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The Apocalypse in Panorama Msg 112 - Pastor Chuck Swindoll Insight for Livining · INSIGHT FOR LIVING: Biblical Wisdom For Everyday Living

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Speaker 1: Well, if you have a Bible with you, I hope
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Speaker 1: you will turn it to the last book in it.
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Speaker 1: I want to read a few verses from the first chapter,
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Speaker 1: and then just a few from the last Revelation one
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Speaker 1: verse one, and then have ready, if you will, the
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Speaker 1: twenty second chapter. In the last few verses, there the
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Speaker 1: revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show
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Speaker 1: to his bond servants the things which must soon take place.
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Speaker 1: And he sent and communicated it by his Angel to
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Speaker 1: his bond servant John, who testified to the word of
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Speaker 1: God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to
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Speaker 1: all that he saw. Blessed is he who reads and
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Speaker 1: those who hear the words of the Prophecy and heed
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Speaker 1: the things which are written in it, For the time
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Speaker 1: is near. Look at verse nine. I John, your brother
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Speaker 1: and fellow partaker in the tribulation and kingdom and perseverance
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Speaker 1: which are in Jesus was on the island called Patmas
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Speaker 1: because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
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Speaker 1: I was in the spirit on the Lord's day, and
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Speaker 1: I heard behind me a loud voice, like the sound
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Speaker 1: of a trumpet, saying, write in a book what you see,
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Speaker 1: and send it to the seven Churches, to Ephesus and
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Speaker 1: to Smyrna, and to Pergamum, and to Thiatya, and to Sardis,
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Speaker 1: and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea verse nineteen. Therefore, write
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Speaker 1: the things which you have seen, and the things which are,
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Speaker 1: and the things which will take place after these things.
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Speaker 1: Then Chapter twenty two, verse sixteen. I Jesus have sent
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Speaker 1: my Angel to testify to you these things. For the churches.
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Speaker 1: I am the root and the descendant of David, the
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Speaker 1: bright morning Star, the Spirit, and the Bride. Say come,
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Speaker 1: and let the one who hears, say come, and let
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Speaker 1: the one who is thirsty come. Let the one who
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Speaker 1: wishes take the water of life without cost. I testify
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Speaker 1: to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of
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Speaker 1: this book. If anyone adds to them, God will add
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Speaker 1: to him the plagues which are written in this book.
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Speaker 1: And if anyone takes away from the words of the
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Speaker 1: book of this prophecy, God will take away his part
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Speaker 1: from the Tree of life and from the Holy City,
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Speaker 1: which are written in this book. He who testifies to
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Speaker 1: these things says, yes, I'm coming quickly. Amen, Come Lord Jesus,
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Speaker 1: the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be withal Amen,
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Speaker 1: Our Lord is given to us, and now we have
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Speaker 1: the pleasure of giving to him. Before we do, let's
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Speaker 1: pray together. We are very grateful, Father, We are very
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Speaker 1: grateful having become acquainted with your grace which sought us,
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Speaker 1: found us not looking for you but running from you.
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Speaker 1: And in your mercy you found us, and you loved
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Speaker 1: us when we were dreadfully unlovely and disinterested and running
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Speaker 1: as fast as we could in another direction, without any
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Speaker 1: good in us, but great grace in yourself. You stooped
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Speaker 1: to show us Christ and to reveal his beauty and
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Speaker 1: sacrificial life and death, all on our behalf. Thank you,
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Speaker 1: Father for finding us and caring about us, and relieving
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Speaker 1: us through the forgiveness of our sins. Thank You for
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Speaker 1: your word in our language, bound conveniently in a book
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Speaker 1: for us to read. May these pieces of black print
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Speaker 1: on white pages come alive, especially from this final revelation
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Speaker 1: you have set forth for us to understand. Assist us,
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Speaker 1: our Father, as we journey through these twenty two chapters.
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Speaker 1: Be our guide as you are our God. Be glorified
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Speaker 1: as your son has been lifted up above all, and
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Speaker 1: be pleased with what we learn, and more importantly, with
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Speaker 1: how we live what we discover. May the blessing of
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Speaker 1: those who read and hear and heed the words of
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Speaker 1: this prophecy rest upon us your peace, for we take
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Speaker 1: this very seriously. Thank You for those who watch over
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Speaker 1: us and provide for our peace. Thank You for those
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Speaker 1: in lonely and difficult places today. Thank you for those
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Speaker 1: who serve you as ministers of Christ in capacities that
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Speaker 1: we can hardly imagine, in difficult places we have never been,
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Speaker 1: who sacrificially pour out their lives on behalf of others
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Speaker 1: for your cause. And now, our Father, as we enjoy
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Speaker 1: the privilege of giving of all things, giving to you,
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Speaker 1: who has no need, that the work of ministry might
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Speaker 1: continue unhindered, find us faithful and generous and joyful. And
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Speaker 1: may the kind of peace that the Lord Jesus promised
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Speaker 1: be ours now that we have the peace with God
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Speaker 1: through our Lord Jesus Christ, in whose name we give
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Speaker 1: and in whose name we pray. And everyone said, Amen.
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Speaker 1: Whoever opens the Bible to the last book of the
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Speaker 1: Bible is ushered into an amazing world. The familiar parameters
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Speaker 1: of Earth as we know it today are pushed back,
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Speaker 1: and we are suddenly encountering scenes that seem weird, and
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Speaker 1: cosmic battles that boggle our minds even more than we
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Speaker 1: can imagine. It is an unlike going about thirty to
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Speaker 1: forty five minutes into a j are Our Tolkien book
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Speaker 1: named The Lord of the Rings, Suddenly you're removed from
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Speaker 1: the familiar, and you are introduced to the land of
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Speaker 1: Middle Earth, threatened by the power of an evil overlord.
