Participants: G.Edward Reid
Series Code: OTR
Program Code: OTR000638
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01:00 Good morning, brethren. Good morning.
01:03 I am very encouraged about being here. 01:05 I told my seminar earlier today that when I came at 8:30, 01:09 I was delighted to see that the front row was already occupied. 01:13 Typically that's not common in churches. 01:15 But I know you're eager to be here 01:16 and I'm glad to be here myself. 01:19 As a matter of fact, it's quite responsibility 01:22 as you can imagine to take the time 01:24 of a large number of people particularly 01:26 when they're busy people and bread winners and so on. 01:30 But I believe that God has given me 01:31 a message to share with you. 01:33 And I will tell you what I'm gonna say 01:35 and then I'll tell you. 01:37 First of all, I wanna give you 01:38 an introduction to the topic high time. 01:40 Then I wanna show you with some PowerPoint slides, 01:44 some current events 01:45 that I believe are fulfillments of prophecy. 01:47 And then after the pictures, 01:49 I want to give you a challenge from God's word 01:54 in my own personal testimony about what it means to be ready 01:58 and what we can do as men of faith. 02:02 First of all, we'll open our Bibles to Romans Chapter 13 02:06 and this is the theme text for us this morning. 02:11 Romans Chapter 13, beginning with verse 11. 02:21 I've prayed earnestly that God would send the Holy Spirit 02:23 that inspired the Bible writers here to inspire each of us 02:27 as we look at these words. 02:29 "And do this, knowing the time, 02:31 that now it is high time to awake out of sleep, 02:34 for now our salvation is nearer than 02:36 when we first believed. 02:38 The night is far spent, the day is at hand, 02:41 therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, 02:44 and let us put on the armor of light. 02:47 Let us walk properly, as in the day, 02:50 not in revelry and drunkenness, 02:52 not in life sensuousness and lewdness, 02:53 not in strife and envy. 02:55 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, 02:58 and make no provision for the flesh, 03:01 to fulfill its lust." 03:04 Seventh-day Adventists have been known 03:07 as Adventists or people 03:09 who talk about the second coming of Christ. 03:12 I know that you have probably in your life contemplated, 03:16 why or how can the church always be excited about 03:20 the second coming when people 03:22 who have fervently believed it for years are now dead? 03:26 Well, I'm gonna give you some thoughts 03:28 from my own prospective in this regard 03:31 and here's what I believe about that. 03:34 No one has waited 2,000 years for the second coming. 03:38 We only have our lifetime to prepare and to be ready. 03:41 And God has put it in the heart of every one of us 03:44 just like He has put in the heart of women 03:47 a mother's love for a child, 03:49 that maybe we could be the generation 03:52 that would see the second coming. 03:54 The bottom line really 03:55 is there's a great prophetic timeline 03:58 that I'm discussing in my seminars. 04:00 And then there's a second way 04:02 and that is the great signs of the end. 04:05 Now I'm gonna give you a little indication 04:08 as we go through here about some incredible things 04:11 that Jesus did the first time to make a point 04:13 about the second coming. 04:15 I believe that if you love Jesus, 04:17 you'll be excited about the second coming. Amen. 04:21 I travel almost every weekend, about 42 weekends a year 04:25 and the happiest day of every weekend is the day 04:28 I'm going home to see my wife. 04:30 We've been married for 39 years 04:32 and Kathy is more precious to me every day. 04:35 Now I'm gonna tell you something incredible 04:37 about this second coming business. 04:40 If you really love Jesus, you will think about it a lot. 04:45 Now I'm excited about this hour. 04:47 But I know at 7:10 in the morning 04:49 at Lansing there's a plane 04:50 that's headed to Detroit and then to Baltimore. 04:52 And I plan to be on it. 04:54 I'm already thinking about it. 04:56 If you love Jesus, you will think about it a lot. 04:59 If you really love Jesus, 05:01 then you'll wanna tell someone else about it. 05:03 And that's what our witnessing is all about. 05:06 This wicked world as we know it is not going 05:09 to go on forever and ever. As a matter of fact, 05:12 I'm gonna tell you something quite bold today. 05:16 Seventh-day Adventists of all people have 05:18 what we call inside information. 05:21 Now in the world of finance, that is illegal. 05:24 Martha Stewart is a good example 05:25 of what you can get involved in if you have inside information. 05:29 But every one of you have inside information 05:32 and the inside information is very simple. 05:34 This world and all the stuff in it including 05:38 all of our possessions are gonna be burned up. Amen. 05:42 And that will reduce 05:43 its value considerably as you can imagine. 05:46 So if you're smart, it's time to transfer 05:49 our wealth to the other side. Amen. 05:51 This is important that I'm telling you about. 05:54 I'm gonna put it in perspective a little bit. 05:57 The second coming of Jesus will be the most cataclysmic 06:00 event to occur on the earth since the creation. 06:03 It will affect every man, woman, 06:06 and child on the earth, all 6 billion of us. 06:10 Now I wanna tell you a few things 06:12 about the first coming to set it just a little tone 06:14 for the second coming part. 06:16 When Jesus came to earth the first time, 06:19 it was as a suffering Savior as you know. 06:23 The life of Jesus was awesome. 06:26 Have you ever thought 06:27 what it must've been like to be one of Jesus' disciples? 06:32 The closest thing I've ever come to it 06:34 is I bought a series of cassette tapes 06:37 that a trained professional actor from New York 06:41 narrated or read through the entire book 06:43 Desire of Ages. It's 32 tapes. 