Russia in Prophecy

Okay, so now we are ready for the sermon. And we have a PowerPoint presentation. It's called Russia in Prophecy. So, as you well know, over a fourth of the Bible is prophecy. God is the one that reveals the framework of prophecy. Now, it is true we don't have all the details, but it's just like a human body that we have the skeleton, we have the main parts of the body that we can understand. Now, what color are the eyes of this? No, that's too detailed. But we do have a framework. We have, just like the body has the skeleton, we have a framework of prophecy. And this is what Christ spoke about. And I want to bring this up. I gave a sermon on Russia in Prophecy in 2015, after the Russians had invaded and occupied the Crimean Peninsula. You might remember that started it. And, of course, using biblical prophecies as best as we understand them, because there'll be a lot more God will reveal, and we will have to adjust our understanding. But what has happened so far in the Ukrainian crisis in 2014? So this is eight years ago that I gave it. And these are the points that I mentioned we should look at in the future. Number one, it has awakened the European Union to the Russian threat to rebuild the Soviet Empire. Have you heard that recently? Yes, we have.

And if you go to Arki News and put down the awakening of a giant, there you can read the article that they have awakened Germany and other nations in Europe. They are rearming very rapidly. They have woken up from this sleep. Number two, it has showed the weakness of the U.S.

The moral decline led to moral weakness and waffling. So we have a leadership crisis where other nations are feeling that they can get away with things. They are emboldened.

And this was back eight years ago, and now it's even worse. Number three, Europe will need strong leaders. If you were in Texas, which as you probably know, the Ukraine is slightly smaller than Texas, if you had this large country that was just one state away that is threatening you, believe me, that would get people's attention. And Europe is very close. As a matter of fact, Ukraine is part of Europe, as well as one half of Russia.

Number four, look to Russia becoming closer to China, militarily, politically, economically. Have we seen that trend? How many think that's the trend? Yep, it's about the whole room.

And number five, the church must do its job warning the world and preparing a people for the end time and the coming kingdom that Christ is going to bring. And now, in 2022, all of these things are coming to pass. We see this is the trend. This is the tendency. We don't have a crystal ball, but we have a Bible framework that tells us about these nations in our days and how they are fulfilling their destinies. And so we have now the symbol of Russia is a bear. The Russian bear is now attacking and Europe is awakening. This is the first true war in Europe since World War II. See, a lot of the youths have never seen a European war.

Oh, they had read or watched movies about World War II, but now it's happening again. But now, with nuclear bombs that Russia has, and now you've got nuclear reactors that are being threatened to be blown up, and then you have this dirty bomb go off. If they destroy those reactors, you're going to have this huge cloud of radioactive dust go and settle all over Europe.

That's how quickly our lives can change. And so what did Christ tell us we should be doing? We have read the Scripture many times before.

In Luke 21, 34 through 36, Christ said, but take heed to yourselves. In other words, be careful with your spiritual lives. Take heed, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life. The world wants to involve you. It wants to swallow you in all of these lifestyles and pleasures, and it's going to be just like the time of Sodom and Gomorrah, where people were just living normal lives, and they had no idea there was going to be a catastrophe. It was going to fall on them and completely evaporate them. If you look at the last magazine, the Beyond Today magazine, it talks about ancient Sodom. And of course, with biblical archaeology is one of my strengths. I've been following this for the past 15 years, since the archaeologists started digging in that area. Is it a coincidence that from all the indications, ancient Sodom has been discovered again? You can actually see, and they just had a report. You can look it up on the internet, that investigators and scientists went to that area, and they came to the conclusion that this site in particular was destroyed by a massive air burst, kind of like the atomic explosion that just disintegrated, and the clay in the area, in the jars, became glass. And this is the same thing that happened over there at Los Alamos, when they detonated the atomic bomb. And then they came back and they looked at what actually was clay and ceramic became glass. It was heated over 2,000 degrees. They found the same evidence. It's very interesting. I could give a whole Bible study on that subject.

And so, it goes on to say, be careful. Don't get sucked in by this present society that Satan wants you to be destroyed. He doesn't want you to survive. He wants to put you under his rule.

