Well, we are going to be talking about Revelation, a pretty easy book. No controversy. Not a not a whole lot of varying views, right? Simple? Or is definitely what what most people would say, probably the most bizarre book we have. And in reality, we don't have any other New Testament apocryphal books, you know. And so most of the time, we don't really know what to do with it, right. It definitely requires imagination. And I think that's the power of it is it's, it's designed to kind of help us recognize what we see around us, and then also cleanse us in and renew our mind knew our minds. As ETS, as we're seeing how this we're seeing how the way the world opera The way that works, you know, but with that use of imagination, I think that has kind of opened the door to where anybody can tell you exactly what it means. And most of the time, they are wrong. Right? Yeah. Just just like, I think we mentioned, you know, if you I went to wikipedians, and pulled up into the world predictions, and I stopped reading them after 500 of them, like exact dates, exact times. And then here's all the reasons why, you know, and, and these are predominant people that said these things, these are people that are still writing books that are famous now, maybe at some point, Jesus will come back here, and all of the dates have come and gone. Does that mean people are gonna stop telling you what date he's coming back? Nope. You know, so that that's part of what we gained from Revelation is we have to recognize that too, and how dangerous that can be, you know, so. So I think there's just, there's a lot more for us to discuss. So in preparation, I quickly decided to not try to be exhaustive, or Yeah, we just joined the group and go another year studying revelation, you know, which, but I will confess, I love the book of Revelation. I absolutely love it. I love what John is able to do and how he does it. I love his creativity. He's basically saw this, and then did the best to try to explain it and articulate it to us. So he saw it, he heard it. And then he wrote it down for us to read it, you know, so there's, there's that kind of dynamic going on. So I think a
lot of times, it's seen as scary, because if we don't understand it, it's we're scared of it. Or we've had it like Dave said, people have taught it to us in a not correct way. And that's scary. And the way they presented a scary and it's like that wasn't his heart at all. Like, I mean, it is part of a love letter, in a way. It's like if you know who you are, then it's not scary at all. Like if you go into this, it's it was written to believers as an encouragement. Not that there won't be any struggle, but that, you know that there's hope. And that's, that's the basis of all of it. So it's like, if you know whose use are whose you are you are you not talk I can't say people's names. I'm so tired. But you know, yeah. Then it's encouraging.
Yeah. Said, That is not to scare you
is to prepare you. Hmm, that's good. That's a good word.
I heard that frame of mind.
Yeah. Yeah. How can how can I prepare
well, and as we know, there's just so much sin in this life. And there's not one antichrist, there's lots of antichrist and we're all like, every generation is going to have their share of evil that's going to rise and it looks like they're winning and it feels like they're winning. And God's people are knocked down like disregard it I mean, and worse, and so it feels like that. And so yeah, it is a preparation but it's a hey, I'm gonna let you peek at the end this is who wins hang with me behind
the curtain. Yes. What's really going on on the cosmic level? You know, so yeah, yeah. So I do have more notes than we can cover also. So that was intentional to because I knew this should be a condensed night but I didn't want to slack on the last round of notes. I get to prepare for y'all you know, so, but as always, and that they're going to be an all crazy order to we'll try to do that. What quite what observations or what stood out or insights did you gain from reading the book of Revelation and or the Vols chapter. And the vault considers revelation one of his area of research a big commentary on Revelation right now. He's written several articles on Revelation and some like the heart of revelation like a guide book. So he's revelation is his jam in a lot of ways. And so his this chapter here is very insightful also, but what stood out to your classes just taught us a revelation class breakdown of the seals how they're all
just ever seals came about. They can find it by the worthy break all the seven seals until Jesus stepped in. It just like just broke them like what No. The actual separation from the right from the wrong an old like the whole judgment about horses, and everything is just that just really stood out just like I wouldn't be here to see it. But it's just like, it was just I can like, be called on, look down and just like wow. That's really just makes you wonder how he thought was the difference. vices.
And then this, and I'll figure out how that came about. You know, the description of the I think it's really trying to put earthly terms to
supernatural things. Like, it's like, I think when we see it, we'll like, oh, that's when he got a pretty good job, John.
I think we have no grid.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Whatever. Yeah.
Yeah. Infinite. Endless, timeless. Yeah.
