We're glad you're here. Glad all you online are with us as well. It's great to have you here with us. Tonight, ignorance isn't bliss. Sometimes Micah and I have too much fun making these graphics. Probably a little crazy, but maybe not. You know, the old saying, I've said it before, if there's one thing we've learned from history, it's that we've learned nothing from history. And, you know, people say, well, that's not logically correct, you know, because that means we're not learning. But that's the fun part, it's kind of paradoxical, the statement. But, you know, I've tried to find the source of that statement, and the earliest, or the one that mostly is given, a guy named George Hegel, he said it this way, we learn from history that we do not learn from history. That's the way he said it. But if you research this, he actually meant it more in a positive way, which is kind of funny. He didn't really mean it the same way, but it's my cousin, sixth cousin, removed or whatever, Winston Churchill, he put it this way. He said, those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. That's kind of what I'm talking about right there. And that's one of the things that I think strikes me about the days we're living, that we're seeing history sort of repeating itself. Now, you might say, well, Brett, then what does that have to do with Bible prophecy if history is repeating itself? Maybe it's not Bible prophecy. But the nature of Bible prophecy, one of the things we need to remember is if you can sort of picture the ripple effect or concentric circles, when you throw a rock in the middle of a calm pond, you know, and there's circles that kind of reverberate through the water there, or, you know, it just reminds us that the Lord talks about how things will sort of come in cycles. And probably the most biblical, you know, example of that is the idea of the woman in travail with child. and how those contractions start coming. And they get more frequent and more intense the closer the baby's coming. And that's the language that Jesus used in Matthew 24. It's the language Paul the Apostle used in 1 Thessalonians chapter five, when he talked about, as a woman travails with child, so too will the coming of the Lord, the end times. We shouldn't be shocked. So seeing things kind of come and then come back again, that sort of returning, the things that we're not learning from history, it really does reinforce what the Bible says about the end times. So, you know, some people are tempted to say, well, you guys have been talking about this stuff, you Bible prophecy people, you know, people cynically say, You know, the same stuff's been happening over and over. Everything's the same from the very beginning. Well, that reminds me a little bit of something, you know, that we read in 2 Peter. Why don't you grab your Bible and turn with me to 2 Peter 3. And there's a notion here about this that I wanted to really kind of sort of take some thought and consideration. 2 Peter 3. This is Peter's sort of dissertation on the last days, the end of the world, end times, stuff like that. Paul has his, Jesus spent a lot of time talking about it. This is Peter's big discussion. He says this, 2 Peter 3, verse three. He says, knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers walking after their own lusts. and saying, where's the promise of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning. So they're kind of saying, yeah, whatever on Bible prophecy. You guys that are into Bible prophecy, they mock. The more people mock, by the way, the more I say, praise the Lord, you're fulfilling Bible prophecy. The more you mock, the more we must be getting closer to that time, according to the Bible. Cause they'll say, where is the promise? You know, nothing's changed from the beginning of creation. You know, you'll hear that from people that churches that don't like to talk about Bible prophecy or don't believe in the biblical eschatology of the end times. They'll just say, ah, you know, we're already in the kingdom. It's all figurative. Nothing's to be taken literally. You guys are all wacko. And it's all been the same. And they'll say people in World War I thought that it was the end of the world, Armageddon, which is true. They did think that in World War I. And you can understand why, if you study the history of World War I, I would have thought it was Armageddon. But you say, well, see, they were wrong, so that makes them stupid, and you don't want to be like that today. And I'm going to say no. That means they were seeing one of the reverberations of the last days, one of the birth pains, and I would say World War I was a big one, was a real big birth pain. And so we're getting closer and more frequent, makes the question of World War II was a big birth pain, what about World War III? Oh, we might get into that a little bit tonight. But it goes on, it says, all things are the same from the very beginning of creation, nothing's changed. For this, this is the key for tonight, verse five, for this, they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old and earth standing out of the water and in the water, whereby the world that was then was being overflowed with water, perished. So this is, by the way, a similar comparison, the days of Noah