Europe's Long Dream

My topic here this afternoon is entitled Europe's Long Dream. As long-time readers of our publications understand, we have always had an interest and a focus on events that are taking place in Europe, current and past, in the light of Bible prophecy. And Europe has had a long dream that I hope to be able to flesh out for all of you and help you to understand here as we move along. And again, just to help you understand why it is that we focus on Europe. You'll find a lot of the news items today, news commentators, are not focused so much on things that are taking place in Europe.

China is the big nation coming on from the east. Very powerful, obviously. Force and world affairs, economic affairs, especially India is another dynamo that is coming out of the east as well. Those are the two nations that are looked at by commentators as the nations to watch that will impact more than anything else in the future events.

We in World News and Prophecy, the Good News magazine, the Church of God tradition have consistently held our focus on Europe. We don't negate and discount China or India and other areas and events to the east. We've kept a sharp focus on Europe. And I, through this presentation, want to once again just bring that to our minds and explain exactly why, in light of so much that does come up today that tends to discount what's taking place within Europe as a museum of the past.

One prominent commentator said that Europe is a museum, and its importance is only in the past, not in the future. We happen to think that that analysis is wrong, and we'll attempt to show you why as we move along here this afternoon. Let's go back a little bit, however. Europe's long dream begins with a dream that this gentleman had. This is Nebuchadnezzar II, the famous King of Babylon. I used to read my boys' books about the King of Babylon.

This is a rather imposing figure, as this artist's representation attempts to show. Nebuchadnezzar II, who was the King of Babylon at the time of the Judean captivity, as a downfall of the nation of Judah, he took captive Ezekiel and Daniel and those biblical episodes, and he is the one we read about in the book of Daniel. Nebuchadnezzar took Babylon to its height as an empire. They swallowed up Assyria, and it was the big kid on the block during its day.

Of course, it interacted with the people of God, and that's why they play such a prominent role within the Bible. We find that Babylon, as described in Daniel chapter 2, as Daniel said, as he interpreted the first dream that Nebuchadnezzar had, he said to Nebuchadnezzar, you are that head of gold, that image of Daniel chapter 2, and he in a sense represented that. Nebuchadnezzar had another dream. In chapter 4 of Daniel, we might just turn there. This is the interactive portion of my Bible study with you, and my presentation at least.

Please turn over to Daniel chapter 4. I'll show you some pictures, try to keep you awake and keep you alert and interested here. But let's together turn over to Daniel chapter 4, because here's where Nebuchadnezzar had another dream. This man had so many dreams, you wonder what he would eat before he went to bed at night. Pepperoni pizza, Mexican food, I don't know what it was, but he ate a lot. Now, in Daniel 4, we find that he was at rest in his house in verse 4, and he said, I saw a dream, verse 5, which made me afraid.

Some dreams do that. And the thoughts of my head and the visions of my head troubled me. And he talked about this image that he saw that came to him in verse 10. He said, I was looking and behold a tree in the midst of the earth, and its height was great. Now, this tree, as the interpretation is going to go on, I'll give it to you up front, was told to him, this, my Daniel, you are this tree. And Nebuchadnezzar epitomized or embodied the Babylon, the empire and the whole system. So we can say that this tree was Nebuchadnezzar.

He represents all of Babylon, Babylon from the ancient times to Babylon in the future modern manifestation that the Book of Revelation talks about. The tree grew, verse 11, and became strong. Its height reached to the heavens and it could be seen to be through the ends of all the earth. Interesting. Again, you consider the reach of this system called Babylon. And we first really encounter Babylon back in Genesis in the pre-flood world, or excuse me, the post-flood world of Nimrach, and what he started at Babel, in this tower that was built.

And this whole system stretches from Genesis all the way to Revelation, and if you will, to the ends of the earth. So when this statement is made, we have to be very careful, pay close attention to what's being said, what we're understanding about this whole system. Its leaves were lovely, its fruit abundant, and in it was food for all, everyone. Can we say all nations or all peoples? The beast of the field found shade under it, the birds of the heavens dwelt in its branches, and all flesh was fed from it.

