fought, and Persia, and then Greece, and Rome, and its revivals, and all the countries that are involved in the last revival of the Roman Empire, are all about war and have been all about war.

And of course, the end time is hallmarked by war. The greatest war, what we call World War III, that Jesus Christ said no one will even survive from, comes from the biggest unity, the biggest unification of people to get what they want, results in the biggest war that would annihilate human life if it were not checked. The ultimate result becomes the gathering at Armageddon, or Har Megiddo, the plane of Megiddo, for the final conquest. If we go to Psalm chapter 2, verses 1-3, we find the purpose of human religions that have been extant since Nimrod.

Psalm chapter 2, getting in verse 1. The kings of the earth set themselves, notice they're not set by God, but they set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed.

In other words, they are thinking and doing different than God, different than New Jerusalem things. This is Babylonian thought. Verse 3, Let us break their bonds in pieces, they say, of their society. Let us take the bonds off the people. What are the bonds? Let us break their bonds and cast away their cords. If you have bonds and cords on you, you are restrained, aren't you?

So what they're saying is, in the face of God and His laws of love and loving God, loving your fellow man, let's break those bonds, let's break those cords, let's free the people to pursue what they want to pursue. He who sits in the heavens shall laugh, the Lord shall hold them in derision, and then He will speak to him in His wrath and distress them in His deep pleasure. Yet I have set my king on my holy hill of Zion. So what we have is, the world is going to create its own power, its own ways, its own system. Jesus Christ warned of this. He said, the love of many will wax cold.

He says, lawlessness will abound. And this is what so-called Christian religion has all been about. It's been like Peter said, taking Paul's writings and getting rid of the law, twisting them to your own destruction, then getting rid of God and man setting up whatever he wants in himself.

But in the end, as we read again here, those two cities, New Jerusalem and Babylon, will come into conflict. In verse 7, I will declare the decree, the Lord has said to me, you are my son, and today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance and the ends of the earth for your possessions. You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall dash them to pieces like the potter's vessels.

Mankind doesn't want to hear about that. They don't want to know about God or God's way.

There exists another woman, just like there's the city of Babylon, the city of New Jerusalem. There's two women. This one's a little different. We begin to read a little about her in John 17. Verse 14, Jesus says to the Father, I have given them Your Word, the Church, another woman, the true Church, the body of Christ. I have given them Your Word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. We are to be in the world. We are to be in Babylon, just as Daniel lived in Babylon and flourished there, and yet was not of Babylon. So you and I are called to live in Babylon, but not be of it, just as Christ lived here, but He was not of it. The unity of this woman is different. It's not a unity based on what she can get and power mongering and brokering. Her unity is based on the love of God, the unity that comes from that.

As we see in verse 21, that they all may be one, as you, Father, are in Me and I in you, that they may be one in us. He mentions that in the next couple of verses as well. A unity that comes from God, from the Spirit of God, the mind of Christ in us.

True love and unity comes from keeping God's laws, His ways, His commandments, humbling ourselves, letting Him lead. That is where unity comes from. Babylon does not contain God's love, so it will never build happy lives. It will never have any type of cohesion because it comes from the Father of confusion, every person trying to get for themselves. Let's go back to Revelation 12 and verse 6 for a moment. Revelation 12 and verse 6. Then the woman, this second woman, fled into the wilderness where she has a place prepared by God. Notice the difference in these two women. In Babylon, you have the people. They go and prepare a place in the wilderness. They start a new city for themselves where they can have power and economy. This woman goes into the wilderness where she has a place prepared for her by God. That they should feed her, not that she would feed herself, but they would feed her for three and a half years.

Verse 13. Now when the dragon saw that he had been cast to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child. We can see that Satan hates this church. It's not part of the Babylonian system. But the woman was given two wings of a great eagle. That she might fly into the wilderness to her place where she is nourished for three and a half years from the presence of the serpent.

This system of gods she is at home with, it is all about her and her mentality, her mind. She ascribes to that.

So when the big push, the big draw, the miracles, all that stops her pulled out to coerce her into joining Satan are thrown at her, does it work? Jesus says, if possible to deceive the very elect, does it work? Does it resonate with her? Let's look at the next verse.

