Heavenly Father, we ask, Lord, that you would bless the time that we have together, that the study of the end times would cause us to be sober, help us to study in faith, that all of these things, Lord God, that we eagerly wait with anticipation. Even though we may not understand the various details of all the visions that John is seeing, I pray that what you've intended to warn, to encourage, to strengthen your church through this letter would have its effect on us.

So help us, Lord God, not to simply put in our time, but that your word would speak to us and through your Holy Spirit, Lord God, that you would guide and lead. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Okay. All right, so there's two basic visions. The first one only covers a couple of verses, and then the second one, the two witnesses.

The first one begins with the commandment to go measure the temple, right? And so the image of measuring is used in the scripture in various ways. What is the purpose of this measuring? Sometimes the imagery is used as a plumb line. Some of you guys may remember in the book of Amos where God tells Israel that on the surface they look like they are right, but God places a plumb line to see if they were really right with God because they were deceiving themselves.

God clearly saw them that their worship was tainted, but according to the law of God, the word of God, they were not right with him. And so God was using the plumb line to reveal to them how far they've strayed away from God. And so that imagery is used in the book of Amos and also in 2 Kings.

Sometimes the imagery is used to measure those who are righteous, so Zacharias 2, 1 through 5, again, where there's measuring going on for the purpose of not revealing sin, but to reveal their righteousness. We're going to see that measuring again in the book of Revelation in much more detail when it's talking about the new Jerusalem, right?

It's going to have an elaborate, detailed description. So the whole debate in the book of Revelation, in particular chapter 21, is that is that a description of heaven or is that a description of the millennial kingdom? We'll get to that when we get there. Depending on how you interpret that is going to have a huge effect on how you see the other parts of scripture, okay?

But we're going to get to that. So that is measured in detail in chapter 21. But what is the meaning of that? Why does God in this text ask John to take measurements of the temple, the detailed measurement of the temple, and tell him not to measure the outer court?

What is the purpose of that? Well, we see a similar thing that happens in Ezekiel. I think I have a, yeah, Ezekiel 43, 6, 3, 8. I'm not going to read all of it, but he says, "While the man was standing beside me, I heard one speaking to me out of the temple.

And he said to me, 'Son of man, this is the place of the throne and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the people of Israel forever. And the house of Israel shall no more defile my holy name, neither they nor their kings, by the dead bodies of their kings at their high places.'" I'm not going to keep reading.

But basically, after he reminds the nation of Israel that the temple is God's house, and then he says, "You've been defiling my house by disobeying and going after other idols," and then he tells him in the next passage to go take all these measurements of the temple, of all the different articles, right?

So again, it kind of correlates with what he's doing here. So why would you ever take measurements of your house? Okay, those of you guys who have your own house or your condo, when would you take measurements of your house? Just to tell your friends how big your house is?

When do you take measurements of your house? You're remodeling, right? Rebuilding, it's for the purpose of building or modeling, right? So the imagery that we see of God telling them to take measurements, it's not that God is remodeling, but it is to signify his presence, that he's restoring the temple, right?

He's restoring the temple. So the measurement of the temple signifies renovation, restoration of God's presence in Israel, right? So basically what he's saying, remember, where are we in the seven-year tribulation right now? Where are we? In the seven years, where are we? Look at my hand. Seven years, where are we?

You're half, right? Three and a half years into it, and he says, remember, time, times, and a half of times, three and a half years, right? We're going to get to that in a minute. So he's right at the half mark, and up to this point, up to this point, God says he's going to bring judgment.

But remember what he says last week? That he was not going to delay? Yes? He was not going to delay. So meaning, he was not going to delay in fulfilling the promise to his people, and he's no longer going to delay in bringing judgment upon mankind. Up to this point, he's been warning the nations.

He was bringing judgments, remember, a fourth of the nature, a third of the people, and then this fire and all this stuff is coming, but all of it, in the midst of all of that, he's waiting for them to repent and return. So even in the midst of all of this intense judgment, God is allowing them time to repent.

