Is This The Beginning of the End?

I'm going to do something today that I don't normally do. We may go just a little over time. I know you hate to hear that. The reason why is, when I give sermons, I will wait five years before I give the same sermon a second time. Now, you'll hear sermons I give where part of it will be from another sermon. I can pace things. I might take three scriptures from a sermon I gave two years ago, put in some new illustrations, add some different scriptures, and it'll be the same subject, maybe a different story out of the Bible.

But I try not to give the same sermon, actual sermon, unless I go at least five years, because by that time most of you have forgotten the sermon anyways. But I want to give a sermon today because of what's happening in the world. I gave this sermon back when COVID began, back when there was panic. Is this the beginning of the tribulation? Is wearing a mask the mark of the beast?

There was this thing where the people were being shot with nanotechnology, where they were going to be controlled by 5G, and that was going to control them. Because that's the mark of the beast. There was all this worry and discussion, and I don't mean just in the churches of God, I mean, evangelical Christianity was doing the same thing.

Oh, is this the mark of the beast? Is this the beginning? Is this the start of the tribulation? Is Jesus coming back in three and a half years? It's on and on and on. And I showed that, for one thing, nothing that was going on at that point was the mark of the beast. We went through and showed that. Well, now here we are with another crisis. And remember, if you remember, I said then, there's been worse pandemics than this. Now, it hadn't reached its full force yet, so we didn't know what it was going to do.

But there's been lots of worse pandemics about history. And when this crisis goes down, another crisis will come. They're never going to end now. I think it's fundamentally changed in the world. COVID changed the way fundamentally governments work. The government in Canada is doing things that no one could ever dream the Canadian government would do.

Kicking in doors on churches because they're holding a church service. You have the US government, which is always messy, but it's a real mess. The country split in so many different groups that it really doesn't matter who gets elected because their own party starts fighting each other. We've watched fundamentally something change. We know economically something's changed. And now we're watching the war take place between Russia and Ukraine. That you might say, well, that's not that big a thing, but it is.

It's fundamentally changed a lot of things. I won't go through all of it. I find it interesting because everything that's happened is predictable. My son has been texting me and saying, is this going to happen? This is going to happen. I kept writing back and saying, no.

Understand, Putin is not a communist. His hero is not Stalin and Lenin. His heroes are the Czars, Peter the Great, Alexander the Third. I have no idea. I've never read anything about Alexander the Third, but that's one of his heroes. Peter the Great is, of course, is considered one of the greatest Czars of all time of Russian history. What he wants to do is recreate the Russian Empire. He sees a globalized world.

As a communist, Lenin and Stalin wanted to create what? A globalized economic system. He doesn't want to do that. He wants to create an independent Russian superpower. Because it's not a superpower anymore. If you take away 6,000 nuclear weapons, they're not a superpower anymore. They're not economically, they're not even militarily. As being shown that Ukraine is causing such great casualties, they should have taken Ukraine in three days. So he has to do certain things to become a great superpower again.

So he will be remembered as one of the great Czars. It's Russia first. He's actually anti-globalist. He's anti...what America's become, because we wanted a global economy so we could be the richest nation in the world. Which we did. We helped create a global economy. He's against that. He wants Russia to be an independent superpower. Even China, who is communist, was sort of supporting him until people started...they were afraid sanctions were going to happen against them.

And their markets, which is a capitalistic viewpoint, their markets would get cut back. But all of a sudden, they're sort of, you shouldn't be doing this. They're actually sort of...well, we want to complain about him some, because we don't want any sanctions against us. Now, they may take Taiwan. This is...they stabilize the whole world, and we're never going back. And...Medovia knows they're next.

People from Medovia are leaving so fast that people from Ukraine are flooding in there, and they're leaving the other end as fast as they're coming in. Georgia's next. I saw an interview with the Georgia...it would be similar to our Secretary of State, I think it was. And she said, well, of course, they've already invaded Georgia a couple years ago, took two provinces, said these are Russian provinces, and built bases there. What happens when they're done with Ukraine? She said, those bases, troops, will come out of there, and we're not a very big nation.

They'll take us in a week. Probably we'll just surrender. Doesn't stop. He told Finland, who he considers part of Russia, you join NATO, and we will have a war. And Finland said, fine, we're going to join NATO. Understand, this keeps ratcheting up and ratcheting up, and it's never going to go back.

I don't know. I can't tell you what's going to happen. It's...there's no way of knowing what's going to happen. And he's a little bit...he's gambled everything, which means he can make...he will not be against using tactical nuclear weapons. He won't be. He's going to launch them against Washington at this point, unless he goes insane. But what's he got to lose? He fails. You know, it's the Julius Caesar solution, right? The government kills him. The problem with being Tsar, you have to succeed all the time.

Or brutally subject your people, which he's already doing. He's planned this for 20 years. Everything he's done has been planned for years and years and years. And this was his next step. It's just he didn't plan for this. Simple little things. Like, he bought cheap Chinese tires for his military vehicles. They don't do well in cold weather.

