16th Meeting - Revelation Chapter 19

Sunday night we looked at both Chapter 18 & 19; since I had already posted chapter 18, I thought we should move on to chapter 19. Now keep in mind that all of these chapters 17 - 20:5 are all on one vision John had had. As you will remember, John introduces the people and places first, then he tells you about them. In chapter 18, the great prostitute Babylon was destroyed, and all of her benefactors looked on, but from a distance. Verses 1-3 explain that Heaven is in agreement with the judgment just unleashed. Verse 4 describes what the view of Heaven will look like. What is happening is God is starting to take back the world from Satan and his corruption. God is more and more visible, Heaven is preparing for the Wedding Feast of the Lamb. This was foretold through many of Jesus' parables during His ministry here on earth. The Parable of the ten virgins is one of these. The 10 virgins are separated into 2 groups, 5 foolish and 5 wise. The foolish did not bring any provisions with them, to account for the possibility of a delay of the Bridegroom (Jesus). These are the people who go to Church, but do not take any responsibility for their walk with Jesus. They only show up for Church, never read their Bible or attend Sunday School, or Bible studies offered by the Church. Their walk during the rest of the week, does not match their walk on Sunday morning. When Jesus' coming is delayed they fall asleep, not worrying about the second coming. The other group is labled the wise. this group also fell asleep, but unlike their counterparts, they made provisions for a late arrival, by securing additional oil prior to arriving at the wedding feast. When the alarm came that the bridegroom was at hand; the foolish ones asked the wise to share their's; the wise said that they would not have enough to share. The wise told the foolish to go to market place and buy their own. By the time they came back, the groom had arrived and the wise virgins escorted the groom into the wedding feast. The foolish were locked out and when they asked to enter; "they were told they were not recognised and told to go away.

15th Meeting - Revelation Chapter 18 - Continued

Without the apostate church part of Babylon, verse 4 does not make sense. In verse 2 Babylon is said to be home for demons, evil spirits and every unclean and detestable bird. Demons, and evil spirits, and people with the mark of the beast would not listen to the voice of heaven calling them out of Babylon. The only ones who would listen would be the posers of the apostate church. These are people who hold to some of the teachings of God, but think that the apostate church is the real one. Only when confronted with the voice out of heaven do they realize they are following the wrong group. This is like what happened to Saul on the road to Damascus, when he was confronted by Jesus Christ and forced to make a decision, to remain in his unbelief or follow Christ. Saul became Paul, and wrote two thirds of the New Testament; and in doing so became one of the loudest voices for Jesus Christ in his day.
If you continue with verse 4 of chapter 18, they are told that if they turn now, they will be free from sharing in the sins of Babylon, and her judgment. God will give her a double portion of His wrath, for all she has done. Words and actions matter. When you become a Christian, you are not sinless, you only sin less! God tells Babylon that all the sins and luxury she made herself available to will be added in grief back to her. She will reap what she has sowed. It took her a long time to accumulate all she has it will be destroyed in one day. Then she will know that the Lord is Lord of all and in control. All of the kings of the world that followed her will she her destruction, and know that their's is only a matter of time, before they will stand before the same God, and get the same fate. The merchants also will mourn, because they made huge profits while they were doing her bidding. Even the merchants who travel by sea, will not be free from God's wrath. He will strike everywhere at once. Verse 23 talks about the light of the lamp; this is symbolic of the lampstands taken out of the 7 churches. God is Still on the Throne.

15th Meeting - Revelation Chapter 18 - Continued

In my previous post, I made it sound like Pergamum was the only church to fail in what Jesus asked them to do. This was not the case, all seven churches failed in keeping the main thing the main thing. This is what many churches today are guilty of; they are trying to fill their seats so badly, that they don't figure in the cost. Churches today preach you should be a good person, and treat everyone fairly. This is true, but just being a good person will not get you into Heaven. If this is your goal, you must meet the risen Savior and understand that God loved you so much, that He sent His Son to Die on a Cross so that you might have Eternal Life. It is through the forgiveness of sins that you obtain eternal life! A personal relationship with Jesus Christ is what is required to go to Heaven.
We have other churches ordaining practicing gay people to become ordained preachers. God created sex and He created marriage. This practice openly mocks God. If you read your Bible, you will learn that God will not be mocked!! If you do not believe that the end times will have an apostate church, just look around. Revelation says that this apostate church will ride on the back of the beast, meaning that they will be of one mind. The anti-christ and God are at oposing sides of the spectrum, the church should never be in league with Satan. We are watching the eroding of the church today. Do not worry or fret for God is Still on the Throne!!

