Eschatology Pt. 2

Thank you so much for having me and uh I give honor to the leadership of this church and uh to I think the leadership runs very very deep here. Um some some churches they don't have a a bench, you know, where there's people waiting if there's something that's needed. I have never had so many people help me when I walked in the door of any church in the world. Everybody has come and I I just makes me want to ask for more. I don't know just just wonderful had a wonderful time last week and uh we began to introduce this.

I determined and I told uh brother Peter this. I said um I've given a lot of seminars and mostly it's uh I've got more powerpoints than you can shake a stick at just um and and so I could bore you to tears seven different ways sideways about the details that are very very interesting to me but may not be as interesting to you. So I determined that in this month I was going to work very hard to make application. So what does this mean to me?

And then how am I to live and so on and so forth. So I will attempt to do that tonight and uh I've got a slide set that's should do that or may not do that. It may be one of those things we're like leave that out next time. So we'll see how that works. We're starting with history and we're going to pull that uh PowerPoint up. Uh it's when I was uh newlywed, I uh lived in Minnesota. We played on New Year's uh eve snow or New Year's Day snow football.

I don't know if you because it's snow, you know, that's what it is. There's like a foot and a half of snow on the ground. It's tackle football. I mean, and why not? Um, and so in that game, I had just been married for six months and uh I got hit in the head and I I sat down and I didn't realize what happened. Like all of a sudden I didn't know I knew I was familiar with everybody. I I couldn't come up with anyone's name.

I didn't know where I was. And um what concerned Nancy a lot was that I couldn't remember being married. And so that was a fortunately a temporary amnesia. It's quite possible for somebody to have in institutions to have long-term amnesia. And this is the case where the church forgot what it believed. Uh so click that's my I'm pretty slick on this. I'll say click and then they'll So um I want demystify prophecy. This is one if you could boil it down to one sentence I would tell you that prophecy is simply God telling his redemptive story.

He knows the beginning. He was there in the beginning God and he knows the end. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. There's no more pain or sorrow. There's going to be no more death. Former things have passed away. That's God's story. That's prophecy. That's So when we read the Bible, and I know there's sometimes symbols that are hard to understand, all this kind of thing, but it's that's the intent. So give me some more on there. All right. Uh what kind of animal is this?

What is it? >> A rabbit. And now wait a minute. Some of you are wrong because they're saying different. So it's possible to read the Bible with different perspectives. Just as if you see a picture a certain way, you look at it and those are rabbit ears. And you look at it another way and that's a duck's bill. It's just a matter of how you see. But um God intends not to confuse us, but he intends for us to understand. Why would he give us a Bible where he he wouldn't want us to understand his story?

Next slide. So here's what you need to know. This is called Apostolic Pentecostal Church. I I know you know that. Okay, so I'm getting a point here. So it's the reason it's called Apostolic Pentecostal Church is because when you have to decide what to believe, the starting place, the foundation, the absolute thing that you should believe, whatever they came to believe later is what the apostles preached and practiced. And so the apostles preached and it was the very birthday of the church. It was the Pentecostal holiday where they got the Holy Ghost.

And so that's where the name of this church comes from. So if you have to choose what to believe, then you should really think about what the apostles believe. Now we have the Bible and we also have the earliest professions of the fathers and they all agree. And the most important thing in the New Testament, the most important part of God's redemptive story is Jesus Christ. specifically that Jesus with intention died for our sins. He was buried. He rose the third day. And in that same confession, he is coming again.

That was the confession of the earliest church and of course the biblical text. Click. There's a word that's called hermeneutics. uh it means the art or science of interpretation. But there's another way to use that word hermeneutics and that's more like as u a modifier or something to be modified. So if you talk to a Catholic, let's say, and you say, "Have you ever thought about the rapture much?" And they'll go, "What? What's a rapture?" or you talk to a Lutheran and you say, "Do you believe in the pre-millennial coming of Christ?" They'll say, "What's a millennium?" If you go to someone who's Greek Orthodox and you ask the same sort of questions, they'll go, "What?

