And
the kind of sad thing about it as you look at men is the fact that
there are no answers. Things are beyond control and man is trapped,
unable to cope with his coming doom. The elite of philosophers and the
cream of the crop of scientists are scurrying around as busily as they
can, trying to figure out how to stop the terrible suicide of the human
race and they really haven't figured it out yet. They have some ideas,
but unfortunately they won't work.
They've decided the only way to
stop the extinction of man is to control man. And we've been teaching
you is, what is going on in our world today is an
effort upon the parts of some elite and some top-drawer scientist to
gain control over the minds of men, over the reproduction of men, over
the wages of men, over everything. And we see in our world, more and
more controls being exercised. We see that there's going to be brain
stimulation; LIFE Magazine ran a large feature article on it. They've already figured out how they can do it, using monkeys, of course, as test cases.
We hear constantly and incessantly
about daycare centers, which are already being subsidized by the
government, which are guaranteed efforts on the government's part to
take children and indoctrinate them aside from the home in order that
they may recreate the human race, in a sense, or create a new kind of
people who don't have crime, and who don't have greed and who don't
overpopulate, etc., etc.
Birth control, the talk about
putting sterility drugs in water and then handing out fertility drugs
to people who are designated by the government to have the right to
reproduce. Money control, price control, wage control, all of this
kind of control that you're seeing is man's efforts to grab his
existence and keep it.
Right now there are over 100 bills
before the United States Congress under the category of changing human
nature; 100 of them. One of them provides that your infant would be
taken out of your home and kept until 5, then sent to mandatory
government schools. One hundred and eighty-six Congressmen voted for
it. It would take $20 billion to implement.
The panic is on, my friends, in our
world, in every corner. The world must be changed; man will never
survive his own suicide if it isn't. But the doomsday machine is
already rolling and it's a little bit late. The heart of man is still
deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, and my friends, no
change is ever going to come in man, no change. They can try every
system they want but they'll never stop man from greed, from crime,
from lust, from all of these other things.
Man will always kill. Man will always
make war; he will always lie; he will always cheat; he will always
steal; he will always overindulge; he will always pollute; he will
always make waste; he will always hate; he will always rebel. Because
he is a sinner; he is depraved; he is deceitful above all things; he is
desperately wicked and he cannot change himself.
He's racing to his doom; he has no
power to stop it. Man will not get better. The world will not get
better, my friends, it will get worse. If you say, "You sound like a
prophet of doom." And indeed I am. The Bible tells us that the world
is doomed; it is inevitable. Everything in man's own sphere says it's
inevitable. Everything that man sees around him says it's grinding to
a halt. And everything in the Bible says it. God says the end is coming and God writes history.
The sun is setting. The sun of
man's day is already casting its red glow of wrath against the clouds,
and night comes very, very soon. The handwriting is, again, on the
wall; thou has been weighed in the balances and found wanting. And a
man who can't see the impending doom isn't really looking, because it's
there.
I want you to see some of
the signs in the word of God that tell us that the day of man is
ending. And I want to give you, three
general and one specific sign, that the day of man is coming to an end. Now, there's so much
material that we should really stretch this out over months. But we're
gonna try to pick out the highlights for you.
The first general sign that man's
day is coming to a close is lawlessness, lawlessness. The world will
not be peaceful, rebellion and war will not end, and no peace will ever
come until the Prince of Peace comes, who is Jesus Christ. And the age
of man will end with a return of Christ, in a great holocaust and a
great judgment like the world has never seen. And the Bible tells us
that a sign of the end, as it moves toward that judgment, and the
coming of the Prince of Peace, will be lawlessness.
Thessalonians chapter 2 verse 3.
Now here the Apostle Paul is talking about the end and he says this, 2 Thessalonians 2:3,
"Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come,"
that is the final judgment, the end of man's age, "shall not come
except there come the falling away first and," and I just want to deal
with this, "that man of sin be revealed the Son of Perdition. And he
is called here the lawless one, the Anti-Christ."
Now go down to verse 6, "And now ye
know what restraineth, that he might be revealed in his time. For the
mystery of iniquity," that's the word anamia, which means
lawlessness, "doth already work. Only he who now hindereth will
continue to hinder until he be taken out of the way."