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Speaker 1: And there are multi headed monsters and ferocious beasts and
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Speaker 1: long sharp swords and snarling dragons, and you find yourself
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Speaker 1: wondering if the darkness will ever be removed and if
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Speaker 1: good will ever win over evil, as gigantic cataclysms break
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Speaker 1: on the scene. Ultimately the darkness turns to light as
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Speaker 1: Aragorn the King finally is revealed in all of his splendor,
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Speaker 1: just when you're about convinced that there's no way good
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Speaker 1: ultimately triumphs over evil. The Book of Revelation is a
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Speaker 1: divinely inspired drama of good good engulfed by evil until
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Speaker 1: the King of Kings appears and leads the conquest triumph.
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Speaker 1: But the wonderful thing about the book is that it
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Speaker 1: is it is. It is not fiction, it is reality.
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Speaker 1: It is not fantasy, It's truth. And what began in
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Speaker 1: the New Testament as the King, coming in obscurity and
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Speaker 1: almost secrecy, veiled in flesh, and appearing in the little,
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Speaker 1: the little country town of Bethlehem, and finally reared in
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Speaker 1: Nazareth as a as a carpenter of all things. And
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Speaker 1: then and then, at the age of thirty, he quietly
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Speaker 1: begins a ministry that is marked by misunderstanding and mistreatment,
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Speaker 1: and uh one enemy and adversary after another, until he
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Speaker 1: is finally, finally driven if you will, to the cross
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Speaker 1: where he submits and suffers and dies. And if that
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Speaker 1: seems strange to the reader of the Gospels, can you
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Speaker 1: imagine how it must have felt to the twelve who
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Speaker 1: followed him, anticipating that he would one day lead them
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Speaker 1: in triumph into a kingdom that would overcome evil. But
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Speaker 1: there they stood, those who stayed close enough to see
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Speaker 1: as he hung and died and was buried. Revelation is
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Speaker 1: the answer to the Gospel's hope. Revelation provides the solution
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Speaker 1: to the problem that is encountered all the way through
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Speaker 1: the book from Genesis to Jude, Revelation says good ultimately triumphs.
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Speaker 1: And it isn't in Middle Earth. It's on planet Earth.
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Speaker 1: And it isn't about some creative novel born in the
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Speaker 1: mind of a man. But it is the message of
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Speaker 1: God to his people. It is, indeed the revelation of
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Speaker 1: Jesus Christ. Now you can understand why so many have
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Speaker 1: gone to wild and ridiculous extremes as they've allowed their
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Speaker 1: imaginations to run free. I remember sitting as a little
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Speaker 1: boy in church, just as you're sitting in church today
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Speaker 1: and hearing the Book of Revelation referred to, and wondering
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Speaker 1: if I would make it through the day before the
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Speaker 1: dragon appeared, or if the beast was living next door,
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Speaker 1: and we might encounter something like that before the week
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Speaker 1: is up. You can understand now why so many have
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Speaker 1: dismissed the book as nothing but an imaginative set of
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Speaker 1: events dreamed up in the mind of some recluse living
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Speaker 1: on an island in the South Aege and c. One
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Speaker 1: man even defines Revelation. It is a famous book in
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Speaker 1: which Saint John the Divine concealed all that he knew.
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Speaker 1: The revealing is done by commentators who know nothing. That
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Speaker 1: really is the majority opinion among the learned. And because
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Speaker 1: I think honestly that Revelation has suffered more at the
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Speaker 1: hands of its friends than its enemies, I've decided, rather
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Speaker 1: than to plunge into the first chapter in the first verse,
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Speaker 1: I would back away, and we would look at it
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Speaker 1: as a whole, sort of get an overview of the book,
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Speaker 1: and take a calm, deliberate approach to it. So let
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Speaker 1: me begin by offering three very practical reminders to guard
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Speaker 1: us from ridiculous extremes. May I do that. The first
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Speaker 1: of the three is expect the unusual. Expect the unusual.
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Speaker 1: This is not like any other Bible book. It's a
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Speaker 1: little like Ezekiel. There's a touch of it like Zechariah.
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Speaker 1: But it is nothing like the writings of Paul. It
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Speaker 1: does not sound at all like Peter. And even the
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Speaker 1: symbolisms and figures of speech do not seem like John. John,
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Speaker 1: who doesn't write like that in his Gospel or in
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Speaker 1: the Three Letters, is now writing these word words that
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Speaker 1: for centuries have been have been struggled over and tried
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Speaker 1: to try to be explained. But this is apocalyptic literature.
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Speaker 1: This is prophecy deliberately given in symbols so as to
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Speaker 1: mask the message from those persecuting. Understand this came and
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Speaker 1: the reign of Domitian, the most vicious and vile of
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Speaker 1: the emperors of Rome. He's the one who sent John
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Speaker 1: to the island of Patmas in exile to rid the
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Speaker 1: land of a man like this and his influence. It
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Speaker 1: was Domician and his ilk who could have gotten hold
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Speaker 1: of a book like this and my they would have
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Speaker 1: read the whole story and realized Caesar is not the
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Speaker 1: king but written in symbols. To them it was ludicrous,
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Speaker 1: nothing but the why, thinking of this hermit who now
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Speaker 1: lives on Petnus. So the symbolism has a purpose. Expect
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Speaker 1: the unusual. If you come across things you don't understand,
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Speaker 1: welcome to the club. You'll be in good company. There
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Speaker 1: are parts of it you simply cannot grasp, and that's okay. Second,
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Speaker 1: restrain your imagination. Some of you are very creative people.
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Speaker 1: You will want to make something of everything. There are
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Speaker 1: times it's acceptable to put names and details to figures
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Speaker 1: of speech and symbols. There are other times you will
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Speaker 1: not be able to do so with any sense of dogmatism.
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Speaker 1: Let me show you an example of where you can know.
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Speaker 1: Chapter one, John has heard a voice, and the voice
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Speaker 1: has given him a message, and John is curious, so
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Speaker 1: he turns verse twelve to look in the direction of
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Speaker 1: the voice, and he witnesses something he's never seen before.
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Speaker 1: He sees this voice in invisible form, this one speaking
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Speaker 1: to him. And he says, having turned chapter one, verse twelve,
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Speaker 1: I saw seven golden lamp stands, seven golden lamp stands.