A lot of his trucks have flat tires. They've got to find thousands of tires. He's made his first giant mistake in 20 years. Okay, why am I bringing all this up? I don't want to talk about Alexander III, Tsar, Alexander III, Putin. What's going on in Ukraine? Ukraine will probably fall and probably end up some kind of guerrilla war. And it's going to be ugly and a lot of people are dying. Is this the end time? That's the question I'm getting. Is this the end time? Is this the beginning of the tribulation? So I'm going to go through basically what I covered.

I'm not going to talk about the Mark of the Beast, which I talked about last time. But I'm going to go through a timeline we need to understand. Because there's two elements of what is called the beast power in Revelation. There's two elements. There's also a historical context. And there is a timeline where we know some things are going to happen. We put those together and we can guess where we are. And I say guess. You never know when God might say, I've slowed things down, it's not time yet.

You never know when God will do that. But when he takes his hand off and lets us go, and lets Satan go, Satan's going to bring humanity to the point where if Christ doesn't come back, we will destroy ourselves. Right now what's happening is the fear of nuclear war is back.

And no one's feared nuclear war for two decades. A lot of people don't even think about it. A lot of people under the age of 30 don't even think, wait a minute, how many nuclear weapons are there? Oh, I don't know, put the whole world together. 15,000! How many of those do you have to blow up to destroy the atmosphere? Not too many. Not too many. So, let's go to 1 Thessalonians chapter 2. Let's start here. So we're sort of backing into this a little bit.

But this is a primary element that we have to understand when we talk about the beast power. What is this thing called the beast? And what is the timeline in which things take place? There are certain things happening right now that are very interesting in the context of the future. You realize how many years it's been since Switzerland ever took a side on anything?

They're used to funding both sides of a war. They've taken sanctions against Russia. It's been since 1945 that Germany was willing to send weaponry outside their own country. Remember when Ukraine, this war first started? They sent the medical supplies and helmets. And everybody made fun of them. No, it's their policy. We do not send weapons to anybody. They've sent a lot of weapons now. This is important. They also just dumped over a billion euros into upgrading their army and increased their defense spending to 2% a year.

That's huge because that means they're creating an army to fight. All they've ever had is an army that is barely maintained to be a show. The German army is basically a show. There's a couple hundred thousand men and they have great equipment, but they're not really prepared for combat. They're now getting prepared for combat. That's a huge change. First Thessalonians 2, verse 1. I'm sorry, 2 Thessalonians 2, verse 1. Now, brother, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you to not be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if it came from us, as though the day of the Lord had come.

What you have here is a new doctrine to come into the church of Thessalonica, that the day of the Lord had already come. It probably had to do with Christ already came once. That's the day of the Lord, new interpretation of certain scriptures. Remember, they did not have the book of Revelation. When He wrote this, they didn't have whole parts of what we call the New Testament.

So this new teaching comes along. And He says, no, the day of the Lord, which is God's punishment, God's interaction with humanity, right before Christ comes back. That's what the day of the Lord is. So He says, let not be deceived by any means, for that day will not come unless the following away comes first. For that day will not come unless the following away comes first.

That a man of sin has revealed the Son of Perdition, a person who is so evil, he just called the Son of Perdition. Just a person of just sin, pure sin, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he sits in the temple of God, showing himself to be God. This person is going to come along and claim to be God.

Now, he's not going to probably say, I am the God in heaven, but he's probably going to take some messianic role. I am the Messiah, so I am God on earth. So there's a religious element to what he's talking about here, and he says the end time events can't be completed until this person comes along. So the day of the Lord will be preceded by a human leader who will sit in the temple of God. This is one of the references why we say there's going to be a temple, an actual physical temple, some kind of temple in Jerusalem. I say a temple, it could be a tent. It could be a tent with an altar. But he actually is there. He goes there. We know that because in Daniel it says that there will be sacrifices that stop, and these sacrifices stop before the coming of the Messiah. And he's going to promote lawlessness. He's going to promote lawlessness. But notice now verse 5. Do you not remember that when I was there with you I told you these things? Boy, I wish you would have written it, Donald, don't you? He tells them, I told you all this stuff. Yeah, but Paul, you didn't tell us. And now you know what is restraining that he may be revealed in his own time. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way. In other words, God's holding him back, but then he's going to stop. There's going to come a time in history when this man is going to come on the world scene and going to be a world religious leader. And we know what this happens because of the next statement. And then the lawless one will be revealed, who the Lord will consume with the breath of his mouth and destroy what the brightness of his coming. So this person is on the scene just before Christ returned. So this is important in understanding our timeline. Because we've got to figure out, do we know when this person comes along? Well, if he's there today, he's not revealed yet. If he's here today, he's not revealed yet. Now, I believe we're real close to the end time. I believe he's here today, but he's not revealed yet. So we could all sort of guess who it is. And we may be right or we may be wrong. He's going to be revealed. And we're told what's going to happen. First of all, this Messianic issue that he is a Messiah, God in a person. The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan. So here's what we have to look for. With all power, signs, and lying wonders, with all unrighteous deception. He's going to come on the scene performing great miracles. Now, nobody's done that yet. I mean miracles that everybody's going to see. He says, and with unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved. And for this reason, God will send them strong delusion that they should believe the lie, that they be condemned who did not believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. So this is a very serious thing that's said here about this person. But one of the things, he's going to be in a temple, some edifice something, in Jerusalem. He's going to be there claiming to have some Messianic power, and he's going to show that power by actually doing miracles performed by Satan. That hasn't happened yet. It's going to happen. The important thing is there are certain things that have happened before this. So we're not looking for this yet. We're looking for the things that must happen before that happens. Now, let's go to Revelation 13. Because this gives us more insight into this. Revelation 13.