Now watch this. The Bible says
that now there is a mystery of lawlessness at work. A mystery in the
Bible is always something which is hidden and will someday be
revealed. The total full, watch it, the total full expression of
lawlessness is still hidden. It'll be revealed during a period of time
the Bible calls the great what? Tribulation, which comes when the
church is taken out. At the end of man's day, there will be this
horrible Tribulation, this horrible time when lawlessness will be full
blown and it won't be a mystery anymore.
But the mystery of it now already
begins to work. But God has moved into this world and he has set some
restraints on lawlessness. And we believe that the restrainer here is
the Holy Spirit. Now watch that. The Holy Spirit is in the world now
restraining lawlessness from going full blown, see. But someday it's
going to be fully and completely revealed, verse 8, "And then shall
that wicked one be revealed." Then we find out about all of the
horrors that are gonna take place when he is revealed.
God has restrained lawlessness in the
world, but someday, the restraints gonna be taken out. The Spirit of
God will leave as a restraining influence. The Bible tells us those
who love Jesus Christ will be taken out of the world before all this
stuff begins. That's our hope, isn't it? And at that point, when
we're taken out of the world, the spirit of God's ministry of
restraining lawlessness stops.
But, friends, the mystery of lawlessness
already works. And as you look at your world today, you can't help but
see lawlessness everywhere. In 2 Timothy chapter 3, in verse 1, we get a glimpse of this kind of lawlessness.
And I don't need to tell you about lawlessness. If you look at the
television or read any newspaper at any day, that's all you ever read
about, breaking the law every kind of way possible and every kind of
law possible. It's the new thing, you know. Do your own thing. Hang
the law. Who cares, right? Lawlessness.
And the Bible says that as we get closer to the end, lawlessness will become more rampant, and it is. Notice in 2 Timothy 3:1 this, "This know also that in the last days, perilous times shall come."
Now, I want to describe the perilous
times, verse 2, here they come. This is the condition of the world at
the end times. Watch it. "Men shall be lovers of their own selves."
Know what that means? Selfish; look out for number one. Demand your
rights. Do your own thing. Lovers of their own selves.
Secondly, covetous. That's a desire to
have what belong to somebody else, whether it's possession, his
position, his job or his wife. Boasters; egomania, promoting self,
exaltation of self, ego, boy, if that isn't today, I think it's mostly
obvious to us in luxuries and clothes and so forth how people exalt
themselves other ways. Proud, that means no need of God.
Self-sufficient, independence, blasphemers, substituting natural
philosophy for divine revelation.
Watch this one. Disobedient to parents,
would you say that's a picture of our age? Unthankful. Has there ever
been a day in the world when more people thought everybody owed them a
living? Ingratitude, unholy, and that's the key to everything, that's
the problem.
Without natural affection. My friends,
we live in a day when the natural course of love has been so messed up
that you can hardly find a normal love relationship. Homosexuality,
all kinds of perversions, even people in a heterosexual love
relationship are totally unfulfilled and people jump from person to
person to person, they can't find it with normal satisfactions of
love. Truth breakers, nobody's word is worth anything. Liars; false
accusers, meaning liars. Incontinent, which of course is follows in
unrighteousness, unable to be trusted and so forth and so on.
Fierce, despisers of those that are
good. Fierce means they can't be harnessed, they can't be restrained.
Traitors, people sell each other off; heady, high-minded that means
headstrong. Lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. And these are
characteristic of the end time and certainly we could pick up any paper
and just in a very general way, we could see these as characteristics.
And the interesting thing is in verse 5,
where it says they, "Have a form of Godliness but deny the power of
it." In other words, with all of the things that are going on, they
still maintain religion. Forty-nine percent of the people in America
go to church. And you can read clippings from any newspaper and you
can see all of those things; they're obvious.
But notice verse 13. That's the
one I really want to point to you. "But evil men and seducers shall
become worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived." Now, there's
always been lawlessness and there's always been these other things.
But the point is, in the end time it's going to become worse and
worse. It's going to come to a place where it is completely out of
control.
Now watch this, backing up, I'm going to
pick up some of the pieces. God basically, according to Romans chapter
13, instituted human governments. And he instituted human government
to punish evil-doers and to reward those that are good. That's
Biblical. Government is to punish evil-doers and reward those that are
good.
