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Good morning.

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Someone beat me to it.

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Well, we always like to open by saying welcome.

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If you are here visiting Hosanna for your first time

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or if you're joining us online, welcome.

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We're so glad you're here to worship us today

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here at Hosanna Christian Fellowship.

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I am Pastor Nathan, and this morning we're going to be

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continuing our look at Revelation chapter 12

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and really this grand look, this grand overview look

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at spiritual warfare in an overview sense.

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You know, you may or may not agree,

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but I think most of you would agree that it's not hard

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to look around the world today and see that evil is everywhere.

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Evil is pervasive.

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And in that thought, the devil would like nothing more

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than for all of us to believe that he doesn't exist.

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He would like nothing more for us to believe that

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there's no such thing as good and evil,

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that there's no such thing as moral and immoral.

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There's no such thing as any of that,

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but just everything is relative.

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The devil would love for us to believe that

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because then it leads to, well, what we see in the world today,

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the concept of moral relativity and people just having

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their own truth, and you do you and live however you want,

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and there's no guidelines of any kind.

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And if the devil can get us to believe that there's no good

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and evil and no moral or immoral, then he could also get us

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to believe that there is no shouldn't or should do,

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one way or the other, no right and wrong.

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And if he could get us to believe that, well, then thus,

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the natural extension of that is if there's no right and wrong,

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well, then there's no concept of reward for doing good

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or justice or punishment for doing evil.

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But the reality is that there is a God, there is a devil,

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there is right and wrong, there is good and evil,

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and above all of that, it really is a picture that there is a war

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for your soul.

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There is a war going on for the souls of mankind,

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one that has been raging for thousands and thousands of years,

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one that is primarily unseen in the heavenly realms,

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but at certain points in history has manifested in physical reality.

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But this unseen war is a war that is happening around us

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all the time.

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Job was made aware of this, not at first, but after all of the trials

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that Job went through, he was made aware of the spiritual nature

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of the difficulties he had been going through,

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that it was part of a spiritual battle for his soul.

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If you guys remember the story from the book of Job,

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God and the devil had had an unseen conversation about Job,

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considering Job himself, a conversation Job knew nothing about,

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and that then manifested in the physical realm

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as Job went about living out his life,

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and the devil brought all of these difficulties into his life

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with the loss of his livelihood, the loss of his property,

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the loss of his family, the loss of his physical health.

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There was a time when Jesus came to Peter and said,

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Peter, the devil has been asking me for you.

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He wants to sift you like wheat.

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And I think that was a moment where Peter got a glimpse

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into this unseen war raging around all of us for his life.

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Chapter 12 here in Revelation, this chapter we're looking at today,

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gives us all a rare behind-the-scenes look

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at this spiritual unseen war,

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at this war that's raging all the time.

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And we're going to see where this war rages,

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where this war has raged, and where this war will rage

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as we look at a place that is populated by the devil

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and his unholy host of fallen angels

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fighting against the angels of God.

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It's really a picture of a battle between the forces of light and darkness.

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And the verses we're going to be looking at today in Revelation 12

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point out a few things that I believe the devil does not want you to know,

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things that he works very hard to keep from your knowledge

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about a very important, effective tactic

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that he uses against God's people.

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And we're also going to see how to overcome that tactic.

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But what we're going to see this morning is a war in heaven

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and then the devil's wrath on earth during the tribulation time.

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And we have to understand as we look at these verses

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and contemplate what they mean for us,

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that if you're a growing, thriving Christian,

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if you're walking with the Lord, if you're in prayer,

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you're in worship, you're in study, you're growing in him,

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if that's you, you're a target of the enemy.

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You are a target of the enemy.

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Now, if you're not a target of the enemy,

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if the devil doesn't harass you and come against you in your life,

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if there's no spiritual warfare in your life,

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well, that can possibly be indicative that you don't belong to God

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or you're not doing much for his kingdom.

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Because if you're not a threat, he doesn't feel the need to come against you.

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But here in chapter 12, we're going to see a little bit of the devil's personality.

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That he is always fighting.

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He is always making accusations.

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He is always exalting himself in his pride.

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That's who the devil is, and that should be a warning to all of us,

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to any of us who exhibit those characteristics in our lives.

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Because if we are like that, if we are acting and behaving like that,

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then we're simply reflecting the personality and the character of Satan himself.

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And Scripture is pretty clear that we reflect the character of the one we are born of.

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1 John wrote a lot about this where he said,

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those that are born of God reflect the character of God.

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Those who are born of Satan reflect the character of Satan.

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And if he can't keep you from becoming saved,

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if he can't keep you from giving your life to Jesus Christ, receiving forgiveness,

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if he can't keep you from becoming a child of God,

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then he and his minions are going to do everything they can

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to keep you from leading others to the salvation that you have.

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He will do everything he can to tempt you into disobedience,

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to tempt you into doing things and living certain ways

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that are poor witnesses and bad reflections of Christ.

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He will try and lead you into places that would cause other people to go,

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if that's what a Christian's like, I don't want to be one.

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And after he does that, he then accuses you,

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condemns you both in your own ear and before God Almighty.

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As he stands to put you down and say, God, look at this child of yours

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that is such a sinner, so disobedient.

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They don't love you. How can you love them?

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And the devil works overtime to do this, but the day is coming,

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and we're going to see it today in Revelation 12,

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when he will finally be kicked out of heaven permanently,

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barred from God's presence permanently, no longer able to accuse us, the brethren.

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And when that happens, he will be furious.

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He will be furious, not just because his favorite thing to do

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is taken away from him, he loves to accuse Christians,

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but because that means that his time to mess with God's people is coming to an end.

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And that is going to make the devil very angry.

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We're going to get into all that this morning, but first let's pray,

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and then we're going to spend some time worshipping God,

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because we are God's people.

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If you know Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior this morning,

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that means that you have confessed that Jesus is God,

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that he is your Lord and Savior, he is the master of your life,

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and we love him, we love him and we praise him,

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we worship him because of what he's done,

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because of the salvation that we have through his shed blood on the cross.

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We praise him for that, we're so grateful.

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But that also means that we are saved then from the wrath to come,

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that our future is an eternity in heaven, in paradise with our Creator,

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and that's glorious, amen. Let's pray.

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Father God, we love you and we thank you, Lord.

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We ask that you would bless us today, that you would speak to us today, God,

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as we study your word, Lord.

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We are literally looking into the future of what is to come upon this planet, God,

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and there is so much to encourage us, Lord, on how to live now.

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God, as we are in this age of grace, this church age, God,

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where we are still here on earth, Lord, people saved,

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filled with the Holy Spirit and called to go out and preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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And Lord, we know that in this age the devil is working overtime.

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To deceive people, as your word calls him, a deceiver.

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Lord, that he does everything he can to get people to believe that God isn't real,

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that you aren't real, that there's no need for salvation,

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that there is no good, no evil, no morality,

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no need for forgiveness, no judgment to come, God.

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He works so hard to deceive people into that.

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And Lord, it's just a reflection of his character and his nature.

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God, we have the hope that one day he won't be able to do that anymore.

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God, we know that one of his greatest tools to come against the people of God, the church,

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those that believe in you, God, today is to stand before your very throne and accuse us.

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And Lord, he accuses us in our own ears all day, every day,

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trying to get us to question our salvation, trying to get us to question our commitment to you.

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And Lord, we rebuke that in Jesus' name.

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We are so grateful, God, that you live within us and greater is he who is in us than he who is in this world.

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So Lord, bless us today, speak to us today, encourage us today.

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God, if someone in here needs to be rebuked today, we ask that you do that too.

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Lord, we love you. You're our Father. You love us. We trust in that.

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It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

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Well, we are, as I said earlier, in Revelation chapter 12.

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We're going to be looking at verses 7 through 17 this morning.

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And the first half of Revelation, what we saw there was a great symbolic display in heaven.

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John says he saw a great sign, and that phrase great sign meant great symbolic display.

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So we understood moving forward from that that the characters being introduced,

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or at least some of the characters being introduced, were symbolic of other things.

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And so we saw the woman, the dragon, and the child.

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And if you want to dive into that and our interpretation of what that means and who those characters are,

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you can get our study from last time on our YouTube channel.

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But after John sees these three characters, the scene he's looking at then turns to a great war.

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And that's where we pick it up here in verse 7.

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It says, Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon.

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The dragon and his angels also fought, but he could not prevail,

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and there was no place for them in heaven any longer.

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So the scene shifts, and I want you to notice the origin and the location of this war.

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It tells us that the war broke out in heaven.

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Now this might contradict the mental picture that some of us often have of heaven, right?

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When we think of heaven, we're thinking of soft lights and gentle music, right?

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We're thinking of clouds and people sitting on those clouds in white robes playing harps, right?

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Serene, blissful, right?

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But what John sees here in heaven is war, battle, fighting all there in heaven.

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And it gives us a glimpse into what's going on there, what's in heaven,

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because the scripture is very, very clear that as of today and up until this point in tribulation

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that we're looking at in Revelation 12, which we are not yet at, Satan still has access to heaven.

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Now that may be shocking to some of you.

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That may surprise some of you because we always think of, well, Satan, he's in hell, right?

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He's sitting in the big red throne and he has his pitchfork and he's there running things there in hell,

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but Satan's not in hell yet.

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As of right now, chronologically, Satan is not in hell yet.

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In fact, up until we get to the end of things, Satan has never been in hell.

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And he won't be in hell until later, which we will read about when we get there in Revelation.

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And when he's finally there, when he's finally sent to the lake of fire, the place of final judgment,

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he's not going to be ruling and reigning.

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He's not sitting on a big red throne.

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He's not carrying his pitchfork of authority.

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He's not the guy in charge of everything.

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In fact, when Satan ends up in hell, he's going to be the chief prisoner.

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He is tormented.

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He is possibly punished more than anyone else is there.

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But today, today, Satan spends most of his efforts before the very throne of God,

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and that might surprise you.

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But we read about that in Job chapter 1 verse 6 and Job chapter 2 verse 1.

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There's a story there that tells us as the angels were coming before God to present themselves before God Almighty,

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it tells us that Satan also came with them to present himself before the Lord.

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So we see in that picture that Satan had access into heaven to the very throne of God, to the very presence of God.

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And what we read about in Job, you might ask the question, well, what is Satan doing there in heaven?

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He's accusing Job.

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That's what we read about in Job.

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The conversation more or less goes like this.

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God's like, hey, Satan, where have you been?

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He doesn't call him bro.

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No, but where have you been, Satan?

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And Satan's like, well, I've been going to and fro on the earth back and forth, just kind of roaming around cruising.

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And then God says, well, have you considered my servant Job?

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God knows Satan is an accuser.

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So have you considered my servant Job?

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God says that he's a man of perfect integrity who fears God and turns from evil.

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And then Satan goes on to accuse Job of a whole lot of things.

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Oh, he just serves you because you've blessed him.

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He just serves you because you give him things.

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Look, take everything away from him.

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Let me mess with him, and Job will turn on you in a heartbeat.

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And then so on the story goes in Job as Job goes through all his difficulties.

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We also read in Zechariah chapter 3 verse 1.

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It says, then he showed me the high priest Joshua standing before the angel of the Lord.

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And this was a picture that the prophet was having of the high priest standing before the Lord in heaven.

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And it says, with Satan standing at his right side to accuse him.

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Now we'll get into this idea of Satan being an accuser later,

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but the picture is what we see in Scripture is that Satan has access to heaven.

