In this intriguing episode of Through the Bible’s Sunday Sermon with Dr. J. Vernon McGee, we delve into the book of Zechariah to uncover prophetic insights and connections to the modern world. We explore the intriguing possibility of Babylon’s reconstruction and how it ties into today’s global pursuits such as space exploration. Just as the Tower of Babel once symbolized humanity’s defiance of God, today’s quests can mirror those ancient desires for self-promotion and independence from divine influence. Join us as we journey through these deep theological concepts, reflecting on their implications for our world today.
What do space exploration and the Tower of Babel have in common? Well, you might be surprised by the answer. Welcome to Through the Bible’s Sunday Sermon with Dr. J. Vernon McGee. We’re in the Old Testament book of Zechariah for a fascinating message titled, Will Babylon Be Rebuilt? I’m Steve Schwetz, and before we open God’s Word together, Greg and I want to share a few incredible letters from our fellow listeners, this time in the country of Madagascar.
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s right. And that’s not just an animated movie. It’s a real place on planet Earth. And it’s a large island off the southeastern part of Africa. And I just want to tell a real quick story that’s old, but it’s very powerful. One of our partners was traveling to Madagascar years ago. Hmm. And one of the reasons we travel is for accountability and stewardship. And he asked, he said, you’re not sending the reports, the monthly reports. And they said, well, we’ve been so busy starting the 16 churches that TTV started, we haven’t had time. And then he said, why didn’t you tell us? And he said, you never asked about that on the report. So we try to be careful in finding out information. But we have some great letters that illustrate the power of this ministry to Madagascar.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, this first one is from a listener who’s experienced some real hardship, and she writes this. Wow. That is powerful. Wow. not far from us. He does not give help to my children, almost nothing, no visits, no greetings to his children. Most of my family has given me advice on what to do, but I say I will follow what the Lord Jesus tells me to do. Please pray for us that we may have a life rich in his love and mercy.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, this highlights something we pointed out many times, Steve, which is that people are people all around the world. They really have the same basic kinds of problems. And this story could have come from Wichita or Los Angeles or New York. And God’s word is always there to help comfort people that are suffering.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 04 :
So now here’s a note that I know many of us can relate to. I have a son who’s not interested in his spiritual life. He does things contrary to the Christian life. When your program is on, I pray and ask him just to listen with me. He agreed, maybe to be polite to me, but God is working in him. And right after listening, he asked me, when can we listen to the next program? Please pray that he will offer his heart to Jesus. Wow.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, that is such an encouragement. If anybody’s got a son or daughter who’s not walking with the Lord, I know that your heart may be skipped a beat thinking that there’s an opportunity here and that God would be faithful with yours as well. Another listener tells us this, the practice of exhumation has an essential place in Malagasy custom. I did not know that, and that’s quite strange. Yeah, nor did I. So I’m interested. Okay. We believe that the ancestors are the mediator between the creator and living family members, so we often pray to the ancestors. I guess you got to dig them up to pray to them. Apparently. Strange. After listening to your sermons in Ecclesiastes 9, verses 4 to 6, I had my family listen, and we are going to change our practices. I ask you to pray that we have the courage to please God and leave behind our old ways. Now, I kind of made a joke about that.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 05 :
But that just shows you how wicked and evil sin can be and how the great deceiver can deceive people into thinking that’s a way you should be doing stuff. And the Bible straightens that out.
SPEAKER 04 :
And it’s amazing how often around the world, particularly in other parts of the world that are not maybe as developed. I mean, we have our own sins in the developed world. Plenty, plenty of them. But the darkness and the idolatry and the ritualism that is a cult, basically, to see God’s word deliver people out of that is amazing.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 04 :
I think we have time for one more. I was discouraged as I don’t have enough energy to face the problems in my life. A coworker told me about your program, and I started to listen. The first program was on John 8, 36, which says, Therefore, if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed. I see changes in my life, and I now want to become a Christian. Can you guide me?
