REVELATION SERIES - Week 8 - October 7, 2026

Okay, let's get started.

Hope you uh if you if you've got your handout, I want you to notice uh we've got our summary sheet on the front, and then on the back, we also have uh graphics on there.

Some of these are you'll see tonight, but I wanted you to have it when you take it away with you.

So uh let's open in a word of prayer and we'll we'll jump into it.

Father, we uh are so thankful that we live in the time that we do, and from the lesson this week, it tells us and assures us that we're at the end of the end.

And so we're knocking at the door for your return, and we just thank you so much.

Thank you for where each one of us are at, and we thank you for the study of Revelation, and we just ask that you speak to our hearts, use the words that I say to move into our hearts, to change us and to make us excited about what you're doing in our lives and in this world.

So thanks again in Christ's name, amen.

Alrighty, so uh let me just review once again this outline.

Uh we we have wrapped up the part on the church.

Okay, so remember chapter one was the things that you saw, and it was a picture of who?

Mainly it was the pre-incarnate Christ, right?

That's what he saw in chapter one.

Then we looked at the things that are, and that is what is that?

The seven churches.

Are we still in this period of time?

Yes, we are.

We are in the R.

Okay?

We we're getting ready to starting not this week and not next week, but the week after, we're getting ready to be in the things that are after the R.

And that's that's chapters 4 through 22.

But we're still right in this section here.

But there's one more layer we need to understand first.

I hope you got that from the lesson this week.

There's still one more kind of layer of information that we need to know about this time we're in right now.

Okay?

Then we'll kind of, that's what we're touching on.

I like what Stephen said at the beginning, and this is listed at the front of your, at the top of your sheet.

Why give the church prophetic letters?

You know, why why give the church this?

If they couldn't, if the majority of them weren't gonna be able to understand it.

Why even put that in there if the majority of the church is not gonna understand it, and really only this lost one is gonna understand it.

Which is us.

Yeah.

There's no way that these guys down here could foresee and and figure this out because history hadn't gone through yet.

It's only this one at the end who's able to look back at history and go, oh, I see that.

Just like what we've already gone through.

Now, the question is why?

Why would God put that in there?

What church?

To what?

To American church now.

Yeah, to it's really to alert us, to wake us up, to encourage us.

We should be encouraged.

It's an encouragement to know that you're right here at this last part.

I like what Stephen said.

It's it's not so the early church would know its future, but so the final generation would know.

This is what I put up here.

Those alive right before Revelation 4 through 22, that's us, would recognize the significance of their own day and be ready.

Are you ready?

We should be.

This is why we have this.

This is why Revelation is so important.

We are living in that privileged final period called to understand the signs of the times.

That's us, that's where we're at.

These guys didn't have this opportunity.

We do.

So, but there's a couple of things we've got to look at here, and um it has to do with two terms.

One is called an age, and the other one is does anybody remember what the other one is?

Last days.

Last days or latter days.

You're gonna see these two terms, an age and the latter days.

So let's let's go through that and we'll kind of look at this a little bit.

So we are in, we have gone, we are still in this one, what's called the church age.

Right?

An age and the last days.

Age just means a long period of time, just like he says here, and it's finite.

It has a beginning and it has an end.

This starts and it ends.

And and one of the things you gotta learn is when does it start?

How do we can we know when it starts?

Do we know when it ends?

These ages.

We're gonna look at that today.

Okay?

Look at Mark chapter 10, verse 29.

Mark 10:29

Jesus said, Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms for my sake and for the gospel's sake, but that he will receive a hundred times as much now, in the present age, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and farms, along with persecution and in the age to come, eternal life.

So he's talking about we're in this present age, and then he's talking about this future age, which is where you're gonna have eternal life.

So even just in the book of Mark, he said, he told, he's the one who told us about these different ages.

So he's saying that when he was on earth with all the disciples and with all the apostles, they were in a particular age.

And he's telling them that you're gonna be in this age, but then there's gonna come a time when you're gonna be in a different age.

Okay?

You got that?

So just getting that.

Okay?

Look at this.

So what this is, where there's a present age and there's an age to come, just from that Mark section that we talked about.

Let's look at the last days.

What does the last days mean?

It's a final period.

This is important, where it says latter days, last days.

Anytime you see that tomb, what does that mean?

It's the final period of an age.

So if you're in this big long age, you're in a certain age, when you get to the end of that age, somewhere near the end of it, that's called the latter days or the last days.

And he warns them on this.

Look at this.

James says this.

Now remember, he's talking to the church here.

He's talking to the church at that time.

Your gold and your silver have rested, and their rest will be a witness against you and will consume your flesh like fire.