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He's not yet consigned to hell.

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Now you might go, well, wasn't Satan defeated at the cross?

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Right? Isn't that what we preach? Isn't that what we teach?

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Yes, Satan was defeated at the cross as Jesus Christ, God himself in the flesh, died on the cross

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as the atoning sacrifice for all of mankind and then went into the grave and then rose again.

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He defeated Satan in all of that. He defeated him.

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And because of what Jesus did through faith in Christ, we also have victory over Satan now here in this life.

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But although he was defeated at the cross, although the sentence was pronounced,

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his sentence hasn't been fully carried out yet.

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That's the picture that we have.

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At this point in Revelation, at chapter 12, we're right around the midpoint of the seven-year tribulation period,

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the final seven years of this age of history on earth.

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And what we see here is another attempt by Satan to overthrow God and to take ultimate authority from the heavens.

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I say another attempt because Satan already rebelled against God in times past.

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And he was kicked out of heaven.

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The idea of him being kicked out of heaven at that point was that he didn't live there anymore,

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but he was still able to come visit.

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And so although Satan was kicked out once and although he goes back to accuse,

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here what we're going to read about today is the second attempt by Satan to overthrow God.

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And he loses again and he is cast down to the earth and this time he is barred from heaven permanently.

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As verse 8 tells us, there was no place for them in heaven any longer.

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And then after the tribulation period, as we continue through Revelation,

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we'll find that he is then going to be bound in the abyss for a thousand years during the millennial reign of Christ.

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And after that thousand-year reign of Christ, he will be released again for a period of time.

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We will discuss why that happens when we get there.

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But that's then where Satan then continues his deception on the people on earth until finally,

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ultimately he will be cast into the lake of fire, permanently, completely,

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separated from God's presence and always for all time.

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But the picture of all of this is we see throughout Scripture that Satan is a relentless,

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never giving up, always fighting, always trying to find a way to usurp authority from God.

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This is who he is and what we see of him here in Revelation 12 is him making one last attempt to take authority from God.

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Now we see that he's here fighting against someone very particular,

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the fourth character that is introduced in these few chapters we're looking at, Michael the Archangel.

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It tells us that it's Michael and his angels that are fighting against the dragon.

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Now we know the dragon is Satan from verse 9.

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We'll get there when we look at that.

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But I want you to notice something very important is John is seeing this warfare take place in heaven.

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It's not Satan fighting against God personally.

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See, we often think good evil, God, devil, right?

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And we often think that the battle is between God and Satan.

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But that's not the picture we see here.

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What we see is two created angelic beings and their forces under their command battling it out.

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It's a very important understanding that Satan is not God's counterpart.

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He's not God's opposite.

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He's not the yin to his yang.

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He's not the black to his white.

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That's not who Satan is.

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Satan is not God's negative.

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He is not the opposite of God.

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He doesn't have the same attributes of God.

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God is almighty.

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God is forever.

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God is infinite.

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Satan is a created being, incidentally created by God.

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Now Satan's opposite or Satan's opposite would be closer to Michael the Archangel

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because we do read in scripture that Satan was one of the, what they call the chief princes,

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the angels at the top of the hierarchy there.

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That Satan was, in some cases they say that his body was seemingly made of music and musical instruments

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and that's why people go, Satan was the worship leader in heaven.

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He was one that would bring praise to God Almighty.

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He was one of the big dogs, right?

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He was right up there with Michael.

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Him and Michael actually in a time they were co-servants of God in heaven.

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Think about that.

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And yet we read that Lucifer, Satan himself, rebelled and fell.

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But the idea there is if Satan tried to go after God directly, it wouldn't even be a fight.

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I mean that would be like an ant going up against a giant.

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It's like, are you kidding me?

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Right? You're just this pitiful, annoyance squish, you're gone.

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That's the picture of Satan was trying to go after God.

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I mean because God is Almighty.

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That means that the mighty, God is all of it.

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Right? God is Almighty.

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He has no equal.

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There is no yin to his yang.

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And so thus Satan's endeavor, Satan's battle, Satan's warfare against God

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and as with any endeavor against God Almighty must and will ultimately fail.

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Now if that's true that Satan's going to ultimately fail, why does he fight?

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Why does he keep fighting knowing he can't win?

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Well in general he hates God.

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He hates God. He just hates him.

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He hates God and everything he stands for and he just wants to hurt God in any way he can.

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He wants to cause God grief and pain in any way he can.

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And that's just a general context that Satan hates God because God kicked him out.

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But contextually where we're at here in Revelation, specifically with the understanding.

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And I know there's other interpretations of this, but the interpretation I hold to is that the woman

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that we saw in verse 1 is symbolic of the nation of Israel.

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And then the child that we saw in the first half of Revelation 12 was representative of the Messiah

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that she gave birth to, that Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Savior of mankind, was birthed

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through the nation of Israel.

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And then add to that we know that Israel is God's chosen people.

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He loves them. They're a special people to God and they have been and they always will be.

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We see the picture that Satan then having failed to stop the birth of the Messiah,

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which we dealt with in our last message, why is he fighting?

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Because he hates God's people. I couldn't stop the Messiah from being born.

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But there's promises that involve God's people about the Messianic kingdom to come.

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And so if I could wipe out all of God's people, well then God's plans can't come to fruition.

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And ha ha, I messed with God.

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And so he has been laboring and will labor specifically during the seven-year tribulation

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against God's people to wipe out specifically Israel, God's chosen people,

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in an attempt to prevent the Messianic kingdom of God.

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That's one of the reasons why he keeps fighting.

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The other reason why he keeps fighting is because he just simply wants people to worship him

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instead of God. He wants the worship.

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That was incidentally his original desire that got him kicked out of heaven in the first place.

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We read in Isaiah chapter 14 starting in verse 12, it says,

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Shining morning star, how you have fallen from the heavens.

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And this is speaking of Satan, who was a shining morning star.

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He was an angelic being and he has fallen from the heavens.

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You destroyer of nations, you have been cut down to the ground.

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You said to yourself, I will ascend to the heavens.

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I will set up my throne above the stars of God.

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I will sit on the mount of God's assembly in the remotest parts of the north.

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I will ascend above the highest clouds.

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I will make myself like the most high.

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But you will be brought down to Sheol into the deepest regions of the pit.

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That was Satan's original rebellion.

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I'm bringing all this worship to God. I want to be worshiped.

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I think I should be worshiped.

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As a matter of fact, I think I want to create my throne above God's throne

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so people will worship me instead of him and God's like, boink, get out.

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But what we see in the tribulation period is that Satan will specifically enforce

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worship of himself right around the midpoint of the tribulation.

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As you study the chronology of the tribulation, you got those first three and a half years

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where the Antichrist comes on the scene, this global leader who seems to solve the world's problems.

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One of the things he solves is the problems in the Middle East, makes a treaty with Israel.

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Hey Israel, you know what? I figured out a way for you to rebuild your temple on the Temple Mount.

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I think it's going to be in such a way where you don't even have to deal with the Dome of the Rock

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and the Muslim Mosque there. You guys can cohabitate. Oh, how awesome.

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Everybody's together. This is wonderful.

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And then for three and a half years, the Jews, they build their temple and they reinstitute their sacrifices

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and the Jewish nation are like, okay, now finally we can be right with God because our temple's back

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and we could do the animal sacrifices.

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And during that time, God raises up 144,000 Jewish witnesses.

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He raises up two witnesses specifically who are in Jerusalem.

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Say, in Israel, you're missing the point.

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It's not about the animal's blood. It's about the blood of the lamb.

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And so they're witnessing for three and a half years and Israel's going about their thing going,

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hey, it's all good. But at the midpoint, we read about this event called the Abomination of Desolation

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where the Antichrist will set up an image within the temple, demand to be God,

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demand that people worship him instead of God. Say, worship this image of the beast.

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And we're going to see that happen.

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And some think that it's a reanimated Antichrist, possibly the man, the Antichrist who is now possessed

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by the devil himself. He was fueled and led and empowered by Satan.

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But this whole scene is Satan himself wanting to be worshiped.

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My man, the one I'm controlling or I've possessed, I'm not sure there's different interpretations of that.

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But the point is, is Satan is setting up worship of himself in God's temple.

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What a picture of what he already tried to do in heaven.

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Now, right around this time in the heavenlies, then, we're reading that Satan then tries to conquer heaven

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one final time.

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Now, what's interesting is whenever we read about Michael, the archangel,

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you go through scripture and there's these chief princes on the bad side,

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and there's these rulers, these archangels in heaven.

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But they're not all named. Just a couple are named, but Michael is one of them.

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And every time we read about Michael, the archangel, every time we read about Michael, the archangel,

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he is seen and depicted as guarding or the guardian of Israel specifically.

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In the book of Jude, you had Michael disputing with Satan over the body of Moses.

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And Moses is kind of the father of the nation, right?

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You go back to Abraham, you come to the line.

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Moses is the one that kind of led Israel out of Egypt, and so he didn't birth the nation,

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but he brought the law and all of that.

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And so Moses is definitely connected to Israel and that whole idea.

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In Daniel chapter 10, we read a story about Daniel praying to God about specifically Israel's fate,

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Israel's future.

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And then Daniel prays for three weeks, and then an angel shows up and says,

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Hey Daniel, the moment you started praying, God sent me with the answer, but guess what? On the way.

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The demon who's in charge of Persia stood against me in that whole area and all of that,

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stood against me and fought against me and tried to prevent me from getting to you.

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But then what does it tell us?

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Michael came to help me.

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And it calls him there one of the chief princes.

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And then later on in Daniel chapter 12 verse 1,

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Michael is specifically called the one who stands watch over Israel, God's people.

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So whenever we see Michael specifically named,

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it's always in connection with Israel, the nation Israel, the people, the Jewish people.

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It's always connected with something going on with them, some battle, some protection, some guarding.

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And this is incidentally another reason why I believe that the woman in Revelation chapter 12

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is the nation of Israel and not the church and not something else.

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And when we see Michael brought into the equation, it's in connection with the nation of Israel.

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So Satan, however, having desecrated God's temple on earth and scattered God's chosen people,

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as we're seeing through the tribulation period, he's then defeated in heaven again.

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And we read in verse 9.

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So the great dragon was thrown out.

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The ancient serpent, the one who is called the devil, and Satan, the one who deceives the whole world,

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he was thrown down to earth and his angels with him.

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Now we do know that the fallen angels, the ones that went with Satan,

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we saw in the beginning of the chapter, the one third that went with him, we call them demons, right?

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But they are fallen angels.

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And notice here how Satan is described.

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There's a few different phrases to describe him.

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The first one is the great dragon.

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We spoke about that in our last message.

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But the idea of this great dragon, he's called the great red dragon earlier in the chapter,

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is this picture of this horrific, fearsome, devouring, destructive monster,

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which is a great depiction of who Satan is.

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But then he says the ancient serpent, that should make you think back to the Garden of Eden.

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The ancient serpent, the serpent that came into the garden to deceive Adam and Eve.

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Then he is called the devil.

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That word devil in the Greek is diabolos, right?

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You may have heard in another language, diablo, right?

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The devil.

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But the word actually is where we get our English word diabolic.

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When you call someone diabolic in English, what you're doing is referring to that they're extremely wicked,

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extremely cruel, extremely evil.

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That is someone who is diabolic.

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And so this word that is used here for Satan is that word.

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Now, what the meaning of the word diabolos is, is slanderer.

