The Winds of War

Some of you may be familiar with the author Herman Wolk. I suppose I'm pronouncing the name correctly W-O-U-K. He's an American Jew, served in World War II, afterward began writing a number of novels based on World War II. He received the Pulitzer Prize for the King Mutiny. A few years after that, he wrote the Winds of War, where he followed a Jewish family, some were still in Poland, some were in Italy.

He followed them through the war, and then there was the Henry family from the US, a military family. And Robert Mitchum played the lead character of Victor Pugg, who was his nickname, Pugg Henry, a Navy captain. One son was a fighter pilot, another son was an officer on a submarine. So it follows those two families throughout the war. And I'll come back to that book and that story. Then, a few years later, the author wrote War and Remembrance, where, because the first book, or the Winds of War, took them right up to Pearl Harbor, and then that's where the story ended, or was suspended.

And then he picked it up in War and Remembrance and followed those same two families on through World War II, including some in the the Jastrow, the Jewish family from Poland, who ended up in concentration camps and lost their lives.

They are novels, though, but with the Winds of War, there was a CBS, or rather an ABC miniseries that came out back about 1983. Seven-part miniseries. And you can still find those. You can probably rent those. Netflix has those, but you know, it's a lot of time. An hour and a half, two hours times seven episodes. But it follows that story, and it is a fascinating story. The Winds of War speak of the events that were brewing across the world that led to the outbreak of all-out war, once again.

And so it picks it up actually in the late 30s, about 1937-38. Hitler is in power, but he has solidified his control. He has, Germany's kind of absorbed little Germany, Austria. And they are marching down the path of militarism. And so it follows the agreement that he has with Russia, that they're going to essentially carve up Poland. It follows them, the events that led to Hitler giving the order. And the Blitzkrieg took place into the low countries, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, and then on down into France. It has a portion where it focuses on the Battle of Britain. And this, the lead character in the Winds of War, is a Navy intelligence officer.

And he is in Moscow, he is in Berlin, he is in Paris, he is in London, he's in the Philippines, and he ends up, he's at Pearl Harbor. So he literally was all over the world with the assignments the Navy Department gave to him. At the end of the book, The Winds of War, and I've seen the Bulletin, that's a title I've taken for today's sermon. At the conclusion, Pugh Henry is writing back home to his wife who is stateside.

He's at Pearl Harbor, it has just been hit, and he realizes we as a country are going to be in broiling war for who knows how long. And he writes to his wife these words. He wrote, lately the winds of war have been blowing us all over the world. Right now, it strikes me that those same winds are starting to flatten civilization.

That's all the more reason to hang on to what we have, and mainly to love each other and our family, and love each other to the end. So it began, the story began in the late 1930s, and amazingly, here we are 75 years later. And for 75 years, the winds of war have blown across this world.

We've gone from Korea and Vietnam, and we've gone to all kinds of more regional wars that haven't affected our country. We've had war in the Persian Gulf, we've had war in the Balkans, and you know, it just goes on and on. And 75 years later, we have a ringside seat to watching the winds of war that are blowing as this world moves inexorably toward the conclusion. We know what will happen in general.

We don't know exactly who some of the key players are. We don't know exactly when, but we're given a great deal. And so I want to look at some prophetic areas with you today, and especially so because, again, a week from Thursday, we'll keep Feast of Trumpets. And the Feast of Trumpets, as was mentioned by the song leader, reminds us of that time when Revelation 11 verse 15 will take place. And that final trumpet blast will sound, and the voices are heard in heaven, and the voices heard that says the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our God and of His Christ, and He'll reign forever and ever. But we've got a lot of difficult times between here and there.

We live in what Paul called perilous times. We live in what is referred to as a time of Jacob's trouble. We will go into a time such as the world has never seen, and the world has seen some pretty awful times. So we're gonna go in a little bit to Daniel. We first will go to one of the Psalms, but God through Daniel long ago gave us a bit of a framework that we can use. But let's just kind of think through some of the news items of the last couple of years. It wasn't that many months back we began hearing this term, the Arab Spring, and our country's administration and the State Department immediately went out there, and they were trumpeting that it's the outbreak of democracy across the Middle East.

And probably most of us thought, I don't know about that. And with due time we realized that no it was. It was anything but that. It is but militant terrorism rearing its ugly head in a different way one more time. And we had events that then led to Libya, and we had well after a while we had Muammar Qaddafi at bay and his rain ended. And you know really it's it's it's hard to look at Libya today. Libya is the country just west of Egypt. It's difficult to look over there and tell exactly who's in who's in charge.

Some of the governmental buildings have the black flags of Al-Qaeda flying over them. And it really is difficult to know. Is it Muslim Brotherhood or is it just outright Al-Qaeda? We then saw that it moved next door to Egypt. And there again there were those who said hundreds of thousands showing up in such-and-such square in Cairo, and it's the outbreak of democracy. And yet there was bloodshed and a lot of violence.

And we began to realize, no, this too. Something doesn't smell right here either. And we had the Muslim Brotherhood coming to the fore. And then as they received enough power within the Parliament, we had an election, we ended up with we they, Egypt ended up with Morsi, Mohammed Morsi as the president. And then the average Egyptian began to realize that, you know, we've been taken to the cleaners here because of all the abuses and because of the forces that began turning against the Coptic Christians and others who were there.