We have this beast that comes out of the sea. Or at least one of them does. He describes this, and we understand right away, it's a world power.

So John receives this vision. Now, I want to stop there a minute because if we look at the I want to stop there a minute because if we just look at this, we say, well, how do we understand who this is? I have read Biblical commentators say it has to be Russia. It's like a bear. And of course, what is Russia called? The bear, right? There are seven-day Adventists looking at this and saying it has to be the United States. So they see the United States as this beast using the bison as an example.

But there is a way we can understand this. And I've given other surveys on this with lots of slides and everything, and I don't want to go through it in great detail. But when we go back to Daniel chapter 2 and Daniel chapter 7, we see in Daniel 7 two prophetic templates. And Daniel 7, of course, it's the statue that Nebuchadnezzar sees. And he is told by Daniel, oh, this represents four great kingdoms. The first one is yours. And then the fourth one is terrible. It destroys. And it ends up in two parts. And at the end, there's ten toes, which are ten kings. Well, it doesn't take...we know the first kingdom was Babylon because he says it was. Babylon was taken by Persia, Persia by Greece, Greece by Rome. So, I mean, that's a pretty easy one to figure out. And so there has to be some restoration of the Roman Empire at the end time with ten rulers involved in it. Daniel 7 is a prophecy about the same thing, but he uses animals to describe what the different kingdoms will be like. And so we have a lion with eagle's wings, which is very interesting because that was the symbol of Babylon. It was a lion with eagle's wings. If you go to the Pergamum Museum in Berlin and you see the walls in ancient Babylon, that's all over them. They were lions with eagle's wings. A bear, a leopard with four wings and four heads. A fourth king that was dreadful and terrible and exceedingly strong and had iron teeth. So all we have now is a description of more of the character. And we can do a whole sermon. In fact, I have. I've done a whole sermon showing the character of these four different empires. The last one is terrible and it was iron. So let's go to Daniel 7. We're going to come back here to Revelation 13. But I want to tie in. There is no way to go the reference point of Revelation 13 unless we look at Daniel 2 and Daniel 7. There's no way to go. Revelation 13 can be anything. It can be the United States. But what is it that we see in Daniel? We see these four beasts and there's one at the end. We know that the one has ten kings and is destroyed by... in Daniel 2, the king is destroyed because a rock hits the feet and destroys it and the rock is the kingdom of God. As Jesus Christ returned. So let's go to Daniel 7 and look at verse 23 because it's talking about the fourth kingdom. Thus he said, the fourth beast shall be a fourth kingdom on the earth, which shall be different from all other kingdoms, and it shall devour the whole earth, trample it and break it in pieces.

Then it says there was ten horns on this king...or on this beast. The ten horns are ten kings who shall rise after this kingdom, and another shall rise after them, and he shall be different than the first ones. He shall subdue three kings. So we've got ten kings again. But we have another king. We have eleventh king.

And he shall speak pompous words against the Most High, and shall persecute the saints of the Most High, and shall intend to change times and law, that the saints shall be given to his hand for a time, a time, and a half, and a time. We're going to see that term in Old Testament parlance. It means three and a half years. Time, times, half, and a time. We're going to see 42 months and three and a half years over and over again.

So we have a king that's different than the other kings. And this king is a religious person. He's not talking about economic systems. He's talking about his blaspheming the Most High. Now we're going to see where he will claim to be representing the Most High. Verse 26 says, But the court shall be seated, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and destroy it forever. Then the kingdom and dominion of the greatness of the kingdoms, under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people, the saints of the Most High. His kingdom is everlasting, kingdom, and all dominion shall serve and obey him. So we're back to, when does this happen? All you have to do is go to Revelation 2.

Well, Chapter 1 and 2, where, I'm sorry, Revelation 12, 1 and 2, and it's my covid brain. 12 became 1 and 2. And you look at it, and what happens is he returns with the saints to make all the kingdoms of the earth the kingdom of God. Okay, so we know once again, we have all these different kingdoms, they're successive. The last one is there when Christ returns. So this is our reference point for... I always put this slide in for the kids. There. It just doesn't look that gruesome, but it's the beast. So the fourth beast of Daniel is Rome. He had a vision of a terrifying beast with ten horns and iron teeth. The beast's ten horns are ten kings that would rise from this kingdom. This beast will be destroyed by the establishment of the kingdom of God on earth after three and a half years. The beast will persecute the saints. Okay, remember this, because three and a half years of persecuting the saints is real important in understanding our timeline. This beast only has power for a time, times, and half a time. I mean, this world-ruling power, that's all it has. It doesn't last very long. So there may be components of the beast being formed today, but the beast power doesn't exist in terms of the way the Bible talks about. Not yet.