Yeah. From what I understand, he's going to
see the events, the way they're going to occur on Earth. So So he's looking to the future. Who knows how far ahead yeah, we don't even know when we're going to know the things that he's trying to describe. Yeah, we've never seen a tank or anything like that was trying to describe these things. And the only words he knows how, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it makes it interesting. Just imagining like, edgy when you can, like, just
from I see, unfolding, like, what do you think, imagined
imagination during while.
I think also, at least for me,
think about Revelation, think about the future. I like what they're after, and say here, whichever one it was
to a man. You know, it's, it's crop revelations with crops, and we're supposed to obey and keep these crops. That only make sense when we understand prophecy has first and foremost a proclamation rather than a foretelling. And then go on with your further access. But Revelation speaks primarily about how God wants His people to live here.
Yeah, and I think and that's a
I think that's, that's definitely key, like, Okay, what is it, we have the book, we read it now John saw saw it heard it heard it, you know, you know, in some form, like almost like what we'd say is a vision, you know, he had this revelation of, or about Jesus, and he tries to share it. At What's it supposed to do to us right now, as believers? You know, what did it do then to the first people it was written to, or the first people that heard it, they probably were being persecuted. They were living in an anti God society. What you know, and so their worship, and their witness was super important. You know, now, I mean, for the most part in America, there's nobody stopping us from gathering together to worships to worship, or to get in a auditorium and worship or to go outside to a park with a group and start worshiping like, No one is stopping us or they're definitely not going to put us in prison. Yet, you know, let me say that, you know, but so we have, we have, you know, it's it's just kind of like trying to see what it was doing to them. And also what's, what's it doing for us and to us? I think it is, you know, Steve and I had a couple of conversations and, and I said something along the lines of is, Revelation is it's a discipleship manual. You know, like you're saying with it preparing it's, it's designed to help us as disciples of Christ as followers of Christ, a catch a glimpse of who you five, on the throne and for God's on the throne and five, it's Jesus. So we, we know worshipping King Jesus on the throne, that that's designed to help us as disciples as followers of him. So, yeah. But yeah, that the end Lynda was kind of getting there with like, Okay, is it future to some people revelation is all future, because you're gonna buy their book and, and you know, they're gonna keep selling them and but it's like understanding what John's doing with this prophecy it is it's proclaiming the centrality of Christ. Not so much concerned about the future, but more the present, you know, and again, I like to think in percentages 75% Now, there's still some stuff that's going to happen, but it's, but I'm reading it now. And it's supposed to be transforming me now, as a follower of Christ, you know, instead of it. That's really ready for the future. Yeah, instead of it going, oh, all this stuff's happening later, you know, now, there's some people early on, read Revelation, as it already all happened, when the temple was destroyed, and cemetery, you know, they all like, and you can kind of say, and John was probably doing that intentionally, like, he knew what was going on. And he knew, if he if he's writing, you know, 80s to 90s, the stuff that happened 70 was still fresh on their mind, you know, so he could kind of let me explain what, what, what was going on there, you know. And so, again, I think he did the best he can to help us understand, you know, so Jesus is still coming back, he's, there definitely will be what we call the Second Coming. There will be the end of the world, I get it. But I think the fact that we have revelation now is kind of like we've got inside information, you know, and that should help us if we're on the right team. Right? Well, I think we want to think about the future. Because we want to know how
like, like, if we understand what the future is going to be like, then how can we manipulate? Or how close can we get to the lines, so that we can live life for ourselves? And so I feel like that's some of the obsession with it. Because if we understand that, rather than if I live now, and I don't really understand the future, like there's this, like, you need to be overly on the side of holiness and walking with God. And it's like, well, how holy Do I really need to be to get to that point, you know, like, so I feel like, a lot of times that that obsession other than, of course, to make money and to get followers, you know, I think there is just this, well, what do we need to do? Like, we don't want to do more than we need to, we want to enjoy this life. And I'm like, that's not the point either. Like the point is like the now like what we need to be doing and not worry about, like God's just saying, all you need to know is I win, and you are going to be on my side and rain with me forever. Both then we're like, but how do you win? And when did you really win? Because why is there still bad stuff? If you want? Yeah, yeah.