So all flesh, all people get food from this tree, from this system. Babylon, there was a reason that it was the first of these empires that was identified as Daniel. The reason that it's the head of gold. It fed everyone. It fed everything that flowed from it. Now those empires that flowed from Babylon afterwards were the Persian Empire. And then the Greek Empire, and then ultimately the Roman Empire. Those are the ones that the Bible focuses on. Not that they were ever the only world empires. There were other great empires. But those are the ones that the Bible focuses on for reasons. And one reason that we're at least looking at here is this Babylonish system that again goes from the beginning of the Bible all the way to the end of the Bible, from the beginning of man's age to the end of man's age.

And all systems, all peoples feed from it in a spiritual sense. And when you understand again the system that is prophesied to come up in Revelation 17 and 18 that is called Babylon the Great, you understand it to be a spiritual system that indeed is part of a worldwide deception at that period and that time of the age.

And so we see that being set up here. Now what Nebuchadnezzar went on to see was that this tree was chopped down because in verse 13 he said, I saw in my visions a watcher, a holy one coming down from heaven and he cried aloud and he said, chop down the tree. So it is God who controls the growth of this tree and this development. He says, chop it down, cut off its branches, strip its leaves and scatter its fruit, let the beast get out from under it and the birds from its branches.

So it comes to an end. Now Babylon did fall to the Persian Empire. Fell in one night, as we know again from Daniel 5. Quickly, suddenly. But it was chopped down. However, we're told in verse 15, leave the stump and the roots in the earth bound with a band of iron and bronze and the tender grass of the field, let it be wet with the dew of heaven and let him graze with the beast on the grass of the earth. And so the stump that remains of the tree, as you can see right here, is bound then with a grass and iron cap.

As we all should understand from dealing with trees or shrubs, that if we cut them out of our yard, you cut a shrub out of your yard, you don't want that to grow back or that tree to grow back, you want to get down and get all the roots out. It's not enough just to cut, in most cases, the tree down or the top part, because in a large tree there's an extensive root system, which means there's still life there.

But by this symbolic cap being put upon this tree, that life is capped. It's not necessarily killed. It doesn't die out. It's still there. But it's dormant, is the idea that is given. And then we have, as this story goes on in this dream, Daniel eventually tells Nebuchadnezzar that you're going to be, like it says here in verse 15, wet with the dew of heaven, and you're going to graze with the beast on the grass of the earth because of Nebuchadnezzar's vanity. And because of his boastful pride, he was himself, we're told in the chapter later on, for a period of seven years, like a beast dwelling among men, and there was a seven-year period of insanity that he went through.

And he looked kind of like this. Kind of scary, isn't it? Actually, folks, this is what you're going to look like by 6 o'clock tonight.

Those of you that remain, to the end of all these presentations, you're going to look a little bit worn and haggard, dragging yourself, okay? But this is, no, this is serious. So this is an artist's depiction of Nebuchadnezzar in his seven years of insanity, when he vacated the throne, and his hair grew, and his nails grew, and he was like a beast to the field. That became a type of, a period of time that was passing over Babylon until that cap would be removed, and that system would spring back to life.

To speak and give you an overall generalized understanding of what this prophecy is talking about. Remember, the roots are still there. There's been a cap put on it. And this system gave birth and was to feed others.

You know, when I went through school, we learned in history or civilization, if we really paid much attention, sometimes we didn't because of the teacher, if it was the gym teacher that happened to be teaching history or whatever, it may not have been all that interesting, but we're always learning in school that Western civilization has its roots in the Greco-Roman system, particularly Greece. And that's true to a very large degree. But the Bible doesn't necessarily put it all there. The Bible talks about Babylon. The system that emerges at the end of time is not called Greece the Great or Rome the Great necessarily.

It's called Babylon. So again, there's been reason to focus on Babylon and to understand what took place there. That would be a whole other subject for us to discuss about Babylon and from that particular point of view. But just here in Chapter 4 to focus on the fact that the system was capped. But the life that it generated, its systems, its religion, its economic system. And again, if you study Babylon and what they were at their peak, there are many, many similarities and many things to learn in terms of what spread out from Babylon eventually to Greece and to Rome and on down in time through history, through various civilizations that are still with us today.

We are the inheritors of much of what was generated and perfected in some ways in Babylon as part of that system. So there are reasons, both spiritually, politically, and economically to understand what took place within Babylon and why God says that it was the head of gold and the first of those systems that would eventually culminate in the end of the age with a Roman system and its various revivals. But keep in mind that God calls it all Babylon. And of course, in the flow of prophecy, we are at a point where this whole system that Daniel prophesied and Revelation continues on has come down to where we are looking for a final revival of the system, this Roman system, that is the culmination of a seven-headed, ten-horned beast system that Revelation 17 talks about, is going to be ridden by a woman up here, the symbol of Babylon, dominating that system.