is something that Jesus talked about, like the days of Noah, that's gonna be like the end times. So this shouldn't be a shock that Peter's kind of alluding to this, the flood of Noah, but the idea is saying they were willingly ignorant of the word of God. And that's the sad thing. We see this willingly ignorant people today. And we'll see how that kind of shakes out. But verse seven, it goes on, but the heavens and the earth, which are now by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. But beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day. So this is one of the things we're not supposed to be ignorant about, is how God seems to exist outside of our time. So when the Lord says, behold, I come quickly, you're like, well, that was a couple thousand years ago. But as Bible prophecy people, we're not supposed to be ignorant that, you know, to the Lord, a couple thousand years ago is a couple days ago in God's economy. This is the mystery that Peter's unlocking for us. And he says, don't be ignorant. So, so far we learned in verse five, there's people that are willingly ignorant of stuff, like the people were in the days of Noah. And then there's a great warning here, don't be ignorant, that time, God seems to exist outside of time. The eternal now doctrine is what it's called. And then he says, verse nine, the Lord is not slack or lazy. "'concerning his promise, as some men count slackness, "'but his long-suffering to us, "'we're not willing that any should perish, "'but that all should come to repentance.'" You know, some people say, why hasn't the Lord raptured his church? And why hasn't he intervened in this God-hating, Christ-rejecting, sinful world? Why doesn't God, you know, squish all the evil and, you know, exalt all the children of God? Well, that's all gonna come, but the reason is right here. The Lord is just long-suffering and compassionate, and He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. The Lord is patient. I believe that that means the Lord is going to just keep being patient until He's good and ready to come and first rapture His church, and then the tribulation period, and then second coming and then restoring all things to himself. That's all coming, but the Lord has been patient. I'm really, as time goes by, I really do look forward to the rapture of the church. Like I always say, I don't have any problem today that the rapture wouldn't solve. I do look forward to the rapture, but the older I get, the more I do value that the Lord has been patient and that we've had longer time than maybe even I expected. Why is that? Because I bet there's some people in here, let's just say for example, let's just say, how many of you have been in this room have been saved for less than 10 years? Raise your hand. Less than 10 years. See, that's awesome. If the Lord raptured us 10 years ago, some of you would have been left behind. I'm really glad that the Lord is patient. You're all here with us. And who's not here with us yet is a big question I would ask you and me. Who's still out there that needs to be brought in? Maybe it's your aunt or uncle, your next door neighbor or somebody you go to school with. Maybe that's the last person the Lord's just waiting for. And if you would just be faithful in your job to preach the gospel, then the rapture will come. Do you ever wonder, like maybe after a service on a Sunday, when I'm inviting people to accept Christ, all of a sudden, boom, the rapture of the church could happen. You say, Brett, the odds of that are very low. Yeah, but it's still better than evolution. Odds-wise. But I do wonder, you know, when is that gonna happen? Well, the Lord is patient and long-suffering, and I'm thankful for that, and I'm glad, because a lot of us wouldn't even have been raptured or taken up without the Lord's long-suffering and patience. But, verse 10, this is where it gets heavy, but the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night. in which the heavens shall pass away with great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, and the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be burned up." Do I believe in global warming? Yes. You can just quote 2 Peter 3, verse 10. The whole earth's gonna melt with a fervent heat. Global warming is true. It's just not over hundreds of years. It's gonna be in a split second. Verse 11, seeing then that all those things that shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in all holy conversation and godliness looking for and hastening unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. Nevertheless, we, according to his promise, look for a new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. Wherefore, beloved, seeing that you look for such things, be diligent. What are we supposed to do? Be diligent. In light of all this, that the end times are coming, even the ultimate destruction of the earth as we know it, that's coming at some time. What are we supposed to do? Just be diligent. Be diligent that you may be found of him in peace, without spot and blameless. Question, how do you become without spot or blameless? you gotta get saved and accept Jesus Christ. That's the only way. You can't be without spot or blameless in your own effort or energy. That's what we would call