What? We I don't even know what you're talking about." What's interesting to me is that apostolics argue. We We've got plenty of I mean, there's a lot to argue about in prophecy. Sometimes we have fun doing it, sometimes we don't. But compared to what the world believes, it's a little argument in a thimble because it's about timing of like is this or that or that. And I think that's important. I think we should try to find out what the Bible says, but these big issue things are are are uh simply uh very very important.

So an apostolic click has this in our hermeneutic. When I say hermeneutic, this is the lens by which we come to the biblical text. We don't think that there's a trinity because you start with the Old Testament hero. O Israel, the Lord of God, Lord is one. That's pretty clear. And then you get to the New Testament, you're not giving that up. You're going to bring that over there. And so we start with an Old Testament foundation. It's centered on Jesus, his life, his ministry, and teaching.

Click. And then we've experienced that through the spirit. All right. So, click to the next slide. Though it took several centuries. This is a guy stepping off a clip. Uh, though it took several centuries. Click some more. Uh, yeah. Go. Go back here. All right. So, some of the things in there got a little fuzzy, but I I will anything that's fuzzy or muddled or whatever. Uh, I'll try to explain. So, uh, you know, it says do not walk here. That's invitation for some people to walk here.

Do not step here. There's wet water. Do not touch hot stove. All those kinds of things. Well, that's kind of what happened. Let me tell you the story first of all tonight of how people the church got amnesia. So here's the story and it will take about we'll see how long it takes. I think I can reduce it to 10 minutes. I usually take an hour on this. I'm not going to do that. All right. So click the next slide. All right. So how to simplify?

Okay. to the first century, everybody in leadership was Jewish people and they started their ideas of what God was like with the Schma here to Israel, the Lord of God, Lord one. But when you get to the second century, you get people that are converted who are Gentiles and some of those did pretty good. Ignatius, great guy and he I like Ignatius. But you get to the middle of the century, you get guys like Justin Martyr and they they start teaching in philosophers robes and saying Christianity is the best philosophy.

And then you get to the end of the second century, you get a guy by the name of Clement Alexandria who doesn't seem to even know what the Bible's about. And they start using allegorical method so that the text can be turned this way and that way and things start changing. So first century Jesus is coming. God has a place for the Jews. There is a millennium. He will uh bring peace on the earth. There's a final judgment. There's a thing called the tribulation period. Everyone believe that.

Get to the second century. Jesus is coming soon. There's a millennium. Uh there's a tribulation. There's an antichrist. Uh there's a final judgment. Jesus is coming soon. They all believe that Jesus was coming soon. I will tell you this majority believed that through the third century as well but this they started making inroads in this when uh there was a bunch of stuff there was some anti-semitism there was well you can't have all these feasting during the millennium there was a lot of different stuff but it started with Clement he's the guy late second century go to the next uh slide and the big guy, the guy who really um changed everything is uh origin.

And I usually do a couple skits here. I'm skipping the skits. I will not do that uh in order to simplify it. So, I'm going to try to explain it. If you don't get it, um I'm okay with that. I'll just I I'll just have to live with it. Uh so the philosophy that was going on at the time was called Platonic philosophy and Plato basically said God's a intellectual concept. He's an unmoved mover. He's the uncaused cause and um you um he is not part of the cosmos but he lives in this ideal realm.

We can't see it. It's not in our sphere. And the way everything is is that God has he's the eternal now. And uh everything that will happen has already happened in that ideal realm. And everything that's on this earth is a copy of what's in that ideal realm. This chair is merely a copy of the real chair in the ideal realm. I know it gets weird. I understand. Just stay with me if you can. So this platonic thought was everything is trying flesh is not good.

Spirit is good. But everything's trying to turn to the spiritual realm and everything was before that. He he kind of had uh um he he had a lot of stuff. He believed everyone ultimately would get saved by doing works and stuff, making their way to heaven. If they didn't, they would come back again till they kind of did make it. Even the devil get saved. That's that's pretty good for the devil. just work along enough and that's that's the way it's going to go. So, uh you can imagine what he thought of scripture uh that said God really works.

There is this real this thing. He was a great scholar in many ways. He did great things, but he he made heaven into Plato's ideal realm. This is the cause of what we sometimes now call Calvinism. It was hatched through Augustine, but it it really came from Plato. Um, you say, "Well, okay." All right. So, let's go on. I'm going to keep moving here. This is only partially relevant, all his weirdness to what I'm speaking on. So, let's move on. So, uh, once he starts doing allegorical interpretation, everyone starts copying it.