And the church has always resisted Satan. It has always been the one that has the spiritual knowledge and truth and has not buckled under Satan's influence. And he's trying to get the youth to pervert themselves and to do wrong things, so sin will be multiplied. And the punishment will be even greater. It goes on to say, and that they come on you unexpectedly. It's not going to be announced. The world is going to be shocked when God intervenes as the people in Sodom and Gomorrah were shocked. For it will come as a snare, which means as a trap, on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth. So it's not going to be just a minor test.

It's going to come upon the entire world.

Watch, therefore, Christ tells us. And that means be awake. Be aware of world events. And also, watch for yourselves, your spiritual conditions, because that also has to do with that. And pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass.

Do we always pray that God have mercy on us when these things come to pass?

And that spiritually, God says, I am going to protect you. When the time of tribulation comes upon this earth, I will protect you. Watch that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass and to stand before the Son of Man. What does the term stand mean? In verses 27 and 28, it talks about when you see these things, it means your redemption is near. Redemption means your transformation, that you will be transformed. You will be redeemed by God at that time, and you'll be converted into a spirit being. And when Christ comes back, you will be able to stand before Him, because there's going to be a lot of people that are going to die at that time. So it's up to us to know if we are going to stand before Him or not.

In 1 Thessalonians 5.20, it warns us the easy reading version of the Bible.

Don't treat prophecy like something that is not important. Don't make that mistake. A lot of people say, oh, all of that stuff, just pure speculation. It doesn't have to do with my life.

That's one of the warnings, because God is not lying to us when He talks about these prophetic events happening. It's in your Bible, but you have to know how to find it, how to look for it. That's part of the church purpose that we have. 2 Peter 1, 18 through 21. I'd like to read that one.

2 Peter chapter 1, 18 through 21. Here's where it talks about the prophetic framework that we have.

2 Peter 1, 18 through 21.

Sorry, 2 Peter 1, 18. It says, And we heard this voice talking about God, which came from heaven, when we were with him on the holy mountain. And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, because it comes from God, which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts talking about when Christ comes. You will have been ready. You will have prepared your life for His coming. And boy, I'll tell you, that really caught my attention as a young man. Yes, I can live a normal life, just like everybody in their ignorance. Or I could actually prepare myself and serve God at this critical time of history. And it's talking about here that I want to be here when Christ comes back and be standing in the faith and ready for His coming and being a good servant of Him. You know, I'm not interested in just being in a secular job somewhere and not doing anything in the church. We need to have support. We're all working together in this. It will be rewarded a thousand times in the future, if you just are willing to put a bit of sacrifice now to serve God wholeheartedly, not for profit, not for power or for importance, because of what He did for us. He died for us. He shed His blood for each one of us. And He wants us to be His servant, to truly do His will. That's why I always say, just like it tells us in Exodus 22 and 23, about when they had these servants that would serve a person. And if you really loved your master after six years, you got your liberty back.

But there it says, but if you love your master and you want to serve Him, the rest of your life He's going to treat you well. You're going to grow up in that family. And it says that you take an awl, which is a way of making a puncture, and they put the earlobe to the wall. And with that awl, and with a hammer, they made a hole in it. And there you knew that was permanent. And you know what? You know, I have a spiritual hole here. I already am not my own. I want to serve God till the very end, whatever it is. And that's what He's saying here, that we are waiting for that Christ like the morning star, that's Venus, that shows up before the sun. And it kind of starts clearing up the sky, knowing this first. That no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation. It shouldn't be something that a person starts speculating on their own.

Bible interprets itself. We should look in the Bible for its own interpretation of what it's saying.

For prophecy never came by the will of man. This isn't something that somebody dreamed up.

But holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.

God used them to transmit this precious truth that is in God's Word.

Okay, going on. We have the present world crisis, which is the Ukraine.

And I want to give you important facts about the Ukrainian war, the political influences of the Ukraine and Crimea. Ukraine is the second largest country in Europe, a bit smaller than Texas. And only Russia is larger. Ukraine is larger than Germany, or France, or Spain, or Great Britain.

Great Britain.

Here we have a map of the current invasion of Russia in the north, east, and south.

And to give you an impression of here we have the Ukraine, and just about Russia is attacking it.

And then you have all the European Union members, which are in that light tan color.

Those are all NATO countries, which are the Western allies.

