Pandemic, Politics, Papacy, and Prophecy: Year End Review with Doug Batchelor

very impressed that we're on the cusp the threshold of some very momentous events and in in looking back over 2021 we wanted to do a special dialogue with you and we're calling this pandemic politics prophecy and the papacy and we're going to be reviewing pastor ross and i just some extraordinary things that have happened this last year we're going to look at them in the lens of bible prophecy and we invite you to be calling in if you've got any special questions that you'd like to ask or you cannot call in so much as email in or you can comment on facebook and right now you might want to text your friends and say there is a live special program streaming from amazing facts regarding a summary of what's happened prophetically the last year in 2020 and we're going to explore these things and also look ahead at some of the hopeful things ahead but pastor ross maybe before we begin we should start with the word of prayer absolutely dear father in heaven we thank you that we have this opportunity to be able to reflect back and look at some rather interesting things that have passed this this year and also see those those signposts those way marks that you have placed for us to see where we are in the great stream of time and as we see what's happening in the world today we know that our redemption is drawing near so we ask your blessing upon this program and send your spirit not only to pastor doug myself here but those who are viewing this around the country and around the world in jesus name amen amen you know pastor duggan discussing some of the things we're going to talk about tonight and we have quite the list so we're going to be moving right along but there was a verse that came to mind and uh you find it in uh mark chapter 13 and it's actually in verse 33 all the way through to verse 37 jesus told a parable about a certain house owner or land owner who was going away on a journey and he told his servants i'm going to be gone but he left instructions for them and one of the things that the master of the house said is he said watch and you find that in verse 33 of of mark mark 13 take heed jesus said watch and pray for you do not know when the time is and then in that parable the next four or five verses the word watch is repeated four times so it's been emphasized that again and again jesus says watch watch watch finally he culminates this parable in verse 37 and he says what i say to you i say to all watch so there's this emphasis of being alert of knowing the time seeing what's happening around us and understanding it from the view or the lens of bible prophecy for these things have to take place jesus says these are signs of the soon coming yeah and then of course in matthew he tells us that uh you can sell tell the weather by looking at the sky says can you not discern the signs of the times and 2020 has been uh you know we've run out of broadcasters keep looking for new superlatives and adjectives to talk about they see it it's been a tumultuous unprecedented historic year and it's been all of that but you know more than anything as as these things are unfolding i'm praying the people of god don't get used to the crisis as we're going through it so if people have ever wondered wonder what the world would look like when we enter the last days i wonder what the final events are going to be like now is what those final events are going to be like in fact i might mention to i think santiago who is watching off the set with us right now he said there's a free offer we're going to make available tonight of the final events magazine online and i think he said we're going to text the word i want to double check future 240 is it uh four zero five four or four zero i don't know they're going to have to that will pass it doug so anyway we got a free offer for you to tell you about this came together very quickly yes maybe santiago would let us know put up a slide but we do have sort of eight categories that we're going to quickly run through this evening of things that we just feel were very significant in this past year pastor doug we started 2020 with all kinds of travel plans there were great evangelistic opportunities we were going to do meetings around the world literally but everything seemed to be come to a screeching halt come around march of this year as everybody knows we ran into a global pandemic and that's really the first uh category that we want to talk about a little bit this evening is this amazing pandemic that we find as i say now as far as pandemics go this one is very widespread because it is around the world but as far as deadliness you look back in history there were some other plagues that resulted in greater numbers of people dying who were infected than this but nevertheless this is still a serious pandemic and it's reshaped a lot of things in our world yeah so even it seems like it's even more serious in the respect to how it has disrupted the world and altered history uh you know economically socially politically and just spiritually in just about every way that you can measure the pandemic has had an impact and uh i was in australia with karen when this first broke out and you know we were right by china and they began to implement some restrictions there and we thought we weren't going to get home and so yeah we've seen of course just major restrictions on travel and gatherings and it would never have we seen so much detail dictated by the government on you know how big the group can be whether it's in the church or in the family no gatherings above the weddings funerals people died and they couldn't have a funeral and so it was just it was very strange and the reason we're bringing this to everybody's attention is because you know we're not wanting to do a special program on wine and pine doom and gloom we're wanting to talk about um you know what does this mean prophetically and we know that as we near the end there's going to be an increase on political government and even religious control and we saw an incredible surge in those things in this last year maybe we can we can give some examples i got my cell phone right here sitting on the table and uh it's kind of interesting pastor a couple weeks ago i got an alert that popped up on my phone i didn't sign up for anything it just popped up somehow and it says you might have been exposed to someone with covet well how would they know that anyway well i guess there are tracking software available that can actually track the movement of people through their phone through the gps and they know where you go who you came in contact with how long you're in contact with that person and we're just seeing these unprecedented government controls and it seems like most of the people are accepting these things because of fear because they realize things are different there's this pandemic were certain freedoms that seemed to be just giving it away in the name of fear yeah i think there was one politician that said you don't want to waste a good crisis and i think this crisis has been exploited by political leaders and certain people in power to manipulate the masses to some extent and again we're not denying that this is real but it's just human nature that when there's power that's available and control that's available people will try to seize it and make the most of it another interesting connective with that is you've seen the past that i know i have and i'm sure those who are watching if i've seen this as well there seems to be a shift in uh tension or at least a greater tension and even some suspicion of people that normally you wouldn't be suspicious of for example you go to the store and uh everybody at the store is kind of looking at each other a little strange they all get their mass on and every now and again you hear somebody grumbling because somebody's standing too close to them or if someone happens to sneeze or cough uh you know everybody looks as if it's something terrible thing that's happened but i mean we know it's real we know this you know this this pandemic's out there but it's changed the way people interact with each other you know estrangers would often talk and you talk to somebody at the store how are you doing you don't find much of that happening anymore i know yeah you just made me think about that i i sometimes struggle with hay fever and i'd be walking through walmart and i'd sneeze or something and then everyone looks like it's like you burp at a white house dinner i mean you feel really embarrassed and everyone's self-conscious yes and everyone's looking at each other it seems through a lens of what is appropriate and inappropriate behavior yeah you walk towards someone and some people bump elbows they kick feet or they bump fists and you you're just hi you know you don't know you see an old friend or family member and you don't know whether it's okay to give him a hug and and it is it's really changed things yeah not only of course north america but we're talking about something global that's really happening around the world so an increase in tension uh that we find with social behavior there's also and this is amazing pastor an increase in online censorship and it's kind of it's it's been couched in providing accurate information about the pandemic uh but along those same lines we begin to see more control over freedom of speech than probably we've ever seen before yeah i'm all for truth this whole ministry is about truth but i think that the reason we're able to proclaim so freely is because even people who want to circulate nonsense have that right in america and when the main purveyors of you know social media begin to say we're going to pick people that'll decide whether or not what you say is true or not and they start to censor you wow that gives an awful lot of power to control freedom of speech to a handful of people and it seems like there's a bias also there's certain religious things you know amazing facts i won't mention the social media giant but on one of the great outlets of social media we said something that protestants have said for years about the papacy being identified as the beast and they flagged it as hate speech and we said it in a very nice way but boy that's really frightening when they can start censoring you like that and i think that's why we even mentioned this past today is because our message that god has called us to take to the world is the three angels messages in the three angels message it warns about the beast and about his mark and about the image of the beast it talks about babylon being fallen being folded not necessarily popular messages and when we find freedom of of speech being taken away it's going to hinder the preaching of the gospel and that's why we're concerned absolutely we need to make sure that we can preserve these freedoms as long as possible and then along the same lines um a lot of discussion about vaccines of course it's just coming out right now and yes we believe that we need to do something and vaccines have a very appropriate place but i think the concern is how rapidly these vaccines have been pushed to market more than any other vaccines developed in the past as rapidly and then also it seems as though some major companies are coming out at least travel companies saying you can't fly on our airline unless you have a vaccine or evidence for evidence yeah right you've had that so uh we are taking things into a different realm that we've never had before yeah and if they start saying that you can and can't go to business trips you can and can't go to certain business places it might even affect you can't come to this mall i mean we don't know how far it's going to go when people are afraid i forget who it was it may have been franklin who said that if people are willing to sacrifice their freedom for a sense of security they will end up with neither freedom or security and that's at the point i think we're at right now okay well that's just one we have some other things you want to talk about so that brings us to our second and that is uh social instability what a year this has been for protests riots um tension amongst different groups race tension there's a lot that's happened this year yeah in matthew 24 where jesus talks about national rise against nation i think in the original greek it's the word ethnos that's where we get ethnicity and it's the the the racial tensions and the way that those differences have been accentuated have it's been inflammatory and there's just been a lot of anger and a lot of probably pent-up frustration that just exploded into the streets now i lived through i remember i'm just a little older than you but i remember the assassination of dr martin luther king robert kennedy and the rights back then i don't think we've seen anything in recent history as we saw this year in streets just as you flip the channel from city to city around america the anger erupting and innocent people suffering for something they had nothing to do with uh and so um yeah we just uh who can deny that this was a big problem and i don't think it's gone away we've seen a massive surge now this might sound interesting to some but there's been a massive surge of gun sales in the united states in 2020. so that tells us well people are afraid maybe it's because of the unrest the protests the violence the rights whatever it might be in the cities but people feel as though they need to arm themselves even more and increasing gun sales and ammunition one of the things that has sold like crazy this last year toilet paper and ammunition those things have just disappeared off the shelf so it tells us there is there is fear in our society like never before yeah and um it should be of concern when we realize that uh and this is i think something we'll talk about a little later but a country that is so polarized politically and in other ways and that people are arming themselves so heavily you just wonder if this is ever going to uh you know mature into an eruption of violence in a meltdown of some sort well then that leads us to another area that sometimes has not been addressed but we hear more of it today in the media and that is an increase of depression divorce drug use domestic violence as a result of the shutdown people losing their jobs families struggling financially just a lot of tension in the home and you know it's terrible how this has been a surge this year of people not dying from covert but dying from violence dying from suicide yeah people struggling with depression yeah the residual suffering connected with these shutdowns and the economic challenges and you and i we're pastors we've seen it there's folks who have lost loved ones they couldn't do a funeral and the incredible depression that they couldn't get their regular grieving and comfort and families that may have had some marital problems without the space of being able to you know go off and shop or go off and work and you know it just accentuated the problems and people who already had a proclivity to drink or smoke the liquor stores were open uh and uh and i might mention at this point that well no i'll save it but that's another some of these things are interrelated and of course we're talking about the schools being closed past it a lot of kids are home i mean for a whole school year just about they've been trying to do classes online yeah they say the grades have gone down it's been stressful for the parents because they're taking care of the kids so just a lot of very interesting things that's happened this year well then that brings us to the next category and this is economic uncertainties now of course when the pandemic began to take place and we had the initial closings of business you know the stock market just collapsed and there was great financial uncertainty now the stock market has pretty much recovered the losses that it had early in the year but there's still a lot of folks who are struggling economically because of this pandemic yeah and i'm i'm not a financial expert i like history though and i've just seen that historically if a government um it just begins to print money willy-nilly billions of dollars and they sort of artificially buoy up the market not through genuine production but they're just printing they're just kind of injecting it's like a sugar rush you know you can get a person that is struggling from hunger you can give them an injection of sugar and they're gonna rush for a while but when that is over then they crash and we've had several injections of adrenaline caffeine sugar into the financial system and it'll give you a temporary surge but then there's a corresponding dropout after that and that's a concern is that you know so many people haven't been working people haven't been able to pay their rent uh government the the checks that people get doesn't even cover a fragment of the losses of small businesses it's a pittance and you know it's almost like there's an artificial or a plastic [Music] reflection we're seeing in the market right now and you just wonder at some point we've got like two trains on the same track heading towards each other and you're not wondering if they're going to collide but you're wondering when they're going to collide at some point there's going to be an economic earthquake and and it's just a fact of life that markets kind of go up and down and when you get a surge at some point you can't have a boom forever and so here you get people who are out of work and the market's going up and you're going what's going on and so i i think that people ought to be praying about what this the decisions they make financially you and i were talking earlier and it's it's kind of like playing that game uno where for a christian you want jesus to come with no money left in the bank you don't want it to all be invested in the market and have it go out yeah you know along those same lines it's also interesting to see the uh the dependency that individuals and families are having now who were self-reliant before but they're becoming more dependent upon the government now that to me is alarming i mean yes we realize the government is there to help and they play an important role but when your independence or you become so dependent upon the government that um without the government sort of providing for you or or sustaining you you collapse it's a concern people large larger parts of the population are becoming more dependent upon the government whether it's for food whether it's for housing whether it's for health whatever it might be people are becoming more and more dependent upon the government that should be a concern yeah well ultimately that's how socialist countries like you know the ussr and china and venezuela they they get where um everyone sort of depends on the and then if people feel like they're not getting paid enough the unions take over and we've got prophetic information that unions are going to have a big role in the last days they keep clamoring for more and more rights and benefits and pretty soon it breaks the piggy bank yeah and then passage you know all of our people probably watching they were there as well we heard news that the government might be not the government but businesses might be shutting down the government's shutting down businesses and i went to the store this is the beginning of the year and i saw carts filled with spaghetti and beans and and paper goods and they were lined up clear to the back of the store and around the back and i asked one of the ladies there at the till i asked have you ever seen anything like this she says i've never seen a rush on on food like this before now fortunately you know we made it through that rush but it shows us how quickly things could be rationed and i think you brought up the point pastor it's one thing to run out of paper goods it's another thing to run out of food yeah the pandemic caused no food shortage in north america but there was a fear and people were doing two things kind of control buying it's fear and greed and there was a fear that took over that what if so even with the trucks all still running and gas in the trucks to deliver we saw on the news people in the markets physically fighting over toilet paper what would happen if heaven forbid there wasn't fuel and the trucks couldn't deliver and there was a shortage of food or there was a famine jesus said there'll be famines in the last days along with pandemics i would i'd not want to be in one of these major cities you saw what happened some of the looting and it was just out of control so definitely it's been quite the year for economic uncertainties some are wondering are we entering you know are we finishing up the seven years of plenty are we preparing for the seven years of famine you know for the situation with joseph and egypt but yeah we are living in some very interesting times absolutely and and the reason we're talking about these things again friends is we're actually very hopeful we'll get to that in just a minute so stay with us all right the next category that we wanted to mention is natural disasters and this has been a year for natural disasters beginning with fires unprecedented fires in the u.s especially on the west coast not just one state but multiple states on the west coast fires in europe some historic fires i believe in spain this this last summer of course fires in australia just an increase in natural disasters you've got the fires on the west coast you've got hurricanes on the east coast you've got flooding in the south you've got tornadoes typhoons in the south pacific just global natural disasters and you kind of experienced firsthand these fires in northern california yeah just the footnote is i was actually out in the front yard of our place up in kovalev talking to a friend when we saw the lightning strikes of the august fire we watched it and then and we i saw little wisps of smoke coming up and we knew that there was a lightning strike well that happens all the time then about a week later they still had not got that fire out because they were fighting fires around the bay area and i was driving across the mountains at night and i got lost and trapped in that fire i shouldn't say trapped i was able to get out but i know i actually did get trapped between two fires and have to take a third way out and that was pretty frightening i put those pictures online people saw and then and then that fire burned for a month it became the largest fire in north america history called the august fire because it started in the month of august it was over a month before they put it out over a million acres burned and then we saw them put it out i was actually bulldozing during the fire uh trying to help create fire breaks so in the devastation you can fly 60 miles over that fire and never leave the burned area it's just unbelievable beautiful forests that are just scorched and if nothing that happened with the pandemic or politically or socially or economically just the natural disasters this year would have made the history books but all these things has been a confluence and doesn't jesus say that at the end of time it's not just the the war and the rumors of war but it's the confluence of these things so that they intensify like birth pains right and the frequency seems to be increasing the intensity seems to be increasing another one we didn't mention past days also some record seating uh setting heat waves across north america in some of the the cities way up in the north new york and i like during the summer and of course also in europe and even in the the northern areas of russia they were reporting some incredible heat that is unusual that they have up there so all of these natural disasters that we see happening in the world are they warning signs and the natural disasters come up a little later because some political and religious leaders are thinking now we can fix that and organize we're going to save the world and the disasters just people say yeah if you think you can fix the climate by making religious laws then let's do it yeah and they're going to be ready for that the next area is polarized politics and boy was this true this year because we had an election and it's been a pretty contentious election season but setting that aside for just a minute something very interesting that we see happening uh is the makeup of the supreme court it's it's unique in the religious beliefs of who the uh the supreme court judges are and i believe there's there's seven roman catholics on the court and two jews yeah no protestants i know that's uh that's amazing because america was largely founded by protestants fleeing religious persecution across the atlantic and that we would slowly in the last 50 years go from where there are only protestants on the supreme court to where there are no protestants on the supreme court you wonder if that's just a pure coincidence or has prophecy said things like this are coming and you know assuming that the election is not going to be overturned again that uh we'll have a the second roman catholic president and again assuming there's no immediate change speaker of the house would be uh another roman catholic and the most powerful positions in the country uh are have suddenly shifted away from the protestant ethics you know the interesting thing about those who are in these positions these roman catholics both the presidency speaker of the house these are individuals that have been very vocal in support of the agenda that is being put forth by the papacy yes so they they're not opposed to some of the dogmen we'll get to that in just a minute they're actually actively supporting and encouraging some of these people ideas so very interesting times yeah also one of the things related to politics and now is just how that we've seen so much commotion and distrust with reference to the election itself it doesn't matter who ends one side or the other is questioning how legitimate the election was yeah whenever there's an election there's a one side that's happy and one sided sad depending on who they were campaigning for but the the depth of the antagonism has seldom broke out into such violence in the streets and you know for the last four years one side has been contesting the legitimacy of the election and now it looks like we're going during another four years where it's going to be contested uh and um that just you know that just really polarizes a culture and for a for a republic that's supposed to say united we stand it's very unhealthy when that happens all right well here we get to the real heart now as you're talking about think something's closer to what we want to talk about and that is the erosion of religious freedoms i think that's one of the biggest concerns that we have and for one we've seen a global shutdown of public worship because of the pandemic yeah yet at the same time the restrictions that have been made on public worship uh you've got you know governments that are saying well it's okay to sell liquor and even gambling and strip clubs can be open you can go to big box stores that we have here in town that are just jammed with people and yet they say if you come together not only you're not allowed to at least in our state they don't want any gatherings right now and some churches are refusing to abide by that it's a couple of cases made it to the supreme court in central california one church has over a million dollars in fines now because they continue to meet and yet theoretically you know if if we were strip clubs can be open liquor stores and bars can be open casinos so if we were gambling stripping and drinking during church we'd be okay i mean there's just something really wrong with it but they say no you can't even sing right now i'm not disputing that when there is a pandemic you need to take extraordinary measures to prevent the spread out of love for your neighbor what we're disputing here is the inconsistency in how that's being implemented and then also along those same lines we have the government defining appropriate and inappropriate worship just you mentioned you can sing you can't sing only so many people are allowed to meet you can't have communion so there's there's some strange things that are happening where the government is beginning to exercise authority in areas where the government hasn't really exercised authority now why is that significant well if you look at the light of bible prophecy we see that increasing as we near the end of time so that's why we want to emphasize this it is it is an interesting time where the government is starting to exercise more authority and religious things and part of what concerns me is and again i'm not disputing that everybody was a little concerned when you first saw the images coming in from spain italy and china folks just spilling out of the hospitals dying and we thought wow you know this is serious and they talked about let's you know take a couple weeks and flatten the curve but as months rolled by the idea that so many christians got used to not going to church and letting the government dictate when they could go we have a lot of members in our church from eastern europe and they said boy this is very strangely reminiscent of what we are being told for your safety do not gather for worship they said it's for your benefit the children shouldn't go to religious schools and and they always came off that it was for your benefit and that just is a little unnerving when you hear the american government say no it's not we love you to protect you you shouldn't be gathering together for worship you can go to the bar or casino it's just it didn't set right and then what about pasadena in some circles there's there's been the government requesting records of people who attend church i guess for tracing yeah well we had that here you know the health department was telling us earlier this year they said now if you're gonna once you do open up we want you to keep a record so if there's an outbreak we know how to trace it back and find out who caused it that's pretty eerie is when the government's wanting you to take records of everybody that's coming or to be able to view the cameras in the church to see who was there in case and again great arguments you know if there's an outbreak we want to track it and stop it but it's still but where does it go what's the next step you know what's the next step so very interesting um we've also spoken a little bit about some of the impacts this has had on on the work of the gospel in general just missionary activity i know it's amazing facts we have some folks who are overseas doing the work of missions and they face some challenges because this is an international pandemic it's made it harder for people to travel it's made it harder for people to go door to door to do evangelistic meetings public evangelistic meetings so we've seen struggling in traditional forms of evangelism it's become harder yeah and you know praise the lord our workers and some of them in countries we can't identify right now have continued to be able to do the work but they have to take sometimes extraordinary measures and do things through uh you know radio or internet or publications and uh but you know god's work jesus his work is still going forward but it is definitely you know we both had international trips planned in meetings and that's all been postponed yeah well that brings us to our next item which is an amplified people agenda now this is interesting past today we have a health catastrophe we have the pandemic on the one hand we have the government extending its influence we have people becoming more dependent upon the government and then you add the papacy that is very vocal in a particular agenda which seems to line up with some of the things happening in the world natural disasters tell us about what's happening there yeah you know it's the old uh trick where you've got the shell game they call it where you put a you know walnut under michelle or something you start moving around and they use the diversionary tactic and the world has been so diverted by the things that have been happening connected with the pandemic that i don't know that everyone realizes that the agenda of the antichrist has made great strides forward during this time and when you just read in in the bible what it says about last day prophecy for example i think it was kind of stunning when just in the month of december when the pope invited 27 of the world's most powerful ceos from north america that companies like you know bank of america and mastercard johnson johnson visa representing billions of dollars and trillions of dollars in assets and led by the famous banking rothschild family they meet with the pope and they become part of this guardians of inclusive capitalism with the mission to create a new paradigm for world business and these are articles from new york times we're not you know digging this up from conspiracy websites and they're celebrating that they're going to help kind of recreate the world it says this council will follow this or from the the uh catholic website's own news release this council will follow the warnings from pope francis to listen to the cry of the earth that's something we keep hearing and of the poor and answer society's demands for a more equitable and sustainable model of growth so you've got econo and these businesses all of a sudden it seems like companies like mastercard and johnson and johnson google youtube facebook they're welding more power amazon they're buying newspapers these companies are helping to mold what people think and i think that is a little bit disturbing so you've got that i think a lot of our friends remember when the pope said that uh on may 15 they were gonna have a special global compact on education that was postponed it was going to be at the vatican until october 15 well the pope did have that meeting it was more of a virtual meeting and in that meeting he gave you know an appeal to safeguard and cultivate our common home again the environmental appeal pope is kind of branding himself as the savior of the planet and instead of using the religious grounds for making laws they're using the environmental grounds because that that'll bring in your atheists that'll bring in your hindus that'll bring in the jews the muslims everybody can buy into well we all live in this common home and so how clever to use the fear about the environment to start implementing change and religious laws and then on october 10 the pope met with world leaders and produced a special a ted meeting and these are meetings where they used to emphasize technology and you know education and they called it countdown and the purpose of it is to build a better future by cutting greenhouse emissions by 2030. everyone from vice president al gore former vice president al gore prince william and many other celebrities were there and it's like the media thinkers and the leaders of the world are saying we're going to save the environment and then just in december 4 the vatican released a handbook avada mekim a 50-page guide for how catholic bishops and priests can promote unity with evangelicals and other christian denominations a whole handbook on how to go about and they they announce it so this stuff is is just the stunning and yet you don't hear christians talking much about what's going on right now and of course you have a whole movement that falls right in line with this and