And we are looking essentially at a point in time for the last of these ten horns to manifest itself within the flow of history, the events leading up to before the return of Jesus Christ. So we've had a basic understanding of this flow of the system down through time from the fall of Rome, 476 AD, to our modern time.

We've seen and understood these horns to represent the various revivals of the Roman system that was the fourth great empire that Daniel talked about, and it had various revivals after the fall of Rome. What I'd like to focus in on for a moment, as we then keep this idea of a long dream of Europe in focus, I'd like to focus in on one of those revivals, and do so by taking you on a little trip, if you will, a little bit of a travelogue, and a trip that I took last September.

This is a map of modern Germany, and it's hopefully something you'll be able to see back there. We're not going to spend much time on it, but I want to just take you to where this yellow circle is right here, on the western edge of Germany today. You've got the Netherlands up here, you've got Belgium, Luxembourg, France is down here, and this is the vast area of Germany.

I made a trip last September to Germany about 15 days, and spent time with one of our ministers and a fellow writer on World Use and Prophecy, Paul Kiefer, and he took me around to a number of spots. The last spot we saw was a city here on the western edge of Germany, the city of Aachen. The city you don't really read much about, Berlin captures the attention, Bonn, other cities of Europe, Paris. But Aachen is where we want to focus in on. We spent a day in Aachen. I've been wanting to go to Aachen for a long, long time, and Paul Kiefer and I and the Secretary and the office there went over and visited Aachen because it was in Aachen that this particular gentleman, a man by the name of Charlemagne, Charles the Great, known by the French, or Cardinal de Grosa, as the Germans would say, typically we refer to more or less as Charlemagne, came to power in the late 700s A.D.

Charlemagne is a very fascinating individual. We look at Charlemagne as one of the revivals of that Roman system, one of those horns of Revelation 17, that beast that we looked at there. And his is a particularly interesting one to focus in on to at least learn how the system has been perpetuated and what it means for today and particularly in the future. Let me give you just a bit of a background to Charlemagne and what he did.

It begins with the fact that Charlemagne lived at a very interesting time in European history. In fact, when he lived, they didn't even call it Europe. He lived in what is now modern Germany or very Germany and France. He inherited his title as a king over scattered Germanic tribes from his father, whose name was Pepin. Pepin had a father whose name was Charles Martel.

Now, what was interesting about Charlemagne's grandfather, Charles Martel, was that Charles Martel fought a very famous battle in 738 called the Battle of Tours.

It was in 738 that the Arab armies, or Muslim armies, had come up out of the south after the death of Muhammad, the rise of Islam.

Charlemagne's grandfather had defeated the Muslim armies in what is modern-day France in a place called Tours, and he stopped the advance of the Muslim armies coming into Europe. Now, that's very significant because, in a sense, it represents the first time in history that we have a push coming out of that area of the south into the area of the north. Those of you that know your story from Daniel 11 and verse 40, where the king of the south pushes at the king of the north in the time of the end and sets up a number of events. That, in a sense, as a way of a type, at least, has happened already in the early lifetime of Charlemagne. And his grandfather, Charles Martel, pushed the Muslim armies back. Pepin, Charlemagne's father, continued to rule, and then when Charlemagne took over, he expanded this rule.

And it was a very interesting dynamic time in the late 700s because Charlemagne had a very interesting and a unique relationship with the pope at Rome. Pope Leo III. And it was during this time, and actually, in a few years before that, that Charlemagne's father, Pepin, had established a relationship with a previous pope named Stephen II.

Stephen II had come over the Alps because he was being pressured by political situations in Rome, and he needed the help of Charlemagne's father, Pepin, to solidify his papacy in Rome. And that really began a very unique relationship that endured down through the Middle Ages between the emperors and the kings of Europe and the papacy.

