SPEAKER_01: You're listening to the road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_00: We will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them.
SPEAKER_00: For he is Lord of Lords, King of Kings, and those who are with him are called chosen and faithful.
SPEAKER_00: Now look around this room.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that a wonderful title for this crowd?
SPEAKER_00: That's you guys.
SPEAKER_00: You are called chosen.
SPEAKER_00: Faithful.
SPEAKER_01: Today, Pastor Steve continues his series on the book of Revelation.
SPEAKER_01: At The Road, our vision is to raise up wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: For more information on The Road, visit the Road.org.
SPEAKER_01: We hope you are encouraged by today's message from Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_00: We're in Revelation chapter 17, and this is going to be a super hard chapter.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm just going to prepare you.
SPEAKER_00: If I stumble over myself, it is because it is hard, it's difficult to understand.
SPEAKER_00: It's about Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: And for this week and next week, we're talking about Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about the last days.
SPEAKER_00: For you that are new today, you walked in in one of the weirdest sermons you could walk into, so I apologize beforehand that you go, wow, this is a weird church.
SPEAKER_00: And we are, because we go book by book, chapter by chapter, verse by verse, and we tackle hard chapters.
SPEAKER_00: And I think any almost every commentator says this is the hardest chapter in Revelation.
SPEAKER_00: Revelation's the hardest book in the Bible, so this might be the hardest chapter in the whole Bible.
SPEAKER_00: So it has been for me.
SPEAKER_00: I've grappled with it all week.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm going to try to make it clear.
SPEAKER_00: And I want you to know I'm a literalist.
SPEAKER_00: So I am a literalist in the sense of a premillennial interpretation in my eschatology of Revelation.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, it's symbolic, but that it's literal in the sense of the things that John saw, he wrote down what he saw, but they were symbolic prophetically of something that was going to happen in the future.
SPEAKER_00: So, as I said last week, you can turn to your neighbor and say he could be wrong.
SPEAKER_00: Because I could be wrong.
SPEAKER_00: But from my understanding, I'm going to do the best that I can.
SPEAKER_00: This, there's a bunch of stuff we can say about Babylon, and we're going to do part two next week.
SPEAKER_00: But this is the spiritual Babylon, not the physical Babylon that I'm going to speak of today.
SPEAKER_00: And then next week I'm going to talk about the physical Babylon, which I believe is being rebuilt right now in Iraq.
SPEAKER_00: And so we'll talk more about that next week.
SPEAKER_00: But this is the spiritual Babylon, because Babylon can be seen spiritually, economically, and geographically.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm going to talk about the spiritual because that's what chapter 17 is about.
SPEAKER_00: You'll understand it in about 30 minutes when we get to the end of it.
SPEAKER_00: You'll see what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_00: But let's look at chapter 17 of Revelation.
SPEAKER_00: It's on the app, or if you just have your Bible with you, just we're going to go verse by verse through this and do the best that we can in discerning what God's saying to us today.
SPEAKER_00: This, oh, let me just start before I say this.
SPEAKER_00: This is, for you that haven't been here, this is the 41st message in Revelation.
SPEAKER_00: And we're in the final three and a half years, the very end, the last days of the last days of the reign of the Antichrist.
SPEAKER_00: So the Antichrist has a one-world government at this point.
SPEAKER_00: He has amalgamated, and this is really the definition in a sense of the spiritual Babylon, he has amalgamated all religions into one.
SPEAKER_00: So that's really important as a precursor as we launch into this.
SPEAKER_00: Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and talked with me, saying to me, Come and I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters.
SPEAKER_00: So this is only the second time in Revelation that the angel has invited John to come and see something.
SPEAKER_00: The other one was chapter 4, verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: In chapter 4, verse 1, the angel says to John, come up, I've got something to show you that's going to happen in the future.
SPEAKER_00: And then he sees heaven.
SPEAKER_00: And I've said this before, and I'll emphasize it again: that chapter 4 and 5 of Revelation is a picture of heaven.
