The Coming Change in the World Order

Well, if you've been watching the news, maybe other than the network news, you see that we had another eventful week and a number of eventful weeks that we've had recently on the world scene. A couple weeks ago, when I was here, we mentioned about the Iranian general that had been assassinated and what effect that might have on the world. We saw the protests that went on in Iran at that time, and then we saw a plane shot down, and the protest took a turn. So then, all of a sudden, the Iranians were protesting against their own government, and kind of a twist of everything there. We have, you know, if you read the prophetic times yesterday, you saw that earlier in the week, the Russian government met, and they announced some changes to their constitution that would give Vladimir Putin a little bit more extended power, give him a little bit more of the direction that he wants to go, and keep him in office for longer. As a result, many members of the Russian government resigned. It's a change in what's going on over there. You know, we have a stock market going that is looking like it's going to hit 30,000, when just a few years ago, people said it would be impossible. One time, they said it would be impossible for it to hit 20,000. Now, it was impossible to hit 30,000. Looks like it's going to do that. We have impeachment trials that continue to divide the country and show the world what democracy is about.

We have a lot of things going on all over the world that are happening, not just in this country, but things marching forward in Bible prophecy. So, I thought today what we would do, once a year, to kind of remind us what prophecy says, see where we're going, what's changed in the last year, because one of the things that God wants us to do is keep our eyes open as to what's happening in the world.

So, when it happens, and when the result of all these things that the Bible says will happen do happen, we're not taken by surprise. The rest of the world will be taken by surprise, but God's people should not be. So, let's turn back to Isaiah 46. To begin, we know that the Bible that you have sitting in your lap, and that we read daily and study, it is God's Word. We should have all proven that. We know that what God says in this Word is absolutely, absolutely His. And in Isaiah 46, He plainly tells us that what He says and what He records for us is certainly going to happen.

He's got the power to make it happen, and it will happen exactly as He said. So, let's begin there. Isaiah 46 and in verse 8. The Word that we should remember, starts with remember. From time to time, we have to remember who God is, remember who we are, remember what He's done, remember what He says He's going to do. Remember this and show yourselves men.

Recall to mind, you transgressors. Remember the former things of old, for I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand and I will do all my pleasure. Dropping down to the middle of verse 11. Indeed, I have spoken it. I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it. I will also do it. As sure as you and I are sitting here today, what God says in this Bible will happen. And as we begin today, I want to show you some of the things of the prophecies that are written in the Bible that have already come to pass.

We know that God will do it because the prophecies that He has recorded in there, many of which have already come to pass exactly the way He said. So we know the rest of them that have not yet occurred will come as well. Let's go back to Daniel 2, a very well-known prophecy. Of course we have prophecies in Revelation. Christ spoke it Himself in Matthew. We have the minor prophets that speak of prophecy.

And Daniel, the book of Daniel, is a very thorough book about what is going to happen in the world between the time that Daniel lived and the time of Jesus Christ's return. It gives a world overview, all of which we can document, and history documents. It happens exactly as the way that God foretold through Daniel, and even a very detailed prophecy we'll get to here in a minute. In Daniel 2, you'll recall that Daniel has been taken captive to Babylon, and he is part of the king's court.

And Nebuchadnezzar, the king, the first world-ruling king, has had this dream that keeps recurring to him. And it kind of troubles him, as you can imagine it did. And you remember the dream that he had. It was of the statue with the head of gold, and the chest of silver, and the waist of bronze, and the legs that were partly iron and partly clay. And so he troubled this, and he wanted his wise men to interpret this dream for me. I want to know what this is. But he made it hard on his wise men of his kingdom.

He said, I don't even want you to tell me only what it means. I want you to tell me what the dream is. So simply impossible. Simply impossible is what the task was. And his wise men said, can't be done. Well, Daniel was there, a man of God. And God revealed to Daniel what exactly that dream was and exactly what it meant in detail. So we have that in Daniel 2. And if we just look at verse 36, and then I'll recount something that many of you, most of you already know.

But here in verse 36, Daniel, as he first describes the dream to Nebuchadnezzar, then he interprets it. And he says in verse 36, this is the dream. Now we will trill the interpretation of it before the king. And of course, Daniel gives God total credit and says, this can't be done of man. It's the God. The God above all gods who has made this known. Verse 37, he says, you, O king, are a king of kings. For the God of heaven has given you a kingdom, power, strength, and glory. Now wherever the children of men dwell, or the beasts of the field, and the birds of the heaven, He has given them into your hand, and has made you ruler over them all.

You are the set of gold. You are the first world-ruling kingdom, is what he said. It was Babylon. Now we know where Babylon got its start. We talked about that not too long ago. Remember, we talked about Genesis 10, and Nimrod was the beginning of kingdoms. Babylon was one of the places. Babylon, as it was known in the Hebrew times, it was one of the places that he began his kingdom, as well as Assyria. You are this first ruling kingdom. And then in the ensuing verses, he goes and he says, after you another king will come forth.

And then after you another king will come forth. And then after you a fourth beast. And let's go down to verse 40. This fourth kingdom shall be as strong as iron, inasmuch as iron breaks to pieces and shatters everything. And like iron that crushes, that kingdom will break in pieces and crush all the others. Whereas you saw the feet and toes, partly of potter's clay and partly of iron, the kingdom shall be divided, yet the strength of the iron shall be in it, just as you saw the iron mixed with ceramic clay.

And as the toes of the feet were partly of iron and partly of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly fragile. And as you saw the iron mixed with ceramic clay, they will mingle with the seed of men, but they will not adhere to one another, just as iron does not mix with clay. So we have four world-ruling kingdoms, and history shows that there was Babylon, followed by the Medo-Persian Empire, followed by the Greek Empire, and then this fourth kingdom, the Roman Empire.

And it was different than the rest of the other empires. It didn't have its end as clearly as Babylon, as clearly as the Medes, as clearly as the Greeks. It was going to continue until the time of Christ's return. And so he says in verse 44, and in the days of these kings, the God of heaven, will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed.

The kingdom will not be left to other people. It will break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it will stand forever. This is what's going to happen between now and until Jesus Christ returns, Daniel. And history bears it out. It's happened exactly the way that God ordained. Even secular sources say that prophecy is exactly what the world has happened to the world. Inasmuch, verse 45, as you saw that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold, the great God has made known to the king what will come to pass after this.

The dream is certain, and its interpretation is sure. And you can see in the next verse there, King Nebuchadnezzar, when he heard it, he knew it was of God. He knew that that was a sure and certain interpretation. And it happened exactly as time has borne out, and the centuries since then has borne out exactly the way God predicted.