It really came to its fruition with what Charlemagne did because, when Charlemagne took over, he was very energetic, and he conquered a number of other tribes, and he expanded his empire in this area. In fact, when you look at this map here, you see the extent of his empire, and what it eventually became. This light area here represents the extent of his empire at the time. This was where Tours was, where that battle took place. You see, they went all the way down to the Pyrenees. It did not take in Spain. The Moors or the Muslims continued to rule Spain for several hundred years. Charlemagne could not drive them out of this area. He did come down into the area of Italy, all of Germany, Luxembourg, France, Belgium, the Netherlands of modern-day Europe. This was the heart of what he conquered, what he created in his empire. This became a very unique area. Only after one event took place, and it was on Christmas Day in 800 AD, Charlemagne had gone down to Rome, again at the invitation of Pope Leo III. On Christmas Day, Leo III crowned Charlemagne as the emperor, as the king of all this area. He placed a crown on Charlemagne's head. Some history say that it took Charlemagne by surprise. Other historians say Charlemagne knew that it was coming. It's irrelevant in one sense. The fact is that it did happen. He was then recognized as the emperor of all of this area. He was not called the Holy Roman Emperor at that time. The concept of the Holy Roman Emperor did not really develop for another few hundred years with successors to Charlemagne.

But we could say that he was the first, and he ruled over a vast empire bigger than anything in Europe since the days of Constantine, back during Rome in the fourth century. So what Charlemagne did, what he did in consolidating his reign and rule over all of these areas, was very significant, especially in European history. Because what he did was to give to Europe, because you have to understand about Charlemagne.

He was largely illiterate. You go to Aachen today and you see his signature as kind of markers in the streets that take you around to the various spots. His particular autograph. I bought a little keychain with his autograph on it. But he could read. He brought a lot of scholars to his court. He amassed a large library. But his favorite book that he read, that they say virtually every night before he went to bed, was a book called The City of God by Augustine.

Augustine was one of the great church fathers of the fourth century. Augustine was probably the first great church father who wrote and solidified church teaching that impacted the church for more than a thousand years. And what Augustine said and wrote about in his famous book called The City of God, he came up with the idea to explain the kingdom of God.

You have to understand, from the time of the first century to the fourth century, because of what is written in the book of Revelation, about the kingdom of our Lord becoming, or the kingdom of this earth becoming the kingdoms of our Lord when Christ returns. And the saints reigning and ruling with Christ on the earth for how many years? A thousand years. Thank you. Revelation 20. We all know those scriptures. Revelation 20 has a very explicit teaching of Christ returning this earth, setting up this kingdom, usurping all other kingdoms, and reigning for a thousand years. That didn't happen in the first century. Didn't happen in the second century. Didn't happen in the third century. The church began to change and develop other ideas, other teachings. The Sabbath went out the window. The Holy Days went out the window. In the fourth century, the church became the dominant religion, and the Christian church, as it was called, then became the religion of the Roman Empire when Constantine adopted it and himself converted, so to speak, to Christianity. From that point on, the church and state were wedded together. Christianity was the official religion of the empire. But Christ had not returned. What do you do with that teaching? Now, the persecuted became the persecutors, and they were in power with the emperor. You have this troublesome teaching about the kingdom of God on earth. That's pretty plain in the book of Revelation and other scriptures. What do you do with it? Augustine came up with an idea. He called it an allegory. He said it really doesn't mean what it says. He said essentially, now the kingdom of God has been placed on the earth in the empire. And the church and the victor of Christ rules in place of Christ in this church. And the two together now become the kingdom of God on the earth. That is essentially what Augustine said in his famous book, The City of God.

It was Charlemagne's favorite book, is the important thing to realize. He read it continually. And he believed that what he had set up in this empire, in Europe, along with the Popeate from Rome, was a continuation of that Roman system, now revived a few hundred years after the fall of Rome, and now able to set up and to establish a spiritual, cultural, political system.

And so this is where Europe, in the modern sense, or at least, we can't say it was modern, but at least in Europe that we know in modern times, really began its roots right here with what Charlemagne did. That's why he's such an important person.

In history, to the whole story of what we call here Europe's long dream. And Charlemagne believed that he, along with the Pope, ruled over God's kingdom, God's empire, re-established on this earth. That's what he taught. That's what he believed, and that's what he died believing. Now, when Charlemagne died, as so has happened with so many strong rulers, things break up, things change. But this whole system never really disappeared. And eventually, it was codified in what became known in history as the Holy Roman Empire. Now, this is the statue of Charlemagne.