We mentioned Deval, and he's got several recommended books, I think even at the end of his chapter that he's written that are fantastic. Those of you that also know I studied in there Scot McKnight, because I quote him a lot talk about him a lot. He him and Cody Matchett, who are the they both host the kingdom roots podcast, they just kind of relaunched. They wrote this book called revelation for the rest of us. So you could kind of consider this similar to like a dummy's guide to Revelation, a prophetic call to follow Jesus as a dissident disciple. So this is the idea of as followers of Christ, we are the remnant. We want to be faithful and following him, even when most of the people around us are probably not, you know. So what does that look like? Scott gave a lecture in Jonesborough, three over three days from this book on Revelation. And so I attended that took notes, copy those notes, downloaded the YouTube, transcribe the YouTube. I've read this book, listen to it on the way up there. This is super helpful. So what I want us to do is we'll talk my talk about these next couple of pages in your notes is all from Scott midnight, I'm going to do my best to regurgitate what he said because I think it's super helpful in terms of reading the book of Revelation, you know, and it but it will be controversial, and his book is to actually have a copy that somebody needs to take from me tonight. If you'd love revelation. First one to steal it from me wins. Just leave mine there. I think Lauren Lauren claimed it I was gonna say you say whoever's gonna share it with you share their
story up. So the book of Revelation
encourages us by giving up on page two, by giving us tools of discernment. To recognize political exploitations in justices, corruptions and power mongering, it forms us to be the kind of people who can discern these problems in our cultures, wherever they show up. The book of Revelation is designed to give us tools of discernment. Discernment is kind of another word for wisdom. It's where we can see it recognize, ponder it kind of process it like, is this good? Is this bad? Am I supposed to take this in? Am I supposed to be a part of this or not? You know, I'm, I'm discerning. And, and it is it does deal with politics. It's Theo, political. It's a drama. That's Theo, political, you know that the editors of this book wouldn't let him put the political in there. But it's Theo political, it's about God's politics, you know, so it definitely is very much. So seeing the injustice is the corruption, the power mongering that's going on around you, and then knowing how to respond appropriately, as faithful dissident followers of Christ, you know, this is a great word, I had to look it up to see what it means because I'm not that educated. I just am able to fake it. You're you're in dissent. You're part of the resistance. You know, you're the rebels. Star Wars, right. I don't know what the debate you're divergent. You know, your Yeah, Hunger Games? I don't know. Your your, you know, I don't know what whatever. Number seven what, what, what call me? I don't know. Anyway, you're the you're dissident. And so again, it's, it's those of us that want to be the true faithful followers of Christ. And we want to live in this world like we're supposed to. And not like the world is telling us not like governments might tell us to, you know, try not to step on who he is. But so he gives us three, three tools of discernment. The first and I've got the first two are on, I've given you spot to take notes. The first one is there are two teams. As Brandi said God's team wins. This, this guy named Randy Harris says this. There's two teams in Revelation God's team wins. Choose your team. Don't be stupid. God's team wins. Choose your team. Don't be stupid. And that's Randy Harris. I don't know who Randy Harris is. But I tried to Google to see you and I have no idea. There's two teams, there's team lamb. And there's team dragon. Team lamb, and team, Dragon. Team lamb, God and the Lamb the seven spirits the women, the woman the seven churches, Allegiant witnesses the for living things, the 24 Elders, angels, all designed for New Jerusalem. The captain is Jesus. He's bringing new Jerusalem team lamb team dragon. You have the dragon we still got that Foley human any. Team Dragon,
you have the dragon and the beast.
McKnight likes to refer the beast as wild things. Because he's like beast Do you think something big but what it's really more just all over the place just wild uncontrollably, chaotic, wild. Bioworks. Two works to
there's two wild things
in the book of Revelation, all inhabiting Babylon. To kings and merchants and sailors and anyone who chooses to have the mark of the wild thing. John names some others. The Nickelodeon's, like a late, I want to say Nick collations. But that's probably not right. And balem Jezza Bell, you know, so he's using words that we might be familiar with, because we've studied Babylon. We know that there's two things that marked Israel and the Jews that was the the captivity in Egypt, Pharaoh, and there was the captivity in Babylon, the exile. And so those were not happy memories. They they wanted to be delivered and rescued out of them. That's how we understand salvation. Well, he uses these tropes or metaphors to describe Babylon. As you know who he's talking about. The captain is Satan. And they're operating out of Babylon. Did we get handouts distributed? Oh, we got Almost, I think I'm lacking. Oh, good. Oh, yeah. Cuz he, he just copies off of his wife well, and I think once he doesn't like paper, he writes on his heart. I love it. I learned better why listening to you?