It is in the last days, last days that you have stored up your treasure.

Look what Hebrews says.

God, after he spoke long ago to the fathers and the prophets in many portions and in many ways.

Look what he says in verse 2.

What does he say?

In these last days, has spoken to us in his son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the world.

Now let me ask you a question.

The last days.

But I thought the last days was the end, at the right at the end of an age.

So we we are in this present age right now.

What is this right here?

The latter days or the last days.

Where is that?

It's at the end of the present age, before the age to come.

Okay.

Look at this picture.

Do you see that?

It's on the back of your sheet.

This is the picture that's on the back of your sheet.

So what he's saying here, this is an age that we're in right now.

And that all that age, that long period of time, also includes what?

The church age.

And the church age is the latter days.

That's what we read in Hebrews and James.

This little part here at the end is the latter days.

And you know when it started?

When did the latter days start?

According to what we just read.

When Jesus was here, when he spoke to the apostles.

Now that's a long period of time.

How long is the latter days, the last days been going on in this age here?

2,000 years.

Okay, it's a long period of time.

We think the latter days or the last days is just you know a week or ten years or a decade or a hundred years, but it's it's just this last age here, this last period has been going on a long time.

2,000 years.

Because Jesus said you we're in it.

So if so, if back when Jesus was on the earth talking to the apostles and he said they're in the latter days, 2,000 years ago, where are we?

Yeah, we're we're we're it's not that it's not the two-minute warning, it's the ten-second warning.

This last period is what's going to culminate.

This is interesting that we need to know.

Remember, an age starts, it has a beginning, and it has an end.

This last stage here culminates this age.

This will be when this church age ends, this age will end.

And then we'll go into the next age.

And we are at the cusp.

We are on the cusp of this ending and as going into the next age.

Okay.

Now, there's a couple of things we have to know.

Is how do we know what that age is?

How do we know what the present age is?

And this is why, this is where you have to go to the book of Daniel.

If you want to know what this present age is, you have to go to the book of Daniel to find out.

And he wrote it in there.

Remember?

They're kind of like bookends.

You got Daniel and you got Revelation, and they go together.

And if you want to understand Revelation, you have to understand Daniel.

And you're going to see some things, and you should already know it from listening or uh reading the notes, what this age is.

Can anybody get anybody from your lessons tell me what it is?

Age?

Yeah, it's the age of the Gentiles.

You all are Gentiles.

Is there any Jewish people here?

It means greatest.

They are.

But basically, in the world, there's only two groups.

There's Jews, Jewish people, and there's Gentiles.

Everybody else in the whole world is Gentiles.

This is the age of the Gentiles.

Okay?

Let's look here.

Everything Daniel foretold about the age of the Gentiles below has already come to pass.

So when we start looking at this, this is all past history.

Remember, he told him in the book of Daniel to seal this book up until the end?

Most of history, people have had no clue what the book of Daniel has said until right here at the end.

Now we're able to look back and we can see it and make sense of it.

Because we can look back in history and see.

Has already come to pass as predicted.

Only the very end, the second stone, second coming, remains.

There's only one thing left, and that we'll talk about that in a little bit.

Okay?

Let's look here.

Let's look at an age that's defined.

How do we know?

Luke 21, 24, and it says, and they will fall.

By the way, who's the they?

We do.

As we read it, you've got to identify who's the they.

And they will fall by the edge of the sword and will be led captive into all the nations.

And Jerusalem, if that's not a clue right there.

Jews.

Yeah, the Jewish nation.

We're talking about the Jewish nation, the Jewish people, will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles.

So what's this telling you?

Jerusalem's gonna be trampled and controlled by Gentiles, and those Gentiles are gonna take Jews and take them out of their nation, and they're gonna be scattered and gonna be all over the place.

But they're not gonna be in their land.

Until what?

Until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.

So that is that's the end of the age.

The end of the age is is once that's fulfilled, guess who's gonna take over again?

So I can be another Gentile nation because this here tells you that's the end of the Gentiles.

That's the end of the Gentile age.

There's only remember I told you there's two groups, Gentiles and Jews.

So if the age of the Gentiles is ended, what's left?

The Jews.

They're gonna, they're in the next age.

They're gonna take over the next age.

We're gonna look at that.

Luke 21.

We've already mentioned this, the age of the Gentiles.

There's two things here.

These are two things, and we're gonna, this is what goes into the next part here of Daniel.

So there's two things that have to occur.

The Gentile nation, whoever is in power at that time, has to do two things.

They have to control the whole world at that particular time.

The Jewish people must suffer death, enslavement, and persecution.