Credibility in the prophecies of the book of Daniel, and I'm not going to turn to Daniel 7, but I will remember in Daniel 7, he talks about four beasts that will be on the earth. Those four beasts show up in Revelation, as he talks about Revelation and what that fourth beast is like. Terrible like all those other beasts, and a formidable power on the earth that would be there at the time before Jesus Christ's return.

If we go over to Daniel 11, we find a remarkable prophecy, a remarkably detailed prophecy, that talks about the history of the Middle East from the time that Daniel was right up until the time of the end.

And it's remarkable, and again, even secular sources will say, it's remarkable what these verses say. No one can deny that what these verses say is exactly what has happened out, has played out in history. No one, not one scholar, has ever denied that what is recorded here actually happened, exactly the way the Bible said. There are some who will say, well, that can't possibly have been written back at the time Daniel lived. It hasn't been written at the time of Jesus Christ when a lot of these things already happened. Now, because they just can't believe anyone, or they don't want to believe that anyone, including God, would be able to predict as precisely as he did exactly what the history that occurred in the Middle East would be. So let's look here, just a few verses of Daniel 11, and see the detail that is there, because again, it lends to the credibility of what we read in the Bible when we see that everything is exactly the way it should be. So let's first look at a couple of verses in Daniel 10. You'll remember Daniel had a vision, and it troubled him, and he wanted to know what did that vision mean. And so he continually asked God and sought him, what do these words mean? What do these things I'm seeing is? And as in a lesson to us, he kept asking, he kept seeking, and finally God gave him, and finally God gave him what the answer was. Daniel 10 and in verse 11.

It is the messenger angel comes to him, and you see that in verse 10 it touches him, and in verse 11, Daniel writing, He said to me, O Daniel, man greatly beloved, understand the words that I speak to you and stand upright. For I have been sent to you while he was speaking this word to me. Daniel says, I stood trembling as you can imagine if you were in his shoes. Then he said to me, Don't fear, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand, and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come because of your words. Dropping down to verse 14, I've come to make you understand what will happen to your people in the latter days, for the vision refers to many days yet to come. This is what's going to happen to you, to your people, Daniel, later on in life.

Excuse me. As you can imagine, Daniel is overcome of what is going to happen to him. But he stands there as the words continue. In verse 21, the angel says, I will tell you what is noted in the Scripture of truth. This is true, and so the prophecy begins in what we have chapter 11. It says, in the first year of Darius the Mede, I, even I, stood up to confirm and strengthen him, and now I will tell you the truth. Behold, three more kings will arise in Persia, and the fourth shall be far richer than them all. By his strength, through his riches, he will stir up all against the realm of Greece.

And indeed, as you look at history, born out by the history books, born out by the Bible dictionaries, born out by every source that is there, Darius the Mede was the first king of the Persians, and there were three more that followed him. Their names were, if I can find it here quickly, Cambecus. There is one called Pseudosmurdus because he was supposedly a son of Cyrus, but he turned out to be an impostor, and then Darius the Persian. Three more kings that followed him, but the fourth, it says, will be greater and richer than them all. And indeed, that fourth king from Darius was richer and greater than them all. He was Xerxes, who we've all heard of, the husband of Esther, and he was a very rich, informatable king. And he, it says he will stir up all against the realm of Greece. And if you look at history, here's what it says about Xerxes. It says, in one of the largest assaults of ancient history, Xerxes sent a vast force of hundreds of ships and a million troops against the Greeks. And that's from Expositor's Bible dictionary.

Now, I will mention, I will mention that if you're interested, I'm not going to go through all of chapter 11 here. I'm going to hit chapter 11, but not every verse. It's a very interesting study. And in our booklet, if you haven't read it for a while, the Middle East in Prophecy, you'll find chapter 11 clearly defined, and the historical facts from history books matching the verses in chapter 11, one by one, you will see how it all falls out in perfect harmony with the Scriptures.

If you don't want to read the book, believe me, you'll miss a very interesting read if you don't. You can go to the UCG Bible Commentary. Just go to ucg.org and the search engine, type in UCG Bible Commentary.

Go to the book of Daniel. Click on chapter 11. And in there, you'll find a very interesting interlinear-type Bible. As opposed to having the Bible and then the references to the Strong St. Chordons, it has the Bible with the historical events. It's just right there, superimposed with the verses that go along with it. So you can see how history exactly matches what's here in Daniel 11.

This is another chapter that none of the scholars have ever refuted that what is in the Bible is exactly what happened in history, exactly what happened in history, down to the detail. So we'll go through a few more verses here. But here we have, you know, before this happens, you know, Daniel's told three more kings. There will be a fourth one in Xerxes. And then verse 3, then a mighty king shall arise. And the next mighty king after Xerxes was Alexander the Great. Everyone's heard of Alexander the Great, the Greek army. He didn't, or the Greek general. He didn't live long. He died at age 33.

He made a sudden impact on the world, and then he was dead. But he was there, at the beginning of the Greek kingdom, when it transferred from the Medes and Persians over to the Greeks, he was there, a mighty king shall arise who shall rule with great dominion and do according to his will. Alexander did exactly that. And when he has arisen, his kingdom shall be broken up and divided toward the four winds of heaven, but not among his posterity, nor according to his dominion with which he ruled. For his kingdom shall be uprooted, even for others besides these. So history shows that when Alexander died, he didn't have any heirs at that time.

He had an unborn son, and there was a general who was close to him and a nephew that he had. And after he died, they tried to form the government around him. Didn't work. It totally didn't work at all. And so four other generals, as it says in the Bible, who weren't part of Alexander's inner circle, they were the ones who divided the kingdom up among them.

So you have the kingdom at that time going from Alexander to these four other generals. Two of them are very noteworthy. One was Ptolemy. He was located in Egypt, and he became known as what the Bible would call the King of the South. So when you read of the King of the South and the further history here, it's Ptolemy, and that line, one of the four of Alexander's generals.

The next one that's of note is Seleucus. His kingdom was in Syria, part of that kingdom at that time. Seleucus and his dynasty became known as the King of the North. So when you read the Bible and Daniel 11 at that time, he's the King of the North. So one was situated in Egypt. The other one was situated in Syria. The two battled each other, but they became very strong. The other two kings, their names were Cassander and Lysimachus.

They were located in other places, but they seem to have faded from history. So you have, then, history bearing out in even the detail of Alexander that he didn't even have an heir. It came about exactly as the Bible said that it divided into four sections, with generals who weren't part of the inner circle, but others that took it over.

And in verse 5, you see where the King of the South is becoming very, very strong. And later, we'll see, the King of the North became very strong, and they sparred with each other on a regular basis. Well, I don't want to go through all of the verses here, but again, you can go through that. And it should be a conclusive proof to anyone who reads it that Bible prophecy is absolutely sure. This is the credibility of the Bible. This is the credibility in Daniel that no one can and no one has refuted.