Then last week, right, last week, God responds and says, it will no longer delay, meaning the rest of the judgment is going to come swiftly, and restoration of his people are going to come swiftly. So the measurement of the temple is God's promise that he's fulfilling, that he's going to restore what was lost, right?

The temple, meaning the church, the church which is going to experience intense persecution, God's going to purify the church, and in the midst of that, the judgment is going to be intensified, right? So remember, is the second half more intense or the first half more intense? The second half, right?

The real intense judgment we haven't studied yet. We didn't get to that. That's the seal judgment. So up to this point, God's, you can call it discipline more than judgment, but here and now, God's going to bring the judgment upon mankind. So that's what the measuring of the temple represents, that he's going to strengthen the church while the judgment upon mankind is going to intensify.

He said, though there's going to be intense tribulation, the church will be protected during a 42 weeks reign of terror by the beast, right? And again, that's recorded in Revelation chapter 13, 5. Do I have that? No. Okay. The outer court is going to be overtaken by the nations and trampled on for 42 weeks.

And the significance of that, the outer court of the temple being trampled on, that signifies the temple is going to be corrupted by false worshipers. And God's going to restore the true church, but he's going to allow the fake church, the superficial church to be judged. So if you remember, remember Matthew 24, 24, one of the qualities that God says is going to bring upon mankind, Matthew 24, 24.

Anybody remember? There's going to come a delusion, right? Deception that even the elect may be deceived if that was possible. Meaning that that's how severe the delusion is going to be. False prophets, divisions in the church where God's going to purify the church. So it may come through persecution.

It may come through false prophecies, false leaders, and then divisions in the church. And then, you know, when typically if there is anything that comes into the church that divides the church, it doesn't divide with one evil and one good. It's usually both sides thinking that they're good, right?

And so he said the deception is going to come so strongly, right? If possible, even the elect will be deceived. Again, long run, of course, the elect is not going to be deceived, but it's to convey how serious this judgment is going to be. And God is going to allow that in the church at the end.

He's going to strengthen the real church, right? The real worshippers of God, but those who are superficially worshipping, meaning that maybe the non-Christians, the false worshippers, he's going to allow the church, a portion of the church to be trampled. And that's what he means by that, right? This is going to happen during a period of 42 months, 1,260 days.

It is referring to a time of intense distress, tribulation, persecution, and destruction. So we're at the halfway mark, and it's going to get worse, but at the tail end of that, it's going to get severely intense. And so that's what the measurement of the temple signifies, right? God's going to draw near.

And whenever God draws near, always two things happen, right? The righteous are comforted, and the sinners are punished, always. Because that's what happens when revival comes. Revival doesn't come and encourage everybody. Revival comes and identifies sin. And so the repentant are forgiven. The unrepentant are disciplined, right? And so that's how it's described at the end times before the intense judgment comes.

God's going to bring revival in the church, but revival to true believers, right? And the superficial or maybe false believers who are following false prophets are going to be identified at that time, and they're going to be judged by it. And so that's going to set up for the next scene where the two witnesses are going to come.

Now, the identity of the two witnesses, no one knows this for sure. And I've read all the arguments behind what they believe, and depending on which view you have. But none of it seemed like to me a slam dunk. But some of the suggestions, some have suggested that they are symbolic of the church, right?

And basically them going out, proclaiming the gospel, and there's going to be a revival, and many people are going to come to Christ. And then at the tail end of that, the beast is going to come and slaughter the church, intense persecution. And after three days, again, all of these things are symbolic.

And after the three days, God's going to resurrect the church, and there's going to be a rapture, right? Again, this is one of the suggestions of what these two witnesses represent. Another suggests that they might be Moses and Elijah. And the reasoning behind why they think it's Moses and Elijah is because of the powers that they have.

The powers that are described that what these two witnesses are able to do are very similar to the powers that, again, Moses, God used Moses to present when he was delivering the nation of Israel, or Elijah, and a lot of the powers he had. So that's where they think maybe that it might be Moses and Elijah.

Another reason why is, remember at the transfiguration, right, Moses and Elijah shows up. So they think that maybe it's Moses and Elijah. Another suggestion is Enoch and Elijah. Can somebody take an educated guess why some people would think that this might be Enoch and Elijah? You're right. They don't die.