SPEAKER_00: And so he sees heaven.
SPEAKER_00: So that's huge.
SPEAKER_00: Well, he doesn't use the phrase, come and see again until here, and it'll come one more time.
SPEAKER_00: So this is huge.
SPEAKER_00: This is something that for some reason John wrote down for us an angel, these angels in chapter 16 we covered last week, who had just dispensed the seven bowls of wrath upon the face of the earth, says, now come up.
SPEAKER_00: I want to show you something.
SPEAKER_00: So this is important, men and women.
SPEAKER_00: This is an important thing that he's going to see.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, there is this judgment coming on the great harlot who sits on many waters.
SPEAKER_00: Now, go down to verse 15 and explains the many waters.
SPEAKER_00: Then he said to me, The waters which you saw where the harlot sits are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues.
SPEAKER_00: So we're looking at this one world government that this harlot sits upon.
SPEAKER_00: The spiritual Babylon church is the harlot all through Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Babylon, and we'll cover this in just a moment, is this harlot of fornication, spiritual fornication upon the earth through false religion, false spirituality.
SPEAKER_00: We're in the midst of it right now.
SPEAKER_00: And really, I think since then it's been true through all time.
SPEAKER_00: But America is unique in being one of the only countries.
SPEAKER_00: Now there's a few in Africa now that are really modern.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, they've been established in the last 15 or 20 years, but they have so much tribal issues, it's totally different.
SPEAKER_00: But in a category of itself is the United States of America that was established through our Constitution, our Declaration of Independence, on this idea of one nation under God.
SPEAKER_00: So here's what's unique, and here's what's interesting.
SPEAKER_00: When we look at what's happened really since the 1960s onward, and I would say probably around 1962, as prayer was taken out of schools, as the civil rights movement was growing, as we saw liberal education take a turn to the left that was different, actually, than the definition of liberal education.
SPEAKER_00: Liberal education, in and of itself, is the idea of being open to all sides, being open to all discussion, and that's what made our country great.
SPEAKER_00: We've always been a country that was open to discussion.
SPEAKER_00: Well, now it's open to discussion only if you fall into this particular category.
SPEAKER_00: And so there's been this shift, and that's the spirit of Babylon of coming in to our nation.
SPEAKER_00: From whom and with whom the kings of the earth committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth were made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
SPEAKER_00: Now, interesting.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 12, verse 3, turn there, chapter 12, verse 3.
SPEAKER_00: Stay right there.
SPEAKER_00: Hold your finger there.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the deal.
SPEAKER_00: People are incurably religious.
SPEAKER_00: So Lennon had it right when he said religion is the opiate of the people.
SPEAKER_00: So this Antichrist figure, this one world leader, now has the earth, as we saw on the sea of the ocean, this picture of a sea of all the kings and nations and ethno groups coming together to fornicate, to spiritually commit adultery against the living and the one true God.
SPEAKER_00: And then look at verse 3.
SPEAKER_00: He carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness.
SPEAKER_00: And I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast, which was full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
SPEAKER_00: So in chapter 12, verse 3, it's a fiery red dragon.
SPEAKER_00: Look at that, chapter 12, verse 3, a fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns.
SPEAKER_00: Then in chapter 13, look at chapter 13, verse 1, it's the beast with seven heads and ten horns.
SPEAKER_00: So the Antichrist is personally embodying this Babylonian system that I believe is a synergy of the false prophet.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, we talked about, we talked about the unholy trinity.
SPEAKER_00: This unholy trinity of the beast, the Antichrist, this false prophet, and then Satan himself.
SPEAKER_00: And so they're amalgamating into whatever this means of seven heads and ten horns, this, I would call it the beast religious system, kind of the beast religious system.
SPEAKER_00: The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the filthiness of her fornication.
SPEAKER_00: And on her forehead a name was written, Mystery Babylon, the great, the mother of harlots and the abominations of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: So there you have it.
