The World Just Ahead

Have you been watching the news? Unprecedented weather around the world? Economic woes that are said to be a fiscal cliff that once we go over as a really worldwide economy, there may be no coming back to the type of economic situation that we've been used to? Almost daily shooting sprees now popping up. War, civil war, threats of possible new wars and new strikes. When we look at events on our planet, they can maybe rattle us or they can scare us. It's a little different, perhaps, than what we may have been used to, what we may have been expecting. But in order to really interpret what's going on, we need to look a little bit below the world map, a little bit underneath the surface of the map, of the way the countries are drawn, of the borders, of the names of the people in the travel logs and some of the sites to see. We need to look a little bit below that, to see each culture that's hidden within the boundaries and the multi-cultures and sometimes the layers of the individual cultures that are within the boundaries of that world map. In order to really understand what's going on and what will go on, we have to understand the history of each of those cultures, not just the nations, but the several cultures that comprise a nation, the various tribes, the various ethnic groups, the various patchwork and piecemeal assemblage that has gone on down over time, that has surrounded with a border and stamped a name on it, a bunch of peoples. We have to understand the pride of each of those cultures, the ambitions that those cultures have and have had and have had historically. They all have had their own history. They've all had their own pride, their own aspirations. We have to see the ambitions that where they want to be and what they want to be, it's part of being human. All peoples have it, all cultures have it. Along with those ambitions and all that pride, we have to understand the setbacks that they have been through. None have reached their ambitions. They have had setbacks. They have been humbled and pummeled in many cases. And along with that pummeling have been retaliations. And in order to look at any geographic entity, country, ethnic group, you have to take into consideration the retaliations down through time and the retaliations to the retaliations and where the scores currently are. And that is true in this country, dating back to pre-Civil War days and the carnage that went on during the Civil War in places like Missouri and Oklahoma and why the West developed the way it did and why the bandits and the outlaws and the cowboys came to be who they were and what the modern day strains and stresses are. It exists everywhere. Everywhere.

When you look at the world map through that kind of a lens, you begin to see the stretching that those countries have, the bubbling, the rising, the compressing that's going on. They want to burst. They want to break. Every one of those countries is being stressed and strained in polls. And sometimes they break. They explode open. And that map rips apart and it's folds over and sometimes folds under with some being pressed under others and new borders get formed and new names go on the map. These things are often propelled by ambition or hatred or a combination, coupled with pride and arrogance and retaliation over unfulfilled dreams that step back through those cultures and those boundaries sometimes hundreds of years. We tend to look at the world through the lens of a tourist, through the lens of, oh, here's who you can see and what we can do and we're all people. But if we're to see what's coming in the world just ahead, it helps to see a world map for what it is.

Not the tourist, not the TV, not the documentary, not the museum view that everybody had some pass. It'd be nice to go back and kind of see what's in the museums. But we're all kind of now modern humans and we're all integrated and we're all kind of unified and dependent on each other. No. We need to be able to see that map for what it's not as much as what it is. From a wanderlust perspective, tourist perspective, the world is a hodgepodge full of relics.

Well, you can go here and you can see relics. You can go there and see the pyramids. You can go over here and you can see people doing this or where they used to do that. And you can see all the museums around the world and the exciting places. But as you go, you'll notice things are pretty much the same. Everybody flies in airplanes, everybody rides in buses, there's taxis everywhere, restaurants, hotels, there's internet and telephones. We're not so different. Whether you're in Shanghai or South Africa or Russia or Alaska, you know, it's just people like us often looking the same and dressing the same.

The same language is often used being English. Everybody has electronics. Everybody's watching TV. If you go from Berlin to Tiananmen Square, it's not a whole lot of difference on the surface. If you go to Cairo, over to Jerusalem, and yet they look very same, very similar on the surface to our eyes. You can go from Cape Town to the tip of South Africa all the way to Anchorage, Alaska, and you will find essentially the same thing going on. Just different poles. You can get the impression that we're all just one global people, one global culture that really likes the internet.

