The Real Reason for the Season

I mentioned in my letter yesterday that it's one of those times of the year when we feel conspicuous, isn't it? All year long, we're different from the people that we live around. We believe things differently. Our morals are different than they are. But it's not something that is out there in front of us all the time. But this year, everywhere you go, and anywhere I go, people make the point that I know they do to you to give you these greetings of the season and it's just different.

It's the one time of year that you know you're different and everyone knows by the way you respond. There's something there that he's just not saying, but they don't go there and they don't bother. But that's okay, as I said. We need to understand that we are separate. And it is a difficult time of year, but it's a difficult time of year for us because we're in a time that is so apart from what God stands for, and this is so much a part of the year where Satan's way and Satan's way of life and religion is so much upfront.

And that's what we feel every time we come into December and really the fall holidays after our holy days, God's holy days are done, and we come into this season of year. It just is different because we're in a different time and that's front and center. Now, we live in a time that kind of sets us apart from that. So we look around us and you know the neighborhood we live in now, the people across the street have huge these huge blow-up things.

It's like, wow, you see it is, well, at the night they're all lit up and in the morning they're all gone. They lose all their air and whatever and I think, can't they just stay that way? But they don't. Every night they're back in full bloom again. But we're front and center with that. And we know and I know that we all know about the Christmas holidays and what they stand for and where they come from. But I wanted to revisit that a little bit today and ask where did it all start?

Where did it all start? And I think we all know where it started. But I want to go back to the Bible because there are some things that we learn about this time of year and what it really, what we really are up against at this time of year and what we're seeing. So if we go back in the Bible, we'll go back to Genesis because we can find the beginning of Christmas and New Year's and all these holidays that the world celebrates at this time back in Genesis.

But let me just begin by reminding you about Adam and Eve. And they were there in the Garden of Eden walking with God. And when they were faced with a choice between God and going their other way, Satan's way, they chose God. And so God ushered them out of the Garden of Eden and there they were. The rest of the world was populated by two people, Adam and Eve, that had rejected God.

So it's no wonder that the world, over the next 1,500 years or whatever it was until the time of the Great Flood, became a very evil and corrupt people, a violent people, perverse people, so bad that God said, I'm sorry I even created man. They become so bad.

But what could it have been? The people that they all came from rejected God. The Bible never says Adam and Eve repented. They just rejected God and lived their own way. So God said, I'm going to wipe the slate clean. Every man, woman and child is going to die. Every animal except those on the ark are going to die.

And I'll repopulate the earth from two people or from a man who has chosen me and all the faces of the earth, just Noah, just Noah, was perfect or blameless in his generation, the Bible says. So God repopulated the earth after the flood with a man who had chosen God. Would it turn out any differently? Would the world be as perverse? Would the world be as violent? Would the world be as corrupt as it was before when the father of these people was with God?

Well, we know what the answer is, but let's go back to Genesis. Let's go back to Genesis and look at some of the things and some of the people that lived after the flood and what happened. In Genesis 8, in verse 21, after Noah and his family gets off of the ark, they sacrifice to God, they're thankful to him for bringing them through the flood waters.

In verse 21 it says, the eternal smelled a smoothing aroma, and he said in his heart, I will never again curse the ground for man's sake, although the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth. That's the same thing that Paul says in Romans 8-7. The carnal mind is enmity against God. God knew what was in man's heart. He knew that even Noah and the family, that they were going the way we were with the choice that was made, and without God's Holy Spirit, we would be continually in conflict with God. We would continually be acting contrary to him. We would be constantly doing something different than him.

I will never again curse the ground for man's sake, although the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth, nor will I again destroy every little living thing as I have done. It's going to turn out the same way. The world is going to be corrupt. This is just what is in man's heart, and it wasn't God's plan at that time for everyone to be called, for everyone to receive God's Holy Spirit, so that they had the power to overcome self, overcome Satan, and overcome their own desires and the world around us.

So God knew what was going to happen, but there was Noah. There was Noah and his wife and their three sons and their wives, and a new world was beginning. It tells us in Genesis 9 here, I don't know verse what, down in verse 17, it says, God said to Noah about the covenant of the rainbow, that he was getting...this is the side of the covenant which I have established between me and all flesh that's on earth, and the sons of Noah who went out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

Ham was the father of Canaan, it says. These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the whole earth was populated. People who feared God, people who saw what God had done, people who knew that the world was destroyed and the people in it were destroyed because they disobeyed God, because they became so perverse and so corrupt, they knew the power of God. And you'd think that their legacy would always have been, we will always remember the flood, we'll always remember that we need to follow God and yield to Him. And for a few hundred years, according to the commentaries, when you look at the generations of the sons who had sons, who then had sons again, the world seemed to be okay.

Not that it was perfect, not that there weren't sins in it and everything, but it seemed to be different than it was before the flood. But then a young man was born and things changed. Let's go to Genesis 10. Genesis 10, we see the genealogy of the sons of Noah here. And as you read down through the verses, you see all these names and everything. Let's pick it up in verse 6. It says, the sons of Ham, he was the youngest of the three of the sons of Noah.

The sons of Ham were Cush, Misriam, Put, and Canaan. And you probably have read, you can read in our Bible commentary, where those nations that are represented by those descendants are today. And then it goes through verse 7. And then in verse 8 it says, Cush, the son of Ham, begot Nimrod, and he began to be a mighty one on the earth. Now, the rest of the people that are in this genealogy, there's their name mentioned, who their father was and everything, but there's something said about this guy Nimrod here.

Cush begot Nimrod, he began to be a mighty one on the earth. Notice the word began. He began to be a mighty one on the earth. There was something about him that was different than the other descendants that had happened at that time.

Now, the commentaries will tell you, and later on here in the verses, it tells us he was a mighty hunter. He was a skilled hunter. He was a skilled hunter. He was skilled at that craft. And God probably gave him that ability to do that, but he became mighty. He began to become mighty on the earth. You know, he might have had gifts that God had given him, talents that God had given him, but he began to be something in his own eyes, and other people began to look up at him.