06:47 And on an occasion 06:48 when I had a speaking appointment in Florida, 06:50 I was living in Georgia, 06:51 I listened to those tapes, every one of them, 06:54 all the way through down and back. 06:57 And when I got home, 06:59 I thought I was one of Jesus' disciples. 07:02 In fact, there were about 10 minutes on the last tape 07:04 and I didn't get out of the car 07:05 and I had been gone for several days. 07:06 My wife came and said, "Ed, aren't you coming in?" 07:08 I said, "I've got 10 more minutes on this tape." 07:11 That's an incredible experience. 07:13 But just imagine when Jesus fed the 5,000 07:17 with a little boy's lunch. 07:19 Just imagine that you were with Him on the sea 07:22 when those awesome waves 07:24 were so big like we've seen on TV 07:25 with these hurricane waves. 07:27 The disciples, who a number of them 07:30 were trained seamen, were feared for their lives 07:33 and had given up hope. 07:36 But Jesus stood up and said just three words 07:39 and calmed the whole thing. "Peace, be still." 07:42 Even the winds and the waves obey Him, they said. 07:46 And then you remember that time 07:48 it was probably Jesus' most awesome miracle. 07:51 When He raised a man from the dead 07:53 who have been dead for 4 days. 07:56 Again with just three words, the Bible says 07:58 He cried out loud. 08:00 After crying to express His sympathy with us 08:04 who go through difficult times, 08:06 again just three words, 08:08 "Lazarus come forth." And Lazarus came out, 08:12 bound hand and foot 08:14 and even covered his face by the power of Almighty God. 08:20 The death of Jesus was also quite an awesome experience. 08:23 If you can imagine the Creator, the Life Giver, 08:26 the Sustainer, the Miracle Worker, 08:27 the Sinless One, the epitome of innocence, 08:30 crucified between two thieves, killed by His own creation. 08:33 "Crucify Him," they had shouted. 08:37 Can you imagine that in your eye? 08:39 We sing about it. We talk about it. 08:41 Sometimes we pray about it. 08:43 Hanging on the cross, naked, bruised, 08:46 bleeding, dying for me, for you. 08:50 But listen, Jesus again is speaking and He says, 08:53 "Father, forgive them for they don't know 08:55 what they're doing." 08:57 The resurrection of Jesus was also very awesome. 09:01 The sonic boom of just one angel descending from heaven 09:04 caused a great earthquake. 09:06 In the glory of that one angel was as bright as lightning. 09:11 Just His appearance caused the whole army 09:14 detail on duty to fall as dead men. 09:18 Then He rolled away the stone and sat on it. 09:23 Just in case you haven't focused the picture in your own mind. 09:25 One angel did all of this and God has jillions of them. 09:30 This is incredible to understand. 09:34 And then Jesus rose from the dead. 09:37 One of the most amazing things about 09:38 the resurrection is that when Jesus' disciples showed up 09:41 at the tomb early Sunday morning, 09:43 the angel who was sitting on the stone 09:45 said those awesome words, 09:47 "Why are you seeking the living from among the dead? 09:50 He isn't here because He has risen, He is alive." 09:55 This is an incredible statement. 09:57 Christians are the only people who serve a living God. 10:00 We sing about it. 10:02 I serve a risen Savior, but it's an absolute fact. 10:06 I think the ascension is one of my favorite things 10:09 because I remember when I was selling books 10:10 as a student colporteur in volume 7 of the 10 volume 10:14 set of Arthur Maxwell's Bible story. 10:20 I was trying to think of the name and the author at the same 10:23 time, where Russell Harland drew that picture of Jesus 10:26 going up into the clouds. 10:28 Most of you are well aware if you've studied this 10:30 that Jesus did not walk 10:31 to the point of ascension with anyone. 10:34 He told them where to meet Him 10:37 and they all gathered around, but where's Jesus? 10:40 And suddenly He appeared in their midst. 10:42 And He gave them those awesome words 10:44 about going into Jerusalem and Judea, 10:46 Samaria and the outermost part of the world and saying, 10:47 "I'm with you always, even to the end of the world." 10:51 And that means right here in Michigan. 10:55 And then Jesus began to levitate. 10:58 He was taken up into a cloud of angels 11:01 and then He was gone. 11:04 It's incredible that the Bible says then two men 11:06 in white apparel were standing there. Also just appeared. 11:10 This is amazing because you can read about it in Acts. 11:14 Some of you have probably read it there before. 11:16 The first chapter of Acts, the angel said, "Men of Galilee, 11:20 why do you stand gazing up into heaven? 11:22 This same Jesus who was taken out from you into heaven 11:25 will so come in like manner 11:27 as you have seen Him go into heaven." 11:30 And so these awesome things that Jesus did, 11:35 His suffering and death, were all for one purpose. 11:40 So He could come again. And I think that's incredible. 11:45 If He doesn't come back, it was all for nothing. 11:48 But He did this so He could come back. 11:50 And that's why we should be so excited 11:52 and that's why I get excited about it. 11:54 Now I have some good news and some bad news for you. 11:57 The good news is that according to the Bible, 11:59 He is even at the door. The coming is near. 12:03 The bad news is this transition time 12:05 is going to be a time of trouble. 12:08 That includes a time of trouble 12:09 such as never was since there was a nation. 12:12 People don't like to talk about that. 12:14 I don't like to think about it either. 12:16 But I know if Jesus can save people in a boat 12:18 when there was a big storm, 12:19 He can save me and whatever happens to me. 12:21 Amen. He's able to do that. 12:23 And we need to have that same confidence. 12:25 In the providence of Almighty God, 12:28 we have been born and now live in what the Bible calls 12:31 the time of the end and we are rapidly approaching 12:35 the end of time as we know it. 12:38 The devil also knows that time is short. 