It is exactly what it is, and God saw to it that everything happened exactly the way he predicted it would happen. So when we talk about Bible prophecy, we can back it up with this has already happened, and we have the luxury of living in the 21st century, so we can look back at history and say it happened exactly the way God said it would, every single step of the way, even in the detail.

And so let's go down and look at another notable aspect of the Middle Eastern history here, if you will, one that has some implications for the end time as well. But if we drop down to verse 28, we find the time is around 167-168 B.C. And we still have the king of the south, and we still have the king of the north, and we still have these two kingdoms that are rivaling each other. And you can see in verse 25 that it says the word he, and then he's stirring up his power. He's the king of the north, and he's coming against the king of the south, so we still have these two, and they're warring, and they're in conflict with one another.

And in verse 28, we read about the king of the north as he is about to go back to his land. Okay? While returning to his land with great riches, says, his heart shall be moved against the holy covenant, so he shall do damage and return to his own land. His heart was moved against the holy covenant. That means he was moved against the Jewish people. He became, in his name, this king, Antiochus Epiphanes, also known as Antiochus IV, became known for that. He hated the Jewish people. He wanted to wipe them out.

He hated everything about them. And indeed, as we go into this, we see, as he was moved against the holy covenant, and he did damage. You look at history, Antiochus murdered some 80,000 Jews at that time. He had laws that prevented them or that were against the Sabbath day, against everything Jewish. He decided that he was going to not have any of it. He went to war with the Jewish people by simply outlawing them.

And he did more besides. It says in verse 29, at the appointed time, he shall return and go toward the south, but it won't be like the former or the latter. For ships from Cyprus shall come against him. So he's got a threat coming. Now he's this powerful being, but he's got these ships. He's got someone challenging his authority. Ships from Cyprus shall come against him. Therefore, he shall be grieved and return in rage against the holy covenant. It's not the people of the holy covenant that are causing these problems.

It's the ships from Cyprus. But where does he turn his anger? I'm upset. I'm irritated. I'm going back against these Jews. I'm going to make them pay because Cyprus, or these people forever they're coming from, are challenging my authority. And I wipe them wiped out. And he returned in rage against the holy covenant and due damage. So he shall return and show regard for those who forsake the holy covenant.

And indeed, history shows that if you are a Jew and you yielded to Antiochus, you became one of his favorites. He liked you. If you would just renounce the Jew's faith, if you would do whatever he asked you to do and worship him in essence, choose him as your God rather than the real God, you were in favor.

Life was okay. You were a hero in his eyes. His mission was turn people away from their God. Turn them away from their God and whatever it takes to do that, turn them away. And if they don't turn away, kill them, torture them, do whatever it takes. And forces, verse 31, shall be mustered by him and they shall defile the sanctuary fortress. They shall take away the daily sacrifices and place there the abomination of desolation.

The infamous abomination of desolation. And Antiochus did that. The temple was there. And you know the rituals of the temple, the sacrifices that were there. God ordained what those sacrifices should be. Antiochus disdained them all. He came in and on the altar he would offer unclean meat. He set up a statue of Zeus in the temple. Anything to defy God, anything to defy the Jews and their holy place. He was simply against God. He was simply against them. And everything he did was toward that bent where they were concerned. But he had the power to do that and he had the power to, in his mind, make people do what he wanted them to do.

Jesus Christ spoke of the abomination of desolation in Matthew 24 verse 15 at a latter time, because this had happened in 167 BC. You know, well before he was there. But he said, when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet, let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.

So we see in this that this is a dual prophecy. It happened exactly as the Bible said in the chronology that is established here in Daniel 11, but it's also foretelling something that will happen in the latter days before Jesus Christ's return.

And so for us who read these prophecies and understand them, we would be looking at a time that somewhere in the future we're going to have a similar situation occur that Jesus Christ talked about, that we could be looking for and watching events as they go about to see how that is all developing.

Because it sure as you and I are sitting here, it will happen. It will happen exactly the way the Bible said it would.

So we go on here in verse 33. Those of the people, verse 32 I guess I was, those who do wickedly against the covenant, he shall corrupt with flattery.

Those who turn against God, forget the Sabbath day, forget everything God has said, I'm just going to follow you, Antiochus, he'll corrupt with flattery. You're a great guy. How smart you are.

Might even promote you, might even make you, in your mind, great in that way.

Those who do wickedly against the covenant, he shall corrupt with flattery.

But the people who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits.

And history shows that there were people in the face of a brutal, brutal Antiochus IV who stood strong with God.

History shows the Maccabees stood there, and they did not yield to Antiochus at all.

They allowed whatever happened to happen to them, and they survived during that time, but they would not yield to this evil and brutal leader.

Verse 33, and those of the people who understand shall instruct many.

Teach them of God's way. Teach them who the real God is. Teach them that the powers of this world are not the powers of God.

The powers of this world can confuse us and mislead us, but it's God who we look to.

Those of the people who understand shall instruct many, yet for many days they shall fall by sword and flame by captivity and plundering.

They suffered a lot. They were people who died. They were taken into captivity. They were tortured. They were martyred.

Everything happened to them, but they stood strong through it all, and they did not betray God or defy Him in any way.

Verse 35, some of those of understanding shall fall to refine them, purify them, make them white, until the time of the end, because it is still for the appointed time.

Sometimes martyrs happen. Sometimes torture happens. Sometimes things happen to purify, to refine whatever God's purpose for us is to make us what He wants us to be and get us ready for His return.

And many of those people suffered some very difficult times during that time, but they endured it and they stood through it.

Well, the next verse is here. There's kind of a transition, if you will, when you look at that. These are the same type of things that Jesus Christ talked about, as would be happening before His return.

And we see that people back in this time had experienced the same type of thing. If we go down to verse 36, 37, 38, 39, it moves into the times of the emperors.

And in 65 BC, it turns out that Rome actually came in and they conquered the King of the North, the Seleucus brand that was headquartered in Syria.

So the King of the North then became Rome. And so from that time forward, we see the throne moved from Syria to Rome because Rome conquered it at that time.

So in verses 36 to 39, you see, as history points out, some of the characteristics of the Roman emperors, the early Roman emperors, and they defied God. They had their own religion.

They didn't listen to anyone. It wasn't even a woman who could convince them otherwise. They were going to do it their way. They were going to exalt themselves. They were going to have the world worship them.

They didn't regard the God of their fathers. They were going to create their own religion. Everything was about them.

And so you read that in verses 36 to 39 and see how the first 14 or 15 Roman emperors of that time were.

Again, every single thing in these verses is borne out by secular history. Every single thing in Daniel 11. In the remarkable prophecy that it is.