15th Meeting Continued - Chapter 18 of Revelation

We will be looking at Chapter 18 along with the messages of the seven churches if an effort to understand the full range of the term Babylon. Chapter 18 opens with another angel coming to tell the world something. He says "Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great!" Then he advises of her sins, she has become a home for demons and a haunt for every evil spirit, a haunt for every unclean and detestable bird. (Rev. 18:2). If you remember the letters to the 7 churches (Rev.2-3); Pergamum was supposed to speak out against these types of sins, that city had a large temple dedicated to the works and power of Satan. This was their call to action by God and they failed to get it done. If you look back at the 7 churches, each one had attributes that churches today would like to aspire to. The message to these churches is the same for us today. We like them can get caught up in what the world thinks is important, and completely turn away from the main thing which is teaching Jesus Christ Crucified. If you look at churches today, you can see that they are losing their focus on Jesus Christ. They are starting to weaken the teachings of Christ. You can not mention sin or hell, because you will upset people. Jesus said He would become a stumbling block! Jesus said "I am the truth and the way; no one gets to the Father except through Me"! This sounds like the way to heaven is quite narrow, but there are churches out there saying all roads lead to heaven. The truth is all roads lead to the cross! Once you meet Jesus you have to make up your mind which way will you go, with Him or against Him. The choice is yours!

15th Meeting Revelation chapters 1-3 & 18 (Church)

We will be looking at Babylon as the apostate church. The definition we will be using for apostate is as follows: Apostate means to believe a certain way and then turn 180 degrees from that belief. This is not a one time thing, and if you are worried about losing your salvation, the fact that you are worried about it, proves that you have not committed this sin. In order to commit the sin of apostasy, you have to be indifferent to the fact that you have turned your back on God. God will not make you be in Heaven if you don't want to.

I waited until now to discuss chapters 1-3, because I wanted to include them with the teaching of the Apostate Church as mentioned in chapter 18. Chapters 2 - 3 talk about the letters to the seven churches that were located in what is now Turkey. At the time these letters were written to the seven churches, Christianity was 98% of the population in this area. We need to keep this in mind to remind us that the seven churches were going concerns and had a large following. Before we look at each one individually, we must understand that each one of the churches were different, and had different challenges to keep their faith alive.

The first Church mentioned is Ephesus, it was commended for rejecting evil, and persevering for the truth of Jesus Christ. The letter warns them that they have lost their love for Christ, and tells them they must return to do the deeds they first did in order to win the "Tree of Life". This means to stay true to the end and receive eternal life. Then I showed them pictures of what the Church of Ephesus looks like today, and it is a pile of rock ruins. This means that God allowed the candlestick to be removed from this church, because of their failing to remain true to Him!

The second Church is Smyrna, it was commended for gracefully bearing suffering. This church had no criticism raised against it. This is the only City of the seven that is still in existence, the Church has also become a pile of rocks. Its promise was to receive the crown of life.

The third Church is Pergamos (Pergamum), it was commended for keeping the faith of Christ. It was criticized for tolerating immorality, idolatry, and heresies. This church was in much the same situation Lot found himself in when living in the city of Sodom and Gomorrah. Lot also believed in God but the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah proved to be much too much for him, he would have given in if it weren't for Abraham and the angels coming and rescuing him. The Church at Pergamum (Pergamos) was not as lucky. The sin of the city finally swallowed them up. Their promise was secret manna, and a stone with a new name.

The fourth Church is Thyatira, it was commended for love, service, faith, patience is growing in them. They were criticized for toleration of cults, idolatry and immorality. They were told to keep the faith; if they remained true they would rule over nations and receive the morning star which is Jesus. They also became a pile of rocks; which means that they did not keep the faith.

The fifth Church is Sardis, it was commended for trying to keep the faith by some of the group, not the whole. They were criticized for being a dead church. Repent and return to keeping the faith of the whole group. The promise was faithful would be honored and clothed in white. This site also became a pile of rocks.

The sixth Church is Philadelphia, it was commended for persevering through faith. It also had no criticism. They were told to keep the faith. Their promise was a place in God's presence, a new name, and the New Jerusalem. They also became a pile of rocks.

The seventh Church is Laodicea, they had no commendation because they were neither hot nor cold, they were not alive. They were criticized for being indifferent. They were commanded to repent and become zealous for the things of Jesus Christ again. Promise, if they retuuurned to their faith they would be able to share God's throne. They did not and became a pile of rocks like the others.

The lesson from these churches is to keep focusing on Jesus Christ and continue to teach about Him if you want to finish the race. In 1999 the percentage of Christians in the area of the seven churches was .2%, that means 99.8% non-christian!!

