REVELATION OF THE FUTURE! France, 26/4/81 DFO 1176
--Part 8 of "The Garden of Eden!"--Revelation Chapter 1
1. PTL! HALLELUJAH! WELL, GBY! WELCOME BACK TO THE GARDEN OF EDEN! And here we are for another revelation! If you've seen all of this show, you've had quite a few revelations already. But now we're going to have an amazing revelation from God's Word about the future. We've started sort of from A to Z. We've started from A & the Creation, the beginning, the Garden of Eden, creation of man & his fall & sin that entered in & all of these things, & then how God began to unfold His plan of saving man from the sins that he'd fallen into. It's a long, long story!
2. MAN WAS CREATED ABOUT 4000 YEARS BEFORE JESUS CAME TO EARTH, & THAT'S ABOUT 6000 YEARS AGO. That's when man was first created, just after the World was created. In fact, on the sixth day after the creation of the World & the solar system & the planets & the stars & the sun & the moon & the Earth & the waters of the seas & the dry land & the plants & the fish & the Birds & animals & the firmament & all of these things, & finally man, & finally His crowning creation of all, woman!--God's gift of love to Adam & to you & to me! PTL!
3. I'D BE VERY UNHAPPY IF I DIDN'T HAVE SOME PRETTY WOMEN AROUND, especially my dear Maria sitting here, helping me, inspiring me, praying for me, my helpmeet. She helps my meat nearly every day, & the other girls help my meat too, they serve me meat, & I've got lots of helpmeets! TTL! 'Cause my meat needs a lot of help!--And that's why God made'm! TYJ! Seems like no matter what subject I start with, I can always wind up on sex somehow! Ha! Hallelujah! Well, aren't you happy? Aren't you thankful God made sex & He made it for us to enjoy? And there's nothing wrong with it or sinful about it whatsoever, TTL!
4. SO THAT'S WHERE IT ALL BEGAN, THERE IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN, but it has taken God now about 6000 years to unfold His whole plan of how to save man & redeem him & work out his salvation & to populate the World & get'm saved and get'm through the Tribulation & into the heavenly Heaven-on-Earth of the Millennium! That's what we're going to deal with tonight, the Revelation of the Future as told by the Lord to Jesus & to His archangel who delivered the message to John, & John wrote it all down & now we're about to read it!
5. NOW YOU SAY, "WHERE DOES THIS THING BEGIN, ANYHOW, THIS WHOLE BOOK HERE, THE REVELATION? When does it start talking about the future?" Well, actually, according to the Bible, the "Last Days" really began with Jesus when He first came to Earth. The Apostle Paul says in his Epistle to the Hebrews, "In these last days". (He. 1:2.) In these last days Jesus has come, in these last days. So believe it or not, the last days of man's history have lasted now about 2000 years! They last from Christ's first coming to His second coming, that's the Last Days! And in fact, right on through into His third coming! And in fact, right on through the Millennium for another thousand years! Those are really the Last Days for mankind on this Earth who are unsaved & not all redeemed.
6. SO WE'VE HAD ABOUT 4000 YEARS OF MAN'S HISTORY, FROM THE CREATION OF THE WORLD & ADAM to the coming of Jesus Christ as a babe in Bethlehem, & then we've had nearly 2000 years since then. So God has been trying to convince man that he can't survive or live or exist or be happy without his Creator. He's been trying to convince man of that for about 6000 years! Thank God, it didn't take much to convince some of us, even from the very Beginning!
7. ABEL, ADAM & EVE'S SON BELIEVED GOD & HE DID WHAT GOD TOLD HIM TO DO. Cain, the other son, disobeyed, got jealous & furious with his brother & killed him, sad to say, & went off & headed a whole tribe of people that fought God until they all died in the Flood. And Seth, the third son, became the chosen line of God to bring forth a man who was to save the World in the Flood, Noah, & then through his son Shem was to come the Saviour Jesus Christ. Well, it's a long story, you see, so it's been taking me a little while to tell it & I've had to have about seven chapters introducing it, because it all began clear back in the Garden of Eden!
8. WHEN IS WAS A PREACHER & HAD A CHURCH & WAS AN EVANGELIST ONCE UPON A TIME MANY YEARS AGO, my wife said, "What is the matter with you, Dave? No matter what subject you preach on you've gotta begin in Genesis & end in Revelation! You go from one end of the Bible to the other & you cover the whole thing from A to Z!" Well, really from G to R, Genesis to Revelation! She said, "Can't you just talk about one little subject without having to preach the whole Bible at'm every sermon, one or two hours! These people aren't going to come back, they're going to go to some church where the preacher only preaches for ten or fifteen minutes!"