So in verses 40 through the rest of the chapter here, we find the prophecy for the end of time. At the end of time, at the time of the end, it says in verse 40.

So knowing that every single thing happened exactly as God said in the beginning verses here of chapter 11, there's no reason to doubt in any sensible mind that what God says is going to happen at the time of the end is certainly going to happen.

Because every single prophecy that you can come up with in the Bible that has been fulfilled is the way that God said.

So let's look at what it says for the time of the end, the time yet ahead of us and what we can learn about the time that is yet to come.

Verse 40, at the time of the end, the king of the south, it's still there, the king of the south, or I shouldn't say still there, it hasn't been there.

We'll get back to that in a minute.

At the time of the end, the king of the south shall attack him, and we see who him is, and the king of the north, we know where the king of the north is.

That's that Roman empire that God said would exist from the time that it began until the time of the end, until Jesus Christ came back and smashed that kingdom into oblivion. At the time of the end, the king of the south shall attack him, and the king of the north shall come against him like a whirlwind with chariots, horsemen, and with many ships, and he shall enter the countries, overwhelm them, and pass through.

And if we have any doubt of where the king of the south was, because it was in that Middle Eastern area, God tells us exactly where this king of the south at the end time will be.

Verse 41, he will enter the glorious land, Israel, Jerusalem. He shall enter the glorious land, and many countries shall be overthrown. But these shall escape from his hand, Edom, Moab, and the prominent people of Ammon.

That's the area of Jordan. He shall stretch out his hand against the countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape.

Well, we all know where Egypt is. In verse 43, it even talks about Libya and Ethiopia. Well, you know where Libya and Ethiopia is, so we have no doubt where this future king of the south is, and where he's located.

So, if we just stop there for a moment, what do we learn about the time of the end? We learn that there's two world powers at that time.

We have a king of the north who has this army and this might that he can go through, and this king of the south, he can just completely overwhelm them.

So we know he's a figure to be reckoned with at the time of the end. We don't have to turn to Revelation 13. You know Revelation 13. We've been there many times, where it talks about the beast power that comes at the time of the end, before the return of Jesus Christ and the three and a half years leading up to his return.

And we know the beast power is a terrible tyrant of a ruler, an autocratic ruler. There's no democracy, there's no freedom of speech, there's no freedom of religion, there's nothing free about him.

People at that time do exactly what he said, and they worship exactly who he says to worship. It's not at all like the world we live in today, but at the time of the end, that's the world in the king of the north. He's it. He dictates, and the world's mission is to obey him.

Now the king of the north, the king of the north, we read in Revelation 13, he just appears out of the sea, and the world marvels after him. They're just, how did this happen? Who can stand up against the king of the north? Who can be mighty like him? Look at his power, look at his economic status, look at everything about him. How can anyone stand up against him?

He appears suddenly, if you will, on the world scene. So we know there's a king of the north, and he's there in Revelation 13 as we read this, but we learned that at the time of then there's also a king of the south.

Today there's not a king of the south. There is no conglomeration of Middle Eastern states. In fact, if you read Middle Eastern history, much of which is in this booklet that I will say, but you can look at it that I mentioned.

You can also read it in secular history. The Middle East has been under the Ottoman Empire rule for several centuries until World War I.

When World War I came, the Ottoman Empire was pretty much dissolved, and the Middle Eastern states, the Arabian states, if you will, became on their own.

Since then, they've been pretty much looking for someone to consolidate them, to make them a power.

Muhammad did it a little bit back in the Middle Ages when he had this vision and introduced Islam, and it was the religion that unified that area of the world for a long period of time.

But then they had their divisions. Now they had Sunnis, and they had people who believed that everyone had to descend from this father-in-law named Ali and others who thought anyone could become the leader of the Islam world.

They were Whites, type- Bachists, Hive-kei's today, other factions, and just they were all over the place.

But you've seen, factions time tried to take control of the Middle East.

We had Al droves, who was going to unify them against America. We had ISIS that tried to take over the Middle East.

We have Iran today, who tries to make inroads into it, and they would like to see themselves as the Middle East.

Some people think it will be magnifying Egypt at the end time.

Because it was Egypt, where Ptolemy was back in the612 of Old Testament.

We have no idea. We have no idea who the king of the south will be, but we know for certain there will be a conglomeration of Middle Eastern states under one power at the time ahead of us before Christ's return. There will be one that is the king of the south who will have those armies mustered, and he will push at the king of the north. And there will be that conflict that's there in the world. And when he does that, the king of the north will march through and basically eliminate him from any consideration. So we know two things then about the world ahead of us. There's a king of the north that's not at all like the government we have today. We know it's north of the Mediterranean Sea. We know that it's centered in Europe. We have Bible prophecy that you can read, and you can document anywhere where it is. And we have a king of the south below the Mediterranean Sea. You know, some think it'll be the Turkish Empire. We have a president in Turkey today who's making noises about, you know, the Ottoman Empire resurrecting, and he's a Muslim state, and he can do that as well. Whether the Arabians will let that happen is anyone's guess. But between now and then, there will be this king of the south that becomes a factor in the earth. Let's go down to verse 44, because we learned something about the world at the time before Jesus Christ and the world ahead of us in verse 44 as well. So the king of the north has passed through the king of the south. He's taken care of these nations and conquered them. In verse 44, it says, news from the east and the north shall trouble him. Therefore, he shall go out with great fury to destroy and annihilate many. So in a world of conflict, because it's not a peaceful world at that time, even though the king of the north arises and people say, who's like him? We do have a world still at war. We do have factions trying to claim world domination. And so we have news from the east and the north. And that troubles him. And just like a king does, as we read back here about Antiochus, he went out and he's mad, so he's going to destroy and annihilate many. How dare you? How dare you challenge my authority? But the east and the north, so we know that at the end time, there's a power. There's a power in the east that isn't there today. A power in the east and the north that will come to war or try to upend the king of the north. We don't have that today.

We might see the beginnings of it today and this coalition that will be there. But at the time of the end, it's there. It's there. It's a very real power. And as whatever we're watching or wherever we are, when we hear these things, it's not there today. It will be there. Well, let's keep, well, let's finish verse 45 here. And he, king of the north, shall plant the tents of his palace between the seas and the glorious holy mountain. That would be there in the Middle East, Jerusalem, where he will plant his tent. And he will come to his end and no one will help him. Well, just as the prophecies say, he'll be there until Jesus Christ returns and Jesus Christ will be the one to end that kingdom. No one will help him and even if they did, it'll be Jesus Christ who ends that kingdom once and for all. We don't take the time, but you see that in Revelation 18 where Christ returns the armies of the world, Revelation 18 and 19, and he conquers them, defeats them, and the kingdoms become his. Well, let's go back, though, to Revelation 16 and just look at a few verses here.