So let me just tell you the two reasons why people got amnesia. The church got amnesia. One, philosophy. The second, politics. There's two reasons the church got amnesia. One is philosophy. Second is politics. He had this thing body, soul, and spirit. And he he said there's three ways to interpret the Bible. And uh prophecy got left out. Um so that's the short one for there. Let's go on. All right. So, now here's the second thing. Um, the church believed in the beast of Revelation. They believed that the mark of the beast would come.

They believed in uh Babylon as the great uh empire that was antirist. And for the most part they associated that with Rome. But what do you do once the Roman Empire is converted? What do you do once the Roman Empire is converted? Is Rome still Babylon? Is the empire still evil? Well, I don't have time tonight to talk to you about what's called double fulfillment, but short answer is yes, he was still evil. Yes, Rome was the fulfillment of that in that time and there would be another fulfillment later.

But there's a guy by the name of Ucius. Uczeius. Ucceius has been called and rightly so the father of church history because he was assigned by Rome to write a history of the church. He's also called the fabricator of church history as well. And uh he he wrote this book about Constantine who was the first Christian empire. Now, when I say he was a Christian empire, he didn't act very Christian most of the time. Uh, you know, killing family members, that kind of thing, you know, just wasn't that Christian.

And he still attended pagan h uh festivals, but uh by the time he took the throne, Christianity had grown from a small group in Jerusalem until it was the majority view of the emperor empire. And so he wanted to write it for political reasons. That was Augustine, excuse me, that was Constantine. That was what he was doing. Soius writes this fawning ritual. In my book, I have this uh interview um between me and I'm asking him a question or somebody I can't remember exactly who it was.

And uh didn't you used to believe that Rome was of the beast? Um well that was when a little more ignorant. Didn't you believe that this that there was a babbling of well you know I was people say things when they so he totally flipped it when he got paid for by the the emperor. So a lot changed in this time and a lot of people became Christians at that time. So the same influence that ultimately changed uh the doctrine of God and we have very shortly the council of Nika and Constantinople.

Changing the doctrine of God is the same influence philosophy and politics that changed a doctrine of the end of the world and what we can expect and who the church is and how you get into the church and all of those kinds of things. All right, so let me this is the quickest you've ever gone through church history, but let's let's just take a next slide here. Um, here's the guy and people wonder why I'm so mad at Augustine. I I I really have Augustine. I've read his confessions and he brings some good stuff.

But, you know, if you cook a great pot of stew but threw poison in it, then it's not a great pot of stew anymore. So, there were some things in there that get codified in Augustine that become the doctrine of the church. He clearly celebrated philosophy. He mixed them readily. The short hand is he baptized Plato into the church because he took this Platonic thought and made it to what he called theology. And so when he got to the book of Revelation, uh he allegorized it.

So you get to Revelation chapter 20. Then he saw an angel coming down from heaven and the key to that bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. He laid hold the dragon, the serpent of oldness, the devil, and Satan and bound him a thousand years. But after that, he must be released for a little while. And I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was given to them. Uh, and uh, okay, so you got this picture of really of what martyrs and then you got a picture of a thousand-year period, which we call the millennium where Satan is bound.

And so they said, Augustine, what does this mean? He said, 'Well, I used to believe it was a future kingdom, but here's what I believe now. When it says the that Christ is ruling and reigning, verse four, I believe it's now. Roman Empire, he's ruling and reigning now. Well, well, wait a minute. Jesus Christ hasn't returned. What What are you talking about? Jesus Christ ruling and reigning now. And he said, well, this is the way he's doing it. He's ruling and reigning through the bishops of the church.

And that's how Satan's bound. Well, so then how do we understand truth? Whatever they say the Bible means, that's what it means. Now, this, my friend, launched what's called preodernism. It launched what I is also called, and it's not politically cleric to say this, the dark ages. But people don't read the Bible because you would be confused. Well, first of all, they can't read a lot of them. And then secondly, there's not that many Bibles around. And thirdly, it's written in Latin. And most of them, if they could read, have lost facility with Latin.