Here we've gone full circle just this summer. And we've seen that the attitude, the, well, actual became all out of revolt against the Muslim Brotherhood. And Morsi is out, and now the Egyptian military, as far as we can tell, is in charge. Our government has been sending mixed messages. Government has continued to send support. Seems that some has been put on hold, but we've supported those who have been the cause of so much abuse among their own people. And then, just recently, Hosni Mubarak, the former president, one who, for decades, was one of the staunch allies of the United States through that area.

Hosni Mubarak has been allowed to go back home kind of under house arrest, but his health is not good. Now, we've also seen the focus shift over to the country of Syria. I have a friend in the ministry who's in Thailand, and he referred to these as kind of cookie-cutter stories from Libya to Egypt to Syria. Kind of the same old thing. Different names, different geographical locations, different leaders, but the same end result. And so, in Syria, we see it almost as if we're returning back to the Cold War, where the US and some of the European powers are providing aid and finances to the rebels fighting against Assad.

And then, you've got Russia and China supporting Assad. Kind of like in the days of the old Cold War, when we would fight these proxy wars, and the great powers, one would support the other. Kind of like when Russia moved into Afghanistan years and years ago, and we were supporting and arming the Mujahideen, who then eventually, with some of our weaponry, were able to shoot down the helicopters that were destroying them.

What difference does this make to us? Why do we in the Church of God? It's been a part of our culture. We watch the Middle East. We watch Europe. We watch our country. We watch to the Far East. What difference does it make to us in distant countries that basically hate our guts and want to see us destroyed? Want to see ever one of us killed? Want to see Christianity destroyed from the earth? Well, let's turn back to Psalm 83. Psalm 83 is a prophetic psalm tucked away in the middle of the overall book, and it has a listing of nations.

It is interesting. I have read commentaries that say, you know, this list of peoples have never ever been allied together, and to that I would add the word, yet. Hasn't happened yet. In Psalm 83, verse 1, this is one of the Psalms of Asaph, keep not you silent, O God. Hold not your peace and be not still, O God. For lo, your enemies make a tumult. They that hate you have lifted up their head.

I'm reading from the King James today, but those that hate you, God, have lifted up their head. For 6,000 years from time to time, Satan builds his house somewhere. If we go back to Genesis 10, we find it was at Babel. If we pick it up with Daniel's prophecies at that time, Satan had built his house in Babylon.

And later, it was in the area of Media, Persia, and Persia. Then it moved over to Greece, then to Syria, then to Rome, and there in Central Europe, it's moved around a little here, a little there. But all of these forces, there is a commonality, and that is a hatred of God. Human nature is wired that way. Human nature doesn't want to have God telling them what to do. They've taken crafty counsel against your people. Two ways of looking at that.

There was a time when God looked down and chose one man. His name was Abraham. And through Abraham, he began to build a little nation of people. He specifically placed the children of Abraham, or then children of Jacob as the name, children of Israel. The name was placed on them two generations later.

But God placed them. You look at a world map sometime, and there, that land bridge between Africa and Asia, you know, Israel, the Sinai, that's Asia. And then not that much further around, across Turkey to the Bosphorus, the Dardanelles Straits, Istanbul. Then across that, you go to Europe.

On that little land bridge, God placed this people that He told from the beginning, you're going to be my example nation. And through you, God's desire was, all nations of the earth will be blessed. The descendants of Abraham, the children of Israel, have certainly been an example.

Certainly been an example. And for the filth and perversion that we have exported around the world, we probably do need to apologize to the world. Because when you travel out of this country, you see some of the dirt that America has left on it. And that's sad. It's not what God intended. So it may be the descendants of Israel, and it may be those who spiritually are the Israel of God, as we read here.

And consulted against your hidden ones. And there we're left with a question. Is that a reference to the church? The church of Revelation 12? That is given place, a place of safety. She goes to her place. So again, it could be the physical descendants of Israel. It could be spiritual Israel, the church. Verse 4, they have said, Come, let us cut them off from being a nation. That the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance. For they have consulted together with one consent. They are Confederate against you.

And he's addressing God. They have locked arms together, rallied together, pooled their resources against you, O great God. And then it mentions the tabernacles of Edom, and the Ishmaelites, and of Moab, and the Hagarenes. These are names that we're familiar with from the stories back in Genesis mainly. Gebal, peoples in Lebanon, and Ammon, and Amalek, and the Philistines, with the inhabitants of Tyre. Asher is joined with them. They have helped the children of Lot, Moab and Ammon. Today we look at Libya and it's a mess.

Our country did nothing as our ambassador was brutally slaughtered. Disgusting what you can read happened to that man. And three brave soldiers, and they were slaughtered. And we did nothing. Next door in Egypt, he was, or it seemed to be, firmly in the hands of the Muslim Brotherhood.