They're gonna be dragged away, and they're gonna be persecuted, and they're not gonna have their land, they're gonna be all scattered.

And the second thing, they're gonna lose their capital, Jerusalem, and it's gonna be controlled by Gentiles.

It's gonna be controlled by the Gentile power at that particular time.

So you gotta have these two things.

Who was the first one?

Yeah, if you go back in history, if you go back in history through, now remember, we're the really in the last 150 years, we're the only ones who can really look back and kind of put all put this all together.

But what power was there that took over Jerusalem, controlled Jerusalem, and took away their people and scattered them and controlled them and persecuted them?

The first one you go back, and they had to be the superpower.

They had to be a Gentile nation, and it's Nebuchadnezzar.

He was the first one.

He came, that's why when you look at Isaiah, Jeremiah, and all those, those are all letters written by prophets to the people saying, you know, they're gonna come, they're gonna take, I'm gonna raise this nation up.

Now that's a whole nother, that's a whole nother ball game.

God's gonna raise a nation up to come and take you and start this whole thing.

Who's in control of the nations?

It's not Russia, it's not China.

I mean, it's not Iran, it's not, you know, we're sitting around everybody freaking out all Iran and Iraq and New Zealand, those are superpowers, you know.

Oh my god.

God's in control, he's in control of the nations.

He raises up Nebuchadnezzar, and now we're gonna start to look at he was the first one who controlled the whole world at that particular time, and he came in in four or five waves and took the people and controlled Jerusalem, and he took the people back to Babylon.

And remember who he took back?

Daniel was one of them.

Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach.

He took, they were the young guys, and he trained them, gave them new names.

All by accident, right?

Okay.

Let's look here.

So what does uh tell me the story.

What's this what's the back what's the story before we get to what's the story?

What's the story before we get to Daniel's explanation of the of the statue?

Yeah.

Nebuchadnezzar, he's the king, had a dream.

And he asked them to tell him what it was.

Ask who to tell him?

Asked his wise men.

And what did he ask them?

Yeah, was that normal?

No.

No, it was just you would tell I would tell you the dream.

I had this dream, and I saw this and this and this.

What does it mean?

And they would go, Well, this means that.

Well, he he didn't trust those guys, right?

But he said he'd kill them as well.

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's exactly right.

And so God gave him the thought so that they could not tell him, had to go to Daniel.

Yeah.

Had to go.

So so that's right there.

He they had to even explain the dream.

Somehow they had to figure out what the dream was, and then they had to come out and explain it.

And uh they couldn't do it, and so his edict is you guys are all gonna die.

Right?

Kill you or wipe you out because you're worthless.

And then what happens?

God has to tell Daniel the truth.

Yeah, don't God, Daniel hears about, well, you know, hey, they're gonna kill us all because nobody can't, nobody can do it.

And Daniel says, Hey, can I can I get a shot at this?

Can I get a chance?

And so he he asks God, and God gives him the dream.

He not only gives them the dream, but he gives them what?

The interpretation of the dream.

Yeah.

And by the way.

That's a man of God, because he's not just asking for his own life.

Right.

Yeah.

He's asking for all of their lives.

You remember, remember what he says to uh Nebuchadnezzar about how he understood this?

You know, did he say, hey, yeah, I'm a really good guy, and I know a lot of stuff, and I'm really wise.

Is that what he said?

What did he say?

There's a God in heaven that knows stuff, and this is what he's doing.

You know.

It was God's dream to Nebuchadnezzar, and only God could interpret it.

Right.

That's right.

That's right.

Pretty exciting.

Really, I mean to think about all this.

Okay, let's go on.

Let's see here.

What have I got here?

I'm just gonna go through this.

I'm not gonna go through this.

Let's go straight to because we already talked about this.

Furious Ariarch.

Okay, here's his answer.

Starting in 31.

Here's Daniel's answer.

You, O king, were looking, and behold, there was a single great statue.

That statue, which was large and extraordinary in splendor, was standing in front of you, and its appearance was awesome.

The head of that statue was made of gold, its breast and its arms and silver, its belly and the thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay.

You continued looking until a stone was cut out without hands, and it struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and crushed him.

Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold were crushed all at the same time and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors, and the wind carried them away so that not a trace of them was found.

But the stone that struck the statue became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.

This was the dream.

Now we will tell its interpretation before the king.

Okay.

37.

You, O king, are the king of kings to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the power, and the strength and the glory.

And whoever the sons of men dwell, or the beasts of the field, or the birds of the sky, he has given them into your hand and has caused you to rule over them all.

You.

You are the head of gold.

Pretty clear?