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Speaker 1: In the middle of the lamp stands, I saw one
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Speaker 1: like a son of man, clothed in a robe, reaching
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Speaker 1: to the feet and girded across his chest with a
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Speaker 1: golden sash. His head and his hair were white like
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Speaker 1: white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame
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Speaker 1: of fire. Now I've seen charts on the Book of Revelation,
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Speaker 1: and when you are one chapter into it, you have
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Speaker 1: this creature and he has flames out of his eyes.
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Speaker 1: But it doesn't say flames came out of his eyes.
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Speaker 1: Look at what it says. It says that his eyes
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Speaker 1: were like a flame of fire. The analogous term is
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Speaker 1: used all the way through like this as that it
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Speaker 1: doesn't mean it's that it means it is like that.
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Speaker 1: It goes on to describe him with another analogy. In
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Speaker 1: his right hand, he I should say verse fifteen, his
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Speaker 1: feet were like burnished bronze. I've seen the pictures bronze shoes,
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Speaker 1: bronze boots, but it doesn't say they were bronze. It
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Speaker 1: says they were like bronze, but not just bronze. Bronze
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Speaker 1: when it has been made to glow in a furnace.
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Speaker 1: So something about the boots being worn, or the shoes
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Speaker 1: being worn, or sandals has a glow to them. That's
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Speaker 1: the point. That's the point of it. And his voice
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Speaker 1: was like the sound of many waters. I've heard this
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Speaker 1: described as you were to stand near Niagara. It doesn't
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Speaker 1: say that the voice was many waters. It says it
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Speaker 1: was like many waters. Apparently was deep and roaring and commanding.
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Speaker 1: But we're not really left to wonder who this is
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Speaker 1: or what this is about. Look at verse twenty. You're
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Speaker 1: on safe ground when you interpret according to the scriptures.
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Speaker 1: Now we're told about the mystery. As for the mystery
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Speaker 1: of the seven stars, which you saw in my right hand,
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Speaker 1: and the seven golden lamp stands. Why the seven stars
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Speaker 1: are the angels and the seven church, and the angels
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Speaker 1: of the seven churches, and the seven lamp stands. Are
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Speaker 1: the seven churches? Still a little bit uncertain, isn't it?
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Speaker 1: Ungeloss translated angels in the scriptures in the New Estimate
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Speaker 1: is a term that frequently means messenger. The Angel of
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Speaker 1: such and such is frequently the messenger of such and such,
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Speaker 1: Because and so this, no doubt, would represent the seven
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Speaker 1: leaders of the seven churches mentioned for us in verse eleven.
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Speaker 1: The seven messengers would be those who make the message
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Speaker 1: known to each of the seven churches. So we are
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Speaker 1: given the interpretation. Now go to chapter thirteen. This is
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Speaker 1: one of my favorites. Chapter thirteen is the most is
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Speaker 1: the most lengthy portrayal of the Antichrist, who is yet
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Speaker 1: to come. So it begins with a bang. The dragon
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Speaker 1: stood on the sand of the seashore. The dragon is
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Speaker 1: identified in the Book of Revelation as Satan himself, and
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Speaker 1: so he's not called Satan, he's called the dragon stood
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Speaker 1: on the sand of the seashore. And I saw a
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Speaker 1: beast coming up out of the sea, having ten horns
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Speaker 1: and seven heads. And on his horns were ten theodema
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Speaker 1: or ten diadems ten crowns, and on his heads were
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Speaker 1: blasphemous names. The beast which I saw, was like a leopard,
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Speaker 1: and his feet were like a bear, his mouth like
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Speaker 1: the mouth of a lion. And Satan or the dragon,
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Speaker 1: gave him his power and his throne and great authority.
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Speaker 1: And I saw one of his heads as if it
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Speaker 1: had been slain, and his fatal wound was healed, and
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Speaker 1: the whole earth was amazed and followed after the beast.
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Speaker 1: And why we have this beast portrayed, as he leads
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Speaker 1: people with enormous charisma and authority, and he has answers
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Speaker 1: that no one else before him has had. And the
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Speaker 1: people follow him, and in fact they become a part
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Speaker 1: of his system. And they receive a mark, a mark
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Speaker 1: on their fours, and we read of the benefit of
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Speaker 1: that mark. In verse seventeen, he provides that no one
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Speaker 1: will be able to buy or to sell except the
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Speaker 1: one who has the mark, either the name of the
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Speaker 1: beast or the number of his name. Here is wisdom.
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Speaker 1: Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast,
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Speaker 1: for the number of that is that of a man.
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Speaker 1: And his number is six hundred and sixty six, and
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Speaker 1: I have heard this beast identified as all sorts of people,
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Speaker 1: and I cannot find those people. In the eighteen verses
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Speaker 1: of chapter thirteen. It's Nero, even though he's dead. It's Domsion,
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Speaker 1: it's Hitler, it's Stalin, it's Roosevelt, it's Reagan, it's Clinton
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Speaker 1: made likely. No, no, no, it's a joke. It's a joke.
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Speaker 1: I've carried away with my own stuff here. Somebody figured
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Speaker 1: out the numerical six sixty six and tied it into letters,
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Speaker 1: and it's spelled swindlef. So don't go there. If you're
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Speaker 1: waiting for me to identify the Antichrist, please don't come back.
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Speaker 1: And I will never I have no authority, I have
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Speaker 1: no insight. I don't even really have much patience with
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Speaker 1: that kind of thing. So restrain your imagination. Where the
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Speaker 1: scripture helps us, we'll allow the scripture to speak. Where
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Speaker 1: good study and reference work assists us, we will suggest that,
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Speaker 1: but there will not be dogmatic statements made or predictions,
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Speaker 1: given that we can't back up with good scholarship. I
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Speaker 1: like the way Earle Paul addresses this. Let me suggest
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Speaker 1: one rule for biblical interpretation. He writes, lean is better
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Speaker 1: than luxurious when it comes to biblical study. If we
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Speaker 1: were to air, it would be better to air on
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Speaker 1: the side of interpretive restraint than on the side of
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Speaker 1: interpretive excess. Back to Chapter one. We can assure you
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Speaker 1: that there will not be excess in our study of
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Speaker 1: Revelation at any point where it is an opinion, I
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Speaker 1: will state it as that. And my opinion is worth
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Speaker 1: no more than anyone else's opinion who has studied the
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Speaker 1: text and goes at it as I'm going after it
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Speaker 1: with an eye for interest in accuracy. So restrain your imagination. Third,
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Speaker 1: ask three questions in whatever section we are in of
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Speaker 1: the scriptures, always asked these three questions. Number one, what
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Speaker 1: does it say? That's a question of observation, and that's
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Speaker 1: the first place people tend to go into error. They
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Speaker 1: read part of what it says, or they read more
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Speaker 1: than what it said, or less. What does it say?