So remember, the witnesses die, and then they come back to life. God puts his breath in them, they come back to life. And so they think that must be signifying those two people who didn't die, right? Enoch is caught up, and he goes up to heaven. Same thing with Elijah, right?

But again, none of these are just suggestions. Again, to me, when I was reading through all of this and the reasoning behind that, none of it seemed like a slam dunk to me. But we know, at least in character, they were wearing sackcloth, signifying a call to repentance. It's very similar to the garb that John the Baptist wore.

The description of John the Baptist's garment wasn't sackcloth. It says it was camel hair, but it was similar to sackcloth. And it signified very plain clothing, a prophet that is detached from the world and basically is calling people to repentance. And that was the central call of John the Baptist, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." So if you look at these two messengers, it doesn't tell us specifically what they were preaching, right?

But whatever it was that they were preaching, it made the people angry. And we're going to get to that in a little bit. It made them angry. So it looks like, when you put two and two together, that the primary message, and considering the context, that it's a preparation for Christ to come, that he's preaching the repentance.

So it's kind of like playing the same role as John the Baptist. He's preparing for the coming of Christ, and his message is to allow them to repent. So even up to this point, even up to this point, God is pleading with the world to repent. And he's given a final warning that any, and this spectacular miracle is going to happen.

These two people are going to come back to life. And even then, the people who refuse to repent won't repent. But that seems to be the main message that they're going to be bringing. They are called two olive trees and two lampstands. We already know that the lampstand represents that they are lightbearers for God.

In the beginning of Revelation, who else is called lampstand? Who else is called the church, right? The seven churches are the lampstand. And Jesus says that we are the light of the world, right? So we are light collectively, we are light individually. And so these two witnesses said they're lampstands for God, they are lightbearers.

So what does the olive tree represent then? If they are the lamp, what does the olive tree represent? What does the lamp need? Huh? Oil, right? So the olive tree is a source of this oil. So to say that they are lampstand and they're olive tree, meaning that there is an eternal supply of oil, that this is not a temporary position that they have, right?

They're permanent lampstand for God. That's what these two witnesses represent. It says that during the time of their 42 weeks of ministry, they're going to be protected supernaturally. They said that they're going to have power over waters, turn them into blood and strike the earth with every kind of plagues as often as they desire.

So again, that's part of the reason why I don't think that this is the church, right? Because the way it's described, they have supernatural powers. And these aren't just ordinary prophets or apostles. No apostle or prophet was able. Maybe Elijah. Elijah is the only one that we can think of that had this kind of power, right?

Not even Moses. Moses, God used him to do certain things. But these two witnesses, we don't know exactly what their identity is, but they weren't ordinary prophets. They're not ordinary apostles, right? Even the angels, right? Not all angels had this kind of power. So again, we don't know exactly who they are, but during their ministry, there's going to be a lot of miracles that's going to take place and no one's going to be able to oppose their message, right?

And their powers that are described are very similar to the power of Elijah that we see in 1 King chapter 17. And again, partially that's the reason why some people suggest that this is… one of them is Elijah. But whatever the case is, right? Whoever these two people are, whether it's symbolic, it represents something, it basically says at the end, before the Antichrist comes, there's going to be a period of intense evangelism, right?

Whether that's three and a half years or whether that's a longer period, if we believe that this is something that's going to come in the future, that God is going to purify the church and basically He's going to purify the church, maybe it's going to come through intense persecution, right?

And the people who've been kind of holding on to God superficially, you know, as soon as the tree gets shaken, the fake fruits are going to fall out, right? And then through the fire, the real Christians, the true believers who are holding on, that they're going to experience a revival.

And that's exactly… if you talk to the pastors in India, that's exactly what they say. Right now, I mean, you can go online and read about persecution around the world and India is almost like… they're going up on this ladder, almost on a monthly basis. I don't know if you heard, I read an article just about three days ago, a pastor was coming out of his church and two young men on their scooter just came by and shot them point blank, dead, just because they were Christians.