You know, as we talk about the kings of the east and the news from the east and the north, we see that the east does have a play of significant role at the time of the end, even here in Revelation. Revelation 16 and verse 12, we have the angel, we have the trumpets here, and in verse 12 it talks about the sixth trumpet. The sixth angel poured out his bowl. Okay, this is the bowls at the time of the end. The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the Great River Euphrates, and its water was dried up so that the way of the kings from the east might be prepared. So news from the east. Now, there are probably many skirmishes, but at the end there will be this conflict between the north and the east, and the rivers dried up so the east can move right down into the area that God wants them to be. And notice in verse 13, I saw three unclean spirits like frogs coming out of the mouth of the dragon.

We know who the dragon is. It's Satan defines that for us in Revelation 12 verse 9. I saw three unclean spirits like frogs coming out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast.

Now, we know what spirit leads him, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. Well, we know what false spirit or wrong spirit leads those three. This is not a kingdom of God like they were going to be wanting to say at that time. God set up this kingdom. We're the savior of the world. No, no, no, not at all. We know, and those who are wise, as Daniel would say, would know what that kingdom is going to be like and whose power it emanates from. For they are spirits of demons, performing signs which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. And so, at the end, there will be this conflict, east versus north. And we know what the end result is. Christ returns, He conquers the world, the kingdoms of the world become His. Now, if you don't know about the king of the north, let's just look at chapter 17 here for a second. Pick it up in verse 5. It says, on her forehead a name was written, okay, Mystery Babylon the Great. So that ancient Babylon that we talked about, Nimrod was the beginning of the kingdoms. We talked about some of the marks of that kingdom, the false religion, the defiance against God, the self-glorification.

Mystery Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and of the abominations of the earth. And I saw the woman, John writes here as he has this vision, I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement. But the angel said to me, why did you marvel? I'll tell you the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns.

The beast that you saw was and is not and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to perdition. Many of the world it used to be, it's there in history, many will think that it no longer exists, but here it is again, alive and well. It'll ascend out of the bottomless pit, we know what reference that makes, and it will go to perdition. It will be judged by God. And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, whose names are not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was and is not and yet is, that fourth kingdom that extends from the time it first appeared on earth all the way until the time that Jesus Christ returns. It's there, it looks like it might disappear, but when it shows up again, the world is taken by surprise, and it looks like the savior of the world, but it's not.

So we see the setting and the changing world order that will happen between today and the time before Christ's return. It's undeniable, it will happen, it's just a matter of when will it happen. But let's go back to Daniel again and complete the message that we have.

Daniel 12. We have chapter breaks, but the messenger angel continues to talk past verse 45 of verse 11 when he says, no one's going to come to the defense of the king of the north, and he will come to his end at the time of Christ's return. In chapter 12 verse 1, it says, at that time, Michael, one of the archangels, will stand up, the great prince who stands watch over the sons of your people, Daniel, and there will be a time of trouble such as never was, since there was a nation even to that time. The same words that Jesus Christ said in Matthew 24, there will be great tribulation such as was never seen in the world before and never will be seen again. And at that time, your people will be delivered. Everyone who is found written in the book, everyone who has the same effect as you, Daniel, everyone who believes God, finds God, led by the Spirit of God, obeys God, is yielded to him. Everyone who is found written in the book, who doesn't yield to the kings of the world, who doesn't yield to the powers of the world. And many of those who sleep, and we know that means who have died, and many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, speaking of the first resurrection at the seventh trump when Christ returns, and some to shame and everlasting contempt, who had the opportunity, who knew the truth, but for some reason just never took it seriously, kind of went through life and allowed things to pass by them, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise, and we know where wisdom comes from, right? Wisdom comes from God. Those who are wise shall shine, like the brightness of the firmament, and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever. But he says, you, Daniel, you shut up the words. Seal the book until the time of the end. We'll stop and think about that for a moment. Seal those words, Daniel. People aren't going to understand those words. They're not going to be understood until the time of the end.

Now, why would that be? Well, as Daniel was, these words were revealed to him in chapter 11, he may well have seen the panorama of history go by him, but as they were written, anyone who was living in 500 BC and 200 BC might read those words and think, I really don't even know what that means.

Today, in the 21st century, even the latter 20th century, we can look at those words and say, we get it. Those words are clear. That's exactly what happened in history. We're on the other side of prophecy. We can look back and say exactly what God said would happen. It happened all the way down, right down to the T. Every single detail is there. Seal up the words, Daniel. It'll be the time of the end when those words will be understood, when you can see the validity and the credibility of this prophecy and understand what it says and understand what it says in those last five and six verses that we read as well. Seal the book until the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase. And so it'll be a time when people have cars, they can fly all over the world in airplanes. They don't have to stay in one place like all the world up until our time did. They lived within, you know, the same 20, 30, 40 miles their entire life. We go all over the world now, and knowledge shall increase. And even 30 years ago, no one could foresee the access that we have to knowledge today. No one could have foreseen that if it really from the from our own homes, we could push a few buttons and we would have access to more than anyone else at any other time in history. Anything we want to learn and anything we want to look at, we have access to.

So he says at the time of the end, these words will be understood, and this is going to define the age. People will run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase. And then in verse 6, you know, Daniel asks, well, how long? How long until these things are fulfilled? What about all these things? You know, when you talk about the time of the end and the great prince standing up. In verse 7, Daniel says, I heard the man clothed in linen who was above the waters of the river, when he held up his right hand and his left hand to heaven, and swore by him who lives forever that it shall be for a time, times, and half a time. The same time, times, and half a time that Jesus Christ speaks about. The same time, time, times, and half a time that it speaks about in Revelation. That it shall be for a time, times, and half a time, and when the power of the holy people has been completely shattered, all these things shall be finished. Daniel says, I still don't really fully understand.

But what does he mean when he says the power of the holy people will be completely shattered?

Who is he talking about there? Well, there are people that God calls holy. He calls you and me holy. In 1 Peter 2 9, he says, you are a holy people, a chosen generation. And certainly, spiritual Israelites who God has called, who have repented, who are baptized, who receive his Holy Spirit, lived by that Holy Spirit, he says, you are holy people. And certainly, in the end time, we know that that power that's on earth at that time, that king of the north, he will be 100% set against holy people. Just like Antiochus IV was, he will want to wipe out anyone who worships the God that you and I worship. But there's another holy people, another people that God calls holy, that also figure prominently in the millennium. Let's go back to Deuteronomy.