So, you can see how removed the biblical text gets from the historical church. So, the the tradition of the Antichrist was too strong. He couldn't get rid of it. That's the funny thing. So, he had a coming antichrist. Not a coming Jesus Christ, a coming antichrist. And then by this time, there's this doctrine of that was started back in the time of origin of what's called purgatory. It meant to be nice at first, like you know, let's say you since now because we're following platonic thought, it's work salvation.

You work your way into heaven. What if you don't quite make it? Well, they had a way to solve this where your sins could be purged. And the way that was is a place uh at first it was wherever you come to the sin, you come back as it goes. But then it developed into a place called purgatory. And so there you could get your sins uh purged. Um, these are not good ideas because they're not in the Bible. Okay? So, I'm not promoting any of this stuff, but I'm saying we traded what the Bible said for something else.

If you want the full story, you can get the book and you can read all the chapters. Um, I'm only going to go a couple more slides in this book in in this PowerPoint. So, click the next slide. I worked on this book for uh several years. So let me try to summarize this. Uh the question is how did everything change and and it changed progressively um through origin through Augustine and and as the middle ages progressed purgatory get get kept getting longer and longer. I mean started out pretty short and then it got longer and longer.

By the time we get to the Martin Luther, uh they were running a special on all Howls Lee Eve. Um and this was also a great building fundraiser. Um that if you contributed the right amount, you could get a million years knocked off of purgatory. But you see how much it had expanded a lot. Um I took about I don't know several years writing this book. U probably a year writ looking through uh the middle ages and for revival and somebody and who knew the truth and when did they know it and how did that work?

Problem is historioggraphy. A lot of the sources got squashed and gotten rid of. So, some we don't know. But here's what I discovered. That every time there was a revival and people were getting the Holy Ghost and there was miracles, it was based on somebody who challenged the way the church was teaching and saying, "I don't think that way. I think a way there's some way that God is giving hope." Now think about it for for the medieval church um what they had to look for was the antichrist.

So if you live you're fried and if they died they were going to purgatory most certainly. So if you die you're fried. Do you understand why it was the dark ages? No. It was the dark ages because it was a time of not much hope. But when there was hope, and I'm going to introduce a word to you. It had to do them with the millennium. You say, "What does this have to do with the millennium?" Well, they took it away. There's no future kingdom. In some way or another, all these people that were getting the Holy Ghost or having revival, whatever, had recaptured it in their own way of interpreting.

And sometimes they would add another millennium. And sometimes they would reconfigure it another way. Um, there came to be a time, and I'm not going to get to it tonight, when there was a post-millennial expectation that Jesus that after a thousand years, then Jesus Christ would come and then everything would get better. And then there was what's called a pre-millennial expectation. That's what we all believe here tonight. We believe that it's when Jesus comes and he redeems the world and and and all of the bad that's gotten rid of in the tribulation period that it ushers us into that thousand years of peace of Revelation 20.

And I'm going to spend more time actually on the the Bible. I'm trying to get you the the broad picture here before we uh dig into specific scriptures. So uh we are premillennialists. We believe that Jesus Christ will come before the millennium and that yes, there will be a terrible tribulation, but we will see the world changed again. So, catchy title, life, death, and the end of the world. I should have said life, death, and the beginning of the world because it's the beginning of a new age.

And that's uh and that's our hope. We have hope when we live. We also have hope uh when we die. And we have hope. Here's a big word in the escaton. At the end of it all, we're going to live forever and we're going to reign with Christ. And it's going to be a wonderful time. So, I need to introduce one more word to you. Click. Oh, before I do that, I have some bad news. All right. So what the church came to believe in the middle ages was that heaven is impossible, purgatory is certain and in the future you're going to fry.

Okay, go to the next uh slide. Uh the church was the actually Jesus Christ is ruling through the uh bishops and they will tell you what to believe. Don't read the Bible. That will confuse you and uh ultimately a loss of hope. Click. Okay, here's my word. This is your million-doll word for tonight. I've got a couple of them, but this is one of them. Millinarianism. Say it to your neighbor. Millinarianism. You say, "What in the world is millinarianism?" Millinarism is the thing scholars hate. I go to these academic uh theological conventions and they get they were millinarians.

