Overview of Prophetic Events, Part 1

There is a handout coming around. We're going to start something today. We'll take probably three sermons and cover an overview of prophecy. This handout that you will receive was put together by John Lebissonaire up in the Knoxville congregation. He did this probably seven or eight years ago and gave me permission some time ago to use it any time. He said it's not perfect, but hopefully it's very close. So you might want to tuck that away in a notebook or a Bible case. Today we'll just be looking at the first four seals. That's about as far as we'll get. And yet I think you'll find some scriptures here added that I'm not going to get to. That may be a good resource for you. I want to read a little bit. I'll wait to tell you what this comes from, but it asks the question, is a world dictator about to appear?

The author wrote, we live today in the most strenuous, anxious, momentous hours of Earth's history. Today we stand on the very threshold of colossal events that will stagger the mind of mortal man. Just now, it is like the law before a great and devastating storm. Everyone senses it.

Ever since the Pharaohs ruled in Egypt, on through ancient Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome, on to Napoleon and Kaiser, there has been a lust for power to rule the world. Today we see three major world powers seeking to rule the world. Now, you will see that this is dated. Soviet Russia admits the theory of communism cannot be proven until all opposition is wiped out, and the whole world is under its sway. The amazing Tanaka Memorial of 1927, recently discovered and exposed, outlines a most astounding program of Japanese expansion involving the defeat in war of the United States and Russia and then of the whole world. It is commonly known today that Mussolini's whole aim is to restore the ancient Roman Empire in all its former splendor, power, and glory, and Rome ruled the world. Well, it goes on. I don't think we need to read further, but what was written is over 80 years old. This was from The Plain Truth magazine, volume 1, number 1, February 1934. Author is Herbert W. Armstrong. That's a long time ago, and yet, until he started naming some of the names of countries that no longer exist and leaders who no longer live, it sounded like it could have been written about our day and age today. And that's been the beautiful thing about biblical prophecy. In the Church of God, we've been students of prophecy, and we should be. Between one quarter and one third of the Bible is prophecy.

It's not the only thing. It is important. What is more important is being ready at any given time for the return of Christ, because it tells us from the outset that we, you, we will not know the day or the hour. But it tells us, be ready, be watching, be praying, and pray to God that you'll be kind of worthy to escape. The last couple of issues of Beyond Today magazine have had articles that focus on prophecy. This is the March-April 2016 False Predictions, How to Separate Truth from Counterfeits. A lot of valuable information there, because here we stand in the middle of the year 2016. And yet it wasn't that long ago that everyone was paralyzed the last few years of the 1990s about the year Y2K. And would life as we know it come to an end? And would our computers suddenly just melt down? And we found out, no they won't. And I'm still mad over the fact that there was an accounting program that got me in 1999 to update, because they could guarantee that that one would work next year. And I don't like it when I'm taken. And it wasn't that many years later that life was going to end because of the Mayan calendar ended in 2012. And that is not that long ago that we had a lot of people all bug-eyed about four blood moons that have been... I mean these can be calculated for centuries and centuries, if not millennia, in advance. And some people made some good money from writing books about four blood moons because they realize prophecy sells.

Prophecy. You scare people. You get people excited. They'll, you know, they'll send you some money.

Well, The Beyond Today magazine, May-June 2016, we have Scott Ashley's opening article, editorial about Jerusalem being the center of the world. We have an article on why does the Middle East matter. The one after that is the global power vacuum. So a lot of a lot of great material there. And also later a study on the subject of prophecy. We have other articles that relate as well. So I want to return to the topic of prophecy with you. As I said, this will be a series we will probably take three times. We'll take today, come back in three weeks on July 16, and probably finish it up on July 30. So overview of prophecy part one. Now, it has been quite some years, number of years, but in a sermon, we covered some of the basic keys for interpreting prophecy. We covered, I think we all remember that oftentimes prophecy is dual.