If we look down, if we go down there further, it says, he was a mighty hunter in verse 9, for the Lord. Therefore it is said, like Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord. Now, the commentaries are all over the place about what that means, Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord. Does it mean that God was just simply blessing him because he stood before the Lord?

Obviously, from the context, and as we get into chapter 11, we see that isn't what it was. And the word translated before there in the Hebrew is an interesting word. When it's a noun, it can mean one thing. It can be used as a preposition in some places it does mean before, but one of the words that it can be translated is that it is 17 times in the Old Testament is against.

Now, if I stand before you, if I'm humble before you and I stand up before you, sometimes you see people who will just stand up to their boss, children who want to stand up to their parents and kind of let them know what they're going to be. And you look at that, and it's not really humility, and it's not really submission that they're doing. It's like, here I am, and this is the way it's going to be, and this is my way of doing it, and whatever.

And there's a spirit there. When they stand before you, that's something. So when the translators did this, you know, they could say, I'm standing before God. Who stands before God? Other people, when they heard it was God, they fell on their face because God was there, but not Nimrod. So this verse is probably better translated, there was Nimrod who stood against the Lord, therefore it is said, like Nimrod, the mighty hunter against the Lord. And as we read about Nimrod, and as we know things about him, we see this man was the first among this generation after the flood that seemed to have this characteristic.

In fact, Nimrod itself derives from a word that means he rebelled. And so he was rebelling against God. And we go down in verse 10 then, and we see again something starting here. And the beginning, and notice that word, the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, Erich, Akkad, Kelna, and the land of Shinar. The beginning of his kingdom. It means it didn't end with those cities. The beginning of his kingdom was Babel. And in chapter 11 we read about Babel. Greek and the Greek, Babel is Babylon. And so the beginning of his kingdom, of his government, was Babel. Babel didn't end when Nimrod died.

Babylon is there right through human history, all the way to Revelation, until God finally conquers Babylon at the end of time. The beginning of his kingdom. The beginning of his kingdom was these cities, it says here, in the land of Shinar. In verse 11 from that land he went on to Assyria and built Nineveh, Reaba there, Kayla, resin between Nineveh and the principal city. So we have Nimrod, whose beginning of the kingdom is Babylon, but he's also there in Assyria.

His spirit, what he started, was part of those societies, part of those kingdoms. And both those kingdoms still exist today. Both those kingdoms and what they stood for, what Nimrod began in the beginning of his kingdom, has existed down through history. The first one, apparently, who was going to rebel against God after the flood and set up something that was different than what the rest of the world was doing at that time.

Now the commentaries will note that when it says kingdom here, Nimrod was beginning a government that was different than the government that was extant on the earth at that time. Apparently, up until that time, people were pleased to just dwell with God or dwell with each other, however they did it.

But here's Nimrod, who began to become a mighty one on the earth and saw himself as something special. He became the first king of the earth. He had a kingdom. He was going to be it. He was the guy who was the head. He was the guy who people looked to. He was the guy who was going to lord it over everyone else, different than the rest of them. And the people, because he had these talents, because he provided for them, because he was a skilled hunter, they were ready to listen to him.

And so we have a change on the earth that came from this spirit of this man who was on the earth, a spirit that has lasted down through the ages. Because as you look at the kingdoms that Babylon is, that Assyria was and is, and these other places, and you look at the history of the earth, the earth began to have kings at that point. And kings didn't have their subject's best interest at heart. They had their best interest at heart. You'll do things my way. You'll worship the God that I want you to worship to. In many cases, you'll worship me, they said.

Being a king was nothing like Jesus Christ as king. Being a king was all about self. Nimrod was all about self and pointing things to him, and this is where it all began. So with this in mind of Nimrod and looking at those words, beginning of those kingdoms there, in chapter 11, we see the well-known story of the Tower of Babel. Let's just read through the first eight or nine verses here quickly just to refresh our minds of what is said here, and then I'll read something with from one of the commentators from Josephus here.

Chapter 11, verse 1 says, Now the whole earth had one language and one speech, and it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found the plain in the land of Shinar. So we know who's going here because we read over in chapter 10, verse 10, that he was in the land of Shinar. So we know what group of people was headed over here to this land, and they dwelt there.

And they said to one another, Come, let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly. They had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. And they said, Come, let us build ourselves a city. Circle the word ourselves. They'll spittle ourselves a city and a tower whose top is in the heavens. Let's make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth. Let's do something here different than it has been done before.

But God came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built, and he said, Indeed, the people are one, and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do. Now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them. Come, let us go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So God scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they ceased building the city.

Therefore its name is called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth, and from there the eternal scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth. Well-known story. A few words. We know what it means. We know what it means. We know what God was doing there. We see that this group of people there were building something against God. God looked at it and said, No, I'm going to stop it. What they were doing was all about themselves and all against God, the mighty hunter that stood against God.

Now Josephus, sometimes when you read the Bible, it gives us what we need to know, but we fill in the blanks through study by looking at other places, reliable sources, and just, you know, can be commentaries sometimes to see what they are. It can be the chordances to see what words mean.

Josephus is a historian that's well-known, and this is what he has to say about this Babylon account. Let me just read it to you verbatim, because he fills in the blanks of what was going, what was in the minds of the people during this time, and notice how it fits so well with what we read in chapter 10, verses 10 and 11 there about Nimrod.

Josephus says, this is from the Book of Antiquities, Book 1, chapter 4, Now it was Nimrod who excited them to such an affront and contempt of God. He was the grandson of Ham, the son of Noah, a bold man and of great strength of hand. He persuaded them not to ascribe their success to God, as if it was through his means they were happy, but to believe that it was their own courage which procured that happiness.

We don't have to remember God. We did this. He also gradually changed the government into tyranny, seeing no other way of turning men from the fear of God, but to bring them into a constant dependence on his power. He also said he would be revenged on God if he should have a mind to drown the world again, for he would build a tower too high for the waters to be able to reach, and that he would avenge himself on God for destroying their forefathers.