I think it's also important for us to know, again, this was written to an audience a specific audience that wasn't us. And I think he's using, like inflammatory words that they will understand. So it's like, whenever we talk to somebody, or like, the next Hitler or something like that, like, it's like words, that that it gives them a grid and context, you know, so I think that's why, even though people were like, oh, rabbit, like, you know, I think too much gets read into that. And I think it's just a device for them to understand what supernatural that we can't really understand. You know, just how would you explain something to somebody? Like, put it in their terms? Yeah, absolutely. And his terms, they were his terms to you know,
so instead of saying Rome is bad, and Rome wants to kill you, he says, Babylon is a beast. Yeah. And they want to definitely mill conquer you and enslave you, and dominate you, you know, so. So is it a hidden coded language? Yeah. But they knew exactly what he was talking about. They they didn't have to have a revelation decoder ring from a crackerjack box. I mean, they knew exactly what he was saying, you know, so, new Jerusalem replaces Rome. So you have a description of New Jerusalem as 12 miles high by 12 miles deep by 12 miles wide. So you have this 144 square mile cube? Don't question the math that could be wrong. Which like, wow, that's exciting. Who wants to live in a 12 mile apartment? You know, it's not that's not very exciting, you know, let's just be honest, but that's the same distance from Jerusalem to Rome. 1200 miles. So maybe he's letting us know New Jerusalem replaces Rome, you know, the power center of the world, you know, so look at this handout that was added loosely that says the playbill of Revelation. It was down on the top of your handouts. So it's somewhere in there, you know, this is from this book, page 4039 4040 41 somewhere and it came right out of here. So it's like if you go to a play if you if you're gonna get a playbook you're gonna know who the characters are. So that what he's like revelation is a drama, to Theo political drama. Here's the playbill, you know, Team dragon in Babylon. And he kind of describes it with the 6x Six the wild things, Team lamb with new Jerusalem, you got God the seven spirits you got, you know, the woman, you know, drew some, you know, so. So that's what he's trying to he's letting us know, you need to know who the characters are. To understand it, there's two teams, Team lamb team dragon when I went to this conference, I was so one of the shirt that I could open up the 17 Lamb, you know, and I didn't have it because I don't have people with crickets that I'm aware of that. That There you go. Very good. Summer Project.
X will that does it? Yeah. Second tool of discernment
is Babylon. Is that in the notes to the page to Babylon, the way they operated is domination. To really get Babylon to really understand this. It's like, no, let's just say like to know how best to read Revelation, you have to start with Revelation 1718 and 19. And y'all are just now getting to the good stuff. So now y'all can start reading Revelation After this Sunday's meeting, you know. Just because I'm scouting, not in fanboy I'm gonna try to read from his second testament. Babylon is creeping from Rome, creeping into the seven churches that we get in Revelation two and three. There's some language in there, you could see how they're these churches might be operating a little bit as if Babylon is controlling them. We know it's Babylon because John mentions the seven hills. That was everyone knew that Rome was the city on seven hills. They ruled over all the kings of the earth, you know. First there's coins depicting Roma, the goddess sitting on seven hills, you know, so we so we knew the goddess Roma, represented Rome and seven hills. And so John lets us know, this is this is I'm really talking about Rome. I'm just saying, Babylon because I know what kind of response that's going to get. Revelation 17 verse nine. Here is the mind having wisdom, the seven heads and the seven mountains where the woman sits on them. They are seven Emperor's you know, so he knew Rome and the Emperor's we knew exactly what John's talking about. So here we revelation 17, that one of the keys to unlocking it, we know that Rome is Babylon
if you wanted to insult the city in the first
century, you call it Babylon. You just say that's Babylon. When Rome captured Jerusalem and destroyed Jerusalem and later Qumran, it was like Babylon all over again, which happened in AD 71st. Peter, he refers to Rome, but he says Babylon, you know, so another New Testament writer, even kind of made that connection. So Babylon, operate in the first century, but Babylon also operates today. Babylon is timeless. There's a whole chapter in here about this. So I'm not going to spend too much time but it's, it's basically a metaphor of, of an empire that oppresses God. Every city has a Babylon, every century has a Babylon, every country has their Babylon. And we're called by this book to become discerning agents, who recognize the presence of Babylon and resist it by not having any part of it today, wherever the See and that's not, that's not of God. That's how Babylon operates. Even now. There's our Bible on
Who do you think it is? Who's been our
Babylon, who is our Babylon? who eventually is going to be our Babylon? This is what Revelation is designed for us to do. Just all of America, one example he gave is if I
were to say, you know, there's this city, and it's got this real
tall monument and this, this memorial to veterans and a statue of Lincoln, we would know, Washington DC, you know, so it's the same with the seven hills. We know he's talking about Rome. Yeah. It may not be an actual place.
