Understanding How the World Works

When you go to Germany, excuse me, when you go to Europe, there are many places to see. But, in my opinion, anyone who ever goes to the European continent should go to Germany, if you want to understand Europe. Europe is a very complex, complicated region of the world. It has been the source of wars, religious, political wars, too in the last century that were world wars, originated in Europe.

If you ever go to Europe, my recommendation, and I think Karl Roth and Bacher would agree with me, if you want to understand Europe, you should go to Germany. If you go to Germany, if you want to understand Germany, you must go to Berlin, which is the capital of Germany. For years after World War II, Berlin was divided into East and West Berlin. But we had the opportunity to see Berlin in that state with the Berlin Wall dividing the city as a result of World War II. Russians had one zone, the Americans and French and English had another zone. It was quite a sight to see.

But since 1989, the Wall came down. It's a United City. It's the capital, as it once was in the past, now again, of a United Germany. And you must see Berlin if you want to understand Germany. There are other things to see in Germany. Cuckoo clocks. That's Switzerland, isn't it? Good beer and nice scenery, but you want to see Berlin. If you go to Berlin, there is one place that you should go. It is a museum called the Pergamon Museum.

It's rather large. It's a unique museum. It has within its halls the many tiles and stones and a near-life-sized representation, replica, of the Istar Gate from Babylon. It's as close as you can get outside of going to Iraq to understanding a bit of what ancient Babylon was like at the time of Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel. But that's not the most important thing to see. In the Pergamon Museum, the largest room is dedicated solely to one exhibit, a large exhibit that takes up a room that is at least three times the size of our hall.

Probably. At least three times the size. In terms of height, width, and just go back about three more times. In that hall is an ancient altar. They call the altar of Zeus. It came there about a century ago after the Germans had been excavating in the ancient city of Pergamos in what is now Turkey, ancient Asia Minor. This huge, gigantic altar dominates this room. Not only the original reliefs and steps and freezes from this altar, but their own representation of what the altar itself looked like as you can go up and past these steps and these huge pictures.

Some of you will remember a few years ago after making a trip there, I showed you a slideshow with those very images that are on the altar of Zeus at Pergamos. Now, what is so significant about that altar? A lot of altars from the ancient world, but this one is probably the largest known and it is magnificent, but it is also very instructive because as you stand and look at the altar of Zeus in the Pergamos Museum in Berlin, you are looking at huge panels that are taller than two of us stacked on one end and will stretch the length of this wall that are representations, giant representations, of gods, goddesses, and huge giants engaged in conflict, in combat, in conflict.

You have representations of Apollo, of Athena, of Zeus, and other gods, goddesses from the Greek stories and the Greek myths. And they are engaged in combat with their shields and their helmets and their swords and their lances and their chariots, and they are waging war against men who are giants in themselves, but they are getting the worst of the battle and the fight according to the story that is told in these depictions.

The spears are being thrust through them, the swords are chopping their heads off, they are in anguish. And what's also interesting about these pictures are intertwined between the legs and around the bodies and vast relief as well are huge serpents with their mouths wide open and their tongues going out. Huge lion heads are also part of this relief that are interspaced there. Some of the lions are being killed, some of the lions are eating the men, the serpents are woven in and through all of this.

And this is what this alter from the ancient city of Pergamos depicts. On about seven or eight sides, and they're huge, you spend a half a day just studying and looking at one, you haven't looked at the same one twice.

It is a scene of chaos and it is a scene of confusion. Now what makes this alter so fascinating for us on the day of Atonement is what we read back in Revelation chapter 2.

Revelation chapter 2.

The letter to the church at Pergamos, which begins in verse 12, which keep in mind is the words of Jesus Christ. Christ says to the church of Pergamos, these things says, he who has the sharp two-edged sword, I know your works and where you dwell, where Satan's throne is.