Let me take you on a bit of a travelogue of this city, just to show you a few things that help us again to understand exactly what we're talking about here. This is the statue of Charlemagne out in front of the town hall, which was, at least a large part of it, was Charlemagne's palace that he built and lived in in the city of Aachen. Aachen became his capital. It had long been a favorite spot because of its hot springs, even back during Roman times. And it was a natural spot for him to park himself and set up his capital.

And he built a very large palace, and this is what you see here. In his left hand, he's holding an orb, which symbolizes the world. You can't see it here, but that orb has a cross on top of it, symbolizing the church on top of the church ruling the world. There's another cross on its crown and his scepter symbolizing the political power right there. This is the backside of that building that you can go to in Aachen. It's on the second floor that there's a very large meeting hall, and that's where he held a lot of his meetings.

This is the oldest part of the building right here on your far right, which was probably his actual personal residence of where he lived. This is the front side of the building, again, that same statue. And if you go into it, you walk up this little short staircase and into the main hall right here, the main door. I want to focus right on this. There's some statues right over the main door. I want to focus in on that and show you this picture of what that is as you walk into this large building today.

You have three figures that you're walking under. The one in the center is Jesus Christ. It's supposed to be Christ. Again, he's holding this orb with the cross over it here. There are two figures kneeling in front of him. Now, these figures represent this one here represents Charlemagne with a crown on his head and a sword in his right hand. And this is Pope Leo III. It was again Leo III who crowned Charlemagne, Emperor on Christmas Day in 800 AD. So Leo III, the Pope at the time, and Charlemagne kneeling in front of this seated Christ.

Again, what you have symbolized here is state and church, in a sense, joined together serving the work of Christ on earth. This is what it represents in many direct ways. You walk under this as you go into this building. But again, it shows what Charlemagne felt that he had established and what many of his successors in the Holy Roman Emperor's felt that Europe was. And again, you have to understand that they were building and developing a spiritual system, as well as a political system and a cultural system in many ways.

And the church provided the spiritual heart of that. Charlemagne also built a church, a chapel. And this section is the original of what he built. And it's just about 150 yards across a paved courtyard from his house or his palace to where he built this church. This part was added on later. And what's interesting, the chapel was built on a lower elevation than he built this house, which I thought was symbolic anyway.

Where he lived was higher than the church, just to make a point, probably. But this church is a fascinating place to visit. You go inside today, and it will have a large sarcophagus up in the nave. And in this gold sarcophagus, which has glass all around it, are the remains of Charlemagne. When he died, I believe, in about 813-814, Charlemagne died. They sealed him up. They set him on a throne.

They sealed him up in a tomb. A few hundred years later, another Roman emperor, Holy Roman Emperor Otto, I think Otto III, came along. So I want to see what he looks like now. They opened up the tomb, and he was still sitting there. Just bones were still sitting there. And he still had a crown on his head and everything. And they took the bones, and they gathered them up, and they put them in this sarcophagus, and it sets them to church today. This church in Aachen is a very famous Catholic church on the pilgrimage route within Europe today.

They come here to not only pay homage to the bones of Charlemagne, who's been canonized, but also to other relics that they have there from supposedly the time of Jesus. This is that octagonal-shaped dome of the original chapel, just looking up into it. There's an image of Jesus Christ right here, sitting on the throne. And you see this long chain that's coming down. There's a chandelier at the bottom of it that hangs down into it. But you see all these windows that are around the top. These are eight windows.

What's interesting is that the light that comes in these windows, and what happens once a year on the summer solstice in June, the longest day of the year, when the sun is at its peak in the northern hemisphere. A few years ago, there was a photographer in this chapel. He was taking pictures. And he was in there on the day of the solstice. And it was a bright, sunny day. And something happened. A ray of light, as the sun reached a certain point, came in through one of the windows and hit the chandelier.

There's a gold orb at the bottom of the chandelier and reflected directly upon this throne, which sets up in the balcony of this part of the chapel. This is the throne of Charlemagne. On this throne were crowned the majority of the Holy Roman emperors down through the Middle Ages. Charlemagne was not crowned on this throne. Remember, he was crowned in Rome. But this is called the throne of Charlemagne. That light shone directly on that throne. It's a very interesting situation. That chapel is also built on an ancient pagan temple that is in the same shape as Stonehenge over in England.