As you can see, several of them border the Ukraine.

And so the problem we see is that there are so many alliances, just like in World War I, that just one assassination of the Archduke of that area of the Hungarian Empire, he was assassinated, and then all of these alliances were triggered. Well, if Russia invades those smaller countries, like Lithuania, up to the north there, or Estonia, the whole group, including the United States, has to go to war with Russia.

And then it's not only Russia, but China and all of their allies.

And because you're stuck, it says there, Article 5 of the Charter of NATO, that if one of those countries is invaded, that is an act of war, and all the nations, NATO nations, have to go and protect them. So in a way, it's a mess.

It's very dangerous what's going on right now.

So who are the Russians and China according to the Bible?

So the Bible identifies in the table of nations of Genesis 10.

Basically, these were the nations after the flood, Noah, his children.

And it says here, now this is a genealogy of the sons of Noah, Sham, Ham, and Japheth.

And sons were born to them after the flood.

The sons of Japheth were Gomer, Magog, Medai, Javan, Tubal, Meshach, and Tiras.

Now, basically, and there are some exceptions, these children of Japheth are the Eurasian nations.

All of these, including Russia, China, and all of the Far East.

And then the sons of Gomer were Askenaz, Ripeth, and Togarmeth.

Japheth basically are the Eurasians, the Eastern Slavs.

Those are part of the Russians and Ukrainians.

And the Orientals, including India, Magog, the son of Japheth, was divided into two branches, the Western Caucasian-looking Slavs, and an Eastern Asiatic type. So you're going to have some Western Caucasian-looking Slavs that usually are the Rus tribes, R-U-S, where the term Russians come from, which the term Rus means blondes.

So we have blond Slavs, and Vlad Putin is an example of a blond Slavs. So a lot of Ukrainians are part of this group as well.

You can look at the sources. Josephus talked about where Gog and Magog were out there to the northeastern side of Israel. From Israel, the nations are northeast.

We have a very fine booklet, 1987 WCG online booklet, which is called Russia and China in Prophecy.

I recommend it's in the PDF file. You'd be surprised how much accuracy.

Even if it's 1987, it still gives a lot of where these Eurasian nations, their origin, and also in prophecy. And also Herodotus, the Greek historian, mentions about these areas of the world.

Now we come to Ezekiel 38 because it here talks directly about Gog and Magog.

And these are nations that just oppose God. They have a certain mentality that they're ruthless as a whole and also just always wanting to conquer and invade others.

It says, now the word of the Lord came to me saying, Son of man, set your face against Gog, which means high or a mountain, a great prince of a people. So sometimes the king is mentioned as the nation of someone.

And the Russians come from Rus, which means blondes.

Meshach is an old name for the Moschi tribe, where the term Moscow comes from.

And Tubal is Tobolsk. We're going to see a map where they're at.

And prophesy against him and say, Thus says the Lord God, behold, I am against you, O God, the prince of Rosh. I'm sure Putin is included today in this, in the sense of, this is the same characteristics. They undermine world order. The Soviet Union was one of the greatest dangers mankind ever had to face. But the mentality is there. They want the glory. They want all that power. Countries don't want to be under them, but they're powerful.

And they will suppress, just like you've heard of Putin saying that, oh, the Ukrainian people are just going to open their arms. They all want to be under Russia. Yeah, sure. How did that work out? It goes on to say, Gog, the prince of Rosh, so again, the prince of the Russian people, because that's where they came from, the area, Meshach and Tubo, I will turn you around, put hooks in your jaws, lead you out with all your army, horses and horsemen, all splendidly clothed, a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords. Persia, which today is Iran.

Well, Iran is being backed by the Russians. Ethiopia. Ethiopia has a kind of a socialistic type of system. Libya are with them, all of them with shield and helmet.

Gomer and all its troops, the house of Tagarma, from the far north and all its troops, many people are with you. So here's a key that, remember, the Bible always is oriented with Israel in the center.

And so to the east, you have Egypt and Libya and all of these. To the west, you have Middle Eastern countries and then later on China. And to the north, you have this great land of the Russian steeps and all of the Mongolia, the Tartar nations, and Genghis Khan, who was a Mongol from Magog, actually conquered a great part of Russia, conquered China, and left its mark there.