salvation or being born again, regeneration. It's to be saved from your sins. The way you do that is to make sure and be saved. And if you're one is watching tonight or here just kind of checking things out and you've never accepted Christ, that's the first thing you gotta do is repent of your sin. and then come to Jesus and say, I need to be saved, forgive me of my sin. And the Bible says, if you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart, Jesus, that God raised him up from the dead, if you confess that and believe it, you will be saved. And then you're declared righteous, spotless, sinless, and you fit that description at the end, that you may be found of him in peace, without spot and blameless. So this is a great description here of the last days, and it's pretty heavy in a lot of ways. But one of the things I really wanna focus on is the willingly ignorant part of this, because that's one of the characteristics of this season that we're in, that I've never in my lifetime seen such willing ignorance. It's shocking how, you know, I think there's a temptation to think, well, all these people are just super dumb that we're watching. It's really tempting just to think, man, I can't believe how dumb people are today. But I think there's something more than that. I think we as Christians need to not just dismiss them as nincompoops or idiots. I know it looks that way sometimes, but I think there's more to it. There's a difference between somebody who's just an ignoramus. The Latin word is ignoramus. You know, I always crack up because gnosco means to know, agnosco means to know nothing. And it's where we get that word agnostic. It means you're a know-nothing. In the Latin, it's ignoramus. So when people say, I'm an agnostic, you can say, oh, so you're an ignoramus. Probably shouldn't say that, but that's what they say. That's what the Latin is for that word that people are claiming to be. I wouldn't wanna claim that. But the truth is, what is this that we're seeing today that seems like just total willingly ignorant people? It seems that they are more deliberately overlooking truth. Do you get that sense? It's not that they are stupid, they just say, I am not gonna believe the truth that's in front of my eyes. That is not a woman, that's a man. or that's not a man, that's a woman. And they're gonna just willingly push their way out of just total rebellion against God. That's what it often has to do with, this willing disbelief or ignorance. You know, it's kind of interesting, the ESV, I think the same verse, it says, for they deliberately overlook the facts. That's what they do is they deliberately overlook the facts. That's what we're seeing. I think we've seen a whole new level from 2020 to the present. We've seen this massive overlooking of the facts. One of the things the Bible warns about this, not just here in Peter, but there's a bunch of things the Bible says, don't be ignorant of. I've done whole teachings. You can look that up on our website if you want on, just look up ignorant. And I think that I did like a six-part teaching, all the things the Bible says don't be ignorant of. One of the big ones, one of the big ones is that we're not supposed to be ignorant concerning God's plan for Israel. That's one of the big five. There's other ones, don't be ignorant of Satan's devices, which is a good one. Don't be ignorant concerning the manifestations of the Holy Spirit. One of the things that's shocking when you do a study in the Bible about the things the Bible says, don't be ignorant about this. It's shocking how the church of Jesus Christ is so ignorant on those very points. The very things the Bible says, don't be ignorant on these things. End times, Satan's devices, the Holy Spirit, the working of the manifestation of the Holy Spirit, there's just sad ignorance. But you can look all those up. But tonight we see here, there's people willingly ignorant. And I'm gonna say, it's not just in the secular world, it's sadly found in the church of Jesus Christ today. Willful ignorance, where we say, we don't wanna know about that. We don't care about that, even though the Bible gives great care and very in careful detail, the Bible outlines truth perfectly. So one of the things is that part about Israel, one of the places we read that, of course, is Romans chapter 11, verses 25 through 26. It says, for I would not brethren that you should be ignorant. of this mystery. Okay, so first of all, we gotta recognize we're about to hear a mystery. And a mystery is something that you don't always understand right out of the gate. So there's a little bit of a cryptic nature to the mystery that we're about to see. But God's saying, guess what? I don't want you to be ignorant about this. I'm gonna say, and perhaps in the majority of the church, this ignorance about Israel. Any church, any pastor or denomination that teaches replacement theology, That is where God is done with the Jews and the church has replaced Israel. So when you read your Bible and it promises beautiful promises and blessings for Israel, those are all for us. All the curses that we read about in the Old Testament, those are for the Jews. And they chop them in half and divvy them up. That's not biblically correct. That's not rightly dividing the word of