That's another interesting side story I don't have time to go into. This is the throne of Charlemagne. If you pay the price, you can go up into the balcony and see that. We did. It didn't set on it. I didn't want to actually set on that throne. It's supposedly built out of marble that comes from the Holy Land. It's a very, very old throne. This is another picture of it here. It's actually a pilgrimage spot for any number of individuals who wanted to have the image and carry on the aura of Charlemagne down through time.

The Holy Roman Emperors were crowned on that throne. This is the replica of the throne or the crown of the Holy Roman Emperors. Only the original sets in Vienna, but they have a replica here in the museum that's part of the palace. Again, you see the cross and the arch over what is supposed to be the world, the church ruling, along with the symbols of the state here. They have a lot of the other regalia of the Holy Roman Emperor at that point.

When Napoleon was about to reach his height in his Venus, Napoleon is another one of those horns of Revelation 17, another revival that came several hundred years later. He made it pilgrimage to Aachen, who wanted to see this throne. This is an artist's dramatization of Napoleon, in a sense, paying his respects before Charlemagne and the throne of Charlemagne in the chapel there in Aachen, Germany.

Napoleon assumed his particular role at this time in the 19th century as the Emperor of France and what he tried to do in extending that empire and recreating something from the period of Rome as well. That is what has taken place in Aachen. That is what has developed down through the years. Now, today, as Mr. Rhodes briefly mentioned, we have a system that has emerged in Europe that is 50 years old this month.

Signing of the Treaty of Rome in March 1957 began a system of political or political, initially an economic union that has grown to be a very large economic system today, and a political system, and a very powerful trading bloc in the world seeing called the European Community, the European system, actually the European Union, as it is called today, 27 countries, with its own currency, the euro, which Mr. Rhodes was talking about, which is, today you go to Europe, you pay something like a dollar of 30 for one euro.

Their currency is valued more than ours. The American dollar is still the currency of the international currency of exchange, luckily for you and I. It's the day comes that this currency or some other currency becomes the currency in which oil is denominated and the major means of exchange on the world economic markets. You and I will pay a whole lot more for gasoline. We think $3 a gallon is a lot. Hang on.

If and when that day ever happens, that the dollar is displaced. That hasn't happened yet, fortunately for all of us. But when it does, things will change. What has happened in Europe today has come to a point where 27 countries, very powerful trading bloc, and yet it is a troubled continent. It is a troubled union right now and a troubled system. What is taking place in Europe is our events that have not yet quite brought them to the point where they are, as I say, ready for prime time.

If we are looking for the revival of the last of this Roman system, this tenth horn of the system of this beast in Revelation 17, of a political, religious, economic system that is going to dominate at the time of the end, and as we have always been looking toward Europe for the revival of this system, we realize today, we have to be honest, that we are not seeing a Europe that is ready to step onto the stage and take that role. They are playing with a number of issues and a number of problems.

Several European countries have demographic problems. In other words, they are not reproducing themselves. Germany, Spain, and Italy are, for instance, the Italians are not reproducing themselves. The Muslims have immigrated into those countries and others, and Holland, and they outnumber, in many cases, or at least their birth rate outnumbers that of the native populations. The most popular name for newborn babies in France last year was Muhammad. It was not Pierre. It was Muhammad. They are not having babies.

Their populations are declining. Russia has got the same problem. The Muslim immigrants are beginning to outnumber. In another 50 years, they could be the dominant population in those countries. That will have a number of repercussions. They have already had a number of issues arise. Terrorist attacks in Spain, youth riots in France a little more than a year ago, a prominent filmmaker in Holland decapitated and left to die on the streets because he had made a film that was disrespectful to the Prophet.

They have had various issues, the cartoons of about a year ago. The Muslim population in Europe is a ticking time bomb in any field. When we look at what is taking place in Europe, we see that they don't have the military might to project that power in other places in the world that Bible prophecy talks about. At least they don't have it today. It doesn't mean that it could not be developed. But right now, they don't have it.

Germany sent troops down to Lebanon after the last summer's war there to patrol the border between Lebanon and Israel. Germany has sent troops to Afghanistan, and they are on duty there, but they have very limited roles. Other nations have pulled back. When you look for a European Defense Force, it is one that is developing, but it is nowhere near the power of the United States. I know that. We all should understand that. But when we look at the Bible and see the prophecies that are yet to be fulfilled, we understand from what prophecy tells us put together with history. This long dream that began with Nebuchadnezzar and this dream of a cultural, political, spiritual system that is yet to arise, we look to this part of the world.