Okay, so let's look at a map here. This is a pretty ancient map. It says here, early Christian centuries. So this must have been like the 300s, 400s, 500s, and already the map makers there had Russia, the Rusk in that area above the Caspian Sea, as you see there. And you have the area of the Moschi, which is Moscow, Meshech area. And then to the top right, there you have Tobolsk.

That is another term for that Tobol.

The Arabs knew very well, and they had maps, Gog and Magog, and this has been going on for centuries.

Here, Russia by the 1200s. And so you started with this principality in the center here, and as you can see, Kiev was very close to that, but this is where the Russian people started conquering other nations. And it grew, and it grew to the empire of the Russians. And of course, Ukraine is included in this. It was swallowed up by 1850, after centuries of conquest.

And these are the prophetic identities as we understand them today. You have Ross, Gog, Gog, to the north, and then Magog, China, and all of these areas, food, India, Persia, Iraq, Iran area, Kush, African nations.

So people have really not moved that much. We know we have a very metropolitan world today, but basically the African people have lived there. They didn't really come from other parts.

After the flood, they settled in these different areas. And you have the Chinese who have been there for thousands of years, until the Mongols under Genghis Khan in the 1200s conquered the Chinese. So you got all of this Magog with China. Let's continue, because it's very interesting. In Ezekiel 38, it's a prophecy. It's not about the time of Ezekiel. It's talking about in the end times, and even after the coming of Christ. In Ezekiel 38, 8 through 11, it says, after many days, in other words, this is far into the future, you will be visited in the latter days, which is a key, end times, and even further, you will come into a land of those brought back from the sword and gathered from many people on the mountains of Israel, which had long been desolate. They were brought out of all the nations, and now all of them dwell safely. Well, that's not the case today, and that won't be the case until Jesus Christ comes back and regathers all of these lost tribes of Israel. God knows where they are, and He's going to bring them back to the land. But it doesn't mean everybody gets converted immediately after Christ comes back. It says, you will ascend, coming like a storm, covering the land like a cloud. On that day it shall come to pass, that thoughts will arise in your mind, and you will make an evil plan. You will say, I will go up against the land of unwalled villages.

People have peace. They're in God's kingdom. I will go to a peaceful people who dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls and having neither bars nor gates. And people don't even use locks anymore, because it's being governed under Jesus Christ. But these ancient hordes in the north, they have not really been told all these things. Yes, many of the armies that came were destroyed, but you still have a huge amount of people. You know, the Oriental people, very few, have to do with Christianity. And they've been taught atheism now for decades, and when they get a chance, they say, well, boy, these people, they don't even have arms, they don't have anything. We can conquer them, and say they will descend. And so we have the invasion after Christ comes back, before all the rebellions are put down. And here we have Ezekiel 38, the invasion of Gog and Magog, that will come down to Jerusalem. As you can see, also from the east, they will come. And then we come to this scripture in Ezekiel 38, 21 through 23. I will call for a sword against Gog throughout all my mountains, says the Lord God. Every man's sword will be against his brother, and I will bring him to judgment with pestilence and bloodshed. I will rain down on him, on his troops, and on many peoples who are with him, flooding rain, great hailstones, fire, and brimstone. Christ acts immediately. He says, Thus I will magnify myself and sanctify myself, and I will be known in the eyes of many nations. Then they shall know that I am the Lord. Ezekiel 39, 9, it says, Then those who dwell in the cities of Israel will go out and set a fire, and burn the weapons, both the shields and bucklers, the bows and arrows, the javelins and spears, and they will make fires with them for seven years. That's all of the warfare that now Russia and China are building up. And it's going to take seven years during the millennium to just melt down all those weapons of war.

Notice now the size of Russia in comparison to the rest of the nations around them.

That's why they can feel their oats. They feel mighty.

They're the bully in the neighborhood. And now we've seen the bully act up.

This in the dark blue is what the USSR is today, but they lost all of these nations, including the Ukraine. They want them back by force, if necessary.

Now, remember, Russia might look very big, but if you look where Finland is, which is the northern little country up there, if you look and you just make a horizontal line across, about two-thirds of Russia is ice and very cold, Siberia. So all of that, except that they found oil there, is not really very worthwhile. It's just south of there where you have the fertile land and where most of the Russians live. About two-thirds of the Russian nation is unoccupied as a whole.