And yet we've seen the tables turn this summer. And now Morsi is out. He has deposed. The Egyptian military is in control. We have seen Islamic jihadis who worked in one country, moved to the next, and then moved to another one. And we find them in Syria, in many cases. They're fighting against Assad to bring that government down. We have had, we, United States, has had politicians, along with some European voices, cry for the declaration of a no-fly zone. But, you know, the news just this last two weeks, it's obvious that Assad's forces gassed their own people.

I mean, whatever kind of an agent it was. I've seen reports anywhere from 130 to 1300. I think what I heard on the news at two o'clock was something like 560 that they have confirmed dead, the Doctors Without Borders, in three of the three of the hospitals there in Damascus. But then many times that number who came in with various symptoms.

So something certainly took place, even though, of course, it's always denied. Again, why does it matter? Why is it necessary that the Western world, the powers from Europe and across the world in both directions, concern themselves with civil war in Syria? Well, I think we find the answer if we go back now to Daniel 11. Daniel 11 is that long continuous prophecy that began in the days of Daniel and goes all the way to the very end of time.

The end of time as far as this age of man, I should add. We go back here and we have the roots. We have to go back to the roots so often because we also realize that prophecy is dual. There oftentimes will be a smaller scale initial fulfillment of a prophecy and that serves as a pattern for a far greater end time fulfillment. And sometimes there are these partial fulfillment by stages, kind of like we see with the Roman Empire through history, that it arose under Justinian and Charlemagne and Otto and on through the ages.

In Daniel 11 verse 3 mentions, of course, Daniel begins his long prophetic ministry when Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian Empire reign supreme. Daniel lived through a time when the next world ruling empire came to the fore and that was the Medo-Persian Empire. And then he prophesied of the next one to come, which was Greece. And he also spoke of this fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, that will destroy and stamp out peoples and it doesn't take three guesses from history to come up with the name Rome.

But here in Daniel 11 he speaks of these three kings of Persia, the fourth being greater, richer, that's Xerxes, and then this conflict with Grisha. Let's pick it up in chapter 11 verse 3. And a mighty king shall stand up and shall rule with great dominion and do according to his will. Well, it's interesting that nearly any commentary I've ever looked at, they all understand that's Alexander the Great.

I don't know any other name you can come up with because Grisha is named. Alexander was the Great King and he, it just was wired in him to conquer peoples, to go far and wide, and to subject those peoples to his rule. And when he shall stand up, his kingdom shall be broken. Now, there was a time when Persia came and stood up against Greece and they were defeated soundly by Greece. His kingdom shall be broken and shall be divided toward the four winds of heaven. And perhaps this already was going to the time when the kingdom of Greece would fall, or I shouldn't say fall, that that great king would fall.

Alexander died at an early age, 323 BC. He was only some 31, 33 years old. He was young. He was good at what he did, and that was being a general. And he had, there is that story that's told. I don't know how much proof is behind it, but the story is told that Alexander reached the extent of one conquest and he sat down and cried because he felt there's nothing else to conquer. But that, you know, may have been glorified through years.

But when he died, you see, he had two sons and they were summarily murdered. So there was no one of his line like he had followed his father, Philip of Macedon. There was no one of his own line to come into the rulership after him. And it says, not to his posterity, nor according to his dominion, in which he ruled, for his kingdom shall be plucked up even for others beside those. Now, what happened was, in short order, the Grecian Empire was carved up between four generals.

You had one named Lysimachus, who reigned around Greece, thrace the area above it. You had Cassander over in Asia Minor, or modern-day Turkey in that area. So power base Greece, Turkey, and then you had the Seleucid family. General Seleucid down at Syria. And then all the way down across the Nile, or at the Nile, you have the Ptolemies.

You have King Ptolemy, General Ptolemy. The first two, in short order, within years, just fell to nothing, became nothing. You really had no power base anymore in Greece, Thrace, or in Turkey.

You had the Seleucids in Syria and the Ptolemies in Egypt. What had been a part of the other part of the realm, basically, was absorbed into the Seleucid family reigning there from Syria. That is important to at least have that foundation, because we're down to two power bases. And if you look at the Holy Land, Syria is to the north. And we're going to come into this phrase, the King of the North. And Egypt is to the south, and hence the phrase, King of the South. And throughout much of Daniel 11, we have this jockeying for power. And to keep your eyes on the stitches of that fastball, continue to ask yourself, who controls the Holy Land? Because it's right there in the middle, as the armies from the north head south, and then later the ones from the south head north, they go right through the land God gave to ancient Israel. The King of the North, the King of the South. Now we have, the Church has, a booklet, the Middle East in Prophecy for those who are interested, and I realize there are a lot who aren't. And that's fine, but for those who are interested, you can go to that booklet, and it will wade verse by verse, sometimes phrase by phrase, as far as this was Antiochus II. And he's fighting Seleucus II, and back and forth. And fill in all the blanks here, because it says, verse 5, the King of the South shall be strong, and one of his princes shall be strong above him, and have dominion, and his dominion shall be a great dominion. So here we're talking about this, actually, the next Ptolemy, Soter, as he was called. In the end of years they shall join themselves together, for the King's daughter of the South shall come to the King of the North to make an agreement, but she shall not retain the power of the arm, neither shall he stand nor his arm, but she shall be given up, and they that brought her, and he that begat her, and he that strengthened her in these times. So you can you can read behind the scenes, or a marriage union took place, this Bernice, and it's a record of history that can be traced through historical writings. But you do have the Ptolemies and the Seleucans, one to the north, one to the south, and you have this shifting of the power base back and forth. One controls Palestine for a while, then the other one does. Let's go over to verse 22, and we are actually verse 21. We just skipped a lot of years. Verse 21, in his estate shall stand up a vile person. This one is identified as Antiochus Epiphanes IV. A vile person he is called. Verse 22, with the arms of a flood, they shall be overthrown from before him, and shall be broken. Yea, the Prince of the Covenant. I won't go into the details here as far as some of the subterfuge with one of the Jewish high priests. Go on down to verse 25, he shall stir up his power and his courage against the King of the South with a great army. So we have, actually, the date of 173 BC, you have Antiochus Epiphanes moving south against Egypt. The King of the South shall be stirred up to battle with a great and mighty army. He shall not stand. He shall forecast devices against him, because some have told him his own officers plotted against him.