So this type of stuff is increasing in India all the time, you know. So when we talk to the pastors, I say, you know, how do you deal with all of this? And they said, it's been good for the church. You know, I say it's been good for the church because only serious Christians come to church.

So you can imagine what the fellowship is like, right? When every single person that's there are being tested with their life, that whether they really believe this or not. So the Bible describes at the end times that the persecution is going to be so intense that it's going to be a gathering of true believers.

But once they're the gathering of true believers are together, there's revival, right? And there's going to be intense evangelism. So whether it's going to be two literal people or the two prophets or if it's symbolic of the church, however you interpret that, it basically is saying that revival is coming, right?

But again, revival is not coming for everybody. He said the outer court is not going to be measured. He's going to allow that part of the church to be trampled on, right? So after accomplishing the ministry to proclaim repentance for preparation of the coming of the King, they are immediately killed by the beast that arise from the abyss.

The beast is not Satan to clarify. Satan is described in Revelations 12, 3 and 9 as the dragon. So the beast is getting power from Satan, from the dragon. But he is not the beast himself. So if he's not the beast, if he's not Satan himself and he's getting power from the beast, who would he be?

He's not the beast. He's not Satan himself, but he is a high servant of the beast. Antichrist, right? Antichrist that Paul mentions in 2 Thessalonians, right? That he's the antichrist, the man of lawlessness is going to come. And so he arises from the abyss, right? And according to Revelations 13, 1 through 8.

So there's going to be a more detailed description of who the beast is and his activity in Revelation chapter 13 and 14 and on. So when we get there, we'll go into more deep description. But he's described as a political figure. It doesn't say political, but again, when we get there, we'll talk about it more.

But it basically describes how the 10 horns are going to unify. And then out of the 10, the 3 are going to go overpower the others, right? And so I've heard so many interpretations of that. I remember, I'm assuming most of you guys don't remember, but years ago when the European Union was coming together, I don't know, how long was that?

That's more than 10 years. It's got to be 20 years. You need to remember. It was a while back. It was a while back. But I remember when the European Union was coming together and they're going to combine their currency and there was a lot of end time prophets who were saying that that was a 10 nation federation, you know, and then they were trying to connect the dots.

I don't know if that's true or not, you know, but a lot of that was coming from this, from the beast and how it's described. Again, chapter 13, not here, right? But I'm not going to get too deep into that because when we get into that, I'll talk a little bit more about that when we get to chapter 13 and on.

But his activity seems like a political activity. He's going to gather the authorities, the kingdoms of the earth, and he's going to bring it under his leadership, right? So there's going to be a period of Antichrist rule where Christians are going to be under the dominion of the Antichrist, right?

So again, that's when the persecution obviously is going to increase. I'll mention briefly here, okay, but I'll get into deep a little bit later. Again, this is not this text. It's going to come up later, but I think the Antichrist is going to be a religious/political figure because he's going to be so beloved that he's not going to force people in fear to submit to him.

He's going to have people give allegiance to him because they want to, and he's going to have a religious overtone to who he is, right? So there's been a lot of guesses about, you know, during the Reformation period that that was the Pope, right? Now I think it's going to be Christian.

I don't think it's going to be Muslims. I think it's going to be, because he's going to come in as an angel of light representing Christ. So I think the only way, so this religious figure is going to unify all the nominal Christians, nominal Muslims, nominal Hindus, and nominal Buddhists.

What did I miss? Right? All the nominal groups are going to be gathered together under one umbrella, and then the one who ends up coming out as a leader of that federation eventually is going to be the Antichrist. That's my opinion, okay? Don't go quote me and saying that he's saying crazy things, right?

The reason why I think that is because when I look at the scripture that it's going to be a religious figure, he's going to have political power, people are going to give them allegiance, and the only person that can do that is, again, a religious figure. Considering it's an angel of light, I think he's going to have the name Christian on it, right?

If you look at the political environment now, because of all the terrorism that's taking place, any extreme group, whether you are a Muslim or a Christian, is being lumped up. Any fundamentalist in any group, whether you are a Hindu or a Jewish or Christian or Islam, is kind of put into one category.