Okay, here's what it means. It means that they believed they were living at the turn of the age and they believed that they could do stuff that would make a difference in eternity and in the world that they live. that they believed it wasn't just a theory, but they believed that they had a special purpose based on what they thought they were in the escaton and that God would use them to change the world. Sound familiar? It's kind of like us hopefully. Pentecostalism scholars will tell you this.

Pentecostalism came about because people believed that Jesus was coming and that because he was coming, he would do miracles and wonders and signs before he came and that he would restore the church of Acts from the early reign to the latter reign and that we could see miracles. That's why Pentecostalism started. Amen. um in uh 1900 there. And this is um I I feel myself going rabbit trails. I didn't mean to, but I'll since I'm already on the trail, I must finish the thought. So 1900 there is 16.7% of the world uh of Christian Christians outside of North America and Europe 16.7 2025 70% of the world's uh Christians live in India.

Asia and Africa. The Christianity that is growing in the global south and in these areas is over 80% Pentecostal. Do you understand what I'm saying? People say, "How do we know the world? Why do you think Jesus is coming now? I mean, he going to have come." Well, there we'll get to some things. Israel, that's miraculous. That story in and of itself. Uh, read Revelation 13, the mark of the beast. How could you be kept from buying or selling? Well, go to China. and they have a social score and they can't buy or sell uh unless they tow the line.

This is the world has is ready for this. And then what about the latter rain? You say, "Well, they're not all that good of Pentecostals. Some of them are really just just in name only or they're not living the life or they're not yet baptized in Jesus' name or they don't know about the God." Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Does God seem to be doing something? Does God seem to be drawing people toward all truth? Does God seem to be working? And in fact, could it be that this generation will be the generation that sees that final revival of the name and sees the miraculous in ways we haven't yet seen it and sees the world converted?

I would say that's quite possible. And if you believe that and you apply it personally to you, then you, my friend, are a millennium. Turn to someone and say, "I am a millennian." Uh, I would take not everything that's all right. It's 809 already. All right. Not everything that's said about Francis of Aisi is true, but he did have the Holy Ghost and he did have miracles. Yo, King of Fior, same deal. Uh, I could give turn you to a bunch of other medieval people and uh, uh, every one of them saw this end time clearly and put themselves into that picture.

All right. Now, people ask me, and I've been asked more than once tonight, and I will get to this. I'm not sure if I'll get it tonight, but probably will. Maybe I won't. Do you believe in a preerttrib, mid-trip, or post-trip? What kind of trip are you? Again, I I feel very strongly about my position, and I will I will will happily teach on that. That's the point. But um here's my question to you. Does what you believe about prophecy make a difference in how you live?

And if it doesn't, can I be so bold to say and don't get mad at me? It then doesn't matter then. Hallelujah. All right. So, I got another thing I'm going to compare now. This I'm I'm moving to that other one side. The other one the other PowerPoint that says um you're a Babylonian if All right. So, this is this one's a little this one's a little uh on the edge. And if you don't like it, I will never I probably won't use it again. I just happened today.

I was on the treadmill and I it came to me and I thought this this will be my way to make application. So, this is it. So, let me let me let me go uh work on this a little bit. In the book of Revelation, uh Rome equals Babylon. And uh it's not just Rome. It's the whole uh earthly system and there's attached to it there's a and I don't want to there's a harlot and the harlot is a number of things but among them false religion and the the uh their team together false religion and uh politics but there's another aspect and it's in in in um uh six different major times in the book of revelation I won't have time to take you there.

It says uh speaking about the world system as Babylon. And in some cases, it's one emphasis or another. So, I'm just going to land on the emphasis in in uh in Revelation 18. So, Revelation 18:1, you can follow along and maybe you can even throw it up there on the screen. Uh that might be good, too. Um, Revelation 18:1, "After these things, I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was illuminated glory. And he cried mighty with a long loud voice, saying, uh, Babylon uh, the great is fallen and has fallen.

It's become a dwelling place from demons, a prison for every false spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird. For all the nations have committed fornication of the earth, and the kings of the earth, all all the nations um have drunk of the wine of fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury. Um here in this chapter, it's talking about money. Uh Jesus said you can't serve God in mammon.