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And slander is basically false or malicious statements made about another that is intended to damage their reputation.

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That's what slander is.

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When you say something to somebody about someone else, and it's not true,

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and you know that the point of what you're saying is to damage their reputation, that's slander.

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And so the devil is calling him the slanderer.

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And then the word Satan there, and that word literally means adversary.

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Satan is the adversary, the one who stands against God and all who belong to him.

453
00:29:54,000 --> 00:29:58,000
And so again, the picture, if you belong to God,

454
00:29:58,000 --> 00:30:03,000
if you have been washed clean by the blood of Jesus Christ through your faith and his finished work on the cross,

455
00:30:03,000 --> 00:30:07,000
if you belong to God, the devil is your adversary.

456
00:30:07,000 --> 00:30:10,000
He's your enemy.

457
00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:13,000
And you are his enemy.

458
00:30:13,000 --> 00:30:16,000
You have to think about that.

459
00:30:16,000 --> 00:30:18,000
Now, this is a good thing.

460
00:30:18,000 --> 00:30:24,000
It's a good thing that Satan's your enemy, because if he's not your enemy, he's your friend.

461
00:30:24,000 --> 00:30:27,000
And I don't want Satan as my friend.

462
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:30,000
You shouldn't want Satan as your friend, you know?

463
00:30:30,000 --> 00:30:33,000
Satan isn't the worst enemy you could have.

464
00:30:33,000 --> 00:30:37,000
Who do you think is the worst enemy you could have?

465
00:30:37,000 --> 00:30:39,000
God Almighty.

466
00:30:39,000 --> 00:30:41,000
That would be the worst enemy you could have.

467
00:30:41,000 --> 00:30:49,000
And matter of fact, Hebrews chapter 10 verse 31 says it is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

468
00:30:49,000 --> 00:30:54,000
I'd rather have God as my friend and Satan as my enemy any day.

469
00:30:54,000 --> 00:30:59,000
And so it says he is the one who deceives the whole world.

470
00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:01,000
He's a deceiver.

471
00:31:01,000 --> 00:31:02,000
Right?

472
00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:04,000
Overt evil is bad enough.

473
00:31:04,000 --> 00:31:06,000
You know, like evil that is just plainly evil.

474
00:31:06,000 --> 00:31:07,000
Right?

475
00:31:07,000 --> 00:31:08,000
That's bad enough.

476
00:31:08,000 --> 00:31:14,000
But evil, the worst kind of evil in my opinion, is the kind that is covered up with a facade of goodness.

477
00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:18,000
That's just evil, right?

478
00:31:18,000 --> 00:31:21,000
And we know that the Bible tells us that Satan is a liar.

479
00:31:21,000 --> 00:31:26,000
Jesus himself said Satan was a liar from the very beginning.

480
00:31:26,000 --> 00:31:33,000
In this age, what he does now is he covers up his evil and what he's trying to tempt us to and the wrong he's trying to do.

481
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:38,000
He covers it up with these veneers of goodness to make it look okay.

482
00:31:38,000 --> 00:31:39,000
And it's all lies.

483
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:40,000
That's how he does it.

484
00:31:40,000 --> 00:31:44,000
He lies to us about freedom and sexuality and choice and God and life.

485
00:31:44,000 --> 00:31:50,000
He lies to us about it to get us to do that which is disobedient to God.

486
00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:54,000
He raises up false religious systems and then says, pick any one of them.

487
00:31:54,000 --> 00:31:57,000
They all lead to God.

488
00:31:57,000 --> 00:32:03,000
He lies by telling Christians, your faith should be private.

489
00:32:03,000 --> 00:32:05,000
You should keep your faith to yourself.

490
00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:07,000
Don't go tell people about Jesus.

491
00:32:07,000 --> 00:32:08,000
That's annoying.

492
00:32:08,000 --> 00:32:10,000
That's obnoxious.

493
00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:13,000
They don't want to hear about that.

494
00:32:13,000 --> 00:32:16,000
And it's a lie.

495
00:32:16,000 --> 00:32:23,000
He lies by telling believers, you know, if you disagree with something the word says, well, it was just written by man anyways.

496
00:32:23,000 --> 00:32:26,000
So.

497
00:32:26,000 --> 00:32:27,000
Well, I disagree.

498
00:32:27,000 --> 00:32:30,000
Well, that word didn't even exist in the Bible until 1954.

499
00:32:30,000 --> 00:32:34,000
So therefore.

500
00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:37,000
He's a liar.

501
00:32:37,000 --> 00:32:40,000
Or as long as you come to church once in a blue moon, just live however you want.

502
00:32:40,000 --> 00:32:41,000
You're all good.

503
00:32:41,000 --> 00:32:45,000
You checked in.

504
00:32:45,000 --> 00:32:48,000
You know, some of you watching online, I love you to death.

505
00:32:48,000 --> 00:32:50,000
I really do.

506
00:32:50,000 --> 00:32:55,000
But some of you, not all of you, but some of you are still staying home and watching.

507
00:32:55,000 --> 00:32:58,000
And you're really just making excuses at this point.

508
00:32:58,000 --> 00:32:59,000
And I love you guys.

509
00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:00,000
I really do.

510
00:33:00,000 --> 00:33:03,000
And a lot of you, you have good reason to be home.

511
00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:04,000
Right.

512
00:33:04,000 --> 00:33:05,000
There's health issues.

513
00:33:05,000 --> 00:33:06,000
There's mobility issues.

514
00:33:06,000 --> 00:33:10,000
But some of you, some of you, you know, you know, Holy Spirit's been knocking on your heart.

515
00:33:10,000 --> 00:33:13,000
I need to go back to church and fellowship with my family.

516
00:33:13,000 --> 00:33:16,000
But excuse after excuse.

517
00:33:16,000 --> 00:33:18,000
And so I'll just leave that with you.

518
00:33:18,000 --> 00:33:19,000
OK.

519
00:33:19,000 --> 00:33:20,000
But I love you.

520
00:33:20,000 --> 00:33:22,000
Please, please don't be mad at me.

521
00:33:22,000 --> 00:33:25,000
But Satan deceives.

522
00:33:25,000 --> 00:33:28,000
He deceives by spreading false doctrines.

523
00:33:28,000 --> 00:33:30,000
He deceives by diluting truth.

524
00:33:30,000 --> 00:33:36,000
And I think his greatest attack, his greatest spiritual deception is an attempt to keep people away from the truth of the gospel.

525
00:33:36,000 --> 00:33:38,000
Right.

526
00:33:38,000 --> 00:33:42,000
He tries to get people to believe you don't need God.

527
00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:44,000
There is no God.

528
00:33:44,000 --> 00:33:48,000
There is no right and wrong.

529
00:33:48,000 --> 00:33:52,000
So therefore, you don't need salvation.

530
00:33:52,000 --> 00:33:55,000
You don't need forgiveness.

531
00:33:55,000 --> 00:33:58,000
It's your own personal choice.

532
00:33:58,000 --> 00:34:02,000
You can do whatever you want.

533
00:34:02,000 --> 00:34:06,000
Oh, 1 John chapter 5 verse 19.

534
00:34:06,000 --> 00:34:14,000
It says, We know that we are of God, and the whole world is under the sway of the evil one.

535
00:34:14,000 --> 00:34:19,000
That word sway means his control, his influence.

536
00:34:19,000 --> 00:34:29,000
But it's a heavy statement John makes there in 1 John that essentially what he's saying is like, look, if you're saved, you belong to God.

537
00:34:29,000 --> 00:34:30,000
And the whole world is wrong.

538
00:34:30,000 --> 00:34:31,000
And you know it.

539
00:34:31,000 --> 00:34:33,000
The whole world.

540
00:34:33,000 --> 00:34:35,000
The whole world is under the sway.

541
00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:37,000
Even the people that say, I reject that.

542
00:34:37,000 --> 00:34:38,000
I just there is no God.

543
00:34:38,000 --> 00:34:39,000
There's no Satan.

544
00:34:39,000 --> 00:34:40,000
And Satan's going, awesome.

545
00:34:40,000 --> 00:34:42,000
Keep believing that.

546
00:34:42,000 --> 00:34:47,000
Because you're under the sway of me is what the devil says.

547
00:34:47,000 --> 00:34:52,000
So he does all this by deception, deceiving, lying, trying to get people.

548
00:34:52,000 --> 00:34:54,000
And in today's age, just go, oh, there is no devil.

549
00:34:54,000 --> 00:34:55,000
There is no God.

550
00:34:55,000 --> 00:34:56,000
There's no right and wrong.

551
00:34:56,000 --> 00:34:57,000
There's no penalty.

552
00:34:57,000 --> 00:34:58,000
There's no reward.

553
00:34:58,000 --> 00:34:59,000
There's no judgment.

554
00:34:59,000 --> 00:35:02,000
And so they go about their lives blindly.

555
00:35:02,000 --> 00:35:06,000
But verse 10, we hear a loud voice in heaven.

556
00:35:06,000 --> 00:35:09,000
And it doesn't tell us the source of the loud voice, just where it came from.

557
00:35:09,000 --> 00:35:14,000
It said, then I heard a loud voice in heaven say, the salvation and the power and the kingdom

558
00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:17,000
of our God and the authority of his Christ have now come.

559
00:35:17,000 --> 00:35:22,000
Because the accuser of our brothers and sisters who accuses them before our God day and night

560
00:35:22,000 --> 00:35:24,000
has been thrown down.

561
00:35:24,000 --> 00:35:29,000
So what we're seeing here is a proclamation is being made in heaven about what is coming

562
00:35:29,000 --> 00:35:30,000
to pass.

563
00:35:30,000 --> 00:35:36,000
The whole process of what is happening here in heaven that Satan has been cast out.

564
00:35:36,000 --> 00:35:39,000
He has been barred from heaven permanently at this point.

565
00:35:39,000 --> 00:35:45,000
And his time to mess with mankind is coming to an end.

566
00:35:45,000 --> 00:35:48,000
But notice what he is called here, accuser.

567
00:35:48,000 --> 00:35:53,000
The accuser, the accuser of our brothers and sisters.

568
00:35:53,000 --> 00:36:01,000
This is what has been one of, if not the most effective tactics of Satan throughout history.

569
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:05,000
It is an effective tactic of his.

570
00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:08,000
He accuses us in our own ears and he accuses us before God.

571
00:36:08,000 --> 00:36:09,000
This is what it sounds like.

572
00:36:09,000 --> 00:36:15,000
You call yourself a believer after you did that.

573
00:36:15,000 --> 00:36:19,000
You think God's going to hear your prayers?

574
00:36:19,000 --> 00:36:21,000
Don't bother praying.

575
00:36:21,000 --> 00:36:26,000
He's not listening to you, you filthy, disgusting person.

576
00:36:26,000 --> 00:36:31,000
What are you doing at church?

577
00:36:31,000 --> 00:36:33,000
You're too bad to be around those people.

578
00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:38,000
Man, if they knew who you really were, they'd run you out the door.

579
00:36:38,000 --> 00:36:43,000
I know Jews, specifically Jewish people that are constantly bombarded with these thoughts.

580
00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:46,000
You're not special to God.

581
00:36:46,000 --> 00:36:48,000
You're not God's chosen people.

582
00:36:48,000 --> 00:36:51,000
I mean, look at how he lets the world treat you.

583
00:36:51,000 --> 00:36:55,000
You think God would do that if you were special to him?