12:41 And he is doing everything he can 12:44 to cause havoc on the earth to distract us 12:46 from what should be our primary focus 12:49 and that is getting ready to meet Jesus. 12:51 Now this is an incredible thing that we understand. 12:54 Maybe you'd like to look at just one passage 12:57 as far as the sign. I'm not gonna mention it later, 13:00 but in Luke chapter 17, 13:04 and I believe that we would find it in-- 13:09 I'm gonna-- I'm sorry, it's Luke 21. 13:11 Luke 21:25, very appropriate for today. 13:17 "There will be signs in the sun, the moon and the stars. 13:20 And on the earth, distress of nations with perplexity." 13:24 By the way, for those of you who care, 13:27 this is the only time the word perplexity 13:28 occurs in the entire Bible and it's translation literally 13:31 is people think there's no way out. 13:35 And then it says, "The sea and the waves roaring." 13:39 In a minute, we're gonna talk about natural disasters. 13:41 You're gonna be able to understand that 13:43 what is happening today is not the result of global warming. 13:47 It is the result of Jesus' signs telling us the end is near 13:52 and it's very incredible that we see this. 13:54 Perilous times are coming. 13:57 So I'm gonna go now to the screen 13:58 and you'll probably want to turn your attention over there. 14:01 And I will just tell you that in the 24th chapter of Matthew, 14:05 Jesus' disciples came to Him privately 14:08 and they said, "Tell us when will these things be 14:12 and what will be the sign of your coming 14:14 in the end of the age?" 14:16 Now this is interesting because 14:18 how many signs did they actually asked for? 14:23 Only one. Tell us what will the sign of your coming. 14:26 By the way, the people living 14:27 at the time of Noah got just one sign. 14:33 Isn't that true? 14:34 Most of the people living in the time of Noah 14:36 would have thought He was crazy. 14:38 I mea,n every one of you, if you live near a city, 14:39 when you drive into the city if every time you go, 14:41 somebody is building this big boat in his spare time. 14:44 He's standing on the corner telling you Jesus is coming 14:46 back. After 120 years, you would think he was crazy. 14:51 How did the people know he wasn't crazy? 14:54 Only one sign that God gave 14:56 and that was when the animals came by twos and by sevens 15:01 and the birds without any help from men or animals, 15:05 no border collies or anything like that. 15:07 And they came into the ark in an orderly fashion. 15:12 Everybody who had a lick of sense 15:14 would have known this was a supernatural miracle. 15:17 You wanna know something interesting about that sign? 15:20 Best we can tell, not one person changed their mind. 15:25 Now listen carefully for the value 15:27 of this kind of meeting. 15:29 Don't think for a minute, you can watch signs go by 15:34 and if you don't change and look at them as signs, 15:38 think you can change at the end. 15:40 When I see the Sunday Law come, 15:42 then I'm gonna catch up on my back tithe, 15:44 and I'm gonna start going to prayer meeting 15:45 and I'll be kinder to my spouse. 15:47 It's not gonna happen. It's just not gonna happen. 15:50 So when the time is when we hear the events to look up 15:54 our redemption is nigh is to make the appropriate occasion. 15:58 So what I'm gonna show you actually is if I can get, 16:02 there we go. Seven incredible signs of the end. 16:06 And the first one is Daniel. 16:08 And I'm gonna tell you I know that in a group this large, 16:11 there's gonna be some theologians here. 16:12 I heard a theologian one time say, 16:14 "If I ever hear about the increase of knowledge 16:16 that has to do with cell phones and laptop computers again, 16:19 I think I'm gonna lose my mind." I will tell you 16:23 I know that Daniel 12:4, "At the time of the end, 16:26 many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase." 16:29 That the primary application is knowledge 16:31 of Daniel's prophecies would increase." 16:33 Don't we all understand that? There's no question about it. 16:36 But there is just as valid a secondary application 16:40 and that is that knowledge of communication 16:42 and travel would increase to facilitate 16:44 the spread of the gospel worldwide." 16:46 Now this is pretty interesting because when you see it, 16:50 you can remember something interesting. 16:52 Way back from the time of Adam, 16:54 if you want to present like creation 16:56 is way over there by that side 16:58 and the second coming is way over on this side, 17:00 do you know that for communication 17:02 and travel for 5,900 years has been 17:06 the same thing over and over again? 17:08 If you want to go somewhere, what do you do? 17:10 You ride a horse. If--I mean this just really, 17:13 really incredible when you think about it. 17:16 Trying to get my little laptop thing to work here. 17:18 There's lots of horses. 17:20 But I'm just gonna show you this one right here. 17:22 Now this is amazing because 17:24 if you wanted to communicate with somebody, 17:27 how did you do it way back in the horse days? 17:30 Just talking or shouting. 17:32 Everybody here has probably taken American history 17:34 and you remember the ride of Paul Revere, 17:36 riding his horse through Boston? 17:38 What was he doing? Shouting. 17:39 He was not on the cell phone. 17:43 But something incredible happened about 103 years ago. 17:49 And I'm gonna show you what it was. This is it. 17:53 On December 17, 1903, two brothers 17:56 Orville and Wilbur Wright 17:57 who had been the workers in a bicycle shop, 18:00 in Dayton, Ohio, had been working 18:02 in their spare time to make the right flyer. 