SPEAKER 05 :
Such an encouraging letter. Let me pray for us, Greg, as we begin. Heavenly Father, we pray that you would make many people free through your Son, Jesus Christ, that they would come to an understanding of what it is to be saved, and they would put their faith in Christ alone. May you be glorified in that, Lord, and may you be glorified in the lives of those that are strengthened and sanctified as a result of listening to the teaching of your Word. May it be blessed as it goes out now. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen. Now here’s the Sunday Sermon on Through the Bible with Dr. J. Vernon McGee.
SPEAKER 01 :
We’re turning to the little prophecy of Zechariah, the fifth chapter, and I begin reading at verse 5. Then the angel that talked with me went forth and said unto me, Lift up now thine eyes and see what is this that goeth forth. And I said, What is it? And he said, This is an ephah that goeth forth. He said, Moreover, this is their resemblance through all the earth. And behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead, and this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah. And he said, This is wickedness. And he cast it into the midst of the ephah, and he cast the weight of the lead upon the mouth thereof. Then lifted I up mine eyes, and looked, And behold, there came out two women, and the wind was in their wings, for they had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the ephah between the earth and the heaven. Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah? And he said unto me, To build it an house in the land of Shinar. and it shall be established and set there upon their own base. Now our subject this evening is, The first astronaut was a woman, or will Babylon be rebuilt? It was indeed a stroke of irony that John Glenn, the first American astronaut to circle the globe in a space capsule without even getting a scratch on him, should fall in the bathroom and suffer a concussion. I think it confirms the old adage that more accidents occur in the home than any other place and more people have been killed in accidents in the home than any other place. I think they coined that adage though before they built the freeways in Southern California. They say, though, that that is still true, more accidents in the home and particularly in the bathroom. The moral to the story is don’t go home tonight, and if you do, stay out of the bathroom. That certainly would be the inference to draw. Now, Russia, however, was the first to put a man in space if we’re to believe the Russians, and we have no reason to discount their story tonight. What is the meaning today of this overweening desire to travel in space? What is the significance of trying to get to the moon? What actually is back of the thinking of man in all walks of life in making this supreme effort today? Let me say to you that I think it’s the reenactment again of the Tower of Babel. This time the modern Tower of Babel is being built a little higher. Instead of getting up out of the water, they’re putting it beyond even the air spaces today and want to build the Tower of Babel as high as the moon itself. And all of this is an effort on the part of man to try to divorce himself from God. no dependence today upon deity whatsoever. It’s his effort to live and maintain an existence without any supernatural help whatsoever. I believe that we are today reliving the Tower of Babel experience of mankind in saying, let us Build us a tower and let us make us a name for ourselves. And the best explanation that’s being offered for this country today to spend billions in this effort is simply this, for the prestige of the country. That, my friend, is another way of saying let us make us a name for ourselves lest we perish from the face of the earth. The same old saws, the same old statements are being made, if you please. Now, will you notice something that I think is quite significant? Neither Russia nor the United States can make the first claim to putting a man in space. Actually, God did it before the flood. Enoch was put into space. Enoch was translated so that he should not see death. Because before that, he had a witness from God that he pleased God. And then God took him. God removed him from the earth. He went into space. After the flood, we have the story of Elijah, who was taken in a chariot of fire into the heavens. But neither one of these men returned. At least they have not returned so far. We had quite a discussion on the radio back in Peoria. Several of us, at least Dr. Philip Newell and myself, had the Hours program every afternoon. I took the first 30 minutes talking on the Olivet Discourse, and then people would call in questions. And one of the questions concerned who the two witnesses would be. And I found I’d agreed with Brother Philip Newell on practically everything except the two witnesses. And we finally decided that there were three sides to that question anyway. His side, my side, and then the right side. We’ll know someday who the two witnesses will be. I personally take the position that you cannot know who they’ll be. And so it may be that Enoch and Elijah will return someday. I do not know. But the first astronaut to go into space and return was a woman. And Zechariah