It got quite an attitude, doesn't it? It got quite an attitude, Nimrod. Now, the multitude were very ready to follow the determination of Nimrod and to esteem it a piece of cowardice to submit to God. See how things turned around? Kind of sounds familiar today. So it's your week if you fear God, is what they were beginning to be told and believe. To esteem it a piece of cowardice to submit to God. And they built a tower, neither sparing any pains nor being in any degree negligent about the work.

And by reason of the multitude of hands employed in it, it grew very high, sooner than anyone could expect. But the thickness of it was so great and it was so strongly built that thereby its great height seemed, upon the view, to be less than it really was. It was built a burnt brick, cemented together with mortar, made of bitumen, that it might not be liable to admit water.

When God saw that they acted so madly, He did not resolve to destroy them utterly, since they were not grown wiser by the destruction of the former sinners. People before them learned the lesson, they didn't learn the lesson. Seeing that they were not grown wiser by the destruction of the former sinners, but He caused a tumult among them by producing them diverse languages and causing that, through the multitude of those languages, that they should not be able to understand one another. The place where they built the tower is now called Babylon because of the confusion of that language that they readily understood before, for the Hebrews mean, by the word babble, confusion.

So we see this man introduced Nimrod. Through him we see a new government coming on the earth, one of kings. One of kings and men who extolled themselves and applaud themselves. We see a kingdom. We see people turning away from God and being told, you're a coward. If you trust in God, trust in me. Look at what we've done. We see an affront to God by the Tower of Babel that we'll build the tower up to the skies.

We'll show God what we're about. We see this attitude that's just ridiculous when you think about it. We see all this coming into the earth now, a few hundred years, between 150 and 200 years, the commentaries say, after the flood. There's this attitude that's there. Where is it coming from? Where is it coming from in this first king of the earth?

Well, you know, there's a few other places in the Bible that Nimrod has mentioned. One of them is 1 Corinthians 1 and 10. And there, the first few chapters of 1 Corinthians, Chronicles, it's a genealogy. And there in 1 Corinthians 10, it talks about Nimrod. And it says, Nimrod began to become a mighty one on the earth. And that's all it says about him. But the commentary on this from the Adam-Clark commentary is interesting. Let me read what Mr. Clark says about this were about this and Nimrod becoming a mighty one on earth.

It says, Nimrod began to be a mighty man in sin, a murderer of innocent men and a rebel before the Lord. The Jerusalem Targum, that's T-A-R-G-U-M, that was kind of like the commentaries back then when Hebrew was beginning to wane as a language, the Aramaic, they would have commentaries and their interpretation of the Bible and a record of the history. The Jerusalem Targum says, he was mighty in hunting or in pray, P-R-E-Y, and in sin before God, for he was a hunter of the children of men in their languages.

And he said unto them, Depart from the religion of Shem and cleave to the institutes of Nimrod. The Targum, or we could say that the commentary that day of Jonathan Benuziel says, from the foundation of the world, none was ever found like Nimrod, powerful in hunting and in rebellions against the Lord. The Syriac calls him a warlike giant. The word, T-S-A-Y-I-D, the Hebrew word, which we render hunter, signifies pray and is applied in the scriptures to the hunting of men by persecution, oppression, and tyranny. Hence it is likely that Nimrod, having acquired power, used it in tyranny and oppression, by rapine and violence, founded that domination, which was the first distinguished by the name of a kingdom on the face of the earth.

Not a man you'd want to live under, right? Wouldn't want Nimrod to be your king. Wouldn't want him to be the one that you were looking to and that you had to pay attention to.

Where did that attitude come from? Well, I think we can see back in Isaiah 14. Let's go back and look at the attitude of where that spirit comes from because it's very familiar to the one of Satan that we read about in Isaiah 14. Let's begin. You know, we always begin in verse 12. Let's begin this time in verse 4 of Isaiah 14 and read through it. It says in verse 4, Take up this proverb against the king of Babylon and say, How the oppressor has ceased, the golden city ceased, the Lord has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers, he who struck the people in wrath with a continual stroke, he who ruled the nations in anger is persecuted and no one hinders.

God's going to stop that. We read that of Satan, but we read that of the kings and Nimrod who thought he was invincible, who had himself as a god on the earth. It happened to him too, we'll see. The whole earth is at rest and quiet. They break forth into singing. Indeed, the sick cypress trees rejoice over you in the cedars of Lebanon saying, Since you were cut down, no woodsman has come up against us.

We were happy to see you die. You were oppressive. You were not a good ruler. You were not a king in the way that the Bible defines what a king is. Hell from beneath is excited about you to meet you at your coming. It stirs up the dead for you, all the chief ones of the earth. It has raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. They all shall speak and say to you, Have you also become as weak as we?

You who thought you were so great? Did you learn that you were mortal too and that you were weak in comparison to God? Have you also become as weak as we? Have you become like us? Your pomp is brought down to Sheol or the grave and the sound of your stringed instruments. The maggot is spread under you and worms cover you.

God says this to the king of Babylon, the kings of the earth who have all met this with that, because they have a spirit, the spirit that we read about beginning in verse 12, how you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning, how you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations, you who didn't bring strength. Strength only comes from God. You took people away from the only strength they have. You weakened the nations. You turned them away from God. You turned them to your own way for your own cause. For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit on the Mount of the congregation on the far the sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the Most High. Isn't that exactly the same attitude that Nimrod was showing when he went and built Nimrod, when he became mighty and began to become mighty on the earth, the very same attitude, because Satan's spirit works in the same way, and it continues down through history, as we will see. Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the lowest depths of the pit. Let's go over to Ezekiel. Ezekiel 28.