584
00:36:55,000 --> 00:36:58,000
He accuses us.

585
00:36:58,000 --> 00:37:01,000
He accuses our brothers and sisters.

586
00:37:01,000 --> 00:37:05,000
It says he does it both day and night.

587
00:37:05,000 --> 00:37:07,000
Both day and night.

588
00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:12,000
That's why he said earlier that most of his work today, Satan's work, is before the throne of God.

589
00:37:12,000 --> 00:37:14,000
Accusing us.

590
00:37:14,000 --> 00:37:16,000
He's got minions galore.

591
00:37:16,000 --> 00:37:19,000
Not more than they're in heaven, but he's got a lot.

592
00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:23,000
He sends them throughout the world, but he's accusing us day and night.

593
00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:27,000
He's so subtle in his ways, right?

594
00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:30,000
He comes before you and he tempts you with sin.

595
00:37:30,000 --> 00:37:34,000
He's like, oh, you know, this thing you shouldn't be doing, do it.

596
00:37:34,000 --> 00:37:38,000
This thing that God has spoken to you, I shouldn't engage in that.

597
00:37:38,000 --> 00:37:41,000
No, no, God didn't really say that, did he?

598
00:37:41,000 --> 00:37:42,000
Right?

599
00:37:42,000 --> 00:37:44,000
That's what he said to Eve in the garden.

600
00:37:44,000 --> 00:37:48,000
Did God really say?

601
00:37:48,000 --> 00:37:53,000
Satan's go-to is question the word of God.

602
00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:56,000
Did God really say?

603
00:37:56,000 --> 00:37:57,000
He says, go ahead and do it.

604
00:37:57,000 --> 00:37:58,000
You'll get away with it.

605
00:37:58,000 --> 00:37:59,000
No one will find out.

606
00:37:59,000 --> 00:38:00,000
Is it really that bad?

607
00:38:00,000 --> 00:38:01,000
And then you do it, right?

608
00:38:01,000 --> 00:38:03,000
You yield to the temptation.

609
00:38:03,000 --> 00:38:06,000
Then he goes, sinner!

610
00:38:06,000 --> 00:38:08,000
You are condemned!

611
00:38:08,000 --> 00:38:09,000
You deserve to go to hell!

612
00:38:09,000 --> 00:38:12,000
God, look what your kid did!

613
00:38:12,000 --> 00:38:14,000
Oh, I'm going to go tell God on you.

614
00:38:14,000 --> 00:38:15,000
Everybody's going to find out.

615
00:38:15,000 --> 00:38:19,000
Wow, you're such a horrible person.

616
00:38:19,000 --> 00:38:21,000
And then he just does the cycle over and over.

617
00:38:21,000 --> 00:38:22,000
Hey, do this thing.

618
00:38:22,000 --> 00:38:23,000
Come on, come on.

619
00:38:23,000 --> 00:38:24,000
It's all right.

620
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:25,000
It's all good.

621
00:38:25,000 --> 00:38:26,000
You do it.

622
00:38:26,000 --> 00:38:27,000
And then he condemns.

623
00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:30,000
That's what it means by him being the accuser.

624
00:38:30,000 --> 00:38:32,000
But here, during the tribulation period,

625
00:38:32,000 --> 00:38:34,000
the time is coming where he loses the coup in heaven,

626
00:38:34,000 --> 00:38:36,000
and he is kicked out of heaven,

627
00:38:36,000 --> 00:38:39,000
and he is cast down to earth.

628
00:38:39,000 --> 00:38:41,000
The time is coming where Satan will no longer be able to

629
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:46,000
stand before the throne of God and accuse you to your God.

630
00:38:46,000 --> 00:38:47,000
God's going to say, enough!

631
00:38:47,000 --> 00:38:48,000
Get out!

632
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:49,000
Permanently!

633
00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:51,000
You can't come here anymore!

634
00:38:51,000 --> 00:38:54,000
And Satan is going to be angry about it.

635
00:38:54,000 --> 00:38:56,000
What did verse 12 say?

636
00:38:56,000 --> 00:39:00,000
It says that the devil has come down to the earth with great fury.

637
00:39:00,000 --> 00:39:02,000
Why?

638
00:39:02,000 --> 00:39:06,000
Because he lost his most effective tactic against us.

639
00:39:06,000 --> 00:39:10,000
This great fury that happens at this midpoint of tribulation

640
00:39:10,000 --> 00:39:12,000
as there's a war in heaven, he is cast down.

641
00:39:12,000 --> 00:39:13,000
You're barred.

642
00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:14,000
You're done, Satan.

643
00:39:14,000 --> 00:39:15,000
No more.

644
00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:16,000
And a matter of fact, not only are you done,

645
00:39:16,000 --> 00:39:17,000
you can't accuse the brethren anymore to God,

646
00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:19,000
but your time is coming.

647
00:39:19,000 --> 00:39:20,000
You only got three and a half years left.

648
00:39:20,000 --> 00:39:23,000
And Satan is upset, and he just goes bonkers.

649
00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:25,000
And that's why we call the second half of the tribulation

650
00:39:25,000 --> 00:39:28,000
the great tribulation.

651
00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:31,000
Because those who claim Christ, especially those of Israel,

652
00:39:31,000 --> 00:39:34,000
fall under incredible persecution, it says there.

653
00:39:34,000 --> 00:39:38,000
So it's all the hate, all the fury, all the anger that Satan has towards God

654
00:39:38,000 --> 00:39:43,000
is now as he's cast out, it's turned on all who would call in the name of Christ.

655
00:39:43,000 --> 00:39:47,000
All of God's people, he's just going to turn his fury upon them ferociously.

656
00:39:47,000 --> 00:39:51,000
And for this last three and a half years,

657
00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:56,000
Satan, his demons, barred from having any access to God's throne,

658
00:39:56,000 --> 00:39:57,000
and it gets real bad.

659
00:39:57,000 --> 00:39:58,000
And we read about some of that already,

660
00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:00,000
where he's given the key to the abyss,

661
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:03,000
and he lets the demons, the bad demons, out of the spiritual jail,

662
00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:06,000
and they go out and they torment people,

663
00:40:06,000 --> 00:40:09,000
and then the four fallen angels go out and they're allowed to kill people,

664
00:40:09,000 --> 00:40:10,000
and all this stuff that is taking place.

665
00:40:10,000 --> 00:40:15,000
And so the battle in heaven now fully rages upon the earth

666
00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:17,000
through the second half of tribulation.

667
00:40:17,000 --> 00:40:21,000
Verse 11, but they conquered him by the blood of the Lamb,

668
00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:24,000
by the word of their testimony, for they did not love their lives

669
00:40:24,000 --> 00:40:26,000
to the point of death.

670
00:40:26,000 --> 00:40:29,000
So the they there, it's referring back to the brothers and sisters

671
00:40:29,000 --> 00:40:33,000
that we just talked about, those that are accused by Satan day and night.

672
00:40:33,000 --> 00:40:37,000
If you even step back a few verses previously,

673
00:40:37,000 --> 00:40:41,000
it's those that are accused by Satan who then are saved out of the whole world

674
00:40:41,000 --> 00:40:43,000
that Satan is working to deceive.

675
00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:46,000
So it's a picture of those who have put their faith in Jesus Christ.

676
00:40:46,000 --> 00:40:49,000
There's two understandings of exactly who these people can be.

677
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:52,000
One of them is, if you remember, during tribulation,

678
00:40:52,000 --> 00:40:55,000
there are still Jews and Gentiles on the earth worldwide, right?

679
00:40:55,000 --> 00:40:59,000
There's the 144,000 witnesses, there's the two witnesses in Jerusalem.

680
00:40:59,000 --> 00:41:02,000
So evangelism is still happening during the tribulation,

681
00:41:02,000 --> 00:41:06,000
and people are still getting saved during the tribulation.

682
00:41:06,000 --> 00:41:09,000
I believe that the church is raptured out at this point,

683
00:41:09,000 --> 00:41:12,000
that prior to the tribulation, the church is taken out of the world,

684
00:41:12,000 --> 00:41:14,000
and I believe scripture supports that.

685
00:41:14,000 --> 00:41:16,000
I fully acknowledge there's other interpretations,

686
00:41:16,000 --> 00:41:18,000
but that's what I see in scripture.

687
00:41:18,000 --> 00:41:22,000
And so the church is gone, and yet evangelism is still happening

688
00:41:22,000 --> 00:41:25,000
because God has a remnant there that are preaching the gospel,

689
00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:28,000
the 144,000 Jewish evangelists, the two witnesses.

690
00:41:28,000 --> 00:41:30,000
And so these people, these brothers and sisters,

691
00:41:30,000 --> 00:41:34,000
could be referring specifically to what we call the tribulation saints.

692
00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:39,000
These are people that believe in Jesus during the seven-year tribulation period,

693
00:41:39,000 --> 00:41:43,000
and these are people that are then slaughtered, it said earlier in Revelation,

694
00:41:43,000 --> 00:41:47,000
for their faith in Christ, that they are aggressively, just viciously slaughtered.

695
00:41:47,000 --> 00:41:50,000
How dare you believe in Jesus? And they are killed for their faith.

696
00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:53,000
And these are the ones that during tribulation, they're going,

697
00:41:53,000 --> 00:41:56,000
hey, God, how long until you avenge our blood?

698
00:41:56,000 --> 00:42:01,000
God's like, hold on, not yet, not yet, right?

699
00:42:01,000 --> 00:42:04,000
However, this phrase, brothers and sisters, and the way this is all worded here,

700
00:42:04,000 --> 00:42:09,000
could also just simply be a reference to all believers of all time,

701
00:42:09,000 --> 00:42:14,000
because the devil has been accusing believers since the very beginning.

702
00:42:14,000 --> 00:42:19,000
So it could be referring to either one there, but the point is, is they.

703
00:42:19,000 --> 00:42:22,000
These brothers and sisters, these who were saved out of the whole world,

704
00:42:22,000 --> 00:42:25,000
these who were accused by the devil, it says they won their victory,

705
00:42:25,000 --> 00:42:30,000
they conquered Satan, all his accusations, all his lies, all his deception, by three things.

706
00:42:30,000 --> 00:42:33,000
These are three things, and I want you guys to take note of these things.

707
00:42:33,000 --> 00:42:37,000
The first one is the blood of the lamb.

708
00:42:37,000 --> 00:42:41,000
They conquered him by the blood of the lamb.

709
00:42:41,000 --> 00:42:47,000
They were washed clean from all sin, all wrongdoing, all guilt,

710
00:42:47,000 --> 00:42:54,000
or specifically, contextually, anything accusable, anything condemnable,

711
00:42:54,000 --> 00:43:00,000
by the shed blood of Jesus Christ.

712
00:43:00,000 --> 00:43:06,000
The blood of Christ is, was, and will always be how anyone is saved.

713
00:43:06,000 --> 00:43:11,000
It is, and will always be, the method by which anyone is saved,

714
00:43:11,000 --> 00:43:16,000
both Jew and Gentile, it's through Jesus, it's through his shed blood on the cross.

715
00:43:16,000 --> 00:43:18,000
That's why Jesus said, I am the way and the truth and life,

716
00:43:18,000 --> 00:43:23,000
and nobody comes to the Father but by me, because it's his work.

717
00:43:23,000 --> 00:43:27,000
It's what he did on the cross is the atoning sacrifice, and that's a great thing,

718
00:43:27,000 --> 00:43:35,000
because if clearing you and me of the guilt of our sin was based on anything we've done, right?