Deuteronomy 7. As God brought the ancient physical people of Israel out of Egypt, and as Moses led them for 40 years, and as God put his blessing on them and made promises to them that will last forever, and as we've spoken about in the recent months, there will be physical Israel in the millennium. God says he won't allow physical Israel to be completely destroyed. And as we read in Ezekiel, when physical Israel understands what they've done and how they've turned against God, they will loathe themselves. And they will be there in the millennium to serve God in the temple, the millennial temple, as it says in Ezekiel, and it tells us in Revelation 5 and 7 in that area when it says what those physical people will do. And to the physical people in chapter 7 and verse 6, God says this, you, you Israel, are a holy people to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth. Certainly to you and I, he says that, but the physical Israel, he's never forgotten Israel. He's never forgotten who they are. He knows exactly where physical Israel today. He is not given up on them. He has a plan for them, and he says you are a holy people, a special people on the face of the earth.

So when Daniel talks about when the power of the holy people is completely shattered, completely shattered, who is he talking about? He talking about God's people, the spiritual Israelites of today? Well, we can examine that for a moment. What power do you and I have? Would we say as a church we have all this power and God's going to completely shatter our power? Is that what he says? It's not our power, right? What we do and we accomplish, not by our power, it's by his Holy Spirit. His Spirit is the spirit of power and love and a sound mind. It's not our power. If it was our power that was doing the work, it would amount to nothing. It's God's power that's in his church. The church today is about his power, not our power. So if he shattered the power of his church, what would he be doing? Worrying about the church, what would he be doing? Worrying against himself? And he says of his church, it will never succumb to the gates of Hades. But physical Israel, they had a pride in their power. Leviticus 26 in the prophecies about if they turn from God, he talks about breaking the pride of their power. And physical people have a pride in their power, power that we have to often remind ourselves. It's not by our power, not by our might, but by your Spirit, O God. So when Daniel says, the power of the holy people will be completely shattered, could it be that he's talking about physical Israel and the Israelite descendants today? Because when we look at the world at the end of time, we see a power of the north, the king of the north, the king of the south. We see news from the east and the west, or the east and the north, but we never read about any power from the west. But where's the power in the world today? The power in the world today is in the west.

It's here in America. America is where the world looks today. We're the military giant, we're the economic giant. We're the ones who people are looking to bring down. People are still in awe of America and don't know how they can defeat this beast, but the west is nowhere mentioned anywhere in Bible prophecy. At the time of the end, the west is absent. It's the east, the north, and the south. And Daniel, the prophecy is revealed to him, the power of the holy people will be completely shattered. They don't even exist anymore. Well, let's pause there for a moment and let's think about where we are today. Because we've seen where the world is going. We know what it's going to be like at the end of time. We know that that lies ahead of us. So we, you know, in Luke 21 verse 36, I'll let you write that down. You know, Christ says, watch. Watch that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will happen. And we talk about that word, watch, quite a bit. And we, you know, say, watch world events, but watch ourselves too. But he says, watch what's going on. You know what the end is. You know those prophecies are sure you know that it's going to be a king of the north, a king of the south, this conglomeration from the east. So watch what's going on. And let's look at a couple of verses here before we get into that. In Isaiah 30, because we'll see in a minute that these, that the trends of society and what's going on, we can already see the buds of the change in the world order that's about to happen. Let's look at, we were in Isaiah 30 verse 12. Thus says the Holy One of Israel, Because you despise this word, because you trust in oppression and perversity and rely on them, and that can speak of the Israelites nations today. They don't want to follow God's word. They trust in their governments and their ways. And you rely on them. Therefore, this iniquity shall be to you like a breach ready to fall, a bulge in a high wall, whose breaking comes suddenly in an instant.

And he shall break it like the breaking of the potter's vessel, which is broken in pieces. He shall not spare. So he says, you know, it's just like if you have this wall in your house, and you kind of look at it, and one day it's kind of bulging over there, and you think, okay, well, I guess things are okay, and you kind of get used to it, and maybe it protrudes a little bit more in a week or two, and think, okay, everything's okay, kind of get used to it, put it out of your mind. But one day it just bursts. All of a sudden it just bursts. And you think, how did that happen? Well, you saw it was happening. You could have paid attention to those bulges, but you just kind of got used to it, kind of went on with your life, and then all of a sudden, boom, you've got this catastrophe on your hands. He said, that's what prophecy is like. It happens gradually. It doesn't just happen overnight. There's forces at work. If we watch, we can see those leaves budding on the trees like Christ says. If we watch, we won't be taken by surprise like the rest of the world will be when they see a king of the north, a king of the south, and a king of the east formed. We'll see it. We'll see it, and we'll be ready for it. Still may take us by surprise, but we'll be watching for it. And so it won't be like a dam or a wall that suddenly bursts, and everything falls apart. Let's look at 1 Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians 5.

Check it up in verse 1. See what Paul has to say about this prophecy and watching what it is that God would have us do. 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 1. Concerning the times and the seasons, and we know he's talking about the end time at the end of chapter 4. He's talking about the first resurrection as you read through verses 13 through 18 there. But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, chapter 5, verse 1. You have no need that I should write to you. For you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night. It'll take the world by surprise. No one knows when it will happen. For when they say peace and safety, then sudden destruction comes upon them.

So one of the things we can look for is when we hear the world saying peace and safety, peace and safety. Everything is okay. We might want to not lull ourselves to sleep. We might want to remember some verses. When they say peace and safety, sudden destruction comes on them as labor pains upon a pregnant woman, and they shall not escape. But you, brethren, you and me, you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this day should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. So God says it shouldn't happen to us. It'll come as a thief on the night. In the night on the world, it shouldn't happen to you. Keep your eyes open.

Watch. So what are some of the things that we can watch? Well, we can take our clues from Daniel.

As we are in 2020, and as we look at the years ahead of us and this year and what's going on, one of the things we can look for and look at what's happening in the East. One of the powers that has certainly emerged in the last several years in the East is a sleeping giant that's been there for centuries and really done nothing with a billion people that they had in their nation. And that's China. All of a sudden, China, under President Xi, has become a very viable force on Earth economically and militarily. You have seen on the news all about trade wars and trade agreements and how important that's become to America today. Because somewhere along the line, China, who was just kind of dormant there all those years, has become an economic giant and has become somewhat at our expense. And so no trade agreements because all of a sudden we have a number two economy that no one saw coming, but all of a sudden one day, whoa! Where did China come from? They've become quite powerful. Now, they have had some of their struggles, and just yesterday came out that their economic growth was the lowest as they struggle with their economy in the last 29 years. But they are growing, and President Xi has come out and said by 2030, his goal is China will be the number one economy on Earth.