Ezekiel 28. We have the familiar verses about Satan as well. And again, God prefaces them with the Prince of Tyre, the King of Tyre. He talks about the attitudes the kings have, and He shows the kings of the earth have this attitude that Satan has. It's the spirit that's in them. And from the time of Nimrod, up until the time really recently when we've had democracies and the earth and the kingdoms of the past that so many people lived under, you know, have had to endure under, disappear, this has been the attitude that's there. Let's look at Ezekiel 28, verse 1. The word of the Lord came to me saying, Son of man, say to the Prince of Tyre, thus says the Lord God, because your heart is lifted up, and you say, I'm a God, I sit in the seat of gods in the midst of the seas. He could be saying this to any king, saying it to Nimrod, yet you are a man and not a God, though you set your heart as the heart of God. Verse 6, therefore, thus says the Lord God, because you set your heart as the heart of a God, behold, therefore, I will bring strangers against you, the most terrible of the nations. They will draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom and defile your splendor. They will throw you into the pit, and you shall die the death of the slain in the midst of the of the seas. Will you still say, before him who slaves you, I'm a God? But you shall be a man and not a God in the hand of him who slaves you. You shall die the death of the uncircumcised by the hand of aliens, for I have spoken, says the Lord God. He talks about this Prince and the spirit that's in him, and then he shows where that spirit comes from. Verse 11, moreover, the word of the Eternal came to me, saying, Son, a man, take up all lamentation for the king of Tyre, and say to him, thus says the Lord God, you were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.

You were in Eden. That wasn't the Prince of Tyre. That wasn't the Prince of Tyre. You were in Eden, the Garden of God. Every precious stone was your covering. The sardius, topaz, diamond, barrel, onyx, jasper, sapphire, turquoise, emerald with gold. The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes was prepared for you on the day you were created. You were the anointed cherub who covers. I established you. You were on the holy mountain of God. You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones. You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created till iniquity was found in you. And you became a different angel. You had a different spirit. From that day on, you rebelled against me. From that day on, you set yourself as an adversary to me. And from that day on, you were in competition with me, God says to Satan. And it never stopped. And in the spirit of man, that same spirit of, from that day on, we'll be in competition with you, God. From that day on, we'll set ourselves against you, God. From that day on, we'll do our things and we'll try to overcome you, God, and do it our own way. Never realize, well, should realize, but never realizing, ye never are. You can never overcome God. He overcomes everything. It seems like such a simple thing. I have to smile when I say it. And yet, Satan and the world around us still keep thinking, I can survive and I can do just fine without God. And from that day, that Nimrod, that attitude entered in him, that has been sustained in all the kingdoms of the earth, and it will be there at the end of time when Jesus Christ returns and finally ends that kingdom of Babylon that was begun by Nimrod. That is marked by the very same attitudes, by the very same dispositions, by the very same words, by the very same rebellion that Nimrod began with. It's all there. It began with him after the flood. Well, Nimrod was a man, we know that, and Nimrod died. The Bible doesn't tell us how Nimrod died, but we know he did. And he apparently died a young man. He didn't have any children that the Bible records and none that you can find in any of the literature, legends, or lore of Nimrod because he was a significant man on the earth, and legends did grow about him.

And Babylon was a kingdom that he started that existed. You remember from Daniel 2, the kingdoms of the earth, what was the very first world-ruling kingdom? Babylon. Before that, Assyria was there, all marked, all started by Nimrod, had the mark of him. Assyria was a cruel, cruel nation that was all about self and getting things for that kingdom. Babylon was the same way. Nebuchadnezzar knew God, but he always turned against self. He was never humbled before God. And when the kingdoms that succeeded, Babylon took over. They stayed in Babylon. They thought Babylon was a beautiful place, the city of Babylon. But there we have Nimrod, and he died. But the legend of Nimrod didn't die. The Bible doesn't tell us much more about Nimrod at that point, but we can look into history and learn some things about him. You know, oftentimes, and you probably remember this from your high school days and college days, some of the poems and epics of old chronicled events that happened in the world at that time. They would take something of a king and make it into a play, and they would replay that over and over again, you know, much like we have movies today that are based on true facts. But they would do that thing, and they would do that. And one of them that's out there that dates from 2000, in the 2000s BC, that was written in Babylon, is called the Epic of Gilgamesh. G-I-L-G-A-M-E-S-H.

And the Epic of Gilgamesh is notable because it chronicles the beginning of a sun god.

So the world up until the time of Noah—I'm past Noah—but in Nimrod, you do have Nimrod becoming a king and introducing a new form of government that's against God and all about self on the earth. And then you have these gods that proliferate throughout the pagan world, which is all the world except for Israel. And sun gods are there, and this Epic of Gilgamesh kind of chronicles how it happened.

And Nimrod—Nimrod, the people who interpret it say and legend says—Nimrod is key in this poem. It dates back to Babylon. That's where it has been. And it talks about Gilgamesh who died an early death. And he was a king, and he had a wife, and he didn't have any children. And it was the people mourned. The people mourned when he died because they were reliant on him. How could Nimrod die? He's our king. He provides for us. And there's this thing that happens, this thing that happens, and I'm just going to read it here from what I—because I don't want to just paraphrase. Now, let me underscore this is a legend, okay? I can't prove this from A Cyclobutabricanica, but sometimes you just kind of put some of the things into perspective, and it fills in the blanks on where we got from here to there. How did we get from God to sun gods and all these other gods and queens and everything else like that of heaven? And here it says, it says, this queen, she claimed that Gilgamesh, Nimrod was a god and was still alive, according to legend. She claimed she saw a full grown evergreen tree spring out of the roots of a dead tree stump, symbolizing the springing forth of new life for Nimrod. Each winter, he would revisit at the time of the winter solstice.

