Talk—Nick Simon
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Well, I must admit I admire the enthusiasm of your singing, especially the children.
And I just want you to remember that in about 10 years, Lord leaves us here, and I really don't think he will when you've turned into a sulky teenager.
You remember the enthusiasm of this night, but more importantly, children remember what you were singing about. Don't ever forget what those songs are really about.
They're precious. Let's give thanks and just look for His blood's help. Our God and Father, we thank Thee for what we've enjoyed, the meetings and the singing that we've had and the enthusiasm and the joy of it, and pray that we would take it away. Something of that with us from this conference. And now we just look to Thee for Thy help as we open Thy word.
Pray for.
Each in the room that whatever the various needs are, there might be something.
For perhaps everyone, just pray for help. For the speaker, just pray in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Amen.
So I have 20 minutes and.
I have notes on my phone.
Which I tried to set so it won't turn off, but I just see that it already has but.
Gonna jump right in. I'm going to talk about three things that the world will Christendom typically confounds when it comes to prophecy. And each of these three things I've only gotten about 5 minutes to talk on, and then I want to talk a little bit at the end. Why? Why it matters what it means to us. So the first thing is there will be no one world order.
That is something we hear very often in Christendom, what we call evangelical Christendom I.
I'm on Facebook, I enjoy Facebook. I enjoy sharing pictures with my family who have brothers and sisters in Australia and my dad is there and it's a great way to share pictures, but there's also a lot of stuff on Facebook too that.
Varying quality, but Revelation, we will be turned to Revelation. We don't have to turn to these. Actually, our time is short, but I'm going to turn to Revelation Chapter 11, and there is a verse there, verse 15.
Says And the 7th Angel sounded and there was a great There were great voices in heaven saying, The kingdoms of this world have become.
The kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever. That is the first time we're going to see one world order when Christ establishes His reign in this earth.
Prior to that, let's just turn quickly back again. You don't have to, but I'm going to turn to Daniel Chapter 2.
And we have there the story of Nebuchadnezzar's image that he dreamed of. And we know that I had a head of gold, which was the Babylonian Empire. It had a chest of silver, which is the Medes and Persians. It had a belly, insides of brass, which was the Grecians. And it had legs of iron, and they ended in 10 toes. And there was a stone that came that was cut out without hands and smashed that image.
To smithereens, and then that stone grew to be a mountain.
That filled the earth. None of those kingdoms that I mentioned was ever or will ever be a one world order, including the legs and toes, 10 toes, the legs of iron and 10 toes. We read about this again in the 7th chapter of Daniel where it's presented as four beasts and that last beast is a beast. I'll just read what it says is a dreadful and terrible and strong, exceedingly and great iron teeth that devoured with the feet of it and.
Diverse from all the beasts that were before and had ten horns. Without going into details because you don't have time, we know that the the last of those beasts, the legs of iron with the Roman Empire and it will revive and it will revive in a form of a 10 nation or 10 headed confederacy or 10 horned. I'd be better put 10 horned confederacy. Again, it only encompasses that which was historically connected with the Roman Empire, plus or minus.
But primarily Western Europe. Perhaps it takes in the United States, perhaps it doesn't only because these this country was populated largely by the nations of Western Europe.
But again, it's not a one world order. That 10 nation confederacy is very limited. There will be other confederacies as well in this world at the time. So we could turn to Ezekiel 38 and we find that there is another confederacy which is of particular interest to this in this day.
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Ezekiel 38 It says in verse two, Son of Man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief Prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophecy against it. I probably should have read it from the new translation, JD's translation that speaks the Prince of Rush. These names that I mentioned here are not mysteries to us. They speak of a Slavic unity, a Russian unity, a Russian confederacy.
And we see right now an I'll qualify what I say, Russia.
Doing somewhat mysterious things, but establishing its dominance.
What has historically been a Slavic world? It's not, I believe, a fulfillment of prophecy that we find in Scripture. There will not be a direct fulfillment of prophecy in Scripture as long as you and I are here.
We'll be caught up at the rapture, but again, I've got to have to keep this really short notice. Verse five. It speaks of Persia, Ethiopia and Libya being.