You hold fast to my name and did not deny my faith, even in the days in which Antipas, my martyr, was killed among you, where Satan dwells. This is the city of Pergamos, where there was a church to which this letter was addressed. This is the city, through excavations that uncovered this great altar of Zeus that you can see in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. Now what is important for us to understand, and I brought this out a few years ago in the Bible study I gave regarding this, is that the very members that read this letter, given to them from John, actually from Jesus Christ, would walk by this temple every day in its original setting in the ancient city of Pergamon.

They would see all of these intertwined reptiles and serpents and lion's heads and the chaos of combat between the gods of mythology and human beings. They would see it. It was right in the center of the city, and it was quite large and dominant. It dominated the life of the religious and cultural life of the city of Pergamon. So when Jesus said to them, you dwell where Satan's seat is, they then would have immediately conjured up a picture in their mind of that very altar. They would know what he was talking about, where Satan dwells. There's a whole other dimension of the story about ancient Pergamos and its connection to this idea, but that altar is what is important that I want to focus on here this morning because Jesus was telling the church something, and it has a message for us today. The reason I say that if you go to Europe, you need to go to Germany. If you go to Germany, you need to go to Berlin, and if you go to Berlin, you need to see this altar because a person needs to see that altar if they want to understand not Berlin, Germany, Europe, but the world. If you want to understand how this world is and why it is the way that it is, that particular altar in that museum with what it depicts and with what we see from Revelation 2 here tells us why this world is the way that it is today. And it is the very reason we are here on the day of atonement, observing this day, one of God's holy days, with a fast, a very solemn occasion with meanings that are rife throughout this day, we understand something that is so important to this world. We understand how the world works and why this world is the way that it is today. The scenes on that altar are of chaos and confusion, war, killing, and the very representations from the Bible of a lion and of a serpent that we all understand to be the representations of Satan the devil. And all told in that picture is the story of why this world is the way that it is. And when we come to the day of atonement, maybe this is the most important thing for us to learn. It tells us why the world is full of chaos, war, and strife.

It tells us why evil exists in this world. Whether they are random acts of evil by an individual, who decides to go into an island off the coast of Norway and murder dozens of people for no reason other than his own ideology, or the one-on-one violence or the mass violence that will occur from time to time in this world of evil. Why there is suffering. On whatever scale we can ever imagine, why bad things happen to good people, and why there is war, and why we don't have the Kingdom of God on this earth right now. Even though we have had Jesus Christ the Son of God come and give his life as the Messiah and make an atonement for sin, we still do not have perfection and total atonement and redemption for all the world. This day reminds us why we need to go to the Feast of Tabernacles and why we need this knowledge, because the Kingdom of God, though Christ said it is at hand, is not here yet. Not in his fullness. Now it's here in the sense that you and I have been transferred into the Kingdom of Light through baptism and the receipt of God's Spirit. We have been removed, in a sense, spiritually into a different relationship with God, which is a fortaste of that Kingdom. But we can all give ourselves a hat-pin test and realize that we're not spirit beings yet. We haven't been changed to immortality. And the Kingdom is yet to come. The fullness of the resurrection and the glorified bodies of 1 Corinthians 15 are not upon any one of us. And yet, God has called us to understand, and you and I have chosen, to accept that calling. And we're in the process of being faithful and enduring to the end. Called, chosen, and faithful. Not everyone who's called picks up that or chooses to take that calling. And not everyone who chooses it even endures to the end. There's a combination in that phrase from the book of Revelation. But the Day of Atonement is a day for us to focus on some little understood spiritual dimension of life. That the altar of Zeus and the museum in Pergamon should tell us that comes right out of the Scriptures. Jesus said what he did here regarding Satan and what he knew was there in that city where these people dwelled. And he should know. Jesus talked quite a bit about Satan. In Luke chapter 10 and verse 18, he said, I beheld Satan fall like lightning from heaven. He was there. He saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. And he went on to say, I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy. Nothing will harm you. He was saying to his disciples on one occasion. Very interesting. Don't go out and start picking up snakes. Don't start getting into that at all. But he's speaking here spiritually that we have the power to overcome the enemy. That's where we are today. In Isaiah chapter 14, we can turn there.