truth. God still has a plan for Israel. And this is part of that mystery. You know, Martin Luther was one of the biggest anti-Semites that ever was. Now he did some great stuff, don't get me wrong. I'm thankful for the Reformation, parts of it, big chunks of it. But one of the things Martin Luther did horrifyingly was he hated the Jews. You know, we'll get into that maybe a little more in a second. But I can understand a little bit of why back 500 years ago, they felt that way. because it seems that God really did forsake the Jews 500 years ago. And you can read your Bible and read all the prophecies that you and I all know about, and it's easy for us, because hindsight's 20-20, we realize, wow, God's promises to the Jews were so literal, it's dizzying. to see that God would scatter his people for 2,000 years and then regathers people and make them a mighty nation. And like everything that we see right now, we go, oh, this is all literal, everybody, but there's a majority of the church didn't catch the memo on this one. That that literal prophecy about the Jews, that's probably one of the greatest proofs of God's existence is what he has done with Israel over the last 2,000 years. It's one of the most shocking evidences, powerful evidences of God's truth. But with that, here's the Bible saying, now don't be ignorant on this mystery. It's really important you get this. And yet it's shocking how many people don't get what we're about to read. the mystery. I would not, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should become wise in your own conceits. I want you to note that word conceit. You might even say arrogance, pridefulness, haughtiness. This is what we're not supposed to do, especially as it relates to being Gentiles. Do you understand Romans 11, 9, 10, and 11 is God telling us Gentiles what his plan is for the Jews. If you ever want the handbook on God's plan for the Jews, just read Romans 9, 10, and 11, three chapters that very much clear the issue. So this is one of the most clarifying. So don't be ignorant lest you become arrogant, is what it's saying here, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles become in. Now this explains a lot. Israel's regathered, they are a mighty nation, but they're regathered in unbelief. That's where some people, they protest, Brett, you believe God's gathered the Jews back to Israel, but none of them believe in God. And they act like that's evidence that we're wrong about the God's prophecies being fulfilled. But if you just read a little more carefully, remember they're gonna be regathered according to Ezekiel 36. In unbelief. Remember the bones and the flesh, but there's no life in them? That's where we are right now. There's no life in Israel, but the bones have been connected, the Lord's regathered them, and there's gonna come a time where he'll breathe life into them and they'll all be saved. I'm getting ahead of myself. Why is that not happening? Blindness. Blindness in part, it says, has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles come in. I'm not gonna go into the detail of that, but that's the rapture of the Gentile church. What about the Jews that are in the Gentile church today? They'll be raptured too if they're a part of the church because they've accepted Jesus as their savior, the Messiah, the Jewish Messiah, Jesus. And verse 26, so all Israel shall be saved. That's an important promise to understand. All Israel shall be saved as it is written, there shall come out of Zion the deliverer and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. It's funny when Israel's in trouble, the Lord uses the old name, Jacob. It's like when your mom speaks your middle name, you know, in big trouble. Brett, Evan met her, oh, run for your life, you know. When I was a kid, if she used my middle name, I knew it was busted. Well, that's what God does when he uses the name Jacob. He's kind of like Jacob, you know, Mr. Heel Snatcher. That's what his name means, deceitful one. But he got a new name, Israel. And all of Israel governed by God, that's what that name means. All of Israel shall be saved. So this is the kind of the thing. Now, with this little description, there's so much here. And man, I hope you're familiar with this. I hope you kind of halfway have this all memorized because this is the problem in the church today. There's ignorance that leads to arrogance. That's important. It's not just in the church, but it's also in the secular world. Antisemitism is ignorance of God's plan for God's people, which leads to conceits or arrogance. I think willful ignorance particularly leads to arrogance. And I believe this is a description of largely what we're seeing around the world today. We're seeing a willful ignorance in so many areas. Maybe never better displayed than with these protests that we're seeing today. You know, it's so funny because even the secular, you know, news agencies are like, man, it's kind of hard to figure these people that are celebrating Hamas. And like, there's just some head-scratcher moments. You're like, what are these people thinking? Like even the person who doesn't know the Bible is like, wow, these people are really, really dumb. Are they dumb or are they willfully ignorant in total rebellion against God? It's the