SPEAKER_00: This mystery Babylon, this great city, which we'll talk about next week, this great economic powerhouse, we'll talk about that next week, but this spiritual mother of all harlots and of the abominations of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Now it says she had a forehead with her name on it.
SPEAKER_00: Roman prostitutes had to wear a headband with their name on it.
SPEAKER_00: And this is obviously not a real harlot because I think she wouldn't be very successful if she said, if she had seven heads and ten horns.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not real smart, I figured that out.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so it's not a real, it's not a real prostitute.
SPEAKER_00: But what's interesting about Mystery Babylon is that it's mentioned, listen now, it's mentioned six times in the book of Revelation, six times.
SPEAKER_00: Six always represents carnality in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: Seven represents perfection.
SPEAKER_00: Seven represents God.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the sign of the beast?
SPEAKER_00: Six, six, six.
SPEAKER_00: Mentioned, Babylon mentioned six times in the book of Revelation.
SPEAKER_00: And listen to this: six chapters of the 66 books of the Bible, and all the chapters that encompasses, six chapters in the Bible are given to Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: I encourage you to read this this week.
SPEAKER_00: You'll find it fascinating when we study the next chapter next week, but let me give it to you.
SPEAKER_00: That would be Isaiah 13 and 14 is about Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: Isaiah 13 and 14, Jeremiah 50 and 51, and Revelation 17 and 18.
SPEAKER_00: Six chapters, the number of carnality, are all about Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: Babylon was the eastern capital of Alexander the Great, which is quite interesting.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, Babylon has been taken over many times, but not virtually and completely destroyed like it will be in the last days.
SPEAKER_00: So he sees this woman arrayed in purple and scarlet and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls.
SPEAKER_00: And I believe this is the economic power of the Antichrist.
SPEAKER_00: This is the beauty from a carnal, fleshly perspective of his control over the seaports and his control of all the trade in these last days.
SPEAKER_00: She's holding a cup of abominations.
SPEAKER_00: She's involved in the wealth of the globe.
SPEAKER_00: Church, really, the Bible could be defined as a tale of two cities.
SPEAKER_00: So more than just a Charles Dickens novel, there's a tale of two cities, and it's Jerusalem and Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: Jerusalem representing the one true God, Jesus Christ, Yahweh, a Jewish nation, a nation built on the foundations of the Torah, built on the books of the Bible that we now have as our Christian Bible, Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: And then there's Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: Babylon is always seen as a spiritual fornicator.
SPEAKER_00: Babylon is always seen of all those things that are evil and unjust and wrong.
SPEAKER_00: And so in the scriptures, you have Babylon mentioned 287 times.
SPEAKER_00: And you have Jerusalem mentioned 821 times.
SPEAKER_00: Jerusalem, God's plan and salvation, and Babylon, the antithesis of God's plan.
SPEAKER_00: So we can almost see it as, you know, the great city and the anti-city.
SPEAKER_00: The great salvation, the anti-salvation.
SPEAKER_00: Jerusalem and Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: Now, turning your Bibles to Genesis chapter 10.
SPEAKER_00: So Genesis chapter 10, and this is the table of nations.
SPEAKER_00: Dr.
SPEAKER_00: William F.
SPEAKER_00: Albright, not a believer, but a world-class archaeologist and anthropologist, has said, and I quote, the table of nations in Genesis 10 is unparalleled and unsurpassed in its accuracy.
SPEAKER_00: Didn't pick that one up in your archaeology class in college, did you?
SPEAKER_00: Genesis chapter 10, and I want you to look at verse 8.
SPEAKER_00: So what we're dealing with here is what happened to the sons and the grandchildren and the great-grandchildren of Noah after the flood.
SPEAKER_00: And this is important.
SPEAKER_00: Cush, verse 8, begot Nimrod.
SPEAKER_00: Nimrod began to be a mighty one on the earth.
SPEAKER_00: He's the great grandson of Noah.
SPEAKER_00: Now here's what's interesting about Nimrod.
SPEAKER_00: Nimrod in Hebrew, the verb form is Marad, which means the one who rebels, the rebellious one.