18:05 They had studied everybody from before and so on. 18:07 They thought they could make a heavier than air machine 18:10 that would carry a man into the air. 18:13 On December 16, they tried it out at the Banks-- 18:17 The Outer Banks of North Carolina at Kitty Hawk. 18:19 And the plane crashed and they spent 18:21 most of the night repairing it. 18:23 They thought the next day that it would fly 18:24 so they hired a photographer. 18:26 Most everybody has seen this picture in an encyclopedia. 18:29 Orville won the coin toss. He's actually at the controls 18:31 laying down and Wilbur was running along and holding 18:35 the wing until it lifted off into the air and he said, 18:37 "If this thing gets off the ground, take a picture." 18:39 So you saw the picture. 18:41 The plane was in the air 12 seconds 18:42 and flew 120 feet. 18:45 Later that day, Wilbur at the controls 18:47 flew the plane 852 feet and it was airborne for 59 seconds. 18:51 You can go to Kitty Hawk today 18:53 and in the Wright Brother's museum, 18:54 you see the telegram that they sent back to Dayton, 18:57 Ohio. "Success at last. Will be home for Christmas." 19:00 Now remember, this was 5,900 years 19:05 after the creation time. 19:07 So not nearly 6,000 years, but 66 years later, 19:12 we had another amazing thing happen. 19:15 And that was the voice of Apollo 11 Commander 19:18 Neil Armstrong heard on the radio 19:21 all the way from the moon. 19:23 "Houston, Tranquility Base here, the Eagle has landed." 19:27 Now everybody knows what he said next, 19:29 but what he said next was said for a reason. 19:32 "One small step for man. One giant leap for mankind." 19:37 So if you're standing at the back of the auditorium 19:39 and you see a picture of all time, 19:40 you got people galloping on horses for 5,900 years 19:44 and then incredible things begin to happen. 19:46 And that's what we're gonna see here. 19:48 Around the world, we're seeing this air--in communication. 19:52 It's just really, really amazing. 19:54 So what I'm gonna show you is 19:55 from horseback to the moon in one century 19:59 So if you're graphing this, 20:01 it's a flat liner for most of earth's history 20:03 and then what does it do? Goes straight up to the moon. 20:06 This to me is very amazing. 20:09 Now the second one, 20:10 I'll talk to you about is wars and rumors of wars. 20:12 If you read Matthew 24:6, 20:15 the big wars at the end are not at the very end 20:19 because if you read Matthew 24:6, it says, 20:21 "There will be wars and rumors of wars." 20:22 But what? The end is not yet. 20:25 So we're gonna see something quite amazing here. 20:28 And that is in the Bible it says, 20:31 "There will be wars and rumors of wars." 20:34 And the most interesting part about it 20:36 nation rise against nation, kingdom against kingdom. 20:39 The last century was actually the bloodiest of all that 20:44 we've seen before. 20:46 And I'm gonna show you what we mean by that. 20:49 Only two of these big, 20:50 huge mushroom clouds have occurred 20:52 in battle on earth's history. 20:54 Most of you are well aware from reading your history books 20:57 that on August 6, 1945, 21:00 especially equipped B-29 bomber took off 21:02 in Tinian Island in the Central Pacific. 21:04 Colonel Paul Tibbets, the pilot didn't know 21:07 if he would return because they had never dropped the bomb 21:09 that would send flames and superheated gas 21:12 40,000 feet into the air, 21:13 much higher than the planes could fly. 21:16 On the day before, he took a paint brush 21:18 and wrote on the fuselage of his B-29, 21:20 Enola Gay, which was the name of his mother. 21:23 That big bomb was designed to detonate 21:26 1,000 feet above Hiroshima. 21:29 Four and half hours later, 21:30 they were approaching the coast of Japan and the bombadier 21:33 lined up his sights right on that bridge 21:35 between the two halves of Hiroshima. 21:37 When the bomb dropped, they quickly banked the plane 21:39 to get out of the way of course because they knew 21:41 this huge cloud would come up. 21:43 But 1,000 feet above the ground 21:44 right as they had planned, 21:46 it detonated and killed more than 21:48 100,000 people in 10 seconds. 21:51 Many thousands more died after that from the radiation 21:54 and the injuries that they received. 21:56 Three days later, 21:57 a second bomb was dropped in Nagasaki 21:59 as you can understand. 22:00 Now something amazing happened with these World War II things. 22:05 "Modern estimates place the number of deaths 22:08 from those two world wars at 69 million 22:11 military and civilian personnel. 22:12 More people have been killed by war in the past 100 years 22:16 than in all of the other wars in the earth's history combined." 22:20 To me, this is an incredible thing to understand. 22:23 Now we're going to look at another sign. 22:26 This is lack of self control. 22:29 And I'm just gonna go through a couple of slides here. 22:31 Violence, these things are quite amazing 22:33 when you think about all that's happening in the world today. 22:36 Gambling, essentially out of control. 22:39 Do you know that Hurricane Katrina 22:41 ruined 16 gambling casinos, these floating casinos 22:44 off the coast of the Southern Mississippi and so on? 22:48 Quite interesting when you see them. 22:51 I may have to have somebody go over 22:52 and sit by my laptop and press the down key 22:54 because I'm not getting my-- there we go. 22:57 Pornography, we even have someone 22:59 talking about that here today from one of our seminars. 23:04 I need to go really fast through this. 23:06 Would someone be willing to go over 23:07 and just there's a cursor key just the arrow of the down key 23:11 because I wanna go though this rather quickly. 23:13 You can be able to view it right there. 23:15 Corrupt business leaders, 23:16 greed and fraudulent business practices, 23:18 Violence, immortality on television, 23:20 crime out of control, selfishness abounds. 23:22 Let's go to the next one. 23:23 Now we're gonna talk just briefly about earthquakes 23:25 and natural disasters. 23:27 Matthew 24, Matthew, Mark, and Luke 23:30 all talk about earthquakes. 