It's not hard to understand.

He's talking about you and the kingdom, your kingdom, you are that head of gold.

You've got the picture on your back there, you've got it up here.

So he this is the him.

He was the first.

This is on your sheets.

He was the first to conquer Jerusalem, 605 BC.

And he did three successive waves, and he went deeper and deeper and more destructive than each time.

And it was the first time the city had fallen since David made it Israel's capital.

Now remember, what are the two requirements?

For it to be a Gentile age of the Gentiles.

What are the two requirements?

Yeah.

Scatter the people, get them out of their land, and can control Jerusalem.

And he's the first one to do it.

This is the beginning of the Gentile age.

The Lord himself granted Babylon this permission as part of the larger plan for Israel.

Okay.

Daniel 2 is where Daniel's God-given wisdom is on display.

He's the head of gold.

You've got to remember he's in power over the whole earth.

Now, do you remember what Stephen said about his power over the whole earth?

Did he actually control the whole earth?

Could he have if he had wanted to?

Yeah, if he had gone to Australia, he would have controlled the Aborigines.

If he could have, but he didn't at that time.

But he could have, because God said, all the animals, all the people, I mean he just didn't have, he didn't have the opportunity to go.

Okay.

Here is uh the Babylonian Empire.

Back then, how it was all controlled, and most of it's over in the you know the Europe, European area, Middle East.

Okay, so that's the first one.

Over every inch of the earth.

Whether or not he personalized personally exercised that, it's a different story.

But he could have if he was.

Okay.

Alright.

After you, there will arise another kingdom.

This is what he tells them.

After you, there will arise another kingdom.

It's gonna be inferior to you.

Uh, then another third kingdom is gonna come.

So there's gonna be a second one that's gonna come, and then there's gonna be a third one that's come, a bronze, which will rule over the whole earth.

So he's talking about, you know, you're the first one, then there's gonna be another kingdom, and then another kingdom.

Now remember, what are the two requirements for these Gentile kingdoms?

What are they?

The same one as the Babylonians.

Yeah, control Jerusalem, scatter the people, persecute the people, but also the second empire has to defeat the first empire, right?

I mean, they've got to they've gotta get rid of those guys.

And then the third one has to defeat the second one, and then the fourth one has to defeat the third one.

I mean, otherwise it's not in control.

We look back in history, and guess what?

So, what this statue is, it's a timeline.

Just like the seven churches, just like the seven churches are a timeline.

Remember?

Like a like a clock.

This statue is a timeline, and it's a timeline of what?

The age of the Gentiles.

These are all gentile powers that do those two things.

So they've got to be a gentile kingdom, be the dominant power of its day, they've got to defeat their predecessor, and they've got to control and trample Jerusalem.

So the second one is Medo-Persia, the Medes and the Persians.

You know who the Persians are, right?

The Rock Iran, you know, and uh I don't know who the Medes are.

Major in the northeast.

Somewhere over there in the Middle East, right?

Yeah.

But they form an alliance.

They form an alliance, and they actually do come in.

They had overwhelming numbers, and they come in and they defeat the Babylonians.

Now notice the value of the metals.

We've gone from gold to silver, it's a little less valuable.

Okay.

Then we go to bronze, which is a little less valuable, and then we go to iron and then clay and mixed with clay.

So as we go through this timeline, these empires become weaker.

They're not as strong as the one before.

Why do they last the empires last longer as the timeline?

Since they're not as superior as the first empire, why are they lasting longer throughout time?

Yeah, well, which one lasts the longest?

The last one.

The very last one.

Yeah, and we'll talk about that when we get there.

But but generally they don't last, you know, they don't really last that long.

I mean, I mean, we're we're already in the Roman Empire when Jesus appears, right?

I think I think the Bath one only lasted 80 years.

Yeah, something like that.

Yeah.

I think it was.

But I I that's what I did on the student.

Yeah.

Isn't it interesting that the statue, you go back to the statue.

Notice how the Stephen brought this out.

The silver is what, two arms.

Now he said something about it doesn't say that the arms are crossed, but it two arms.

What do the two arms represent?

The Medes and the Persians.

Okay, so that just that simple illustration there.

Okay.

The um then we go, let's see here.

Then we go to the next one.

Medo-Persian Empire.

Notice it's kind of the same.

Okay?

Kind of the same.

And here's Jerusalem, by the way.

So you see how it's controlled?

Jerusalem is controlled by they're in control of it.

But you can see where it all goes.

Yeah.

So we have the Medo-Persians, then we go to the Greek Empire.

And remember who's the Greek?

Who's that?

Alexander the Great.