So there's a nominal Christian, nominal Christianity, nominal fringe groups are becoming the central, and they're gathering together. There are more and more churches that are coming together and declaring unification with other religions, right? So what we consider universalism, all roads lead to God, it just happens that your road, Christian road leads to God, the Hindu road leads to God.

So that type of thinking and that type of heresy is growing in our generation because of the extremists. So at some point, right, and if you haven't noticed, at some point, being an evangelical Christian, you're going to be equated, your faith is going to be equated with the extreme jihadists, right?

And based on that, if you haven't noticed, that's already happening in Europe, it's already happening in Canada, they could actually take your children away in Canada. I don't know if you guys have been reading the article, they passed an ordinance that if you teach things that are contrary to the belief of the state, right, about the liberal agenda that they have, they actually have the right to take your children away.

So you can't teach what you believe inside your own home, right? So I think that's going to eventually spread all over the world. And so what's unifying the world right now is a reaction against Islam, the extreme, the terrorism. But a reaction against that is also causing a reaction against anything, what they consider extreme, right?

Now this is all, you know, this is all just kind of piecing things together and we'll talk about that more when we get to the later chapters. But I believe at the end time when Antichrist actually comes, that he's going to be a religious figure that's going to have all the nominal groups under his umbrella.

And then he's going to eventually reveal himself as who he is. But I think that that's what's happening. Right now if you look at the world events, that's exactly what's happening. The abyss is not hell. In Luke 8.31 it describes that as a place of punishment. Okay. So again, this is not hell, but it's described as a place of punishment where the demons, certain types of demons are held in captivity until a period when God allows them to be released.

Right? Hell is an eternal state that once they get in, that that's going to be a place of punishment for eternity. So these two witnesses have so much power, so that anybody who opposes them, they have the authority to basically extinguish them, to kill them. But at the end of their 42 weeks, the beast comes out of the abyss and they overpower them.

Right? So as strong as these, powerful as these two witnesses were, are, the Antichrist is going to be even stronger. So that kind of gives you a picture of how powerful the Antichrist is. So again, we are warned in Jude chapter nine, where the Archangel Michael's contending with the devil, with disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce blasphemous judgment but said, "The Lord rebuke you." In other words, he says, not to be arrogant, to think that somehow we're going to battle Satan by our own authority.

Right? And I think the mistake that we make is one, we make the devil too big. Right? A lot of that coming from movies that we watch. Right? The demons and all these demonic figures overpowering the priests and the church and they're cowarding and feared and nothing can get in their way except for a little cross or something.

Right? And they kind of over exaggerate the power of Satan over the cross, over Christ. But the other mistake that we can make is to make him too little. Right? Where we think, "I'm going to..." You know, I had friends a long time ago, back in college, where the charismatic movement was in full bloom.

And I remember they dedicated their summer to go after demonic powers. Right? They were kind of the charismatic group and they said they were going to take a mission trip to Utah and they're going to go head to head with the demons. And I remember they were asking people for prayer.

I remember hearing the whole time, I was like, "What the heck are you two doing?" And they were going and asking, telling people, you know, they called themselves like, I forgot what it was, but we called them Ghostbusters. Because that's basically how they were selling themselves. Right? But basically we were warned if we make too much of him where we think that what God tells us he was in us is greater than he was who is outside of us.

Right? Talking about Satan. That Satan has no power over his children. But at the same time, if we don't respect his power, then we don't understand the kind of battle that we're in. Right? The spiritual battle that we're in. That we can somehow think that if we're clever and if we just unite together, right, and if we just did the right things and had the right people that somehow we can win this spiritual battle.

Right? And that's another severe mistake that the church can make. Right? This is not a battle that you and I can win by being strong. It's the only way that we can engage in this battle is to put on the spiritual armor. Right? That we're told in Ephesians chapter six.

And so that's how it's described here. As powerful as these two witnesses were, the Antichrist comes up and he overpowers them and he kills them. The two witnesses are killed. Right? They are not buried. Right? Again, you probably see images, right, the terrorists in certain parts of Middle East, they will kill the American soldiers or the people that they captured and they'll kill them and then they won't bury them.