Right? Yeah, absolutely. Worship. I
mean, yes. As all of the churches that are listed in Revelation.
All had had Babylon creep. Had Babylon creep. Yeah, it was.
Yeah. I have to. We have to recognize it and resist it. You know, we see Babylon and Putin. Absolutely. You know, I mean, I don't want to say this, because this will definitely push the buttons, but it's like, look at how Netanyahu is operating. That's Babylon. That's not, you know, God bless America. You know, I mean, this is, you know, I don't have a plan for it. I have a plan for Hamas. I just can't share it with you. Yeah, I'm gonna wipe them out. That's your plan. You know, look at what you're doing, you know, like, anyway, sorry, trying to not be too sensitive. Let's stay with Putin. You don't like him? We recognize political corruption. The more we worship the lamb, the more we see the corruption of our political leaders. Worship is resistance. That's what they're doing revelation, they're singing the spirituals. They're resisting by worshipping. Absolutely. So when one quick thought, like, I think it's sometimes hard for us to
recognize who the Antichrist are in our generation, that like, we can easily look back, you know, like, we're like, Adolf Hitler, you know, like, we can look back and see, then in past generation, because we can see, like, what part of history they ended on. And I think sometimes some of us get blinded. And again, that comes back, the whole point of running revelation is tread lightly. Because as Rhonda pointed out, even these churches that were getting it, right, like even a lot, right, there was still, the evil was seeping in. Because it's like, we still exist in Satan's domain. And evil is planted here on Earth, and we are existing among it. And we have to Jesus told us, he's like, it's going to be that way until I come back. I'm not going to separate the evil out until then. So it's, it's not that there's all evil and all good. I think even the good we see, you know, strands of, of evil in even the best places. Yeah, and there's gonna become, yeah,
yeah, sure. Yeah. They just dip their toe in it. Yeah. And then it starts
creeping up their way and then before you know it, and sometimes we miss that. Yeah, until you miss it until later and you're like, oh, oh, yeah. And we'd like to say the church is exempt
from power struggles. No, you know, we'd love to say that like, Oh, these are God's people. I love the Lord. They're worshipping Jesus. But they're still Babylon Creek. Yeah, literally. Yeah. Or in our for applicable for today. False authors. Yeah. Anyone can be an automaker. unless you got 440 $4
million in the bank and you're gonna tell me how about Revelation
do Sorry. Y'all just met last week? What are you gonna do fine
Oh, yeah
let's let's read John's take on it right? Yeah, I know. Yeah. And again anyway, yeah. Richard Baucom, who is probably one of the best revelation scholars says absolute power on earth is satanic, satanic and an inspiration destructive and its effects adulterous, and its claims to ultimate loyalty. So absolute power demands absolute loyalty and domination. That's how Babylon operates. That's how Rome operated. That's how Satan is operating. So we have to move from being adulterous to our ultimate Lord, we only have allegiance in King Jesus, the lamb. Read Revelation five. So how do we recognize if Babylon is creeping and how they operate and what they're doing? Next page, page three, seven marks of Babylon. I guess maybe I need 666 marks. I don't know. Seven marks of Babylon. Six anyway, I can't I can't do it. I'm trying to be creative. I can't. So this is this is as dissident disciples. This is how this is one simple way. So this is the third tool of discernment is recognizing the seven marks of Babylon number one, idolatry, idol worship, anything that claims our allegiance from God. Like Peter has said something like that. Anything that demands your worship. It's not God. Whoo pig suey. Any sport, he are trying to get fired? Any anything?