Okay, so let's go back to Revelation.

It's okay sometimes to do this in services. I want to make sure you've got where we're going, because we're just pulling out some prophecies and putting them together. Anybody have a question about this so far? We've got two prophecies about four different kingdoms. Last one exists when Christ comes. The last one has a religious component, another horn, which is the man of sin, the second Thessalonians. Because what's the man of sin doing in second Thessalonians? Exactly what Daniel says this one horn is going to be doing here. So that's what we have so far. I haven't named who the ten nations are. I haven't named who the horn is. We're just saying this is what it says. That's the only context for Revelation 13. If we don't add that together, if those aren't the templates, I have no idea who Revelation 13 is. If that is the template, because God put it there, then we do know that there's going to be some kind of revival of what used to be the Roman Empire.

Someone asked me, was Russia ever part of the Roman Empire? I said, no, but Crimea was. In other words, part of Ukraine was part of the Roman Empire. I just find that interesting. I don't mean anything by it. I just find it interesting that they were. I'll tell you who else was part of the Roman Empire. It was Turkey. Turkey did something this week that is unbelievable. They told the Russians, we have a treaty that goes back to the 1930s, and we have the right to close the Bosters Strait. It's the only way into the Black Sea. There's no other way into the Black Sea. They said, you can't send any more warships in. According to the treaty, only ships that are there can leave. Sheep can leave, too. Ships that are there can leave. They're going to be swimming sheep. Four warships from Russia showed up, thinking they wouldn't enforce it. They said, send them through the straits and we'll sink them. They turned around and went back.

Basically, the Russian navy that said the Black Sea is in a prison. They can leave. They can never come back. I don't know how they're going to get supplies in. They just landed in an army. Where do you get supplies if those ships can come in? But Turkey was part of the Roman Empire.

That's neither here nor there. Let's go back to Revelation 13. Now we're down to verse 7.

Let's go to verse 4. Remember, in verse 2, it talks about the ten horns. Now the beast, which I saw was like a leopard. The feet were like the feet of a bear. His mouth was like the mouth of a lion. This is all describing what we read in Daniel 7. This is a composite of all those empires. So they worshiped the dragon, verse 4, who gave authority to the beast. And they worshiped the beast, saying, who is like the beast? Who is able to make war with him?

This power is going to come on the scene, and they're going to impose military rule over nothing. It doesn't say they're going to rule the whole world. They're going to impose military rule in such a way that they're going to control commerce. It doesn't mean they're going to invade every country. But they are going to control the economy. We know that from Revelation 17.

Because the whole world cries when the beast power falls because it was like, how are we going to trade anymore? How are we going to have economies anymore? So don't think in terms of an army just crushing the world. No. But they're going to fight some war, and they're going to win it. They're going to fight some war, and they're going to win it because of what they're going to be able to achieve.

And he was given a mouth speaking great things. Verse 5, this is the beast. The beast is both a system and a person. And he was given authority to continue for 42 months. How long was the persecution of the people of God going to be in Daniel?

Anybody? Three and a half years. What's 42 months? Okay. So the beast power, once again, comes to power. It can't hold the world together. It's not the nature of things. It only lasts... Even Satan in charge of it doesn't work. It lasts three and a half years as far as its power base. Now, it's going to take a long time for it to build, but its power lasts three and a half years. He opened his mouth and blasted me against God to blast him his name, his tabernacle, those who dwell in heaven. It was granted with him to make war with the saints to overcome them. So there's going to be this great persecution of the saints.

All who dwell on the earth will worship him whose names have not been written in the book of the Lamb, slain from the foundation of the world. If anyone hasn't here, let him hear. And so, we can look at the man of sin in 2 Thessalonians. And sometimes when you look at the Bible, is he the beast or the false prophet? Here he appears to be the beast. But where does he get the power from? Well, from Satan. But there's a religious element. Remember the little horn? So let's go.

So, the great deception will evolve the spirit of lawlessness, persecution of Christians who don't agree, same as Daniel 7.

So now let's go to verse 11. Because there's another beast here. There's two components to this beast power. Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth. He had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon. This is very important. He looks like a lamb. Who in the Bible is the lamb? Christ. It looks Christian and it's not. That's part of its great deception. Now, it'll probably be an ecumenical movement. Probably, including all religions who want to come along. But it's going to be led by something that looks to be Christian. That's important to understand. And he exercises the authority of the first beast in his presence and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. It performs great signs so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. So, you know, we go back to that man of sin. Well, here it appears to be the false prophet because he's the one bringing down fire. The thing is, they're all working together here. And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do with the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. So, something's going to happen to this beast's power that seems to have disappeared, but it won't. Or maybe it's the person who just says, beast. But here it seems to be the system. He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause, as many as would be not worshiped the image of the beast to be killed. And then it goes on. It says, there is the mark of the beast. Now, that's where we went last time, and we stopped there. We stopped with the mark of the beast. But I'm going to go a little farther now into the 42 months. If we're watching prophetic events take place, where are we in those prophetic events? Right? We've been able to figure out what the beast is. It's some kind of resurrected Roman Empire. It is interesting that the Roman Empire did end up in two parts, the Western and the Eastern. And it's clearly shown in Daniel that there's two parts, and some of the kings come from one part and some from another. So, is the EU the beast? Well, not yet. Something else is going to form. Something else has got to form. So, the 42 months, we saw there's persecution of the church. It lasts 42 months. We see that the beast only lasts 42 months. Now, in Revelation 11, we will go there, but Revelation 11... Let's see if I have that up here. Okay. Revelation 11, it talks about that Jerusalem will be occupied, and there are two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 42 months. Jerusalem has not been occupied yet, and the two witnesses aren't here. So, you understand what we're going through shows the trib... We are not into the three and a half years. I read something recently that said that we're already two years into the three and a half years. I'm thinking, oh, thank you! This is so much easier than what I read in the Bible!