saw such a one in a vision. And we have read that particular portion this evening. Frankly, I think it’s a very awesome spectacle. It’s sensationally frightful to see what takes place. Now, we are going to see that Zechariah was a dreamer. He was one who wrote an apocalypse. Actually, the book of Daniel, the book of Ezekiel, the book of Zechariah, and the book of Revelation are all apocalypses. But Zechariah is the only one who wrote in the land. And his apocalypse… is more in the realm of visions than any of the others, much more so than the book of Revelation. He was a dreamer. He was a man with his head in the clouds. As we said this morning, Haggai was the practical man and he had his feet on the ground. And candidly, you need both of those men. It’s well to have a very practical man about to put a foundation under the castles that the dreamer is going to build. Because if he doesn’t put a good solid foundation under those castles they will never materialize and they’ll never come into existence. In other words, It’s well to have a man like that. As someone has said, to have horse sense means to have a very stable mind. And Haggai was a man who had horse sense, and that gave him a very stable mind, if you please. And so this man God used, and he used him to take a measure in line. And he put it right down and said, the temple’s going to be this long, and it’s going to be this wide, and it’s going to be this high. But when you read Zechariah, there’s no measurements given at all. This man is definitely up in the clouds, but he is the man that’s going to give the people a vision, and he’s going to be helpful at those moments of discouragement. And so we need this man, and we need his dreams, we need his visions, for they have a message for us today as they did for the people in that day and will have for the future. Zechariah stood, tiptoeing. He peered over the gates of heaven. He saw strange and mysterious things. He lifted the people from the drab and the monotonous existence there among the ruins and debris of the city of Jerusalem. And his vision here is one that is awe-inspiring. And in some respect, it’s rather simple. I want you to notice it, though, and we’re going to look at it rather briefly this evening. Then the angel that talked with me went forth and said unto me, Lift up now thine eyes and see what is this that goeth forth. And the angel is doing this with the utmost politeness. Our translation doesn’t quite bring out the thought here. The French have the expression, s’il vous plaît, if you please. And actually, that’s what he’s saying to Zechariah. Lift up now thine eyes, if you please. He’s urging him to do this in a most polite way and see what it is that goeth forth. And I said, What is it? And he said, this is an ephah that goeth forth. He said, moreover, this is their resemblance through all the earth. Now we have brought before us a bushel basket. An ephah was a measurement used by the Hebrews of just a little bit more than a bushel. It is the space capsule, if you please. It’s something that is quite symbolic. You asked me this evening what it suggests. I would say that it suggests this as we move on into it. It suggests commerce. You see, the children of Israel had learned something down in Babylon actually that they did not know before. We like to think of the Jew today being the shopkeeper. May I say to you, the Gentile taught him that in Babylon. When the Jew left Palestine, he was an agriculturist. He was a farmer. And isn’t it interesting, have you noticed today when they returned back to that land, especially immediately around 1949 when it became a nation. They began to pour out of Europe into that land. We saw in the pictures, and I ran many of them here in those days, you will recall that we’d see doctors and lawyers and men that had been professional men. They went back to that land and immediately started tilling the soil. When they go back to that land, they return back to the soil. The minute they leave that land, they go into business. Now, down in Babylon, they became shopkeepers. And now when they come back to the land, they have an overweening desire to continue that sort of thing. And you will find in the book of Nehemiah, for it’s contemporary with Zechariah, that Nehemiah rebuked them for their commercial spirit, even for charging usury of their brethren. And so this is that which symbolizes commerce. And we’re going to see that this ephah will be removed and taken down to Babylon where it came from. The commercialism will go back there, and I’ll move ahead and just say this. that Babylon is to be rebuilt, it will become the greatest commercial center the world has ever seen. It was that in the past. It will be that in the future, putting London or Berlin or Rome or New York City, or Los Angeles, or any other great commercial center, Singapore, or any of these other places, putting them into second place. For Babylon will become a great commercial center. And that is fundamentally the meaning back of the ephah here, as we shall see it transferred back to Babylon, if you please. Now, that is the first part of this. It is made of lead, which interests me a great deal. That is, the cover of it is. That seems the most unlikely metal to take out into space. But