In verse 29, 28 he refers to turning his heart against those of the Holy Covenant. We get to the year 168 BC, and we have something that happens, and it happens as a pattern. That was a preliminary fulfillment of Daniel's prophecy. But when Christ walked the earth and gave all of that prophecy, he said at one point, remember what Daniel the prophet said of this abomination that makes desolate. And this will tie in as far as where we need to keep our eyes. A little later we'll ask some key questions. Who is the King of the North?

Who is the King of the South? Who is the false prophet? Who are the kings of the East? The men of the East? The short answer on all those is, we don't know. But you see, so much of what we can do today is speculate. And speculation is good as long as we know it's speculation. We know the what, but we aren't told the who, we aren't told the when yet.

The day will come when God will have us know some of those things. So in verse 29, at the time appointed, he shall return and come toward the south. So there was this series of scraps between those of the north and those of the south. So once again he's going to move toward Egypt, but it shall not be as the former or as the latter. That's clear as mud, isn't it? Now at this one point, 168, we have the forces of the King of the North moving toward the south, but as they move through Palestine and near Egypt they are met by an envoy from Rome.

And the envoy from Rome informs them at the Roman navy is out in the Mediterranean to back up what he is saying and that they are to cease and desist and essentially don't invade Egypt to go back home. And so he heads north and he's not a happy man and decides to focus his attention upon the city of Jerusalem. Verse 30, the ships of Kittim, identified as the Roman fleet, shall come against him.

Therefore he shall be grieved and return and have indignation against the Holy Covenant. Now by this point, the northern tribes are long gone in captivity. They've disappeared. Some have migrated. Some are still up in the area of the Black and Caspian Seas. And further east known as some of the Parthians, they'll come in a little later. Some have already begun migrating to the north and the west across Europe. He will have indignation against the Holy Covenant.

So shall he do. He shall even return and have intelligence with them that forsake the Holy Covenant. And arms shall stand on his part and they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength. Where is the sanctuary? Well, it's in the temple. The Reconstruction Temple was there in Jerusalem. And shall take away the daily sacrifice and they shall place the abomination that makes desolate. Now let's pause there. Antiochus Epiphanes is met by an envoy with the backing of a strong army from Rome. They are encouraged to change their mind and go back home.

In sense that having his plan sorted, Antiochus heads north and turns his army toward Judea. Antiochus and his men at that time murdered literally thousands of Jewish men, women, and children. He took steps to destroy the worship of the God of Judea. He forbade the right of circumcision. He forbade observance of the Sabbath and the Holy Days. All sacrifices are halted. John earlier and Daniel there was a time when it talked about the suspension for 2300 evening and morning sacrifices.

And this is a historical fulfillment and there will be a fulfillment at the end. There will be sacrifices that will have returned and there will be a point when they are stopped. And when that happens, we know that it's just over the horizon. Or maybe it's on the horizon the time when Christ will return. He made possession. Antiochus Epiphanes made possession of the Torah punishable by death. He erected an idol of Jupiter Olympus out on the altar of burnt offerings and back in the Holy of Holies.

He ordered the priests to sacrifice pigs on that altar. They were to capture the pigs' blood and it was strewn everywhere, desecrating the holy place. The temple was plundered. The temple lights that were to never go out were extinguished. He ordered his soldiers to engage in the most vile acts out openly around the temple. Now, some of the leaders of the Jews, as we, or did we just read that? Yes, the end of verse 30, have intelligence with them that forsake the Holy Covenant. There were some of the Jews, some of the leaders, who abandoned the Covenant of Israel and joined in the worship of the pagan idols and joined in the practices and the dress and the customs of the armies.

A period of time transpired and then a Maccabean family, a priestly family, the Maccabees, arose. The leader was Judas. Judas, Maccabees, and others of the family were those who rallied forces. People came to support him by droves. And at about this time, Antiochus Epiphanes received tidings out of the north and the east. His kingdom was threatened by forces way over off the radar screen, as we would use a modern term, from the area of Parthia. And who was it? Parthia? Well, some of the lost tribes of Israel were there.