In union with this Russian confederacy, and I believe as Russia and the West become increasingly antagonistic towards each other and isolated, Russia will turn and form unities with those nations to the South of it. Persia is Iran, for example. But there's another confederacy, and we have that in Psalm 83.
And Psalm 83.
It says in verse five they have consulted together with one consent. They confederate against thee and.
This is a confederacy of Eastern nations that Tabernacles of Edom, the Ishmaelites of Mob and the Hagarians, Gibel and Ammon, Amalek, Phyllis Knight, and so on. They may derive some of their power from Russian support, but they will be a separate and independent confederacy. So my point is simply this. There will not be a one world order until Christ comes and establishes his throne in this world. There will be these.
Confederacies.
My phone's not going to cooperate with me.
Second thing that we often perhaps read over, perhaps you've heard of.
We are not presently in the beginning of Sorrows. What do I mean by that? Well, let's turn to Matthew 24.
The revived Roman Empire we know is a 10 nation confederacy, and it's going to be in power for essentially 7 years. We know quite explicitly from scripture in the middle of those seven years, after 3 1/2 years, one of those horns, one of those heads, is going to rise to power and become a dictator and become former dictatorial power. He's an individual called the Beast.
Another common.
Universal.
Confusion in Christendom is between the Beast and the Antichrist, but I won't go there. The Beast is the political head of this Western confederacy. He will rise to power and take dictatorial control in the middle of those seven years, and he will reign for 3 1/2 years. It's referred to as time times and a half a time, 42 months, 12160 days.
But that seven-year period is divided in two. The beast arises to power in the middle of it. The first half of that seven-year period is called the Beginning of Sorrows and the Beginning, and we have it described here in Matthew 24, and it uses that expression.
In verse eight of Matthew 24, all these are the beginning of sorrows. And what is the beginning of sorrows?
Well, it says in verse five, Many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ and shall deceive many.
And ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars, see that ye be not troubled. For all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. And for nations shall rise against nation, Kingdom against Kingdom, and there shall be famines and pestilences and earthquakes in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows. And then we find the beast rises to power, and it switches in verse 21. For then shall be great tribulation. There's other things that happen in the middle of that week too, but the beginning of sorrows.
To what we have in Revelation chapter 6.
But Revelation chapters 2 and well, let's read a verse in Revelation chapter one.
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John is given to see a vision or visions, and he it says in verse 19 of chapter one, write the things which thou hast seen. He had already seen some things, the things which are that's chapters two and three, and the things which shall be hereafter beginning with chapter 4.
Did I just make that up? No, you turn to chapter 4 and it very explicitly says in verse one, I will show thee things which must be hereafter. At this point, John is code up. Hit her. He's called up to heaven. And although the rapture is not explicitly mentioned in Revelation, I believe in type. John represents the family of God, both Old and New Testament Saints, and we are caught up to heaven and they're represented in chapters.
4:00 and 5:00.
As the four and 20 elders and you just need to read what the four and 20 elders say and the intelligence which with which they worship and the new song which they sing in the 5th chapter to know that it's not an angelic host. It is the Saints of the present time dispensation and also the Old Testament Saints too. They will not be left behind. That's another point that is commonly misunderstood when it comes to prophecy.
And it's not till we get to Chapter 6 when we have the opening of the seals. And what are those seals correspond to? Well.
The first of the so-called four horses of the apocalypse and the first horse is a White Horse, and we find that he goes forth to conquer. So we have in the the White Horse.
Nation rising against nation and then we have a a red horse and it says power was given to him that sat there on to take peace from the earth, that they should kill one another. I think this is social upheaval and violence, something which we are and have seen in this country.
But it's not the beginning of sorrows, because I'm still here. I will not be here when the beginning of sorrows begins. I will not be here when the first seal is broken. I will be in heaven. I will be.
Counted amongst the number, they are represented by the four and 20 elders. And then the third horse is a Black Horse, and it says to him.
A measure of wheat for a penny, 3 measures of Bali for a penny, and so on. And so with the social upheaval, the political conquest, there will be famine.
And then the last horse is a pale horse and a hymn that Satan was death and hell. So it will be followed by pandemics. Again. What we have witnessed with COVID is a mere shadow of what is going to happen.
Third Point. Third thing that is commonly misunderstood or misrepresented when it comes to prophecy, we need not fear the mark of the beast.