have you ever noticed it does withstand friction? If you’ve ever… Notice around machinery. They have babbit that they put in the boxes where the shaft turns, and that is of lead, of course. It stands less friction. It’s quite interesting just to note that. I think the important part of the fact that it is lead, it is a weight that denotes again with the ephah, denotes measurement, denotes business, denotes this commercialism that leaves God out of the picture altogether. Now that is the first part of the vision that we have before us is the space capsule. Now we come to the second part here, and we’re introduced to something else. Behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead, and this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah. Now we find there is a woman in the space capsule, and the Hebrews suggest that she’s sitting there in comfort, which altogether suggests that she’s enjoying all of this commercialism. And I’m sure that many of you who are Bible students are already suspecting the correspondence to the 17th and 18th chapters of Revelation where you see both commercial and religious Babylon appear again. and one identified as a woman, if you please. So that this makes this indeed very significant here to see that this woman is in this space capsule and I identify her tonight as being the first astronaut. Now, as one commentator said, it would take a pretty small woman, however, to set in a bushel basket. But I think you could get a lot of the girls in a basket, about a little over a bushel. Some of them, I think, you’d have a little problem. But I’m of the opinion that there are those small enough that could get into this measurement. And of course, evidently, this is a small one here. I recognize that difficulty, of course. Now will you notice, he says, and he said, this is wickedness. And I’d like to change that just a little because it’s masculine and it should be, instead of abstract, it should be translated, this is the wicked one. and he cast it into the midst of the ephah, and he cast the weight of the lead upon the mouth thereof. She’s ready now for space flight. They lock her in, you see. The top is put on, and she’s ready to take off from the launching pad. Now, let’s look for just a moment here. This woman in the space capsule, and we’re told this is the woman wicked one. And that is, I think, the point of identification. If you will notice over in 2 Thessalonians, the second chapter, verse 8, we’re told this. I’ll begin reading at verse 7. For the mystery of iniquity doth already work. Only he who now letteth or hindereth will hinder until he be taken out of the way. And then shall the wicked one be revealed. Apocalypse, the apocalypse if you please. The wicked one shall be revealed whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming. Now we have before us here, this one is the wicked one. And I think that the minute we find this woman in this particular position here, that we can become suspect. Because when you find a woman out of her place in Scripture, you generally find, especially religiously, you’ll find that that represents evil. in the parable, for instance, that our Lord gave. He made that very clear. The kingdom of heaven is like leaven which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till the whole was leavened. That, again, is a picture of a woman in the place of doctrine. And she’s putting leaven, that which is evil, into the meal, that which represents the word of God, contaminating it, if you please. That is the thing that has happened and has happened in the history of the church. The woman is identified in the 17th chapter of Revelation as Babylon. But also she is known as the harlot, if you please. Another woman out of place and representing doctrine, false teaching. And it is the Lord himself, you remember, that said to the church, the Thyatira, that you suffer that woman Jezebel to teach. And Jezebel stands in Scripture as the very worst woman. I do not think that you could have one any worse than she is. And the apostate church, and that church which will not be taken out of the world, for it is not the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, but it’s a system, an organization, And I do not mean to just identify it with Rome, but to identify it with liberal Protestantism and any group that deny the deity of Christ and deny his sacrificial death as being adequate and sufficient for our sins and that he died a substitutionary death upon the cross. So that apostate church is called a harlot, a woman out of place, if you please, that enters the great tribulation period. The founder today of the cults and isms in America have either been women or women have been connected with the system in one way or another. I have an entire list up in my study. I actually intended to bring it down here tonight. I can give you a dozen of them. Let me just mention offhand the one I think that we’re most familiar with, and I’m saying this in, I hope, a nice way tonight, but it’s Mary Baker Patterson Fry Glover Eddy, and she’s the one that founded Christian Science. Now that woman, you will recall, she taught you not to get married. Well, if there’s anybody who was an authority on that, she certainly was. And that was one