And they began attacking Syria from that far other direction. So he took the vast percentage of his army and he takes off to go meet the Parthian threat. He leaves a smaller army, and that's the army the Maccabees were able to overthrow. There was a period of time when there was no sacrifice, and then the Maccabean priests took back over control. They cleansed the temple. They got rid of Jupiter Olympus. They rekindled the temple lights and restored the sacrificial system.

To this day, the Jews observe Hanukkah, which is based on this. Or sometimes it's called the Feast of Lights because the lights were rekindled. Sometimes it's called the Feast of Dedication. In fact, in the New Testament in John 10.22, it mentioned Jesus was in Jerusalem. It was winter and it was the Feast of Dedication. So different names for the same festival that's observed in Jewish communities to this day. Now, that's a pattern. We want to remember that pattern because history has a way of repeating itself. And in some regards, it has. But there is an ultimate fulfillment that still lies ahead.

That will pale that one into insignificance. Now, Antiochus takes off toward Parthia. As it turns out, he came to his end. He came to his end because he was diseased. He had been proclaiming himself as the King of the Gods, seeking worship for himself. And then came down with something in his bowels. And it sounds kind of like Matthew says, or about when King Herod died, that his whole stomach was eaten up with worms. Or not that one, but the other one. Anyhow, you know what I mean. But he died. Now, the whole period of time was about three and a half, four years from the time when Antiochus and the forces came and moved against Jerusalem until his life is over.

I think it's interesting that in Daniel 12 verse 11, it talks about a 1290-day period of time. Verse 11, from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away and the abomination that maketh desolate set up, there should be a thousand, two hundred ninety days. A little over a three-year period of time. Once again, now, I won't go into the sacrifices any further than that. But you see, this forerunner took place, it was 160 years before Christ was even born that this took place. It's a long time back that it occurred, but it was given to Daniel, written down for us.

Daniel wanted to understand, but he was told, sealed the book as close to the time of the end. At the time of the end, as we get even closer, we will learn more. Let's keep our place in Daniel, and let's look at Matthew 24. We just read of this abomination that maketh desolate. And in Matthew 24, we have one of the accounts of the Olivet prophecy, and it too is dual. And he spoke of certain conditions of false religion, and wars, and famine, and pestilence, and the gospel being preached. But then he also says in verse 15.

Matthew 24 verse 15, When you therefore shall see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, who so reads, let him understand. Let them who be in the in Judea flee to the mountains. Let him who is on the housetop not come down to take anything out of the house. Neither let him who is in the field return back to take his clothes. Woe to them that are a child. Woe to them that suck in those days.

Give suck in those days. And pray your flight not in winter, neither on the Sabbath day. For them shall be great tribulation. And so Jesus said, when you see this happen once again, like happened historically, then you'll know you're looking at the tribulation. You're looking at just over three and a half years and Christ returns. Let's go back to Daniel 11. The setting up of the idol of Jupiter Olympus had taken place, I was approaching a couple hundred years before Christ spoke these words, or prior to when Christ spoke these words, 170 or 80 anyhow.

It had already happened, it will get happened again. But at first the stage has to be set. There will be continued battles between the king of the north and the king of the south.

In Daniel's day, that meant Syria and Egypt. And we know sometimes that these power bases moved to different locations. Back in the days of Nimrod, it was in the Mesopotamian Valley. Many, many years later, Babylon was still the power base. Syria before it, up further north. Then it moves a bit over to the Medes and the Persians. Then it moves way over west to Greece. And then the remnant of what had been Alexander's kingdom, the main power base of the north, moved to Syria.

And then the Roman Empire came to the fore. And the power base moved once again. And even though one leg of that, if you think back, harken back to Daniel 2 and the image of the dream of Nebuchadnezzar, the bottom part, that part that represented Rome, you had two legs.

And we've puzzled over those two legs. There was a time in the days of the Iron Curtain where we thought, well, maybe there's one leg here in the west and then one will stand down here in the east. But a lot of times it seems like one leg's down in Italy with the church power base and the other one's up in somewhere up in Germany or Austria. So we can speculate. We can keep here to the ground. We can watch. We know what's going to happen sometime. We don't know when. We don't know names.

We used to think we knew the name of the beast, but he died. And then we looked at the next guy, you know, from Franz Joseph Strauss. Then we looked at Otto von Habsburg and he died on us too. So his son Karl is probably around somewhere, but things are kind of quiet. And it does talk about the beast rising suddenly out of the abyss.

So it may nearly shock us even though we're born in advance. Daniel 11, we got down here to about verse 32. Such as do wickedly against the covenant, shall he corrupt by flatteries. But the people that do know their God shall be strong and do exploits. Well, I think in part we have to start with the Maccabean Revolt, the purification of the temple, the renewal of the sacrifices.

And in part, we have to continue to the time when Christ came. He found the church and the church was given the Spirit of God and told to go to the end of the earth. And that's something that continues to this day. And they that understand among the people shall instruct many. But, you know, looking across the ages as it says here, yet they shall fall by the sword and by flame and by captivity and by spoil many days.