We don't look to China. We don't look to India for that to develop. We look to that area, perhaps, for other prophecies to eventually develop, but not these main ones out of Daniel and Revelation. And yet we realize there are problems. Europe has some spiritual issues as well. By that I mean they don't go to church. They don't believe. They are what they call post-Christian. And that is a very great concern, especially for the current Pope Benedict XVI. He took his name Benedict after the patron saint of Europe. And the last Benedict, Benedict XV, who was the World War I Pope, played a very significant role at that time trying to keep Europe from tearing itself apart in World War I.

So when Cardinal Ratzinger took the name Benedict XVI, he was making a very strong statement of his intentions, of what he sees and needs, Europe needs, and that is a revival. He was not the first Pope to see that. Pope John Paul II saw that very clearly as well and made a number of statements in regard to that. About a year ago a book came out called Minnes in Europe written by a lady named Claire Burlinski.

And Miss Burlinski wrote in this book, Minnes in Europe, about what's taking place in the European continent from a spiritual or religious, cultural, political, demographic viewpoint. Claire Burlinski wrote a number of things that you would have thought you would have read in some of our literature going back over the last 50 years. And she titled it Minnes in Europe because her point was that what happens in Europe affects America.

You can't ignore it. You cannot slough off this whole region because of what has happened in its history and what it is capable of producing on the world scene even in the future. Claire Burlinski is a Jew. I don't know if she's a believing Jew, but she's a child of immigrants. She grew up in Europe. And she wrote with a very interesting style and wrote with a very interesting style about what was taking place in Europe.

But she had a very clear perception of Europe's past and some of the things they're facing with the Muslim immigration, the spiritual crisis, a general identity crisis in one sense throughout Europe. And she knows that that eventually could have a repercussion, that events could rapidly change things, and that what we are seeing in one sense in terms of Europe right now with these particular problems and crises is not the full story of Europe's past, or potentially its future, and that things can change. And she spent this whole book writing about this. And she talks about what would happen if a terrorist attack of a major proportion of 9-11 or greater would hit the European continent. If someone came along afterwards on the streets of Madrid or Paris or Berlin and began to blame some of their problems, some of their social problems, some of their spiritual problems, on other people, immigrants, for instance, or other religious groups, anti-Semitism is still very much alive on the European continent, especially in France. In Israel, at the feast after the feast in 2005, Scott Ashley and I were talking with the director of the YMCA in Jerusalem, and we were looking out the back window out from the YMCA there, and he was showing us a series of condominiums that were going up on property that the YMCA was leasing to a contractor, and these two large condominium projects were going up, and he said they're basically 100% filled. All the units had been purchased, and he said most of them had been purchased by French Jews who want a place to come to if it gets too hot in Europe for them.

And, you know, he didn't know who we were, he didn't know what we believed, he just was telling us some of these things. And you pick these things up, and you realize that you read the headlines, you read about anti-Semitism and various events and how they're coming, and you realize that some things haven't changed in that part of the world, and those who live there and are Jews understand that.

Ms. Brolinski wrote very compellingly about these issues as she talked about so many different things and what could happen to change Europe in the future. So, you know, what could happen? What is it that could be a catalyst that could change Europe's current situation, which is still quite strong, as it was brought out. They are – it is the largest market in the world and the most populous market in the world. Germany exports more than any other nation in the world. They do have an aging population. They have a social model of economics and welfare and government that has caused them problems. It's unsustainable, especially with their declining population. So it's headed for some real brick walls. A terrorist attack could turn – a major proportions could turn things around. A number of different things could happen on the world scene that could change Europe and many other areas. The world – you know, right now we are experiencing a tremendous global surge in our economy, and we're all the beneficiaries of that.

And that, I think, is probably going to get bigger before, you know, it all winds up. I don't know that we've reached the height of that. But certain things could happen that could threaten the global economy, and that would precipitate leaders making – seeing a need to make certain changes to ensure that it doesn't collapse and it goes on. And just, what, two weeks ago that we had a little burk on the stock markets around the world where the prices of stocks plummeted in one day more than they had since 9-11?