SPEAKER_00: Now look at verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: And we've read verse 9 before on some of my hunting trips.
SPEAKER_00: I will not do this in the future.
SPEAKER_00: He was a mighty hunter before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, it is said, like Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Now here's what's interesting.
SPEAKER_00: Most commentators, evangelical commentators who study this say that the translation might be more accurate to be this.
SPEAKER_00: Now look at the next verse.
SPEAKER_00: And the beginning of his kingdom was what?
SPEAKER_00: Babel.
SPEAKER_00: This is the beginning of the systems and the actual city of Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: But he doesn't end there.
SPEAKER_00: It says then Erech, Akad, and Kalina in the land of Shannar, which is present-day Iraq.
SPEAKER_00: So here's what's interesting.
SPEAKER_00: Many people who have studied this stuff will say that they believe Nimrod was the first world dictator.
SPEAKER_00: That he was a type of antichrist in the days to come ahead in the future.
SPEAKER_00: In the sense that he controlled the economies.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, everybody's still there.
SPEAKER_00: We just had the flood.
SPEAKER_00: These are the great, these are the grand, these are the sons, the grandsons, and the great-grandsons of Noah.
SPEAKER_00: And here he begins to build at Babel what?
SPEAKER_00: A great tower.
SPEAKER_00: And that's covered in chapter 11.
SPEAKER_00: We're not going to go into that because of time, but he begins to build this tower against God, to oppose God.
SPEAKER_00: And he begins to set up this system.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't end there though.
SPEAKER_00: Now it's going to really get spooky for you.
SPEAKER_00: Ready?
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: Tradition has it that Nimrod was the leader who built the Tower of Babel.
SPEAKER_00: And it is said that he had taken a wife, and her name was Samirimas.
SPEAKER_00: I could be mispronouncing that, but Simarimis.
SPEAKER_00: Legend has it that she was impregnated by a sunbeam.
SPEAKER_00: Not a mixer.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, a sunbeam.
SPEAKER_00: So she was impregnated by a sunbeam.
SPEAKER_00: And she became a god-like image in ancient legends.
SPEAKER_00: And she was called the queen of heaven and the mother of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Now follow me in this.
SPEAKER_00: Supposedly she had a son by a miraculous birth from the sunbeam.
SPEAKER_00: She named him Tamus.
SPEAKER_00: How many have heard the name Tamus?
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: You that are kind of maybe you've studied cultures, you know that term.
SPEAKER_00: It's going to become familiar.
SPEAKER_00: Tamose was supposedly gored by a wild boar, and after 40 days, so well, I said that wrong.
SPEAKER_00: He was gored by a boar and died, but then 40 days later, through the mourning of Samirius, was raised from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: And the symbol of Tamus is Tao, which is a cross.
SPEAKER_00: Does any of this sound familiar to you?
SPEAKER_00: The ancient art that we have of the legend of Nimrod and Samirimas is of a Madonna holding a child, Samirimas, Tamus, with a halo over both of their heads.
SPEAKER_00: Ever seen those pictures before?
SPEAKER_00: So there's two ways to look at it.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember being in a discussion with someone, a really close friend of mine, and they say, well, I mean, the whole idea of the of the virgin birth of Mary, I mean, that there's all kinds of cultures that have that and the flood and all that.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember saying, right, to my point.
SPEAKER_00: So on the one hand, they took it as just a copy, what they should have taken, and at the end of our discussion, I think they walked away at least shaking their head a little bit, is that Satan's doing the copying.
SPEAKER_00: So before Jesus is born, before Mary was impregnated by the Holy Spirit, there was this spirit of Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: Because listen to what it says.
SPEAKER_00: Mystery Babylon the Great, listen, the mother of harlots and the abominations of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Church, starting at Babel, was the mother of harlots.
SPEAKER_00: It's been a part of the systems of the world ever since then.
SPEAKER_00: Pervading and idolatry, pervading and all kinds of abominations of spirituality.