This is great! Someone did ask me, is COVID the beginning of the tribulation? I said, I hope so.

I really do, because this is not that bad. I mean, it's bad, but it's not that bad.

It's not what's described in the Scripture. Then, in Revelation 12... Now, I have not given a sermon on Revelation 12, and I need to.

Revelation 12, the church flees tribulation, and Satan tries to destroy it. Part of the church is persecuted, part isn't. Part of the church is protected for three and a half years.

Okay, it's all starting to add up now. We know who the players are, at least... We don't know all ten kings. We do know that there's one point that says they give their power to the beast for a short season. In other words, this isn't some kind of permanent thing. Because of what's happening economically in the world and militarily in the world, ten nations or groups of nations, whatever, that were part of the Roman Empire come together and say, We've got to unite to save the world. Which makes me wonder where the world's in the United States. Either that or we're just a puppet, then, of the... The United States could be a puppet of the beast. That's possible. Subjugated and just... All our resources go there. I don't know what happens to them. There's a lot of theories about that and it could be destroyed. But the issue is we've got these ten nations that used to be part of the Roman Empire. They come together, part of the East, part of the West. We do know it only exists for three and a half years. We do know that it comes together because of some crisis. We've got to find out what that crisis is. And that persecution of true Christians is part of it. Even though they will claim to be Christian but be motivated by the dragon. So we've got all that down. And I haven't had to speculate much, right? I haven't had to speculate much, which I could, but I'm not going to. So, we look at this. The first beast of Revelation is a political system whose leader is also called the beast. He's known as the man of sin. The system of the man are destroyed in Christ's return. He's known as the man of sin. I always say some people read that and see it as either of them because I know some people say, but I've always thought it was this one. Well, of course, it depends on when you came into the church, too. It's been taught in different ways. This beast is the same as the fourth beast of Daniel 7, which is destroyed in Christ's return. Also, Daniel 2. The second beast of Revelation 13 is a religious system, also known as the harlot. That's in Revelation 17, who is led by the false prophet and destroyed in Christ's return. These two beasts have power for 42 months or 3 1⁄2 years. During this time, they persecute the people of God. Okay, we have all that now. So when does this happen? Can we even figure out? Okay, when does this 3 1⁄2 year start? Well, there's no way to know exactly, but we do know there are certain things that happen before this happens. So let's go to Matthew 24. Any questions now?

Probably, I can't answer half of them anyways. I can only tell you the outline of what we know. Over the years, the church has filled in so many details and only found out they were wrong. But what's happening today needs to be noticed because of what we're going to look at here in Matthew 24 and then a few scriptures in Revelation. I do have a question. Yeah? The two faiths are they occurring in the time of things? Yes. Remember, they help each other. One does all the spiritual stuff, including miracles, and gives power. People follow the political leader because the spiritual leader says, he's the guy. He's the dude. He's the Messiah. They follow him. And this religious leader there is very integral into what happens. It is not just a political movement. Yeah? I have a question too. Is there scriptural evidence or like why some of the church is persecuted and some not? Like, is there a bit of a, I know that the jaggy was after the church that they tried to escape, but is there scriptural evidence or why that is... I have heard servants years and years ago looking at the churches of Revelation and saying, well, all the Laodiceans, or what the Laodicean attitude gets persecuted, the Philadelphians don't. And there are still some old Church of God groups that teach that. There's no scriptural evidence for that. All I know is this. When you look at people who are persecuted in the Bible, there's two reasons. One, they either need to do that to be perfected. Or two, they're so strong God has them persecuted as an example. So I guess the thing is, don't be so weak or so strong. So be as lukewarm as you can. No, wait a minute. That's the Laodiceans. But you see, God makes choices here based on what He's doing with that person. Some people are going to be persecuted because they're going to stand up against the beast publicly and help convert others because it says many people come out of the tribulation following God. That's going to be because of the two witnesses. But there's going to be somebody someplace saying, Hey folks, those two witnesses are really the ones from God. Well, no, no. The two witnesses are the beasts of false prophet. Oh, not that they're going to call them that. You see what I mean? You're going to have two here and two here both saying, one saying, probably I am the Messiah, and the other saying, we represent the Messiah. And that's not Him. And someone's going to be saying, no, they're right. And they're going to be paying a price for it. So I think it's either way. I think some of us will need to be perfected. You know, I thought, God, man, help me not be so weak. I have to be tried and fired. Help me to be not so strong. But you've got to remember, we put this in God's hands. And God does what's best for us. And some of us, if this happens in our lifetimes, who knows, some of us may have to stand up and be persecuted, not because we were weak, but for the opposite reason. God said, somebody's got to tell them. So we can't hide. We're not allowed just to go run and hide. We're not supposed to be stupid, you know, until you get needless persecution. But we can't hide.