14th Meeting Continued Revelation 17: 9-18.

17:9 calls for wisdom. The seven heads are seven hills on which the woman sits. The City of Rome sits on seven hills. 17:10 This passage goes on to say "they are also seven kings, 5 have fallen, one is, the other has not come, he must remain for a little while." This passage has caused a lot of problems for commentators over the years. There at least 9 different ways scholars have tried to explain this verse, none of them has explained it to me without trying to force the information. For this reason I am not going to spend time trying to explain it. Going on to verse 17:11, the beast who once was, and now is not, is an eighth king; this is also the anti-christ the number 2 in the demonic trinity. The anti-christ is to come from the 10 kingdoms, but not part of the government, this is different from the little horn seen by Daniel in the third kingdom (Greece). If you remember this little horn grew out of an existing horn (Daniel 8:9). The little horn of the 4th kingdom (Rome) will grow out from amongst the 10 but not part of an existing horn (Daniel 7:20). It will destroy 3 kings, if you look at Revelation 17:11, the ten kings minus 3 kings that the anti-christ will subdue brings the number to 7 plus the ant-christ makes 8, he like the seven kings before him will go to their destruction. Verses 12 - 14 explain that these kings will all make war against the Lamb (Jesus). Jesus will win out in the end because He is Lord of lords and King of kings this will conclude with Jesus' followers following Him when He comes back, in the eastern sky.

Verse 15 through 18, talk about the multitudes of people and nations that will side with the anti-christ at this time, in verse 16 they start to hate the prositute, so there is the beginning of in-fighting amongst the lost. God is in control and is giving power to whomever He wants.

God is still on the throne.

14th Meeting Continued Revelation 17:6

The beast mentioned in verse 8 is the same as mentioned in 17:3. Once was, now is not and will come out of the Abyss and go to his destruction; this part of the verse threw me last night, it was the part about the Abyss that confused me. You remember that the third part of the demonic trinity comes out of the Abyss. Now we will look at verse 8 closely and hopefully this time we will be able to say without question this is the anti-christ number 2 of the demonic trinity. Once was, points to the fact that the anti-christ at this time has come to power (still future to us now); he will be wounded by a head wound and seem to die, signified by now is not. And will come out of the Abyss and go to his destruction if you look back at Revelation 16:10, the fifth angel poures out his bowl on the throne of the beast and his kngdom and the beast is plunged into darkness, this is the symbolism of the Abyss. The beast is broken and subdued but not yet cast into the lake of fire, which is how he will come up from the Abyss and go to his destruction. Verse 8 concludes with the inhabitants of the earth whose names are not written in the book of life being astonished when they see the beast, because he once was , now is not, and yet will come. Those of you who read my blog and don't come to class, missed a discussion at this point. I write on the Board a zero, and tell people that that is the number God would like to be in hell. The people who find themselves in hell can not blame God for their being there. They themselves have put themselves there by their unbelief. The class thought they had me, when they raised this question. "If God predestined these people to be not written in the Book of Life, God couldn't want zero people in hell." Sounds good, but this arguement makes the point of free choice. Remember in Genesis 3:15 when God curses the serpent and the woman; God said that the seed of the serpent would find enmity between his and her seed. Enmity means hatred; the seed of the woman are the God fearing ones and the seed of the serpent are the ones who follow Satan.

I see that I have run out of posting space and will take Revelation 17:9 on next post.

14th Meeting 9/13/09 - Revelation Chapters 17 & 18

Chapter 17 begins the "Final judgment at the time of Eschaton (last things). This section starts in chapter 17 and goes through Revelation 20:15. This should be grouped together and taught as a block, but due to the immense amount of symbolism and the different subjects talked about, this section will take some time to discuss and map out. We will attack this subject one verse at a time and hopefully it will make sense.

Verse 1 starts out with one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls (judgment) came and said to me (John), "Come I will show you punishment of the great prostitute, who sits on many waters.
The great prostitute is the name given to Babylon, but this passage goes on to say she sits on many waters. Historic Babylon sat on only two rivers the Tigris and Euphrates, I don't believe this Babylon is the one mentioned here. Historically, the term Babylon was used in the Bible in prophecy and applied to Rome and other cities. Verse 2 talks about the kings she committed adultery with and the inhabitants of the earth were intoxicated with the wine of her adulteries. When the Bible talks about the kingdoms and kings committing adultery, this means that they have sinned against God and the place that they commit their sins against is Israel. The Bible is stating that the countries around Israel joined Babylon in committing sins against God and Israel.