My friends, you live in a day when that
is in the process almost of being reversed. With all of the things
that are going on today, government is failing to punish evil-doers,
failing to stop lawlessness. And government is going to come to a halt
and anarchy is going to result, and then Anti-Christ world, and then
Jesus is gonna return. It's all coming right to a head.
Law breakers go unpunished. Courts
won't convict anybody. Police have a terrible time trying to do their
job. They catch a criminal, turn him into the courts and the courts
turn him loose. Our own police chief wrote the governor a letter last
week and he pleaded with the governor to revoke a new law in California
that permits the prisoners 72‑hour passes, because already in the last
month or so, two of those on passes have murdered two people.
A judge in Pasadena recently had a
person brought before him who was a rapist and the person told him that
he'd never do it again; the judge let him go. He did it again, only
this time he murdered the little girl after he'd raped her.
And government, because of the tangling
of law and all the other problems, sentences are commuted, juries are
hung, probations are given, early releases, police can't get
convictions, etc., etc., it goes on and on and on. Civil disobedience
is in order, everybody breaks a law, do what you want, burn the
buildings, march, protest. And I'm not against a healthy, normal kind
of attitude that desires to see change, obviously. But there's no
place for disobedience and yet we see it all about us and it's a sign
of the end.
The Bible says, when you start seeing
lawlessness on a worldwide scale, look ahead, the end is near. You
see, there is only way to deal with lawlessness, there is only one
way. That's to create a police state. That's what you do.
Ultimately, it drives itself to a police state. And you see, that's
what Anti-Christ has when he comes. He sets up a total world rule.
And why he'll be such a hero, evidently, from the word of God is that
with all the lawlessness all over the world, lawlessness on an
international basis and on a national basis, is that he is evidently
gonna be able to resolve this and get control everything.
And I believe what the world is going to
exist under, according to the Bible, is a Tribulation that is a police
state. Why, if you take the mark of the beast, what happens to you?
You get killed. That's the only way you can control lawlessness. And
that's what's gonna make that great hero out of the Anti-Christ
possibly, the fact that he can resolve the lawlessness into a
controlled situation.
All right, that's a general sign, very,
very general. Let me give you another general one. Not only is
lawlessness a general sign of the coming of Christ but so is false
religion. 1 Timothy 4, 1 Timothy 4:1,
"Now the Spirit speaketh expressly," pointedly, specifically, "that in
the latter times, some shall depart from the faith." Now, in the
latter times, my friend, in the latter times, some shall depart from
the faith. Boy, have we seen that in liberalism, rampant everywhere.
Who denominations have rejected the
faith that was once there, tenants and their _____. Who churches,
schools, seminaries, have kissed the whole thing goodbye for
rationalism. "... depart from the faith given heed to seducing spirits
and doctrines of devils."
In the last days, my friend, false
religion, sponsored by demons, is gonna reign. Did you know that all
false religion is demon worship, did you know that? All false religion is demon worship. All idolatry
is demon worship. Paul said in 1 Corinthians chapter, "The gentiles
sacrificed to devils." All other religion, than that which is true, is
demon worship. And, my friends, we are in the heyday of false
religion.
Never been like it is now: 455 million
Muslims, 400 million Hindus, 350 million Confucianists, 250 million
Buddhists, 100 Shinto and Taoists. And in all of those religions,
there is demon and spirit worship; 750 million who have no religion or
are in primitive kind of animism. Thirteen to 14 million Jews, 200
Zoroastrians, and 1 billion atheistic communists.
The world is full of false religion.
It's dominated by the doctrines of demons. And demons are behind the
cults, as we know it. And the cults are growing as a rate that's
absolutely unbelievable. Some of the cults have tripled and quadrupled
in recent days. And people have gone so far that it's not only
necessarily a religion or a cult, but they're actually worshipping
directly demons and even the devil himself.
And you know about Anton Lavey and the
Church of Satan, in San Francisco; mediums, séances, horoscopes, Ouija
boards, ESP and whatever else. Ten million Americans subscribe to
horoscopes. Typical demon work can be seen in the pseudo-Christian
literature, for example, of Jeane Dixon, Edgar Casey, Ruth Montgomery,
Arthur Ford, etc. All over America we have witch's covens. And all
this to an extent never known in the history of the world.