We're all communicating, really well these days. Now I want to ask you a question. How can you reconcile the perceived reality of this tourist world, this facade of everybody's in this modern era and we're all getting along with Bible prophecy? When we look at Bible prophecy, we see things shaking out very, very differently than we can even imagine in the current world. We see things shaking out very differently than we can even imagine in the current world. It's a real challenge to think that it will really come apart at the seams and really take civilization to the brink of genocide, not just a physical cliff, but the cliff of actual survival of human life, any human life.

There are nice people. I'll tell you, in our travels, one thing that humans have is nicety. Humans basically love their families. Humans love marriage and kids, and they all want their families and their kids to be happy, and when they're fairly content, humans around the planet are pretty much the same. They're very, very pleasant, very fun to be with. It's just fantastic to think as you walk through China or Russia or Africa, you see the people, you meet the families, you go through Europe to think that those people would ever change from just loving families and going to work and enjoying the sunshine, enjoy good food to genocide.

It's hard to imagine. Let's examine our world through a little different lens today, and let's see what's brewing up. Then we're going to see how you can prepare effectively for what's coming in the world just ahead, which is the title of this sermon. Jesus Christ taught us to live each day with a relationship between the world and the world.

Jesus Christ taught us to live each day with a relationship to the God family, to the kingdom of God. Every day we are to seek His righteousness and to seek to be like the mindset of that kingdom of God and to repent of anything else, to believe, accept, obey the gospel, the Bible says. Doctrines were given by Jesus Christ, parables, lessons, an example along all these things.

I try to follow His example by teaching those doctrines and lessons about living our daily life like we were anticipating the kingdom of God and being in that kingdom of God, seeking it first. Jesus also taught and warned us to live through the times of turmoil and that we needed to live through those times as well. There would be persecution, just like there was for Him. He talked about events that would come upon the church down through time, terrible things that would happen, and ultimately in the Olivet prophecy forecast a time of the end, a time that would become so bad that human life would cease to exist if He did not return and step in.

He taught us how to live in relationship to those times as well. We need the focus for living as we should during any time, any and all times. Not just the good time, not just the blessing, not just the good weather, not just the good health, not just the blessings God gave to Abraham, but all the time in any situation, including political upheavals and the very time of the end crises that are forecast, prophesied in the Bible.

So today, let's examine what's brewing up and then we're going to see how you can be prepared to effectively deal with, live through those times, and do just that.

And do just fine with whatever comes down the pike. I'd like to begin with the end in mind. Jesus said, He who endures to the end shall be saved. We need to keep the end in focus and endure to the end. How? Endure in godliness. In other words, always be seeking the kingdom of God and His righteousness unto the end, our end, your end, my end, the end of this present evil age, if we live that long. This needs to be something that is a real part of you and me, not just something we put on in the good times and then we cave in and do something like society will in the bad times. So remember that goal. He who endures to the end in godliness will be saved. Let's take a look at some background that has shaped some of the world's geopolitics. This is going to be a little different history than probably you've heard before. I'll take responsibility for trying to get it right. But you know, there is another quite a different history that exists other than just the overview of world history coming down through time, which is basically a series of wars and of successions of government. If we step back, just pick a year in time. Let's go back to the year 1800. 1800, a couple hundred years ago, was a time when none of us lived. The Ottoman Empire of the Arab world was one of the largest empires ever to reign. It had a large amount of people in it. It stretched all the way across North Africa, down through the Egypt part, up through the Sudan, ringed Saudi Arabia, up through the Fertile Crescent, and over. It took in a vast amount of area, including up to, I believe, Turkey, and well, it did include Turkey and Greece, taking in the southwestern part of Europe. The Ottoman Empire under Suleiman, the Great, going back to around 1600, had just been huge and very successful. And it was a sort of a force, it was a caliphate of leaders that came together and bonded.