The beast, as I pointed out before, will not rise to power until the middle of those seven years at the beginning of the great tribulation. And we have described in detail all that in the 13th chapter, well, 12Th and 13th and the 17th chapter, and but in the 13th chapter we read of this individual.
Well, just reading in verse one, I stood upon the sand of the sea and saw a beast rise out of the sea, having seven heads and 10 horns.
There's those 10 horns again.
And it says in verse 5 quite clearly he should continue 40 in two months. That's 3 1/2 years.
Keep in mind these are Jewish years and hence 12160 days is exactly 3 1/2 years.
But there's another individual also that this chapter speaks of, another beast coming out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb and spake as a dragon. This is the Antichrist. The Antichrist is a religious head, not a political head in the sense of the beast. He will be a political head in that he will usurp the role of the true Messiah and present himself as a king in Israel, and he will be received by the apostate.
Jewish nation at that point.
The elect will not receive him, but he is a religious figure. He will be Jewish. The Lord himself said when he was on earth another would come in his name and that they would receive him. Matthew 24 again.
I'll just return back to it. The Lord warns his disciples who are represented of the Jewish remnant. He says there in verse five, many shall come in my name, saying I am the Christ. The Antichrist is a usurpa. He takes that place as the Messiah, the promised Messiah, the promised Prince in Israel.
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But the nation of Israel, under the leadership of the Antichrist will look to the beast for protection, and they will form a covenant with the beast. But in the middle of the week the the the revived Roman Empire, when the when the the individual called the beast rises to power, he'll break that covenant with Israel and the Antichrist will then.
As it says in this chapter.
In verse 12, Revelation 13, verse 12, he that he exercises all the power, the first beast before him, and causes the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast whose deadly's wound was healed. And then finally in this chapter we read.
In verse 17 or verse 16 I'll read, He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand or in their foreheads, that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark or the name of the beast or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that understandeth count the number of the beast, for it's the number of men. His number is 603, score and six.
You know, so much of the confusion that comes with prophecy is to place the church at the center of prophecy. The church is not the center of prophecy.
Is not even the subject of prophecy. Prophecy is really occupied with the Lord Jesus Christ, but especially in connection with this earth. And when it comes to this earth, Israel is at the center of God's thoughts and purposes.
So we we need not fear the mark of the beast. I can remember as a teenager reading a little booklet and it proposed that Henry Kissinger was the Antichrist.
Now as I said in Christendom the beast and the Antichrist are totally confused and made to be the same individual. So to be more correct, Henry Kissinger was made out to be the beast slash Antichrist.
And then I remember some years reading another little pamphlet. I remember a vivid picture of Mikhail Gorbachev, and he had a mock, a birth defect on his face, and he was the mock. He was the beast.
Well, he's in Russia. He's not even a part of the the revised, not even from the West. Whether revived Roman Empire is going to to have its control.
Another little story.
In you know we well.
In the 1970s, well actually the 1960s, credit cards made the leap from the wealthy to the common man. In the 1970s, I believe it was, there was a card introduced in Australia called the bank Card B for bank and the picture on that, on the card, it had a bee that was three colors embedded in each other. So you have three BS. Guess what that looks like.
666 So suddenly, oh, anyone that uses the bank card, that's the mark of the beast.
Well, guess what? Who here amongst the adults don't have a credit card in their pocket?
You know, every time that we have this false speculation in the public arena, all it does is further Satan's goals.
He will use each of these misconceptions to lull people.
In the coming day that oh, you don't have to worry about that. You remember all those things that people said and they're all turned out to be false. You know, when the disciples asked the Lord in the beginning of chapter four, let me turn to it. I should have left a bookmark in chapter 24 of Matthew, but.
They ask the Lord, as I mean the disciples asked the Lord there, tell us what, when, when shall these things be, and what shall be the sign of the coming and of the end of the world? And it says the disciples went and asked him privately.
And I believe the Lord answered him privately. These things are not for speculation in the public arena. This world loves sensationalism.
And that's what we see.
Unfortunately, when it comes to prophecy.
Sadly, within Christendom sensationalization of prophecy, it's not for public consumption.
Now certainly, well, let me just my closing remarks. I have about 5 minutes left I think.
