"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 Trying to Get Along
Yet for the sake of trying to keep peace, Gedaliah tries to tell people to honor the king of Babylon. "Look, we have to go along with the system; we don't want to be deported too. We don't want to find ourselves re-scattered. We don't want to be taken away; we want to keep what we have, so we have to agree to pay homage; go along with the system." This is very much what happened in the 1st Century. The reason the early Christians got themselves into trouble was not what they believed, but their refusal to pay homage to the Emperor, who at that time had become the equivalent of the king of Babylon. The mystery religions of pagan Babylon were now in Rome, in the pantheon, and the Emperor as the pontiff was the head of it. What the king of Babylon was in Jeremiah's day, the Emperor was in the 1st Century. It was not what they believed, but what they did not believe that got them into trouble. "You can believe what you want, as long as you go along with the program." We will find this mindset increasing in the Last Days, even among the faithful remnant. We will have visible leaders who will try to compromise with Babylon, and they will give you what seem to be pastoral reasons: "I'm trying to protect you." "I'm trying to secure what we have, to preserve what remains." Even among the faithful remnant, expect a concerted effort to bring you into line with the status quo. They will come with very persuasive and very logical arguments along that line.
God will judge such people and their motives; they won't survive either. Gedaliah was even warned to stop what he was doing, that he was going to get himself killed; but he refused to listen. Do not think for one moment that you can make some kind of peace with the king of Babylon. Do not think that there can be any accommodation or cessation of hostilities. We cannot “get along” with the king of Babylon.
They were invited to come to Babylon; that was their first choice. Is your church going to join the ecumenical movement? Is your denomination going to join the World Council of Churches? The False Prophet will eventually gain control over this and use it to support the Antichrist. That's the first choice; expect it to happen in the Last Days. You will find people who will try to rationalize and gloss over the issues – “Well, maybe I don't agree with them, and I understand that we're the faithful remnant, but we have to try to get along with them.” We will find this being said; but ultimately, there is nothing in that but death. Notice that not only did Gedaliah die, but those of the poor and simple who followed him died with him. Down that road lies death; there is no peace with Babylon.
More than that, Babylon cannot be changed. Let's look at Jeremiah 51: Babylon is under judgment in verse 49; Babylon is to fall for the slain of Israel. In verse 60 Jeremiah writes on a scroll of the calamities that will come on Babylon. In verse 24, it says that God will repay Babylon for what Babylon has done. But in verse 6 Jeremiah is saying, “Flee from the midst of Babylon; each of you save his life.” In other words, 'Get out of there!' Get out of ecumenical denominations; God's purpose is to destroy them.
In verse 9, we find that there was attempted healing applied to Babylon, but she was not healed.
We applied healing to Babylon, but she was not healed;
Forsake her and let us each go to his own country,
For her judgment has reached to heaven
And towers up to the very skies.
Babylon cannot be healed. It has not changed from the time of the Tower of Babel to the Babylonian Empire to what you see in the book of Revelation; it cannot change. One of today's myths is this: The Roman Catholic Church has changed since the second Vatican Council. Well, the second Vatican Council documents all affirm the Council of Trent. You have two kinds of doctrine in the Roman Catholic church: proxima fadi and di fadi. A proxima fadi doctrine can be changed; the pagan mass can be changed from Latin to English. A di fadi doctrine cannot be changed; the mass itself cannot be changed, nor can purgatory or any doctrine like it. The Roman Catholic church admits this.
Jeremiah 51:19 says that all of mankind is stupid, devoid of knowledge. People are stupid; Jeremiah uses very strong terms. Throughout his book, he says things that would sound crude if we were to say them. He uses two different words for human stupidity, and neither one of them is pleasant. Look at Jeremiah chapter 10:8:
"But they are altogether stupid and foolish in their discipline of delusion."
One of the words he uses for “stupid” means a perversion of logic to justify what is known to be wrong. People know that certain things are wrong, but they pervert their logic in order to ease their conscience. When Jeremiah says they are stupid, he doesn't mean they are congenitally stupid, that they are slow learners or have a birth defect, he means that they willfully pervert their logic. This is exactly what we see happening today; people who should know better, even theologians like J. I. Packer, are perverting their logic. And what is the purpose of it? To make a deal with Babylon. But those who follow Gedaliah will wind up like Gedaliah.
The first offer to be made, then, is an invitation to go to Babylon. But let us continue
This is Page 5 of 12
Scripture taken from the New American Standard Bible Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.