And the Bible says that in the end
times, watch it, the doctrine of devils. It's all over the place. And
the doctrine of devils in an organized, religious way will come to a
head, in Revelation chapter 17, in that false‑world church. We'll look
at that a little bit later.
All right, let me give you the third
general sign: apostasy, not only lawlessness and false religion, but
apostasy. Apostate is one who knows the truth and rejects it.
Religious liberalism; and by that, I mean, those who have departed from
the truths of the word of God; preachers and teachers who teach less
than the inspiration of scripture, the Deity of Jesus Christ is virgin
birth, substitutionary death, atonement, resurrection and coming
again. Anybody who teaches less than that is an apostate.
And the tragic thing about apostasy is
it finds itself in denominationalism, in church pulpits, in "colleges"
of a Christian nature and in seminaries. And most seminaries, and most
so-called Christian colleges in America are producing liberals who are
apostate. The rise of liberalism in colleges, seminaries and churches,
gives abundant evidence that men are departing from the faith fast.
False teachers everywhere. And Paul
tells us in 2 Corinthians chapter 11 that they are dressed up like
angels of light. Yes, some
shall depart from the faith.
People say to me, "You know, I'm in a church where the pastor doesn't believe in these things. What should I do?" And I say, "Get out." That kind of
stuff is damned, my dear friend. No Christian sits under the doctrines
of demons and prospers.
You say, "Well, how can you tell an
apostate?" Two ways: number one, he denies the deity of Jesus Christ,
that he's totally God. Number two, he denies the Second Coming,
always. Number one, denies Christ's deity. So just what Peter says,
just clearly as possibly can be said. 2 Peter 2:1, "False teachers, even denying the Lord that bought them."
And over in chapter 3, they say, "Where
is the promise of his coming?" And they laugh. See, they always deny
two things: the deity of Jesus Christ, that he's God in human flesh,
and the Second Coming, always. Because the Second Coming is tied with
judgment, and they are subject to God's damnation.
But you know, they're gonna be busy.
They're busy fellas, the apostates, very busy. Because they're
building a great church, they really are. The only problem is, when
the true church is gone, they'll just get rolling. The Bible says in
Revelation chapter 17 that when the true church leaves, they just begin
to really move on their church. The true church in the Bible is called
a bride, their church is called a whore, Revelations 17.
They're building a church, all right.
It's the devil's church. Revelations 17 is a fantastic prophesy that,
bit by bit, describes the church of the Tribulation, the church that's
here on earth after the true church is gone and it's being built today
by the apostates. Friends, you and I are seeing it being built.
Now, there's only two things necessary
for the apostates to build a church that's the whore or the harlot.
Only two things: number one, a lot of apostates to do it; number two, a
drive for all of the apostates to get together and build one church.
Have you been watching your papers? Have you heard about ecumenism?
Have you heard about COCU? Not cuckoo, COCU, which is the Council on
Church Union. Have you heard of the World Council of Churches? The
National Council of Churches? These are apostates banding together to
build their church. They're gonna be very successful 'cause it's
energized by Satan.
There's a new step every hour toward a
world unified church, uniting under - not doctrine, not Jesus Christ -
social actions, civil rights, anti-war, housing, welfare. A recent article in the paper said this, "60 Protestant,
Roman Catholic and Jewish religious leaders have announced the
convening of an emergency religious convocation in Washington to
mobilize to end t war."
UPI Washington said, "Dr. Cynthia Wedel,
president of the National Council of Churches, has predicted that the
National Council of Churches will be replaced by a new and strong
ecumenical organization within 18 months or 2 years at the most."
They know where they're going. And
they're getting together on everything but the truth. They're getting
together on all kinds of things. They're getting together on social
action. I believe in some cases they're getting together in
experience, falsified spiritual experience that's ingenuine. It's a
sad thing to look around our world and see all of these apostates.
If you have a denominational
background as, many of you do. I look back at the denomination and I shake. The Glock and Stark survey of 1970 asked a
couple of questions, one of them was this: Are the scriptures the
inspired and inherent word of God? Seventy-seven percent of the
American Lutherans said no; 67 percent of the American Baptists said
no; 87 percent of the Methodists said no; 88 percent of the
Presbyterians said no; 95 percent of the Episcopals said no, the Bible
is not the word of God.