Now, they have this money, they have this wealth, they have this determination that they haven't had in history, right? At least in the history that you and I know. And they have some economic might, and they're using it because they don't want to just be a good economy. They want to be a military might as well. And so if you read the prophetic times, you see something about China, you know, they'll do some exercises in the South China Sea. They'll, you know, they'll do their, they'll flex their muscles a little bit. You'll read something about them developing some kind of, you know, armaments and whatever. Here's an article that appeared in Business Insider Magazine back in August of this year, August 26th, written by an LNI onus. Let me just read a couple paragraphs from what she says. The title of the article is this. She says, China's military power may surpass the U.S.'s faster than you think, thanks to six shrewd strategies. She writes, China's military power is quickly becoming the greatest threat to U.S. military primacy. From posturing in the South China Sea to damaging hacking campaigns, the Chinese government is investing more time and resources into its military strategy, and it shows. A June report from the Center for a New American Security, co-authored by former Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert O. Warke, outlines the ways China's strategy and technology threaten to best the U.S. in a great power struggle and what the U.S. can do to maintain its military primacy. China's military, she writes, is well on its way to besting the U.S.'s technological edge due to rapid economic and military development. By stealing, and those two are the words that are there, hacking, right? And we know that China hacks, and by stealing already extant weapons technology, China is developing advanced weapons at a rapid pace. It's also figuring out how to disrupt the U.S.'s battlefield systems, working on long-range weapons and leading the way in artificial intelligence. China is developing highly secretive weapons, which include, quote, directed energy weapons, advanced space weapons, electromagnetic rail guns, high-powered microwave weapons, and even more exotic arms, according to this Mr. Work in his report. So we see a power that is looking to make itself a world leader. And the article talks about how they're very secretive, and they've figured out ways to hide what they're doing from the satellites, because when they're in battle, they don't want the enemy to know what they have. They want to take them by surprise if there is an attack or if they attack. They want the enemy to not know what is going on. So China is someone to watch, and when you hear China, don't just kind of dismiss them and think, oh, it's just something that is passing by. China has a mission. And China is becoming a leader in that eastern area. You know, they also, you know, she talks about artificial intelligence. You've probably heard of this Chinese company, Huey. It's kind of like the equivalent of Apple over there.

And our government has said we won't do any business with them, because they are concerned that there is a way that they're spying on the United States through parts of that. And indeed, when you read about Chinese artificial intelligence, it says China knows exactly what its population is doing. It knows exactly what its population is doing. And as we watch even in our own country and the intrusiveness of what we have in our computers and our cell phones and everything else like that, we see we're moving to a society where anyone can know what we're doing, what we're saying, what we're thinking almost at any given time. And certainly at the end time, we see a beast power that is well aware, well aware of what is going on in the world around it and who is following their dictates and who isn't. Well, China's one power to watch, and watch how that develops. I should also mention, you know, they're buying up things in South America as they foster up their resources, because like any military giant, they need to have resources. And South America is kind of like a wasteland out there, if you will. No one has been paying attention to it, but they're down there and doing a number of things in South America as well. Now, we can also mention Russia, because Russia is there. And, you know, we talk about hacking with Russia, and often about our elections. And one day we'll think we should have been concerned about maybe a lot more about what people are hacking than our election process. But they're hacking as well, and North Korea is out there in that same area. And as you watch those three powers, they tend to be with one another. They're not looking to Europe. They're not at all trying to make any alliances with them. But the three of them seem to be working together, and it could well be that we begin seeing that power coalescing into the news from the North and East that the Bible talks about in Daniel 11, because there certainly will be power in the East at the time of the end. Well, let's look at America. Let's look at Europe and the King of the North. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on the King of the North. We talked about that enough. The Bible prophecy tells us it'll happen north of the North of the Mediterranean Sea. But as we see world events today, we can look at things like the United States' stance on NATO. And so we see all of a sudden, for decades and 70-some years, Europe has seen unprecedented peace post-World War II. NATO has played a part in it, what the agreements at the end of the war with the United States taking care of the defense there. But now, as we push back, Europe, you know, they're watching what's going on in the East. They see a threat there that's not there, especially as Russia begins to take its stance and change its constitutions, to go back to where certainly Mr. Putin would like them to be back in the days of the USSR. And as you watch what's going on there, Europe, who's been being told, you need to bear your fair share. We don't want to. We don't want to defend you anymore. We don't want to bear all the cost. Well, Europe is one day going to realize we've got to take them at their word.

We're kind of sitting ducks here. We need to arm ourselves. We need to have a military white night. And sooner or later, that will probably be what happens. We also have the exit, the issue of Brexit, right? Brexit, British exit from the European Union has been in the news for several years now.

And Bible prophecy dictated Brexit had to occur. I'll get to that in a minute. But for the last three years, they've been wrestling. What trade agreements? What do we do going forward? How do we not have a trade agreement with the European Union? And no one can come to a court on it. You know, our country has said, you know, you can have a trade agreement with us.

And that's very attractive, I think, to Britain. I mean, it's the world's leading economy. You can ally with us. You can have your trade agreements with us. And between Britain and America, it'd be a very powerful, powerful alliance. Some speculate, and it was even in the last Beyond Today magazine and an article there, some speculate that that alliance could expand to include Australia, Canada, and the English-speaking nations of the world. If that were the case, and let me stress, if that were the case, you would have a powerful alliance economically that isn't on the earth today, arising from Brexit. A large part of the strength of that alliance would be the United States economy. The United States economy has been growing at a pace no one ever expected it to. The stock market is looked at as a god around the world, almost ready to hit 30,000. What more can they do? But as we've talked about, and if you read articles, you see that a United States economy is not all it's cracked up to be. Yes, the stock market is very strong. Yes, it's surprising people. Yes, on the face of things, the United States economy looks like who can touch it. The world falls, and the world grows on the strength of the U.S. economy.

But if you read the articles and you watch what's going on, and you listen to a few things other than the entertainment news, the weather news that so often dominates our national news anymore, you see that the government, or not the government, the Federal Reserve has been pumping billions of dollars into our economy. In fact, quite a few, some estimates, or several, well several, a few trillion dollars have been pumped into it to keep it afloat and to keep the interest rates down. And so we have, we have this, as I would call it, kind of a faux, FAUX, faux economy, if you will, that could come down at any minute, because it's not based on what historic Wall Street values are based on. Let me read to you from an article that appeared in the Wall Street Journal just a week ago, just a week ago, about what the state of the stock market is today. This was an article written by James McIntosh. It appeared on January 9th. The title of the article is, Money-Losing Companies, Mushroom, Even as Stocks Hit New Highs. Subtitle, The Percentage of Listed Companies in the Red is Close to 40%. First paragraph, the con, well, I think there's a few introductory paragraphs. The combination of forces has pushed the percentage of listed companies in the U.S. losing money over 12 months to close to 40%. 40% of those that people are investing in aren't even making money. Now, does that sound like a good investment, or does it sound like the stock market has become something other than a financial indicator of the health of all the companies that are out there? This is the highest level since the late 1990s outside the post-recession periods. This time, though, there's no recession, and stock market indexes are at or near record highs. That sounds scary, although it's mainly worrying for investors in smaller companies. So we have an economy that looks really strong, but the economy is a house of cards. In 2000 and 2007 and 2008, we learned just how fragile our economy is, and literally overnight we woke to a disaster that God rescued us from and allowed the country to go on.