719
00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:42,000
Well, gosh, Satan has quite a bit of evidence on every single one of us to the contrary, doesn't he?

720
00:43:42,000 --> 00:43:47,000
Satan has plenty of evidence that we are indeed guilty.

721
00:43:47,000 --> 00:43:53,000
So it's not on anything we've done that clears us of the guilt of breaking God's law, it's the blood of Christ.

722
00:43:53,000 --> 00:43:55,000
It's his sacrifice.

723
00:43:55,000 --> 00:43:59,000
Satan lies to us about God all the time.

724
00:43:59,000 --> 00:44:04,000
God doesn't love you, God's not listening, but he doesn't need to lie to God about us, does he?

725
00:44:04,000 --> 00:44:09,000
He doesn't need to go to God and make up stuff that we've done wrong and make up ways that we've fallen,

726
00:44:09,000 --> 00:44:14,000
because he has all the evidence, and we give him plenty every single day, don't we?

727
00:44:14,000 --> 00:44:17,000
We say something, we think something, we do something, and we're like,

728
00:44:17,000 --> 00:44:19,000
dang it, I know that was wrong, and Satan's like, aha!

729
00:44:19,000 --> 00:44:25,000
And he adds that to his trove of evidence, but Jesus, the Bible says, is our advocate.

730
00:44:25,000 --> 00:44:32,000
Jesus argues for us in every single item that Satan reads off of his record of evidence.

731
00:44:32,000 --> 00:44:35,000
Jesus goes, covered by the blood.

732
00:44:35,000 --> 00:44:38,000
Oh yeah, but he said this, covered by the blood.

733
00:44:38,000 --> 00:44:41,000
Well, he thought this, covered by the blood.

734
00:44:41,000 --> 00:44:44,000
Blood, blood, blood, blood, blood, blood.

735
00:44:44,000 --> 00:44:50,000
And Satan's like, reads the next thing, blood.

736
00:44:50,000 --> 00:44:54,000
And you can't lose with a lawyer like that, right?

737
00:44:54,000 --> 00:44:56,000
You can't lose.

738
00:44:56,000 --> 00:44:58,000
You can't lose, it's all paid for, it's all covered.

739
00:44:58,000 --> 00:45:02,000
You know, Satan may stand there and say, Nathan, God, Nathan's a sinner.

740
00:45:02,000 --> 00:45:05,000
He said this, and he said that.

741
00:45:05,000 --> 00:45:11,000
And I think God just looks at Satan and is like, I already knew Nathan's a sinner.

742
00:45:11,000 --> 00:45:13,000
That's not news.

743
00:45:13,000 --> 00:45:16,000
But Jesus died for all of it.

744
00:45:16,000 --> 00:45:18,000
So what else you got?

745
00:45:18,000 --> 00:45:20,000
And he has nothing.

746
00:45:20,000 --> 00:45:25,000
He has nothing on me, he has nothing on you if you put your faith in Jesus Christ.

747
00:45:25,000 --> 00:45:27,000
There is no accusation.

748
00:45:27,000 --> 00:45:33,000
In fact, Romans says there is now therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

749
00:45:33,000 --> 00:45:36,000
That's a beautiful truth.

750
00:45:36,000 --> 00:45:41,000
That is a beautiful truth, especially today, when Satan comes whispering in your ear and accusing you.

751
00:45:41,000 --> 00:45:43,000
I can't believe you call yourself a Christian.

752
00:45:43,000 --> 00:45:45,000
I can't believe you think you're going to serve in ministry.

753
00:45:45,000 --> 00:45:47,000
I can't believe you think you're going to do this and do that.

754
00:45:47,000 --> 00:45:53,000
And it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, covered by the blood.

755
00:45:53,000 --> 00:45:56,000
And you can't say anything against it.

756
00:45:56,000 --> 00:46:01,000
The blood of the lamb, incidentally, it's a majorly important concept in Scripture.

757
00:46:01,000 --> 00:46:03,000
We might think of like, what are the important concepts in Scripture?

758
00:46:03,000 --> 00:46:05,000
And you might think of the love of God, right?

759
00:46:05,000 --> 00:46:06,000
Love of God's important Scripture.

760
00:46:06,000 --> 00:46:11,000
And in the New Testament, the concept of the love of God is mentioned 290 times.

761
00:46:11,000 --> 00:46:18,000
But the atonement by the blood is mentioned over 1,300 times in the New Testament.

762
00:46:18,000 --> 00:46:19,000
Why?

763
00:46:19,000 --> 00:46:25,000
Because our standing before God is based on the finished work of the shed blood of Jesus Christ on the cross.

764
00:46:25,000 --> 00:46:28,000
That's the whole standing is based on that.

765
00:46:28,000 --> 00:46:30,000
It's not of our own works.

766
00:46:30,000 --> 00:46:34,000
We don't get into heaven by listing our accomplishments.

767
00:46:34,000 --> 00:46:38,000
We don't get into heaven by listing what we've done.

768
00:46:38,000 --> 00:46:40,000
It's purely by the shed blood of Christ.

769
00:46:40,000 --> 00:46:43,000
And we stand before God now and then.

770
00:46:43,000 --> 00:46:50,000
And incidentally, in this life, we defeat Satan in our lives by the finished work on Calvary 2,000 years ago.

771
00:46:50,000 --> 00:46:55,000
The cross is the very first step in overcoming Satan's most effective tactic against you.

772
00:46:55,000 --> 00:46:56,000
He accuses you.

773
00:46:56,000 --> 00:46:58,000
You plead the cross.

774
00:46:58,000 --> 00:47:00,000
He brings accusation into your life.

775
00:47:00,000 --> 00:47:02,000
You say the blood covers that.

776
00:47:02,000 --> 00:47:04,000
And that makes Satan mad.

777
00:47:04,000 --> 00:47:07,000
Spurgeon said, nothing provokes the devil as much as the cross.

778
00:47:07,000 --> 00:47:08,000
Why?

779
00:47:08,000 --> 00:47:13,000
Because when you apply the cross to your life, when you make Jesus your Lord and Savior,

780
00:47:13,000 --> 00:47:16,000
when you claim the forgiveness that the blood has applied to your life,

781
00:47:16,000 --> 00:47:22,000
and I'm washed clean by his perfect blood, you are forgiven of all sin forever.

782
00:47:22,000 --> 00:47:27,000
No accusation can ever stand against you at that point.

783
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:30,000
You are clear.

784
00:47:30,000 --> 00:47:32,000
Satan loses his hold on your life.

785
00:47:32,000 --> 00:47:37,000
He loses the war for your soul.

786
00:47:37,000 --> 00:47:39,000
Now you in this room are watching today.

787
00:47:39,000 --> 00:47:43,000
Have you received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior?

788
00:47:43,000 --> 00:47:44,000
Have you received him?

789
00:47:44,000 --> 00:47:47,000
I mean, can you say today, I stand firm today.

790
00:47:47,000 --> 00:47:53,000
I stand in victory over Satan and in victory against all his accusations

791
00:47:53,000 --> 00:47:56,000
because the blood of Jesus has covered me and washed me clean.

792
00:47:56,000 --> 00:47:59,000
Can you say that today?

793
00:47:59,000 --> 00:48:01,000
Many of us can.

794
00:48:01,000 --> 00:48:04,000
Some of you maybe not.

795
00:48:04,000 --> 00:48:06,000
Some of you have never applied that to your life,

796
00:48:06,000 --> 00:48:08,000
and so Satan's going to come into your life constantly,

797
00:48:08,000 --> 00:48:13,000
and he's probably doing it right this very second, saying God will never forgive you.

798
00:48:13,000 --> 00:48:15,000
That's a lie.

799
00:48:15,000 --> 00:48:20,000
The shed blood of the Lamb, Jesus himself, ensures that God will forgive you.

800
00:48:20,000 --> 00:48:22,000
You just have to apply it to your life.

801
00:48:22,000 --> 00:48:25,000
You have to receive that free gift.

802
00:48:25,000 --> 00:48:28,000
That's the gospel of Jesus Christ.

803
00:48:28,000 --> 00:48:30,000
That's what the blood of the Lamb is.

804
00:48:30,000 --> 00:48:33,000
Now the second thing that they won their victory,

805
00:48:33,000 --> 00:48:37,000
they conquered Satan by, it says, is by the word of their testimony.

806
00:48:37,000 --> 00:48:42,000
Word of their testimony, it means that they shared what God had done in their lives.

807
00:48:42,000 --> 00:48:43,000
That's the idea there.

808
00:48:43,000 --> 00:48:47,000
Nothing shakes the grip of Satan over a life,

809
00:48:47,000 --> 00:48:52,000
I think, more than the joyful realization and declaration of what God has done.

810
00:48:52,000 --> 00:48:55,000
When you realize what God has done in my life, I've received him,

811
00:48:55,000 --> 00:49:01,000
gosh, the hold Satan has just dissipates.

812
00:49:01,000 --> 00:49:02,000
God loves me.

813
00:49:02,000 --> 00:49:03,000
He will forgive me of everything.

814
00:49:03,000 --> 00:49:05,000
He has forgiven me of everything.

815
00:49:05,000 --> 00:49:08,000
I could have a brand new life right now.

816
00:49:08,000 --> 00:49:10,000
I just confess my sin to him,

817
00:49:10,000 --> 00:49:13,000
receive him as my Lord and Savior and follow him.

818
00:49:13,000 --> 00:49:16,000
I'm free.

819
00:49:16,000 --> 00:49:21,000
And when that's your testimony, man, he really can't do a whole lot in your life.

820
00:49:21,000 --> 00:49:24,000
When a person realizes that and experiences that,

821
00:49:24,000 --> 00:49:29,000
they can't help but to tell others about it.

822
00:49:29,000 --> 00:49:32,000
But when the saved person starts evangelizing and starts sharing the gospel,

823
00:49:32,000 --> 00:49:36,000
you're invading Satan's territory.

824
00:49:36,000 --> 00:49:37,000
You're invading Satan's territory.

825
00:49:37,000 --> 00:49:42,000
You've gone from defense, Jesus died for me, I'm good,

826
00:49:42,000 --> 00:49:46,000
to offense, Jesus died for you.

827
00:49:46,000 --> 00:49:49,000
You can receive him today.

828
00:49:49,000 --> 00:49:53,000
When you do that, you're moving into territory that is under his sway,

829
00:49:53,000 --> 00:49:56,000
as we looked at earlier, telling those that are born of him,

830
00:49:56,000 --> 00:50:01,000
those that are unsaved, that they can be forgiven and set free as well.

831
00:50:01,000 --> 00:50:04,000
They can have the hope of eternal life.

832
00:50:04,000 --> 00:50:08,000
They can be forgiven and the devil hates that.

833
00:50:08,000 --> 00:50:12,000
Hates that.

834
00:50:12,000 --> 00:50:13,000
So what does he do?

835
00:50:13,000 --> 00:50:14,000
He tries to get you to not evangelize.

836
00:50:14,000 --> 00:50:18,000
If he can't get you to evangelize, the next step is he tries to get you all caught up in theological

837
00:50:18,000 --> 00:50:22,000
and apologetical debates all day long.

838
00:50:22,000 --> 00:50:23,000
Right?

839
00:50:23,000 --> 00:50:29,000
People bring up these weird, obscure things and it's good to have an answer for those things.