I think you can watch
the Razorbacks and worship the Lord. You know, like, this is not like, Oh, I gotta cut all this out. I'm just saying anything that's demanding your worship can easily become an idol. Caesar did this. And we learned that that's blasphemy. It's referred to in the book of Revelation as idolatry, which is a metaphor for I called adultery, which is a metaphor for idolatry. Figure out how to spell those one. It starts with an A one starts with an eye, you know, Revelation 17 Again, we're starting with Babylon revelation 17. One. One of the seven envoys having the seven shallow bowls came and spoke with me saying, Come, I will exhibit for you judgment on the Great Prostitute sitting upon many waters, with whom the lands kings prostituted, and with whom the ones residing on the land or boozed up from her sexual immorality is wine. So we see a woman a prostitute, a great prostitute, and people are drunk on her right there. They're boozed like boozed up from her sexual immorality. So he's usually saying, and it wasn't just sex. This was just his way of describing idol worship, you know, anything that's going to take away your focus revelation mystifying the revelation 18 This is still idolatry. That's number one. After these things, I saw another envoy descending from heaven, having great authority in the land was illuminated from its splendor, it cried out in a strong voice saying it fell, it fell the great battle on it became a residence for demons, and a prison for every contaminating spirit and a prison for every contaminating bird and a prison for every contaminating and hated wild thing. Because all ethnic groups have drunk from the wine of her sexual moralities fury and the lands kings prostituted with her in the lands conductors of business got rich from her Central's power. So and again, this is ignites translation. So it doesn't sound familiar, you know, Revelation 18, one through three. This is idolatry, I D. O. L, and is described as adultery adu Lt. Anyway, sorry, I can't I can't talk I can't pronounce. So number one is idolatry. So he described this book while you're looking for that it makes me think of totally guilty pleasure.
This is not holy at all, y'all, but I love Dateline. So we're watching it a Dateline episode. Dave hates it. Oh, I missed a lot of commercials. He'll sit with me. Sometimes he's just like, oh, but anyway, we were watching about a wife that she gets killed in She had her two year olds sleeping with her. And there was like a set five, seven year old another room or whenever she somebody shot her, like with her baby in her bed in her arms. It was horrific. But anyway, that's the horrible cry. I don't like it. I know it is horrible. And we watched it, I think on Mother's Day. He was like, can't you find something happy? I'm like, the kids are asleep. gonna watch that like, but anyway. So the whole point of that was the husband worked at he was a DJ, but he worked at a strip club. I'm like, what, and apparently y'all may be wearing more hip than we are. I had no clue. But apparently, especially for rappers like all this rap music that's so popular right now. It really gets launched in more times than not in the strip clubs, because they pay hundreds of 1000s of dollars for their equipment, like their sound systems and all of this and they pay these DJs are making fat money and the gatekeepers are the gatekeepers.