of the cults. Then you have the cult of the Theosophy, started by Madame Bizant and Madame Blavatsky. Then you have this thing that’s religious science out here, or science of mine, or science of something or other. And it started by the Fox sisters back in Kansas City. Their husbands were sort of near-do-wells, didn’t do well, and these girls were quite enterprising girls. They found out you could tie a black cord to your big toe and tie it to something and wiggle it and make people actually believe that the spirits were there. And they did a pretty good job, by the way, of fooling the public. It’s amazing how people are taken in on the subject of religion, especially if there’s something supernatural appears around it. Then you find that the women right now are leading in the tongues movement again. They’ve always done that. They’re leading again in it. You let a woman step out of place doctrinally and you’ve got a cult and an ism on your hands immediately. Now I’m not saying that tonight in an unlovely manner. What I’m saying is merely a statement of fact and history substantiates what I’m saying right now. These just happen to be the facts. Now you can move back 1900 years and see why the Word of God is so emphatic. And even going to Zechariah, Zechariah saw this woman in this ephah going through space, if you please, being transferred from the land of Palestine back to Babylon. We haven’t quite got to that yet. Now, the thing that makes this significant is the fact that it represents evil. Now, don’t misunderstand me tonight, and I don’t want to be misunderstood. I believe that we today in fundamental circles have not given women their rightful place. I say this again. I think that there’s an office known as deaconess that the church of the open door does not recognize, nor do any of our fundamental churches today. I think it’s a scriptural office. I think that if the church had given women their proper place in the church, that we would not have them springing up as they are today or have in the past and a few out of place doctrinally, if you please. I believe that. You go into the Word of God and you’ll find that God has given them a rightful place in His service. I think of the epistle to Philippians. The church in Philippi gave women a very prominent place. When Paul wrote to the church in Philippi, he says, “‘Help those women that labored with me in the gospel.'” And when we take the position today as fundamentalists, when it says, let a woman keep silent in the church, and believe me how we fundamentalists have pushed that verse, that has no reference to a woman standing here in this pulpit and speaking at all. It has reference to only one thing, and that’s speaking in tongues. God says, let her keep silent in the church when it comes to speaking in tongues. But He did not forbid a woman to speak in the church. We’ve made a big mistake in trying to say that women are not to speak. And I believe that over America today that God has raised up, and I’m finding this everywhere, Bible classes taught by women in certain areas where there’s no witness. And God’s using that class. I went to, outside of Peoria, to a place called Pekin, and I spoke to over a hundred women, taught by one of the loveliest Christian women I think I’ve ever met, Mrs. Thompson. Some of you folk from back there know her. Mrs. Thompson has a class there, and then in Peoria itself. And in Pekin, there’s no longer a witness. The best church there went into liberalism not long ago. God’s raised up this class, taught by this very lovely woman who makes no pretense of being a preacher or attempting to push out at all, but just teaching these women that come, over a hundred of them. And believe me, they’re well-taught in the Word of God. maintaining a witness. Now, God’s using that. And if you think tonight that this preacher is criticizing women having that kind of service, you are wrong, because I believe God is raising them up in this day. Up in the Bay Area is one of the finest, loveliest women teaching a Bible class over that section. She’s been a real stalwart. of the faith today. And any place I go, I always find that there’s a Bible class being taught by some lovely lady that God has raised up and given her a special gift to teach. So God is using them. But what I’m talking about tonight is this thing that we have here, this woman moving into a place in a wrong way, religiously, if you please, so that now what we have is an ephah representing commercialism, woman representing false religion, if you please. And notice now what happens, and I must be brief. I’m sure I’ve already alienated all the ladies in the congregation. I can see now what I can do with the man. Now will you notice the movement that we have here? Then lifted I up mine eyes, and looked, and behold, there came out two women. There are two stages to the rocket that puts us into orbit. Two women, if you please, here. And the wind was in their wings, for they had wings like the wings of a star. And they lifted up the ephah between the earth and the heaven. Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah? And he said unto me, To build it an house in the land of Shinar, and it shall be established and set there upon her own base. Now that’s the movement. Back, if you please, to Babylon. You see, these people have just recently returned from Babylon. They were very commercial in Babylon. Now God says, let commercialism go back to Babylon and also let false religion go back to Babylon. I believe that Satan’s headquarters will move back to Babylon. I think it was there at the beginning. Babylon was the mother of idolatry. That’s where all idolatry began in the area of Babylon. Goes back to the time of Nimrod, the one who founded the city of Babel. And from that came all of the pagan religions, if you please. You can trace them all back there, as well as the modern cults today. So that we have now religion moving back to Babylon. We find now commercialism, which means that Babylon is to be rebuilt. Now, very briefly, will you note something I think very important? In my book, in Isaiah, I take the position that Babylon is to be rebuilt. And I’m delighted to find today that Many men are taking that position. I believe that Babylon will again become the center of this earth. And I think all the movement today is toward the near and the Middle East and will continue to be that way until we come to the very end time. Will you notice in the 13th chapter of Isaiah, verse 19, And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldees’ excellency, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. Now, I believe that’s been fulfilled. It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation, neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there, neither shall the shepherds make their fold there. Now, that has been literally fulfilled. Babylon has been destroyed and Jeremiah said it would be a rubble. It’s been a rubble down through these centuries, never rebuilt. And he goes on to say this, “‘But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there, and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures, and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there, and the wild beasts of the island shall cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces, and her time is near to come, and her days shall not be prolonged.'” “‘Satyrs’ means demons.” And I wish tonight we had time to spend time on that, of what is believed concerning those ruins of Babylon today, especially by the natives in that particular area. Now, Babylon could not be rebuilt, as Isaiah says, on its old foundation. It’s already seven to nine miles from the Euphrates River. In the years, it’s moved away from it. It’ll be built on another foundation, if you please. Now, Jeremiah makes it very clear that Babylon is to be rebuilt, and what he has to say concerning it has never yet been fulfilled. I turn to the 50th chapter of Jeremiah, and will you listen very carefully? For out of the north there cometh up a nation against her, which shall make her land desolate. None shall dwell therein. They shall remove, they shall depart, both man and beast. And then dropping down to verse 29, will you note this? Call together the archers against Babylon, all ye that bend the bow camp against it round about. Let none thereof escape. Recompense her according to her work. according to all that she hath done. Do unto her, for she hath been proud against the Lord, against the Holy One of Israel. Now dropping on over to the 51st chapter, this has never been fulfilled. Listen to this. For Israel hath not been forsaken, nor Judah of his God, of the Lord of hosts, though their land was filled with sin against the Holy One of Israel. Flee out of the midst of Babylon and deliver every man his soul. Be not cut off in her iniquity, for this is the time of the Lord’s vengeance. He will render unto her a recompense. Babylon hath been a golden cup in the Lord’s hand that made all the earth drunken. The nations have drunken of her wine, therefore the nations are mad. Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed. Howl for her, take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed. We would have healed Babylon, but she’s not healed. Forsake her, and let us go every one into his own country, for her judgment reacheth unto heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.” Now that has never been fulfilled because Babylon actually went down gradually until it was deteriorated. This is yet to be fulfilled, and it means therefore that this great city is to be rebuilt on the Euphrates River in the future. And let me now in closing give you my picture or my conception of the prophetic picture and the movement for the future. It’ll take place during the Great Tribulation period. Antichrist arises in the West in the domain of the Roman Empire. And he takes three kingdoms, and when he takes three kingdoms, by sheer force, he’s able to take the other seven. That means the ten kings that constitute the Roman Empire, he puts it back together again, performing a miracle. In the meantime, Russia goes down because they’ve come down into that land, and God has destroyed them as he did Sodom and Gomorrah. Now that leaves Antichrist as the world dictator. He moves east. He had made a covenant with the nation Israel, and he now breaks that covenant with the nation Israel and puts his own image yonder in the great tribulation temple that will be rebuilt. But he doesn’t stay in Jerusalem. He