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Speaker 1: Let it say that, Let it say what it says.
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Speaker 1: The ideal is to do our best to find out
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Speaker 1: what it said in the day in which it was written,
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Speaker 1: which brings me to the second. What does it mean?
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Speaker 1: That's a question of interpretation. That's a more serious and
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Speaker 1: complicated question to answer. Now that I see what it
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Speaker 1: says and have a pretty good grasp of it, having
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Speaker 1: observed the text, what does that mean? And again, ideally,
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Speaker 1: what did it mean to them when they first read it,
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Speaker 1: they first heard it, or John first saw it? What
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Speaker 1: does it mean? Third question, what does it mean to me?
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Speaker 1: That's a question of application. Now that I've read what
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Speaker 1: it says, now that I have grasped pretty well what
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Speaker 1: it means, what does it mean to me? Skeptics have
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Speaker 1: a field day with revelation. One cornered the famous Charles
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Speaker 1: Hadden Spurgeon back in the in the nineteenth century and
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Speaker 1: said to him, as he had read one of the
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Speaker 1: cryptic sections of the book there, now, can you tell
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Speaker 1: me what that means? Mister Spurgeon With a twinkle in
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Speaker 1: his eye, he looked at the very difficult passage, and
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Speaker 1: he responded with a smile. Why, of course I can
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Speaker 1: tell you what that means. It means just what it says.
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Speaker 1: There will be times that that will be the best
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Speaker 1: we can do. All of the details are not spelled out,
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Speaker 1: so we are not in the business of offering prophecies
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Speaker 1: that do not have biblical justification, and we will restrain
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Speaker 1: ourselves as we ask those three questions. Now, let's move
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Speaker 1: to some foundational information that will give us an understanding
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Speaker 1: a better understanding of the book. First of all, the
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Speaker 1: title of the book. The title is taken directly from
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Speaker 1: the first line of the first verse. Up ecalypses esue
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Speaker 1: Christeu the revelation of Jesus Christ, Please observe revelation is singular.
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Speaker 1: The most common mistake made by well meaning Christians and
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Speaker 1: non Christians is to call this book plural. It isn't
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Speaker 1: the book of revelations. It is the body of revelation,
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Speaker 1: so get rid of the ass. When we get our
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Speaker 1: word apocalypse in the English language, it conveys the idea
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Speaker 1: of an imminent cosmic cataclysm, the ultimate, the ultimate disaster
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Speaker 1: and final doom of something. But that's that's not the meaning.
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Speaker 1: In its original Greek, apocalypsis means unveiling, disclosing something that
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Speaker 1: has been hidden or not known is now made visible.
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Speaker 1: It's used over fifteen times in the New Testament. Invariably
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Speaker 1: it conveys that meaning. This is an unveiling, a disclose
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Speaker 1: of the Lord Jesus and his plan for the future.
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Speaker 1: The book discloses what will occur now I want you
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Speaker 1: to remember that. I want you to remember the title.
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Speaker 1: The book is not titled the Confusing of Events the
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Speaker 1: hiding of important information. God's desire is that we understand
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Speaker 1: the future as best we can. Remember the words and
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Speaker 1: put it in the margin of your notes. First Thessalonians
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Speaker 1: four thirteen, Paul says, I would not want any of
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Speaker 1: you to be uninformed concerning those who are asleep. By
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Speaker 1: that he means those who have died, and then he
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Speaker 1: goes on to describe the future of those who have
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Speaker 1: passed from this earth. But the point is, I don't
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Speaker 1: want you to be ignorant. There is nothing spiritual about ignorance.
29:02
Speaker 1: If knowledge is available, there is something wonderful about admitting
29:07
Speaker 1: one's ignorance if no one could know by investigation. But
29:13
Speaker 1: if the truth is set forth, God's desire is that
29:17
Speaker 1: we go to the trouble, if you will, of informing ourselves,
29:22
Speaker 1: because when it comes to the future, we gain confidence
29:27
Speaker 1: for the present. If we know where we're going. God
29:31
Speaker 1: doesn't suddenly desire to confuse us, having made the previous
29:36
Speaker 1: truth clear. John MacArthur writes in his book on Revelation,
29:41
Speaker 1: these two words the revelation are essential to understanding this book.
29:46
Speaker 1: Many people are confused by the Book of Revelation, viewing
29:50
Speaker 1: it as a mysterious, bizarre, indecipherable mystery. But nothing could
29:57
Speaker 1: be further from the truth, far from from hiding the truth.
30:01
Speaker 1: The Book of Revelation reveals it. Then he adds this
30:05
Speaker 1: comment I think is good. It is unthinkable to believe
30:08
Speaker 1: God would speak with precision and clarity from Genesis to
30:13
Speaker 1: Jude and then when it comes to the end, abandon
30:20
Speaker 1: all precision and clarity. Good point. The title of the
30:27
Speaker 1: book tells you God wants us to know about the
30:32
Speaker 1: future as much as we can, and to grasp it
30:37
Speaker 1: for application now, to help us as we face what
30:42
Speaker 1: will come in the future. Secondly, the writer of the book,
30:47
Speaker 1: we're told of him in verse one. It's communicated by
30:53
Speaker 1: the Angel to the bond servant John. He's mentioned in
30:56
Speaker 1: verse four John tones that are in Asia, and in
31:02
Speaker 1: verse nine with the first person singular i John. So
31:08
Speaker 1: he's literally writing the book. He gave us the Gospel
31:14
Speaker 1: to give us something to believe. He gave us the
31:18
Speaker 1: three letters to help us be certain. He gives us
31:23
Speaker 1: the Revelation to make us ready. So John, when he
31:28
Speaker 1: comes to this last book of the Bible. His final
31:33
Speaker 1: message in writing writes, unlike he wrote in the Gospels
31:37
Speaker 1: or in the Letters. What do we know of John? Well,
31:41
Speaker 1: look at verse nine I John, your brother and fellow
31:46
Speaker 1: partaker in the tribulation and kingdom and perseverance which are
31:55
Speaker 1: in Jesus. Before we go to where he was, let
32:00
Speaker 1: me remind you that John has been placed there because
32:05
Speaker 1: of a ruler who was vicious in his treatment of Christians.