9. WELL, THAT WAS MY FIRST PASTORATE, BUT I LEARNED! I LEARNED THAT I WAS NOT A PASTOR & WAS NOT CUT OUT FOR PASTORING! That was my first & last pastorate. Because I have to cover It from A to Z, Genesis to Revelation. I've gotta tell you the whole story because I want you to understand it all. I want you to understand the beginning from the end, & the end from the beginning, & the whys & the wherefores of it all! Because as I can see, & as you can certainly tell by this time, after seven chapters of this series on the Garden of Eden to Revelation, God seems to be more interested in your salvation & in souls than just tickling your ears by telling you what the Bible says about the future.
10. BUT WE ARE GOING TO GET AROUND TO THE FUTURE, & I HOPE SO ESPECIALLY TONIGHT, because we already titled this segment the revelation of the Future! Some of my camera crew are laughing `cause the know how I plan to talk on one subject & I sometimes never even get around to it & I always wind up on something else! But I am determined, I am going to start reading the Bible to night & reveal to you the future! First of all I'm going to show you how God revelation revealed the future to the apostle John who received this great revelation there on that beautiful sea island in the Mediterranean, the Island of Patmos, Which we showed to you in the last lesson.
11. AND I'M GOING TO PROVE TO YOU THAT THIS BOOK COVERS THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF HISTORY, 2000 years already past, because it began with John. And then it goes through into the seventh thousand, or 7000 of man's history, the third thousand of years that this book covers, though the Millennium, seventh thousand years of history! It's called Millennium because that simply means a thousand years, but the Millennium is a special thousand years which you'll hear about later. It's the restored Garden of Eden on Earth, man living in beauty & plenty & peace & without the Curse, like the Garden of Eden in the beginning. Isn't that beautiful wonderful good news before I give you the bad news?
12. I WAS TELLING SOMEONE TONIGHT, I THINK ONE REASON THE LORD TOOK US THROUGH SEVEN CHAPTERS OF THE STUDY OF THE GARDEN OF EDEN until we start actually getting into the text of Revelation--He's taken us all the way from the Garden of Eden to Revelation, from Genesis to Revelation or the Apocalypse, from cover to cover of the Bible--because He's more interested in getting you saved first and then He's willing to tell you about the Future! Because if you didn't get saved, if you didn't take Jesus in your heart & know the love of God, it wouldn't make much difference, because your future is all bad & all bad news! So you wouldn't even want to hear about what's going to happen if you're not saved. Because if you're not saved, It's bad news for you!
13. SO THE LORD WAS MERCIFUL & LOVING & TENDER & KIND & GENTLE & IN SEVEN LONG ONE-HOURLY CHAPTERS INTRODUCING THE BOOK OF REVELATION, WE'VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT SALVATION BEFORE REVELATION! Because God wants you to get saved first, so you can enjoy the Revelation! Otherwise It's a horror story! I mean, it's a nightmare full of monsters & Hell on Earth for the wicked!--And hope & salvation & rescue only for the saved. So you wouldn't have enjoyed the study of the Book of Revelation & God's picture of the future unless you'd gotten saved first.
14. WELL, I'VE BEEN HAMMERING AWAY ON YOU NOW FOR SEVEN WHOLE HOURS, seven chapters to introduce this book to try to get you saved first so you can enjoy it! Praise God? Hallelujah? Amen? Do I get an Amen, Class? (Amen!) Where are you guys out there, anyway? Did I get an Amen? (Amen!) Come on! Amen? (Amen) Hallelujah! I like a little audience response! We've got a little bit of an audience here, about as little bit as you can get, our camera crew & floor director & so on, God bless everyone. Our dear Peter is our cameraman, & our dear Alfred is our sound man, & dear Maria is our floor director & sometimes we have more than that. But as you can see, I'm the star! Ha! Well, my dear wife Maria really does think I'm a star!