And that, in 1800, was very much in existence. But it was separate. The West didn't know much about that. They didn't go there. They didn't understand that. Europe and our part of the sphere of the world, we lived in our own world with our own history, with our own ambitions, our own dreams, just as this ancient culture that post-dated the Roman Empire lived in it with its aspirations, its pride, its ability to perform and do great things, its own religions. It was considered the most elite kingdom in the world. At the same time, China was the supreme culture. China, in its very reclusive, hidden, forbidden structure, was massive. And going back to about 500 B.C., it had brought together the warlords and compacted and taken in many, many cultures and many peoples and pressed them together in many different languages over a great, great area. And China looked to itself as a place of great the greatest supreme culture, the longest high-end culture that there was. European nations in 1800 had risen out of the Dark Ages, had risen to greatness, and the Industrial Revolution was roaring. And great things were happening. The weather had changed from the Little Ice Age, and Europe was it. And you look at the countries of France and Spain and Portugal, of Italy and Germany and all the other countries, they were flourishing and beginning to really rebound. They were doing very well. They considered themselves the elite. They had the religion. They had the best religion. It was better than the Eastern Orthodox religion. They had history that dated all the way back into Roman times as a successor of the Holy Roman Empire. Russia, under its czars, was the greatest nation on Earth. Proud, proud nation. And the czars ruled and pulled people and pushed people together and restricted them, but they built the great buildings and they had the power and the prestige through a massive amount of space over there on Earth. New Spain, south of us, later renamed Mexico, New Spain was extended from where Oklahoma is today all the way to Panama. And it was run by the Spanish, and it was a burgeoning, exciting culture where it was flourishing and changing and upgrading. Throughout the Americas and Africa, nearly every native tribe and people lived and fought in noble ways. That their tribe was the noble tribe. Their ways were the noble ways. Their religions, all the way from the alutes up in Alaska down to the tip of South America and all through Africa. These people were proud people, and they had existed for millennia. At least they can be dated back a couple of thousand years with some sort of history, but they had engineered ways in order to fight, and there was pride in the fighting of proud warriors and the clans and the chiefs, etc., etc. So here you have a planet filled with individual cultures that all think that they are just supreme, and they don't know any better. They all think they're supreme. And you have the British Empire sort of girdling the world, enforcing its law over 25% of the population. This was quite a time. But there was a problem, and that problem had roots, deep roots. We find the problem back in Genesis 6, verse 5. Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth. Human beings by themselves are wicked, and that every intent of man was of the thought of his heart was only evil continually. The problem with all these cultures that had all these families wanting the best for themselves and their children and enjoying the fruits of God's earth and the sunshine and the rain and the beauty of life had a flaw. And that flaw was wickedness and evil intents. And those wickedness, those wicked and evil intents, bumped up against other people and caused problems. Lots of problems.

And thus our history is really of the challenges that people and cultures have experienced down through time that have added up, built up, exploded, shrunk back a bit, pressured people to build up some more, opportunity arises, more explosions. The nations of 1800 that we just looked at had been building stresses for 4,350 years since that time in Genesis when God looked down and saw the hearts of men were evil. That's a long time for a big complexity of problems to brew. Local pride and arrogance had been met with setbacks and problems from others, defeat. When you get defeated and your aspirations and your pride is wounded, then bitterness and animosity results all had advanced their own superior histories. We don't know those histories. We, being whoever you are, know your own history from your perspective, your pride, your view, your aspirations, your achievements. Every culture has those and each doesn't know their own. Doesn't know each other's like they know their own because they look at their cultures and their histories as superior. Their religions are superior. Their cultures, their music is superior. Their art is superior. Their life way, whatever that life way is, that's a superior life way. A matter of living and economics and whatever. All had ruled themselves. They had fought. They had competed within local spheres, regional local things for a long, long time. They had been in the same place for a long time. But then came the superpowers. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, a superpower showed up with weaponry that wasn't like what the culture had, what the culture had ever known. This stuff was sophisticated, explosive. This stuff would corral you, it would contain you, it would humiliate you, it would obliterate you. All of a sudden, you were exposed to some invasion of a different culture with different history, different values, and it was imposed, and yours were removed. The Spanish, the Portuguese, the British, the French, the Germans, later the Americans. In these countries, these cultures, these tribes were shocked.

They were shamed. In many cases, they were colonized. Even China, at one point, was forced to become a purveyor of opium for the West, and its own people became dependent on it.

It could not do anything about it, and that was China. They invaded everyone, from Russia, India, Middle East, Africa, America, China, and the previous millennia of local troubles were now compounded globally. It just took a step up. In World War I, the Ottoman Empire was crushed. People saw the invading force in 1914 come, cultures they didn't know that crushed them, divided them, smashed them, forced them into things that they were not aware of. For more, you could read the book, Destiny Disrupted, a History of the World through Islamic Eyes. Just a different viewpoint there. A totally different viewpoint of history.