And and I don't know if you know it, but Alexander actually read Daniel.

And he he he he could see how quickly Alexander was known for how quick he went, how quick he did it.

Right?

He he and he actually read in there, and he saw himself.

He believed that he was he was this.

He read Daniel.

So the Greek Empire.

Once again, it gets weaker, weaker and weaker.

Um they were a great military power.

They constantly contended with city-states and land aristocracy.

Uh, I think they would come in and take over areas, but they would leave the people there and they would just become vassals, you know.

It's not like Babylon.

He he didn't have the authoritative power like Babylon had.

So how that's how they're weak.

Yeah, getting weaker and weaker and weaker.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

They're still strong.

They're still strong enough to control all this area.

Once again, is Jerusalem, you know.

Barely in there.

But he just didn't carry it out.

Yeah.

And when the four generals divide, got divided.

He died when he was 43 years old.

Yeah, remember he remember he didn't have any children, so he couldn't leave his empire to anybody, so who did he leave it to?

It's four generals, so four.

And then what happened to those four?

They divided, these two divided over here, and these two divided over here.

And you notice in the statue, that's why you have legs.

So these two generals went over here, these two generals went over here, and ever since this time, East and West.

This this right today.

You talk about the East, you talk about the West.

Goes all the way back to this.

But it's really becoming a democracy, whether than how to lead up.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, we're getting there.

Yeah, it's uh but you get you see how it's getting weaker and weaker and weaker and weaker and weaker.

But it's still a statue, and it's still the time of the Gentiles.

So now uh now we get down to the Romans, which is the iron.

And it's it's I think Stephen mentioned he kind of skips over two and three real quick.

He just kind of mentions them real quick, but then when he gets to this fourth one, he talks more about it because it's the beginning one and the end one that are most important.

Okay.

The Greek, look at this.

So you notice how much he said about these ones up here?

Let me see here.

No, he didn't say much, he just kind of skipped over it.

And then he gets to here, and he talks about then there will be a fourth kingdom.

As strong as iron, as much as iron crushes and shatters all things, which is the Roman Empire, like iron that breaks in pieces, it will crush and break in all these pieces.

So we're not talking about like Babylon, where it unified that came in and just made everybody one big thing under the control of a dictator.

Now we're getting, like you said, we're getting more and more shattered, more and more spread out.

But we're still in control of one empire, the Roman Empire.

In that you saw the feet and toes, partly of potter's clay and partly of iron.

It would, look at this.

What does it say?

It will be a divided kingdom.

So it is a kingdom, and it's still fulfilling the controlling of Jerusalem and the sh the persecuting of the Jews and the scattering of the Jews, but it's divided.

But it will have in it toughness of iron, inasmuch as you saw the iron mixed with common clay.

As the toes of the feet were partly of iron and partly of pottery, so some of the kingdom will be strong and parts of it will be brittle.

We're getting weaker and weaker and weaker here.

And in that you saw the iron mixed with common clay.

They will combine with one another in the seed of men, but they will not adhere to one another, even as iron does not combine with uh pottery.

What did Stephen say about this?

He spent a lot of time talking about this.

You gotta got you had to get something.

Alliances.

Alliances.

He called it imperial democratic alliances.

Imperial means what?

Did he say?

Imperialism.

I'll tell you a good example was the British Commonwealth.

That's an example of imperialism.

They went out and they conquered and controlled all these countries, and it's called the Commonwealth.

I was part of a country that was part of a Commonwealth.

Australia, New Zealand, Canada, India.

Remember, they talk about the what they say that Britain, the sun never set on the never set on the British Empire.

It's not true today, they're all independent.

You know, this just joining together and breaking apart, joining together, breaking apart, marrying and all these things, and then you know, the break just put together and back.

Are we still doing it today?

Yeah, he gave examples, right?

Like in Europe, you got Serbia and Bosnia, and remember Yugoslavia, and then you got they all used to be one.

Ukraine broke away from Russia, and now they're trying to get it back, and it's just it's just nothing.

It's it's you get it?

We live in this time.

How do you know you're at how do we know we're at the bottom of this?

How do we know from the statue that we're that we're at the very end of the Gentile age?

What's gonna appear?

Look at your statue.

Look at by the way, everybody look down.

How do you know you're at the end?

What does it tell you is gonna appear at the end?

You tell appear at the 10.

10.

Something's gonna appear.

We're not there yet because there's not a some kind of group of ten yet.

Now we have the G.

There's 10 beings in the 25th.

We have the G twenty and the H45.

Well, I don't know, I'm just making stuff up.

But that's how the World Economic Forum is what what built in the 10 areas of the world right now.