What was interesting about that – if I could take just a minute as kind of a semi-divergent from that – if you recall, at the same day or a few hours before that began to develop and roll across the country – across the world and eventually hit New York, is that Vice President Dick Cheney was in Afghanistan, and there had been a suicide attack on the compound where he was. Now, I'm not trying to connect necessarily those two events, because I don't think we can – you can credibly link what happened with Vice President Cheney and then the subsequent burk on the world economic markets.

Fortunately, President Cheney was, you know, was okay. But I had just read a few weeks ago an article by Neil Ferguson, a Harvard historian who's written quite extensively about American Britain and its place in the world. He has quite a number of brilliant insights. But he was drawing a comparison between where we are right now and June of 1914, especially from an economic perspective.

And he made the point that in June of 1914 – I think it was June 28th – you may – some of you that know history, I know Mr. Rose remembers history better than I do in these dates. But on June 28th, 1914, the Archduke Fernadad was killed in a Muslim country, Bosnia, Herzegovina. Nothing happened immediately, but within a few weeks, World War I began, and the whole world changed. One man, the heir to the Austrian-Hungarian throne, was killed in a Muslim country. What happened about a month after that, as the guns began to roll into place and the armies began to mobilize, the markets around the world froze up.

The world was going along pretty good. It was the last global economy at that point. I mean, the world was very globalized economically in 1914. There was a great deal of money flowing among the markets across borders, not to the extent we see today, but greater than anything before that time. That was a period of globalization, the last one before the current one we're living in. But the markets began to dry up, and the money froze. The banks began calling in debts. They stopped the flows of money. When the money stops flowing, everything begins to collapse. It took six months for a London stock exchange to open after the first shot of World War I took place.

Things just happened overnight, and Neil Ferguson's point was that imagine a vice president of the United States getting killed and assassinated in Baghdad today, and it sets off jitters throughout the world economic markets. He wrote that in January of this year, and in March, a little blip, an assassination attempt takes place on the vice president. This was written by a Harvard historian. This was not written by me or Mr.

Rhodes. We weren't trying to predict anything. I guess the point I'm trying to make is by people writing a lot of things, and you have to read very carefully, and we'll try to do that in trying to keep up with certain things and understand how things are flowing along and how quickly events can change and turn around to create a system that is different, that will eventually lead to at some point, the emergence of two figures in Revelation 13, a political figure, the first beast of Revelation 13, who the world wonders at, and a religious figure who causes the world to worship this first beast of Revelation 13.

So you have a political and religious figure that arrives in this age and this time to create this final system of Babylon and re-emergence of this long dream that goes all the way back to a story in Daniel 4 of a tree that was cut down, but its roots remained. In 1982, Pope John Paul II gave a speech in Spain to a youth gathering, and he encouraged Europe of the ages, he said, to recapture your roots. He began to say this in 1982, a very famous speech that he made at that time.

Benedict XVI has said Europe is in a cultural and historical concept, and he has said as one of the purposes and missions of his papacy to revitalize the spiritual condition of Europe, again keeping in mind the very name that he chose to bring about a resurgence of the spiritual roots of this whole system that began in Babylon. I'd like to conclude with a statement that was made by Clara Berlinski at the end of her book, Minnes in Europe, as she had recounted all the political, spiritual, popular cultural issues that are taking place in Europe. And she said, if I can very quickly end here, she said, as someone who has spent time thinking about Europe and its history, I do not prophesize the imminent demise of European democratic institutions, but I don't rule out these possibilities either.

Europe's economy, she says, will collapse. Its demography will change. The European Union may unravel. Islamic terrorists may succeed in taking out a European city. We have no idea what these events would herald, but it is possible and reasonable to imagine a very ugly outcome. And through the book, she'd made the point that the outcome could very well be a return to some of the genocidal, militaristic traits that personify the whole history of Europe. And that what we're into right now is just kind of a blip in terms of the whole scheme. Her last sentence of the book, if this happens, she says, and once again, the only people to whom this will come as a surprise are those who have not been paying attention.

Let me repeat it. The only people to whom this will come as a surprise is those who have not been paying attention. That's another way of saying watch. And this is coming for someone who probably doesn't even believe in Bible prophecy in the vein that we do. She concludes her book by saying pay attention. Europe has a dream, and when it comes to fruition, it's going to be a nightmare for the rest of the world before the coming of Jesus Christ and the Kingdom of God. And that's why we pay attention to what's taking place on the European continent.