What is it? Why am I telling you all this anyway? Is it to tell you? Oh, everything is fine? You. We're not in the beginning of Sorrows. We don't have to worry about a one world order. You don't have to fear the mark of the Beast. Everything's fine. You know, that's not why I'm telling you this.
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I'm telling you this because these things, as I said, are used to sensationalize prophecy.
They're used to, I fear, to.
Cause a certain amount of fear.
It says in Second Timothy that God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of sound mind. I know that in the context it's probably more correctly to translate that word fear is timidity or cowardice, but it actually derives from the word dread. God doesn't want us to dread things. He doesn't want us to fear things. And I can remember as a child hearing things about prophecy.
And it made me fear that's not what God wants us to do. He wants us to have a reverence for Him. He wants us to be concerned for judgment to come. Paul preached of righteousness and temperance and judgment to come. Yes.
It's certainly fine to preach those things, but we live in a day where the testimony of Jesus is grace.
The Spirit of Prophecy is the testimony of Jesus, and if we take our prophecy in any other way.
Than to present the testimony of Jesus, then I think we're really misusing it.
No, we live. We know that throughout the history of Christendom, throughout last 2000 years, very bad things have happened to Christians.
I was going through a packet of letters that my uncle gave me their photocopies. Not originals unfortunately, but I had AI came across a ladder. I knew it existed in this packet, but I was looking for it. That was written in 1942. Who in this room under the age of 16 wants to tell me what was happening in 1942?
World War Two thank you. This letter was written by JT Mawson whom some of you will recognize the name to my either my grandfather or great grandfather, I'm not sure which. And here he marked of how he had heard of Harold Barker. Some of you would know who he is too. He wrote a book that BTP no doubt carries John what's the title of it? It's.
Yeah, so he was at the time, in 1942 or 41, he was in Portugal and he was doing the Lord's work there. And he sent, I don't want to get my facts wrong, but.
I know I wrote it down somewhere. Now I don't see it. He sent his, I believe it was his whole family, wife, daughter, grandchildren, back to England by ship and the ship was torpedoed and I believe he lost his wife, his daughter, his daughter-in-law and 10 grandchildren drowned on that ship.
So God, we've sung it tonight in the hymns. God does not promise us.
A life without trials here.
No, the trials are pot and possible of our portion as long as we are in this world.
But we don't need to dread these things that people like to sensationalize.
We don't need to fear the mock of the beast. We don't even need to fear or speculate what technology that might be.
I don't know what it will be. Maybe it exists, maybe it doesn't exist. I don't have to fear it. It's not going to happen to at least three years after the Rapture.
The Antichrist is not going to be revealed until after the rapture. He might be alive today. Maybe he is, maybe he isn't. There's no profit in speculating over these things. As I said, the as it says in Revelation 19, the Spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus, and that's what we should be focusing on today. And the testimony of Jesus in this present day is grace.
Grace reigns in this present day. After the church is taken out, the gospel of the grace of God will no longer be preached.
You'll have the everlasting gospel preached to the nations, and you'll have the gospel of the Kingdom preached in particular to the to the Jewish people.
But in this day in which we live, just remember we are ambassadors for Christ.
We don't make trade of the word of God. We don't go around fear mongering. Yes, preacher of righteousness, temperance and judgment to come.
But Paul said that he was an ambassador for Christ. The love of Christ constrained him that Second Corinthians 5.
Let's just close in prayer.
Our God and Father, we thank thee. We have such assurances from thy word of God that we will not be here.
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During that trial, which is going to try all those that dwell upon this earth, the inhabitable earth, we have the promise that will be taken out of here. Before then, we have the promise that we're going to be kept from the wrath to come. On the other hand, we take it very seriously that if any in this room have not received the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, they stand in very great danger of judgment to come.
And so we would.
Certainly pray that if there's any wavering, if there's any that have any doubts in their hearts, that they might receive the Lord Jesus Christ tonight and not make wait another minute longer.
We just thank thee for this time that we've enjoyed together. We give you thanks for these refreshments. We thank Thee for the hands that have been, that have prepared it. We certainly thank all our local brethren here in the Carolinas for the work and time that they put into putting together this conference. We just thank Thee in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.