So the serpent spewed water out of his mouth like a river, the Greek would say here, or like a flood or like a river. You know, when water in the Bible comes from God, it represents His Holy Spirit. Twelve rivers of river, the water of life, God's Holy Spirit. It's His mind. It's His attributes. And here we find from Satan, water as well. A false kind of water. His spirit, His attributes, His opportunities, His lure comes after this woman. Perhaps, I don't know if this is a threat to her or an enticement to her that Christ was referring to.

But it came after the woman that He might cause her to be carried away by the water. Come to me. I'll support you. I'll give you what you need. Look at the wonders of my Babylon. What are you doing out here in the desert? You know, come join the system.

And the dragon was enraged with the woman. She didn't buy it. She didn't want it. And he went to make war with the rest of her offspring who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. So we see that we are called to be in God's kingdom of His mind following His city. How is that done? Well, Ephesians 6, 11, 17 talks about the armor of God. I won't turn there. But we need that in order to fight Satan. It's not an earthly, physical, human battle that we're fighting.

We're actually fighting for the kingdoms that want control of us. Satan wants us, and our Father in Heaven wants us, and we need to choose.

The world is in the process of unifying for one great attempt at prosperity, and it's going to work well for a while. It's really going to be amazing for a while.

Let's go back to Revelation 18, briefly.

It says in verse 3, For all the nations have drunk of the wine, of the wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury. Remember, this is the tough time. This is during the great tribulation, and things are going well.

If you're in that group, if you're with Babylon, you do really, really well. That's got to be alluring.

But there's a problem here in verse 7, in the measure that she has glorified herself. God didn't glorify her. God didn't bless her. She took this on herself and lived luxuriously at the expense of others.

In the same measure, give her torment and sorrow.

In verse 9, therefore her plagues will come in one day. Suddenly, boom, that will fall. That system will go down, and she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord who judges her. And the kings of the earth who committed fornication and lived luxuriously with her will weep and lament. They won't like that. Verse 11, the merchants of the earth will weep and mourn, for no one buys their merchandise anymore. Merchandise of gold and silver, precious stones and pearl and fine linen and purple and silk and scarlet, every kind of citron wool, every kind of object of ivory, every kind of precious wood, bronze, iron and marble and cinnamon and incense and fragrant oil and frankincense, wine and oil and fine flour and wheat. Wow! Cattle, sheep! Your needs are met. If you're part of this empire, but if you're not, you could die, you could be killed, you can't buy or sell. Verse 17, for in one hour such great riches came to nothing. It's going to be hard, hard to stand firm if you don't have a strong allegiance to the country, to the values and to the God of New Jerusalem. It just is. It's going to be a test. It's important for us now to be showing in our lives how we live our lives, what choices we make on a daily basis, really what we stand for. Are we really about society and all the funds and the breaking of God's laws? But it's funny, and the entertainment and getting involved in the parties and breaking the Sabbath and all this stuff.

But we're in the church! We're going to be there in places of safety. If we're making those little choices now, those choices are going to be real easy to make when it comes down to our life on the line. Three and a half years doesn't seem like a long time, but the earthquake that happened last night or this morning, I guess it was this morning at six o'clock up in Nevada that shook a little town to its foundations, a woman who was in that town said, it felt like the earthquake lasted five or six hours. You know, earthquakes probably last less than a minute, a long one. She said, it felt like it lasted five or six hours. What would three and a half year Great Tribulation feel like? You know, a day as a thousand years might come to us as far as a feeling, you know? It could be a very long time.

This world is in process of unifying itself for a last run at prosperity, for a great, great opportunity, and it's doing it in typical human fashion. Take it for yourself. Do it for yourself. Set God aside, set godliness aside, put it all together with your best minds, and go get it for yourself. It's the mind of Babel, Babylon. There's another mind. Let's go to Malachi chapter 3 and verse 7. There's another mind that God puts in us the inhabitants, the future inhabitants of New Jerusalem, those of us who have the kingdom now shed abroad in our hearts.

It's what we identify with. We feel like strangers and foreigners here because we're really members of another country, and we're trying to get there. We want to be there. Malachi chapter 3 and verse 7 says, Yet from the days of your fathers you have gone away from my ordinances. There it is again. Man's always getting rid of the laws of God, wants to do it his way, wants to pursue selfishness, and have not kept them. Return to me and I will return to you.