Apostates everywhere, and all of them
getting together to build their great church. Thirty-five million
people in American belong to COCU; the United Methodist, the Episcopal
Church, the United Presbyterian and the Presbyterian USA, United Church
of Christ, and Christian churches, etc., etc., etc., the African
Methodist Church and whatever else.
Revelations 17 says a very interesting
thing. It says we'll all be centered in the city of Rome. Read it in
verse 4 and verse 9 in Revelations. You say, "Well, maybe it's not
talking about Rome." Then take the Catholic Bible, 1963 Confraternity
version, read that chapter and see who they say the city says in view
in chapter 17. In the Confraternity Catholic Bible, it says, "The city
here is Rome." It's obvious who it is, the city on seven hills.
And since Pope John XXIII died, there
has been a growing movement toward this one-world church. Pope Paul at
Vatican, too, pled for the worldwide union and forgiveness for the
iniquities of the Roman Catholic Church in the past. They exonerated
the Jews from crucifying Christ, etc., etc.
Jeane Dixon had a vision of a cathedral
in Washington, which became very important to all these people in this
effort. In the vision, she said, "A remarkable peace came over me and
I know that a council of our church would soon bring together, under
the roof of Rome, the religions and nationalities of the world."
That's what she saw in her vision. Four years later, the council met
and it began. You say, "Does she get supernatural visions?" I believe she does. They're not of God.
So lawlessness, false religion and
apostasy are signs of the end of man's age. Now, I want to give you
specific signs, specific signs. We're living in this age. It goes
along; Jesus comes down, not to the earth but to take His own. Gathers
us and we meet Him where? In the sky. It's gonna be great. God turns
off gravity for all Christians.
And there we are, right? And the ones
in the grave go first because they have six feet further to go and we
want to meet together. So the ones in the grave, and we meet - except
in New Orleans where they're above the ground. We meet in the air with
the Lord. We go to be with the Lord, and when we're going with the
Lord, then seven years of Tribulation comes on earth as God judges all
of the other unbelievers.
And at the same time, He's gonna work
with Israel. And at the end of seven years, He comes back and we come
with Him. That's how it goes. Now, when we go, all that horrible
thing is gonna happen, the Tribulation. The Tribulation happens after
we've been taken out of the world. But, watch this, we can already
begin to see Tribulation events happening, forming. And we're gonna go
before they happen but we can already see them beginning. I don't
think we have very much time. I don't know how much time we have. We
may not even make it to the tomorrow. Praise the Lord. Even so, come
Lord Jesus. Can you say that?
But there are some events happening.
Let me give them to you. Number one, the rebirth of Israel. You wanna
know what Israel is?
The Old Testament clearly and repeatedly
foretold that Israel, as a nation, would be reborn. All over the Old
Testament. Ezekiel chapter 20 verse 42, "And ye shall know that I
am the Lord, when I shall bring you into the land of Israel, into the
country for which I lifted up mine hand to give it to your fathers.
And there shall ye remember your ways and all your doings in which ye
have been defiled. And you shall loathe yourselves in your own sight
for all your evils and you've committed. And ye shall know that I am
the Lord when I have wrought with you for my namesake, not according to
your wicked ways, no, no, grace; nor according to your corrupt doings,
oh ye house of Israel, saith the Lord God."
House of Israel, you're scattered all
over the world. But I'm gonna bring you back. And old Ezekiel over
there in chapter 37, God took him out in the valley, verse 1, "And the
hand of the Lord was upon me and carried me out into the spirit of the
Lord."
And verse 1 says, "He set me down in the
midst of the valley which was full of bones." Ezekiel's having a
vision. God puts him in a valley, bones everywhere. He looks around
and sees all the bones. "And he calls me to pass by roundabout. And
behold, there were very many bones in the open valley and, lo, they
were very dry." A valley of dry bones.
And he said to me, "Son of man, can these bones live?"
Ezekiel answers, "Huh? You know, you brought me here. I don't know."
And he said unto me, "Prophesy upon
these bones and say unto them, 'Oh ye dry bones, hear the word of the
Lord.' Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones, behold I will cause
breath to enter into you and you shall live. And I will lay sinews
upon you and bring up flesh upon you and over cover you with skin and
put breath in you and you shall live and you shall know that I am the
Lord."