Are the rappers that want to make it or get a soul like even I can't really say some famous rapper
it some of y'all would know him. I can't think of his name. Anyway, he'd like slipped money, they would flip money to the key like DJs that were really talented at putting music together. And then that's how it got played. And then it would go mainstream. But I was just thinking like, this is so our like Moulin Rouge, like backdoor stuff that, that maybe a lot of us aren't familiar with, or we are but we don't talk about it. Like I totally was oblivious to this, and how much impact music has especially on our young people like rap, you know, and how it's forming. And I'm like, this is stuff that is being birthed in a way. I mean, it wasn't necessarily written there. But you know what I'm saying? It's being birthed into ears and being funneled by people that, you know, like it like, that's Babylon. That's who you know. And so it was just like, the case itself was so disturbing, but just hearing that and the whole time I was thinking I was like, gosh, this is revelation, like what we're talking about, like this is going on right in front of us and we maybe know or we don't know, or maybe we're okay with it. You know, like even stuff like we've gotten where we can't even watch the halftime shows like for Super Bowl for because of kids but even if the kids weren't there, I wouldn't want to watch it. I'm like, oh, like it just It seems so. Yeah, not of the Lord and not holy. And it's again it's been inching up our leg but anyway, yeah. So number one, he says anti God is you know, so you tend
to find adultery but he says it's anti God. So I got five minutes number two, opulence. RP opulence. A lot of everything absolutely. opulence revelation 17 For the woman was wrapped in purple and scarlet. Golden with gold and precious stones and pearls. Having in our hand a cup of a gold cup full of abominations intersectionality immoralities contaminations in our forehead a name was written a secret the great Babylon, the mother of prostitutes and the lands abomination she's covered in purple and scarlet and gold and precious stones. Look at how much more money I have than you. I'm you we have to have we have money to have money to further to the spread of the gospel further the spread of the absolutely gospel absolutely to meet in this room to meet him and talk about this this room and talk about one has to pay this light but this someone has to pay the bill and light bill and by and by a roof ceiling tile to fix leaks and anyway like someone spent a lot of money on paper last couple of months. But there's there's a when you're when you're just flaunting and you're just overextending and you're you're trying to keep up there buddy, you're going to debt. That's how Babylon operate. That was a controlling mechanism also so number three murderous revelation 17 Six I saw the woman boozed up from her blood of the devoted ones. And from the blood of Jesus witnesses. I was stunned with a great stunning thing her murderous drunk with blood, millions were killed by the Roman Empire. Millions were enslaved by the Roman Empire like we mentioned last week, when they conquered they would enslave millions of people, when when slavery made it to the US, like learn how to do it, and how to operate it and how to sell slaves and put them on a block from Rome. But the way they did it was by killing people. benefit and from a slave economy. Domination. So Rome called it the pox Romana. The way of peace
Rome's presence was everywhere in their statues in their temples on billboards are written on the ground carved into stones in their architecture. For Jews, Herod's temple was a reminder of Rome's impact. Herod was able to build this temple, from the money that he collected with rooms, miked. idols were everywhere. There was no separation of church and state. It was just all imagery. So
I've got the page before page five, it's a numbered on the left. It's a picture that was common. The SP QR was Rome.
You see the eagle with its wings out? You see the greenery
in the what's the crown? Or the crowns that like Caesar woodware? Oh, yeah. I can't think of anywhere. And, you know, you'd see you'd see Rome and you think, oh, peace, like a dove. If you look on our coins, you know, we've got holding this
stuff. On the right is
probably some steal from the United States of America. And it's eerily similar. Read your own conspiracy theories into that, oh, look at how peaceful we are. It's like, well, let's look at our spending. And so we have that they, they would keep their imagery of how powerful they were all around and everywhere as a way of, of letting you know, get in line or will kill you. Number five, military or militarism. Again, also from Revelation 17, verse 13, we have you heard that we've heard that let's go for images in Revelation. Now just their statues, their architecture, their idols, their temples. So just it was if you go over there, like they're digging up Pompeii, and every time they do they find more. There's books where you can see all their pictures of how it was everywhere. It was Rome everywhere, and all their symbols and all the statues and that kind of stuff. And just as a reminder, they use the power of images and I think revelation. That's why it's maybe some bizarre imagery they're using we're already doing oversaturation for marketing. Blitz campaign. So Revelation 18. I put 13 in my notes, but it might be 11. Yeah, well, this is the next one too. It's kind of like the ship's manifest.
They were cargo of gold
and silver stones pearls, violet and purple silk,
Scarlet.
Wood, costly wood, brass and iron, marble, cinnamon, spices, incense, frankincense wine, olive oil, flour, wheat, cattle, sheep, horses. So all their stuff and enslaved bodies of humans. Fruit, you know, so you have this? You know, look, the military would would conquer and then they fill up their ships with all their loot. I think there's a question over here. So what one was this one? Number five military, military tourism, military military militarism? I was I was I said military and then it's like military ism. I don't know. I don't have my notes or revelation 11
military ism or images? Or is it
both images that images didn't have a reference? It's throughout? militaristic is what he put militaristic, number five, page 56 in here when he whoever steals this book.
Yeah, Revelation 1811.