Well-known Scripture, but we should be reminded of what the prophet was able to bring out in Isaiah chapter 14.

And beginning in verse 12, a little bit of prehistory.

For Isaiah is inspired to say, How are you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning?

How you were cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations. For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will also settle the mount of the congregation on the farther sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the most high, yet you shall be brought down to shield to the lowest depths of the pit. And he was. Just as Christ said, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. When Satan made an effort to usurp the power of God through a demented, twisted series of thoughts that began in his heart and spread to what Revelation chapter 12 tells us, must have been at least a third of the angels. Let's go over to Revelation 12 because this also helps us to understand this scene of chaos that an altar in Berlin tries to tell us.

Revelation chapter 12 is a whole chapter devoted to, as an inset chapter in the story of Revelation, to describing the church, the birth of Christ, the church being persecuted and attacked by Satan. Verse 7, we'll jump there, it says, War broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought. A depiction of Satan. Michael, a powerful archangel, one of two mentioned in the scripture along with Gabriel. But they did not prevail, though these angels, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world. He was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

And so he took that idea that he could be like God, and he convinced a number of others and led a rebellion. And then I heard a loud voice saying, salvation and strength in the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ have come. For the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. And then down in verse 12, the latter part, For the devil has come down to you, having great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time. So in what seems to be a picture of the future event, there's a flashback to what happened in Isaiah chapter 14, Ezekiel 28, also brings in at a point in time prior to what we read in Genesis 1 and verse 2, where there was a rebellion, a spiritual rebellion on such a scale that this one altar tries to tell in a physical sense. There was a spiritual rebellion and battle that took place. Now this altar of Zeus depicts a battle between gods and goddesses and giants. It's mythology. It's a Greek mythology. In Roman, we've woven into it in others. But it's kind of a mix-up of the whole story that we find in these scriptures in the Bible that tell us how this world came to be the way it is and the origin of evil, the accuser, and Satan, and a being like that. There were pride, envy entered into his heart, his mind, and all of it we could speculate on as to led to that and why that happened and how and even why that had to happen. Interesting questions to contemplate. You can run down various rivulets of answers to try to figure that particular period out of time with what little bit that God gives us. But I think what these vignettes from Isaiah, from Ezekiel, from Genesis, from Revelation, tell us is really a window into the world as it really is today. And that's what's most important. You see, when we come to Genesis 1 and verse 2, we read where God begins to recreate the earth and to form and shape it. Verse 1 of Genesis 1 tells us there was chaos and confusion, which was the result of this battle, which was the result of a battle that is depicted upon this altar in Berlin that we didn't know about other than what God tells us, but has lived on in various cultural myths and literature through all of those stories down to this time. But when we really understand it, we're getting an insight into the reason and the way this world really is and what is behind the present world that we live in.

And that's where we come to the Day of Atonement and why this day is so important for us.

I've come to appreciate this day. I'll share with you. This is my favorite Holy Day. My surprise you, not because we're fast. I still don't like to fast. I don't know how many times I told you that over the years, but I still don't like to fast. And I have to work at fasting, but I fast because I know it's a very important spiritual discipline. But that's what it is. But this day is perhaps my favorite because of what we learn from this day, what it means to the world, how important it is. You know, we keep the Passover in the spring, which is a very personal matter. That sets the whole thrust of the rest of the Holy Days and what we learn from the Holy Days with Christ's sacrifice. But the very preparation and scriptural teaching regarding the Passover makes it very personal. We are to examine ourselves. We are to work on putting out sin through the Days of Unleavened Bread. But we come and we take individually the symbols of the bread and wine, the body and blood of Christ. And then we kneel and we wash each other's feet in humility. It's a very personal time of reflection and examination. And we accept the blood of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice, and we understand what that means for us personally. And that's where the plan of God really does begin. When we come to the day of Atonement, we have, again, an Atonement with God. And we have Passover symbols and themes through this day. Because when we read back in Leviticus 16 on the special offerings on this day, we read about two goats. We read about other offerings. And we know that one of those goats represented Jesus Christ. And we talk about becoming at one with God. And we understand that. But then we think, well, wait a minute. Didn't we become at one with God through the Passover? We did. You did, and I did. And any other individual who was accepted that sacrifice became at one with God. But the world has not become at one with God. You see, that's where we diverge from traditional thinking about the Passover, the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. The world hasn't become at one with God. Not everyone has accepted the name of Jesus Christ. And whatever name they think they have accepted is a false name. Based on a false God, a false plan, and a false image.