The world map was redrawn. Sham governments were instituted. The West came over, and instead of the old governments of the Empire, they put up new public governments, artificial governments, the governments you and I have been used to through the years, that were favorable to the West, favorable to the policies of the West, to the oil production of the West, to the military strategies of the West. It forced them into subservience and obedience, it forced them into culture changes and messing with things that they were proud of and have been proud of for hundreds and hundreds of years. Religions changed. Oil money went to the traitor leaders. Rivalries escalated. Invaders came. Bombs. They were all in the streets. Controls were placed. In World War I, in Europe, all those unique countries of Europe, suddenly all order and law in Europe collapsed out from under that continent. All the countries, all their infrastructure collapsed, and that was followed by the Great Depression, so their money became worthless on top of that. Very, very difficult time. It bankrupted the countries. They tried to solve the problem in part with World War II, at least one or more countries did. Of course, World War II ended up killing over 30 million people. And World War II was really a releasing of a lot of the tension that had built up in all those areas. With the lack of order, remember all those little ethnic groups that through time had been forced and shoved and piled on and hurt, and the atrocities that took place?

30 million deaths during World War II just piled up the atrocities, and the people went crazy. It wasn't just allies against the Nazis. It was just the people that were there.

It was people settling scores. World War II officially ended with dancing in the streets in May of 1945, and from our perspective, the war was over. But World War II would continue for another 10 years in reality. The ravaged landscapes across Europe that raised the cities and broken down all forms of social structure and order, ability to have water and food, caused people to have the fresh memories bubble over of who had done what to whom and what culture had done what to whom, what local atrocities had been committed by who, who were the informers and who were working with this government or that government. Everyone sought revenge for the wrongs that were done to them. The concentration camps were reopened in Poland and Russia to continue what the Nazis had begun, to finish it off. Resistant paramilitary groups turned their fire now instead of on the resistance to their old enemies. Rival ethnic groups within their countries. They had murderous fury as hundreds of thousands of people would die in the next 10 years after the war in returning tit for tat and inter-ethnic warfare. Massacres in some places led to civil wars in some places.

Tens of millions of people were expelled from their ancestral homeland in an ethnic cleansing operation. What before the end of World War II had been the redrawing of maps around cultures after World War II became the map staying pretty much the same and forcing people to move. The Jews were not welcome anywhere in Europe. Holland had the only government that probably wouldn't take action against them. Everyone else was totally hostile toward them.

And thus we have the nation that's called Israel today. They had nowhere to go. They were being exterminated. For more on this, you can read the book The Savage Continent, Europe in the Aftermath of World War II by Keith Lowe. The lesson of the book is that when economies and law fail, humans return to theft, murder, and genocide, just like that. Now, let's listen to this one more time. When economies, every year of economies failing, and laws fail, humans return to theft, murder, and genocide. There's a lot of pressure that we don't see on the tourist map. There's a lot of long-term situations that exist in the world. And if economies and laws are starting to fail, then what can we expect in the world just ahead? It begins to make sense some of what the prophecies in the Bible are talking about. It begins to seem very real. Very real. Here's a question that another book raised. What would the world look like if America were to reduce its role as a global leader? Is America reducing its role as a global leader, or being reduced as a global leader? Yes.

And we could totally fall out of sight if the dollar ever becomes what it's really worth. It could happen very rapidly. One perspective comes from the book, The World America Made by Robert Kagan. It says, the world would see the retreat of democracy and the return of war among rising nations as they jostle for power, just as happened with the breakdown of the Roman Empire and the collapse of European order with World War I. Do you begin to see kind of an end-time scenario developing with this kind of look at news, this kind of look at a world map? Beyond today's television program, one of them hosted by Mr. Steve Myers, I'd like to quote what he said, significant prophetic events are unfolding in Europe. You should be concerned. What's going to happen in the debt-free world is that you should be concerned. What's going to happen in the debt-ridden members of the Eurozone?