So we're skipping over centuries left and right here across the ages. Now when they shall fall, they shall be helped with a little help, but many shall plead to them with flatteries. It's always been true in the Church of God. You look back in history, you look back in the days of the early Church that there were some it is. It is as though they were camp followers. They got caught up in a movement. And, oh, we're all going over here. Well, I'll go too. But when times get tough, people like that don't continue. So, plead to them with flatteries, and some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them.

Yes, God does allow trials and tests come on us. We come out stronger on the other end and to purge and to make them white, even to the time of the end, because it is yet for a time appointed. Well, we just skipped over a lot of time right there. The time of the end. Daniel, when he wrote these words, surely had no way of realizing how much time, 2000 plus years, would be covered by what he was writing.

In verse 36, the King shall do according to his will, and he shall exalt himself and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvelous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished. For that that is determined shall be done. The indignation shall be accomplished. That will be at the return of Christ. But the context would take us back up to what the King of the North was doing. It is interesting that through the years of the resurrection of the Roman Empire and the Holy Roman Empire, you had so many the emperors seeking worship of themselves.

There was emperor worship, a part of the Roman Empire. It was a part of Antiochus Epiphanes. We've seen it before. It's not new. And it's beginning to reveal to us that there's going to be worship of someone as though he is God. Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers nor the desire of women, nor regard any God, nor he shall magnify himself above all. Justinian set himself up as though he were God. But in his estate, and I know some of these phrases here, it's a little difficult in the translation, especially here in the King James, it has its challenge.

But in his estate he shall honor the God of forces. And a God whom his fathers knew not shall he honor with gold and silver and with precious stones and pleasant things. Thus shall he do in the most strongholds with a strange God. So here it's as though we're introducing someone else. And in Revelation, we see it pretty clearly that there are these two major personalities. There's the beast power, but there'll be a leader of that beast system.

But he will have a partner in crime called the Great False Prophet. And those two, we're told at the end of Revelation 19, will be cast alive together into the lake that burns the fire and brimstone. Strange God, whom he shall acknowledge and increase with glory, and he shall cause them to rule over many, and shall divide the land for gain.

When we get to verse 40, we all of a sudden leap to the end, at the time of the end. So the King of the South, so this power base that in Daniel's day was down in Egypt, or a little bit after, I should say a bit after Daniel's day was down in Egypt, is still going to be around.

Might still be headquartered there, and it might have shifted somewhere else.

We have to keep our options open. When we need to know, God let us know. The King of the South, push at him. The him is the King of the North. Now, push at him. We have a once upon a time, when we saw one possibility. Into the 70s a bit, we had the, you know, we learned what OPEC means, the oil producing and exporting companies, countries, and they began to threaten to turn off the oil spigot. And that affects different nations of the world in different ways, because Russia has their own vast reserves of oil. And frankly, you know how we Americans are, we like to tie both our hands behind our back and try to play catch up. We have a vast amount of oil under this country, and we have peaceful nations to the north and the south and through the Gulf of Mexico and all the way down to Venezuela. So we have lots of oil. If the oil is cut off from the Middle East, Russia survives, we'll squall like we're being hurt, but we could survive. But you have other parts of the world, like the major powers of Europe. They don't have their own oil. Like China, the world's fastest growing economy, they are dependent upon Middle Eastern oil. And I'll come back to that a little bit later. We can't rule out oil, although at one time it's all we saw. But also in the 70s, we began to see the specter of terrorism.

And we ignored it as something random, way off, unrelated long ago, and then it came on our soil. And we can't ignore it. And it won't go away. I do wonder someday if there is just open, major terror across cities of Europe. Some there may react differently, because there's national characteristics that come out. And I remember Luigi Barzini's book, The Europeans, which amazingly was written nearly 30 years old now, but the chapter on the mutable Germans, he ended it with saying once again, the world's going to part the reeds with Germany, and they're going to find they're facing a roaring lion once again. So Germany will react differently than the French or the Italians or others will. So is it oil? We can't discount it. Decades ago, then Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said, control the oil and control nations. Something real close to that. Control the oil and you control nations. Or is it terrorism? I don't think we can rule that out either. Middle of verse 40, and the king of the north shall come against him. Now king of the south, where is it? Well, right now we can't really see. King of the north, where is it? Well, again, right now we've seen where it has been a number of times. But today we can't look and see exactly where it is. Shall come against him like a whirlwind with chariots and horsemen and many ships. He shall enter into the countries and overflow and pass over. Sounds makes me think of the word blitzkrieg, which came to the fore when Russia and Germany, by agreement, divided up Poland. And the Germans by blitzkrieg came across into the area of Poland. He shall enter also into the glorious land. Well, we don't need three guesses on that one. The Holy Land, Palestine, and many countries shall be overthrown because you see there are all these little countries around here. So many areas in especially Isaiah and also Jeremiah, many of the minor prophets, has prophecies about all these little peoples, little countries like we read in Psalm 83. Moab and Ammon and Edom and all these people, the Philistia. And he'll overthrow many, many countries. But these shall escape out of his hand, even Edom and Moab and the chief of the children of Ammon. Why will they escape? Well, if we understand Psalm 83 correctly, it is looking at a confederation ultimately at the time of the end, where you have a power base to the north and all of these smaller countries who become their satellites or the allies of the European beast power. He shall stretch forth his hand also upon the countries, and the land of Egypt shall not escape. He shall have power over the treasures of gold and of silver and over the precious things of Egypt, and the Libyans and the Ethiopians shall be at his steps. But notice, tidings out of the east and out of the north shall trouble him. Therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy and utterly to make away many. And he, he goes back to this king of the north that has been overrunning the Middle East. He shall plant his tabernacles of his palace between the seas and the holy mountain. Yet he shall come to his end, and none shall help him. Tidings to the east and the north. We've seen it before. It happened to Antiochus Epiphanes, and he pulled, for the most part, pulled out of Palestine. We'll see it again. Because of the time of the end, we also have to keep our eyes to the east. The men of the east, the kings of the east, they're called.