There there are actually places you can go, websites, uh, teachers, uh who are teach, and they will show you that the that they will the world people are organizing a group of ten.

For some reason.

Why ten?

So I go through.

Because this is what's gonna happen near the end.

There's gonna be something of ten.

Yeah, there's verse uh 43 there talking about the the uh enterprise and the false prophet also.

Uh in 43 in 43 where you've got the iron and the claim dicks, could that be the false prophet?

No man also the no, I don't I don't think so.

I think it's just talking about these gentile powers that are in their existence today.

Could it be man merged with a machine?

There's there's a lot there's a lot of discussion about Genesis 3.15 that plays in to this right now.

Yeah.

See, it's easy to speculate.

This is one thing you don't want to do.

You want to go with what are we what are what what are we starting with at the beginning?

We're talking about powers, world powers, political powers that are in control of Jerusalem and that are shattering and persecuting the Jewish people.

Now, I this is what this is this is what's crazy.

So Jerusalem has to be trampled by the Gentiles, and all the Jews have to be scattered and persecuted out of their land.

Well, is that true today?

No.

They're coming back.

They're coming back, they've got a nation, they have a government, they have a military, they have an economy.

Uh do they have control of Jerusalem?

No.

Not really, not complete control.

So we're still, we're still in this time of the Gentiles.

We're still in it.

You know.

In fact, they never, they never, they never even got back in their land until the Balfa declaration in 1948 as a result of World War II, and the world was so upset with Nazis that they said, we got to do something for these people.

So all the all the democratic alliances got together and said, let's give them you know, so but what who's in control?

God what's God doing?

He's he's he's getting ready, guys.

He's getting ready to end the time of the Gentiles.

And he's bringing his people back.

This is why they call it the a super sign.

This is a super, super duper sign.

Physical return, getting ready for a spiritual return.

Yeah.

They are still in unbelief, though.

They've still rejected their Messiah, they still reject their Messiah.

But we're getting set up where that's about to change.

And that's what we're gonna see when we go into four, when we go into chapters four through twenty two.

Okay?

Roman Empire.

So we are still in this.

Now, what's gonna happen?

Look at this.

Here's 44 and 45.

We're talking about a statue, we're talking about this gentile uh age, this period of time.

It's gonna end.

It is gonna end.

How?

Jesus threw the stone.

Yeah.

It's great.

Look at this.

In the days of those kings, we're talking about those ten.

In the days of those kings, we're talking about those ten kings.

The toes.

The kingdom which will never be destroyed, and that kingdom will be not left to for another people.

It will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure.

Inasmuch as ye saw that a stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold.

Now notice it comes down.

Here's the picture.

It comes down and it hits the feet.

Now it destroys what?

Just the feet?

All of it.

It destroys all of it.

It says it turns to dust and blows away.

What's that saying?

What's it saying when it says it destroys all of it?

What's he trying to what do they know more of it?

It's an end.

This is the end of what?

The Gentile Age.

Because this is the Gentile Age.

This is the end of the Gentile Age.

What does it say?

It's this thing that comes from heaven, a rock.

And it says it's an uncut rock or an uncut stone.

What does Stephen say about an uncut?

Uncut stone.

Holy ground.

What?

Holy ground.

No human hands.

Right?

It's something that is made with no human hands.

Where does that come from?

He talks about that in Deuteronomy, where you build an altar, and what do you do on an altar?

Sacrifice and atonement for sin?

That's where you offered the lamb or the whatever the animal.

The blood was shed.

And it was uncut stones.

What did Stephen say about why it had to be uncut stones?

God does it all.

They weren't bricks.

Are bricks man-made or God-made?

Man-made made made.

Man-made.

That's why the Tower of Babel was such a bad deal.

Because it was made of bricks.

Let us.

Let us.

Let us.

Well, here you have these this altar.

It's not made with, it's God's deals.

You have nothing to do with your salvation.

You have nothing to do with your atonement.

That's what he's saying here.

God does it all.

It comes from heaven.

It's uncut.

And it smashes it.

Remember Stephen's sidebar about altars?

What did he say?

It's a pet peeve of his.

Oh, he unlocked the pastors.

I'm using that word.

Should churches have altars?

Do they have altars?

Do you need an altar?

No, you're not there.

I like what he said there.

See that table up there?

What's that?

What is that?

Well, it's a table.

Not an altar.

He he is our sacrifice.

We're not sacrificing anymore.

He's done.

It falls at the feet.

It's the end of the age.

Yeah, the rock is Christ, comes and destroys the end of the age.

And then remember, what does it say that it becomes?

It says it becomes a mountain.