And following 1811 Does it does start 1713 Two, but we've already read that one. Humans sold a slavery they create the creation of slaves. 33% of the people were enslaved, like we mentioned last week. It was part of the military and exploitation of Rome. That he gives an example here in the book of WSP. And he gathered Jews from around Galilee, marched him down to Tiberius. He says he killed all the old people, enslaved 6000 Send them to Corinth. Corinth was a super popular slave city, sold another 30,000 gave some to Agrippa and Agrippa sold them. So and this was Josephus kind of sharing the story just let us know this is how Rome operated. Bye bye but because of their military might they were able to enslave people. Number six, I'm already over time, economic exploitation. They're still jumping, I'm sure. Revelation 18 verse three, Revelation 1811 through 13 that we just read all these cargo ships that are full of all this stuff and all these people bring them to Rome. economic exploitation,
economic economically exploitative.
Oh, what what's reference revelation what Revelation 18 verse three, that we've read Revelation 1811 to 13 that we just read of all the cargo ships, so it wasn't just enslaving people with the military, it was also all the money that they got from that. So And number
seven, which could be the one that sums up all
of them. Arrogance, arrogance, Revelation 18, verse seven, B. Seven B, Revelation 18, verse seven, B says, I sit as a queen, and I am not a widow. And I will never see grief.
completely and utterly
arrogant.
I'm in charge, it's my way. Get in line. So this is how Babylon operates. These are the seven marks that we see that can help us discern if maybe Babylon is operating today today with
all the different stuff, you know, Mother Mary, brown, a thorn thorns the holy grail thing, the cloth that slowly looks like Jesus
on it, and then you got you know, the arrogance of how big they are. You've got the the images of everything. And how big they are. Everybody counts, flocks to them. Yeah, excruciating thing in the talk. I mean, he's not picking on all Catholics. So the Roman Catholic Church, but he says the most opulent example is St. Peter's cathedral. And it's just, it's flamboyantly gold covered everything, you know. So I think yes, that's
part of our we need to not be comfortable with that to be like, here's, we're following Jesus that had no home. That was poor. That was a peasant that you know, and yet now we've built these monster stadium things like pastors with mansions. Like there's a reason why they didn't go down well, preaching and $5,000 sneakers, you know, so go over what these pages are real quick, so people know what everything is. So yeah. So you got a page that kind of
discusses the seven churches and you can kind of see again, the Babylon creep.
I gave you my notes on pages four,
starts on four. What kind of literary is this? What's the
historical situation? What's the purpose?
These are some of my old notes that I developed years ago.
The next page that I think I included is Lord Redeemer, Liberator savior, divine Son of God, God God from Almighty God Almighty. These are titles for Caesar. I don't know why he didn't put that at the top but Okay, so at the bottom, Caesar Augustus, but it sounds like it looks like a quote by him, ya know, these are his titles. He's got coins, Devi Fabius. Octavian wanted to be known as Son of God. Okay. Well, next time you have to put titles by FCS or something that looks like a he said that?
He did. He said, I want you to call me Son of God. Yeah. Oh, here when I'm saying, right.
This, this is like how we have Congress. I'm like, Caesar Augustus Germanicus. Wanted
image. He did it wrong. One of the Caesars
wanted an image of him in the temple in Jerusalem, you know, so they wanted to be worshipped as gods, you know,
so I gave you some modern. They took the sculptures of the Caesars
and made them look like yearbook photos,
to let us know that these were human beings. They were not gods, you
know, but I loved what they did there. And you can kind of see how creepy some of them were, you know? So you got the Yeah, this could be America's Most Wanted, right? The general consensus is that Revelation was written during the time of Domitian. That's why I included him last. But you can also see a lot of Nero in the way Domitian operated, but it's just this is how Babylon operated. You know, so
really Caesar Augustus started it,
and it never got better, you know, so you can kind of see that. Some more of my notes that eventually pick up on page five, an outline of Page Six because like I mentioned, you got to fly. You got to Look at the big picture of Revelation. So kind of knowing where some of the things are super helpful, you know, so questions on Revelation we just ran out of time we ate too much. It's a hard book. Let's leave as faithful followers discerning and resisting. We resist by worshiping, we resist by witnessing, talking about Jesus to the people around us. So, may we be encouraged to share the story of what God's doing, share the message of Christ around us and continue to worship him as faithful dissident disciples. To me, amen.