Because we still have war, confusion, suffering, evil, in a world that has not yet been able to bring about the factors of the kingdom of God. I did a program that aired, I guess, last week on the millennium. And part of the program on Beyond Today, I was talking about the fact that human beings have never been able to bring about the conditions of the millennium. No political government, no church, no social movement, no ideology, no philosophy has ever been able to bring about utopian conditions. There have been so many efforts. Whether it's a dictator who tries to impose his will upon a country and a whole continent and a whole world and fails, drags the world into chaos in the result. Or whether it's a well-meaning individual who persuades a group of people to be like him and they march out into the wilderness of southern Indiana or Iowa, a place called Maytag out there in Iowa. I forgot the name of the place. You could go down here to New Harmony in southern Indiana and find an example of it. Amana, that's it. Amana, Iowa. They used to make Maytags there. Yeah. Amana, Iowa, New Harmony, Indiana, were experiments in utopian society building by well-meaning individuals, and they both failed.

They both failed for many reasons. No one has ever been able to build the millennium, to build the kingdom of God on this earth at this time. It hasn't happened. You know what? The Church of God hasn't been able to do it either.

We were discussing this the other night, some of us, and we had a visit with some, and we were talking about passing on the truth to the next generation and the importance of that and how difficult it is in this culture. And after the conversation, I got to thinking, you know what? We may be well-meaning, as we are. We've had our programs. We've had Ambassador College, three campuses. We had high schools, elementary schools, where we were going to teach, and did make a concerted, noble effort to teach God's way of life. And none of them exist anymore. And then we've had all kinds of other programs and youth education and camps and whatever, and still do, and still will. But after this conversation, I had to step back and realize, you know what? As well-meaning as we can be, we're not going to create the millennium either. We're not going to create the kingdom of God by our own efforts. That doesn't mean we shouldn't pass on and teach and prepare a people. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying in the back of our mind, we'd better understand something, that when it comes down to it, you and I must resist the poles of this world and this flesh and this spirit influence. And you and I have the choice to do that. And no one else is responsible for what you and I choose to do. And in the end, that's what it's all about. God will bring about the millennium. God will bring the kingdom to this earth through Jesus Christ. We're not going to do it even within the church. We're going to preach it. We're going to teach it. And we sure better live it as best we can in our individual lives. And collectively, whatever community we can create, the fruits will be positive. But, you know, we can roll out manicured lawns, beautiful buildings, and high-five it to the kingdom.

And you don't have the kingdom.

It's all gone, at least from our hands and our control. But we're here because we make choices. And that's good. And that's right.

And so we come to the day of atonement, and we recognize this world has—and what we are, as the people of God in this world, has not yet come to pass. The kingdom is not here. We recognize the opposition that we have. I think looking at the world today is a major proof that God's holy days are intact. The kingdom is not here. We don't have peace yet. Wherever we may look in the world, if it was only that Christ was to die for the sins of man, what happened? Well, Christ died for the sins of man, and for those that God has called, and as part of His elect and His church, they have received that forgiveness and that atonement. But the whole world has yet to do that. The day of atonement is a big step in the plan of God before all the other main events can happen, before we can get to the kingdom that is to come. For you and I to just have our sins forgiven does not by itself make the world a better place. It makes our life a better place when we truly understand that. It can make our family a better family. It can make our church community a better church. But it doesn't bring about the kingdom of God completely, only as it may come to us. Second Corinthians chapter 4 is another reminder that this day gives us.