32:13
Speaker 1: Domitian was far worse than Nero. He reigned from eighty
32:17
Speaker 1: one to ninety six AD eighty one to ninety six.
32:25
Speaker 1: Probably the letter or the book is written towards the
32:29
Speaker 1: end of that time ninety four ninety five ninety six,
32:34
Speaker 1: John having been exiled to the island to be silenced.
32:39
Speaker 1: John had been ministering at Ephesus and Domssion, hoping to
32:44
Speaker 1: silence the impact of his message, felt that he belonged exiled,
32:50
Speaker 1: and he put him at a place of a Roman
32:52
Speaker 1: penal colony on the island of Patmos, tiny little six
32:58
Speaker 1: miles by ten miles isles long island in the South
33:02
Speaker 1: Aegean Seas. Matter of fact, if you have a set
33:06
Speaker 1: of maps somewhere in your Bible. If you don't you
33:09
Speaker 1: need another Bible, go to the last section of the maps.
33:16
Speaker 1: You will see the journeys of Paul, and you will
33:21
Speaker 1: find in the Aegean Sea. If you can't find that,
33:25
Speaker 1: you need glasses, because that's right there in the middle.
33:28
Speaker 1: You will see the Aegean and you will locate Ephesus
33:33
Speaker 1: in what is today Turkey, but in those days was
33:36
Speaker 1: called Asia, and just west southwest of Ephesus, only thirty
33:42
Speaker 1: seven miles into the sea, you'll find the little island
33:46
Speaker 1: of Petmos. Petmos, John Walvard writes the exile of John
33:55
Speaker 1: to the Isle of Patmos is in itself a moving
33:58
Speaker 1: story of devotion Christ crowned with suffering. This small island,
34:05
Speaker 1: rocky and forbidding in its terrain, is located in the
34:09
Speaker 1: Aegean Sea, southwest of Ephesus, just beyond the island of Semos.
34:15
Speaker 1: Early Church fathers such as Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, and
34:21
Speaker 1: Eusebius state that John was sent to this island as
34:25
Speaker 1: an exile as an exile under the ruler Domitian. According
34:31
Speaker 1: to Victorianus, John, though aged, was forced to labor in
34:35
Speaker 1: the mines located at Patmas. Early sources indicate that at
34:41
Speaker 1: about ninety six, at Domitian's death, John was allowed to
34:46
Speaker 1: return to Ephesus when the emperor Nerva was in power.
34:52
Speaker 1: Nervas succeeded Domssion on the throne of the Roman Empire
34:57
Speaker 1: and apparently was soft towards them of the faith, or
35:01
Speaker 1: at least softer than the mission, and John returned to
35:04
Speaker 1: his homeland of Asia. I have been to the island
35:09
Speaker 1: of Patmas, as have some of you. It is rugged,
35:13
Speaker 1: it is rocky. When you travel the aege and c
35:17
Speaker 1: you look forward to Patmos because it has such notoriety,
35:22
Speaker 1: being linked to the place where the revelation was written.
35:26
Speaker 1: When you are there, there are guides who delight to
35:29
Speaker 1: take you to the cave where John was, And of
35:35
Speaker 1: course cameras began to flash, as stomachs began to turn
35:40
Speaker 1: a little, and you find yourself a little elevated, thinking
35:44
Speaker 1: you're going to see the cave. And when you get
35:47
Speaker 1: inside the cave, which by the way, is covered with
35:50
Speaker 1: religious stuff, you get to a stone that's hollowed out.
35:55
Speaker 1: That's where John lay his head at night when he
35:59
Speaker 1: was tighted. Flashes of camera and then then this is
36:03
Speaker 1: where he put his arm. That's why the stone is
36:06
Speaker 1: worn as it is for flashing cameras, and the guide
36:11
Speaker 1: loves it and gets extra tips for comments like that,
36:15
Speaker 1: it's hogwash. You don't know if he was in a cave,
36:19
Speaker 1: and you don't know where he lay his head, and
36:23
Speaker 1: even if he did, he would never hollow it out
36:26
Speaker 1: by putting his head in it. Give me a break.
36:30
Speaker 1: I've laid my arm on my bed all of these years,
36:34
Speaker 1: and it does not have a little place where I
36:37
Speaker 1: lay my arm, and that's a mattress. So understand again,
36:45
Speaker 1: we love things that we love religious stuff. Let's take
36:51
Speaker 1: the religion out of it. Let's help it be real.
36:56
Speaker 1: It was on an island, and it is the island
36:58
Speaker 1: of pat must be caught, because scripture states both. In fact,
37:03
Speaker 1: scripture tells us he was there because of his commitment
37:07
Speaker 1: to the Word of God and because of his testimony
37:10
Speaker 1: of Jesus. It was out of persecution. But the tiny
37:14
Speaker 1: details of his life leave us at that point. He
37:19
Speaker 1: is surrounded by water all those years, and in the
37:24
Speaker 1: solace and solitude and perhaps even in the pain and
37:28
Speaker 1: poorment of his exile, the Lord appears to him and
37:32
Speaker 1: reveals to him what he was to write, and we
37:36
Speaker 1: leave it. We leave it at that. A third I
37:41
Speaker 1: would mention, along with the title and the writer of
37:43
Speaker 1: the book, I would mention the blessing of the book.
37:46
Speaker 1: It's unusual. Look at verse three. It's like a beatitude.