I think there's another hand. Yeah, Kat? Do you think that some of the people that are going to be persecuted, you know, the slides are just churches? I mean, like, there's a lot of people, there's a lot of Protestant churches, that are very lonely in faith. And God also said that, you know, he's going to, you know, left the world. I can't remember the term, but his knowledge will be spread. But there's going to be a lot of people that will have an understanding of God. I agree. I don't think it's just the church. No, it's not just the church. Everybody knows where it is. And that's important, too. It's interesting when you look at German, Roman persecutions, on the church in the second, third, and fourth centuries, before Constantine came along and made it a legal religion. They were equal opportunity persecutors. It didn't matter what you believed. If you were a Christian and you weren't willing to worship the emperor, remember, emperor worship is part of this. It's not like, well, you can believe in your God. You just have to believe that the emperor is somebody divine. And they were persecuted for not believing that. Lord was there, Jesus was there, curious. Jesus is the Lord. Well, yeah, but Caesar is your Lord, too. No, Jesus is my Lord. You're in trouble. So, yes. It won't just be, oh, well, we'll just look for all the Sabbath keepers. That's what they're going after. Now, they're going to go after anybody that's going to say, no, this is not what the Bible says. So, there's going to be a big persecution. So, don't be surprised if you're being persecuted if the person next to you happens to be a Baptist. Because it could be. What religion is... ...nately... ...in Russia? It's Russian Orthodox.

Which is very interesting because Ukrainian Orthodox used to be part of the Russian Orthodox Church. Some of them are... ...lead boards towards the Pope. Now, all the Orthodox churches believe the Pope is important. They just don't believe he's the guy in charge. They believe that all patriarchs, all leaders of areas are equal. He's special. He's like the guy who should lead the discussion.

But when he said, no, I'm going to tell you what to do, all the Orthodox churches said, then we're not going to follow you. You have to have us part of the discussion. And all the Orthodox churches today, that's how they make decisions. They bring in all these patriarchs and they sit around and argue about it for ten years. That's how they make decisions. So, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church has separated itself some, even though they believe exactly the same.

And then there is a church, an Orthodox church, I don't know how big it is, in Ukraine that are almost Catholic. No, no, no, the Pope really is the most important dude. Even though we're not Catholic, we recognize him. And it's interesting that, you know, there could be a religious element to this because the Russian Orthodox Church believes that the Ukrainians should be brought back into the fold.

But he doesn't like Putin. He's playing it, you know, but he's, he does, Putin does like him either. Putin's Orthodox, at least not Christian, he pretends to be Orthodox. I mean, he's not even a good Orthodox. I'm sorry? But he's not a globalist. He's not a globalist. He's Russia first. And I am a Tsar. I mean, he sees himself as a Tsar. What you understand, and everything he does is absolutely predictable. It's just he plays chess. NATO plays checkers. The US plays go fish. Anyways, Matthew 24. Any other questions? Okay.

Verse 3. Now, Jesus said to the Mount of Olives, disciples came to him privately, saying, Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age? Where am I? Okay, this is where I am. I was trying to skip some of these slides because they had to do with the other sermon, but I still don't want to miss the ones that are important.

And Jesus answered and said to them, Take heed that no one deceives you. For many will come in by name, saying, I am the Christ, and will deceive many. So there are going to be many Christianities that are wrong. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled, for all these things must come to pass. But the end is not yet. For a nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows. Oh, that's not good. He didn't say this is the tribulation.

He said these are the beginning of sorrows. Then he says, Then they will deliver you up to tribulation, and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake. Now we know part of this, there was a former fulfillment of this in 70 AD, which helps us understand a lot of this. Because there's a much bigger, and we know it's a bigger fulfillment, because in this passage he says, And I will come, you will see me in the clouds. That didn't happen then.

So this part had a partial fulfillment, the big fulfillment yet in the future. And he says, And then many will be offended. Now this is about the church here. And betray one another, and will hate one another.

Then many false prophets will rise up and see many. And because all in this will abound, the love of many will grow cold. But he who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached to all the world, as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come. Okay, that final part of that can only be done by the two witnesses.

There's no way to do it any other way. So he mentions all these things. Then he mentions the persecution of the church. From what we've seen in Daniel 2 and Daniel 7 and Revelation 13, who does the persecution on the church? Who does it? Yeah, but who's he working through? It's the beast. The beast is only around three and a half years.

So when we get to this next section, everything he said before that is about things that happen before the beast comes on the scene. What we know when the persecution starts is when the beast rises up. Now that doesn't mean there's not going to be persecution before that, but I mean this is the organized, massive, brutal persecution on anyone that doesn't accept the beast of false prophet. And it may include even more than Christians.