Interesting, isn't it? So here we have Nimrod, who kind of saw himself as a god on earth, but he's cut down. We don't know how. There's all sorts of speculation out there of who might have killed Nimrod, but no one knows for sure. But then we have this legend that's out there that talks about him coming back and his wife saying, you know, here's this evergreen that sprouted out of a dead tree trunk in the middle of winter, and this is this is Nimrod. This is him reincarnated, and he, and that is what began the legend of the sun gods, they say. So the sun god in the middle of winter, middle of winter, when the lead, when everything is dormant, the world is is dry and no color in it, here comes this thing, and then the world began to continue to worship, I guess, this sun god that was there urging him to come back to life, come back to life and bring the world to life. So was Nimrod, who was the first king of the earth, the beginning of his kingdom was Babylon and Assyria? Could he have also been the first sun god in his death? Could a legend have grown from that? Because what you find throughout the rest of the world at that time, and you can go into any encyclopedia and see that every one of the pagan nations back at that time had their own sun god, all by different names because they had different languages, but they all did the same thing, and they all worshipped it around the winter solstice time. This is from our the UCG Bible commentary regarding this. It says, the winter solstice was observed by the pagans because the sun reached its lowest zenith on that day, the shortest day of the year. It was believed that worship, fires, and sacrifices were needed to encourage and boost the sun god back to his higher station. Afterward, the people celebrated the rebirth of the sun. Indeed, the sun god was understood to have been born of his mother goddess around the time of the winter solstice, in fact, by the reckoning of various ancient cultures on December 25th. Evergreen plants and trees were used in this particular worship because they seemed to retain life through the winter months. Here's these things in the midst of winter. When everything is dead, you have this tree that's evergreen, all there around the worship of the sun god, all at the time of the winter solstice. Now, you can go to many websites and find similar things. This is one from abc.net, a website out of Australia. It said that early Romans, early Romans used evergreens to decorate their temples at the festival at Saturnalia, which was the time of worshiping their sun god. Ancient Egyptians used green palm rushes at that time during the winter solstice, and you can find that throughout history. Here's from a professor at the University of Sydney. He says, the idea of bringing the evergreen into the house represents facility and new life in the darkness of winter, which was much more of the pagan themes.

And so you have this now thing at the beginning, after Nimrod dies, of sun god arising.

Evergreens are all of a sudden part of the festival and the worship that goes on to this sun god. And it's all happening at the winter solstice around December 25th, and this happens well before Jesus Christ's birth, well before that, and it's spread throughout the entire world.

Through the entire world. You know when God was bringing Israel out of Egypt, he cautioned them about many things. You remember, we talk about them often. He said, cut down their altars. Don't follow what the Gentiles do. Follow me. Do only what I say. Now Deuteronomy 12, 29 through 32, we could all repeat, right? Don't add to what I say and don't take away from it. Do exactly what I say.

Because Israel was all around, alone in a nation where the rest of the world around them were doing these things. They had kings, just like Nimrod was a king. They had sun gods, just like Nimrod might have been known as a sun god. They had all these things going on, including this custom at the winter solstice that they would bring out at that time. Let's look at Jeremiah 10.

While you're turning to Jeremiah 10, I'll read another comment from the UCG Bible commentary. It says, the evergreen trees were employed as idols of Asherah. She was a goddess. Such trees being referred to as Asherah, A-S-H-E-R-A-H, in the Hebrew Bible. God forbade them from being placed near his altar, as if to honor him, as he did not want his worship system corrupted by them.

So we read in Jeremiah 10 something that has a familiar ring. There's many in the world who would say, oh no, this is talking about something totally different. But in Jeremiah 10, knowing that these trees and knowing what went on around the time of the winter solstice, and it was happening during this time of Israel, and we'll go back to Deuteronomy ever before the Israel crossed over into the Promised Land that Moses was warning them about this. Jeremiah 10, and we will pick it up in verse 2. God speaking, he says, don't learn the way of the Gentiles. Don't be dismayed at the signs of heaven. They would watch the stars and astrology and try to direct and predict things.

For the Gentiles are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are futile. For one cuts a tree from the forest, the work of the hands of the workmen with the axe. They decorate it with silver and gold. They fasten it with nails and hammers so that it won't topple. Cut it down and bring it into their homes. They're upright like a palm tree. They can't speak. They must be carried because they cannot go by themselves. Don't be afraid of them, for they can't do evil, nor can they do any good. And it goes on to talk about how people worshipped these trees they were cutting down and decorating. They were a symbol to them. A symbol to them of their son God, something that happened in the winter that was so unique that in the dead of winter you had this tree that always stays green. And they found that they used that as a sign to worship that. And God says here, and many people will read that and say, boy, that sounds like a custom that began way back at the time of Nimrod or this epic of Gilgamesh in the 2000s BC in Babylon that still continues today. You can go to any country on the earth, any gentile nation on earth, and you can see this very same thing happening in the world today. Maybe they don't worship it and bow down before it and pray to it, but it's part of the religious symbolism that goes along with this time of year that began way back, way back, way back, way back in the beginning, apparently from Babylon, because apparently everything came from Babylon at that time that has permeated the earth and defined it from then until now. Let's go back to Deuteronomy. Look at a few verses in Deuteronomy.

Israel has not crossed over into the Promised Land. Moses is about to die. And he is warning, reminding Israel, and in this book of Deuteronomy, the things that they need to do, reminding them what God has done, reminding them to follow him and not become enamored with the ways of the gentiles around them, because it was going to be a trial for them, as it was even when they were in the wilderness and they were there among the other nations that they would leave God. Deuteronomy 7 and verse 5. Deuteronomy 7 verse 5. Moses, and he says this several times, and he's talking about when you go over to possess the land, he goes, but you shall, thus shall you deal with them. You shall destroy their altars, break down their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images, and burn their carved images with fire. Now we know that verse, but what's interesting about it in context is in reading from the commentary I did where Asherah, A-S-H-E-R-A-H, means these trees that symbolize and accompany their worship, it shows up. It shows up in this verse. In verse 5 where it says wooden images, that's Asherah. Cut down there, and in the Old King James it says groves. Cut down their groves. Destroy their groves. Cut down those trees. Don't have those trees anywhere around me. Break down their pillars. Cut down their Asherah. Burn their carved images with fire. He repeats it again in chapter 12. Chapter 12 and verse 2. You shall utterly destroy all the places where the nations which you shall dispossess served their gods on the high mountains, on the hills, and under every green tree. And you shall destroy their altars, break their pillars, burn down their wooden images with fire. There's the word Asherah again.

Burn those trees that are associated with that worship. Get rid of them, God said, along with the altars, along with the pillars, along with everything else. Get rid of those pillars.

Don't let them be part of your worship. Deuteronomy 16.