There's economies, possibly failing. Bible prophecy does indicate what lies on the horizon for the European Union. This will affect your life and potentially your faith. Can you escape what's to come? Stay tuned as we examine Europe bracing for the beast. That was one program.

Here's another end-time component. This comes from the IPCC, an international weather agency. It's their extreme weather report from November 2011. Extreme weather worldwide appears to be both increasing in frequency and intensity. A report warns that the world should expect more floods, heat waves and droughts to such an extent that some regions may become increasingly marginal places to live.

That at a time when the population is burgeoning, past the 7 billion mark, we're rapidly rushing higher and higher, where some regions may become increasingly marginal places to live.

Here's an article from August 2012. NASA warns that global warming is real.

Our analysis shows that it is no longer enough to say that global warming will increase the likelihood of extreme weather.

A study of 60 years of global temperatures show a stunning rise in the frequency of extremely hot summers.

Hot temperatures now cover 5,000 percent more of Earth's land area than during the period of 1951 to 1980. The point of all this today is to highlight the troubled waters that we're swimming in.

This is a troubled water, a troubled stream, as it were, that society has created.

You and I are told to come out to not be part of this. We shouldn't be floating downstream in the course of this world.

But rather, we need to come out of her. We really need to be doing what we should every day in order to be in the right place, the right time, so that when the world just ahead gets bad and gets rough, we don't have to worry. Like Jesus said, do not have anxious thoughts for tomorrow.

God loves you more than grass of the field, etc., etc.

And if we are truly pursuing godliness every day in the best way that we can with His help, and really sincerely succeeding in that with His help, then the Bible is full of encouragement. It's not always easy to go through things, but it's very possible.

We don't need to fear, we don't need to worry, unless we're not doing what we should.

And then there's that fear of the Lord, and God wrote these things in the Bible for us to be prodded to do what is right and what is good.

We should be asking ourselves where we stand, and how well we will remain standing in anything that comes along.

We don't know what will come, when it will come.

But we can see the signs of the leaves on the trees, can't we, that summer's near, you know?

When they're budding out and they're getting real fat and tight in the spring, you get a good idea that something's happening. Beyond Today Daily, a short excerpt by Mr. Darris McNeely, had him asking, What actions have you taken as you have watched and interpreted the times and seen the storm clouds coming, the winds blowing, and knowing that it's going to be hot?

These are the things we can kind of perceive. What actions have you taken, he asks. Has it moved you to action in your own life to take some tangible steps to improve your lot or to position yourself for them? That's a lot of what Jesus talks about, even in his parables and his sayings. He's encouraging us to get our priorities right, be focused on the right things.

Another Beyond Today segment, Mr. Myers asked, What might take place if your way of life were threatened with collapse? We know what would happen in society, you know, economic and collapse of law. They go right to thievery, murder, genocide, and some other things that I left out.

What would happen if your life were threatened with collapse? Could you put your hope, your confidence in someone that promised to bring prosperity and to save your lifestyle? That sounds tempting, doesn't it? It actually will happen to most people. A persuasive leader will emerge on the world scene.