And it actually goes on and tells you that that mountain is a kingdom.

Now what kingdom is that?

It's God's kingdom, but what is that kingdom?

The millennium.

The millennial reign of Christ.

The kingdom age.

Remember, go back to this.

Jesus came the first time to offer the kingdom.

He came to offer it as a proposal.

Here I am, I'm your Messiah.

And what did they do?

Not interested.

You're Satan.

And that was the turning point.

So then he turned from the Jews.

He said, You're done.

That's basically the unpardonable sin for the nation of Israel.

And he's turned to the Gentiles.

And what's he building?

He spends that all the rest of the time now about the church.

He's turning to the Gentiles.

We are now in the kingdom program.

That's the church.

What are we trying to do?

What's the church trying to do?

Bring it in.

We're trying to recruit citizens.

The kingdom's not here yet.

It will be when we get to the place, which is the thousand-year millennium, the age to come.

And when he comes in and smashes that gentile thing, and comes in and smashes the feet, he sets up this millennial kingdom and sets up his kingdom place.

And by the way, what something happens to the Jews.

Something happens to the Jewish nation.

They rejected him the first time.

Zechariah 12.10.

What does Zechariah 12:10 say?

Zechariah 12:10

They're going to look on him who they have pierced.

It tells you this, remember, that's prophetic.

He tells them that there's a day coming where you, as a nation, now, individually, people, Jews, can accept Christ.

They can still, they individually they can still do that.

But as a nation, there's a day coming, and Zechariah said, they will look upon him whom they pierced.

And as a nation, they're going to repent and fall down.

You know, Ian on that kingdom right there, we're going to get into that later.

You know that Jerusalem's going to be the highest place on the planet.

Yes.

When we see what happens in the rest of Revelation.

Jesus is going to be higher, set up.

Yeah.

Highest place on earth.

Yeah.

You don't have to climb Everest, guys.

It's going to be flattened.

You don't go climb Everest.

Just wait.

You know, one of the things I said is look, God's given us thousands of years to see if any man was worthy to be on the throne.

And all we do is prove him right that there's never been a man worthy.

And that's why Jesus has given us all the opportunity to show that he's the only one that's worthy to raise.

Right.

Yes.

I'm basically done.

In the kingdom program.

And now Islam is the fastest growing religion.

Do the Christians have to become the fastest growing religion to fulfill the kingdom program before it's it matter.

Doesn't matter if what who's joining the church or not.

Who's going to usher in this?

Who's going to start this kingdom?

When he comes back the second time, he's going to start the kingdom.

It's not up to us.

Our job, our job is to recruit people, to go share the gospel.

To try to get as many people to get as many people to get passports.

We're basically trying to get we're trying to get people to be to become citizens before the country's even here.

Usually it's the other way around.

When I became a citizen, I had to come here first.

I had to come to America, marry American.

Then I had to go through naturalization.

Then I had to, then I got my citizenship, answering a few questions and filling out some papers and becoming a resident alien for a while.

Well, see, see the difference?

You come to the place first, then you become a citizen.

We're doing it, God's doing it the opposite.

Did you know that?

He's getting citizens first before there's even a place to go to.

But we're being born into that kingdom.

Yeah.

Now when you become a believer, he seals you with the Holy Spirit, seals you as a pledge, you're his.

And you're going to be in that kingdom.

That's our job.

That's why we're trying to talk to people and tell people.

We're trying to recruit citizens ready for this place.

When this rock comes, bang, we're in there.

Now, I think we're going to jump and get there quicker, but uh David's going to talk about that in a couple of weeks.

Yes.

Curious.

Would you say that Christ's teaching and God's commandments through Christ, especially to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself, are part of the kingdom program?

Yes, it is.

So we ought to be paying attention to that?

Yes.

And let me ask you this.

Why would you want to love your neighbor as yourself?

What's your whole purpose in loving your neighbor?

Is it because I'm doing a good work and uh that's what I'm supposed to do because that's a good work and that's going to earn me uh heaven?

Yeah, you you're supposed to love your neighbor as yourself because that's what Christ would do, and people would people out in the world, that's not what the world does.

And people out in the world see you loving your neighbor as yourself, and they go, Whoa, are you weird?

What what why you and then you have an opportunity.

Light.

Yeah.

So one thing is one can't understand is love.

Yeah.

I've been there to talk to that.

But remember, we live in a world where Satan doesn't want us to do that.

He's he he he wants to limit how many people get into the kingdom place.

He's gonna do all he can to shut us down, shut us down, and to keep people away.

That's our this is our assignment.

Now, what we're getting ready to get into is how we get from this kingdom program into the kingdom place, and how the Jews, what happens to the Jews.