15. BUT THE REAL STAR OF THIS SHOW IS JESUS, THE MORNING STAR, THE BRIGHT & THE MORNING STAR! (Rev.22:16.) It's not the star of David either, but the Bright & Morning Star of Jesus! He is the Star of this show that you're going to hear about in this book. In fact, I think it's in this very book that He's called the Bright & Morning Star. Hallelujah! He's the Star of the show, & I want you to get to know Him first so you can enjoy the book & you'll enjoy hearing about the future. Although some of it may sound pretty bad, & is, & bad news & a lot of trouble we've gotta go through yet, thank God we can take it.
16. BECAUSE LIKE MOSES, "HE CHOSE RATHER TO SUFFER AFFLICTION WITH THE PEOPLE OF GOD than to enjoy the pleasures of sin & of Egypt for a season. For he had respect unto the recompense of the reward." (He.11:25,26.) He was able to look beyond the problems & the troubles, trials he was going to go through in the plagues of Egypt, God's judgments upon that wicked, idolatrous & Sodomyland, through 40 years of wilderness wanderings & trials & testings of faith, finally into the Promised Land, into that beautiful Land of Canaan, which they said was like the Garden of God, the Garden of Eden, flowing with milk & honey!
17. SO YOU SEE, I HAVE TO BE LIKE MOSES & LEAD YOU OUT OF YOUR EGYPT OF THIS WORLD & Worldliness & wickedness & sin & lost as you are, wandering around, not knowing where you came from or why, or why you're here, or where you're going or how, I have got to lead you out of the world, this World, & through many trials & tribulations. As the old Negro spiritual used to sing, "Oh, we'll have great trials & great tribulations, we'll have great trials' but there's room for many a more!" There's going to be room for a lot more before we make it through to Heaven.
18. BUT THAT'S THE THING THAT'S GOING TO CARRY YOU THROUGH IS THAT FAITH, that vision of what's coming, that gives you the faith to believe God & the courage to launch out & take the initiative & follow through, right on through the plagues of this World, of Egypt, that you're going to go through pretty soon, some of you, & the Tribulation, & right on to the coming of Jesus Christ! And then, thank God, He's going to rescue us out of it all! PTL!
19. WHILE WE'RE GONE AWAY TO BE WITH HIM IN A GREAT SHINDIG UP IN HEAVEN CALLED THE WEDDING SUPPER OF THE LAMB, a grand marriage reception, a wild party up yonder in the heavenlies with the Lord, there's going to be Hell on Earth down below until we come back again with Him in Jesus' Third Coming! He's not only had one First Coming, He's got a Second Coming coming, He's got a Third Coming coming as well! And we're going to come back with Him then, destroy the wicked & the wicked governments of this World & take it over & run it the way it ought to be run!
20. GOD'S GIVEN MAN 6000 YEARS TO RUN IT HIS OWN WAY, & to try to run it without God & in disobedience & every time he keeps making a worse mess of it all the time! Every war has been a worse war! Every kind of government has actually been a worse government! Oh, man's tried to convince himself that his governments now are better than they used to be, that democracy is better than it used to be, than those dictatorships & those monarchies & autocracies & all of that. Well, that's not so!
21. THE BEST GOVERNMENT THE WORLD EVER HAD WAS A THEOCRACY, A DICTATORSHIP OF GOD, through Nebuchadnezzar, a man of God! The best governments God ever had were Godly kings & Godly prophets who governed the people by the Word of God. That's the best government. Democracy is really the worst because it's gotta be wrong, because the majority rule a democracy, right? And according to God's Word, the majority are always wrong! Think of that! "For straight is the gate & narrow is the way that leadeth unto life eternal, & few there be that find it!" (Mt.7:13,14.) There are only going to be few saved by comparison with the billions lost in destruction!
22. SO THE MAJORITY ARE WRONG! THEREFORE RULE BY THE MAJORITY IN A DEMOCRACY IS WRONG! It's not God's kind of government & it's bound to be always wrong because the majority are always wrong! Because they're wicked, unbelieving, Christ-hating, God-denying, evolution--believing! I'd better not get onto that subject or we won't get back onto the future! Evolution has no place in the future, it hasn't even got any place in the past, there never was such a thing! That's just another lie of the Devil & the oppositions of science falsely-so-called, to deny this beautiful creation of God that you see here & theses lovely beauties of God's creation you've seen passing across this screen. But god did make it & He did make you & me & them & here we are. But we made a helluva mess out of it!