Verse 3 says that the angel carried John away in the Spirit into the desert. In the Bible, the desert can be a place of refuge as we saw in earlier chapters where the pregnant woman was taken for protection; and as a place for judgment like the Children of Israel found during their Exodus from Egypt. The second half of this verse shows the woman sitting on the beast. The fact that the woman is shown riding on the beast means that they are like minded at this time. This beast is the anti-christ mentioned earlier and person number 2 of the demonic trinity. Verse 6 states that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of those who bore testimony to Jesus. Babylon was destroyed before the birth of Jesus, so I believe that Babylon mentioned here is the city and kingdom of Rome.

I will stop this post here and take it up in a new post. I told you this will take some time to get through.

13th Meeting continued things we discussed.

List of Psalms you were to read on End Times and Messianic Psalms.

Messianic Psalms: # 2, 8, 16, 22, 45, 52, 58, 59, 69, 72, 89, 109, 110, 118, 132, 140

End Times Psalms: # 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 17, 18, 19, 24, 29, 47, 48, 74, 75, 80, 83, 85, 92,
96, 98, 104 & 111.

These are other places you can look for information concerning end times. After you have read them we will discuss them.

We talked about how to study your Bible, and the book "HOW TO READ THE BIBLE FOR ALL ITS WORTH" by Gordon D. Fee & Douglas Stuart ISBN# 0-310-38491-5

In this book you will learn terms like Exegesis and Hermeneutics. These are tools you will need to know, and learning how to use them, in order to study your Bible for all its worth.

First Exegesis - means that you do careful and systematic study to learn what the Bible actually said to the people that first heard it. This is what that passage actually means, and you must not change that meaning.

Second comes Hermeneutics - means that you apply the information of the Bible passage so that it will be understood today, without changing the Bible passage's meaning from what it meant when it was first written.

If you read the Bible this way, you will have the tools to be able to discern good Bible teaching from Bad, and faithful teachers from false. This will be more important as we get closer to the End Times. Jesus warned us that false prophets and false teachers will abound during this time, and we must be able to distinguish between the two.

I hope that this will be of some help to you.

13th Meeting 9/06/09 - Revelation # 15 & 16.

We have been learning that the visions so far have taken us from earth to heaven, and back. Chapter 15 opens with a vision from heaven, introducing the last 7 plagues and the 7 angels that will deliver them. Verse 2 talks about the glassy sea mixed with fire (symbolizes judgment), and beside it were the ones who had successfully been victorious over the beast, his image and the false prophet. To be at the glassy sea, means that they would have to be dead. We know this because no one can be in the presence of God the Father and live. There was some questions here about how could these people be called successful and yet be dead and the demonic trinity still be in power? Very good question.
These people who are at the glassy sea, are the ones who remained true to God until death. This is what Jesus calls all of his believers to do. Endure to the end, be true to the end, "I am with you always, even to the end of the age." These people who were killed, by the power of Satan are up in heaven, Satan is still around on earth at this time and still very much in power. In verse 3 these people are singing the new song of Moses. Remember this song was started by the 144,000, and has been building in strength and power. If you go back to Daniel chapter 2 and look at the statue, and the rock that is mentioned there; this rock crushes the statue and starts to grow until it takes over the whole earth. This rock symbolizes Jesus Christ, and His turning the earth from darkness to light.
The chapter ends with the seven angels dispensing their bowls of judgment on the earth.

Chapter 16 opens with the seven angels each being introduced and dispensing their bowls onto the world. These seven judgments should look familiar to you if you have studied Exodus and Moses fight with Pharaoh to let God's people go; these seem to be the same plagues. Look carefully at who it is that is affected by these plagues from God; it affects only the ones with the mark of the beast, who like pharaoh before them did not turn from their unbelief. The ones with the mark of the beast, they cannot be turned so this chapter is confirmation of this fact. Verse 12 talks about the 6th angel and he is drying up the Euphrates River, making it possible for the kings of the east to make their way to Israel and Jerusalem. Notice verse 13, the demonic trinity, adds to the curses already being handed out by God. Why is this? As we learned from Exodus, pharaoh's priests could not stop the plagues but could only help with the increase. The devil can only spread suffering, he can not get rid of suffering. This is a way that you can expose Satan and his workmanship.
Verse 15 says "Behold I come like a thief!", this is Jesus talking, notice the timing around the time of the Battle of Armageddon. Which coming of Jesus is this?? How many comings of Christ did Jesus tell us about?? My Bible only tells me about two, his first advent, and this one! If you read 1 & 2 Thessalonians carefully, no mention of when the catching up in the clouds takes place.
The catching up of believers would take place when Jesus comes in the clouds with great power as mentioned in Daniel Chapter 7. This is why there are so many schools of thought on how the end will come about. It has been my intent to bring the whole Bible to the table, and not just the verses that back a particular agenda. God tells us to study, if we are right or wrong on this issue, will not keep you in or out of heaven. If you believe this, then what does it matter. All we know for certain is that it will go God's way, and we will not know which way this was until after the fact! "God is still on the Throne"!!