Some prophecies are continual. In other words, they begin at a certain point and they continue uninterrupted. Sometimes they're telescoping in their scope. They start out small, and the further they go, the wider and wider the scope. Sometimes there are time lapses where it may pick up and go a distance and then stop and then pick up years later down the line. So there are a lot of keys that we need to keep in mind. Type and antitype is all throughout. But we have to start somewhere and we can't cover everything. So let's go ahead and turn to Matthew 24. And you may want to keep your place in Matthew 24 and then in Revelation 6. Because in Matthew 24, Jesus is the one who was asked by His disciples what would be the sign of your coming.

And then in Revelation, the book begins by saying, the revelation of Jesus Christ.

And then in Chapter 6, He was the one found worthy to undo the seals. And we have one after another undone. And by putting the two together, we're given understanding. In Matthew 24, Jesus went out and departed from the temple. And His disciples came to Him, for to show Him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said unto them, See you not all these things, verily I say unto you, there shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down. So all of the old temple and the surrounding buildings are long gone, completely destroyed. Now the Western Wall, granted, does date back to the time of Herod, but that was a part of the foundation for the temple. But the buildings on top are long, long gone. Verse 3, And as He sat upon the mount of Olives, that is, the mountain to the east. A lot of times the Gospels refer to things, events that took place there. The disciples, Mark's account said it was the two brothers, two pairs of brothers, Peter and Andrew and James and John. Doesn't matter whether it was 12 or 4. The disciples came unto Him privately. So that tells us this is not something that He gave to a multitude of 5,000 people that day, saying, Tell us when shall these things be? It seems some things never change, because approaching 2000 years later, you and I deep down in our heart of hearts, we want to know, God, when is it going to happen? Will I live long enough to be there? So we have the same questions they had. What shall be the sign of your coming and of the end of the world or the age? Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.

And He's speaking to us. He's speaking to the disciples. He speaks to us today.

It is a smorgasbord of prophetic stuff out there that you can eat of if you want to. There are a lot of writing. Again, prophecy sells. It makes money. There are Church of God organizations who focus more on prophecy than others do. I still contend the most important thing is, let us be ready. Let us have our spiritual house in order when Christ returns. That's far more important than figuring out exactly when it's going to happen. In fact, we're told we can't know that. We'll certainly know the season as it gets closer and it appears that the world is getting closer. For many shall come in My name, saying, I am Christ. So again, Christ Jesus is the one speaking. And He said, there are those who will come in My name, and they're going to say Jesus is the Christ, and shall deceive many. So here is the first sign, the first part of His answer to the question, what's going to be happening when the end of the age is upon us? He's speaking here of religion. He is specifically speaking of Christianity, that there would be a lot of confusion out there. There will be a proliferation of wrong ideas and concepts. Deception always involves mixing truth with error to varying degrees. There are those out there who outshine us as far as good works.

But you know, if you're not obeying God, somewhere down the line, Christ says, I don't know you.

We need all the above. We need to be obeying God. We need to be keeping the law of God. And we also need to be performing good works. This prophecy, and probably a lot of these that we'll look at here today, we could view as being both dual in nature, meaning there's a beginning, but then you may have a greater fulfillment later on. You may have a number of fulfillments. These also are telescoping prophecies, because He's speaking at the time. And in the next couple of chapters, it's going to lead to the story where He dies. And then the church, He's resurrected, and the church begins. So we're looking back in the early 30s AD. And there was a counterfeit church that we find in history just a couple of years later that began. And it took the name of Christ, used the name of Jesus, looked so good, sounded so good, and yet fulfilled that statement, deceived many, led many astray.

Let us keep our place there in Matthew and go to Revelation chapter 6.

Revelation again begins by saying, the revelation of Jesus Christ. It is not as the title in the Old King James says, the revelation of St. John the Divine. It is Christ who is the Revelator. He is the one unlocking understanding. And as these two chapters are tied together, we are given a lot of insight. Revelation is the book also that tells us about what I call the tale of two churches. You have this small, persecuted, scattered, often sometimes fleeing, true church of God that has the testimony of Jesus Christ and keep the commandments of God.