Verse 3, This is a very straightforward verse that the gospel has failed. The God of this age, Satan, has blinded the minds of unbelievers to understand the true gospel. And so we have variations of the gospel. And we have some very brilliant individuals who can even see glimpses of what the gospel truly is, but never able to put it all together because of a lack of complete doctrinal truth. The scripture still stands, the scripture still holds. We read in Ephesians 2 that Satan is called a prince of the power of the air. In Ephesians 6, Paul reminds us that we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but our struggle is spiritual. We wrestle against spiritual wickedness in high places. Paul identifies the source of evil in the world, and he shows that the source of man's inability to overcome the guile of the world and to establish a peaceful system, and why every human attempt has failed at that.

And so we come to understand that on this day of atonement, we have a high priest who is operating in a very real way for us. Let's turn over to the book of Hebrews, chapter 9.

The day of atonement pictures when the final barrier between man and God, all mankind and God will be removed. Hebrews chapter 9 talks about the tabernacle that was prepared in verse 2, with all the various furnishings of that tabernacle, and that there was a veil in that tabernacle behind which is called the holiest of all, which had the golden sensor, the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which were the golden pot that had the manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant. And above it were the carobene of glory, overshadowing the mercy seat of these things we cannot now speak in detail. This is the most important part of the temple that was constructed where God's throne was within that holy of holies. And it's quite a bit different from what you actually see, you can see in that museum in Berlin, of Satan's throne, or of Satan's seat, were scenes of chaos and murder and war, and symbols of spiritual deception are so prominent. Here you see the law of God, the commandments, you see gold, you see a sensor and all that that meant. And you see a carobene of glory, a righteous carobene of glory, not a hostile, twisted spiritual mind rebelling against its creator. You see the law of God, you see the pot that had the manna, which was a symbol of the very bread of life, Jesus Christ himself. Those are the symbols of God's altar, the most important part of that altar within that temple into which the high priest went every year. Because it goes on here in Hebrews 9 to explain that in verse 7, in the second part, the high priest went alone once a year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people's sins committed in ignorance. The Holy Spirit indicating this, that the way into the holiest of all has not yet been made manifest, while the first tabernacle still standing. Leviticus 16 described that whole ritual every year where the high priest went into the Holy of Holies with a very special offering. He goes on to show that Christ came as the high priest in verse 11, of good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, not with the blood of goats, but with his own blood he entered the most holy place, once for all having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats, and he goes on and won't talk about that, but let's skip down to verse 23. It was necessary that the copies of the things in heaven should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are the copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us. Not that he should offer himself often as the priest enters the holy place every year with blood of another. He would then have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world. But now, once at the end of the ages, he has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself, and he has. And he operates today as our high priest in this very scene in the throne of God in heaven, making intercession for us, for you, for all of the church, for all of God's, for all of his people, the people of God, wherever they may be, wherever they may be found, in whatever condition. This is the role that Jesus Christ is playing today as that high priest. So we don't have a temple, we don't have a priesthood, and we don't have two goats up here that we cast lots over. But we still have the meaning and the understanding that is so important from us.

You know, I'm not going to go back to Leviticus 16 today in my sermon, but I do want to go back, at least, I'm not going to have you turn there, but I do want to bring up a point regarding the importance of, again, the symbols of that day, of the Day of Atonement, and what we are to learn from it. Because this is so critical as to, again, understanding why the world is the way that it is, and how it works. You will remember that in Leviticus 16, on the Day of Atonement, there were a number of offerings, but the two significant ones fell upon two goats that were chosen and brought before the priest. Now, these were identical goats. Couldn't tell a difference. They were both, let's say, they were both white, maybe with a dark blaze across their forehead, identical in age, sex, and appearance. And, as we know, one of those goats was sacrificed, and its blood was taken into the Holy of Holies, and it came to represent Jesus Christ. The other goat was led away at the hand of a fit man into the wilderness.

It was not killed. It was what is called the Azazel goat. It is a goat upon which the sins of the people were confessed, and then it was led out. That goat represented, as we understand, Satan the devil. And we understand it because of what we read back in Revelation, chapter 20. Let's turn and read that.