23:32 Now there may not be many earthquakes in Michigan. 23:34 But if you understand, go on to the next slide 23:36 there are hundreds of just-- 23:42 maybe the down cursor key, yeah. 23:46 The Bible says, "There will be earthquakes." 23:47 Okay? 6,000 major earthquakes each year. 23:53 Now in addition, go on to the next one, please. 23:56 Earthquakes will happen all over the world, 23:58 we're told, but they don't have to happen right 23:59 where you live because we see them 24:01 various places the Bible says. 24:04 Okay? In the 10year period from 1900 to 1910, 24:08 earthquakes worldwide, there were three of them 24:11 on 6.0 or greater on the Richter scale. 24:13 In the last 10 years of our century 24:15 from 1990 to 2000, 943 earthquakes 24:18 worldwide on the Richter scale, 314 times greater frequency. 24:23 This is really incredible. 24:25 Now before I talk about the pestilence, 24:27 I just want to tell you that if you look under-- 24:31 in the little book Last Day Events, 24:33 there's a section called "Cities" 24:35 and it will tell you there are other references but it says, 24:38 "Near the end, the coastal cities 24:41 that are plagued with wickedness will be swept away." 24:45 I don't need to tell you. 24:47 If you want to get on the internet, 24:49 you can check out what I'm telling you. 24:50 But on the weekend before Labor Day, 24:53 every year in New Orleans since 1972, 24:58 thousands and thousands-- 25:00 they were expecting 125,000 homosexuals 25:03 for the southern decadence parade 25:06 and week of celebration in New Orleans. 25:08 Two days before that happened, the Lord closed the city down. 25:11 I believe that. It was not a coincidence. 25:15 And that's an incredible thing to see that. 25:17 Let me just tell you I was in Norway this summer 25:18 for a camp meeting and an amazing thing happened. 25:21 A lady came to me and she just couldn't stop talking. 25:23 She said, "Do you remember the tsunami 25:25 on the 26th of December last year?" 25:27 She said, "There were 50 families from Norway. 25:29 My husband and some of his coworkers 25:31 and myself and so on, 25:33 50 families in a hotel in Thailand. 25:36 We don't know why, 25:38 but we chose our daughter asked us, 25:39 if we can sit on the back table. 25:42 We wanted to be close where we could see the ocean. 25:44 But when the tsunami came and it crashed through the walls 25:46 and people, and tables, and food were coming tearing toward us. 25:50 We were thrown out of the building 25:52 into the back of a pickup truck. 25:55 And that pickup was washed two and half kilometers 25:58 inland over a mile." And that family of four 26:03 were the only family who did not lose either else, 26:06 everyone in the family or someone in the family, 26:08 this Adventist family. She said, 26:11 "We were just hugging each other and crying all soaking wet. 26:14 Thankful that we were saved and we heard this terrible crash 26:17 and here came the second wave." 26:18 And she said, "We all climbed separate palm trees 26:21 and God spared our life the second time." 26:24 Incredible. You've seen the cities that bond, actually 26:27 just completely wiped out. Not even there anymore. 26:30 Okay, we're gonna go on to Pestilence, 26:31 but I wanna show you, 26:33 "In different places there will be pestilence, 26:35 earthquakes," and so on. 26:36 Go on to the next slide. Now this is an amazing thing. 26:39 I will only mention one of these. 26:40 And this one is the idea of AIDS. 26:45 It's very, very interesting to recognize that 25 years ago, 26:49 nobody had ever heard 26:51 the words immunodeficiency syndrome, 26:55 this acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, AIDS. 26:58 But in the last 25 years, 27:00 more than 60 million people have contracted AIDS. 27:03 More than 20 million have already died from it. 27:06 And if you look in the national news, magazines 27:09 and so on, you know that in Sub-Saharan Africa, 27:12 there are now more than 12 million AIDS orphans. 27:15 These are children, little children 27:17 who've lost both parents to AIDS. 27:19 It's an incredible thing. 27:20 And by the way we haven't even seen the peak of it yet. 27:23 Now we're seeing big ones in the former Soviet Union 27:26 that is big incidence of it, 27:28 also in China and in Southeast Asia, incredible. 27:31 Okay, let's go along real quickly 27:33 to the next one here on again. 27:35 I want to go to the next-- there we are. 27:38 Now I want to tell you that I would typically not do this 27:42 at a general public meeting. 27:44 But I want you to know that a sign, 27:46 a fulfilling of Revelation 13 is occurring 27:48 in a tremendous way today 27:50 and I will have to assume that you are familiar with Daniel 2, 27:54 and Daniel 7, and Revelation 13. 27:56 And that you understand the players at the end of time. 27:59 So I wanna talk to you about 28:00 the union of the church and state, 28:02 the Roman Government and the church, 28:04 and particularly church and state 28:05 in the United States. We'll go on ahead. 28:08 I'm just gonna show you in this particular one, 28:10 this is a picture-- 28:12 I scanned it actually out of inside the Vatican. 28:14 But President Bush, 28:16 the president of the United States 28:17 who was present for the opening 28:19 of the Pope John Paul the II Cultural Center 28:21 which is the little Vatican, they call it, 28:23 on the campus of Catholic University in Washington DC. 28:26 And by the way, 28:28 I will just point out to you, this particular picture 28:30 also is kind of interesting because Jim Nicholson 28:33 was Chairman of Republican National Committee 28:35 from 1997 to the year 2000. 28:37 Most of you probably never heard of this name. 28:39 But he's the primary politician in the Republican Party. 28:41 The next picture actually shows him 28:43 what he did for the next 4 years. 28:45 He became the U.S. ambassador to the Vatican. 