But they're on the run. They're keeping their head down. Then you have this other church, this other church that is aligned with a powerful government that controls many nations. Revelation 6 verse 1.

And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were, the voice of thunder, the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts, the four living creatures, saying, Come and see. And I saw, and behold, a white horse. Now, let's pause there. White in the Bible so often is used to represent righteousness. And he that sat on him had a bow, and a crown was given unto him. And he went forth conquering and to conquer. So a bow and a crown. History bears out the fact that this other church, Christ founded his church, but then there was this other church that came along, and it began to flourish. And especially as we get through the 100s and the 200s, especially as we get to the time of the, well, say, 325, some of the councils that took place, we find a very powerful church that is being aligned together with the empire. We have, oftentimes through the years, had this love-hate relationship, the religious leader and the political leader. Once in a while, the religious leader would excommunicate the emperor, and the emperor would tell the religious leader, well, go up here to Ravenna, get away from here, or go up into Avignon. So we have 325 AD. We have, in the days of Constantine, the emperor became Christian, as it is called, as they called it. And you had a marriage between church and state. Now, as we get to the 1500s, we have a reformation. The Protestant Reformation began taking place. It was 1517, when Martin Luther had all of his theses that he nailed on the door of a church. He took great exception to the church leaders selling forgiveness, selling indulgences, lots of complaints that were valid. But great religious deception has magnified over and across the years. Let's go to Revelation 12, and notice just a little bit over here, because it speaks of the church fleeing, and the church flees more than once. Revelation 12, verse 1, there appeared a great wonder in heaven.

A woman, and often the Bible uses a woman to represent a church, but this one is clothed with a sun. The sun gives off light, and light represents the way of God. This woman is the true church, and the moon under her feet. The moon is that orb. You may have seen the beautiful full moon as it came up a few days ago, Monday, I think it was. Absolutely beautiful. Kind of reddish cast to it as well. Very orange. The moon rains over the time of darkness. Darkness represents error.

And upon her head, a crown of 12 stars. Now, the church in the wilderness consisted of 12 tribes of National Israel. This woman actually came from National Israel. She was of the tribe of Judah, because her genealogy is given in Matthew chapter 1. But also, there is the church that was founded through the child she gave birth to. And there were 12 foundational stones called apostles, who were there to form that which is spiritually the Israel of God. Physical Israel and spiritual Israel. And she, being with child, cried, prevailing in birth, and pained to be delivered. In verse 3, we find there is, and there always has been, an adversary. And there appeared another wonder in heaven, Behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads, and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads. This speaks of the composite beast that chapter 13 goes into greater detail about. Seven heads. And we have to go back to Daniel, because most of them are named.

Babylon, Persia, Greece, and yet Greece at one point broke into four separate kingdoms.

And then finally, there was this fourth beast that Daniel wrote about. Dreadful and terrible, and we don't need three guesses to come up with the conclusion that that was Rome.

So, his tale drew a third of the stars of heaven. And stars was used as an emblem in chapter 1 to represent angels. One third of the angels followed this one who formerly was called Lucifer, the light-bringer, and rebelled against God, and did cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman, which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.

Physically devour the Christ child. Remember the actions of Herod. There in Matthew chapter 2, the ordering of the pogrom, the genocide, the killing of the children below a certain age.

There also was a time when Jesus was baptized, and it was time for his ministry to begin. First order of the day was, here comes the same being, called the tempter who came to try to trip him up before he began his earthly ministry, to devour her before the child as soon as it was born.

And she brought forth a man child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. Well, earlier in Revelation, it talked about that being Jesus Christ. And her child was caught up unto God and to his throne. Skips right over 30-some years of life, but he ascended back to his father and is at his father's right hand until the father sends him back. And the woman fled into the wilderness. And there we just skipped over another great period of time, where she has a place prepared of God that they should feed her there 1,203 score days.