Deuteronomy 16 verse 21.

You shall not plant for yourself any tree as an Asherah. You shall not plant for yourself any tree as an Asherah near the altar which you build for yourself to the Lord your God.

Don't bring into my sanctuary these trees that the pagan Jews that they worship along with their God as part of the symbolism of their way of life.

Don't bring them in close to me. Don't think it's okay. Don't think it's a cute little thing to do. It's a nice little decoration. Understand that in God's eyes, those are an affront to God.

That he looks at them and that's the alternate religion. That's the alternative religion. That's the one of Satan. That's some of his symbolism. Extant throughout the world then. Extant throughout the world today. It's still there. Whether Christ is part of the reason for the season or not, and so much time the world today, he's not even, he doesn't even figure into the equation anymore. It's just about the tree and everything that goes on and the presence that goes along with it.

You know, I titled this sermon, The Real Reason for the Season. Because the real reason for the season is not the saying that you hear some people say. The real reason for the season is so far against God, it's diametrically opposite. And the season and all of its trappings are an affront to God. They symbolize rebellion. They symbolize the way of the world. They symbolize everything that is against God. And down through history, it has gone from one thing to another, and it has spelled through history as part of a religious way of system that changes names, but still has the same trappings, still has the same trappings that go on, that go on before it. Israel fell prey to it. Israel planted some of those groves. Israel liked that.

They thought it was kind of cool to have these trees as part of their worship service. And in direct contrast and disobedience to God, they planted and they used those trees. Let me read here again from the our Bible commentary. It says, in direct disobedience to God, the Jews under King Manasseh actually set up an asherah in honor of Baal. Baal is a sun god, right? Baal is a sun god that they also often fell prey to. The Jews under King Manasseh actually set up an asherah in honor of Baal, the son and husband of Asherith, because, well, we'll talk about that in a minute. Indeed, such was used in surrounding cultures to honor the sun god Baal and his mother on the birthday of the sun, known then as December, or now as December 25. You see this thread running through history. You see through the Bible the way of God and the redemption of Jesus Christ and the return of Jesus Christ and the establishment of his kingdom. But you see through history the thread of Satan, through the symbols, through the governments, through everything that Satan has set up, it all had its beginning after the flood through Nimrod. He was the beginning of Babel. He was the beginning of Assyria. We could turn to 2 Kings 17, but Mr. Permar recently gave a sermon on on paganism and the mixture of religion. In 2 Kings 17, it talks about how when the nations, when Assyria conquered Israel, they didn't know what to do. They thought the god of the land isn't listening to them, and what they actually did was mix religion. We'll learn the ways of God for what we can get out of it, the god of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the god of Israel, but we're going to continue worshiping our own gods, too. We'll have a mixture of religion. And so the Babylonian system, not only a government of kings and despots and tyrants, and lording it over, and kings wanting to be worshipped, but also a system of religion that is so good at combining things and mixing things, and that's continued down through history as well. So we see a government that came out of Nimrod. We see a type of a king that's different than the king Jesus Christ will be, and the king that the Bible says, you and I, if we continue to live his way and be led by his spirit, different than the kings we will be. In fact, the total opposite of what kings under God's definition is. We see a sun god coming up where people begin to worship the sun, and they have these little trees that they have all the trappings of these things that kind of mean something to them. We have those things, and if we look at here in what I just read out of the Bible commentary, we see that Baal, the noted sun god of the Bible who Israel often fell prey to, was married to a goddess named Ashtaroth. We know Ashtaroth. She's also known as Ishtar. She is, again, in every single pagan religion and nation that's out there. All of them have someone that's associated with her just by different names. And we see this concept of a queen that begins to appear on the earth, and the queen and the mother begins to be adored as it is there. And God has some things to say about that as well. Let's go back to Judges 2, because one of the things he warns Israel about is, you know, the sun god that the nations around them are worshiping, the symbols that they use to worship that sun god. And he also tells them to be aware of these queens and the queen of heaven that the nations around because they all have these mother gods, these goddesses that they're worshiping that isn't any part of the Bible at all.

And it might have begun with Nimrod's wife, who saw herself in that. Many people call her Semiramis in other languages. She has other names. Where am I going here? Judges. Judges 2. Judges 2 and verse 13. You see the people quickly after they come into the land, they forsake the Lord, turned away from him. And what did they begin doing? They began serving the sun god and the queens and the goddesses. They began worshiping Baal and his wife. Some of the legends say it was not only his wife but his mother. All these gods had beginnings and they were faulty gods. But they began serving the Baal and the asterisks, the asterisks, the queens of heaven. Looking at my scriptures here. Let's go to Jeremiah 7. Jeremiah 7 verse 16.

God, speaking of the people of Judah at that time who were rebelling against him in Jeremiah, you know, lived his life trying to turn Judah back to God. In verse 16, God says, therefore don't pray for this people. Don't lift up a cry or prayer for them. Don't make intercession to me, for I will not hear you. Don't you see what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. The children gather wood. The fathers kindle the fire. The women need dough to make cakes for the queen of heaven. Look what they're doing. Don't even talk to me about them, God says. Look what they've done. They've gone so thoroughly against everything that I call them out to be. They pour out drink offerings to other gods that they may provoke me to anger.

God does get angry when he sees his people forsaking him and turning to another God, and even the symbols that people might use for that. He says the same thing back in Jeremiah 44.

As God talks about these goddesses that are out there and these saints that are created, Jeremiah 44 in verse 17.

Here people are responding to Jeremiah. You can see in verse 16, they say, As for the word that you have spoken to us in the name of the eternal, we will not listen to you, but we will certainly do whatever has gone out of our own mouth to burn incense to the queen of heaven, to pour out drink offerings to her as we have done. We and our fathers, our kings, our princes in the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem. For then, they say, we had plenty of food. We were well off and saw no trouble. We're going to continue worshiping these other gods. We're not listening to you, Jeremiah. We're not turning back to God. We will continue worshiping false gods and false goddesses.