840
00:50:29,000 --> 00:50:30,000
It's good.

841
00:50:30,000 --> 00:50:34,000
But I think what's more powerful than all of that is your testimony,

842
00:50:34,000 --> 00:50:36,000
the word of your testimony.

843
00:50:36,000 --> 00:50:37,000
Right?

844
00:50:37,000 --> 00:50:41,000
When you say, this is what God did in my life personally,

845
00:50:41,000 --> 00:50:43,000
people can't refute that.

846
00:50:43,000 --> 00:50:45,000
No, he didn't.

847
00:50:45,000 --> 00:50:47,000
You weren't there.

848
00:50:47,000 --> 00:50:49,000
I'm telling you my personal experience.

849
00:50:49,000 --> 00:50:51,000
This is who I was.

850
00:50:51,000 --> 00:50:53,000
This is how I used to live.

851
00:50:53,000 --> 00:50:54,000
I gave my life to Christ.

852
00:50:54,000 --> 00:50:55,000
This is how my life has changed.

853
00:50:55,000 --> 00:50:58,000
It's different.

854
00:50:58,000 --> 00:51:00,000
You can't refute that.

855
00:51:00,000 --> 00:51:03,000
People will try.

856
00:51:03,000 --> 00:51:04,000
But that's powerful.

857
00:51:04,000 --> 00:51:11,000
I still run into people today that I was in high school with and they go, what do you do?

858
00:51:11,000 --> 00:51:13,000
What?

859
00:51:13,000 --> 00:51:16,000
Yeah, I'm a pastor.

860
00:51:16,000 --> 00:51:20,000
Did I hear you correctly?

861
00:51:20,000 --> 00:51:21,000
Did I get that opportunity?

862
00:51:21,000 --> 00:51:24,000
Yeah, Jesus changed my life.

863
00:51:24,000 --> 00:51:25,000
I used to party with you.

864
00:51:25,000 --> 00:51:27,000
I know.

865
00:51:27,000 --> 00:51:29,000
We did a lot of terrible things, but you know what?

866
00:51:29,000 --> 00:51:32,000
That's not who I am anymore.

867
00:51:32,000 --> 00:51:40,000
And to share that testimony is way more powerful than let's argue the theology of the Trinity.

868
00:51:40,000 --> 00:51:42,000
Now, yeah, have an answer, right?

869
00:51:42,000 --> 00:51:45,000
Study those things, but don't neglect your testimony.

870
00:51:45,000 --> 00:51:50,000
Your personal testimony is very intimidating to the enemy because it brings conviction of heart.

871
00:51:50,000 --> 00:51:56,000
Your personal testimony allows the person standing before you to see the evidence of a changed life right there.

872
00:51:56,000 --> 00:51:59,000
The evidence is standing right before them.

873
00:51:59,000 --> 00:52:01,000
And so if you're a believer, you have a testimony.

874
00:52:01,000 --> 00:52:03,000
So share it.

875
00:52:03,000 --> 00:52:04,000
Tell the truth.

876
00:52:04,000 --> 00:52:07,000
Share the truth of what God has done in your life.

877
00:52:07,000 --> 00:52:09,000
It's so powerful.

878
00:52:09,000 --> 00:52:10,000
And guess what?

879
00:52:10,000 --> 00:52:16,000
You already know what God did in your life, so you don't need to have to go to four years of Bible college to know what God already did in your life.

880
00:52:16,000 --> 00:52:18,000
I don't know what to say.

881
00:52:18,000 --> 00:52:20,000
Tell them what God did.

882
00:52:20,000 --> 00:52:25,000
The third thing that they won their victory and they conquered Satan by is that they did not love their life.

883
00:52:25,000 --> 00:52:31,000
They said they did not love their lives to the point of death, simply meaning that they were prepared to die for the truth.

884
00:52:31,000 --> 00:52:35,000
They didn't consider life more valuable than their commitment to Christ.

885
00:52:35,000 --> 00:52:40,000
They didn't consider, you know, this life and the things of this life more valuable than the gospel truth.

886
00:52:40,000 --> 00:52:43,000
And so they were ready even to die for it if it came to that.

887
00:52:43,000 --> 00:52:44,000
So how did they overcome?

888
00:52:44,000 --> 00:52:46,000
They had a true, genuine faith.

889
00:52:46,000 --> 00:52:49,000
They had an ongoing testimony and they endured.

890
00:52:49,000 --> 00:52:53,000
And that really is the essence of true Christianity.

891
00:52:53,000 --> 00:52:55,000
They live this life.

892
00:52:55,000 --> 00:53:05,000
And when we live this kind of authentic life based upon the blood of Jesus, pleading the blood of Jesus, I am saved, I am forgiven by the blood of Christ,

893
00:53:05,000 --> 00:53:12,000
and then we live with this ongoing testimony of what God has done and what he's doing in our lives, and we just want to share that with people,

894
00:53:12,000 --> 00:53:14,000
and we endure all the attacks of the enemy.

895
00:53:14,000 --> 00:53:15,000
Verse 11 says what?

896
00:53:15,000 --> 00:53:17,000
We conquer him.

897
00:53:17,000 --> 00:53:19,000
We conquer him.

898
00:53:19,000 --> 00:53:20,000
You have victory.

899
00:53:20,000 --> 00:53:24,000
You want to have victory over Satan today?

900
00:53:24,000 --> 00:53:28,000
Plead the blood of the lamb.

901
00:53:28,000 --> 00:53:32,000
Share the word of your testimony and endure.

902
00:53:32,000 --> 00:53:35,000
And you can endure because God himself lives within you.

903
00:53:35,000 --> 00:53:39,000
Stay close to him and you will have victory.

904
00:53:39,000 --> 00:53:42,000
Verse 12, and we'll do this real quick.

905
00:53:42,000 --> 00:53:46,000
Therefore, rejoice, you heavens, and you who dwell in them.

906
00:53:46,000 --> 00:53:53,000
Woe to the earth and the sea because the devil has come down to you with great fury because he knows his time is short.

907
00:53:53,000 --> 00:53:54,000
And so heaven rejoices.

908
00:53:54,000 --> 00:53:56,000
You know, yay, the devil's finally been cast out.

909
00:53:56,000 --> 00:53:57,000
You know, that guy stinks anyways.

910
00:53:57,000 --> 00:53:58,000
We don't want him here.

911
00:53:58,000 --> 00:53:59,000
You know?

912
00:53:59,000 --> 00:54:02,000
And they're just like, he's evil, he's wicked, he's horrible.

913
00:54:02,000 --> 00:54:03,000
He brings these accusations.

914
00:54:03,000 --> 00:54:05,000
It's like, ah, just get him out.

915
00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:06,000
He's finally gone.

916
00:54:06,000 --> 00:54:07,000
Celebration.

917
00:54:07,000 --> 00:54:09,000
But woe to the earth and the seas.

918
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:12,000
And that's kind of an encapsulating term of the whole creation.

919
00:54:12,000 --> 00:54:19,000
So by extension, those who are still down there, woe, because the devil is ticked off and his temper tantrum will be mighty.

920
00:54:19,000 --> 00:54:26,000
Verse 13, when the devil saw that he had been thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman who had given birth to the male child.

921
00:54:26,000 --> 00:54:32,000
So we touched on this a bit in our last message, remembering that the woman is a great sign.

922
00:54:32,000 --> 00:54:34,000
She's a great symbolic display.

923
00:54:34,000 --> 00:54:40,000
Again, I believe she's representative of the nation of Israel for reasons I shared in the previous message.

924
00:54:40,000 --> 00:54:50,000
But one of those big reasons is which, that the nation of Israel, the woman, gave birth to the male child, who will, it says, rule all nations with an iron rod.

925
00:54:50,000 --> 00:54:56,000
It's interesting, that word rule there means shepherd.

926
00:54:56,000 --> 00:55:02,000
And then in Revelation 19, 15, when it's talking about the second coming of Jesus Christ, it tells us this.

927
00:55:02,000 --> 00:55:05,000
He will rule them with an iron rod.

928
00:55:05,000 --> 00:55:09,000
He will also trample the winepress of the fierce anger of God, the Almighty.

929
00:55:09,000 --> 00:55:12,000
And so the male child is Jesus Christ, the Messiah.

930
00:55:12,000 --> 00:55:14,000
So he persecutes her.

931
00:55:14,000 --> 00:55:16,000
He ramps up his persecution because he knows, tying him short.

932
00:55:16,000 --> 00:55:24,000
And then verse 14, it says, the woman was given two wings of a great eagle so that she could fly from the serpent's presence to her place in the wilderness,

933
00:55:24,000 --> 00:55:27,000
where she was nourished for a time, times, and half a time.

934
00:55:27,000 --> 00:55:33,000
From his mouth, the serpent spewed water, like a river flowing after the woman, to sweep her away with a flood.

935
00:55:33,000 --> 00:55:35,000
But the earth helped the woman.

936
00:55:35,000 --> 00:55:40,000
The earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the river that the dragon had spewed from his mouth.

937
00:55:40,000 --> 00:55:45,000
So the dragon was furious with the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring,

938
00:55:45,000 --> 00:55:50,000
those who keep the commands of God and hold firmly to the testimony about Jesus.

939
00:55:50,000 --> 00:55:53,000
And so, again, this is all symbolic stuff, right?

940
00:55:53,000 --> 00:55:56,000
Because the woman is symbolic, the eagle wings are symbolic.

941
00:55:56,000 --> 00:56:03,000
But when we look here that the devil's time is short, it tells us how much time he has.

942
00:56:03,000 --> 00:56:07,000
And he uses this interesting phrase here, time, times, and a half of time, right?

943
00:56:07,000 --> 00:56:12,000
And people go, just like, I know it's in English, we can use English we understand, right?

944
00:56:12,000 --> 00:56:14,000
It's like, what does this even mean?

945
00:56:14,000 --> 00:56:22,000
Well, this phrase, time, times, and half a time, it's found in two places, here in Revelation 12 and in Daniel chapter 7.

946
00:56:22,000 --> 00:56:32,000
And in both places, this phrase, time, time, and half a time, is always linked to the concepts of 1,260 days or 42 months.

947
00:56:32,000 --> 00:56:35,000
And you know, you math that out, that's three and a half years.

948
00:56:35,000 --> 00:56:45,000
And so, like in Revelation 12,6, it said the woman fled into the wilderness where she had a place prepared by God to be nourished there for 1,260 days.

949
00:56:45,000 --> 00:56:52,000
And then here in verse 14, it says the woman fled to her place in the wilderness where she was nourished for a time, times, and half a time.

950
00:56:52,000 --> 00:56:59,000
So the common understanding is that time, times, and half a time is equivalent to 1,260 days, which is equivalent to three and a half years.

951
00:56:59,000 --> 00:57:05,000
So the idea here is that for the last three and a half years of the great tribulation, she is then protected by God.

952
00:57:05,000 --> 00:57:09,000
But Satan, he's full of great fury because he only has three and a half years left.

953
00:57:09,000 --> 00:57:16,000
And he's barred, fully barred from heaven now, and so he pours out all his wrath on her and he's ticked.

954
00:57:16,000 --> 00:57:19,000
He's not allowed into the presence of God anymore to make accusations.

955
00:57:19,000 --> 00:57:21,000
He's now confined to the earth realm.

956
00:57:21,000 --> 00:57:29,000
So he just goes ballistic trying to prevent the plan of the coming Messianic kingdom by wiping out every Jew he can.