1,260 days. 1,260 years. There is that principle in prophecy that oftentimes a day in fulfillment is a year. So if you take from 325, when essentially certain edicts came out that the true Church of God had to either keep their head down or hide up in the mountains or go outside the empire, if you go forward 1,260 years, you come to the late 1500s. 1585. Mary, queen of Scots, was executed, essentially assuring the great Britain would be Protestant.

You had the breakup of the Spanish Armada in 1588. The greatest Catholic power of the day lost its navy to a freak channel storm. You had King James VI of Scotland, who became King James I of the United Kingdom, which included a good portion of France at that time. If you have the King James open up to the beginning of some time, and it has this letter of the translators that was written to King James, who ordered the translation in 1604, and then that was completed in 1611.

And we have, for the first time, the Holy Scriptures in the vernacular written down, and the average person could have a copy of the Holy Scriptures, and people began reading it. But it speaks to them of the Church fleeing. And then, late in the chapter, we have war in heaven again. And in verse 14, to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time and times and half a time from the face of the serpent.

We won't comment further on that, likely a three and a half year period of time of protection that would coincide with the Tribulation, but then at the very end, the dragon turning against the remnant of her seed. So, let's go back to Revelation 6. Revelation 6. And let's read a little further, because we get to the second seal of Revelation. And your chart from John Lebissonaire will bear that out.

The first seal was the white horse, the false Christs and false prophets, false religion in general. Second seal, the red horse, wars and rumors of wars, as we tie it in with Matthew 24. So verses 3 and 4 of Revelation 6. And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see. And there went out another horse that was red. Red, as we know, is the color of blood. And the life is in the blood, the shedding of blood, the taking of life.

And power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, that they should kill one another, and there was given unto him a great sword. So now, let's go back. As I mentioned, keep your place in Matthew 24, but keep your place in Revelation 6. We'll be back. Matthew 24.

We read through verse 5. Let's pick it up in verses 6 and 7. And you shall hear wars and rumors of wars. See that you be not troubled. For all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. This second seal as well, we can view as being a telescoping prophecy. It seems it's a natural state of human beings, that we're unable to get along with each other. It goes all the way back to Cain and Abel, all the way back to the beginning. Man can't get along with himself.

And yet, as we get to the time of the opening of these seals, which may have taken place in the first century, the further we go, the wider the scope. It telescopes. But we are reminded, the end is not yet. The world still has yet to see that time of Jacob's trouble, a time such as the world has never seen. First part of verse 7, for nations shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom. We'll break there, because it goes on to another seal. Red the color of blood.

The seal is of warfare and the taking of life. Once upon a time in a class on international relations, the textbook basically broke down world history into three parts. It is, first of all, preparation for warfare. Secondly, waging warfare. And thirdly, preparing for the next round of warfare. There seems to be a lot of truth to that. You study world history, you're studying war, and the taking of human life. From one certain point of view, 1815 was the beginning of modern history, as far as continental Europe and the nations, the modern nations that we find. Through the 1800s, we had these various states in Italy and then different areas, provinces up in Germany, being brought together, ending up in the form of the countries under Mussolini and, excuse me, Garibaldi, later on the 20th century, Mussolini, Kaiser, and others then ending up with Hitler into the 20th century. But we have found nations increasingly forming these alliances with other groups of nations, these power bases forming. And that's where it ties in here with nation rising against nation and kingdom against kingdom. We look at our country's population, we look at the world's population today. You'd have to be 71 or older to have lived during World War II. It's been a long time ago. You'd have to be 75, 76 to have any faint memory. Maybe you would remember VE, VJ days, things like that. Maybe you would faintly remember hearing of some big bombs being dropped. But you'd have to be 80 or more to really have to have memories where it formed and fashioned you, who and what you are as a person. We have now gone more than three times the amount of time we had between World Wars I and II. That was just 20 years. And now we've had a long time. We've had a lot of other wars, a lot of other bloodshed, but we have in our country, George H.W. Bush will prove or has proven to be the last president who was a product of World War II itself as he was in the military the last year. Everyone since then has heard about it, like I have, like most of us have. Heard about it, read about it, but it didn't form in fashion and mold us. We've gone through Korea, Vietnam. Probably we don't have half the population that remembers Korea. I was born during that time. I don't, I just heard about it later. How long will it be when we'll have a major percentage of this country that doesn't remember anything about Vietnam, even though it went on for years and years? Won't be long. But we have leadership of many countries, not just ours, of those who didn't go through the crucible of hard times, like depression and World War II. We have those who were formed in fashion by years of rebellion, years of rebelling against the establishment, years of tearing down the country. And it's sad to see. We have in this world revolutionary battles that continue. We have peoples that battle and fight and probably have no idea why, why do Turks hate Serbs? Why do Arabs hate Israelis? And vice versa and all those. They probably don't know. Why do different tribes in Africa hate the next tribe? You know, it was not, well, it's been quite a few years ago. You have the the Hutus and the Tutsis and the horrible genocide taking place there. We have peoples that just hate each other. And it reminds us that there is a prince of the power of the air. And he wants to not just destroy the Church of God, the work of God, the plan of God, he wants to destroy the human family. Everyone who at the very beginning was created in the image and likeness of God, which speaks of a potential of living forever with God. Matthew 24, notice verse 22.