23. MAN HAS MADE A HELLUVA MESS OUT OF THIS WORLD FOR 6000 YEARS! There's been hardly a day in history there hasn't been a war going on somewhere, people fighting, killing, maiming, wounding, injuring & selfish & starving & disease-ridden! Man has made one Hell on Earth of what was once Heaven on Earth! The Garden of Eden was Heaven on Earth, but man has made it Hell on Earth, & it's taken God 6000 years to convince man that he can't do without God!
24. IN FACT, WE'VE GOT A LITTLE MORE TO GO YET IN WHICH MAN IS GOING TO HAVE HIS FINAL GOVERNMENT OF MAN, run by the Devil, the Devil-man in fact, the superman, the great Antichrist, as he's called in the Bible, the Devil in person, a man as inspired of the Devil & full of the Devil as Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit of God, that's going to be man's last fling at government it's going to be denying God, Christ-hating, & the Devil setting himself up to be worshipped as God, his final fling! He comes out again, the Old Rascal crawls out of his hole & causes some trouble at the end of the Millennium, but that's another story. But then he's dealt with finally.
25. BUT WE HAVE TO TELL YOU THE WHOLE STORY. IF WE DIDN'T TELL YOU THE BEGINNING OF THE STORY, HOW COULD YOU UNDERSTAND THE END? Have you ever been to a continued story, you know, in the movies, & you missed some chapters? Or maybe you've not been getting your newspaper a few days & you missed the series, your favourite comic strip, you wonder what happened? Well, I'm trying to fill in the gaps! Maybe you got the first part of the story, you heared about the Garden of Eden, but you've been wondering what the hell happened since then! Well, that's just what happened--Hell! Hell on Earth brought by the Devil! So we had to carry you all they way through this past history to bring you up to date.
26.NOW JOHN HERE ON THE ISLE OF PATMOS IS GETTING THESE MARVELLOUS REVELATIONS FROM GOD ABOUT THE FUTURE, his future right then, the future of the World right then for the next 2000 years, & that's pretty well covered in these first few chapters. Because he says that this revelation is of "things which must shortly come to pass." Look at it. Here we have it right there in the very first chapter, the very first verse. He said, "Things which must shortly come to pass"--that means very soon.
27. AND THEN DOWN THERE AT THE END OF THE THERE VERSE, HE SAYS, "FOR THE TIME IS AT HAND"!--THAT MEANS IT'S HERE! "What I'm going to show to you is beginning now, John, it's beginning now!" All right, fourth verse. Let's really dig in here now! When's the beginning, Class? (Now.) Now! When was now? Who's talking here? Well, you didn't have to come back to my ugly mug, stay on the Scriptures! It's not written on my face, it's written in the Bible! Who's talking' there? Who's it say? John! Right? OK! So this book began at John's day & it's foretelling the future, most of which is now history for the next couple thousand years, told by John right here in this book. I'm driving this cameraman wild trying to go back & forth from my ugly mug to the beautiful Bible! Praise God!
28.SO HE SAYS: "JOHN TO THE SEVEN CHURCHES WHICH ARE IN ASIA", FOURTH VERSE. He's writing this Revelation in seven letters to the seven churches. In those days they didn't have any carbon copies, typewriters, mimeo machines, so either he had to write seven separate letters or what they usually did is, he wrote one long letter & then they took it around to the different churches & it was read in the churches. So he's writing to the seven churches which are in Asia.
29. IF YOU SAW THE MAP WHICH WE HAD IN THE LAST LESSON, YOU SAW THAT HE WAS LIVING ON A LITTLE ISLAND JUST OFF THE COAST OF TURKEY, NOT FAR FROM THESE CHURCHES. He was sort of like their Bishop or their District Superintendent, & he was naturally concerned & burdened about these very important churches in seven very important cities of Turkey, which was then known as Asia Minor. Why can't we just zero in on that for a moment. Whatever happened to our map here, anyway? Let's try to get it up here & show you again right what we're talking about. Some of our folks & some of you folks may not know much about geography & where things really are, but we'll show you right here. We're going to show you where this is.
30. IT WAS RIGHT OVER HERE IN ASIA MINOR, WHICH IS NOW TURKEY, NOT FAR FROM ISRAEL & CYPRUS. Here we are, this little Island of Patmos. It says Patmos here, but the island is right there, that little Island of Patmos right there, & here are these churches all marked for you right there, see? All around there not far away. So he wasn't going to have to send it air mail, they weren't far away! They had boats going over to Ephesus, & then they had people going around visiting the churches all the time. They'd probably start here & go around this way, & that's probably why he named them the way he did in the order he did a little later in the same chapter, or the Lord did.