SPEAKER_00: And the imagery of the Madonna being impregnated by a sunbeam or being impregnated by the sun god to be the mother of the earth or the mother of the sun, the sun god, which is what we we called her in Japan, the sun goddess.
SPEAKER_00: And many of you don't know this, but the emperor actually enters into a holy chamber, tradition has it, and he literally does this to have relations with the sun goddess in Japan.
SPEAKER_00: So here's what here's what I mean it pervades cultures.
SPEAKER_00: Follow it to Egypt and you have Isis and Osarius.
SPEAKER_00: Follow it to Assyria and you have Ishtar and Tamus.
SPEAKER_00: Same thing in Babylon with Nebuchadnezzar, the Ishtar gates, and 180 Ishtar idols in Babylon at the time.
SPEAKER_00: In Persia, Ishtar and Ashtar, and Baal as Tamus.
SPEAKER_00: In Greece, you have Ashtarite and Erath.
SPEAKER_00: In Rome, you have Venus and Cupid.
SPEAKER_00: There are over 200 cultures, men and women, on the earth today that have written about a worldwide flood.
SPEAKER_00: And there's 40 nations, 40 cultures, I said that wrong, not nations, 40 cultures that have in their tradition a worldwide flood and a Madonna figure with a miraculous birth and a child that's raised from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: In India, it's Eseth and Ashwara, and in Asia, Subila and Alias.
SPEAKER_00: All coming, church, from the fountainhead of Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: Read in your spare time Jeremiah 44 and Ezekiel 8, and you'll see even Israel mourning the worship of the God of heaven, Tamus.
SPEAKER_00: Even Israel fornicated, because this is that spirit.
SPEAKER_00: The spirit of Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: I saw the woman, verse 6, back to Revelation 17, drunk with the blood of the saints.
SPEAKER_00: This is about we're about we're moving into some comic relief here.
SPEAKER_00: I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus, and when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement.
SPEAKER_00: So what John sees is he sees that the spirit of Babylon is, oh my goodness, that's what was happening in Israel all in the past.
SPEAKER_00: That's what's happening with the saints in the New Testament, too.
SPEAKER_00: The slaughter of the believers is the spirit of Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: And so he sees that, and he and he must have thought about Babylon and Egypt and Persia and Rome, these religious systems, and he's staggered by Mystery Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: And then now, look at verse 7.
SPEAKER_00: Angels are.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, angels are cool, but I don't know where they're coming from sometimes.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I really don't.
SPEAKER_00: The angel said to me, Why do you marvel?
SPEAKER_00: I will tell you the mystery of the woman of the beast that carries her, which has seven heads and ten horns.
SPEAKER_00: You know what this reminds me?
SPEAKER_00: I read something.
SPEAKER_00: It's like, here comes Mary and the ladies to the tomb.
SPEAKER_00: They got spices for Jesus, and then here's two shining guys, angels, and they say, Why are you why are you seeking the living among the dead?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, nobody's told them anything, right?
SPEAKER_00: That's not fair.
SPEAKER_00: And then, you know, and then we see Jesus ascending to heaven.
SPEAKER_00: And then in Acts it says an angel showed up and said, Why are you staring up into heaven?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you were just hanging out with Jesus right there, right?
SPEAKER_00: And he just and he decided to rise up, I can't think of anything better to do than watch him go up.
SPEAKER_00: Then why are you doing that?
SPEAKER_00: And so John sees this staggering thing.
SPEAKER_00: He means he sees this harlot on a beast, and there's seven heads, and there's ten horns, and then the angel says, Why are you marveling at this?
SPEAKER_00: And then I love what the angel does next.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the angel's explanation.
SPEAKER_00: Alright?
SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all ready for this?
SPEAKER_00: So I marvel with great amazement.
SPEAKER_00: The angel said, Why do you marvel?
SPEAKER_00: I will tell you, I will tell you now the mystery.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna tell you the mystery.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna let you know the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has seven heads and ten horns.
SPEAKER_00: Now listen to the angel's explanation.