28:47 This is rightly a mixture of church and state 28:49 as you can understand. 28:51 But notice what I have at the bottom there. 28:52 The Holy See that is the central government, 28:54 the Roman Catholic Church 28:55 has now full diplomatic relations with 172 nations. 28:59 Actually since I did this slide a week ago its 173 nations now. 29:02 But out of 228 recognized are sovereign nations 29:05 by the United Nations. That is 76% 29:08 of all of the sovereign nations on earth 29:10 have full diplomatic relations with the Vatican. 29:12 Okay? Now I'm gonna show you 29:14 how again church and state is working. 29:16 Most of you have know these two people just by sight 29:18 because they're very common in America. 29:20 The man on the left is Karl Rove, 29:21 who is the political strategist for the Bush administration. 29:24 And the man on the right is Jerry Falwell 29:26 who is a very influential, evangelical leader in America. 29:30 They met together at Liberty University in May of 2004 29:33 because Karl Rove told Jerry Falwell, 29:36 we need to get the president 29:37 re-elected and if we need to do that to be successful, 29:40 we'll need to have the Christians to help us 29:42 and they believed that that happened. 29:44 I'm just going to tell you that after the election, 29:47 Jerry Falwell just the bottom paragraph there, 29:49 "We're gonna be organizing in all 50 states, 29:52 and enlisting and training million of Americans 29:54 to become partners in this exciting task 29:57 of bringing this nation back to the moral values of faith 30:00 and family on which it was founded." 30:02 On to the next one, please. 30:03 Now this is a common face for most of you. 30:06 But what I'm gonna tell is not well known. 30:09 Then next-- Doctor James Dobson, 30:12 of Focus on the family just before last years election 30:15 resigned his position as the president of Focus on the family 30:18 and started a new organization that would not be hampered 30:22 by the restrictions for 5013C corporations. 30:27 The next slide please, brother. Thank you. 30:29 I'm just gonna read a quote from U.S. News 30:31 and World Report of January 17, 2005, 30:33 "Before the election, November 2004, 30:36 Dobson stepped down from the presidency of Focus, 30:38 he's still the chairman 30:39 but to launch Focus on the Family Action, 30:41 a fund-raising and grass-roots organizing engine 30:44 free of the political spending limits 30:46 imposed on the nonprofit focus. 30:48 The more-- the move allowed Dobson 30:51 to make his first presidential endorsement for President Bush 30:53 and to write hundreds of thousands 30:55 of Focus constituents in states 30:56 with tight Senate races with political advice, 30:59 and to appear in TV ads to unseat Senate Minority Leader, 31:03 Tom Daschle in South Dakota." 31:05 Now do you understand that James Dobson 31:07 made videos or movies 31:09 that were played on the television stations 31:11 and he personally went to South Dakota to defeat 31:13 the Senate Minority Leader, Tom Daschle? 31:16 He is out of his job. 31:18 Does everybody understand that? 31:19 James Dobson now says to all of the other centers 31:22 take a lesson from Tom Daschle. 31:24 You vote like we want you to or you're gonna be history. 31:27 You understand the power now of religion 31:29 in the political process in America. 31:32 Now I'm gonna show you something real interesting 31:33 because the pope's funeral showed us 31:35 two very, very interesting things. 31:38 The first one I'll point out to you is that this "M" 31:41 on the pope's coat of arms talks about Mary, 31:44 I'm all yours. Okay? 31:46 The next one is during the pope's funeral--by the way, 31:51 if you watched television the day of the pope's funeral 31:54 from 3 o'clock in the morning in the United States 31:55 to 9 o'clock in the morning that was all that was on TV. 31:58 So most of you if you watched TV during that period of time, 32:00 you saw this that he was buried in a little pine box. 32:03 But his will was released at that same time 32:06 and he said, speaking to Mary, "I'm completely in your hands." 32:10 That was his last will and testament. 32:12 So he also has that little M on the casket as you can see. 32:15 And then we also wanted to mention something interesting. 32:19 "Christianity Today" which is the largest circulated 32:22 evangelical publication in the world 32:24 is now encouraging Protestants to also accept Mary. 32:28 Now the reason that I mention this is-- 32:30 because you are well aware that spiritualism 32:33 has two constituent elements. 32:35 One is that you believe in the conscious 32:37 existence of man after death. 32:39 And the second one is you believe that being or person 32:41 who's died can communicate with people on the earth. 32:44 So spirit Mariology by definition is spiritualism. 32:48 But here's Christianity today, the blessed evangelical Mary. 32:51 And also on Time Magazine 32:53 "Hail, Mary" Catholics have long revered her. 32:55 Now Protestants are finding their own reasons 32:58 to celebrate the mother of Jesus. 33:01 So you understand, this is the glue 33:02 that's kind of bringing together. 33:04 Okay? I wanted to show you something also. 33:07 Before the pope died, the year before in June, 33:09 the President of the United States 33:10 went to the Vatican and gave the pope the Medal of Freedom 33:13 which is the highest honor that the United States 33:15 can honor to anyone. 33:16 Okay, we'll go rapidly through some of these other ones. 33:19 This is the flag on the White House at half-staff 33:24 during the pope's funeral day. 33:26 And it's kind of interesting that the President made an order 33:29 that all government buildings, 33:31 all government embassies around the world 33:32 and all of our ships at sea have their flags 33:34 at half-staff in honor of the pope. 33:37 The pope appeared on the cover of many, many magazines 33:40 and I'm gonna show you. Go ahead to the next one, please. 