37:53
Speaker 1: When you get into the Matthew Gospel. You quickly come
37:56
Speaker 1: across the beatitudes blessed is he, or blessed or they
38:00
Speaker 1: here's a blessed is he who reads, and those who
38:05
Speaker 1: hear the words of the prophecy and heed the things
38:11
Speaker 1: which are written in it, for the time is near.
38:15
Speaker 1: You will find a similar statement at the very end
38:18
Speaker 1: of the book in twenty two seven. Behold, I am
38:21
Speaker 1: coming quickly. Blessed is he who heeds the words of
38:25
Speaker 1: the prophecy of this book. So they're like book INDs.
38:28
Speaker 1: There are blessing book INDs on this revelation that has
38:34
Speaker 1: been preserved for us. You will be blessed by hearing
38:37
Speaker 1: and reading and heeding. You will be blessed in heeding
38:42
Speaker 1: the truth of it. So this is a book that
38:45
Speaker 1: is not simply to satisfy idle curiosity. This is a
38:49
Speaker 1: book that if kept close and held fast and guarded,
38:54
Speaker 1: this book will result in a life that can be
38:58
Speaker 1: greater blessed. And the promise is right there for us
39:02
Speaker 1: as we work our way through the Revelation. We're not
39:05
Speaker 1: only interested in gathering prophetic facts. We're interested as we
39:10
Speaker 1: hunt for truth in things to live by, truths to embrace,
39:16
Speaker 1: and even in places to guard. Now a turn to
39:20
Speaker 1: page to verse nineteen, and I will show you happily
39:24
Speaker 1: and inspired outline. You who have spoken publicly know the
39:29
Speaker 1: value of an outline. You who have reviewed books usually
39:33
Speaker 1: have an outline in your mind of how the book
39:36
Speaker 1: is put together. It's wonderful that the Lord has given
39:38
Speaker 1: us an inspired outline of the book of the Revelation.
39:42
Speaker 1: To some it's too simplistic to suggest as an outline.
39:46
Speaker 1: I find, on the contrary, it's very helpful. John is
39:50
Speaker 1: told to do three things. One, write the things which
39:55
Speaker 1: you have seen, Second the things which are, and third
40:05
Speaker 1: the things which will take place after these things. Now
40:10
Speaker 1: let's let it say what it says. John is told
40:15
Speaker 1: to write, and he has told the categories in which
40:21
Speaker 1: he is to do the writing. Write the things that
40:25
Speaker 1: you see. That's chapter one. He sees this one who
40:32
Speaker 1: comes dressed in this way, He sees the details of
40:38
Speaker 1: his appearance, and he sees as we will discover the
40:44
Speaker 1: Lord Jesus, who is the Alpha and the Omega. I
40:48
Speaker 1: think it's wonderful. By the way, none of my sources
40:51
Speaker 1: mentioned this. John walked with him for those three years
40:54
Speaker 1: and more as a disciple. But when he encounters him here,
40:58
Speaker 1: he doesn't know him because he never saw him in
41:01
Speaker 1: this a blazing glory of his glorified state, and is
41:07
Speaker 1: not as he was in heaven revealing himself. And he's
41:10
Speaker 1: introduced to him as the one who was the beginning
41:14
Speaker 1: and the ending, the Alpha and the Omega, and seeing
41:18
Speaker 1: these things, he's to write them down. So John, no doubt,
41:22
Speaker 1: after the ecstasy of the vision, where he is lifted
41:25
Speaker 1: beyond the consciousness of this earth and caught up in
41:28
Speaker 1: the spiritual awareness of God's revealing himself, he writes down
41:34
Speaker 1: the things that he sees. That's chapter one. In chapters
41:38
Speaker 1: two and three we have the seven churches that were
41:42
Speaker 1: named for us. In verse eleven of chapter one, those
41:45
Speaker 1: are the things that are how helpful that is, these
41:49
Speaker 1: are the things that are going on right now in
41:52
Speaker 1: these seven churches. If you turn too quickly from the
41:55
Speaker 1: map that you overlooked inland the seven churches that make
42:00
Speaker 1: sort of a circle. Cynthia and I have visited the
42:03
Speaker 1: sites that are still identified as places to this day
42:08
Speaker 1: as those original spots. Some of them are now obscure.
42:12
Speaker 1: No one can say for sure where some of them are.
42:14
Speaker 1: But in the first century they were all extant. Ephesus
42:20
Speaker 1: and Smyrna and Pergamum and Thia Tyra, then down to
42:26
Speaker 1: Sardis and Philadelphia, and finally lay out a Sea. In
42:30
Speaker 1: every one of these churches there are strengths, and in
42:35
Speaker 1: all but one of them there are blazing and obvious
42:40
Speaker 1: weaknesses that the Lord reveals. And you're to write those
42:45
Speaker 1: things that are and these messengers are to take these
42:48
Speaker 1: messages and read them to the churches so they will
42:51
Speaker 1: know by the way, Just as an aside, wouldn't it
42:56
Speaker 1: be interesting if the Lord were to give this messenger
43:00
Speaker 1: the message concerning Stonebrier Community Church. Wouldn't you like it?
43:06
Speaker 1: Maybe you wouldn't, But wouldn't it be interesting if I
43:10
Speaker 1: came on a given Sunday and said, I I've just
43:15
Speaker 1: encountered the Lord and he has given me his message
43:19
Speaker 1: for us. Do you think you would be on the
43:22
Speaker 1: edge of your seat? Well? Probably not, because I would
43:26
Speaker 1: be weird getting a message from a vision, but in
43:29
Speaker 1: those days it wasn't weird. That's how God revealed his truth,
43:34
Speaker 1: and they must have sat on the edge of their
43:36
Speaker 1: seats listening to his evaluation. It is the Lord Jesus'
43:40
Speaker 1: evaluation of local churches in that first century. Those are
43:44
Speaker 1: the things which are Here's the third category, and that's
43:49
Speaker 1: what keeps us busy and often gets us in trouble.
43:53
Speaker 1: And that's chapters four through twenty two, where we write
43:57
Speaker 1: of the things which shall be hereafter the things which follow.
44:01
Speaker 1: By the way, look at chapter four and verse one.