continues to move east. Why? because it is his belief, as it has been all the great rulers of the world, that the proper place to rule the world is on the Euphrates River, the cradle of the human family. It was Alexander the Great, if he had not died at the age of 33 a drunkard, he was moving his capital to the city of Persepolis. It was Caesar, Julius Caesar. And if you think he was after Cleopatra, you haven’t read history. You’ve been looking at the wrong things, my friend. He was not after her. He was trying to move his capital to the Euphrates River. Napoleon said it was his desire to move the capital to the Euphrates Valley. All wanted to make Babylon the headquarters. The great movement today is in the Near and Middle East, and it’s stirring again. The cradle of the human family. is the Garden of Eden. They began there and mankind began his rebellion there and he’ll end his rebellion there. And I believe that that’s where the Lord Jesus comes in judgment. And I think it’s what Isaiah means when he says, who is this that comes out of Basra with dyed garments? He won’t even have touched the earth then because he does not touch the earth till he comes to the Mount of Olives. But why has his garments died? He has put down Antichrist, who has moved now and moved the capital of the world to the Tigris-Euphrates Valley. Man is not only trying to build the Tower of Babel, but he’s trying to build the Garden of Eden without God today. And again I say, I don’t like our president. to act like he’s a messiah, that he’s going to bring peace in the world, and that he’s going to solve the question of poverty. I don’t care whether he’s Democrat or Republican, man can’t settle the problems of this world as long as there’s sin in this world today, and there are too many things out of place. Israel has to be back in that land. Christ is at God’s right hand. He must be on this earth. The church is on this earth. It must be with him in heaven in the new Jerusalem. And Satan is going about seeking whom he may devour. He must be in the bottomless pit. And until that takes place, there cannot nor will there be peace on this earth. But in that land today, it’s stirring. The sheikh of Kuwait, a little bitty kingdom there, gets $1 million a day royalty from oil. He’s putting up fabulous buildings, all sorts of improvements. And that’ll continue because the greatest oil deposits in the world are today in the Near East and the wealth will pour where all that oil is, you may be sure. You and I will never see the woman astronaut. I’m not looking for her. But she will remove commercial. It’ll become the commercial center. It’ll become the religious center. It’ll become the political center of the world. You say, is that any particular value for us? Well, we are seeing today the resurgence of evil. Horatius Bonar said in the last days that evil at its sometimes sleep would in the last day with new energy would come forth, and it’s moving forward today with renewed energy. Because of iniquity, the love of many are waxing cold. All around you see Christians today are losing their zeal, and many of them are losing their testimony. What about you tonight? In the midst of this falling away and the midst of iniquity today, what about your zeal for the Lord? You love him tonight? Are you serving him in the midst of a day when there is this falling away? And then, my friend, are you here tonight blinded to the claims of Christ upon you? We are living in a day when men are looking up into space. But I want to say to you, if you will look up, you will see someone that has been lifted up. He said, if I be lifted up, I’ll draw all men unto me. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. My friend, he wasn’t lifted up in space. He was lifted up on a cross, and he died there for you and me. And it’s not tonight whether you’re going to get to the moon. The question is, are you going to get to heaven tonight? The question is not tonight how far out in space can you go, but what right have you to come into the presence of a holy God tonight? Well, the Lord Jesus Christ who was lifted up on that cross is putting men and women tonight on a launching pad. He puts them there by faith. And one of these days, there’ll be the countdown. And the countdown is, for the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and the trump of God. And the dead in Christ are to be raised. Then those which are alive are going to be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air. I’m looking forward to space travel, but not with a female astronaut. But on that launching pad of faith today, of looking to a Savior who will make it possible for He alone, He alone tonight, not man’s power, but by the power of this living Christ, can you be brought tonight into God’s presence.
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We’ll be right back. Well, this is Steve Schwetz, and as we go, I pray that you’ll walk closely with our God who’s able to keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, as the book of Jude tells us. See you next time.
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Jesus paid it all All to him I owe Sin had left the prince unsaved He washed it white as snow.
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