This this is key about Revelation.

What happens to the Jews?

You gotta remember, Daniel was written mainly to the Jews.

Now, next week, this is his first dream.

Next week we'll look at, he has another dream, but this time it's animals.

In chapter 7, he sees beasts, he sees animals.

And we'll talk about those.

And it's very much related to this, but it gives more detail.

We're getting more and more detail.

See you later, Missy.

She doesn't want me to do that.

That's why I do it.

Any uh anything else?

Yes.

I don't know if this is right on the subject, but Jesus' principles, we should align ourselves with his principles and preach the gospel and love our neighbor and be the poor.

This is what he teaches us.

We have to align ourselves with him, not man.

Yep, but Jesus is the only way.

I don't know if that ties into what you know.

What it ties, all those things that we're to do.

Like you can you can feed, listen to this.

This is a great thing.

You can feed the poor, you can clothe the poor, you can uh love your neighbor, and they're all lost.

Let's say they're all lost.

But that does no good.

Unless you tell them the gospel.

I mean, if you love them, you're gonna be able to do that.

Yeah, yeah.

You don't want to.

A lot of times, a lot of times we do all those things, we do all those things, and then and you get, you know, and then you well, I don't want to, I don't wanna I don't want to say anything because they might not like me.

Or, you know, I don't want to say that.

We can say, well, you that's the very thing they need, because you can feed them, you can clothe them, you can do all this stuff, but if they don't ever come to Christ, they're still gonna go to hell.

Whether you fed them and clothed them.

I mean, you made them feel comfortable on the way to going to hell.

And that is not, you understand what I'm saying?

We gotta take that, we gotta, we gotta go that.

That's why we have a lot of institutions today that started off real well, you know, with the gospel, and now they're just social.

Social.

The gospel is uh non-existent, but the institution still goes on.

Do you see why revelation should motivate us to to to evangelize and Satan doesn't want us to study this because he doesn't want us to do this?

Where does the salvation of the Jews come into the picture?

We're getting there.

Well, actually, you know, when we get into when we get into when we get into verse uh chapters four, four through twenty two, it's all, it's I hate to tell you this, guys.

It's all about the Jew.

You're gonna be studying about the Jew.

You're not gonna be studying about the church.

This the church is never mentioned, it's never mentioned on chapter four on.

You never ever see it.

So like, so it's something it's a it's a switch.

It's a it's something changes, and now you remember, remember how I told you the king the kingdom proposal?

Jesus came to offer the proposal, and they rejected it.

And so he turned to the Gentiles.

He said, Okay, I'll go to the Gentiles.

And Paul even did the same thing.

Went to the Jews, went to the synagogues first, and then he went to the Gentiles.

Well, guess what happens?

When we get into chapter 4, he's done with the Gentiles, and he's going back to the Jews.

It's all about the Jewish nation.

Chapter 4 on.

The rapture takes the church out, and that's why it's not meant to.

Right.

Yeah.

Well, I kind of read it.

When Christ comes, it's going to be at the end of the tribulation because that's when we come, because there's still nations, and they're warring against Jerusalem, and that's when he will crush it at the end of that seven years.

There's two different main things that are said: there's a coming of the Lord, and there's the day of the Lord.

Totally different.

The coming of the Lord is the rapture, the day of the Lord is the second.

Steps on earth.

David will get to talk about that in two weeks.

He's going to be talking about it.

We have like the Jews all coming back in Israel.

Yeah.

We have a very small, a really very small percentage of the Jews in Israel right now believe in Christ.

Oh, yeah.

Very small, like 40%.

Yeah.

So God's going to get their attention.

Yeah.

That's why the 144 times comes.

Yeah.

You don't want to know how he's going to get their attention, though.

No.

He's going to get their attention.

Be encouraged.

Time is short.

Yeah.

Be encouraged.

Be encouraged.

Recruit citizens.

We're going to get citizens.

For the kingdom that's not quite here yet.

The real kingdom.

All right, Father, thanks so much.

I notice a lot, but uh it's so neat to see your sovereignty and how you you're in control of the nations.

You're in control of leaders.

And it's all to bring about purposes and plans that you have.

And we thank you that you haven't abandoned your people, the ones you've chosen, the Jewish nation.

But you've also abandoned us that you love us, the bride of Christ.

And it's something that was not seen.

But there's going to be an end to this.

End to the church, and there's going to be an end to the Gentile age.

And then you're going to come in all your glory.

We're so excited about it.

So, Father, make it real to us.

Challenge us and encourage us.

And we thank you in Christ's name.

Amen.