44:04
Speaker 1: I found this this week and thought it was very interesting.
44:09
Speaker 1: After these things, remember the lines chapter one, verse nineteen,
44:13
Speaker 1: the things which will take place after these things. Four
44:17
Speaker 1: one starts with those very words, after these things, I
44:20
Speaker 1: looked and behold a door. Now stop. John, in this remarkable,
44:27
Speaker 1: supernatural moment of time, is taken up from this Earth
44:33
Speaker 1: in this vision, and he is seeing the peaks of
44:37
Speaker 1: the future. He is witnessing things in heaven chapters four
44:42
Speaker 1: and five, Judgments on Earth six through nineteen of the
44:47
Speaker 1: Book of Revelation, and he witnesses all of it. In fact,
44:51
Speaker 1: at that moment, as they are unfolding, and these are
44:56
Speaker 1: the things that will come after our time, not mentioned here,
45:03
Speaker 1: but would give some sense of peace to all of
45:05
Speaker 1: you who know the Lord Jesus, and no peace to
45:09
Speaker 1: you who do not, that we who know Christ are
45:13
Speaker 1: taken up from this earth and brought into the Lord's
45:17
Speaker 1: presence to be with him forever before the events of
45:21
Speaker 1: the judgments unfold, and the events on this earth hit
45:26
Speaker 1: with full force and greater intensity. As these things begin
45:30
Speaker 1: to come to pass, and John writes them, I imagine
45:34
Speaker 1: he wrote with some sense of passion as he put
45:38
Speaker 1: down one thing after another after another, as he saw
45:42
Speaker 1: the events transpiring. So that's an outline for the book,
45:47
Speaker 1: and I'll frequently refer to it. One nineteen, the things
45:51
Speaker 1: you've seen, chapter one, things that are two and three,
45:55
Speaker 1: and the things that will come after four through twenty two.
46:01
Speaker 1: Beryl Tenney writes, the Seer of Revelation, under the power
46:05
Speaker 1: of the Holy Spirit, was transported in consciousness to a
46:10
Speaker 1: new scene of action, where spiritual realities and future events
46:14
Speaker 1: were disclosed to him, and where he received revelations that
46:19
Speaker 1: were not given under ordinary circumstances. When God gave his
46:25
Speaker 1: truth to human beings. It was a supernatural event, and
46:30
Speaker 1: it was watched over by the Holy Spirit, so that
46:33
Speaker 1: the transmission of it into writing was miraculously preserved without error.
46:40
Speaker 1: As the Lord spoke or revealed ex cathedra. So the
46:44
Speaker 1: writers of scripture wrote ex cathedra without error, exactly what
46:51
Speaker 1: it is God wanted written. And John did that faithfully
46:55
Speaker 1: from the beginning to the end of the Revelation. By
46:59
Speaker 1: the way, fourteen times it says in Revelation that he
47:01
Speaker 1: has taken up in the spirit. One is while he
47:05
Speaker 1: was on the island of Patmos, another he is in heaven,
47:08
Speaker 1: third he is in a wilderness, and the fourth scene
47:11
Speaker 1: he is in a great and high mountain. Just a
47:16
Speaker 1: few closing words as we sort of unfold the book.
47:19
Speaker 1: There's a prologue in the first eight verses. So if
47:23
Speaker 1: you were a type of person that really likes to
47:25
Speaker 1: get it down to the NAT's whisker of verses one
47:29
Speaker 1: through eight of chapter one is a prologue. Chapter one,
47:35
Speaker 1: verse nine to the end of that. Chapter nine through
47:41
Speaker 1: twenty would be the things John saw, and here is
47:46
Speaker 1: a revelation of the person of Christ. And then two
47:51
Speaker 1: and three would be the things which are that would
47:55
Speaker 1: be the messages to the seven churches. Now listen carefully.
48:01
Speaker 1: When you get to the fourth chapter, you come to
48:04
Speaker 1: a time of enormous pain and anguish on this earth.
48:09
Speaker 1: It is a time of Scripture calls it tribulation flips.
48:14
Speaker 1: This is the word. It's the idea of pressure, anxiety, anguish,
48:22
Speaker 1: and it grows in intensity. Get it. From seven seals
48:29
Speaker 1: to seven trumpets, to seven bows. The seals are broken,
48:35
Speaker 1: and each one represents another anxiety, another anguishing experience, And
48:43
Speaker 1: the seventh seal opens the first of the seven trumpets,
48:47
Speaker 1: and those six trumpets are sounded, and each one represents
48:50
Speaker 1: a crescendo of painful, anguishing events that occur on this earth.
48:57
Speaker 1: And when the seventh trumpet is sounded, the first first
49:00
Speaker 1: of the seven bowls called the plagues, are opened and
49:04
Speaker 1: poured out. So there are seals broken, trumpets sounding, and
49:10
Speaker 1: bowls pouring out the anguish upon this earth that climaxes
49:15
Speaker 1: at the final great battle of Armageddon. If you will
49:21
Speaker 1: turn to chapter nineteen, how's that for a quick skate
49:25
Speaker 1: from four to nineteen. When you get to nineteen, you
49:29
Speaker 1: come to the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords,
49:33
Speaker 1: who steps onto this earth's scene sounding the if you will,
49:38
Speaker 1: the final death knell on the Antichrist and the false Prophet,
49:43
Speaker 1: who are thrown into a place of an abyss called
49:46
Speaker 1: the Lake of Fire, and Satan is bound for a
49:52
Speaker 1: thousand year period of time. Chapter twenty and the millennium,
49:57
Speaker 1: the millennial reign of Christ, full filling promises to the
50:01
Speaker 1: Jews given way back in ancient times, now are being fulfilled.
50:07
Speaker 1: Where Christ rules and we rule and reign with him.
50:12
Speaker 1: What a wonderful privileged position will be ours. Satan is bound,
50:16
Speaker 1: the false Prophet and the Antichrist are cast aside so
50:21
Speaker 1: as to no longer give influence, and there is the
50:24
Speaker 1: unrolling of peace like the world has never known, even
50:28
Speaker 1: the kind of peace described by some of the minor prophets,
50:32
Speaker 1: And all of that being fulfilled, Satan is loosed briefly.