So God says they're gonna live. That
whole valley of bone gonna come together, flesh gonna get on them,
they're gonna breathe, they're gonna be alive. And Ezekiel verse 7,
"So I prophesied as I was commanded. And I prophesied, behold there
was a nose and behold a shaking." And the head bone connected to the
neck bone and away it went, see. And bone connected to bone. And that
whole thing came together. Verse 8, "And when I beheld all the
sinews and the flesh came upon them," and the skin and pretty soon
breath comes into him. And old Ezekiel says, "Lord," verse 11, "who is
this? What does this mean?" Verse 11, "Then he said to me, 'Son of
man, these bones are the whole house of Israel.'" Wow. Do you know
that nation has been scattered? It's never possessed it's own land and
controlled it's own land for 2,500 years; has been re-gathered.
Have you ever met a Hittite, Amorite,
Jebusite, Hivite? You say, "Huh?" There aren't any. But there are
Israelites all over the world. God has preserved the Jew. Why?
Because God says, "I'll bring Him back to His land." They're His
people.
God chose to work his redemptive act
through one nation. That's His nation. They forsook Him and He
scattered them. But in your lifetime, beloved, and in mine, He has
re-gathered them. Boy, it's a fantastic thing to realize. Since 586 BC
when Nebakanezer conquered the land, Israel hasn't been in power, 2,500
years.
Now watch this one, in Luke 21:24,
it says, "Jerusalem," meaning the whole land of Israel, "shall be
trodden down by Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be
fulfilled." Hey, you mean Jerusalem and Israel is gonna be under
Gentile control until the times of the Gentiles are over? That's the
end of man's day. You mean that the Jews aren't gonna control their
land until it's the end of the Gentile day? That's what the Bible
says, Luke 21:24.
Listen, friends, in your lifetime,
Israel has begun to gain control over her land. You know what that
says to me? Fast closing are the times of the Gentiles. It's almost
over. A miracle; 70 AD, 1,100,000 Jews were killed by Titus
Vespasian. In a single day, 10,000 throats were cut in Damascus. In
115 AD, Hadrian destroyed 985 towns and killed 500,000 Jews. In
Crusades, they slaughtered them all over Europe.
For thousands of years, they've been
massacred. But in 1873, they came back. First settlement, 1914,
90,000 of them; 1935, 300,000 of them. In 1945, 6 million of them
dead. In 1948, they were a nation, controlling their own country, a
part of it, for the first time in 2,500 years. The miracle of
history. No nation in history has ever done that; they did. And you
have seen it happen.
God has re-gathered Israel because once
the church is taken out, the seven years he deals with Israel, and
they've gotta be in the land to be dealt with, and they're in the
land.
Let me shock you. Matthew 24 verse 32.
Now Jesus, in this whole chapter, is talking about the end times.
Look at verse 32. "Now learn a parable of the fig tree." Jesus is
gonna speak a parable here, or an illustration. "When its branches yet
tender and putteth forth leaves, you know that summer is near. So
likewise, ye, when you shall see all these things, know that it is near
even at the doors." In other words, he's saying now there is an end
coming to everything. The great end is coming.
Now he says, in terms of a fig tree,
when the branch begins to put forth a little leaf, you know that
summer's near. So he says, now you watch, "When the fig tree begins to
put for its branch, the end is coming."
In the Old Testament, Israel is a fig
tree. So Jesus says, "Folks, watch. Folks, watch." Because when you
see the fig tree bud - May 1948 - this is what this prophesy means.
And this is a possible interpretation obviously. The fig tree budded.
He says, "Watch it; the end is near."
Verse 34, "This generation, Genoa,
shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled." What does he
mean? Many Bible scholars feel he means this, "The generation
that sees the fig tree bud will not die off till all the events of the
end come to pass." Did you get that? "The generation that sees the
fig tree bud will not die off till all the events of the end come to
pass."
Guess whose generation saw the fig tree
bud? You say, "You mean, this is the last generation?" I may be wrong, but I believe there's evidence from the
Word of God that that's very, very possible. I would never set a
date. But as I read it, if Israel is the fig tree, it's budded. And
the generation that sees that will not die off till all these things
come to pass.
You've seen it, friends. You've seen
God brings people back. And if you don't think God did it, ask the
Arabs. One little incident out of the war, the Israeli Air Force took
off, and the Arabs had a plan. They put dummy airplanes on the runway,
six-day war, 67. Put dummy airplanes on the runway, they flew over.