33:43 He appeared a record 16 times on Time Magazine. 33:47 The next one actually shows you 15 of them 33:49 and that other one was one of them. 33:51 Uh, go ahead. Under his leadership, 33:54 of course Newsweek Magazine says that, 33:56 "Pope John Paul who helped bring down the Iron Curtain, 33:58 the Holy See gained more political clout 34:00 than it had enjoyed since the Renaissance." 34:04 The pope's funeral was the largest attended 34:07 funeral in world history. 34:09 More than a million people actually came to Rome. 34:12 And I'll just go on quickly and show you 34:13 some of the others. Revelation 13:3, it says, 34:16 "And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; 34:19 his deadly wound was healed; 34:20 and all the world wondered after the beast." 34:22 Now the interesting thing about 34:23 that you've seen picture likely. 34:26 It's been on the cover of Liberty Magazine and so on. 34:29 But you have the President of the United States 34:31 kneeling here, his wife, Laura Bush kneeling here, 34:34 former President Bush kneeling, 34:36 Bill Clinton kneeling, Condoleezza Rice kneeling. 34:38 By the way, there were only five 34:40 from the American delegation 34:41 because it was the largest gathering of world leaders 34:46 in the history of earth went to the funeral. 34:49 And we were actually 34:51 limited to only five people to go from the U.S. 34:54 Jimmy Carter wanted to go too, 34:55 but there was not room for him with those others there. 34:58 Presidents and Kings, Prime Ministers, 35:00 Heads of State from more than 100 countries. 35:02 And they said it was the largest funeral in history 35:04 and there is never been a-- these are the--by the way, 35:07 are from inside the Vatican. 35:08 These pictures and this little statement, thank you. 35:11 By the way, the new Pope Cardinal Ratzinger was, 35:14 for the past 24 years, the leader of the Congregation 35:16 for the Doctrine of the Faith, 35:18 formerly called the Office of the Inquisition in the Vatican. 35:21 Now I want to give you just a little insight. 35:23 Go--another one, please. Another one too. 35:26 I want to get right over to the U.S. Supreme Court 35:28 because our time is up here and everybody's hungry 35:31 and I just want you to see these even farther. 35:33 Go on till you see the Supreme court, even more. 35:36 Okay, there we are. And I'll give you just one-- 35:38 there are the names of the Supreme court justices, 35:41 and go to one more, 35:43 and you can see there are their ages. 35:45 Three of the Supreme court justices, 35:47 Antonin Scalia on the left, Clarence Thomas right here, 35:50 and Anthony Kennedy right there are Roman Catholics 35:53 and the reason I mention that is because the Catholic church 35:55 has recently printed in the publication 35:57 "I Receive in Sight." 35:59 Our Sunday visitor, that if-- go to the next slide, please. 36:03 If John Roberts, who was just recently 36:06 approved by the Senate Judiciary committee. 36:08 If he is approved, this next week 36:09 will be the fourth Roman Catholic 36:11 on the U.S. Supreme court. 36:13 The largest number in the history of the court. 36:15 And of course, John Roberts is 50 years old 36:17 and would likely be on the Supreme Court for many years. 36:20 And of course, there's even another vacancy. 36:22 Let's go on to the next one. 36:23 Alberto Gonzales was also a Roman Catholic. 36:25 That is the current Attorney General. 36:28 The President had said he would like him to be 36:29 but he may be too controversial to be confirmed. 36:31 Let's go on--keep going until-- this was one I want you see. 36:36 This is one of the last slides here 36:37 before I just show you the seventh sign. 36:39 And that is-- this is on the Roman Catholic 36:42 website called Glenmary.org. 36:44 G-L-E-N. Just one N. The Roman Catholic church 36:48 actually has a goal of having the predominant religion 36:51 in every county in the United States. 36:53 That is every voting precinct to be Roman Catholic. 36:57 In the United States of the 3,143 counties 37:00 and independent cities they state, 37:02 they are the predominant religion of 1,295 counties 37:06 or 40% of the counties, 37:07 which is represented here in blue, by the way. 37:10 The red are the southern Baptists down here. 37:12 You can see where Michigan is there, 37:14 all but about seven counties predominantly Roman Catholic. 37:16 Now the reason that this is the goal of the church is 37:18 because they want to be very prominent 37:21 in all of the election processes that go forward in America. 37:24 Okay, now the last one and the greatest one 37:27 is the Gospel is going to all the world. 37:29 And I think this is absolutely incredible. 37:32 I do not think of myself as a TV star, 37:34 but I can just tell you most everywhere I go, 37:36 whether it's South Africa or Norway 37:38 and Japan or whatever, people say to me, 37:40 "We've seen you on 3ABN." 3ABN has a footprint now 37:44 that covers virtually the entire earth. 37:46 Adventist world radio, the same thing. 37:48 It's really incredible to understand 37:50 that the Gospel will be preached to all the world, 37:53 then the end will come. 37:54 And I want to go on to another slide near the end. 37:57 One big problem faces people 37:58 and that's not everyone that says to me, 38:00 "Lord, Lord" will enter the kingdom, 38:02 but he that does the will of my father. 38:04 And there's another final picture there, 38:06 go on to the next one. 38:09 There's one more, I think. I want to show you 38:10 a final one of the second coming. 38:12 And this one is-- their it is, right there. 38:15 When Jesus comes, will you be ready? 38:18 Now let me just give you about 2 minutes of an appeal. 38:20 This is my last slide. 38:21 I want to tell you it's high time, 38:25 that we as Christian leaders recognize that God is giving us 38:29 signs coming out of our ears. 38:32 We are near the end. I think, that as Christians, 38:37 we ought to recognize a number of important points. 