Jesus warned about this individual and others like him. The Bible calls him the Beast, and God compares him to a ferocious wild animal with sinister intent. And he's coming on the world scene with powerful help from unseen, evil spiritual forces. The ten horns on the Beast of Revelation, chapter 17, verses 12-13, represent ten kings who, in order to help solve this world's crisis, will give their power and give their authority to that Beast. Now, that's going to require individuals to have the mark of the Beast, whatever that is, probably thinking and doing, forehead, thought, right hand, deed, or left hand if you're left-handed. But something that you've compromised that is lawless, it's against God. God will not accept those who have the mark of the Beast. And yet it's going to be very intriguing if you're wanting to keep your skin alive. Let's review an iron-clad scenario that will happen in the world just ahead. Daniel, chapter 11, is something that cannot be argued. When we look at prophecy of the end time, we usually see strange things in beasts and things in on scorpions and tails, and it's kind of foggy and you want to go, oh, will that happen? What will it be like? Daniel 11 is different. 11th chapter of Daniel is irrevocable. It is an arguable prophecy. And the interesting thing here is Daniel wrote it in about 500 B.C. 500 years before Christ. Obviously he wrote it with inspiration from God. What happened 500 years before Christ was that not only events were forecast, but the people who would do the events were forecast. Specific men and women and relatives, specific deeds and how those deeds would be done, the way a murder would be done, even the mental predisposition of certain leaders was forecast. These individuals would not live, some of them, for hundreds of years, much longer than the United States has been a country. Let's go back to Daniel 11 and just review a little bit here, just to see that this is a prophecy that requires reliance. Some examples in Daniel 11. Let's just jump in in verse 3. Daniel 11 verse 3. Then a mighty king shall arise, Alexander the Great. From Daniel's time to the time of Alexander the Great in the 300s, we're talking a time forward as long as the United States has been a country a specific man would be named. In verse 4, we find his four generals are mentioned, broken up into the four winds. He had generals of the north, west, east, and south. It even mentions that these individuals would be replaced with those who are not his own choosing or his own relatives. All these things happen exactly as prophesied. In verse 5, it says, also the king of the south. That's Ptolemy I. He came up and speaks about one of his princes, Seleucus Nicator. Everybody knows that's who these people were. These people didn't exist for hundreds of years, and yet individuals and exactly who they would be, where they are, what they did, how they did it is recorded. Verse 6, at the end of some years, specifically in 252 BC, they shall join forces, for the daughter of the king of the south shall go to the king of the north. Bernice was her name. History records it well. It's exactly what happened. See, God knew that it would be the daughter. It would be Bernice. The daughter of this king would do something. She would make a specific agreement. It just keeps going down, right down, person after person, even after... Here's another one. Verse 17, break in the middle part of the verse. And he, he, referring to Antiochus III, shall give him, Ptolemy V, the daughter of women, Cleopatra, to destroy it. But she shall not stand with him or before him. What does that mean?

Well, you see, Antiochus was her father. And it would be unusual that the daughter did not stand with her father. But the Bible records, she shall not stand with him nor before him. Antiochus III. And that's exactly what happened. See the specifics here? We're running out now hundreds of years in advance, and we're talking about people whose relatives hadn't even been born yet. And we're talking about what they will do and who they will side with.

In verse 18, after this, he, Antiochus III, shall turn his face to the coastlands and shall take many. But a ruler... Oh, that's the Roman Scipio. A ruler will do something. And so on and so forth it goes.

Verse 20, There shall arise in his place one who imposes taxes on the glorious kingdom, on Judah, Judea. And that was Seleucus the fourth. Wow! Just person after person after person. You can see in my Bible here all the names are written in. We don't have time to go through all of this stuff. But you can read this elsewhere. Here in verse 20, this Seleucus, Within a few days he shall be destroyed, but not in anger or in battle. Here we're looking forward hundreds of years, and this one person will rule a short time, but he'll die.

Not in anger, not in battle. He died of poisoning. Isn't that interesting? See the detail of these prophecies. And his place shall rise a vile person. So on and so forth it goes. Let's drop down to verse 32.

Those who do wickedly against the covenant, that was the Jews in that day, they had broken the covenant, he shall corrupt with flattery. They're going to be corrupted by someone with flattery. Here's the interesting thing here.

The people who know their God shall be strong and carry out great exploits. These are the Maccabees. The Maccabean Revolt. Jewish independence took place. It was one of the greatest moments in Jewish history. It was the Maccabean Revolt. And they were strong because they did stand up for the truth at the time when others were not. And they were able to get their own independence. Verse 37, Then the king, this is referring to the Caesars now of Rome, shall do according to his own will. He shall exalt and magnify himself above every god. Caesars proclaim themselves as gods.

They shall speak blasphemies against the God of gods. Etc. etc. Verse 37, The Caesars shall regard neither the gods of his fathers, the gods of Greece, gods of Rome, nor the desire of women. Caesars declared themselves as God. And there was Caesar worship. And, it says, nor the desire of women. Again, hundreds of years in advance, the first 14 Caesars out of 15 were homosexuals. Prophesied right here. Going on. If we look in verse 39, Thus he shall act against the strongest fortress. Here, the emperors to come, the emperors of the Roman Empire to come, would act against the strongest of fortresses with a foreign god, something new, which he shall acknowledge and advance its glory. Those were the popes. And he shall cause them to rule over many and divide the land for gain. Divided the lands for church and state, and the popes ruled over the kingdoms. You know, these are very interesting prophecies that eventually, over the Holy Roman Empire, these things were absolutely fulfilled. Now we come to verse 40. Guess what it says in verse 40? Next verse, at the time of the end, we now step forward, just race forward, to the time of the end. Now, do you think we could trust what he's going to say next? Did he nail what happened in the past? He got every one of them. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And now he comes to the time of the end. What do we say? Oh, I don't know. I don't know if I can trust this one. Next breath, same prophecy.