31. SO HERE IS WHERE JOHN IS, JUST HERE IN THE AEGEAN SEA. Isn't that what they call the Aegean? This is something else over here, this other sea. What is this one between Italy & Yugoslavia? The Adriatic! So I got it right! How about that! For once I'm right! This is the Aegean Sea between Turkey & Greece, & this is Greece as we showed you before, & Yugoslavia & Italy & France & Spain & North Africa, & here it is!
32. THIS IS A TRUE BOOK! THIS IS THE BIBLE! IT'S TELLING YOU THE TRUTH! This really happened & here's where it happened! He was on this island when he got this Revelation, & he's telling these churches about it. He's writing a letter that's going to be taken around to all those churches & read to them, & many copies made. In fact, finally the copy that we have in our hands. Praise God! Hallelujah? Ok, now let's get on with the show, shall we ?
33. "GRACE BE UNTO YOU & PEACE FROM HIM WHICH IS, & WHICH WAS, & WHICH IS TO COME!" That can only be God, of course. "And from the seven Spirits which are before His throne"--God's throne. We find out who those spirits are later, they're the angels of God, the angels of these churches to whom he's writing. "And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness"--Jesus Himself was a faithful witness--"& the first begotten of the dead".
34. HE WAS THE FIRST ONE TO RISE FROM THE DEAD, & then immediately after He rose from the dead three days after His crucifixion all the Old Testament saints also rose from the dead! It's in the Bible. You can read it if you don't believe it, don't take my word read it in the Bible, in the book of Matthew. (Mat.27:52,53.) It says that when He rose from the dead, that these other people rose from the dead too. But He was the first one that rose, "first begotten of the dead." "And the Prince of the Kings of the Earth." He is the king of Kings!
35. "UNTO HIM THAT LOVETH US, & WASHED US FROM OUR SINS IN HIS OWN BLOOD."--Who did that?--Jesus! He died on the cross for our sins. He took our punishment for us so we could be saved just by believing on Him receiving Him as our Saviour into our Hearts, loving Him & His Father God, & the Mother Holy Spirit, & loving others, our neighbours as ourselves, & preaching the Gospel in all the World to every creature! Hallelujah! TYJ! PTL! Amen? Well, I'm going to get to preaching salvation again here before you know it!
36. "AND HATH MADE US KINGS & PRIESTS UNTO GOD & HIS FATHER, TO HIM BE GLORY & DOMINION FOR EVER & EVER, AMEN." Don't be in a hurry, Son! God bless our dear cameraman. He doesn't know where to shoot next, because he doesn't know where I'm going to shoot next! God bless him! Sixth verse, "And hath made us kings & priests unto God." We're already kings & priests unto God, think of that! I'm a king! "Oh, that's that nut, that Bible Prophet who claims to be a king, King David, King Moses David, Daniel, or whatever his name is!" Well, you're a king, too, if you love Jesus!--Not King Tut, but King too!
37. THANK GOD YOU'RE NOT KING TUT, HE WAS AN OLD ATHEIST, UNBELIEVER & IDOLATOR & is in Hell to this day or in the place of evil spirits. Watch out you don't catch one of'm from his sarcophagus either! Don't go around touching that thing, it might rub off on you! They've got a lot of little hitchhikers on some of these artifacts the archeologists are digging up nowadays in China & Egypt & all these ancient places, with the devils who ride along with'm, the little imps who are hitchhiking on the artifacts & the findings of the archeologists! If you go around bending over'm & looking at'm, touching'm, if you don't know Jesus, you don't know the Lord, you haven't got the protection of Christ in your heart & His guardian angel, they could just hop right off on you! And then you've got yourself another evil spirit besides your own evil spirit!
38. SEVENTH VERSE, "BEHOLD, HE COMETH WITH CLOUDS; & EVERY EYE SHALL SEE HIM!" When Jesus comes back to rapture His saints, He's going to come back in the clouds just the way He went away on the day of Ascension. And just like His disciples watched Him go up in the clouds. So there going see Him come down in the clouds. "Every eye shall see Him"--no secret Rapture--"& they also which pierced Him"--the Jews that crucified Him. "And all kindreds of the Earth shall wail because of Him". The whole Earth is going to see Jesus come when He comes back for you & me, to rescue us, His children, out of this wicked old World. "Even so, Amen." Hallelujah? TYJ! PTL!