If there is a crash in the stock market, and if there is alliance that the world looks to and leads the world, it'll be the United States that causes it. If we crash, there will be a global disaster, such as the world has never seen before. Never seen before. It will crumble, it will fall, and literally overnight we will be in a different world than we are now. Let's turn to a Hosea 5.

Hosea 5.

Speaking of the West, speaking of the Western powers, speaking of Israel, Judah, and Ephraim, there is the verse in Hosea that has never been fulfilled.

That will be Hosea 5. I can find Hosea 5, Hosea Joel Amos, right after Daniel. Hosea 5, verse 5. The pride of Israel testifies to his face. Therefore, Israel and Ephraim stumble in their iniquity. Judah also stumbles with them. We've got three countries there. I mean, there had to be a little nation of Israel for Bible prophecy to be fulfilled as well. Israel and Ephraim stumble in their iniquity. Judah stumbles with them. With their flocks and herds, they shall go to seek the Lord, but they will not find him. He's withdrawn himself from them. They have dealt treacherously with the Lord, for they have begotten pagan children. The children in this, they don't even know God. They're not even of him anymore. Now a new moon shall devour them and their heritage. What it means, within 30 days, they will fall. Within 30 days of each other, they will fall. Suddenly, to the world, suddenly that breach will occur, and the world may well be thrown into a panic that it has never seen before. And out of that panic and out of that catastrophe that will occur, the King of the North arises. King of the North, with wealth, with military power, the world looks at to it and says, that's our Savior. And it probably promotes itself as the world's Savior. Watch. Watch the economy. Watch what's going on. Keep prophecy in your mind. So we can watch the East and what's going on over there with three primary countries and more. China, Russia, North Korea. We can watch what happens with Brexit because Britain has to be apart from the European Union for prophecy to be fulfilled. And America, and whatever alliances occur there, and the fall that will come because there is no power in the West ever mentioned at the end time. And we can also look at the Middle East and watch what's going on over there. Some of this I've already covered, but you know, we can look at the Middle East. It's been kind of an undefined era area, and not until the oil became a factor in all the world's economies that the Middle East really mattered to anyone. It was just over there in the desert, and the people were there, and no one really paid much attention to it. But when oil came to be, then the Middle East became important. People needed the oil. And so we find that, you know, the area became wealthy, and we've watched it go through a number of iterations. You know, Iran itself, in 1979, it was pro-United States. The government was overthrown, and anti-American government was put in. Some say that the Iranian government will be overthrown today, that the protests that have gone on now, from a number of occasions over the last few weeks, indicate that the power in Iran is about to be broken, and the world order or the region order over in Iran will change again.

Only God knows if it'll happen. But we've watched the area go through a number of iterations. Back eight or ten years ago, we had the Arab Spring, and the United States was behind that. As one dictator, another fell, and then out of that, new Muslim leaders were put in. The the scope of the or the ideology of the whole area changed. ISIS developed, Al Qaeda developed, they've gone one by one. What will happen in the Middle East? We just don't know.

We just don't know, but it is an area to watch because we know, we know that there will be a king of the south at the end time. Now watching those world events, when it happens, when it happens, is something that we can pay attention to. Well, why do we talk? Let me mention also, you know, you watch one of the trends that you, if you look back over the last few years, and really the last five or six years, you see around the world all of a sudden an anti-democracy feeling that has cropped up, even in our country.

You know, half of our country would just would really embrace socialist ideas, as opposed to democracy. Democracy, which has been really one of the catalysts of the world that has created the freedom, you know, created the freedom and the wealth that the world has, it seems to be more and more under attack. Russia's going back from it. China doesn't want it. Even in America, we see that it hasn't happened, and partly because of the way it's been handled in here. But watch the anti-democratic or the anti-democracy feelings that continue to increase in the world because we know that the world at the time of the end, it's not going to be a democracy at all.

That's going to be gone. It will be total, it will be total autocracy, total tyranny. There won't be, as I said before, there won't be any freedom of speech. There won't be any freedom of religion.

There won't be freedom of anything. It will be what the dictators say it will be. And so these feelings of anti-democracy will continue as the world marches toward the time of the return of Jesus Christ. Let's go back, you know, why do we talk about these things? Just to scare us? Now, you know, maybe they do scare us when we realize this is going to happen, but God doesn't give us these things and this knowledge to scare us. He gives us this knowledge to motivate us because we are His people and He wants us to survive. He wants us to thrive. He wants us to be the people He wants us to be.

He wants us to be in His kingdom and we must go through these things and not defy and not deny our God. Let's go back to 1 Thessalonians 5, where we were a few minutes ago. You know, as your attorney, 1 Thessalonians 5, you know, Peter in 1 Peter 3 or 2 Peter 3, I guess it is, you know, he asked a question when he goes through those verses like in 9 through 14 and he says, you know, all these things are going to happen.

And he asks the question that we should ask ourselves, what manner of people should we be? We know these things are going to happen, so who should we be and how shall we be?

Paul touches on the same things here. Let's pick it up, you know, in verse 6. Well, verse 5, repeating what we did before. He goes, you are all sons of lights, 1 Thessalonians 5, 5, you are sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore, let us not sleep, not us not sleep as five of those ten virgins were so thoroughly asleep in Matthew 24. Let us not sleep as those others do, but let us watch and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night.

But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love and as a helmet the hope of salvation. For God did not appoint us to wrath. That wasn't why he called us that we would just face the wrath. He didn't appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. He called us to become the people He called us to be. As you see this approaching, draw even closer to Him. Examine yourselves even more closely. Look at your life. Don't fall asleep. Don't be lulled to sleep by the world around us.

Look at what God has called us to and get closer to Him. You know, in Daniel 12—I won't turn back there—in Daniel 12, at the end of that chapter, it talks about 1260 days.

And we know what the 1260 days are, the three and a half years. It talks about 1290 days, 30 days before that. And it talks about 1335 days, even 45 days before that. And it says to those who are there at 1335 days, blessed are they who come to the 1335 days. No one knows exactly what that 1335 days is, but blessed are those who are there before the 1290, before the 1260, who are counted worthy of God and who are not asleep but awake, who have been watching and who are faithful to Him.

Let's all strive to be the blessed of the 1335 days.