Revelation, chapter 20, comes into scene after the return of Jesus Christ. And in verse 1, John records, Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key to the bottomless pit, and a great chain in his hand. He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who was the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years. And he cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal on him, so that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years were finished. But after these things he must be released for a little while. That scene has not yet occurred. This scene takes place on this day, the day of atonement, and we go back to Leviticus 16. We find that one goat that was led out by the hand of a man into the wilderness to understand the connection. A goat that was not killed. A great spiritual being who was bound with a chain for a thousand years. Just as a side note, when I was up in Elmira, we stayed with Johnny and Hazel Lambert, an elder up there. He's also the pastor of the two churches. We were in one of his guest rooms in his basement, and he had a number of paintings throughout his house. And just outside our room was a painting done by a church member from Poughkeepsie, New York. I believe his name is Donald Teague. Mr. Teague has done a number of paintings. He's done, if not all, most of the Holy Days via a painting. He's painted a picture that describes the Holy Days. The Days of Unleavened Bread he's done. He's done the last great day.

Those two, I think, are hanged down in the home office. He gave the originals to the home office, and he's got one of the last great day, which is quite interesting in its concept. But outside of our room, Mr. Lambert had a print of his painting depicting the Day of Atonement. And the way he depicted the Day of Atonement in this picture was a whole mass of people standing and kind of looking up to the skies and their eyes wide open, symbolizing the deception taken off, and their eyes are now open to understand. And down in the bottom left-hand side of the painting, there's a pit with a hand kind of grasping and a chain.

And all these people with the deception lifted off of their minds as they are looking up. That's his way of looking at the Day of Atonement. Very interesting. I thought that was probably one of the best depictions that he has made of the Holy Days. Revelation 20 verses 1-3 tie in with that image of those two goats in the wilderness. And we see Satan, the deceiver of the world, and his influence is removed. Let's go back to those two goats for a moment. Remember they were identical?

How do you know the difference between the two goats?

How did the high priest determine which one was killed and which one was let go? Lots were cast, weren't they? Whatever that meant, it was two sticks, whatever. Lots were cast down, and what essentially happened was through that process they were appealing to God to make known the truth.

The priest, no other Levite, no other human being could determine which goat was to be for Satan, which goat was to be for Christ. Which would be left alive, which would be killed.

Which would represent evil, which would represent righteousness, which would represent lies and deception, and which would represent truth. Only God could do that. Only God can lift the veil. Only God can call and convert a mind today. Only God's truth, only God's spirit, can lead us into the truth and lead us out of deception. I think there's a very important lesson in that for the Church of God at this juncture of its development, as we keep the Day of Atonement, as we look back on those two goats. Only God can lift the mind of deception. Sometimes on issues that come down to us, only God can tell us where the lies are and where the truth is. We'd better be close to God. We'd better be very close to Him to be able to always discern the truth, whether it comes to doctrine or what, dare I say, any man ever says to us.

Because there are sometimes, and I've noticed this, sometimes it comes to the point where God has to show who is right and true and who is a liar. Just as He did with those two goats, He had to show them which one was to represent Christ and which one was not. Even today, it takes the Spirit of God and extreme spiritual discernment. And it is a humble warning to you and I, brethren. Stay close to God. Stay close to His word. You want the truth? As the line says, can we handle the truth?

We all want the truth. But sometimes because of lies, deception, and all kinds of other issues, it's just very difficult to see it. You tell God it makes it very plain. And sometimes, and in some situations, God does that in His own time, way, and mercy. And has to. And that's fine, too. We should all be able to accept that and come to understand that. But don't forget that one of the lessons for us on the Day of Atonement comes from those goats. That it's a matter of the Spirit. You know, today, deception is so refined. We think we have the truth because we keep the Sabbath and the holy days we understand the plan of God. We can read this book and discern deep truths out of it. And that is a great gift from God. And it is so important. But even for the elect, it is so important that we stay close to God and allow ourselves to be corrected, chased, and taught, and dealt with because deception today is so refined. Remember that Christ said in Matthew 24 coming deception upon this world that would be so intense that if it were possible, even the elect would be deceived. None of us are immune from that. So I think the one point that I want to leave with you here on this Day of Atonement is the lesson from those two goats. Appeal to God. Stay close to God. Let him lead us always to truth, to a discerning between deception and truth, between evil and righteousness. And let his standard and his word be true and every other man a liar, as Paul said.