957
00:57:29,000 --> 00:57:31,000
And we've seen that already in the past, right?

958
00:57:31,000 --> 00:57:33,000
Hitler, we're going to wipe out all the Jews.

959
00:57:33,000 --> 00:57:38,000
And times throughout history, people for one reason or another were going to wipe out all the Jews.

960
00:57:38,000 --> 00:57:41,000
It's been a plan of Satan all along.

961
00:57:41,000 --> 00:57:45,000
But we see this aggressiveness coming from him.

962
00:57:45,000 --> 00:57:54,000
And I believe in the last three and a half years of tribulation, there's going to be a new, intensely aggressive wave of anti-Semitism that we've never seen before on the earth.

963
00:57:54,000 --> 00:57:55,000
But God protects her.

964
00:57:55,000 --> 00:58:01,000
God protects his special people by giving her eagle wings to flee from the serpents present into the wilderness.

965
00:58:01,000 --> 00:58:07,000
Now, again, since the woman is a great symbolic display, the eagle wings are symbolic as well, right?

966
00:58:07,000 --> 00:58:10,000
John is seeing this and he's describing the symbolic display.

967
00:58:10,000 --> 00:58:16,000
But the image of the eagle wings further supports the idea that the woman is symbolic of the nation of Israel.

968
00:58:16,000 --> 00:58:18,000
And this is why.

969
00:58:18,000 --> 00:58:27,000
There are exactly the same or very similar analogies often used throughout scripture to depict God's protection over Israel specifically.

970
00:58:27,000 --> 00:58:28,000
Okay.

971
00:58:28,000 --> 00:58:38,000
For example, in Exodus 19, 4, when Israel was delivered out of Egypt, he said, You have seen what I did to the Egyptians and how I carried you on eagle wings and brought you to myself.

972
00:58:38,000 --> 00:58:50,000
In Deuteronomy, chapter 32, verse 11, where God was speaking of his care of Israel specifically referred to as the offspring of Jacob, he goes, He watches over his nest like an eagle and hovers over his young.

973
00:58:50,000 --> 00:58:53,000
He spreads his wings, catches him and carries him on his feathers.

974
00:58:53,000 --> 00:59:04,000
And then in Isaiah, chapter 40, after the Jews had been in captivity in Babylon for 70 years, they were getting a prophecy that they would indeed make it back to Israel safely.

975
00:59:04,000 --> 00:59:08,000
And it says there, But those who trust in the Lord will renew their strength.

976
00:59:08,000 --> 00:59:10,000
They will soar on wings like eagles.

977
00:59:10,000 --> 00:59:19,000
And so the idea of the woman having eagle wings just ties back to symbolism we've already seen throughout scripture that again, the woman is the nation of Israel.

978
00:59:19,000 --> 00:59:23,000
So we have the serpent that spews water.

979
00:59:23,000 --> 00:59:27,000
And again, images are symbolic here, so the water is likely symbolic.

980
00:59:27,000 --> 00:59:32,000
This could be there's there's not a whole lot to really tie this to in that sense.

981
00:59:32,000 --> 00:59:40,000
But one of the common understandings is that it could be literal water, a literal flood that is coming through Israel to wipe out Israel.

982
00:59:40,000 --> 00:59:55,000
But more than likely, since it is symbolic, it refers to a prophecy in Ezekiel, chapter 38 and Joel, chapter one, where there is a king from the north who comes down with an army like a flood to destroy Israel.

983
00:59:55,000 --> 00:59:58,000
And it's a prophecy of something to come in the future.

984
00:59:58,000 --> 01:00:07,000
And so this idea that that this flood coming from the north spewed forth or from the devil or empowered or led by the devil could be this this army.

985
01:00:07,000 --> 01:00:15,000
And a lot of commentators believe that there's going to be a Russian army comes down from the north to invade Israel during the tribulation period.

986
01:00:15,000 --> 01:00:22,000
Then you see the earth helping the woman by swallowing up the flood that also aligns with the prophecy in Ezekiel, chapter 38.

987
01:00:22,000 --> 01:00:32,000
Because in Ezekiel 38, we see that this army that is coming from the north like a flood, there is a devastating earthquake in Israel that destroys the whole army.

988
01:00:32,000 --> 01:00:37,000
And so the earth opening up to swallow the flood there ties all that together.

989
01:00:37,000 --> 01:00:45,000
And so then after that, Satan, who again is just furious that his attack on the nation of Israel fails, turns his attention to the believing remnant.

990
01:00:45,000 --> 01:00:54,000
And it says he went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring, those who keep the commandments of God and hold firmly to the testimony about Jesus.

991
01:00:54,000 --> 01:01:02,000
So contextually tying to the interpretation, this is a remnant within Israel that are still believing in Jesus as the Messiah.

992
01:01:02,000 --> 01:01:09,000
But there are other people that say it's talking to all believers, both Jew and Gentile, during this time who put their faith in Jesus.

993
01:01:09,000 --> 01:01:12,000
But the idea there is that God is protecting his people.

994
01:01:12,000 --> 01:01:20,000
So the overall point of this chapter, the whole chapter 12, is that Satan has waged war against God.

995
01:01:20,000 --> 01:01:23,000
That war has started back eons in history.

996
01:01:23,000 --> 01:01:26,000
He rebelled against God. He took a third of the angels with him.

997
01:01:26,000 --> 01:01:35,000
They were cast out of their dwelling place in heaven, but Satan still had access to heaven the whole time up until this point in tribulation.

998
01:01:35,000 --> 01:01:41,000
He has some kind of access to the throne of God where he loves to tell on you and me.

999
01:01:41,000 --> 01:01:43,000
He's just a big tattletale.

1000
01:01:43,000 --> 01:01:46,000
Runs in there every time. Guess what Nathan did?

1001
01:01:46,000 --> 01:01:48,000
Guess what Nathan did?

1002
01:01:48,000 --> 01:01:50,000
Over and over and over.

1003
01:01:50,000 --> 01:01:56,000
And he tattles on you and me, and he tattled on saints of God like Job and other prophets and others throughout history.

1004
01:01:56,000 --> 01:02:02,000
One day he will show up in an attempt of final takeover of heaven during the tribulation period, but he fails.

1005
01:02:02,000 --> 01:02:07,000
He's cast down to the earth. He's permanently barred from any access to heaven or the throne of God.

1006
01:02:07,000 --> 01:02:14,000
That eventually and ultimately is going to lead to a time where he is cast out forever, out of God's presence fully and completely into the lake of fire.

1007
01:02:14,000 --> 01:02:17,000
We'll read about that in Revelation chapter 20.

1008
01:02:17,000 --> 01:02:19,000
But Satan's going down.

1009
01:02:19,000 --> 01:02:22,000
He's going down and he knows it.

1010
01:02:22,000 --> 01:02:30,000
But he is not satisfied until he takes as many with him as possible.

1011
01:02:30,000 --> 01:02:33,000
He wants to do that because he knows it will hurt God.

1012
01:02:33,000 --> 01:02:36,000
It's probably Satan's only satisfaction.

1013
01:02:36,000 --> 01:02:45,000
Every time a creation of his, a human being, dies without salvation, I imagine Satan's just like, yay, because that hurts God.

1014
01:02:45,000 --> 01:02:47,000
That breaks God's heart.

1015
01:02:47,000 --> 01:02:54,000
The Bible tells us that God wants none to perish, but all to have everlasting life.

1016
01:02:54,000 --> 01:03:03,000
So Satan is going to push forward and fight and fight and pump his ego so he could get worship and get people to worship him, whether they know it or not.

1017
01:03:03,000 --> 01:03:06,000
And really, I mean, Satan knows the Bible.

1018
01:03:06,000 --> 01:03:08,000
He knows the end.

1019
01:03:08,000 --> 01:03:09,000
He knows what's to come.

1020
01:03:09,000 --> 01:03:22,000
But if he can keep millions of people from salvation in Jesus Christ, if he could keep millions of people from the gospel, well, if he's going down with a ship, he wants everybody to sink with him.

1021
01:03:22,000 --> 01:03:27,000
But are you one of those people today standing without the testimony?

1022
01:03:27,000 --> 01:03:32,000
The testimony of being washed clean by the blood of Jesus Christ?

1023
01:03:32,000 --> 01:03:40,000
Do you stand before this, before God this morning without the atoning sacrifice applied to your sins?

1024
01:03:40,000 --> 01:03:48,000
Are you standing before God without any of that because it's only that atonement that tames the accusations of the dragon.

1025
01:03:48,000 --> 01:03:52,000
It's only the blood of Christ that stops that.

1026
01:03:52,000 --> 01:03:56,000
It's only the blood of Christ that takes the sting out of all of that.

1027
01:03:56,000 --> 01:03:57,000
It's not you.

1028
01:03:57,000 --> 01:03:58,000
It's not what you've done.

1029
01:03:58,000 --> 01:03:59,000
It's not your efforts.

1030
01:03:59,000 --> 01:04:00,000
It's not your actions.

1031
01:04:00,000 --> 01:04:02,000
It's Jesus.

1032
01:04:02,000 --> 01:04:06,000
Jesus is the only one who can save.

1033
01:04:06,000 --> 01:04:09,000
Now, I know I'm saved.

1034
01:04:09,000 --> 01:04:11,000
I know that I've conquered the devil.

1035
01:04:11,000 --> 01:04:15,000
I know God sees me as his child, and I have great confidence in that.

1036
01:04:15,000 --> 01:04:16,000
Why?

1037
01:04:16,000 --> 01:04:25,000
Because I trust in the blood of Jesus who died for me, who paid the price for my sin in every day of my life.

1038
01:04:25,000 --> 01:04:27,000
Yeah, I marvel.

1039
01:04:27,000 --> 01:04:38,000
I marvel at the wonderful love that God has for me, that he took a sinner, a mean, hurtful, selfish, wicked sinner,

1040
01:04:38,000 --> 01:04:44,000
and transformed me into something that could reflect and shine the glory of God.

1041
01:04:44,000 --> 01:04:47,000
That just baffles my brain.

1042
01:04:47,000 --> 01:04:49,000
But I hang on to it.

1043
01:04:49,000 --> 01:04:54,000
I cling to him, and I know that I'm his child.

1044
01:04:54,000 --> 01:04:59,000
And so every time the devil shows up and says, no, you're not, I might get out of here, dude.

1045
01:04:59,000 --> 01:05:00,000
You're a horrible person.

1046
01:05:00,000 --> 01:05:02,000
I know.

1047
01:05:02,000 --> 01:05:07,000
But God washed me clean, and I'm trying every day to live for him.

1048
01:05:07,000 --> 01:05:09,000
Well, you know you want to do the thing.

1049
01:05:09,000 --> 01:05:10,000
Oh, stop tempting me.

1050
01:05:10,000 --> 01:05:11,000
You know you want to do the thing.

1051
01:05:11,000 --> 01:05:13,000
Ah, you gave in to the thing.

1052
01:05:13,000 --> 01:05:15,000
You're going to hell.

1053
01:05:15,000 --> 01:05:16,000
No, I'm not.

1054
01:05:16,000 --> 01:05:18,000
I'm sorry I did the thing, but God forgave me.

1055
01:05:18,000 --> 01:05:19,000
He loves me.

1056
01:05:19,000 --> 01:05:23,000
I'm washed clean.

1057
01:05:23,000 --> 01:05:27,000
That is my testimony, and that continues every day of my life.