The Arabs figured, "They'll drop their payload on the dummy airplanes
and we'll take off and beat them back and destroy Israel." One thing they didn't realize, the
Israelis had developed a homing bomb that only homed in on live
targets. They flew over runways and they dropped the bombs. Destroyed
90 percent of the Arab Air Force in less than a day; they never got off the
ground.
So they had manned every possible place
with Arab forces where the Jews could possibly get up there. And they
thought they were secure. There was one area that was too steep for
anybody to climb to they left that alone. And that's what cost them.
Because the Israeli Army got all their tanks and pushed them up the
Golden Heights with bulldozers, and they all came over the top. And
they came in with an air strike and wiped out that whole thing and
moved the line back 10 miles. They said, "That's fair, we can fight on
flat ground."
The girl who drove the _____ track that
led the largest column of troops said she saw before her a pillar of
fire, one reporter said. He didn't know what the pillar of fire is but
it sounds like somebody we know. And she said, "When I saw the pillar
of fire, I diverted the whole column. A couple of vehicles were late
and they didn't see the pillar of fire. They went straight ahead into
a mine field and blew into bits."
God is superintending the recovery of
Israel to the land. In Israel, you just can't believe what you see,
you can't believe it. It looks like a large construction zone, like
they should put a wooden wall around the whole city, you know,
construction zone. It's the fastest growing city in the history of the
world. It'll double in 10 years. People are coming back.
Let me give you a second one, a second
specific. The rise of the United Nations. In Revelation 13,
Revelation 18, Daniel 2, Daniel 7, Daniel 9, Daniel 11, every place in
those passages, prophesies are concerning the political picture at the
end of the age. And the political picture is that there'll be one
world government with one world ruler. And the whole thing will
eventually disintegrate into a total war among all these big powers in
the world.
But the Bible says there'll be one man,
one world ruler. Well, you know, all
the nations under the world weren't under one umbrella. You happened
to see the inclusion of Red China into the United Nations, which means
as of now, all nations in the world, significant nations, are in the
United Nations.
You say, "What does that mean?" That
simply means that if one man were to rule the United Nations, for the
first time in history, he would rule the world.
Now you say, "Are you saying the United
Nations will be the vehicle of Anti-Christ?" No, I'm just saying that
the mind of men is collectively to get together for a common rule. And
they are, for the first time in the history of humanity, under one
umbrella. And theoretically, if a man could get control of the United
Nations, he'd rule the world. It's never been possible before. You've
seen it in the last couple of months.
Recently, Belgian Premir Spock
said, "The truth is, that the method of international committees has
failed. What we need is a man, someone of the greatest experience, the
highest order, of great authority, of wide influence, of great energy,
let him come and let him come quickly. They want a man. They're gonna
get one.
Jeane Dixon, who's had many
demon-inspired visions says this, "Strange things began to occur in
Mrs. Dixon's house," his is the writer commenting. "As she gazed
toward the East before sunrise, she saw an Egyptian Pharaoh and Queen
Nefertiti. And cradled in the queen's arms was a baby in rags. The
couple advanced toward her," that is toward Jeane Dixon, "extend the
baby, whose eyes were full of wisdom as if offering it to the entire
world. Soon the baby grew and became a man before Mrs. Dixon's eyes.
A small cross, which had formed above him, began to grow in size until
it extended over the earth. Then people of every race were seen
kneeling and adoring this man.
"Her interpretation was that a child was
born into the world who would revolutionize the world. And before the
close of this century, he will bring together all mankind in an
all-embracing faith. This will be the foundation of a new
Christianity, with every sect and creed, united through this man, who
will walk among the people to spread the wisdom of almighty power."
Where do you think she got that vision?
That's a perfect description of Satan's man, the Anti-Christ. It's a
shocking thing to realize the day in which we live, shocking. He'll
come; he'll be here, the man the world wants. And when he comes, he
will come to establish peace. What is it the world wants more than
anything else? Peace, peace, peace, peace, you hear it all the time.
You're gonna get a man who brings peace.
Revelations 6, I'll introduce him to
you. Here's the man, Revelations 6 verse 1. Well, now here you have
the four visions of what happens in the Tribulation, four opening
visions. Verse 2 says there's gonna be a conqueror that's gonna
conquer. And he has a bow, and notice he doesn't have any arrows which
is an indication he conquers by peace. This is a picture of the
Anti-Christ, as he's commonly called.