Now, let's see in size comparison, the Soviet Union or the Russia with the United States, including Alaska. So the US is basically the one that can stand down Russia, not the Europeans right now. But the US is far away. We have been blessed with two big oceans.

They're like moats in a castle. Huge moats! But if you're living close to Russia, kind of reminded me of a Mexican president once said, poor Mexicans, so far from God and so close to the United States. Well, the Ukrainians can say something like that, too, which is poor Ukrainians, so far from God and too close to Russia.

But of course, the US has been a good neighbor and nothing like this other. But anytime you have a huge nation, superpower, and you have a little one, you know you have to tread lightly, right? That's the way the Ukrainians feel right now. Here's the tribal separation in Europe and Russia. So this is the main part of Russia that is populated and it's the Slavs, which again, you have the blondish Slavs and then you have more of the Eastern Slavs.

So you see the different tribes that had grown up to be nations. In Daniel 11 verses 43 through 45, it tells us what is going to happen. Now we're going back to our present times before Christ returns. Daniel 11, 43 through 45, it says talking about the king of the north, which still it can happen very quickly. The formation of the 10 prophetic kings in Revelation 17. God prophesied already in Daniel that in Europe, which is the area, ancient part, the king of the north, used to be the Roman Empire and in its different iterations or resurrections, that we're in the sixth resurrection, which ended during World War II, and the seventh and last resurrection of this Holy Roman Empire is about to appear. With a king of the north, he is going to be even worse than Adolf Hitler that will appear. He will have demonic powers, as I will bring out. So it isn't the person as important as that this person has yielded themselves to being guided by by Satan, and that's how all these atrocities happened during World War II. Daniel 11 43 through 45, it says, he the king of the north shall have power over the treasures of gold and silver and over all the precious things of Egypt. Also the Libyans and Ethiopians shall follow at his heels. So they're going to conquer all of this northern Africa area. Hitler did the same thing. He actually wanted to conquer all of these northern African countries. They were in charge of everything from Tunisia and then Libya, but they were stopped by the British there in Egypt, the frontier, and they couldn't sweep up to meet all the way to Greece, where they would control the whole Mediterranean. They got pretty close with Rommel there, but they couldn't make it. Well, here it's the same type of strategy. You invade the Middle East, and so they do this. It says, but news from the east and the north. And in the Greek, there's no term like northeast. So when the Greeks talk and they talk about northeast and east, it's talking about northeast section. And if you draw from Israel a line northeast, that's where Magog are. But news from the east and the north area of Gog and Magog shall trouble him, the king of the north. Therefore he shall go out with great fury to destroy and annihilate many. And he shall plant the tents of his palace between the seas and the glorious holy mountain. That means that he's going to conquer Israel, and he's going to set up there the religious center with the false prophet in Jerusalem. That's what it talks about in 2 Thessalonians 2, about that temple and that he sits. And that's the false prophet that will sit there. But the beast has to conquer that territory first. Yet he shall come to his end, and no one will help him. So when Christ comes back, he's finished. So what's going on in Europe right now? Well, the Europeans are having meetings in what they call the space egg, which is this huge building. And inside, there's this whitish egg, and that's where they meet. This is the European council. It's the heads of state they meet. They are the ones that make the decisions. And I was really surprised when The Economist magazine, this past October 23rd, published the article called Court of Kings. It said, in the European Union, every leader becomes a monarch, which is the same word for a king. The European council hands leaders too much power.

Notice in the drawing, each leader of these Europeans, they're 27 right now, is shown wearing a crown. And it reminds me in Daniel 2, 36 through 44, about the eventual 10 leaders that will arise that will hand the power to the beast.

Well, again, once the king of the north feels threatened from the east, just like Hitler felt threatened by the Russians and invaded them, this is what is called in the Bible in Revelation 12, 8. Revelation 8, 12 through 9, 12, it's called the first wall because this is the first battle.

And basically, it's an air battle that Europe sends the planes and helicopters. That's why it's described as these huge locuses that are going and they're going to attack. Notice what the Russian mentality is. How many of the airplanes and helicopters, they can't even conquer some place like the Ukraine so far, but they've got all these huge tanks like the bear. It's not very quick and it's not like the eagle, not like the lion.