I could see Muslims dying because they wouldn't accept it. Others might go along with it. You know, Hindus wouldn't care. Who just wouldn't care? Some would. But I could see other... obviously, I could see Protestants. There are some Protestants I could see standing up and saying, no, and they would be first kids. So we know that this part here starts something new. The persecution of the church has to happen. Daniel 2, Daniel 7, Revelation 13, all say, when this beast power comes, it persecutes the church, the people of God.

That's why it's so interesting here in verse 15. Therefore, when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet standing in the holy place, well, there is a holy place. There's a temple. Whoever reads, let him understand. It talks about that they will have to flee, and that people will say, Christ is here, but he's not. But verse 20, and pray that your flight not be in the winter on the Sabbath, for then there will be great tribulation, such as not been since the beginning of the world, until this time, no, nor ever shall be.

And unless those days were shortened, no flesh should be saved, but for the elect's sake those days will be shortened. So from the point where the beast power gets into power, and it launches this massive persecution on anybody that doesn't accept what's going on, they will not be able to unite the world into one world order. Three and a half years later, if Christ doesn't come back, there will be no human beings left.

Massive world war, plus the destruction of the environment is going to kill everybody. So understand, it doesn't work. Satan's last great ploy to think, I'll make this work, fails miserably. You know, I think of Hitler saying that he was creating the thousand year Reich. It lasted 12 years. So this resurrection of the Roman Empire is going to be the empire to save the world in the last three and a half years. Now notice, this is great tribulation. You know, there is no title of great tribulation.

We talk about that. That's not in the Bible. We just take that phrase. And we're not the only ones to do this. All the Protestants do it too. The great tribulation is because he says that there will be great tribulation. There's a point where it's so bad it's like no other time on earth. Like no other time on earth.

Now what brings us to that point? Because there's all these things that happen, and then there's this persecution. And these things that happen before the persecution, what happens because the Beast power comes into power. It's called the time of sorrows. Time of sorrows. And he talks about how there's going to be lots of false Christianity. And there's wars and rumors of wars. And there's going to be nation against nation, kingdom of the kingdom, famines, pestilence, earthquakes in various places. This isn't the great tribulation at this point. This is what's going to be happening in a destabilized world that's coming apart.

That's why I said COVID is not the tribulation. What's happening in the crate is not the tribulation. Is it possibly the beginning of the time of sorrows? We need to be watching this. We need to be watching this. How bad does the time of sorrows get?

You know, when you go, we'll finish here, to Revelation 6. And I'll let you read this yourselves. I'm five minutes over, which some of my grandchildren will give me a lecture.

Is Abby asleep? Is she? Okay, can I ask? I didn't want to say that she's awake.

At church in Nashville last month, we had a service and a Bible study. So I said, I'll get through the sermon, we'll take a break. So we had a shorter service, and I'm walking back. They're all singing this song, and she walked up to me and says, It took you a long time to get to this break!

Okay, I guess. That's what it is with your grandpa.

In Revelation 6, we have what is known as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. And when you look through the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, I just like that picture. It's in the public domain, so I can flash it all I want. It was 1887. This is the painting.

Here's what happens. If you take Matthew 24 and Revelation 6, the first seal connects with Matthew 24. False religion. That first horse is a false religion. There's two white horses in the Book of Revelation. The second one is Christ coming back. The first one isn't Christ. I'm amazed how many biblical scholars will take the first seal and say, Jesus Christ. How can it be Jesus Christ? He doesn't come back to the end of all this. But anyways, a false religion with power behind it, has a punch behind it. It's influencing the leaders specifically of the ten leaders and the beast of the beast power. Matthew 24, we just read that. All these false crises. Christ. The second seal, Matthew 24, they tie you together. There's wars and rubors of wars. Then you've got all kinds of pestilences going on in famines. You look at one, two, three, four seals, but you look at those passages we just read. They're all explaining the same thing. And remember, Jesus says that this is the time of sorrows. Then there's the persecution of the church. So we've got the first four seals. We've got Matthew 24. Now, what's really interesting is when you go to verse 9 of Revelation 6. Verse 9, you have the fifth seal. And it says, When he opened the fifth seal, I saw unto the altar the souls of those who have been slain from the word of God and for the testimony which they had heard. Now, this is an allegory. I've had people argue that this means that you have an immortal soul. And I said, boy, that would be sad. You go to heaven as a disembodied spirit. Your promise reward is a spiritual body. And now you're under the altar complaining to God all the time. That's not a good viewpoint of heaven. He says, They cried out with a loud voice, and how long, O Lord, will you not judge and avenge them? Then a right woe was given to them, and it was told that they should rest a little longer until both the number of their fellow servants and their brethren who would be killed, as they were, was completed. So after the fourth seal, we have persecution on the church. Stop a minute! How many times have we heard that? We know when that is. The persecution of the church is when the beast power comes in. And we know it lasts three and a half years. And Revelation 12 says, part of the church is protected and part isn't. So the time of sorrows is before the three and a half years. It has to be. Now, how will we know when the time of sorrows is headed towards the tribulation? Well, first of all, this isn't gloom and doom. We're not told this for gloom and doom. We're told that so we can understand what's happening. That God really is a charge and we are His children and we have to trust in Him. That He's going to be with us no matter what we go through. And it's like, oh wow! All of us who have been around long enough know people that said, oh, why get a job 30 years ago because Christ is coming back? Well, He hasn't come back yet. So I'm not going to stand here and tell you, Christ is coming back in 5 years because He made on it. I'm sorry I'm not privy to that kind of information. I can only tell you what has to happen. And there are certain prophecies that couldn't take place until there were things like nuclear weapons. There are just certain prophecies that couldn't take place. So we're in a time where anything could happen.