And in Daniel 6:4, Daniel 9:27, Ezekiel 38:8-12,
we have the same description of the same guy, and all of those places
tell us he's gonna conquer by peace. This guy moves in and he's
accepted as a world leader and he brings peace. My friends, what is it
the world wants? Peace. And they're gonna get just what they want.
Only, it's not the Prince of Peace, it's this Anti-Christ. And he
brings peace but it's a phony peace,. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 verse 2, "For
yourselves, know perfectly that the day of the Lord comes like a thief
in the night." Final day, listen to this. "For when they shall say
'peace and safety' then cometh sudden destruction."
The world's gonna be in a situation of
false peace and it's not gonna last. Look at verse 4, "Another horse
in the vision comes and power is given to him that sat on it to take
the peace form the earth. Peace is short and he rips it from the
earth." And what happens? "And then kill, One another.
And it was given unto him a great sword."
Ezekiel 38:21
says, "Every man's sword will be against his brother." They kill each
other. This is inter-country revolution. And the word for sword is
not ramfiah, the big sword. It's makirah, the
assassin's dagger. Men are gonna turn against each other and
assassinate each other all over the world. And you know this is the
thing we fear so much, even in our own country, is civil war.
The slaughter is infused in the men by
Satan himself. In America, for example, we have 200 million guns and
we sell 3 million more every year; pistols, revolvers, shotguns,
rifles, uncounted machine guns, bazookas, hand grenades, mortar,
anti-paint guns. One ad in the paper said, "Buy your father a machine
gun for Father's Day."
There are more guns in Los Angeles than
there are in Saigon. In the last 70 years, nearly 800,000 Americans
have died of private guns, 630,000 by war; 170,000 more we've killed
ourselves. We're an armed camp, my friends. And when the war breaks
loose after peace is gone, men are gonna kill each other. And we're
ready for that. It can happen. The tension is right for, when peace gets ripped from the earth,
men are gonna turn on each other. The results are staggering; the
results are shocking in verse 6. Famine and it goes to describe famine
by talking about the terrible price for wheat and the terrible price
for barley. And they won't be able to touch the oil and the wine,
which will belong to the rich people. Famine is gonna hit our world.
That kind of war and that kind of slaughter, and everybody fighting and
nobody producing, and famine is gonna hit.
The Bible tells us elsewhere that famine
is gonna be a part of the end times. Do you realize that 400 million
people are starving in our world right now? Ten thousand drop dead
every day of starvation. A hundred thousand a month died of starvation
in Biafra; that many are dying in India. And it can only get worse.
But, my friends, it's not only gonna be
that personal assassination but the Bible says in Matthew chapter 24,
that there will be wars and rumors of wars on a national basis.
There'll be internal revolutions and there'll be massive wars. I think
these are staggering thoughts.
Look how many people are gonna die, in
verse 8. "Power was given to them over the fourth part of the earth."
One-fourth of humanity will die. Later on the, Bible tells us in a few
chapters, chapter 9 verse 15, that one-third will die. Put
that together and you've over half the earth. The population of the
world today is about 6.5 billion. Can you imagine 3 or 3.25 billion
people dying in 3.5 years?
It's shocking. Only 62.5 million people
have died in all of the major wars; 3 billion at least, 3.5 billion
perhaps, dying if Jesus were to come now, in 3.5 years. And the
shocking thing about it, my friends, that would have been a
mathematical impossibility 50 years ago. Couldn't have killed them
that fast. Can your imagine using that many arrows? Can you imagine
using that many single-shot bullets? There's only way to do it, that's
in germ warfare, chemical warfare, poisonous gas and bombs. And we can
kill them a lot faster than 3.5 years.
The United States, USSR, Red China and
Europe has 50,000 atomic devices. The United States has 30,000 atomic
devices with 25,000 megatons of power. And listen to this, 1 megaton
equals 50 A-bombs like we dropped on Hiroshima. We've got 25,000 of
them stockpiled.
We can do more damage with one missile,
with one nuclear warhead, than all of the bombs combined dropped in
World War II. And we could do it in a half an hour. The world is
ready for war, like it's never dreamed could exist. We're an armed
camp.