An army of 200 million men. European nations, the Americas, most places of the world cannot think about fielding an army of 200 million. But there are places to the far east that can, because of sheer numbers of population. But let's go to 2 Thessalonians 2.

2 Thessalonians 2. Because we saw what seemed to be the indication to me that here's this king of the north, but then here's this strange god. There's this other character involved. And they'll be allied together. It is an interesting story to follow the history of the Roman Empire, the Holy Roman Empire. Holy meaning when they were allied with the church. The emperor and the pope seemed to have had this love-hate relationship from the outset. There were times when the emperor would banish the pope up to Avignon, France, or up to Ravenna. And the pope would turn around and excommunicate the emperor. But when push comes to shove, they're on the same side. They worked together. The Roman church was awfully quiet during what happened in World War II. 2 Thessalonians 2, verse 3, "...let no man deceive you by any means." Jesus cautioned about that as far as the very elect, if we aren't careful, can be deceived. For that day shall not come except there come a falling away first. And that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he as God sits in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. We have had emperors who have sought worship as though they were God. We have religious leaders who pose as the representative in the stead of Christ.

Fascinating how this happens. There's something within human beings. We want to find someone with great powers and get on the bandwagon and follow along. Take our marching orders.

How can this be? Well, when we get to the time of the end, we have a beast that arises.

We'll look in just a minute at Revelation. And it says the dragon gave its power and dominion.

And the dragon has identified the chapter before as Satan. And Paul called him the God of this age. And when Christ was tempted by the devil, he took him to the high mountain and showed him the kingdoms of the world offered him a quick, easy access to rulership. And Jesus rejected that. But he didn't deny the fact that Satan had those kingdoms offer him.

It's been ages ago, one biography of Hitler der Fuhrer, Conrad Heiden. And he interviewed some of the German high command who had been in some of those meetings of the highest level. And they described Hitler as though he was a split personality. That normally, good politician, good economic mind, you know, the German people got behind him because the German economy was rolling again. But then they said, there'd be this other guy. And the one general said, you'd see it in the eyes, something in the eyes, and he would change into this human dynamo and barking orders and the German high command quaking in his feet. I think some of these personalities at the very end will be possessed by Satan and hence could seek and receive worship as though they literally were God. Well, I would say a God. So the king of the north, the beast, allied with this man of sin, son of perdition, sits in the temple. Is it the temple or is it a holy place? That's a debate for another time. Israel went a long time with a tabernacle tent that was portable. Then there was a temple. There will be sacrifices come back. That requires a holy place. Does it require a temple? It remains to be seen. Some feel adamantly there has to be a final temple built, but there will be a time when sacrifices will come back. Duroblenka's morning and still am. There is a group there in the holy land. I can't think of the name, but they have reconstructed all the accoutrements of the temple, the high priests, the linen garments, everything that's needed. They've had training for whenever there is access to a holy place, which, of course, they feel needs to be right there on the temple mount area. Worship seeks worship as being God.

Now let's go to Revelation 13. Revelation 13. This is one of the chapters that focuses on the beast.

John is writing down what he sees as this curious beast comes out of this sea, and he has seven heads. Well, we know how to count the seven because of what Daniel had written.

Because there's Babylon and there's Medo-Persia, and there were four divisions, actually four different empires for a while of Greece, and then the last one is Rome. But here we are at the time of the end, and this system has all parts of all the above. Seven heads and ten horns, because from the point of view chapter 13 takes this this final empire is going to rear its ugly head ten different times. It's going to go down, be suspended, then it'll come back. Go down, be suspended, and come back. But then the last one, the last one is a we have to go to chapter 17, which we want today, but it harkens back the Nebuchadnezzar's image, this these these feet of iron and miry clay, and then the two feet on the two feet are ten toes, and these ten kings give themselves give their power over to the beast for a short time. Well, verse two, the beast was was like a leopard, had a feet of a bear, mouth of a lion, and those harken back to Daniel as well, some of the things that he saw in chapter 7. And the dragon gave him his power and his seed, and great authorities. Well, then it talks about the Roman Empire being killed, but then it came back. Let's go on over to verse 11. Verse 11, it speaks of this counterpart of the beast, this partner in crime. And he held another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon. When John the Baptist saw Christ walking that day, he said, Behold, the Lamb of God who bears away the sins of the world. So here is one who wants to be seen as a savior, but from the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Our words give us away, and his words are like those of a dragon. And he exercised all the power of the first beast.