SPEAKER_00: Ready for this?
SPEAKER_00: The beast that you saw was and is not and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to perdition.
SPEAKER_00: And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, whose names are not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was and is not and yet is.
SPEAKER_00: Here is the mind which has wisdom, the seven heads and seven mountains on which the woman sits.
SPEAKER_00: There are also seven kings, five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come.
SPEAKER_00: And when he comes, he must continue a short time, and the beast that was and is not is himself also the eight, and of the seven, and is going to perdition, and the ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they received authority for one hour as kings of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Angel.
SPEAKER_00: I really appreciate that explanation.
SPEAKER_00: That's really, really helpful.
SPEAKER_00: I'm glad angels didn't write scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: But let's try to tackle it.
SPEAKER_00: What's going on here?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 8.
SPEAKER_00: He does say the beast that you saw was and is not, and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to perdition.
SPEAKER_00: If you recall in chapter 13, when we looked at the qualities and the characteristics of the Antichrist, and you can go back and find that message.
SPEAKER_00: I mentioned this deadly wound, this deadly head wound that was healed.
SPEAKER_00: So I believe as we read this, he says, he is, he was, but then he was not, but then he ascends out of.
SPEAKER_00: It's this picture, I believe, of the of this world dictator, the Antichrist, who's been, I don't know if he was shot or somehow he was dead.
SPEAKER_00: It appears that he was dead, and then he resurrected.
SPEAKER_00: And you can go back and listen to my explanation of that.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: Here is the mind which has wisdom, the seven heads are the seven mountains on which the woman sits.
SPEAKER_00: Now, anybody at the time of John would have said this is Rome.
SPEAKER_00: Because Rome is known as a city on seven hills.
SPEAKER_00: And so the explanation to them, but it's so much broader than that.
SPEAKER_00: And that's because of the rest of what he says about these seven heads and these seven mountains.
SPEAKER_00: Church, there's some interesting stuff happening right now.
SPEAKER_00: And there's so much we could cover, and I'm way over time, and I'm not even done yet.
SPEAKER_00: But let me just say this that there is, how many of you are familiar with the Ark of Hope?
SPEAKER_00: Anyone familiar with the Ark of Hope?
SPEAKER_00: That's what I thought.
SPEAKER_00: The Ark of Hope was put together and it's been shown at the UN, and it's actually gone all over the world.
SPEAKER_00: And the Ark of Hope is a copy of the Ark of the Covenant.
SPEAKER_00: It's actually, it was created by John D.
SPEAKER_00: Rockefeller and his friends along with Maurice Strong and Mikhail Gorbachev.
SPEAKER_00: And it and it and when you go in, you can just put an Ark of Hope, you can look it up, and you can see this chest that looks exactly like the Ark of the Covenant.
SPEAKER_00: I don't believe it's, I'm not sure if it's acacia wood or not that you carry it with.
SPEAKER_00: It might be, but inside is a new Ten Commandments.
SPEAKER_00: A Ten Commandments for a one world religion.
SPEAKER_00: And this Ark of Hope is gaining popularity among different groups, different political groups.
SPEAKER_00: But the idea is of a one-world government and a one-world religion.
SPEAKER_00: This is, men and women, this is the system of the Babylonians.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Babylonian system.
SPEAKER_00: Don't miss this.
SPEAKER_00: If you get this, you got the main point.
SPEAKER_00: All of the Babylonian religious system is inclusive.
SPEAKER_00: Christianity is exclusive.
SPEAKER_00: As you start to take a stand, John 14, 6, where Jesus said, I am the way and the truth and the life.
SPEAKER_00: No one comes to the Father but through me.
SPEAKER_00: In the years ahead, you will be persecuted, you're derided for that.
SPEAKER_00: Because it smacks and opposes everything about the Babylonian system that's beginning to pervade the globe.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what's exciting, though.
SPEAKER_00: What's exciting is there's going to be revival.
SPEAKER_00: There's going to be a mighty, mighty move of God in the last days.