That's what's so important.

In 1 John 5, verse 18, he says, We know that whoever is born of God does not sin, but he who has been born of God keeps himself, and the wicked one does not touch him.

We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one. We know that the Son of God has come and given us an understanding that we may know him who is true.

We are in him who is true. In his son Jesus Christ, this is the true God and eternal life. Little children keep yourselves from idols.

I said it earlier that for us at this time, the choice is very personal every day as to how we live and obey and relate to God to one another and all of our choices. John here is saying that he who has been born of God keeps himself from the wicked one. He keeps himself. In the end, it's very important that you and I keep ourselves, because when it's all said and done, that's about all we can keep up with is ourselves.

But that's another point for us to learn on the Day of Atonement, for our application here today, that we keep ourselves.

The world is in the grip of Satan. We have so much to be thankful for, and the calling, as David was bringing out in the offeratory message, we have a computer today, and most of us have more than one, one forum or another. We're in the top 1% of people in this world, the top 1% of all people in this world, to have such technology available to us.

No matter what the size of our checking account, it's a whole lot more than the majority of the other rest in the world has as well. And yeah, for us to come here on the Day of Atonement, that is a blessing. That is a blessing. There are things for us always to learn here. But we are to check ourselves, keep ourselves. In the end, at this point in time, that is probably what God is looking for each of us to accomplish, and it is a very important lesson to take from the Day of Atonement. In recent years, and even in recent months, we've seen Satan's onslaught and attacks upon the people of God. We've seen sheep scattered, shepherds tested, and many have held firm to their faith. Others look wearily into the future, aware that another blow is building. Now what I just read to you, I read eight years ago. Shall I read it again?

In recent years, we have seen Satan's onslaught upon the people of God. We have seen the sheep scattered and shepherds tested. Many have held firm to the faith and look wearily to the future, aware that another blow is coming. I first read that to you eight or nine years ago, in another sermon on the Day of Atonement. It was true then, and it's just as true today.

Just as true today. And each one of us has a choice to make.

God, in His mercy, does not let Satan attack us at his will, only when we might allow it.

Atonement shows us that this world is not what it seems.

There is a great battle spiritually still taking place.

And if you want to understand the reality of how this world operates, if you ever find yourself walking the streets of Berlin, you have a spare half a day, go to the altar of Zeus in the Pergamon Museum. Or go on, just go home tonight and look it up online, and you can still see it right there. And it will tell you, I think, something about the reality of this world. And don't pay any attention to anything else. I love that line. Just ignore that man behind the curtain. I love that line. Some of you know what it's from. Just ignore that man behind the curtain. Just ignore what you think you know about this world, what the world tells us is enduring and will last. And look at what God tells us. He says, this world is passing away and the lust thereof. When we humble ourselves through fasting on the day of atonement, we get a wake-up call, we get kind of pulled up short. And God tells us that we need Him more than He needs us. And when we learn that lesson, then we can be instruments and tools in His hand to be a part of that kingdom that is to come, which we have the immense privilege to go and observe and get a foretaste of in the Feast of Tabernacles here in a few days.

So I wish all of you, brethren, a wonderful Feast of Tabernacles. Safe trips. Please be careful as you drive. Don't take any chances. And may God's blessing as angels be about you as you drive and as you fly wherever you may be going. Some of you are going overseas. Some of you are going to Hawaii. Some of you are going to Gatlinburg. And Debbie and I will be leaving on Tuesday for Jekyll Island and then for the first part of the Feast and then the last half in Virginia Beach, where we will see some of you there. So have a wonderful Feast of Tabernacles, and we will see you on your return.