Verse 22, And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved, but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. And the word elect refers to you and to me. We have a responsibility. There have to be those who hold fast to the truth, who live the truth, who proclaim the gospel of the kingdom of God. And for their sake, time will be cut short before man destroys himself. Back to verse 6, the latter part, it says, But the end is not yet.

The second seal, again, a duality involved here. You know, if you go back 40 years ago, think back to the... You know, we had a marvelous crop of leaders, world leaders at that time. If you looked at Ronald Reagan in the U.S. at the same time, Margaret Thatcher in Great Britain, Francois Mitterrand in France, Brian Mulroney up in Canada. You even had Mikhail Gorbachev, who knew how far to push, and also listened when President Reagan stood there and said, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. And you had Naka-Soni in Japan, all at the same time, a lot of common sense leaders. But the world's a far more dangerous place today.

It's even more so an armed camp. You have individuals and little rogue nations that have power that should frighten us. If it weren't for the promise that, for the elect's sake, time will be cut short. So we better hold fast and do our job. We have enjoyed years. We look back over the decades, sometimes relative stability, sometimes great upset. The world economic scene has its ups and its downs. Seems more erratic here of late. Price of oil rises, and then it plummets. We have elections that take place in one country, and it shakes the world economy. Anyhow, let's go on to the third seal in Matthew 24, in the middle of verse 7.

And there shall be famines. This is as far as we need to read.

Famine. Your chart will tie in famine with the black horse that we'll see in a moment in Revelation 6. Famine. Famine can come from a number of directions. It's not necessarily that there's no food. Not necessarily that at all. Maybe it has been the factor. One factor has been that our government has mandated, and our government's not the only one, mandated that 10% of our fuel has ethanol. Ethanol comes from what? From corn.

Which used to be fed to people and livestock, but now it's put into our fuel tanks.

We also have foodstuffs that have been genetically modified, improved, to enhance the yield, to make it disease resistant. I spoke with my sister the other day, and she told me that my part of the farm, the farmer who rents it, had harvested the wheat. And he said, there's another, a cousin of mine has a 25-acre wheat field, and the farmer is debating whether he would even harvest it because he's only getting about 40 bushels per acre. Now, when I was a kid, 40-45 bushels per acre was phenomenal. 50 was unheard of. But man has improved. I hope you know I'm being a little facetious there. Man has improved our wheat. Our wheat is not your grandpa's wheat.

And the yields have gone up so that we have farmers debating, well, there's only 40 bushels to an acre, so is it worth my time and fuel to harvest it? Lots of food. Some places, many countries have great stockpiles of food, but then you have other areas where people are starving.