50:36
Speaker 1: A few follow him, I should say many follow him,
50:39
Speaker 1: and they, along with the final enemy adversary himself, as
50:44
Speaker 1: well as Death, are cast into the Lake of Fire.
50:47
Speaker 1: And that opens chapter twenty one. To the end chapter
50:50
Speaker 1: twenty two, the eternal State, the final place of rest
50:56
Speaker 1: and reward of those who claimed the name of Christ.
51:01
Speaker 1: There is an epilogue again for you who care about
51:04
Speaker 1: those kind of details in twenty two six to twenty one.
51:08
Speaker 1: The prologue is one one to eight. The epilogue is
51:11
Speaker 1: twenty two six to twenty one, where John wraps it up.
51:19
Speaker 1: What a journey we have in front of us. You
51:24
Speaker 1: have my word. I will do my part, and I
51:29
Speaker 1: will expect you to do yours. You pray that the
51:35
Speaker 1: idiot's book on Revelation will not impact me too severely.
51:39
Speaker 1: You pray that I will let the word of God
51:42
Speaker 1: speak so that I can then represent truth for you.
51:47
Speaker 1: You pray that your own heart will be open to
51:50
Speaker 1: what may seem to you to be a stretch to believe. Again.
51:55
Speaker 1: You're pushing the parameters of the familiar back out of sight.
52:00
Speaker 1: You are invading a world that is not familiar, that
52:04
Speaker 1: is full of unusual events, the likes of which this
52:07
Speaker 1: world has never known. Let me leave with you three
52:11
Speaker 1: simple and very practical lessons can I do that? First,
52:17
Speaker 1: God's word is a reliable map to take us through
52:21
Speaker 1: all life storms. God's word is a reliable map to
52:26
Speaker 1: take us through all of life storms. A Second, especially
52:35
Speaker 1: as it relates to revelation, God's plan is a sovereign
52:40
Speaker 1: arrangement of events that replaces fear with hope. His plan
52:51
Speaker 1: is a sovereign arrangement of events that, when you understand them,
52:58
Speaker 1: will replace fear with hope, and will replace superstition with truth.
53:06
Speaker 1: Some of the most tragic people on the face of
53:10
Speaker 1: the earth are those who live under the superstition of
53:14
Speaker 1: a horoscope or palm reading, or tarot cards or some
53:19
Speaker 1: means of connecting with the dead. This will take away
53:24
Speaker 1: all of that necessity in your life, all of that
53:27
Speaker 1: all of that curiosity, and will rivet you to truth
53:31
Speaker 1: that you can live by. Third, God's Son is the
53:34
Speaker 1: glorious Lord, worthy of our allegiance, And you know what
53:45
Speaker 1: you can put just comes to mind. He has the
53:49
Speaker 1: last word. We've got some pretty persuasive voices. We've got
53:56
Speaker 1: some pretty charismatic kind of leaders around this world. We've
54:02
Speaker 1: got some folks that can really get a following, and
54:05
Speaker 1: there will be more. In fact, the most is yet
54:08
Speaker 1: to come, as we shall see. But the wonderful truth
54:11
Speaker 1: is that the Glorious Lord Jesus Christ will stand in
54:14
Speaker 1: his glory, and we who serve him will realize he
54:18
Speaker 1: has the last word, and in the end he wins.
54:22
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you that takes away some of
54:24
Speaker 1: the mystery, but you knew it anyway. It's a good
54:27
Speaker 1: story because good does triumph over evil. Maybe bow together.
54:36
Speaker 1: Perhaps you've never met the Lord Jesus Christ, and you've
54:40
Speaker 1: come out of a sense of curiosity, or you may
54:42
Speaker 1: come back with curiosity, and I need to tell you
54:48
Speaker 1: that a lot of this will fall by the wayside
54:50
Speaker 1: without the Lord Jesus alive in your life. I invite
54:56
Speaker 1: you now, in the quietness of these closing moments, to
55:01
Speaker 1: just turn your life over to him. Release the anxieties,
55:05
Speaker 1: the filipses of your life, the tribulations, the trials, the struggles,
55:11
Speaker 1: the unanswered qualms and questions, and in return He will
55:17
Speaker 1: give you not only his forgiveness, but direction and truth
55:21
Speaker 1: to live by. What a pleasure it is to introduce
55:26
Speaker 1: you to the one with whom you will reign and
55:30
Speaker 1: rule and serve as you pass from death to life.
55:36
Speaker 1: You will move from time to eternity with Him, and
55:40
Speaker 1: you will know a peace that can never be described
55:43
Speaker 1: on this earth. You have nothing to fear when you
55:48
Speaker 1: know Christ, Lord God. We are grateful for your word
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Speaker 1: that lives and abides forever heaven and earth. Will pass
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Speaker 1: away as we know it. But your word will never
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Speaker 1: pass away, nor will the souls of women and men,
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Speaker 1: boys and girls. They are the eternal part of us.
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Speaker 1: I pray that you will bring us to account. Our Father,
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Speaker 1: show us the value of the life of faith and
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Speaker 1: trust and confidence. Reveal to us in this study that
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Speaker 1: the spiritual realm is even more real than the temporal,
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Speaker 1: that the eternal is more important than what goes on
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Speaker 1: in time, and showing us that may you change our
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Speaker 1: values so that they began to be reflected in the
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Speaker 1: way we live and how we live, the way we
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Speaker 1: invest our time and our money, the things we do
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Speaker 1: with our lives. Thank you, Father, guide us into all truth.
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Speaker 1: As we begin this study together. I ask it in
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Speaker 1: the name of Jesus, our magnificent, glorious, conquering Lord and Savior.
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Speaker 1: Everyone said amen.
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Speaker 2: The preceding message The Apocalypse in Panorama was copyrighted in
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Speaker 2: two thousand and three, two thousand and six, and twenty
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Speaker 2: twenty four, and the sound recording was copyrighted in twenty
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Speaker 2: twenty four by Charles Rswindahl, Inc. All rights are reserved worldwide.
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Speaker 2: Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited,