The Confidence of Prophecy (#11) - June 3, 2020

well the year was 1943 and there was a pastor's wife who lived in the state of Pennsylvania who at the height of World War 2 found herself doing household chores and grieving over all of the chaos that was ensuing on planet Earth during that time world war 2 as you probably know is a war whose death count between battle fatalities as well as civilians reached between 70 and 85 million deaths which is proof positive that we have lived through more difficult times than that which we find ourselves facing today her name was Ruth K Jones one day is her anxiety seemed to overwhelm her she opened her Bible and she read from 2nd Timothy chapter 3 and verse 1 where Paul wrote to Timothy and said in the last days perilous times will come inspired by those words perilous times will come she grabbed a notepad from the kitchen and she composed what would become a hymn that has been sung for many years since then called in times like these verse number 1 says in times like these you need a Savior in times like these you need an anchor be very sure be very sure your anchor holds and grips the solid rock mrs. Jones would live long enough to watch on her television set in her living room one day someone named George Beverly Shea singing on live TV that him that she had penned in her kitchen years earlier what I came to tell you tonight is this is that in times like these you need to know your Bible in times like these you need to know about prophecy in times like these all of us need know that God is still on his throne and you know there's something about studying Bible prophecy that instills a sense of confidence in our hearts no matter what is going on around us because we have seen the end it's almost like prophecy allows you to read the last chapter of a suspense thriller and you already know the outcome and guess what God wins and because we belong to him we win - so the title of tonight's messages the confidence of prophecy the confidence of prophecy will eventually get into the eighth chapter of Daniel so if you would go ahead and be turning there but I just want to walk us through some things some of this will be a little bit of review in order to catch us up and go over a few things that we've covered especially from last week but if you're one inclined to take notes and I hope that would be true of you I hope you'll joint down and that is that prophecy is God's gift to increase our understanding it's a gift from God to us to give us greater understanding to increase our understanding our understanding of God understanding of the times in which we live also it's impossible to appreciate prophecy without history so it forces us to understand more about the past ground we've covered but most especially it helps us to know where this is all going to end see prophecy helps us to ask not simply what's happening but prophecy causes us to say where is this heading and I want you to hear me carefully I'm gonna repeat that again when you're immersed in prophecy it causes you not simply to ask what's happening but to ask where is this heading which is more important than even what's happening in the present it causes us to ask not just what's going on but where does this fit into God's plan prophecy causes us not just to ask what should I do but it causes us to ask who is behind this a right understanding of prophecy protects us from deception in Jesus lengthiest discourse on prophecy in Matthew's Gospel he spoke about this deception in Matthew 24 and verse 4 jesus answered and said to them take heed that no one deceives you he was very clear about it that when we're living in those last days it will be very possible if not probable for people to be deceived by things that happen in their contemporary events prophecy also helps us to see God's big picture and not just the immediacy of life's circumstances in the present and along this line I want to just encourage you by by telling you we must never ever allow ourselves to be swept into despair by current events or by circumstances that are taking place and if you're not careful that's exactly what can what can happen and and people in the scriptures live through tough times and endure them people in in that you have known have lived through tough times and have endured them and we too will live through tough times and will be stronger for it but if anybody had a right to be swept into a state of despair it was Daniel although we reached a point there in the sixth chapter where he had advanced into his 80s as an as an old man going back to his childhood as a young man he was ripped from his home he was stripped away from his country from his homeland and as a teenage boy he was taken along with his fellow Jews to a distant country where he was forcibly consigned to serve at the will of a pagan king so as we read this book we've seen how he is it in years and think about it from being a teenage kid now having spent almost seventy years of his life as a captive as a slave among those who despised him and who despised his God and and we look at the whole history of the Jewish people especially men like Daniel and other prophets their circumstances were despicable but their faith in God gave them the victory and God used them in the midst of terrible a terrible environment and what looked like seemingly in surpass able odds I am sure that Daniel felt many times that his life had been derailed but here's what God showed Daniel time and time again throughout his long life God showed Daniel that God's plan always goes forward no matter what's happening to me what's happening in my life what's happening in the times in which I live what God showed Daniel God will show us the same that God's plan always goes forward and Daniels prophetic visions that we have been interpreting and and looking at in our study through Daniel allowed Daniel to be lifted up above the circumstances of Babylonian captivity where all of his fellow Jews were held as captives and revelation after revelation dream after vision after dream God showed Daniel insights into the future that caused his present circumstances to pale in comparison and this is one of the most important reasons for prophecy in the Bible is to show us that this life is not the end that God's got a better plan that God will take us forward and we can trust him by faith and so some of the themes in prophecy are that the coming of Jesus would be a fulfillment of prophecy Jesus is the ultimate theme of prophecy but in the Book of Daniel one of the things we see is that God's plan for Israel is a major part of see it was important to Daniel to know that it was important for his Jewish exile friends and fellow Jews to know that and it's important for us to remember that as Christians looking at a State of Israel having been reborn in the middle of the 20th century we need to realize that God's plan for the people of Israel is still a major part of Bible prophecy and not only that but one of the most important themes of Bible prophecy is the return of Jesus to the earth it is a major fulfillment of Bible prophecy so what I'm saying to you is this prophecy is God's gift to increase our understanding and with increased understanding comes increased faith and confidence to face the uncertainties and the difficulties of the present age true for Daniel true for us true for all of God's people in the future who will ever face adversity who will ever face discouragement so the second thing I want you to write down if you're tracking with me tonight I hope you are is not only that prophecies God's gift to increase our understanding but God revealed to Daniel - wicked leaders he revealed to Daniel - wicked leaders now as we all know if God had chosen to reveal to Daniel all of the wicked leaders who would appear throughout history after Daniels time on earth it would have required a dream or two a vision or two every day and every night of Daniels life but God's intention was not to reveal to Daniel every wicked ruler who would ever mistreat other people in the unfolding years of history God's decision was to reveal to wicked leaders - Daniel and what is the significance of these two wicked leaders who would appear on the stage of history what would be the significance of these two why did God single them out among all of the rest who would one day come in the future well one reason is because both of these wicked rulers who would be revealed to Daniel prophetically through and visions both of them would play a role in persecuting the Jews not only that but both of them would defile the temple in Jerusalem in horrible ways now at the time that that Daniel saw the visions about these two wicked rulers who hadn't even been born yet you know he's an exile in Babylon Nebuchadnezzar had already plundered the temple back in 586 BC and he had burned down the city of Jerusalem and had destroyed the temple but but what Daniel sees is two wicked rulers of the future who were going to defile it in even greater ways now interestingly when these two figures appear on the stage of human history they're going to defile temples that will have been rebuilt after having been destroyed one of them is going to defile a rebuilt temple that replaces the one Nebuchadnezzar tore down and the second leader is going to defile an end times temple that we believe is going to be reconstructed on the Temple Mount where the Dome of the rock is now in the city of Jerusalem so just understand both of these wicked leaders who were revealed prophetically in a dream and a vision to Daniel by God would defile a reconstructed temple not only that but both of these wicked leaders would be the human embodiment of Satan in their time and then finally I want you to think about this when it comes to these two wicked leaders that God would reveal to Daniel one of them would be a foreshadowing of the other one or you might say the latter would be a fulfillment of how the former predicted or was a type of the latter so one will appear in history first and he will be a little version of the second one who will appear later so who are these two figures in history well you need to realize that in the in the flow of the Book of Daniel of course with Chapter seven coming before chapter eight chapter seven actually reveals the wicked leader who will come last chapter eight reveals the the wicked leader who will come first who foreshadows the one who will come last so in Chapter seven if you remember Daniel saw the Antichrist and the references Daniel chapter 7 and verse eight the Antichrist now Daniel tells us exactly when he saw this vision it was in 551 BC and this is the little horn on the head of the fourth beast now this little horn on the head of the fourth beast which we believe comes from a revived Roman Empire the identity of this leader is not revealed he appears to rise to power from among a european confederacy confederation of leaders or countries and i want you to look at this display on the screen if you will because daniel's four beast vision in Chapter seven culminated in this little horn that grew up on the head of the fourth beast now what we know is this has yet to be fulfilled but the fulfillment will be the Antichrist you say well when is the Antichrist going to appear well we're still waiting well how much time has passed from when Daniel saw that prophetically revealed until to now until now standing here in 2020 well almost twenty six hundred years have passed isn't that interesting and still as far as we know there is no Antichrist but the fact remains the Antichrist was revealed to Daniel now here's something else I want you to write down from Chapter eight Daniel not only saw in Chapter seven the Antichrist who is in the last days who has not been revealed as far as we know but when we got to chapter 8 Daniel saw one who would be like the Antichrist all right important to recognize the distinction and the one who will be like the Antichrist he saw in the eighth chapter now even though I know chapter 7 comes before chapter 8 understanding chapter 7 he saw the Antichrist who comes at the end of time just before Christ returns but in Chapter 8 he saw one who is like the Antichrist who would precede the Antichrist and he is this the little horn that sprung off of one of the four horns on the head of the goat that attacked the RAM and if you'll remember all of that was Alexander the Great and the kingdom of Greece that he led and after Alexander's death his four generals squabbled over different territories of his empire and one of those generals whose name was Seleucus established a Syrian kingdom and one of those kings was someone who was called Antiochus Epiphanes so if you miss all of the who the goat is and who the four horns on the head of the goat and the little horn that grew from one of the four horns all you need to know is from the Greek Empire came a very vicious and ruthless Syrian king who assaulted the Jewish people in terrible ways whose name was Antiochus Epiphanes I want you to notice this this chart that I have depicted for you in Daniels Ram and goat vision of chapter 8 it culminated in this little horn that grew from one of the four horns and we believe that as time progressed after Daniels life had ended 383 years later this historical figure this Syrian king named Atticus Antiochus Epiphanes desecrated Jerusalem and the Temple in 168 BC so all I wanted do in these charts was to let you see the Daniel saw the Antichrist someone we don't even know is around yet but he also saw Antiochus Epiphanes someone who would appear three hundred eighty three years after the vision in which God revealed him now let's go back to Antiochus Epiphanes you say well I do not want to sit here on a Wednesday night watch livestream and learn about somebody whose name I can't even pronounce well you need to know who he is because if he was prophesied in Scripture and just so you know he's not only revealed to Daniel in Chapter eight but he has discussed at length in Chapter eleven so you might as well latch on and learn a little bit about him because we're gonna talk about him again when we get over to the eleventh chapter but here's some one of the things we know about what he did to the Jewish people this little Syrian dictator who vented his wrath and fury on the Jewish people as he set up shop in Jerusalem he killed eighty thousand Jews did you get that number he killed eighty thousand Jews not only that but he sold another forty thousand Jews into slavery and profited from their sale he burned every copy of the Jewish Scriptures which were called the Torah or the law that he could get his hands on the five books of Moses every copy of the Bible he could get his hands on he set fire to to eradicate the Word of God from the hands and hearts of the Jewish people he outlawed the observation of all of the laws in the Torah including Sabbath Day observance and the circumcising of baby boys there is an account from history that tells of two Jewish women each of whom had given birth to a male child and each of whom willingly defied his edict outlawing circumcision but because of their desire to obey God both of these Jewish women had their baby boy circumcised well word got to Antiochus Epiphanes that they had defied his and so what he did was he had each of these ladies baby boys killed and then he forced his soldiers to tie the baby boys around each of those mothers necks and he forced those mothers with the carcass of their murdered babies to be paraded through the streets of Jerusalem and finally brought them to a pinnacle on the wall of the city and had his soldiers shove both of these precious Jewish ladies over the wall falling to their deaths with their already murdered infant babies hanging around their necks that's a kind of leader that he was there's another story about Antiochus Epiphanes about a woman who had seven sons and she with the strength of conviction had challenged her seven boys to defy the decrees of Antiochus Epiphanes that they worship at the altar of Zeus and that they deny the commandments of the Lord their God and renounced their faith in Jehovah God and what he did was he lined those seven boys up in front of their mother and he made the mother watch as his soldiers cut the tongues out of the mouths of each of those seven sons of hers and after they had their tongues cut out of their mouths he had a metal grate installed and turned it into a barbecue grill and he made that mother watch as he roasted and fried on a griddle those seven sons of hers one at the time and then after he watched her and tortured her by watching her seven sons be killed in that way he had them kill her do you do you see why this person has talked about do you see why he's prophesied about in Scripture he was an animal he was a beast the historians tell us that he had an idol to Zeus erected beside the altar in the temple in Jerusalem he stopped morning and evening sacrifices from taking place and he offered pigs on the altar in the temple which was the height of blasphemy to the Jewish people against their God and his laws to take the epitome of what is unclean and number one just to take it into the temple much less to slaughter it there and then he sprayed the blood all over the walls of the holy place all of these acts on the part of Antiochus Epiphanes defiled the temple now I want you to think about it Nebuchadnezzar had already destroyed the temple and once the Jewish people were allowed by Cyrus to start returning from Babylonian exile they started rebuilding the temple so this temple that Antiochus Epiphanes desecrates a hundred and sixty-five years before the time of Christ is not solomon's temple but it is it is a feeble duplicate of that what these feeble Jews who came back from exile were able to rebuild prior to its desecration by Antiochus Epiphanes so why why is he so important why is he going to appear again in Daniel chapter 11 well I'm gonna tell you a little story when the Jewish priests called judas maccabees led the revolt against Antiochus Epiphanes eventually forcing this this pig out of Jerusalem Judas came back and conducted a ceremony to rededicate and to purify the temple to clean it up and to reconsecrate it to reap yura fie it as the house of God and as the center of Jewish worship of Jehovah God and according to Jewish custom there was an eight-day period of time required for the reconsecrated or the cleansing of the temple now you may not know this but the law of Moses is given from God's lips to Moses himself when Moses was being told about putting the tabernacle together which you know was the type of the temple the tabernacle was the house of God on the go the mobile version which was like a tent that could be set up and taken down and God raised up King Solomon the son of David to erect a permanent structure called a temple so that God's house was was no longer going to be a tent and so when God was giving Moses the laws about how to conduct sacrifices and how to maintain the furnishings inside the tabernacle those laws eventually followed over into the temple and in Leviticus chapter 24 verses 1 and 2 it says the Lord told Moses command the children of Israel that they bring to you pure oil of pressed olives for the light to make the lamps burn continually now the reason that I wanted you to see that is because from the days of the tabernacle all the way through the time when the temple was built by Solomon it was required in the law of God to Moses that the lamps within the temple burned continually without interruption it was it was part of the priestly assignment in the rotation of duties to ensure that the lamps were continually resupplied with oil and so when Antiochus Epiphanes desecrated and defiled the temple and extinguished all of the lamp light that was in the temple Judas Maccabeus comes back after purging Jerusalem of this pig of a man named Antiochus Epiphanes and he says we need to get the house of God back in order we need to rededicate and reconsecrate the house of God so when he was going in there and he was trying to relight the lamps inside the temple to comply with the law of Moses he only found one cruise or container of oil that would be sufficient to supply the lamps with fuel for a 24-hour period of time and by a miracle according to the the Jewish book called the Talmud that Judas Maccabeus serviced all of the reservoirs for those lamps with that one cruse of oil and rather than exhausting the supply of oil which should have just lasted for 24 hours by a miracle of God that one cruse of oil supplied the lamp light in the temple for eight consecutive days which was the period of time required for the rededicating of the temple after its defilement what I'm telling you is according to the Talmud a sacred Jewish book that what should have lasted for 24 hours in supplying the fuel for the lamp light in the temple when it was being rededicated that was miraculously multiplied and extended throughout the eight-day period when Judas Maccabeus was rededicating the temple and this was such a significant miracle through this sustenance of the oil going from 24 hours to an eight-day duration it inspired the birth of a new holiday for the Jewish people and that holiday is called Hanukkah the word Hanukkah literally means to dedicate because it was the miracle of the of the oil that was multiplied by God to last beyond what should have been just a 24-hour period to an eight-day period it is also called the festival of lights it is also called the feast of dedication those three terms refer to the same holiday which go back to the rededication of the temple of God by Judas Maccabeus after it had been defiled by Antiochus Epiphanes to this day during Hanukkah Jewish families light one candle on the menorah each day during an 8 day period of this festival of lights or Hanukkah which usually coincides with our Christmas season a way of commemorating the miraculous multiplication of oil during the rededication of the temple by Judas Maccabeus now even though Hanukkah or this feast of dedication is not one of the seven major feasts commanded in Deuteronomy to be observed by the Jewish people because of its significance because it inspired such hope and courage and renewal in the hearts of the Jewish people after they were exposed to such desecration it worked its way onto the Jewish calendar as an official holiday where it survives to this day and do you want to know who else that we loved actually observed the feast of dedication or Hanukkah during his time on earth you probably are jumping ahead and thinking could it be Jesus absolutely in John chapter 10 beginning in verse 22 John tells us now it was the feast of dedication that's Hanukkah the festival of lights the feast of dedication that goes back to the rededication of the temple by Judas Maccabeus it's on the Jewish calendar it was the feast of dedication in Jerusalem and it was winter and Jesus walked in the temple in Solomon's porch and the Jews surrounded him and said to him how long do you keep us in doubt if you are the Christ tell us plainly and so right here during Hanukkah Jesus is at the temple observing it as John calls it the feast of dedication and they're asking him are you truly the Christ and you know what Jesus could have said what he was saying through everything he did through everything he performed and through who he was I am the fuel that will never ever be exhausted I am the light of the world I'm the light in your heart I'm the light to the Jews I'm the light to the Gentiles I am the fulfillment of your Hanukkah celebration so see if you hadn't tuned in tonight perhaps some of you already knew this but I would venture to say many of you not heard the history of Hanukkah and did not know of its connection to Antiochus Epiphanes and and we have studied who Antiochus Epiphanes is because Daniels saw him depicted in a vision when the goat of Greece rammed the RAM of Persia and the central horn of Alexander the Great was was broken off eventually replaced by his four generals who were the four horns on the head of that goat and out of one of those four there grew a little horn and that little horn was Antiochus Epiphanes all you need to know is that in Daniel 7 Daniel saw the Antichrist of the last days who has yet to be revealed but in Daniel 8 he saw one who would be like the Antichrist of the last days who in his fulfillment about a hundred and sixty-five years before Christ was the notorious Syrian King called Antiochus Epiphanes and it is from the rededicating of God's temple after what Antiochus did to it that the festival of lights' feast of dedication or Hanukkah made its way onto the Jewish calendar now here's something else I want you to write down this is main point number three we've talked about how prophecy is God's gift to increase our understanding we've talked about how God revealed to wicked leaders to Daniel 1 who would foreshadow the Antichrist Antiochus Epiphanes and the Antichrist whose identity we don't know yet third thing is some prophecies have dual fulfillments oh this is so important for any student of the Bible and anyone who truly wants to know what a prophecy is all about prophecies many of them have to fulfillments there is a partial fulfillment there is a final fulfillment this is this is especially true in the prophecies about the person of Jesus Christ because when Jesus came into the world 2,000 years ago there were prophecies all you have to do is read the book of Matthew how many times does Matthew comment on something Jesus said or did and Matthew says this happened in order to fulfill what a prophet said he'll quote whatever prophet said so you can check off a lot of prophetic boxes that Jesus fulfilled from Old Testament writings but we also know that there are many prophecies about the Messiah that Jesus did not fulfill when he was here 2,000 years ago those are prophecies that he will fulfill only when he comes in conquest to rule and reign on his second Advent to the earth so just in in how Christ fulfills prophecy when he came the first time it was partial fulfillment when he comes in the future for the second time it will be complete fulfillment so many prophecies work that way in the Old Testament as well as in the new now I truly believe that Antiochus Epiphanes was the fulfillment of that little horn that grew from one of the four horns that replace the main horn of Alexander the Great in other words the vision of the goat which was the Greek kingdom from which Antiochus eventually descended I believe that Antiochus Epiphanes fulfilled that in his lifetime but if you'll bear with me Antiochus Epiphanes was spoken of again in the eleventh chapter of Daniel as I mentioned earlier in chapter 11 and verse 31 it is revealed to Daniel that forces shall be mustered by him and they shall defile the sanctuary fortress then they shall take away the daily sacrifices remember Antiochus Epiphanes did that and place there the abomination of desolation which was fulfilled when Antiochus Epiphanes not only erected an altar to Zeus the chief god of the Greek pantheon but when he slaughtered a pig and shed its blood on that sacred altar in the temple did you notice that expression abomination of desolation now chapter 8 that little horn and tychicus epiphanies chapter 11 and verse 31 the one who will commit the abomination of desolation it's talking about the same person Antiochus Epiphanes so what I'm saying to you is this what Antiochus Epiphanes did inside the temple of Jerusalem in a hundred and sixty-five years before the time of Jesus what he did was a fulfillment of this prophecy called the abomination of desolation but here's what's interesting a hundred sixty-five years after he did that he most likely would be burning in hell by that time Jesus comes along and during Jesus preaching and teaching he says this in Matthew 24:15 Jesus said to his followers therefore when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet standing in the Holy Place whoever reads you need to understand then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains and let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything out of his house now think with me again about this when Jesus said when you see future the abomination of desolation standing in the Holy Place when Jesus said these things Antiochus Epiphanes had already lived and died a hundred and sixty-five years earlier and yet Jesus was making it clear that there would be another abomination of desolation in the temple that just as there had already been a fulfillment of the abomination of desolation revealed to Daniel by Antiochus Epiphanes 165 years before the time of Christ when Jesus prophesied this he said there is going to be another fulfillment of the abomination of desolation by another person who will stand in the temple and defile it and desecrate it that's what I'm telling you is that prophecies many of them have a dual fulfillment so Antiochus Epiphanes was the first installment on the prophecy the abomination of desolation Daniel 11:31 and all that was described in Daniel chapter 8 but when Jesus came along he said in the last days someone else will do a repeat performance of what Antiochus Epiphanes did except that he will do it on a much grander scale so what I want you to understand is Antiochus Epiphanes if we want to know what the Antichrist is going to look like what he's going to be like what he's going to act like we have already witnessed in history the one whom God said would be a foreshadowing of the last days Antichrist now we just look back in chapter 8 in verse 24 where it was being explained to Daniel we believe this was fulfilled in Antiochus Epiphanes his power shall be mighty but not by his own power and we know that he got his power from from having descended from the Greek Empire he shall destroy fearfully we've already said Antiochus Epiphanes killed 80,000 Jews and then sold 40,000 others off into slavery he will prosper he will thrive and he certainly did he shall destroy the mighty and also the holy people which are the Jewish people so what I want you to understand is you're looking at that verse is Antiochus Epiphanes fulfill that initially but if you read it and think about the Antichrist the Antichrist will completely fulfill this because guess what when you look his power shall be mighty but not by his own power the Antichrist of the last days will be empowered by the nations of the earth who'll in him their authority but ultimately it will be Satan empowering him he shall destroy fearfully he shall prosper and thrive the Anti Christ of the last days will assemble all the nations of the earth under his Alliance under his sway he shall destroy the mighty and also the holy people the Anti Christ of the last days will be just as anti-semitic as Antiochus Epiphanes was a hundred 265 BC before Christ now let's look at verse 25 of chapter 8 through his cunning he shall cause deceit to prosper under his rule and he shall exalt himself in his heart he shall destroy many in their prosperity he shall even rise against the Prince of princes but he shall be broken without human means now to think about this Antiochus Epiphanes fulfilled Daniel 8 25 and we could break each one of those statements down and look at exactly how that happened but also consider the Antichrist will be the ultimate fulfillment of Daniel 8 and verse 25 because he too will be cunning he will cause deceit to prosper under his rule he will exalt himself in his heart he will destroy many in their prosperity and he will rise against the Prince of princes not just against the Jewish people but he will rise against Christ who will ultimately come and defeat him now I want to break down the last phrase of verse 25 that simply says this he shall be broken without human means do you see that if you got your Bible open well consider going back to Antiochus Epiphanes who was the first fulfillment the partial fulfillment of these prophecies about the Antichrist how was he broken without human means I'll tell you he died a horrible debilitating death which serves him right he died with his bowels being infested by worms and maggots through some type of intestinal contamination and history records that the stench around him during his during his days of prolonged sickness was so foul that none of his attendants none of his subordinates could even walk into the room because of the putrid odor that emanated from his decaying body as he arrived in anguish and pain certain accounts say that while he was pleading to be able simply to die that he begged the God of the Jews to forgive him for everything he had done to the Jewish people and I want to remind everybody who's listening to me tonight that the story of the death of Antiochus Epiphanes is proved positive from the Word of God and from history that justice will always be served we need to pray for it work for it and demand it through the means available to us in this life but let there be no doubt there is a great judge seated on his sovereign throne and he sees to it that justice is served always and forever more mark it down and Antiochus Epiphanes was broken without human means the way Daniel 825 said he would be almost 400 years before it happened but not only that the Antichrist will be the ultimate fulfillment of he shall be broken without human means how will the Anti Christ of the last days die well Paul writes about it in second Thessalonians chapter 2 and verse 8 he says and then the lawless one will be revealed that's the end of Christ whom the Lord will consume with the breath of his mouth and destroy with the brightness of his coming in other words Paul says the Anti Christ of the last days is going to be consumed by the breath of the fire of the theory of Jesus Christ when he comes back to the earth either way is a pretty bad way to go and it to be eaten up by maggots while you're still living and no one around you to comfort you because you stink so bad they can't even get close to you or to be consumed by the fury of the holy wrath of Jesus coming back on a white horse to conquer planet Earth in the final appearing of our Lord well there's so much to say and I'm not going to stop if you got something else to do I understand if you log off but I want to give you this final point because I've just got to got to do it because we got to move on to chapter 9 God used angels to interpret Daniels vision angels are God's messengers they appear throughout scripture in fact you know I've always thrown out on Wednesday nights that I want to do this series of that series in the other series we need to do a series just on angels and so maybe that'll be after we get out of Daniel and out of the book of Revelation maybe we'll do something about angels next but just just consider you know chapter 7 remember chapter 7 where he saw the four different beasts in the dream that he had and in verse 15 he says I Daniel was grieved in my spirit within my body and the visions of my head troubled me and I came near to one of those who stood by who in the world could have been standing by in his dream he says I asked that guy the truth about all this so he told me and made known to me the interpretation all these things I believe that what Daniel saw in Chapter 7 to help him understand the dreams was an angel a holy one standing by and his out-of-body experience it was an angel who interpreted what those four beasts meant and then when we get to chapter 8 when daniel has seen this vision remember how he was transported to Susa the capital city of persia and this is before persia even conquered Babylon and he saw this RAM being conquered by a go whose feet didn't touch the ground and we know that was Greece conquering Persia Alexander the Great all of those things he said I need help with this verse 15 of chapter 8 says it happened when I Daniel had seen the vision and I was seeking the meaning that suddenly there stood before me one having the appearance of a man the appearance of a man and I heard a man's voice between the banks of the river and that man's voice called out said Gabriel make this man understand the vision so he came near where I stood and when he came I was afraid and fell on my face but he said to me understand son of man that the vision refers to the time of the end now as he who is he as Gabriel the angel Gabriel you following this as Gabriel was speaking with me I was in a deep sleep with my face to the ground but he touched me and stood me up right and he said look I am making known to you what shall happen in the latter time of the indignation for the appointed time for at the appointed time the end shall be here is Gabriel interpreting because another angel said hey Gabriel explained to Daniel what all he is seeing now I love this because Gabriel means champion of God mm-hmm and this is the first time in the pages of Scripture that an angel is called by name as you know Gabriel will appear again in the ninth chapter if you've studied this book if not we'll see him come up in the next chapter but do you remember that there was a man named Zacharias who was married to a woman named Elizabeth and there was an angel who came to tell them they were going to give birth to John the Baptist what ain't what was the names name his name was Gabriel and you might remember in Luke chapter one not only did Gabriel talk to Zechariah and tell him him and Elizabeth and have a baby named John the Baptist but the angel Gabriel went to a virgin girl named Mary to tell her that what would be conceived in her would be of the Holy Spirit and that she would bear the Son of God within her womb Gabriel Gabriel is an important player in a life of God's redemptive plan and out of all the Angels mentioned in the Bible only two are called by name Gabriel and Michael and both of them will be mentioned in Daniel Michael is mentioned in the tenth chapter and the twelfth chapter and he is also mentioned in the little one chapter book of Jude as well as in the last book of the Bible the book of Revelation so here is Gabriel interpreting this troubling vision that Daniel had had you know in in first Peter chapter 1 Peter was saying that the prophets weren't aware of everything that they were preaching everything they were seeing everything they were revealing they knew it had to be for a latter time and I would include Daniel in that but here's what he says in Chapter 1 first Peter in verse 12 to the prophets it was revealed that not to themselves but to us who would live years later they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven and notice what I've got underlined Peter says these are things which angels desire to look into and how why is it that angels desire to look into the preaching of the gospel why is that angels are interested in the preaching of scripture in the preaching of prophecies because angels were crucial in revealing prophecy and just please know that the most crucial prophecy in the Old Testament is the prophecies in Daniel and Gabriel was the mediator of that prophetic truth from the throne of God to Daniel he was the interpreter of the vision and dreams to Daniel he was the one who announced the birth of John the Baptist to his parents he was the one who announced the birth of Jesus to his mother Gabriel is a crucial player and so if God uses these angels and has already given angels insights into things to come don't you know that angels are watching as we study this that angels are watching me as I preach this that angels are empowering and attending to me and my weakness and frailty and any preacher of the gospel who dares to tackle the prophetic word of God first Peter 1 in verse 12 says angels are interested in that angels get into that angels are looking in on that situation oh I would tell you we are standing on holy ground and I know that there are angels all around and you just need to know that every time you open the Word of God but especially when you dare to become a student of scripture to sift through the mysteries to persevere through the historic details to move beyond what is entertaining and intriguing in the moment and to delve into the depths of the revelation of God when you get serious about that angels are attending you angels are accompanying you angels will be dispatchers of blessing to the student of the prophecies of the Word of God Oh father thank you for these truths that blow my mind and that lift me out of the despair that causes me to suffer with bouts of depression discouragement and anxiety but by delving into your word you lift me up to a higher plane and I see the last chapter and I know that because you win your children win to God be the glory through Jesus Christ our Lord amen

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Length: 53min 22sec (3202 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 29 2020