SPEAKER_00: The Catholic Church is right now, Time Magazine reports, working on a catechism for the universal church that brings Islam, Christianity, and Judaism together into one religion.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 10.
SPEAKER_00: There are also seven kings.
SPEAKER_00: Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come.
SPEAKER_00: And when he comes, he must continue a short time.
SPEAKER_00: So this at the time of John hearing this, I believe that he would be speaking of the religious systems of Egypt, Syria, Nebuchadnezzar's Babylon, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome.
SPEAKER_00: Five have fallen.
SPEAKER_00: And then five have fallen and now is, and that would be Rome.
SPEAKER_00: So Rome is in control at that time.
SPEAKER_00: And then this next kingdom that he's about to talk about, I believe, is the Antichrist system.
SPEAKER_00: The beast that was and is not is himself also the eighth and is of the seventh and is going to perdition.
SPEAKER_00: I love this going to perdition part.
SPEAKER_00: That's really encouraging.
SPEAKER_00: The ten horns, which you saw, are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they've received authority for one hour as kings with the beast.
SPEAKER_00: Now I remember back years ago, people talking about Europe representing these ten nations.
SPEAKER_00: I would say that I believe today it's ten regions of the world.
SPEAKER_00: There's probably ten regions of the world that will rise up and amalgamate into one.
SPEAKER_00: But then here's the trump card.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 14.
SPEAKER_00: These will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them.
SPEAKER_00: For he is Lord of lords, King of Kings, and those who are with him are called chosen and faithful.
SPEAKER_00: Now look around this room.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that a wonderful title for this crowd?
SPEAKER_00: That's you guys.
SPEAKER_00: You are called chosen, faithful.
SPEAKER_00: You are called chosen and faithful.
SPEAKER_00: And the only reason you are is because he who knew no sin became sin on your behalf that you might be the righteousness of God.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us, the book of Revelation tells us that Jesus is the one who was and is and is to come.
SPEAKER_00: Because he is the one who was, he can say you are justified.
SPEAKER_00: Because he is the one who is, he can say you are sanctified.
SPEAKER_00: And because he is the one that is to come, he can say you will be glorified.
SPEAKER_00: The dragon is at war, church.
SPEAKER_00: We are in a war.
SPEAKER_00: My prayer every Sunday is to equip the saints.
SPEAKER_00: Through our worship, through our prayers, through our mission teams, even through our announcements, that you would come out of here more equipped than you came in for the battles ahead, because life is hard.
SPEAKER_00: If life's been easy for you, just hang in there.
SPEAKER_00: It'll get harder.
SPEAKER_00: But as we discover how to walk in victory, it's trusting in Christ and knowing that he's the Lord of Lords and the King of kings.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I think he means by Lord of Lords.
SPEAKER_00: He is the Lord over your overlords.
SPEAKER_00: If you are addicted to some substance, if you're addicted to sex, if you're addicted to pot, if you're addicted to cocaine, you have a Lord in your life.
SPEAKER_00: And it's a cruel taskmaster.
SPEAKER_00: Sin is always a cruel taskmaster.
SPEAKER_00: Pride is a cruel taskmaster.
SPEAKER_00: Your way or the highway is a cruel taskmaster.
SPEAKER_00: He can be Lord of that Lord in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Will you give it to him?
SPEAKER_00: When you give it to him, capital L, Jesus Christ becomes Lord over that taskmaster, and he begins to set you free.
SPEAKER_00: And he's the king of kings.
SPEAKER_00: And so he is the king of all the presidents and all the prime ministers and all the emperors and all the leaders of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: He is actually moving and forming a direction for his greater glory.
SPEAKER_00: And we get to be a part of it.
SPEAKER_00: And then we are called.
SPEAKER_00: And we're called, not because we have a calling into full-time vocational Christian work.
SPEAKER_00: Very few of us, 99.1%, are not called to that, but we're all called to mission.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever job you're in, whatever work you do, you're called to be a wholehearted disciple right there.