2600 years later, 2500 years later, 2500 years later, the time of the end, the king of the south. This is some kind of Muslim beast, I don't know. You see, we haven't seen these things happen yet. They're written in the same way what has happened was written, and it was exact. But we see through a lens, darkly, as it were, looking forward. At the time of the end, a king of the south shall attack him, and the king of the north shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots, horsemen, many ships, and he shall enter the countries, overwhelm them, and pass through.

No doubt the Middle East is being spoken of there. We begin to see that something's going to happen, some interchange is going to happen, between the remnant areas of what were general, Alexander the Great General's, one in the north, one in the south, south being Egypt, we could maybe tribute that to the Arab world, the north being the area that eventually migrated or is considered a day to be Europe, the ten nations of Europe, the ten kings giving their power to a beast. That's one prominent scenario within the church.

Verse 41, he shall also enter the glorious land, the modern nation of Israel, and many countries shall be overthrown. But these shall escape from his hand, eat of Moab and the prominent people of Ammon, if you look at a map you'll find that's pretty much modern-day Jordan. So we do have some specifics. It's going to be this retaliation, it's going to come through, Jordan will be exempt at this point. He shall stretch out his hand against the countries, what countries? Where are they? And the land of Egypt shall not escape. He shall have power over the treasures of gold and silver. Treasures of gold and silver, economy, world economy, you'll need something to buy and sell if you want to stay alive. It's about economics. We read about, in Revelation 18-19, we read about a group and an individual, it's all about money and luxuries and false religion.

The land of Egypt shall not escape. He shall have power over the treasures of gold and silver, over the precious things of Egypt. Also the Libyans and Ethiopians shall follow at his heels. Looks like East, North, West, Africa gets involved. But news from the East and the North shall trouble him. Russia, China, Dono, India, India's East, the big population centers of the world, countries with big weaponry, nuclear powers, massive armies, potential for them. 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.

Sounds like between the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean Sea, perhaps on the glorious Holy Mountain. We see an individual, a false Christ come, the Antichrist, showing himself in the temple declaring that he's God and above all gods, and performing signs and wonders. Yet he shall come to his end and no one will help him. We read in places like Revelation 17.6 about how the ten kings on the beast, the ten horns, the ten kings hate him, and they consume him and devour him. During this time, at that time, whichever time that is, 12 verse 1, Michael shall stand up, the great prince who stands watch over the sons of your people.

And there shall be a time of trouble, such as there never was a nation, even to that time. Words of Christ on the Mount of Olives. Worst time that will ever happen, in history or in the future. And at that time, your people shall be delivered, everyone who was found written in the book, the book of life.

Everyone who is fulfilling faithfully their calling to be come Christlike, to seek the righteousness of God and the kingdom of God, rather than the affairs on this earth, getting embroiled in them. In verse 2, And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life. Looks like the first resurrection takes place at the seventh trumpet.

Some to shame an everlasting contempt. Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the firmament. They will be the sons of God. They will be literal family members, brothers with Jesus Christ, who is the light. He shines so bright. He and the Father, they are light. And the heirs, the first heirs of the kingdom, the first fruits, will be light, shine like the brightness of the firmament. Those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars, forever in bright, bright lights, they will have the spiritual form and attributes of the God family.

Now, I'd like to interject here a parable, the parable of the dragnet from Jesus. In Matthew 13, verses 47-50, Matthew 13, verse 47, remember one of Jesus' responsibilities will be to choose who lives and who dies, separate who are sheep, who are goats. We just read there in Daniel that some will be resurrected to that ultimate state with the God family and others will be burned. Well, from Jesus' perspective here, he states in Matthew 13, verse 47, Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet that was cast into the sea and gathered some of every kind, which when it was full they drew to shore, and they sat down and gathered the good into vessels but threw the bad away.