39. JESUS GOES ON TO SAY THEN: "I AM ALPHA & OMEGA, THE BEGINNING & THE ENDING, SAITH THE LORD! " Jesus was there in the beginning in the Garden of Eden, He walked with Adam. He used to walk with Adam every evening in the cool of the day. God walked with Him in the form of Jesus Christ, Jehovah, in his God-body, & He walked with Adam in the cool of the day. He was there in the beginning.
40. THIS SAME DEAR APOSTLE WHO WROTE THIS GREAT BOOK OF REVELATION, this same one, do you know what he says in the first part of his Gospel of John? He said, "In the beginning was the Word"--that's Jesus--"& the Word was with God & the Word was God", because He was the Son of God! "All things were made by Him & without Him was not anything made that was made!" Think of that! Jesus was there. (Jn.1:1-3.)
41. "OH," YOU SAY, "NOW YOU'RE GETTING BACK TO THAT GARDEN OF EDEN AGAIN! Isn't that guy ever going to get out of the Garden of Eden? We want to know about the Book of Revelation & the Future! The Garden of Eden is past!" No, it's not! The Garden of Eden still exists, believe it or not, in that wonderful World to come! And who was there in the Garden of Eden?--Jesus! Who walked with Adam in the Garden of Eden? -- Jesus! He was there at Creation. He helped create the World & Adam & all the rest. Think of that!
42. AND THAT'S WHAT HE SAYS HERE: "I AM ALPHA AND OMEGA, THE BEGINNING & THE ENDING." You folks down there in Greece will understand what Alpha & Omega mean, because those are the first & last letters of the Greek alphabet: Alpha, our "a", & Omega, something we don't have in the English alphabet. So Jesus is here saying He is the "Alpha & Omega, the beginning & the ending, saith the Lord, which is, & which was, & which is to come, the Almighty!" He's been here a long time.
43. NINTH VERSE: "I JOHN, WHO ALSO AM YOUR BROTHER, & COMPANION IN TRIBULATION, & IN THE KINGDOM & PATIENCE OF JESUS CHRIST"--did you know we're already in the Kingdom? If you have Jesus in your heart, you have the Kingdom of God within you! Therefore you're already in the Kingdom, you're already a king in His Kingdom!
44. JOHN SAYS, "I WAS IN THE ISLE THAT IS CALLED PATMOS." There it is again, I just showed it to you on the map a little bit ago, "For the Word of God, & for the testimony of Jesus Christ." He was literally in exile, he was a kind of a prisoner. He'd been exiled to the island like Napoleon was exiled to the Isle of Elba, & later to some other island. But anyhow, they were trying to get rid of this guy who had caused them so much trouble be talking about God all the time & preaching Jesus to these unbelieving, pagan, idol-worshipping Romans. But he wouldn't stop talking about Jesus, so you know what they did? They tried to boil him in oil to make him shut up, & he wouldn't boil, because he wasn't done! No amount of boiling in oil ever managed to cook him to a done!
45. SO THEREFORE THEY FINALLY SAID, "WHAT CAN YOU DO WITH SUCH A MAN! We can't shut him up, stop his mouth from preaching, & we can't kill him! We'll just have to ship him off to the Isle of Patmos in exile where there are so few people to preach to he surely couldn't do much damage there!" So what did he do? He got a marvellous Revelation from God that has preached to literally billions of people ever since! Think of that! Down through 2000 years of World history from his day, about AD 90, until today. About 1900 years ago.
46. ON THAT LITTLE DESERTED ISLAND WITH SO FEW PEOPLE, A FEW FARMERS, HE PREACHED THE GREATEST SERMON HE EVER PREACHED, the Book of Revelation, that he got from Jesus through an angel, that has reached more people than all of his other sermons ever reached, aside from the Gospel of John & his letters. So you can't get rid of a guy like that! You just keep faithfully witnessing for the Lord & there's no way to get rid of you, not even if they kill you!--Then you're going to come back & haunt'm!