SPEAKER_00: You're called to be a part of the Springs Initiative.
SPEAKER_00: To show up with a paintbrush in your hand and a rake and gloves and get dirty for Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: One of the things that my dad gave me, and I'll share this more next week, was a love and a compassion for the underprivileged.
SPEAKER_00: For those who had not been blessed with as much as I'd been given.
SPEAKER_00: And in the South, where I grew up, in South Carolina, near my granddaddy's ranch, we had everything.
SPEAKER_00: He drove a Pontiac, Bonneville, baby blue.
SPEAKER_00: Only on Sunday.
SPEAKER_00: We'd all get in there.
SPEAKER_00: And then he'd go park it in the garage, and we'd never see it again until next Sunday.
SPEAKER_00: But right across the tracks, literally railroad tracks, were those in shanties and shacks.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll tell you more about that next week.
SPEAKER_00: But we're called to love people.
SPEAKER_00: We're all called on a mission.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, you're not only called, what does he say?
SPEAKER_00: He says you're chosen.
SPEAKER_00: Folks, you're beloved.
SPEAKER_00: You've got Jesus Christ's genes flowing in your spiritual bloodstream.
SPEAKER_00: You're a child of God.
SPEAKER_00: Greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said, the works you've seen me doing, they've been really great.
SPEAKER_00: Greater works.
SPEAKER_00: Greater works shall you do.
SPEAKER_00: That's what this team in Rwanda experienced.
SPEAKER_00: They saw greater works.
SPEAKER_00: And then he says, We're faithful.
SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm not very faithful, see.
SPEAKER_00: You only knew what I did this week, and I don't want to hear about it.
SPEAKER_00: You might need to repent, but you know what I love about Hebrews 11?
SPEAKER_00: Hebrews 11 is called the hall of faith, and Hebrews 11 is about all these guys that are mentioned as man, they had faith for this.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever read about those guys?
SPEAKER_00: Pretty messed up group of folks.
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about adultery, we're talking about fornication, we're talking about murder, we're talking about basically practically selling your wife to someone else so you can save your own skin.
SPEAKER_00: And these are the hall of faith.
SPEAKER_00: There's some divine editing going on here.
SPEAKER_00: You can be faithful.
SPEAKER_00: Wherever you've been and whatever you've done, start today.
SPEAKER_00: Because that's where joy is found.
SPEAKER_00: And he concludes with this.
SPEAKER_00: Then he said to me, The waters which you saw where the harlot sits are peoples and multitudes, nations and tongues.
SPEAKER_00: And the ten horns which you saw on the beasts, these will hate the harlot, make her desolate and naked, eat her flesh, and burn her with fire.
SPEAKER_00: So this thing's gonna implode, gang.
SPEAKER_00: These guys are just gonna turn on each other.
SPEAKER_00: And if you've got pot-smoking friends that you hang out with, or you're doing cocaine over here, or you're doing a little sex over there, whatever it might be, it's gonna eventually implode on you.
SPEAKER_00: Always does.
SPEAKER_00: Demons, the only thing demons hate more than you is each other.
SPEAKER_00: Demons hate each other.
SPEAKER_00: They like to group up and do a little.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, have you ever seen anybody smoke pot by themselves?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, nobody smokes pot by themselves.
SPEAKER_00: You mean you gotta hang out with the gang, right?
SPEAKER_00: They're gonna betray you.
SPEAKER_00: Cruel taskmasters.
SPEAKER_00: Watch out.
SPEAKER_00: That's what's gonna happen to the beasts and the prophet and Satan.
SPEAKER_00: For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill this purpose.
SPEAKER_00: To be of one mind and to give their kingdoms to the beast.
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't that remind you of the Tower of Babel being of one mind?
SPEAKER_00: And to give their kingdoms to the beast until the words of God are fulfilled, and the woman whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth, and that's next week.
SPEAKER_01: You've been listening to The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.
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SPEAKER_01: And be sure to listen to the next edition of The Road with Pastor Teacher Steve Holt.