You can read down through verse 25 of that, where God is talking about those things. Here's a response to that. But we see introduced goddesses. Again, from the epic of Gilgamesh, the first goddess may have been Nimrod's wife. Because Nimrod visited her, and she claimed that Nimrod visited her, and she claimed that Nimrod visited her.

She had a son as a result of that with him visiting her as a god. Now, some of the history out there and commentaries will say she was not a woman of wonderful love. She was a woman of wonderful repute, and as you look at the goddesses of the world, most of them aren't like moral figures, are they? Most of them, I mean, all the festivals around them are about sexual abandon.

But she claimed that she was divinely impregnated by Nimrod, and here's a son that she had. And so, we have from that, throughout every pagan nation, you find statues. And you can go to the museums in Berlin and the museums in London and around the world and see these statues they've uncovered of a mother and child. Of a mother and child. And that has gone through society in every nation. Now, let me read a little book here called Babylon Mystery Religion, written by a Ralph Woodrow. And some of this, well, all the book is very interesting. Some of it you cannot verify all through, you know, through independent sources. But let me read a couple of things that you can independently verify through Encyclopedia Britannica and other places. This is on page 13. It says, one of the most outstanding examples of how Babylonian paganism has continued to our day may be seen in the way that the Romus Church invented Mary worship to replace the ancient worship of the mother goddess. The story of the mother and child was widely known in ancient Babylon and developed into an established worship. Numerous monuments of Babylon showed the goddess mother Semiramis with her child Temuz in her arms. When the people of Babylon were scattered to the various parts of the earth, they carried the worship of the divine mother and her child with them. This explains why many nations worship the mother and child in one form or another, centuries before the true Savior Jesus Christ was born into this world. In the various countries where this worship spread, the mother and child were called by different names for, we recall, language was confused at Babel. And then he goes on and explains with all the different ones from China and all around the world what the mother and child figures in all these pagan nations and religions were. It was well known and established through their claiming to have begun in Babylon at that point. According to legend, let me go over to page 15.

You know where I'm going with that because during this time of season, at least in years past, you would see statues and you can go over to Rome and see statues of mother and child and how that is deified. Let's drop down to page 15. It says, this false worship, having spread from Babylon to the various nations in different names and forms, finally became established at Rome and throughout the Roman Empire. It says a noted writer concerning this period, the worship of the great mother was very popular under the Roman Empire. Inscriptions prove that the two, the mother and child, received divine honors not only in Italy and especially at Rome, but also in the provinces, particularly in Africa, Spain, Portugal, France, Germany, and Bulgaria. It was during this period when the worship of the divine mother was very prominent that the Savior Jesus Christ founded the true New Testament church. What a glorious church it was in those early days.

By the third and fourth centuries, however, what was known as the church had in many ways departed from the original faith, falling into the apostasy about which the apostles had warned.

When this falling away came, much paganism was mixed with Christianity. Unconverted pagans were taken into the professing church and in numerous instances were allowed to continue many of their pagan rites and customs, usually with a few reservations or changes to make their beliefs appear more similar to Christian doctrine. One of the best examples of such a carryover from paganism may be seen in the way the professing church allowed the worship of the great mother to continue, only in a slightly different form and with a new name. You see, many pagans had been drawn to Christianity, but so strong was their admiration for the mother goddess that they didn't want to forsake her. Compromising church leaders saw that if they could find some similarity in Christianity with the worship of the mother goddess, they could greatly increase their numbers.

But who could replace the great mother of paganism? Of course, Mary, the mother of Jesus, was the most logical person for them to choose. Why then couldn't they allow the people to continue their prayers and devotion to a mother goddess, only call her by the name of Mary instead of the former names by which she was known? Apparently, this was the reasoning employed, for this is exactly what happened. Little by little, the worship that had been associated with the pagan mother was transferred to Mary. And we know the story. Little by little, little by little, the pagan religion was assimilated into Christianity. But it didn't happen on day one. The early church had no part of Mary, as he quotes here. He says, Mary worship was no part of the original Christian faith. It is evident that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was a fine, dedicated, and godly woman, especially chosen to bear the body of our Savior. Yet none of the apostles or Jesus himself ever hinted at the idea of Mary worship. As the Encyclopaedia Britannica states, during the first centuries of the church, no emphasis was placed upon Mary whatsoever. This point is admitted by the Catholic Encyclopedia also. Devotion to our blessed lady in its ultimate analysis must be regarded as a practical application of the doctrine of the communion of saints, a group of men getting together. Not an application from the Bible, but an application of the communion of saints. Seeing that this doctrine is not contained in the earlier forms of the Apostle's Creed, there is perhaps no ground for surprise if we do not meet with any clear traces of the Blessed Virgin in the first Christian centuries, the worship of Mary being a later development. In fact, it wasn't until 431 that she became a saint and the church said, worship her. Worship her and see her as an intercessor.

So we see down through the ages, again, what happened that began with Nimrod, so many things. A kingdom, a king, defined in a way that he was a tyrant, it was all about him, and the people looked at him and he provided everything, saw himself as a god. We see a system of worship that began at that time that came down from Babylon that continues to this day because we see the trappings, and if we don't see the trappings, then we're blind or we simply don't want to see it. We see it all around us. We can't escape it. And so we live in a time right now where we see it and we're face-to-face with it, and it does have this effect on us when we see it, the same effect it has on God. This is the opposite. These are people who are rebelling against me. These are people who are in competition with me. These are people who are worshiping another god because they don't want what I have to offer them. Let me read here from something called the Abbott-Cornant Dictionary of Religious Knowledge. Then I'll bring this home.

Again, he shows how things are assimilated into our culture. How Israel allowed it to assimilate, but it's all in the world around us. He says, this book says, Christmas seems to have first appeared in the Roman Church after the middle of the fourth century. At a somewhat later period, it spread into Eastern Asia. It was not received with equal readiness by all the churches. Some denounced it as an innovation. It wasn't until the sixth century that anything like unanimity prevailed as to the day to be observed. The manner in which this festival came to be observed in the Romish Church and through it to the other churches is as follows. In this season of the year, a series of heathen festivals occurred.