47. "WHAT DO YOU MEAN? YOU BELIEVE IN GHOSTS?" YES, I BELIEVE IN GHOSTS! I especially believe in the Holy Ghost & all His holy ghosts, & all His departed saints & the good spirits of the Lord, that we are "encompassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses!" He says, "Wherefore brethen, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us run the race!" (He.12:1.) Hallelujah? He's kind of talking in sports language there, some of you great sports fans. Are you a good sport? Well, you should read my Letter on that subject sometime & you may decide you don't want to be a good sport after all! In fact, it may not be sporting of you what you might want to do to me when I tell you what I think about good sports & the Olympics & so on! (See No.179A.)
48. BUT HE WAS TALKING IN A LANGUAGE BOTH THE GREEKS & THE ROMANS UNDERSTOOD, about the arena & a race & a great crowd there in the arena watching the race. He said that's the way we are, like we're in the arena running a race, & up there in the balconies & in the stands & the bleachers are all these people watching us run this race. We're in this little old arena down here on a tiny little planet. a speck of dust called Earth, & we're running a race for Jesus, for souls, for Eternity! And around us are billions of the spirits of God, both good & evil, good angels & evil angels, departed saints, good spirits of God, departed devils of the Devil, evil spirits. But so great a cloud of witnesses! We've gotta do our best, we've gotta run a good race! Amen? Praise God!
49. SO HE SAYS HERE THAT HE WAS ON THAT ISLAND OF PATMOS & HE GOT THIS SERMON, THE BIGGEST SERMON HE EVER PREACHED, & the most amazing sermon & preached to more people than ever before, even though the Romans tried to get rid of him. "For the Word of God"--he was there because he was a good witness, like in prison. Tenth verse: "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day & heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying, I am Alpha & Omega!"--that's the very thing Jesus had just said to him before, now He's saying it again--"the first & the last: & what thou seest, write in a book, & send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia; Unto Ephesus, & unto Smyrna, & unto Pergamos, & unto Thyatira, & unto Sardis, & unto Philadelphia, & unto Laodicea."
50. WELL THERE YOU ARE! JESUS HIMSELF COMMANDED HIM THAT HE WAS TO WRITE ALL THIS DOWN IN A BOOK & that's what he did, & we've got the book to show for it today! We're studying it right now today, here on this beautiful South Sea island, somewhat similar to the Isle of Patmos.--The Book of Revelation that John faithfully wrote down & then sent it to all these churches, these seven churches you saw over there in Asia Minor & Turkey on our map tonight. It names them!
51. AND THEN JOHN SAYS: "AND I TURNED TO SEE THE VOICE THAT SPAKE WITH ME. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; & in then midst of the seven candlesticks One like unto the Son of man." Notice that's capitalised, "S" on the word Son, meaning Jesus. He was not only the Son of God, but also the Son of man through a woman, a little 16-year-old girl! You don't believe in child brides? Well, Jesus was born of a child bride only 16! You don't believe in unwed mother? Well Jesus was born of an unwed mother, 16 years of age! She & her husband were only engaged or betrothed, they hadn't gotten married yet!
52. SHE'D NEVER SLEPT WITH HIM YET, SHE'D NEVER KNOWN A MAN, BUT SHE KNEW GOD, SHE KNEW JESUS, HER BABY! And she found out what the Holy Love of God was like when He took the form of a body, a theophany, a God-body, & He had intercourse with Mary & sowed the seed of God in that human flesh & that woman-made egg, & conceived & brought forth a Son of God, Jesus Christ, through a virgin who had never known a man, only God! Think of that! Wow! What a miracle, huh? Premarital sex with God!--Married first to God!
53. WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE FUCKED BY GOD? HUH? Well, you can is, if you'll receive the Holy Ghost, the Holy Spirit of God! I've been talking about salvation, but you can receive the Holy Spirit who is that wonderful, wonderful Spirit of God, & it's just like an orgasm of sex when you get the baptism of the Holy Ghost! You explode, with the power of God & you want to tell everybody about Jesus! I want to tell everybody in the world about God's love!
54. I HOPE YOU'VE ACCEPTED HIM, I HOPE YOU'VE RECEIVED HIM. I hope that you have Him, now that we've been talking about Him for about seven chapters, now this is the eighth chapter, so that you can look forward to these marvellous future events that we're going to read about here, not with fear & trembling, but with hope & faith & assurance that God's going to see you through. He's going to save you & rescue you out of it all & take you to be with Him, & we'll live with Him forever. Have you received Jesus? And have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed? (Ac.19:2.) I trust that you have. May God help you to receive Jesus, in Jesus' name. Amen.
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family