So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come forth and separate the wicked from among the just and cast them into the furnace of fire, and there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. So that's just something to remember as we look at our need to always be Christlike, always be growing in godliness, repenting daily, and becoming more like Christ should be what we do.

And if you find that you're playing any games or kind of sloughing off or goofing off, showing up or thinking you're in the church or whatever, these are important times. And even if you're trying your best, these are important times because Judgment Day is coming on those who will be the firstfruits or those who won't, and we have that wonderful opportunity to participate in a right way if we are doing things rightly every day.

Let's here take a look at something from Beyond Today, Mr. Steve Myers say. Now as you think about that, he says, I mean, some of the things we're talking about, they're just absolutely frightening. What can a Christian do? What should we do as these things are coming?

They are certainly prophesied. What should be our perspective of these things? Now on the program, Mr. Gary Petty answered. He said, the first thing we need to realize is you need to prepare spiritually. It's your personal relationship with God, being close to God, being on our knees before God. God taught us to do that daily. And not just pray about anything, but pray the way he taught us to pray, about the things that he taught us to pray about.

Really in the order and the priorities that he taught us to pray about. Focus on those things. What should a person be concentrating on that wants to be ready for the world just ahead?

Well, there's one verse in Zephaniah, chapter 2 and verse 3, that I'd like to read to you as we conclude. Zephaniah, chapter 2 and verse 3. Very insightful.

He says, seek the Lord all you meek of the earth. Blessed are the meek. They're going to inherit the earth. The kingdom of God coming to this earth, first round, ultimately, eternal life, new heavens and new earth. Seek the Lord all you meek of the earth. That's the one who says, I don't know how to live, God.

I rely on you. I don't have the ability to tell the Israelites how to get out of Egypt. I rely on you. Moses was the most meek man of his day. We need to rely on Jesus Christ to lead us as well, like David in Psalm 23.

Seek the Lord all you meek of the earth who have upheld his justice. Seek righteousness. Seek humility. It may be that you will be hidden in the day of the Lord's anger. That would be a great place to be, wouldn't it? Wonderful place to be.

Jesus said, be a person of prayer. He said, pray. Pray. Live your life. Watch. Watch your spiritual state. Be alert. Be awake.

And it may be that you will be counted worthy to escape all these things and stand before the Son of Man.

You might recall a three-part sermon on the end time that I gave in July of 2011 that included Part 3, a place of safety. God doesn't just intend for all of his children to have to go through all that's coming in the world ahead of us. There is some testing and trying and growth now that God is recognizing, and some will be spared from that. And it would be good for us also not to just be trying to get the reward, but to be genuinely interested in children who desire us of being like our God and our elder brother. And in doing so, they can bring blessings upon the faithful as they deem right and proper.

I'd like to conclude where we began with the end in mind.

It's the end that we need to endure to. We need to continue on in genuineness and faithfulness and always be faithful to our covenants. Always be faithful to our God and to Jesus Christ who has given himself totally for us. We should give ourselves totally to him.

Last evening, Monty called, and a statement he made was, We need to keep doing godliness no matter what. And I said, I'm going to quote that in the sermon tomorrow. Simple statement, but that's it. We need to keep doing godliness no matter what. And while the world is out there trying to figure out how to get through one more year or one more day or make this whole mess of the global map last and succeed, you and I need to be focused on the righteousness of God in relationship with his kingdom. I'd like to conclude by reading Christ's words in Luke 21, verses 29 through 37. Luke chapter 21, beginning in verse 29.

Then he spoke to them a parable. Look at the fig tree and all the trees. When they are already budding, you see and know for yourselves that summer is now near. So you also, when you see these things happening, know that the kingdom of God is near. Verse 34. But take heed to yourselves.

Lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and the cares of this life, and that that day come upon you unexpectedly. For it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth. Verse 36. Watch. Thayer's defines that as, Keep awake, be attentive, be ready.

Therefore, and pray always, don't let down in prayer, that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and stand before the Son of Man.