We won't take more time there. Let's ask a few questions now. Who is the King of the North? Well, the short answer is we don't know. Oh, we've got lots of clues. And any student of history has seen this system rear up in Europe time and time and time again. We have a pattern. There are certain patterns that follow through with each one. So we keep our eyes on Europe.

But you know, once the military headquarters, or rather the political headquarters, was in Charlemagne, was over in Aachen, Germany, just across from the Belgian border, as we have nations drawn today. And then the Habsburgs were down in Vienna. We've had Napoleon from Paris.

And so the power base may move around, but we still look to that area of central Europe. It's happened too many times. We still look there. We could ask ourselves, who is the King of the South? Well, the Day of Daniel, it was the Ptolemy Empire down there in Egypt. And Egypt has very much so been a key across the centuries. When the little Jewish state was fighting for its very beginning, the Arab League moving in there in 1947-48. Egypt was at the forefront.

War that has taken place. Six-day war. Egypt was at the forefront. We have to keep our eyes on Egypt.

The most populous Muslim country in that whole region. But still, they don't have the oil that the Saudis have in other countries. But we still keep our eyes there. Maybe something yet to be determined will arise. And maybe something terribly heinous will arise, such as the Muslim brotherhood and the enforcement of Sharia law throughout. Now, who are the men of the East? You know, over 40% of the world's oil goes through the Persian Gulf, through the Strait of Hormuz.

As I said earlier, Russia has their own resources. Yes, they buy from abroad, but they could survive if it was cut off. America, Canada, we could survive if it was cut off. But you have nations of Europe who could not, and you have nations to the far East who could not. China, Japan, India may have a little bit more than the others, but you have some major population areas.

20th century was called the American Century. The 21st, maybe the Chinese century. China has the fastest growing economy in the world, and they have tremendous influence. They have influence over us. They own more of our debt than anyone else. I think the so-called Federal Reserve Trust Fund. I hope there's some money in there one of these days. It holds most of the U.S. debt.

The Federal Reserve has the second amount of U.S. debt, and then the nation of China has third.

So, interesting. China is flexing its muscle. They need petroleum. There is a tie company building a deep water port on the western part of where Myanmar, ancient old Burma, comes in.

And from that area, China is constructing a rail line and a pipeline up over the mountains. They are concerned. They're looking over the horizon. They want to maintain the free flow of oil. They have a phenomenal aircraft carrier from what I've read about. Phenomenal technology that they have.

Japan. Just recently, it was in the news, Japan has some type of a carrier. Of course, it's against their constitution to have an aircraft carrier, as remember from history what happened in World War II. But, you know, there are jets. You have a carrier to carry helicopters, but there are jets. The British have had the carrier for a long time, and we're coming out with jets that can do the vertical takeoff and land. And so, how much of a deck does it take? So, we have lots of things happening there. We have signs that the power is rapidly shifting toward China. The Saudi oil company Aramco forever has held their annual board meetings in Houston, Texas. And now it's shifting to Shanghai, China. So, all kinds of signs are out there. It's Deepwater Port in Burma. Let's turn over to Revelation 9. Revelation 9. We do have peoples to the Far East who will come in to play at the time of the end.

We could ask, who are the nations that will form this great army? And we don't really know, but it's kind of hard to look to the east without considering the population centers of India, China, and some of the know-how in Japan. Revelation 9, verse 14. This is the sixth trumpet blast. Verse 14, saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. Isn't it interesting that we have these forerunners? God named 150 years in advancing, named by name Cyrus. Cyrus was the one over the Medes and the Persians.

And when it was time for God to pull Babylon down, he did it through Cyrus and his armies.

And what did they do? They diverted the Euphrates away from the city of Babylon, and they entered from the north and the south through the dry riverbed. And with some fifth column people inside that opened some gates, they walked in in the midst of an orgy, as you can read at the end of Daniel 5. The Euphrates was dried up, and here are forces bound on the other side that Mesopotamian area is kind of the line between Europe and Asia. And they're bound up, the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour a day, a month, a year, for to slay the third part of men. Chapter 16, a bit later, in the final plagues, seven last plagues. Revelation 16 verse 12. Verse 12, and the sixth angel poured out his vial, Upon the great river Euphrates, and the water thereof was dried up, the way of the kings of the east might be prepared. There will be a king of the north, however, God allows Satan to build it. There will be a king of the south, however, God allows Satan to build that one too, because Satan's kingdom is divided against itself. Why not battle each other?

There will be a vast army off to the far east with some of these, surely from some of these areas of phenomenal populations, all coming together to lock horns at the time of the end.

But a week from Thursday, we will keep a day that reminds us one more time. It will not always go on as it is, as it appears that it will be. There will be a time when we can read here in Revelation 11 verse 15. Revelation 11 verse 15, and the seventh angel sounded. That's the seventh trumpet, the final trumpet. And there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever. When will that happen? We don't know that either. There are a lot of things we don't know, but we know enough to stay tuned. Keep our eyes on the United States and Britain. Keep our eyes on Europe. Keep our eyes on the Far East and the Middle East. Keep our eyes on a little country called Israel. Keep our eyes for what might fulfill a push, a push from the south against the north. And let us pray every day, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.