What is the meaning behind that? Right? Is an example to warn other people. Another is for humiliation. You mess with us, this is what's going to happen to you. And it shows an extreme hatred toward those people that they killed. So terrorists, exactly, they're trying to instill terror upon people.

You mess with us, this is the power that we have. Right? And again, it's to publicly display the kind of hatred that they have toward the people that they're killing. And so the fact that these two witnesses are killed and these two people, these witnesses are God's light, they're directly sent.

Right? And they're pleading with the world for repentance and the hatred that they garner for speaking the truth was so, again, was so intense that even after they killed, nobody buries them. They said that this happens in the big city. The big city, most scholars believe, is talking about Jerusalem.

And this is where our Lord was crucified. And there's going to be another intense spiritual battle that's going to take place. Right? There was an intense battle that took place in Jerusalem when Jesus was crucified and resurrected. And again, at the end time before Christ comes, there's going to be a great spiritual battle.

And again, this is, again, reiterating what I said. The fact that the nations gaze at their bodies without burying them, right, it signifies the intensity of the hatred that they had toward the two witnesses. And again, the reason why they had this hatred toward the two witnesses is because they hated their message.

And their message was repent. Right? Judgment is coming. The two witnesses are brought back to life by God. And as they are called up by a loud voice, a great earthquake hits the city, killing 7,000 people. Again, we see the prophecies in Ezekiel 38, 19 and Zechariah 14, 4.

Right? So, all of these things that we see in Revelation, there are pieces of these revelations in Ezekiel, in Lamentations, some in Isaiah, a lot of it in the book of Daniel, in Zechariah. Right? So, after you study the book of Revelation, go back and study the major prophets and the minor prophets.

Right? You're going to see how much of that language is in the book of Revelation. I could just sit here and just quote the Old Testament. Right? Just, but then we'll just sit here and I'm just kind of like 15 verses behind every verse that we talk about. But you're going to see how the book of Revelation is a compilation of all the prophecies that were made in the Old Testament and how it's coming together here in the New Testament.

So, all of this, I'm just mentioning a few verses, but all of these, you'll see parallels in the Old Testament. And it says that when this earthquake comes and these two witnesses are risen, it says that they were struck with fear and they gave glory to God. Right? The world was struck with fear and they gave glory.

Does that mean that the whole world repents and come to Christ? Probably not. Right? So, what does it mean to give glory to God? Giving glory to God here is not signifying repentance, but a forced acknowledgement of God's power. Right? Remember, when the first judgment comes and they see the judgment of God coming, what do they do?

The people run up to the hills and they hide beneath the rocks instead of repenting. So, their hearts are so hardened. At this point, they've made their decision. So, if they would have come to repentance, they would have come to repentance already. Even after all of this, they would cling to idols and they're going to give their allegiance to Antichrist, but they're not repenting.

And we're going to see that as we continue to study. So, when the seventh trumpet is blown instead of revelation, a great plague or disaster, we hear voices in heaven declaring the eternal sovereignty of God and His Christ. So, there's a period of intense revival in the church. These two witnesses come and they begin to preach the gospel and warn people and bring them to repentance.

There's a battle that happens with the Antichrist and then he comes into power. These two witnesses go to heaven. And then the seventh trumpet is blown and immediately we don't see the next judgment. We see a scene up in heaven. It's almost kind of like you're taking a break from all this disaster that's happening and kind of, you know, it's almost like the world is in absolute chaos.

Earthquakes, famines, persecution, and it's just going nuts, right? That's what we've seen for three and a half years and it's going to get even more intense. But before he gets to the real intense persecution of the bold judgments, he gets a glimpse again. He goes back and he gets a glimpse of heaven.

Why do you think that happens? As chaotic as it is, as out of control and as rebellious as the world is, the scene up in heaven is not like that, right? So contrast the scene in heaven that we are shown with the scene that we see on earth. Complete opposite, heaven and earth.