The celebration of which was in many ways closely interwoven with the whole civil and social life of the Romans. These festivals had an import which easily admitted of being spiritualized and transformed into a Christian name. First came the Saturnalia, which represented the Golden Age and abolished for a while the distinction of ranks. Then came the custom peculiar to this season of making presents afterwards transferred to the Christmas festival. Next came a festival still more analogous to Christmas, that of the shortest day of the year known as Brumalia.

The birthday of the new sun about to return once more to earth. Hence, the celebration of the Nativity of Christ was transferred to December 25. In the Romish Church, Christmas is a very high festival. The most important festival, one of the at least two most important festivals, and all around that time decorations occur. You can see all the trappings of it. Here was an interesting, I thought an interesting quote that is in the body of this religious dictionary. It's an author by, I didn't write down his first name, Crippen. Here's what he says. He says, at the time of persecution, Christians, okay, this is after Jesus Christ's resurrection, at the time of persecution, Christians were detected by not decorating their houses at the Saturnalia. Isn't that an interesting quote? They didn't have to ask, are you keeping the Sabbath instead of Sunday? Your house isn't decorated. You must not be of the same faith we are. Isn't that an interesting thing that a religious festival could be so pervasive that even on the face of it you'll be known or could be known by what you do or don't do with your home for anyone passing by to see. Let's go to Revelation 13.

Revelation 13. We saw the beginning of Babylon, a governmental system, and a religious system that began back with this man Nimrod. And here at the end of the Bible, what he began is still extant on the earth at a time that's yet ahead of us, where the world moves from whatever our governments are today back to a state that more closely defines what Satan's way of government is. Chapter 13, verse 1. I stood on the sand of the sea and I saw a beast rising up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his horns ten crowns and on his heads a blasphemous name. He's against God.

Now the beast which I saw was like a leopard, his feet were like the feet of a bear, his mouth like the mouth of a lion. And who gave him his power? The dragon. Satan, as he's defined in Revelation 12, the dragon gave him his power, his throne, and great authority. He gave him his power and authority and he sounds like Satan. He sounds like Isaiah 14. He sounds like Ezekiel 28. Verse 4. So they worshiped the dragon who gave authority to the beast and they worshiped the beast, saying, Who's like him? Who's able to make war with him? Look at everything he brings us.

We have to be reliant on him. Who needs God? We'll take this God. We'll take this man.

And he was given a mouth, speaking great things and blasphemies, and he was given authority to continue for 42 months. And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, just like Nimrod stood there against God. He opened his mouth in blasphemy against God to blaspheme his name, his tabernacle, and those who dwell in heaven. It was granted to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority was given over every tribe, tongue, and nation. The whole world yielded to him except the people of God. Except the people of God. Who knew who God was and who knew what was going on, even though the whole world had fallen prey to who can make war with this king? He provides everything. And he has a religious element as well. The government, he convinced people were there, and he just goes out to make war with God's people. Just like the kingdoms of Babylon and the kingdom of Assyria that had its beginning in Nimrod, made war against the people of God. Assyria conquered Israel. Babylon conquered Judah. And this king is against God and his people as well. Go over to rebel... let's drop down. We've got a few minutes here in Revelation 13. 11. I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke like a dragon. Oh man, he sounds just like Isaiah 14. He sounds just like Ezekiel 28. He exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, this government, and causes the earth and all those who dwell in it to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed. He's the religious end. He's going to be the one who says, this is the way you will worship. This is the religion you must adhere to. And everyone who doesn't... now verse 14, he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived.

He gave breath to the image of the beast. In verse 16, he causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast or the number of his name.

He'll know. He'll know who's of the system and who's not. Here's wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast. It's the number of a man, number 666. The people of God will not receive the mark of that beast. The rest of the world will.

They'll fall prey to it because they don't have the Spirit of God that you and I do.

They can't see through it. They don't see the time that we live in and where these powers get their authority. Revelation 17.

Again, this is, of course, end time stuff ahead of us. Let's just drop down to verse 4 here. The woman, speaking of the church, the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, adorn with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the filthiness of her fornication. And on her forehead a name was written, Mystery Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and of the abominations of the earth. Then, now, and in time past, 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. And the angel said, Why do 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. And then he goes through the whole history of that. But in the end, in verse 18, or chapter 18, God puts an end to that system, that government and that religious system, forever.

Forever. Let me close in two places. One in Deuteronomy 12.

Learning everything we've learned about Nimrod. Seeing how it's permeated the earth from then until now. Seeing the symbols and seeing the two ways of life that are there between the way you and I know, God's way, and the way of the world, it should become pretty clear. What we're doing is pretty clear why God would hate this time of year. He would hate what he sees going on around us. And I think it explains to us why when we see those things in our neighborhood and we feel we feel separate, we feel apart because it has nothing of God. It has all, and it's the time of year when it's front and center and the whole world around us is worshiping different than us.

Deuteronomy 12 verse 29. When the Lord your God cuts from before you the nations which you go to dispossess and you displace them and dwell in their land, take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them. Now, 2 Corinthians 6 says, don't even touch them. Don't want to be any part of it. Take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them after they are destroyed from before you, that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, how did these nations serve their gods or worship their gods? I will do likewise. You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way. For every abomination to the Lord which he hates, they have done to their gods. They have even burnt their sons and daughters of the fire to their gods. Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it. You shall not add to it nor take away from it.

Do it the way God said. Don't compromise. Don't think that's okay. Oh, that seems harmless.

Understand what God sees when he sees the season that we're in.

I guarantee you, God isn't saying the reason for the season is what the world says. The reason for the season is because man is against God, because man rebels against God, because man has a carnal nature and has been encompassed in competition with God and has not yielded to him and wants his own way at all costs and doesn't give up. James 1. James 1 and verse 27.

Pure, pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this. To visit orphans and widows in their trouble, that's the agape love part of the church that God expects us all to be developing. To visit orphans and widows in their trouble and to keep oneself unspotted from the world. Don't even touch it. Understand what it is and understand every time you see what the real reason for this season is.