1058
01:05:27,000 --> 01:05:30,000
And it's a testimony that I will share.

1059
01:05:30,000 --> 01:05:34,000
I will live as his witness till the day I die.

1060
01:05:34,000 --> 01:05:36,000
But Satan is fighting for your soul.

1061
01:05:36,000 --> 01:05:42,000
He is fighting with everything he has to keep you from finding forgiveness in Jesus Christ.

1062
01:05:42,000 --> 01:05:50,000
Every lie he can spew, everything he can think of to keep you from putting your faith and trust in Jesus Christ.

1063
01:05:50,000 --> 01:05:54,000
Don't let him win.

1064
01:05:54,000 --> 01:05:58,000
You have sinned against God.

1065
01:05:58,000 --> 01:06:02,000
God is just and holy, and he's going to judge that sin one day.

1066
01:06:02,000 --> 01:06:09,000
But today, now, he has made a way to say, look, I paid the price for your wrongdoing.

1067
01:06:09,000 --> 01:06:13,000
It was my blood shed on the cross.

1068
01:06:13,000 --> 01:06:14,000
You put your faith in that.

1069
01:06:14,000 --> 01:06:15,000
You trust on that.

1070
01:06:15,000 --> 01:06:17,000
You call out to me for salvation and forgiveness.

1071
01:06:17,000 --> 01:06:18,000
Guess what?

1072
01:06:18,000 --> 01:06:19,000
It's available to you.

1073
01:06:19,000 --> 01:06:20,000
Heaven is available to you.

1074
01:06:20,000 --> 01:06:24,000
New life now is available to you.

1075
01:06:24,000 --> 01:06:29,000
And God would do everything he can short of forcing you to receive that.

1076
01:06:29,000 --> 01:06:36,000
He won't force you, but he wants to tell you about the grace and the mercy and the salvation and the forgiveness that he has for you.

1077
01:06:36,000 --> 01:06:48,000
And in fact, he has gone to the extreme length of telling us in advance what is going to happen on this earth in the book of Revelation before it happens.

1078
01:06:48,000 --> 01:07:09,000
So that we would be able to exercise our intellect, our heart, our mind to make the intelligent choice to escape the wrath to come, to conquer the servant, that dragon, the devil, the deceiver, the accuser, and receive hope and joy and peace and new life in Jesus Christ.

1079
01:07:09,000 --> 01:07:14,000
That's what's available to you today.

1080
01:07:14,000 --> 01:07:19,000
So we're going to pray and I'm going to give you an opportunity to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior today.

1081
01:07:19,000 --> 01:07:21,000
And I pray.

1082
01:07:21,000 --> 01:07:23,000
I know he's been knocking on your heart today.

1083
01:07:23,000 --> 01:07:25,000
Respond.

1084
01:07:25,000 --> 01:07:26,000
Receive the gift.

1085
01:07:26,000 --> 01:07:27,000
Let's pray.

1086
01:07:27,000 --> 01:07:34,000
Father God.

1087
01:07:34,000 --> 01:07:42,000
Lord, there are some here in this room today, God, that have been fighting against you, against truth, Lord.

1088
01:07:42,000 --> 01:07:45,000
They've been hearing the lies of the devil.

1089
01:07:45,000 --> 01:07:48,000
They've been hearing the lies of Satan.

1090
01:07:48,000 --> 01:07:51,000
And they have entertained those thoughts that God is not real.

1091
01:07:51,000 --> 01:07:58,000
And they have entertained those thoughts that there is no good and evil and that there is no moral and immoral and that there is no reward or judgment, Lord.

1092
01:07:58,000 --> 01:08:00,000
And Satan has had a grip on their life.

1093
01:08:00,000 --> 01:08:10,000
But God, I believe that they have heard this message today and you've brought them here either to the room or to our live stream, God, to hear the truth of the gospel that you so desperately love them.

1094
01:08:10,000 --> 01:08:16,000
That you love them so much that you came to this earth 2000 years ago to die on the cross for their sin.

1095
01:08:16,000 --> 01:08:19,000
To shed your blood for their sin.

1096
01:08:19,000 --> 01:08:25,000
To be the atoning sacrifice for their sin.

1097
01:08:25,000 --> 01:08:28,000
That through faith in you they would be forgiven.

1098
01:08:28,000 --> 01:08:30,000
Washed clean.

1099
01:08:30,000 --> 01:08:33,000
Set free.

1100
01:08:33,000 --> 01:08:37,000
To become unaccusable by the devil.

1101
01:08:37,000 --> 01:08:46,000
And so while we're praying with heads bowed and eyes closed, if you want to receive Jesus this morning, if God is speaking to your heart, you know you need to receive him because you never have.

1102
01:08:46,000 --> 01:08:52,000
Maybe you've come to church, maybe you've read the Bible here, but you've never received Jesus as your Lord and Savior.

1103
01:08:52,000 --> 01:08:57,000
Just where you're seated right now, I just want you to raise your hand and say, I need to receive Jesus this morning.

1104
01:08:57,000 --> 01:08:59,000
I need to be saved.

1105
01:08:59,000 --> 01:09:00,000
God bless you on the side.

1106
01:09:00,000 --> 01:09:01,000
Anybody else?

1107
01:09:01,000 --> 01:09:02,000
God is speaking to you this morning.

1108
01:09:02,000 --> 01:09:03,000
I see you in the back.

1109
01:09:03,000 --> 01:09:05,000
Both of you.

1110
01:09:05,000 --> 01:09:07,000
Anybody else? God is pulling on your heart right now.

1111
01:09:07,000 --> 01:09:11,000
You know he's speaking to you and you need to receive this.

1112
01:09:11,000 --> 01:09:17,000
Because I guarantee the devil is fighting to kill you before you get the opportunity.

1113
01:09:17,000 --> 01:09:21,000
If you want to receive Jesus, say, just raise your hand where I can see it and I'm going to pray with you.

1114
01:09:21,000 --> 01:09:22,000
God bless you in the middle.

1115
01:09:22,000 --> 01:09:24,000
Anybody else?

1116
01:09:24,000 --> 01:09:28,000
All right, if you're watching online and God is speaking to your heart, obviously I can't see you.

1117
01:09:28,000 --> 01:09:34,000
But if you want to receive Jesus, just shoot a note into the chat real quick and say, I want to receive Jesus Christ.

1118
01:09:34,000 --> 01:09:37,000
Anybody else before we pray?

1119
01:09:37,000 --> 01:09:43,000
All right, for those of you that are receiving Jesus this morning, I want you to just pray this prayer with me.

1120
01:09:43,000 --> 01:09:46,000
There's no specific magic in the words, right?

1121
01:09:46,000 --> 01:09:47,000
It's not the words you say.

1122
01:09:47,000 --> 01:09:48,000
It's the meaning in your heart.

1123
01:09:48,000 --> 01:09:52,000
But I want to lead you in this prayer of confessing your sin and receiving Jesus.

1124
01:09:52,000 --> 01:09:53,000
And so pray with me.

1125
01:09:53,000 --> 01:09:58,000
Say, Jesus, I know I've sinned against you.

1126
01:09:58,000 --> 01:10:02,000
I know I've broken your law.

1127
01:10:02,000 --> 01:10:07,000
I've listened to the devil for too long.

1128
01:10:07,000 --> 01:10:11,000
I've heard his lies for too long.

1129
01:10:11,000 --> 01:10:16,000
I don't believe his lies anymore.

1130
01:10:16,000 --> 01:10:22,000
God, I believe in the truth of your word.

1131
01:10:22,000 --> 01:10:27,000
I believe in the truth of the gospel.

1132
01:10:27,000 --> 01:10:31,000
I believe you died for me.

1133
01:10:31,000 --> 01:10:38,000
I believe you shed your blood for me.

1134
01:10:38,000 --> 01:10:40,000
I receive it.

1135
01:10:40,000 --> 01:10:46,000
Thank you for loving me so much.

1136
01:10:46,000 --> 01:10:51,000
Thank you for giving me the hope of heaven.

1137
01:10:51,000 --> 01:11:00,000
Help me, Lord, to tell people about what you've done in my life.

1138
01:11:00,000 --> 01:11:06,000
Help me, Lord, to endure for you.

1139
01:11:06,000 --> 01:11:08,000
I love you.

1140
01:11:08,000 --> 01:11:10,000
It's in Jesus' name I pray.

1141
01:11:10,000 --> 01:11:12,000
Amen.

1142
01:11:12,000 --> 01:11:14,000
For those of you that prayed that prayer, God bless you.

1143
01:11:14,000 --> 01:11:16,000
Welcome to the family of Christ.

1144
01:11:16,000 --> 01:11:20,000
If you prayed online, God bless you.

1145
01:11:20,000 --> 01:11:25,000
You know, this is a relationship that you have embarked on with God, your creator, right?

1146
01:11:25,000 --> 01:11:26,000
The devil's going to keep attacking you.

1147
01:11:26,000 --> 01:11:28,000
You don't think that's going to stop, right?

1148
01:11:28,000 --> 01:11:30,000
But now you can just say, step off, bro.

1149
01:11:30,000 --> 01:11:33,000
I don't need to listen to you, all right?

1150
01:11:33,000 --> 01:11:36,000
The Holy Spirit now indwells you as the Bible promises.

1151
01:11:36,000 --> 01:11:38,000
You are filled with the Holy Spirit of promise.

1152
01:11:38,000 --> 01:11:42,000
And we want to help you on this journey, this relationship you've just started.

1153
01:11:42,000 --> 01:11:45,000
So at the front here on the pews or in the back as you're leaving today,

1154
01:11:45,000 --> 01:11:48,000
we have what's called a new believer's packet, okay?

1155
01:11:48,000 --> 01:11:49,000
I encourage you to get one of those.

1156
01:11:49,000 --> 01:11:54,000
It has a bunch of resources in there to help you on this relationship you've started.

1157
01:11:54,000 --> 01:11:55,000
There's worship resources.

1158
01:11:55,000 --> 01:11:57,000
There's scripture resources.

1159
01:11:57,000 --> 01:11:58,000
There's all kinds of stuff in there.

1160
01:11:58,000 --> 01:12:03,000
If you're online and you received Christ today and you want to get one of our new believer's packets,

1161
01:12:03,000 --> 01:12:04,000
just let us know.

1162
01:12:04,000 --> 01:12:06,000
Our chat moderators will connect with you privately.

1163
01:12:06,000 --> 01:12:09,000
Or you could email us through our website and we'll mail it out to you.

1164
01:12:09,000 --> 01:12:11,000
We're so blessed to be able to help you in this.

1165
01:12:11,000 --> 01:12:15,000
But guys, the time is short.

1166
01:12:15,000 --> 01:12:17,000
And we are called to redeem the time.

1167
01:12:17,000 --> 01:12:21,000
Now, we still have time until His tribulation comes.

1168
01:12:21,000 --> 01:12:25,000
But that doesn't mean we should take our foot off the gas and wait.

1169
01:12:25,000 --> 01:12:30,000
If you know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you have a testimony that He has changed you.

1170
01:12:30,000 --> 01:12:33,000
Tell people about that.

1171
01:12:33,000 --> 01:12:39,000
And I believe God is going to use that testimony to stir up hearts that they, too, would come to know Him as well.

1172
01:12:39,000 --> 01:12:40,000
Amen?

1173
01:12:40,000 --> 01:12:55,000
All right, God bless you guys. Let's worship.