that's giving giving the earth a sabbath rest called the green sabbath yeah and of course there's a whole movement for sunday sunday observance where you don't buy you don't sell you just rest let the earth rest and we even heard this the beginning of the pandemic when businesses were shut down people were saying it's kind of nice pollution has dropped globally maybe we need to have some kind of day where we set aside and of course bible prophecy tells us which day that is and what happens as a result of this sunday legislation out of fear yeah for what's happening in the world the plan of the economy and that are going to be seeing a perception of the wrath of god people are going to turn to god some out of fear and that kind of leads us into maybe some of the good news absolutely and of course even though this was a rough year in a number of ways this was really an incredible year for the proclamation of the gospel and that brings us to our final area when we talk about i know it's it's impacted a lot of churches financially because the people can't meet together and yet it's a great opportunity to do evangelism and the lord has just blessed amazing facts uh in a most remarkable way in 2020. we're talking about this earlier pastor doug 2020 is going to go down as a flagship year in the proclamation of the gospel for amazing facts it's it's been an incredible year of opportunity for ministry so we've seen a tremendous increase in in what the bible says so our bible school enrollment and amazing facts has reached an all-time high of people wanting to study the bible wanting to know what the bible says about the future yeah just the records have been shattered when it comes to people interested online uh i think when we did then the revelation now program you know we had just 3.5 million people that tuned in to that event and as you said our online evangelism training just probably quadrupled and so you know people are hungry uh they're wondering about the end people are searching and so you know the bible says where sin abounds grace abounds it's also true that where problems abound interest in the gospel and opportunity abounds and so amazing facts we've been investing more in new channels and networks and websites to get the gospel out than ever before because we we see the opportunities now as greater than ever before and i might you know we were going to give away a magazine a final events magazine and our studio if they're able to send someone in here i don't want to give out the wrong information but we have a way where people can download they can text and download a free version of the final events of prophecy magazine and i hear footsteps what's the word i thought that's what it was future and the number four okay so we'll give you a free copy of the final events magazine that anybody can receive you can just text the number or text the word future to five zero zero five four four one more time four zero five four four four zero five four four now but if you're dyslexic both dyslexic so we have our issues here it's one of those numbers front and back all right so just text the word you this is a great magazine you could even send the link to someone else people need to hear about the final events of bible prophecy and you know pastor maybe i want to say one other thing you know when we prepare these sharing magazines we call them truth magazines on different topics right final events we have to prepare months in advance even six months sometimes we don't know you know what's gonna unfold but um in 2019 we began to feel as though we needed to have a magazine dealing with the united states in bible prophecy and so we started the work and in 2020 this year the magazine actually came out called the u.s in bible prophecy um it's it's just flown off the shelf folks have bought it to share with their friends they see the evangelistic opportunity to take advantage of the time where we're living where people are asking these questions to provide them with truth yeah so we've just mentioned two magazines that would be great sharing resources one you can download right now for free just text the word future to four four zero five four four and um that's the final events of bible prophecy and we have a new magazine it's not online yet but if you wanna get these to share to you with your friends it's america in prophecy and we've probably put more energy and beautiful artwork into this magazine help get the message out absolutely and you know take advantage of your own personal situation with your family or friends whatever you can do to share the gospel because there is an opening i was just talking to somebody last night they mentioned that their son-in-law who's an atheist has seen what's happening in the world and he's beginning to think that there must be a god there must be something significant as to what's happening in the world and he's open to bible studies so i think we're seeing more and more of that if people are showing an openness they they're wanting answers they're wanting hope they're wanting purpose and of course the gospel has the answers yeah absolutely we've never seen uh interest like we see now so friends i'll tell you it's says jesus said the harvest is great the laborers are few i pray the lord will send more laborers into the field and we hope that you'll labor with amazing facts you know right now at this time of recording what will be the 28th of december and just a few days left in this year if you want to invest in a special way in helping us get the gospel out through media social media television broadcast radio then we'd invite you to continue to support amazing facts and and all they have to do is go to amazingfacts.org and you can click the donate button and uh invest in the kingdom that's the currency of the kingdom now we have something else happening this week to help people get a new year both for young and old you want to