And then we have the second wall, which is the counter-attack. Here, Russians, China, they gather and they attack Europe. This is described in Revelation 9, 13 through 21, and you'll see there that it talks about these huge armored horses, but that their armor plated and out of their mouths come out this smoke and fire. And it has a kind of a serpent's tail that is shooting things because, of course, John was using his own terminology of the first century. And then, finally, the third wall is when they converge on the area of Israel at Armageddon, and then Christ comes down in the clouds. That's the resurrection, the first resurrection, his saints go up and are with him as he descends on Jerusalem. He destroys these nations from the king of the north and from the east and all the other nations. Now, in World War II, I want to say, Satan has used dysfunctional, perverted men to do his will in the past, such as Hitler, Stalin, and Mao. Hitler in charge of the German, Stalin in charge of the Russians, and Mao in charge of the Chinese. He will use similar evil men in the future and enter into them along with some of his demons. Notice what it says in Revelation 16, 13, and 14.

It says, The sixth angel poured his bowl on the great Euphrates River that divides the Middle East from Asia, and it became a fine road bed for the kings from the east.

Well, that's India, China, and others.

Some of the areas of the Middle East as well. From the mouths of the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet, I saw three foul demons crawl out. They look like frogs.

These are demon spirits performing signs. They're after the kings of the whole world to get them gathered for the battle on the great day of God. And so, when Satan is involved, then you're going to have a lot of destruction, and he uses these people as puppets. So, then, starts the good news. Christ returns in the clouds and defeats the warring nations as they converge in Jerusalem. The beast and the false prophet are thrown alive into the lake of fire, Revelation 19, 19-21. He then puts Satan and his demons in a deep pit and seals it for a thousand years. He's not going to have any influence or involvement during the thousand-year period of Jesus Christ. And then, Christ will rebuild Jerusalem. Ezekiel 43, 5-7. It talks about that new Jerusalem. Actually, it's not the one with God the Father coming later, but this is a new Jerusalem where he will reign for a thousand years. He will rule with the saints of the first resurrection for a thousand years. This will be the ultimate solution to man's problems. There will be no more war, poverty, pain, or diseases. Ezekiel 43, 5-7. God says, this is a place where I will dwell with men.

Revelation 24-6 talks about those that will rule with Christ at that time. Blessed are they who are part of the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, and they will rule with Jesus Christ for a thousand years. And that's what we are all being trained to be part of that group. Can you imagine being able to start at the beginning of this government of God on earth and be able to serve and be sent by Christ to convert the nations and to serve people at that time and teach them the right way to govern? You know, I look forward one day to be serving the Cuban people as well and be able to be there and see them come to the knowledge of the truth and be converted. And everyone, God has a role for you to one day reign over cities in God's kingdom. Regarding the European Union, Paul Henry Spock, Belgian Prime Minister and President of the Council of Europe in 1949 through 1951, said something prophetic.

He said, we do not want another committee there in the European Union. We have too many already.

What we want is a man of sufficient stature to hold the allegiance of all people and to lift us out of the economic morass in which we are sinking. Send us such a man and be he God or the devil we will follow him.

That's the mentality. They're looking for that strong leader. Will he appear soon? Will that be the next shoe that falls? The first one was COVID and how it changed people's lives.

And now the Ukrainian war is the second. The saber rattling. Wars and rumors of wars. Now it's really getting heated up. And we're going to start seeing some leaders that are like the ones that were in the second world war. So don't have much time left. From what we presently understand, number one, Gog and Magog will be part of the kings of the east that will first be attacked by the European beast power. That's the first woe I talked about. Then they will counter-attack in the second woe and convergent Armageddon and at Jerusalem be defeated. That's the third woe.

There will be a second rebellion by them at the beginning of the millennium leading a Eurasian horde described in Ezekiel 38 and 39. A third and final rebellion of Gog and Magog will take place at the end of the millennium when Satan is loosed and is described in Revelation 27 and 9.

So this has always been the rebellious spirit that enters into the nations. So as I begin to conclude here, we need to be watching world events. We don't know all the details, but do have the overall framework of prophecy. Now whether you stay in the church or not, you're going to have this framework of prophecy. Follow you the rest of your life because now you know the truth about it. And it's just a matter of where will you be at that time.