And you have reasons for that. Maybe it's the system, and maybe it's the warfare. And sometimes you have countries that have who will send foodstuffs that then sit on the docks, and you do not have the infrastructure or the will within the leadership to get the food of the people who need it. And so it sits there in rats, and that has happened over and over.

Civil war, war that ravishes the country, does not allow you to prepare a seedbed and plant the crop. Well, now let's go to Revelation 6. Revelation 6 verses 5 and 6.

And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see, and I beheld, and lo, a black horse. And he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand. The pair of balances were for trading, making deals, as we will see for the buying and selling the trading for food. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny, and see you hurt not the oil and the wine. Oil and wine. These are products of the Mediterranean area, which was the focus of the Bible. You have lots of places around the world now that have the grapes. You have grapes in this country and in Chile. You see a lot of wines from Chile. Australia. Oil, not talking about the type that's pumped out of the ground, but the type that's squeezed out of olives. But here is a picture of the portioning of food only to those who have the wherewithal to pay for it, the funds to purchase the food. So it's not necessarily speaking of an absence of food, but an inability to purchase food. Some of you older people, those are about 50 and up. You may remember, I'm one of you, by the way, you may remember the book came out, it probably came out 40 or 52 years too soon, Fama 1975 by, last name is Patek, William and Paul Patek, Fama 1975, maybe a few decades early, but interesting what they had to say. But the prophesied trouble has begun. It telescopes, it intensifies, we may have greater famine in areas where they simply do not have the ability to transport supplies to those who are in need while parts of the world have a great deal of food. Chapter 6 verse 8.

Just notice a little more than halfway into that verse that these were given the power unto them over the fourth part of the earth to kill with the sword, with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. So some of these seals that we have looked at, it summarizes that the end result will be that one-fourth of humankind will die. Not a pleasant thought to think about, to focus on. But let's go to the fourth seal. In read verses 7 and 8, the chart ties in the pale horse with pestilence and earthquakes. Verse 7, And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see. And I looked, and behold, a pale horse, and his name that sat on it was death, and hell, Hades, the grave, followed with him, and power was given them over the fourth part of the earth, the sword, hunger, death, and the beasts of the earth. So here we have a fourth seal. And this is the problem that always comes with famine. With improper nutrition, with malnourished peoples, you have the immune system broken down, and they're unable to resist.

Now we have malnourished children who grow up to be malnourished parents, rearing malnourished children. And the cycle goes on. Matthew 24. Verse 7, it simply adds, And pestilences and earthquakes in diverse places.

So here is a seal that is opened that heralds the coming of disease epidemics. When millions grow up in hunger and are then displaced from their own lands, you have a high likelihood of disease. When you have people displaced from their areas, I mean, look at what is happening to our country and others, you have diseases like tuberculosis that we thought basically the country had a handle on, and now we have others coming here, and they're bringing disease with them. We have had our forerunners, we've had our harbingers. If you go back to the 1300s in Europe, the Black Death, the Bubonic Plague, you will see different estimates, some going as high as 50 million people. And that's back when the world population was a lot smaller.

You know, the world population, when I was a few years old, it hit 3 billion. And today, I looked online, it's from 7.1 to 7.4 billion people on this earth. 1963 billion to today, well more than double. And you can tell anytime you go driving across this country, there are a lot more people living here than there were in the 1950s or 60s.

We had, during, well, at the end of World War I, we had the flu. And the flu killed major percentages of some cities, like Paris. You had estimates again, from 20 to 50 million people died from the flu of 1918. We have other diseases. We hear of swine flu and bird flu, and a lot of that is still unknown. We have other names, like Ebola. We have the Zika virus, the danger of microcephaly in an unborn child. We have antibiotic-resistant diseases that continue to appear in proliferate, pro-liferate, excuse me. As antibiotics are overused, what happens when you have something on the strongest antibiotic that man has doesn't face it? Somewhere down the line, that's where we're headed. Earthquakes in various places. Luke's parallel account, he adds the word great. Great earthquakes. And so, I mean, you look at what's in the news. We head in Seattle, up in the Puget Sound area. We have this tremendous, we have that drill. What happens if we have a major disaster here? We have things down in Southern California signs taking place. We oftentimes see Yellowstone, the bulging cauldron, the dome signs point toward some of these volcanoes that have been extinct for a long time, having another event like Mount St. Helens. What was that? Three, four decades ago, not that long ago. But we have all kinds of signs like that, the Ring of Fire around the Pacific, and the predictions of a possible earthquake in Southern California. Or, you know, we don't want to forget up here at New Madrid, a fault line there.