Earth is burning, the sea is turning into blood, a third of mankind is dying, people are in rebellion, they're killing the prophets of God. I mean, the world is on fire, it's absolute utter chaos, antichrist is coming into power, people are giving allegiance to the antichrist, and then the seventh trumpet blows and he gets a glimpse of heaven and what does he see in heaven?

Worship, right? Worship, even in the midst of all of that, God is still on his throne. 24 elders are bowed down, prostrated, worshiping this God. So no matter how chaotic this is here, like what does that tell us? God is still on his throne, he's still being worshipped. God is still sovereign.

And that's the scene that God shows John and us, right, before he goes back to what's happening on earth. This 24 elders, again, we see them prostrated before God. Again, remember the word prostrated, proskuneo, is the most common word for worship in the New Testament. It means to be utterly prostrated, right?

The kind of thinking that we have of worship, we think of singing, we think of giving, we think of gathering, but the most common word in the New Testament for worship is being prostrated. Like being in awe of something that is so beyond your imagination that you're just kind of lost, right, in the presence of God's glory.

And that's the scene that we see. Every time we see a picture of worship in heaven, it's people who are affected by his glory and that's the scene that we see of the 24 elders, right? And the elders break out in prophecy, singing praise to the Father, and then he describes the judgment that's going to come and the great white throne judgment, the end time judgment that they are prophesying happens in Revelation chapter 20, 11 through 15, right?

Then after the great white throne judgment, we get into chapter 21, which is the millennium or eternity. And we'll get to it when we get there, okay? And then it ends again, we get the vision takes us back to the temple and the temple is filled with the cloud signifying that he has filled the temple, right?

He's taking all the measurements to renovate, to renew, to revive the church and in the midst of all of this chaos that the revival comes, persecution happens, right? Fear falls upon mankind, earthquake takes place, and then we see up in heaven, God is being worshiped, right? Just like before all of this happened.

And then the chapter ends with the restoration of the temple, right? And he looks into the temple and he sees the Ark of the Covenant that's inside restored, right? You guys ever – you guys watched the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark? Don't tell me you didn't watch that movie.

You watch Star Wars, you didn't watch Raiders of the Lost Ark? Really? You guys didn't watch Raiders of the Lost Ark? Okay. Oh my gosh, all right. That's a generation gap right there. All right. Raiders – okay, I'm not even going to say it. Basically that whole movie premise is going searching for the Ark of the Covenant, right?

And the Ark of the Covenant is actually – no one knows exactly where it is. There's actually a documentary where they try to trace it back and they found this one church and it's supposed to be in the basement but no one can get in there and the government won't allow.

And there's a whole documentary but no one knows this for sure, right? So the Ark of the Covenant symbolized the covenant that God made with the nation of Israel, right? And it contains the tablets of God and Moses' rod and the manna and so all of it signifying God's covenant that he made with his people.

So when he says the Ark of the Covenant, he saw it back into the temple, means that God remembers his covenant and he's restoring his promise that he made with his people. And that's the scene that we're shown at the temple, that in the midst of all of this, before the final day comes, that God's promises, all of it is going to be fulfilled, right?

That's the picture that we're shown here. And that's what it means for the Ark of the Covenant to be in the temple, that his house, his presence among his people are going to be restored, right? So again, as we wrap up and I'm going to give you opportunity to take some time in your small group to discuss that as you're studying this, if even a portion of this makes sense, right?

Even if a portion of it, even let's say about 10% of this that you believe is going to happen, I don't know how it would not affect you, right? I don't know how this could not affect you. I don't know how this could not affect the way you view life, the way you view what's valuable and what's not valuable, right?

And I think that was the intention for the book of Revelation, not for us to figure out the details of how, when it's going to happen. It's going to be seven years, it's going to be middle of the seven years or what the Antichrist is going to look like, all of that.

I think when it happens, you're going to remember a lot of things that you studied in the book of Revelation and say, "Oh, I remember this." Who knows, maybe two actual witnesses, two men are going to show up and they're going to actually be doing this and say, "Yeah, those two men are mentioned in Revelation chapter 11." And when it happens, it won't catch you off guard like thieves, like thieves coming in the night.