38:40 And that is, we know that, 38:42 we've been told in great controversy, 38:43 page 593 and 594, 38:45 no one but those who have their minds 38:47 fortified with God's word are going to stand 38:49 through the last time. The big question is, 38:51 are we fortifying our minds with God's word? 38:54 Do you understand? 38:55 I mean, we know the answer to this question. 38:58 I don't think my mind is fortified. 39:00 I love this Bible and I have this one pretty well marked 39:02 and so on and it's even taped together. 39:04 But for the last 5 years, my wife Kathy 39:07 and I have been reading the Bible through together 39:10 out loud every year. 39:11 That means three chapters a day and four on Sabbath. 39:14 And even I call her on the cell phone, 39:16 and we do the readings that we-- when I'm away. 39:19 Because we want to have 39:22 our minds fortified with the word of God. 39:24 Someone asked me recently, 39:27 "How do you have time to write all these books?" 39:29 And I said, "It's simple. No television." 39:35 Most of the people you see on TV, 39:38 with the exception of 3ABN, but let me just tell you, 39:41 most of the people you see on broadcast, 39:42 normal broadcast television ABC. CBS, NBC, CNN. 39:46 Most of those people 39:47 are not even planning to go to heaven. 39:51 I'm not judging these people, you ask them. 39:53 This great Peter Jennings who recently died, 39:55 not one word was said that he's in heaven. 39:57 Is that true or not? 39:59 Have you ever heard anybody say it? 40:00 They're not going to say it. He wasn't planning to go. 40:05 And if we live and act like people on TV, 40:07 we're probably not going either. 40:09 I think it is time for us to spend time in the word. 40:12 This is very, very important. And to pray regularly 40:16 and to share God's word with people. 40:18 We know where we are in time, 40:20 it's very, very important. 40:22 Now I'm going to meddle a little bit, 40:24 because this is my role in the North American division. 40:27 But it's pretty simple to me. 40:29 If I as a man, and not willing to trust God 40:34 and be faithful with my tithe and offerings at a time 40:37 when it is relative prosperity. 40:39 What am I going to do when I can't buy or sell? 40:43 Do you understand what I mean by that? 40:45 If I can't trust God to take of my family right now, 40:49 will I trust him then? 40:52 It is time for us to recognize that a great revival in Malachi, 40:56 the third chapter, beginning with verse six. 40:58 God says, "Return to me and I will return to you." 41:02 So we're talking about important things here. 41:05 Faithfulness, and for our families 41:07 and our children to know that we love God 41:09 and we pray for them and we do things with them. 41:11 And we make Sabbath 41:12 a special day for them and so on. 41:14 It's an awesome thing to understand 41:17 what we know and not tell anybody about it. 41:21 You remember that experience in the siege of Samaria 41:24 when the lepers went out. 41:26 And they said, "If we stay in here, 41:28 we're going to die. If we go out there, 41:29 they might just kill us." 41:31 But when they went out there, the Syrians were gone 41:34 and they had all this food out there. 41:36 And they first jump in and started eating like crazy, 41:38 and then they thought, "Man, we've got all this stuff 41:41 and there's people starving back inside. 41:43 We ought to tell them." 41:44 Do you understand the point? 41:46 Somehow the good news needs to be shared with other people. 41:50 Jesus is coming. The one who died for us, 41:53 the one who calmed the storm, 41:54 and raised the dead and fed the 5,000, all of that. 41:57 That awesome God did all of that, 42:00 so he could come back. 42:02 So I'm going to encourage you 42:04 as you're here to pray together and to attend the seminars 42:09 and make a commitment that you will be faithful. 42:12 Do you know that we are told that Jesus said, 42:15 "Where two or three are gathered together, 42:16 I'll be in midst with you." So we know God's here, 42:20 we know the holy angels are here. 42:21 We've invited them. 42:22 They're going to send a report back to heaven. 42:26 Would you like them to tell the heavenly beings there 42:29 that you're planning to come soon 42:31 and you thank God that you're seeing all these signs? 42:33 Would you like to just raise your hand 42:34 and let the Lord know that? Thank you very much. 42:37 I want to pray for you and ask God to bless you. 42:40 We're going to sing just one stanza of a song, 42:42 I believe, and have a benediction 42:44 and then some information about the meal together. 42:48 Let's bow our heads. 42:50 Father, I want to thank you for the opportunity 42:53 we have of being together today, 42:55 for the inspiration of this hour. 42:57 You've seen the commitment of those who are here today, 43:00 wanting to take seriously the signs 43:02 and spend more time in your word 43:03 and talking with you in prayer and sharing 43:06 and with our families. 43:07 May we have your blessing as we make these commitments. 43:10 May this be a special day for each of us 43:12 as we go to our places of rest. 43:15 Later, we pray that you'll help us 43:17 to contemplate individually and may our prayer life 43:19 and our devotional time with you grow and strengthen 43:22 so that very soon we can hear the words, 43:24 "Well done, good and faithful servant. 43:26 Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 43:28 I pray that you'll bless each family that's represented. 43:31 The leaders of our churches 43:32 and the leaders of the conference 43:34 and the fathers and the brothers and the--everyone who's here. 43:38 I pray that you'll help us to be 43:39 so committed to you that people will be able to tell 43:41 that we've been with Jesus. 43:43 In his name we pray, amen. |
Revised 2014-12-17