"Egypt, Babylon, & the Palm of God"
What are the options for the faithful remnant in the Last Days? Previous biblical examples provide a picture of what it will be like for Believers.
Download or email this sermon Other Examples of "Last Days"
The last days of the 1st Century, before the Temple was destroyed in 70 AD, is one of the things that teaches about the end. The last days of Samaria in 720 BC is another thing that teaches about the End. However, we are now looking at about 585 BC, the last days of Judah before the Babylonian Captivity. Above all else in the Old Testament this teaches about the end. It is evident in the New Testament where it talks about eschatology – especially in the teaching of Jesus about the Last Days – that the themes from the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel about the Babylonian Captivity are being recycled. The destruction of the Temple talked about by Jesus in Matthew 24 and Luke 21 comes straight out of Jeremiah. Jesus warns repeatedly about false prophets and this theme is also prominent in the Major Prophets. "Fallen, fallen is Babylon" in the book of Revelation (Rev. 14:8; 18:2) comes straight out of Isaiah and Jeremiah. (Is. 21:9; Jer. 51:8)
The same things that happened in the last days of Judah, when Jeremiah's message was rejected, will happen in the Last Days full-stop, both to the Jews and to the church; it will be repeated. Remember that a Judeo-Christian perspective of prophecy regards it as cyclical.
Let us begin to understand this: What will happen to faithful churches and the faithful remnant in the Last Days? What should we expect? There are various teachings that could explain some of this; for example, the Maccabees. However, we're looking at it now from the point of view of the Babylonian Captivity. In Jeremiah chapter 40, the Captivity is underway. Nebuchadnezzar invades Jerusalem four times. What you see happening right now, with the interfaith movement, the ecumenical movement, and the New Age movement, is about the Babylonian Captivity.
During the Middle Ages, Martin Luther came to realize there had been a Babylonian Captivity of the church under the medieval papacy. He understood the spiritual character of Babylon, this marriage of the political system of the world to a corrupt religious system: this was the “Holy Roman Empire”, which was neither holy nor Roman. This will happen again; we can see the Captivity coming. There are people everywhere who believe in having one “apostle” over a city, which is an ancient error begun by Ignatius of Antioch that is called “monoepiscopacy”. That is how the papacy began to evolve; it is an ancient deception that is making its comeback. The problem, of course, is that most of my fellow Pentecostals and Charismatics are too ignorant to realize that these are things that have happened in the past which will result in the same thing that happened in the past: a Babylonian Captivity of the church.
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Scripture taken from the New American Standard Bible Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.