tell us a little bit absolutely you know we thought it might be good to start the new year 2021 on the right foot so to speak and starting this evening on december the 28th there is a special program geared for the youth but anyone can tune in and participate it's called recharge your life in 2021 we've got four presentations some energetic speakers that are going to be sharing about 40 minutes they're going to be sharing a bible truth related to revival reformation in own lives those are going to take some time to answer some questions and that's going to start at 7 p.m tonight right here on this one right here we'll have to clear out and other folks will come in and it's going to be available at the granite bay church website i know it's also going to be at the granite bay youth youtube channel and facebook but just go to the granite bay seventh-day adventist church uh facebook page and you'll be able to view that live it's gonna be tonight tomorrow the next day thursday they wrap that up and that kind of sets the stage for something else happening this weekend that we're very excited yes well now tonight i want to just mention that our speaker tonight is daniel hudgins who is our afco evangelist and you're really going to be blessed by his energy and his message tonight and then that'll all transition into a special program we thought you know we want to start the new year on a positive note in the word of god everything we do at amazing facts is about getting out the word living the word sharing the word seeing people saved by the word equipping people in the word and so we thought we'd begin the new year with the bible and we're having a program that's going to be called reset and it's beginning with the bible beginning 2021 with the bible january 1 that's friday evening 7 o'clock and we'll be coming we'll be broadcasting from the church facility and then sabbath morning january 2nd saturday and that's at 11 o'clock pacific time and then saturday evening at the 7 pm again so friday night saturday night 7 p.m then sabbath morning begin the new year of the bible three presentations talking about finding the bible feasting on the bible and following the bible and we trust that this will really help you begin the new year you call it a weekend in the word and what better way you know i'm guessing folks that you're not going to be at too many new year's parties and so we think this would be a great way to celebrate the new year is just begin by being rooted in the word of god and so we'd encourage everybody to participate and you can you can view it on the amazing facts um the amazing facts channel amazing facts tv it's also going to be broadcast on 3 abn that's friday evening sabbath morning at 11 a.m and then saturday evening at 7 p.m so three events are going to carry it amazing facts tv amazing facts youtube and of course facebook so spread the word we want to encourage folks to start the year right with the word with the bible i know uh some of the presentations uh the titles of some of those presentations i'm excited about it i've heard some of these sermons before but these are great great sermons so we want to encourage folks tune in you will be richly blessed by that now pass today we don't want to you know end on a negative note and i don't think we have we've spoken about how the lord is blessed and what's in store we're planning some some great evangelistic opportunities for next year even if we can't travel as much as we like we can still reach people through media we can share through literature but uh we wanted to end with a verse from scripture that i think is very encouraging for believers and it's luke chapter 21 verse 28 and this is what it says jesus is talking in the context of end times he says now when these things begin to happen look up lift up your heads because your redemption draws in here so yeah it might be scary on the one hand when you see everything happening around us but we know that these are signs of the soon coming of jesus as believers we have hope we have courage we know how the story ends we can look up for our redemption is drawing now that's right i'm i'm excited i'm looking forward to jesus coming amen and we know that just before he comes it may get a little bad before it gets really good but you hang in there friends the gospel is still good news and maybe as we close this segment pastor ross would you just ask the lord's blessing on what we presented and people who may be watching that they'll make the lord first in their lives absolutely dear father in heaven we are so grateful that you've been with us this past year through its ups and its downs and the challenges we faced but lord you've also opened up great opportunities for evangelism and sharing the gospel and lord we want to pray for those who are viewing this they've also gone through their own personal journey this past year some have faced some real trials and whether it be with health or family or finance but lord we pray that you would continue to sustain them encourage them and maybe not grow fearful but rather may our faith grow knowing that you're in control and that you are promising to make all things new and blessings for those who put their trust in you so lord we thank you for the way you've blessed the ministry and we pray that you continue to guide us and provide the resources needed for the proclamation of the word not only through this ministry but through your church and through the many other ministries preaching the three angels message around the world so thank you lord we ask your blessing upon tonight's meeting as well as what's going to be happening the next few nights and in a special way this weekend as we start 2021 in your word so thank you lord for

Channel: Doug Batchelor

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Id: xsfHYlC9fbs

Length: 47min 0sec (2820 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 29 2020