12th Meeting Discussion of Paul and Jesus

Jesus Christ was the first to talk about the second coming; and since He will be the principle character when it happens. I can not understand why His words on the subject are left out when looking at Revelation. Jesus said in His Sermon on the Mount, that He came to fulfill the law and the prophets. If this is what Jesus taught, and Paul is His apostle, Paul would also teach the same things. When Jesus was teaching the Gospel what did He say concerning His relationship with His Father? Didn't Jesus say "I do the works of my Father who sent Me". "You will know my words are true because they are my Father's Words?" If all of this is true, then how can we just look at what Paul says and apply our own meaning to what he says or does not say?? As I pointed out yesterday, Paul knew the Old Testament and therefore knew what it said concerning End Times.
The doctrine that Jesus and Paul taught is the same, not different. Jesus said "If it were not so I would have told you"!!

The Old Testament talks about end times in more places than just the major and minor prophets. The Psalms also speak of how things will be. We will be looking at these as well. If you look back to the beginning of my blog I wrote what the intent of this class was to be. And I warned that the whole Bible would be brought to the table, not just the verses that back a certain opinion. This is why I have not looked at the different schools of thought yet, I feel that you need to know what the Bible says on the subject, before you can make a decision of which school if any you will believe. We need to look at the whole truth not just pieces of it.

12th Meeting Discussion Continued.

I have been quoting the words of Jesus lately; and I have been thinking maybe I should talk a little about the differences in the teachings of Paul and of Jesus.

When Saul/Paul had his encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus; something happened to Saul to make him become Paul. Lets look at this a little more closely. When Saul became Paul, he did not throw out everything he learned about the Old Testament. It was this knowledge of the Old Testament that helped him witness to the Greeks. The Greeks had access to the Old Testament Scriptures written in Greek in the form of the Septuagint authorized by Alexander the Great 323 B.C. It is this form of the Old Testament that Paul quotes from most.

Paul's letters to the Thessalonians were written from Corinth after Paul had taught in Thessalonica. Why would Paul write letters to the Thessalonians after he had taught there? The answer is that they did not understand what Paul had taught them. The first letter was to correct their misunderstanding that when Jesus comes only the alive in Christ will be caught up.
Notice no mention of when this would take place. Paul continues by saying that the dead in Christ or believers would rise first and then the alive in Christ. Paul thought that this letter made all the corrections; then Paul hears from Timothy that they still have not got it right. This was the reason for the second letter. Paul had to write the second letter because they now believed the persecution they were going through had to be the time of the tribulation; so they stopped working and went to the hills around the city to wait for the Return of Jesus Christ. Paul then tried to explain to them how the tribulation would be much worse than what they are going through now.

Jesus taught that the student is never above the teacher; I don't think Paul ever forgot this. This brings us up to the question, did Jesus ever say anything about end times? The answer is of course the Olivet Discourse, and several parables. I mentioned one in my discussion of Revelation chapter 14. The parable of the 10 virgins is another of these teachings on end times.

Do you remember the Road to Emmaus? Jesus appeared to two of his disciples on the road, they did not recognize Him, and He opened the Scriptures to them starting with Moses and all the prophets explaining to them how they witnessed about Him. Which scriptures did Jesus use? The New Testament as we know it was yet to be written at this time.

The Old Testament Prophets taught on the great and terrible Day of the Lord. I remember reading this as a young boy and wondered how one day could be both great and terrible. As I kept on reading the Bible and growing up I came to realize that depending where you stand on that day determines which it is, either great or terrible.

You notice on the right hand side of my blog are Bible verses, soon to grow. These are there for a reason, to remind me what is right and what is not. Jesus said "I came not to do away with the law and the prophets, but to fulfill. Every yot and tiddle every dot of the "i" and every cross of the "t" will be fulfilled." I believe that the Bible can never mean what it never meant. I stole this from Gordon Fee and his book "Reading the Bible for all its worth". This book is worth its place in your bookcase.

I believe that you have to know all the signs, before you can have an understanding of how it will go. "Trust and Obey" and "God is still on the Throne".