This is what God says. Quit worrying about yourself. Seek the kingdom and my righteousness and these physical things that you would like. These things will be added to you by me. I'll do it for you.

Don't go do it yourself. Return to me and I will return to you. I will bless you. It's kind of like what God says to the Laodiceans. Quit getting your own righteousness from other sources. Buy gold from me. That's what he's saying. Get it from me. Here he says in verse 10, Bring all the tithes into the storehouse. You be givers. You love God and love your fellow man. Bring the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And try me now in this, says the Lord of Hosts.

If I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you such a blessing that there will not be room enough to receive it. I am the God. If you follow me, if you obey me, if you love me, I will do this for you. I will open the windows of heaven and I will make you so powerful and so great there will never be a nation that exists more powerful than that.

Or that has more wealth than you will inherit the entire universe as a co-heir with Christ. And you will reign forever. But do it my way. Let me do it for you. And so we see the contrast of the two cities. One is greed and take for self. And the other one is give and serve for others. The one lasts, the other doesn't. In conclusion, let's take a look at a couple of scriptures.

This old Babylon that continues to be reinvented time and time and time and time again is coming around for another course. And it is in collision with New Jerusalem. Just as Satan the Devil and Jesus Christ are on a collision course as well. Like Abram, you and I have been told to get out of Babylon. Come out of her. Get away from that. Be part of the family of God. And in the process we find ourselves very small humans amidst very large events.

I don't know about you, but when I see some of the things going on in the world and things coming together and visited other capitals, you feel pretty small. And it's sort of out of your control, isn't it? You can't really do anything about it. Let's go to 2 Corinthians 10, verses 3-6 and see what we should be doing. 2 Corinthians 10, beginning in verse 3.

For though we walk in the flesh, and all of us walk a little slower each year in the flesh, we all know what the flesh is like, especially if you start getting up there in years, we walk in the flesh. Tomorrow some of us are going to walk to the bottom of the Grand Canyon. We're all sure we can do that. We're not sure what's going to happen after that. Coming up is another story.

So, we all walk in the flesh, but we don't war according to the flesh. And here's the difference. Yes, we are weak physically and mentally, but actually we don't war according to our flesh or to our mind, our physical human mind. For the weapons of our warfare are not physical. That's what the word carnal means. It's not physical. But, mighty in God. So, even though we are weak, and even though these events are huge, we don't need to fear because we are mighty in God. For the pulling down of strongholds. Babylon is going to come down. The ones who are going to rule with Christ are going to help bring it down, by the way.

But also, the strongholds of our mind of sin can come down as well. Casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God. All of that is coming down, both inside you personally and in the world at large. It's all going to come down. Everything will be brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

So know this. New Jerusalem will succeed. New Jerusalem will be the only thing left standing. New Jerusalem will last forever, and those in it will live forever. In verse 6 it says, And you, being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled. We're going to help Christ rule with a rod of iron and to bring Satan and his demons out of the human sphere and put them away and to bring in godliness. And if you love that, if you want that, if you're fully allied with New Jerusalem and not Babylon, completely separated from Satan's society, then you'll feel like this in Hebrews 13 verse 14, For here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come. That is us. We have no continuing city. We seek the city which is to come. The saints will be successful with Christ. And in conclusion, let's read Daniel chapter 7 verses 15 through 18, a prophecy for this end time. Daniel 7 verse 15, I, Daniel, was grieved in my spirit. He had spoken and written these prophecies about the kingdoms of this earth and about things that would happen in the end time. And he was grieved in my spirit within my body, and the visions of my head troubled me. And I came near to one of those who stood by and asked him the truth of all this, and so he told me and made known to me the interpretation of these things. Verse 17, Those great beasts which are four, they are four kings which arise out of the earth. Babylon and Babylon's head continues. Medo-Persia, Greece, Rome, the revivals of Rome, all of that is one image, one mentality, it's called Babylon. These arise out of the earth. Verse 18, But the saints of the Most High shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever, even forever and ever. So what city do you have an allegiance to? How strong is that allegiance? And will anything ever be able to cause you to cross your allegiances? That is the big question that God wants to know. For those who have full allegiance to New Jerusalem, they are going to possess the kingdom forever and ever and ever.