Up there, where Tennessee and Missouri, Boot Hill, and all those states come together, you go down across Arkansas, you've got Crowley's Ridge, and that dates back to the big ones of the early 1800s that took place that were over 8.0. So we tend to look and we think, well, we've always had cycles of weather. We've always had cycles of natural disasters, and that's true. That's true. I mean, you read of those in biblical times. It may or may not have had much to do with God punishing peoples, but we do read more and more of volcanoes and tsunamis and earthquakes and typhoons, and we can look for even greater and more increasing patterns of natural disasters. More polluted water. Had a little news item along in this area here recently. Some of you were affected by that, as far as don't drink the water. Makes you wonder about the water any of us drink, but it may not be a lack of water. It may be that it's water that's unfit to use. So more disease, more death. That's what these seals are talking about.

But while we're here in Matthew 24, we're not going to go further with the chart. Just these first four seals is all I wanted to approach today, but we have other a little bit more added here. In Matthew 24, because it talks about the Church of God, and that's where it comes home to roost for you and me.

It tells us, in essence, we'd better be preaching the gospel, and it tells us we'd better be ready whenever everything comes to a head. Matthew 24, verse 8, All these are the beginning of sorrows. Ouch!

False religion, deception, wars, famine, pestilence, natural disasters. This is just priming the pump for what's going to happen. Then shall they deliver you, who's he speaking to, to the disciples. They shall deliver you to be afflicted, and shall kill you. And you shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake.

You know, we do have a lot of freedoms in this country, and there are many countries that we have freedom. We have freedom to come and assemble here today, so far. We live in a society that's kind of, you know, whatever you believe, that's fine. You know, you see it that way, fine. Go, be at peace, leave me alone, I'll leave you alone. We have a lot of that going around, but that won't last forever.

Then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. And to that, I would say, let's be very careful. Let us be cautious.

There's always somebody coming out with a new twist, a new flavor, a new variety, a new twist on prophecy.

Church of God's got a... well, what did I read? Something from over 80 years ago. We have a long track record of, I believe, a basic common sensical approach to prophecy as far as scripturally piecing together Daniel 2, 7, and 8 with Matthew 24 and with Revelation 13 and 17.

You can find things on the internet if you want to waste your time on it, and they'll talk about building a temple of Baal here or there. I think it largely is wasting time.

It's still interesting. I don't blame you for looking at it. It's still interesting. But let's keep our eyes on the trunk of the tree.

Who is the Beast booklet from Mr. Herbert Armstrong back in, I don't know, when it first came out, 1950s, and then was revised? Who or what is the prophetic beast? And then the literature that we have and other Church of God groups have? It's the same basic understanding. We want to let... well, as Paul told Timothy, the Church of God, the pillar and stay of the truth. We want to stay where it's safe.

And many false prophets shall rise and deceive many, and because lawlessness, iniquity, shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. That's a warning to us. We live in a world where the sanctity of human life is worth nothing.

People just blow others away. We live in a world that disregards law and the basics of family and the things that have made us great as a people. And it can have an effect on us. And the challenge is, when we see the evils around us, you see, sin is highly contagious, and we don't want to let it get on us. The love of many shall wax cold. There's a danger for us. But he that shall endure unto the end of the same shall be saved. Verse 14, In this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world, for a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come. But the way it is worded, there is a work to be accomplished first. And so, as we consider the church of God, we consider the work of God. The church has been very fragmented of recent decades. We don't seem to do very well in staying together and locking arms and rallying together to have a flagship magazine and set of booklets and voice and presence on television or the internet. But still, we go on. The United Church of God has a phenomenal presence on the internet, which is kind of the wave of the future. We look at the leadership of the church.