So maybe God placed enough in the scripture about the end times so that when it happens, you're going to know, right, if you've been paying attention. But prior to that, everything that we see in the book of Revelation is for the purpose of making an imprint, a deep imprint that the end is coming, that this is not a guess.

This is not God's wishful thinking. This is human history coming to an end, saying that this is where the end is going to happen. So however it happens, whatever the timeline that it happens, the end is certain. Victory in Christ is certain. Judgment upon sin is certain. Eternity in Christ is certain.

Sovereignty of God and worship is certain. The end of the world as we, you and I know it, is certain. We don't know exactly when, we don't know exactly how, but it's absolutely certain, right? So how does that affect us? How does that affect what we pursue? How does that affect what we value?

And so as I've been saying on Sunday, if we take our faith even somewhat seriously, it should at least cause us to take a step back and cause us to examine, if this has absolutely no effect on you, why not? At the minimum, we should be asking that question, right?

Let me go over the discussion questions real quick. The Lord prepares His coming by restoring His glory to the church. In what way can we contribute to this restoration? How can this be applied personally rather than thinking what others should be doing? So again, don't discuss like, "Yeah, the church should be like this," or "Those people should be like that." How can we contribute to the restoration of the church, revival?

Number two, we collectively, individually are called to be light of the world. In what way are you actively shining your light? Okay, I think that's pretty straightforward. Number three, what traits do you think the Antichrist will have to be able to recognize that he's not from God? Obviously, he's not going to be wearing a hat that says "Antichrist." He's going to be coming to deceive, right?

And if he's very powerful, which the Bible says he is, and he's very deceptive, meaning a lot – he said even if – his deception is going to be so powerful that even the elect may get deceived, if that was possible. In other words, it's not possible, meaning there's going to be a lot of people that you thought were elect are going to be deceived and find out that they weren't elect.

The real elect are going to persevere, but that's how severe this delusion is going to be, right? Even the people who withstood other stuff, that when the Antichrist comes and he deceives, he's going to be very successful. So how are you going to recognize that, right? How would you be able to tell between false prophets and true prophets sent from God, knowing that deception is often internal rather than external, right?

Deception typically happens inside, right? It's not simply because, "Oh, here's 15 marks of who is and who is not from God." Typically, the way deception happens is we can be doing God's work for ungodly reasons. We can stand up for truth, for pride, for self-ambition, right? So deception happens internally.

That's why the Scripture says that the Word of God is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of our heart. It doesn't just judge the thoughts and intentions of all the spirits. It judges the thoughts and intentions of our hearts, right? So if we're not regularly in the Word of God, we can be pursuing righteousness with a deceived heart, right?

So I think it's important not only do we recognize external signs that the Scripture says, but how do we make sure that we are not being deceived, right? Because every single one of us is susceptible to that, and that's what we're warned. So how can we identify this? Number four, our spiritual battle is directly linked to our prayer life.

Without prayer, we may have all the best intentions but still be very susceptible to deception. In what practical way can you improve your discipline of prayer? Ultimately, it's a spiritual battle, so if we're going to engage in the spiritual battle, we need to be on our knees, right? So let's take some time with our small groups and discuss the questions.

And again, I want to encourage you next week, the questions on there is mainly for the purpose of review. And then, yeah, and then, so if you have people who weren't able to come up today and they missed and they feel kind of lost, next week will be a good time for them to come at all costs, okay?

Let me pray for us, and then I'll have you guys get into your group. Heavenly Father, we want to thank you for the opportunity for your church to come together. I pray, Father God, for your continued grace. Every single one of us, Lord God, we wrestle with being entangled, distracted.

Lord, eternal things, Lord, that at times when we're not sober, it just doesn't seem that important. But I pray that your word, that you would cause our hearts to be softened, our eyes to be sharpened, and our ears to be open, Lord God, to your word. And all the warnings and encouragements would continue to strengthen your church, that we would wait eagerly, Lord God, and that we would not be caught off guard when the end time begins to unravel.

So I pray for our church, I pray for our discussion, that you would help us to be fruitful in all that we do. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.