There will be four great end-time leaders that will arise. Number one, the beast. And Daniel called the king of the north, backed by 10 European rulers. Number two, the false prophet, a miracle working leader that presently is in Rome. He's still, that leader hasn't arrived yet, but we see the system already working, described in Revelation 17. Number three, the king of the south, probably an Arab Mahdi or their Messiah. So all of these Arabs and Muslims are just going to be captivated by this leader in time of the end. And then four, Gog leading a federation of nations, Magog and other nations.

And so this is what prophecy tells us, that a part of the church will be protected at the end time. We're going to go through a time tunnel that's three and a half years long. It's called the Great Tribulation. Nobody can leave it once you've entered it, and you have to survive all the way through, because there's no getting away. But before we enter, God is going to have mercy on his church.

And it says here in Revelation 12-14, when Satan comes down and ready for the Great Tribulation, and it says, but the woman, talking about the church, was given two wings of a great eagle. That means the church will be taken to a place of protection. That she might fly into the wilderness. It's going to be an area that's not going to be inhabited by anyone at the time. To her place. God knows where that place is. Now, we believe from all indications, the Bible, it's the place is next to Israel in Jordan called Petra.

There is an area, thousands of acres, and it's got 10,000 caves, and it's got a whole water system, and nobody lives there. There's not a hotel, there's not a house, because the Arabs are frightened because there are spirits that keep everybody away from settling in. I went there to that place, and I talked to some of those Arabs. They said, we have to leave before sunset, because once we're here, then all the things start happening.

And they fled with their trucks. They took all their stuff from the caves and just fled as far as you could. That happens every day. How many have gone to Petra? How many? A couple? Okay. So the woman was given two wings to fly to her place where she is nourished. Now that means that the woman is not going to be in charge of nourishing herself. She doesn't have to provide the nourishment. It says she will be nourished. So probably, just like the Israelites for 40 years, about two to three million were fed every day with manna and water and such nutritious food that nobody got sick.

Everybody, even if they were old, their clothes, they never rotted during that time. They are going to be nourished. How long? For a time and times and half a time. Three and a half years. And then the church prepares for the coming of Christ. We plan to have universities there, schools.

We're going to have training. Everybody's going to get just no distractions as far as we go. We got three and a half years. The kids are all going to be together. We're going to have wonderful activities. It's going to be family time. You don't have to worry about working. Yes, it's kind of nice. We do have some engineers and architects. I don't know how you want to get your cave fixed up, but whatever happens, it's going to be a time. And it might be someplace else.

We can't be 100% sure, but whatever it is, God is going to protect the church and says here that He will be protected from the presence of the serpent. Satan can have no involvement during that time. It's going to be like this bubble over that area. It's going to be protected. I use that analogy when we go to the Feast of Tabernacles. It's like God puts this bubble of protection every year. Preparing. And the Feast of Tabernacles is a sort of preparation for that coming time of fleeing.

So this is the last slide. This is the encouraging lesson for the coming Passover. We're going to be taking the Passover, which is the first of God's feasts in the Bible. Revelation 19 6 through 9 says, and I heard, as it were, the voice of a great multitude as the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty thundering, saying, hallelujah, for the Lord God omnipotent reigns.

Let us be glad and rejoice and give him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come. Those are the people that made it. Through thick and thin, they remain faithful. To the end, they will have the marriage supper with Jesus Christ at his coming. For the Lamb has come, and his wife, talking about the church, has made herself ready. And to her, it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen. It wasn't something she earned God granted through his grace. For them all, all their sins are forgiven.

Everybody is with white clothing, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. They're the ones that are keeping the Sabbath. They're the ones that are keeping the Holy Days. And they're also the ones that not only are keeping it externally, but with the right spirit. There's a spirit of conversion, of dedication inside. You can keep the things outside. It doesn't mean you're keeping them.

Spiritually inside. So these are doing that. And it says, then he said to me, right, blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb. Boy, talk about winning the lottery ticket of the universe. And we have an opportunity to be part of that. So let's stay strong. Let's stay faithful. And let's keep the faith.