All right, I guess I need to back up to last week. Anything I say is not about you missing the rapture. Okay, I'm talking about tendencies. Tendencies I have because I live in a rich country. ten tendencies thinking that it's easy to um absorb the cultural uh angst and uh all the weirdness of the riches in which we live. I heard a voice from saying heaven saying come out of her my people lest you share in her sins and lest you receive of her plagues. That's verse four.

And in the end of the chapter Babylon does fall. it's crashed and the they're weeping and crying because the economy has is crushed and so on and so forth. So I I'm not sure I'm going to be living during that time frankly as you'll hear my teaching. I don't think I will. But I do think that the spirit of Babylon, it's in uh Peter uses Babylon for Rome and it it it's present throughout the entire time because Jesus spoke a lot about money and what we should think about money in the monetary system.

So all right, so I'll just do this. You may Okay, I was thinking of the redneck jokes. You know, that's what I was thinking of. You may be a redneck if that. Okay, I just have to admit that. All right, that's what I was thinking of. So that's where this came from. You might be a Babylonian if All right, go to the first one. You believe the commercials. I'm going to say that again. I don't know why it's not saying that, but that's what I put up there.

You might be a Babylonian if you believe the commercials. Did you know that every commercial is designed to make you unhappy? That you only can get your needs met if you buy this product or do this thing or do this other thing. And they work. They're, you know, you you've got these entire scenes of this and that and only in last slide does it say and this is the product. You don't even know. They're selling you a story that's not even the product and they've kind of done a bait and switch on you.

Um Jesus said that life does not consist in abundance things that we possess. And sometimes I believe that Even though the culture every day says that's not true. Click to the next slide. See if that appears. Okay. You might be a Babylonian if you believe the news. Can I just tell you if you watch the news right before you go to bed, that's the stupidest thing to do in the world. And you have competing stories and stations. You watch this over here and everybody on this other side is just a terrible person.

And you watch this and and they're not meant to calm you. They're meant to get you mad. By the way, the same thing is true in all of social media. Okay? Now, I'm not Amish and I'm not saying you should never use social media, but I'm telling you, um, Babylon is streaming at us. And, uh, you may like one political character or another, um, but whoever you vote in is not going to fix the woes of this world. And everybody, democracy doesn't work unless people are Christians.

And I don't know if you know this, but most people that have been leading us haven't been Christians for a very long time. Okay? So my trust I mean I think you should vote. I think you should try to make a difference. But our trust is not in the political system. Our trust is in Jesus Christ. Amen. All right. All right. Now, you might say this next one, I've gone I've left preaching and gone to meddling, but I'll let's do the next one. You might be a Babylonian if you believe you're unable to give.

Some of the richest people uh don't believe they can afford to give anything to anyone. I'll go further as long as I'm stepping on toes. I might just step on them all. Um, Garden of Eden says, "God will provide. You work. It's great. Wonderful. God will provide." Tree of Life in Revelation, God will provide. Provide everything you need. And in between, we're supposed to look at those ideals and say, "Will God provide?" And the answer is yes. And so, uh, a tenth of what you have is not really yours.

That's that's God's. Actually, it's all God's. But in order to remember that, we give a tenth and then we give offerings beside that. And we do that because we are saying we trust in the Lord. Now, if you withhold that, you say, "I don't have I can't afford it." Um, and I just can't do it. It's not that you're hurting God. You're um, you just got sucked into Babylon. You got sucked into the thinking of the world. Now, could God forgive and will will carnal people or people that are struggling go to heaven?

I'm I'm I'm not here to say God's going to keep you out of the rap. That's not that's not that at all. I'm here to tell you how to live a life that's gotten rid of Babylon. One more and I'll be done with these Babylonians. You may be a Babylonian if you believe getting ahead requires giving up the most important things in life. Why are you working so many hours? Well, I'm in debt. How'd you get in debt? Well, I bought stuff. Well, why did you buy it?

Because I had to. Because you know, you got to have a car that works and you got to do this that works. Okay. And what I'm saying next is not to be condemning. And I look in the mirror and some of the things I'm saying I struggle with totally myself. So I'm not saying you people. I'm saying we people. Uh I got a Facebook post. Uh there was a big uh was it a typhoon or windstorm or something? Madagascar. who blasted through the complex and they asked for prayer there.