There are a lot of our ministers have hair that's gray, and they're losing their hair. Have you seen that too? I've seen it all over. I go to the GCE each year, and I think, did I come to an elderly ministers conference? Look at these old guys!

And anyhow, there are so many who are 60, 70, and 80 something, but it's not just the ministry. Look at the congregations. It's us too. 60, 70, and 80. We have so many with so much experience, so many decades of training under their belt. It's a wonderful thing in many regards.

You think back to Acts 2 that we talked about just a week ago.

The Day of Pentecost. 3,000 were baptized, and then the disciples started going out. How much training did they have? Well, probably no more than three and a half years, if some of them were students of Christ all along, and others might have been green as gourds. But here we have congregations, people who have 30 and 40 and 50 years in God's calling under their belt. I believe that's for a purpose. What purpose will we have to wait and see? But it is a remarkable situation. We have weathered a number of storms. We have weathered many assaults against the truth of God. And to your credit, you're still here. And yet, it's not over. The time is not yet. We have to go on. We have to continue with the work. And we also realize there is an enemy who would love to destroy us. Sometimes it is as though God says, like he did there in Job 1, God's the one who said to Satan, have you considered my servant Job? And there are times when I wonder, has God said to Satan, have you considered my church? And then relaxed certain parts of the hedge and allowed him to get in here to try us, to test us, to see what we're made of. But as far as those of us who gather here, we're still here. But it's not over. Keep your place in Matthew. Let's go to Habakkuk 3. Mr. McNeely, quite often, it seems of late, has referred to this statement of Habakkuk. Habakkuk 3, verses 1 and 2. A prayer of Habakkuk, the prophet upon Shigionoth, a Hebrew word. It's a morose, pain-filled lamentation, is what it refers to. But in verse 2, he says, O LORD, I have heard your speech and was afraid. O LORD, revive your work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known in wrath. Remember mercy.

That was Habakkuk's prayer at that time, long ago. Please, Father, revive your work. Let Habakkuk's prayer be our prayer. Let his approach be our approach. In crying out to God, to revive the work, to give us laborers, to give us, as he sees fit, growth.

Now let's go back to Matthew 24 and we'll wrap it up. Matthew 24.

We were cautioned, we read verses 12 and 13, that because time goes on and we have to live in this world, there is a danger of catching something. There is a danger of having our love wax cold. The end's not yet. Verse 22, we read also this, we are assured for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. But in the meantime, let's go a little further. Verse 42. As late in the chapter, Matthew summarizes what is most important.

What is most important, we find in verse 42. Watch therefore. Yes, once upon a time we could all just rattle off the names of world leaders. You know, we knew it, we kept up with it, and it seems like we've let some of that slide. David Cameron in Britain has said he's going to resign. Who knows what will follow? We have elections going on this coming week in Australia that will determine their leadership. We have a frightening election that's going to take place here. Somebody's got to win.

Scares the wits out of me. Somebody's going to have to win. Watch. For you know not what hour your Lord does come.

Verse 44. This is what's important as well. Therefore, be you also ready.

Oh, we can spend hours every day chasing down prophecy and trying to piece it all together. And we ought to be doing that. I don't know about hours every day, but we ought to be pondering, filtering these things, trying to distill it all down to what does it mean as events change.

But he said, be ready. And that's what's most important.

For in such an hour as you think not, the Son of Man comes. And verse 46. Here's something else that's important. Blessed is that servant whom his Lord, when he comes, shall find so doing. So watch. Be ready spiritually at any given time.

And be about the work. Doing the work of God, but living as Christ lived. Serving one another. These are the things that will keep us going as we seek first the Kingdom of God. We will continue part two in three weeks. Have a wonderful Sabbath.