And what happens at the end, let's go back now to that fourth seal in verse 7. He opened the fourth seal. So He told us what's going to happen here. There's death in Hades. And then notice, power was given to them. In other words, all these things that are happening. Matthew 24, Revelation 6. All these things that are happening, power was given to them over a fourth of the earth to kill with sword, with hunger, with death by the beast of the earth.

We know when the time of sorrows has ended and the bad times start when 25% of the earth dies.

That's only 1.3 billion people.

Then it gets bad. So don't get... I always tell people, today, before you get out of bed, thank God that you're alive and you have a bed to sleep in. Thank God that you're going to have breakfast. Approach this day with the joy of what God has given you.

I was out walking the other day, the guy comes walking past me.

He said, Hi! He said, Have a good day! I said, Well, it's the day that's been given to me. He stopped and said, Yes, and thank God for it.

It's what's been given to us.

We are to live with God's love and His blessings every day.

This stuff may happen in our lifetimes. I don't know. Boy, there are certain things that are happening that could mean that we're getting close.

But what if it isn't for 20 years or 30 years?

It's like I've always said, if I'm dying in bed, I'm going to gather all my kids and grandkids around me and say, You better be ready because He's coming.

Because that's all that matters. You better be ready because He's coming. I don't know when, but we're supposed to read this to know.

I probably spent an hour a day either listening on the radio or turning on my YouTube or watching news at night, you know, you add up a whole day, just keeping up with what's going on in Ukraine because it's like it's so predictable. Everything in it is so predictable. You understand Russian history. I don't know a lot about Russian history, but I know.

It's like I kept telling my son. He said, Look at these airstrikes he's doing. I said, It's nothing. He says, Look at the convoys that are going to be wiped out. I said, I want you to look at them, Chris.

They're all recon units. There's never more than four or five trucks. A couple tanks.

He said, He's trying to use precision bombing and probes. You know why? That's how we fight. We've won every war for a long time. Until finally we bring on the massive power behind him. I said, He's going to get frustrated with this because Russia fights wars this way. You have 10,000 men, we bring up 40,000. We bomb you for three days until we either kill everybody or everybody's got a concussion. Then we come at you at waves, knowing the first wave is going to get wiped out, but we kill all of you. That's how they fight. They did it in Chesney a couple years ago. This is how they fight. They did it in World War II. This is how they fought. They did it in Afghanistan. They're just not really good at fighting guerrilla warfare because they can't use all that punch. I said, the punch is coming. When the punch comes, those Ukrainian people will die by the tens of thousands. It started two days ago. The punch started. It's the way they do things. He's a Tsarist. That's what he's going to do. It's predictable, but it's destabilizing the world even more. New alliances are made. Chad is trying to make an alliance with every nation on earth, and nobody wants to make an alliance with them. It's like, well, we'll just play the field now. They're trying to play the game, too. So why go through this? Well, don't panic. The tribulation hasn't started. Then you're all panicked as well. You mean it's worse than this? Yeah. But God is with us. Can you imagine facing this and not knowing what's going to happen? Not knowing Christ is coming back? Not knowing the promises made to us? That would be horrible. I'd be getting a gun, even at 65, and going over to the joining Ukrainians. Better stop it there. There's thousands. There's now 16,000 guys from Europe, Australia, and the United States headed over there just to go fight. They're going to die. I hope they don't make it, because they'll die by the thousands. They don't understand. And we're not going to go in here because we don't want our boys to die, and we don't want to start a nuclear war, and he's crazy enough to do it.

He's crazy enough to do it. Because he's calculated everything but a loss, and he's losing the war. He'll win it one way or the other. Okay. So, I'm sorry I gave you the same sermon I gave a year, two years ago, when we began COVID. But it was about the mark of the beast.

I went through the fifth seal. Great tribulation did that last time. So, and 666. We will do 666 this time. So, realize we may be in the time of sorrows. I don't know. I tell you what, if I lived in 1933, I would have believed I was in the time of sorrows. The Great Depression, Nazi Germany coming on the scene. Total collapse of world governments, world systems, economic systems, all collapsed in the 1930s. You would have thought it was the time. In the 1400s, the Christians all believed in Europe that it was the time of the end. Between bubonic plague and famines and climate change. The climate change so much it snowed in Paris in July. And wars, I mean, the things that were going on, they all believed. He's coming back. The four horsemen are rushing all across Europe and they were wrong. But it's going to happen sometime. And this is the first time that the whole world is involved. And that's worth thinking about. So, I'll wait a while before I give that sermon again. But I thought I wanted to cover it again. Not to be discouraged, but to think, wow, God's given us insight. That means He cares. And we can believe He's going to do what's best for us in that time period, and then Christ does return.