They have this incredible revival in different places, one of which is Madagascar. Uh hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people come to the great revival center. Do you know what the By the way, people from Madagascar tithe? Do you know what the ina annual income of people in Madagascar is? Well, I will tell you it's $450. That's it. Annual income. I looked it up today. Do you know how much we the median amount for for feeding your dog any areas? Again, this includes some people spend thousands and thousands on extra medians.

So, um, we're taking an average here, $450. I don't want to condemn you for living in America. I live here, too. I don't want to condemn you for having nice things. I have nice things. I don't want to condemn you for having a recent model car. I have a recent model car. So, this is not No, this is not about condemnation. This is about um living with heaven in view and thinking what could I do for the kingdom of God if I really believe that Jesus was coming and my actions that I said and did could make a difference in someone being ready for the coming of the Lord.

All right. So, I'm going to turn it around here. You might be a millennarian. Let's make it positive. Oh, 8:23. I'm I'm going to I'm I'm closing down here. I'm not going to get to re not going to get to Revelation. I have a SL whole slide. I'm going to believe in Revelation. That's going to be next week. And maybe you'll come next week when Okay. So you might be a millinarian if uh you the peace of God that passes all understanding will guard you say well I don't have enough for the bills the peace of God passes all understanding will guard your heart which if you think whatever is true and just lovely good report there's any virtue, if there's any praise, think they got these things.

Um, the poor in America are the wealthy. Uh, nobody truly has to go without food in America. You say, "Well, we got homeless." Well, there's always a story there. Could be drugs or whatever. Um, but we are a gracious country. We help people. The church helped people. Um, we're so blessed. And I'm not I'm not trying to be insensitive to your circumstance. You may have a very difficult thing going on. It could be family issues. It could be um things that you beyond your control. But I'm just telling what the word says that if you're living with heaven in view, you're invited tonight to live in peace.

Give me another one. You might be a millinarian if your calendar and checkbook say so. Give me another one. You might be a millinarian if you pray for big things. If I had time, I could go through this audience and say, "Tell me a time God answered prayer. Tell me about a big prayer you prayed for. Tell me about things that was impossible that God did." And you would be amazed at all the miracles sitting here and you know it yourself. But sometimes Babylon, the spirit of Babylon washes over us and we get anxious.

Be anxious for nothing but everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving. Let your requests be your name. I don't know the answer, Lord, but I bring it to you and I praise you that you're going to help me. And Lord, there's this relative that nobody can reach in Jesus name. I claim your salvation. May perhaps next week I'm going talk about every prayer in heaven is recorded and every prayer is answered one way or another. Your prayers are never never never ever ever wasted. Pray for big things.

And lastly, or was that lastly? Did I have another slide? Ah, you might be a millinarian if you decide that when you speak, you're going to speak with heaven in view. And when you come across somebody who's struggling, you say, "Lord, bless him. Lord, help them." Say it under your breath. You don't have to lay hands on everybody. Uh, and you say, "Lord, I pray for this circumstance today. I'm going to live in your presence." You can you can live in his presence. You got the Holy Ghost.

He's with you always. You can live with values that nobody understands. You can have a smile on your face when other people aren't smiling. You can live in peace. God wants that for you. Would you bow our heads? Lord God, I call down blessing in the name of Jesus Christ. These are your people. These are your precious people. These are people that you care for and have brought to you and have given gifts and you have whispered callings. You have whispered callings into their hearts and lives and sometimes we've taken those and put them on the shelf and real thinking does not matter or if life brought it whatever.

But we're praying tonight in the name of Jesus that you would bring back the dreams and bring back the insight and bring back the calling and make it alive today. Help us to live with you in view. Help us, Lord God, to do your work and your will. Help us to be the church. Lord, I I thank you, God, that you're going to do that. And I pray in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. So, next week we're going to go over the entire book of Revelation. Well, at least we'll go over the outline.

I'll tell you what I think about that. And then I'm not sure if we'll get time to it for next week, but I do want to tell you what happens when people die because there's a lot of confusion about that. So, we will work on that as well. And I appreciate your attention. And uh you can say thumbs up or thumbs down on this Babylonian PowerPoint.