same problem with the transgender, what is a woman? It's the same willful ignorance where when a person says, I believe I'm a female, even though I was born a male or assigned, all this language is just outright rebellion against God. They're saying God made a mistake when he made me. I'm not what he assigned me at birth. And so it's just out for willful ignorance. So we say, what about science? What about biology? Like, what about logic? They could care less about that because they're willfully, willfully ignorant like 2 Peter articulated for us. So where do we start on Prophecy Update? Probably the best place to start is Portland, Oregon. Man, it's embarrassing. Our city's the tip of the sphere when it comes to ignorance. and all kinds of other things. But let's just kind of catch up. I know a lot of this isn't new. I've actually been shocked though. I was just talking to a guy today and I was like, man, what do you think about the Portland State situation? And they're like, what are you talking about? You mean in New York State and the protests? No. In fact, it's funny because Portland's starting to be dismissed by the major news outlets because we're always the craziest one. Like, oh yeah, Portland, whatever, they're always crazy. They're taking over another building, burning things down. Two nights ago, they burned 12 cop cars. Nobody even knows about that. It's an amazing thing how we don't make the news anymore, because it's just like, oh, that's just Portland. It's kind of sad. We have work to do here, folks, as Christians that live in the trenches. We've got to bring light to the city. But basically what's going on here in Portland, you know, there were protesters. These are the ones that took over the library at Portland State. Was it yesterday, I think, they made this... They were... Sometimes I do wish I was a police officer, I'm just gonna say. That guy, good for him. More power to him. But these protesters, if you didn't know what happened yesterday, of course, a bunch of these protesters took over the library at Portland State. I'll show you the damage they did, which is shocking. But what happened was they all kind of found a hole where they could all sort of run out and hopefully get away. Many of them did not get away, as you saw in the video there. But, you know, they took over and then everything kind of calmed down. The Portland police sort of cleaned up some of the junk, put it all in dumpsters, and then went off for a lunch break or something. The Portland police say they did this willfully. I don't know what their plan was, but they retook the library. Like, these protesters came back in. I could just watch that all day, I'm sorry. It's just... They took over the library again last night and the police had to come and get them out and they arrested I think it was eight people last night and then they closed it up. It's kind of sad because you know, the mess they made. Let me show you another video. This is the police video of them going into the library, and you can kind of see some of the damage that was done there. The students, you know, you kind of see what their complaints are when you see all the graffiti that they sprayed on all the walls and windows and wood surfaces and everything, you know. I've noticed a lot of them don't know how to spell very well, but... But, you know, this is just kind of, this is what they left. They just kind of destroyed everything there inside. And it was just kind of this weird, oh, they're throwing their umbrellas. The reason they all have umbrellas, I guess, is because they were worried about, like, the pepper balls that the police might shoot at them. But there was, you know, gas that they used at one point. But, you know, they just totally demolished the library there at Portland State. And their argument is, who cares? We can destroy property, that's not a crime, because there's lives being killed in Palestine. That's sort of their argument. Now, after this, there was a march yesterday that was noteworthy. It's kind of interesting how the Bible does talk about how the last days lawlessness will be increased. Jesus said this in his Olivet Discourse. Lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. We're seeing that in Portland, but this idea of lawlessness is something we see all around the world with protests, especially there's a group of people. It seems that a lot of the same people that were here in 2020 in our summer of love here in Portland, where there was 120 nights of violence and burning buildings and federal buildings, stuff like that, that was all, we had not seen such lawlessness. But we're seeing more and more. Now it's just an everyday occurrence. It's becoming normalized, and that should also be a sign of the time where we're living. This lawlessness extended from Portland State, then this march went on. It's kind of interesting to discern who are these protesters? Are they in fact students? Well, as it turns out, they're not all just students. There's some, you know, these sort of Antifa professional hired guns that are paid somehow to do this stuff. along with some professors from Portland State, they were arrested as well. But this is Nordstrom, notice they don't have to spell free. Free Gaza, what does that mean? And they mashed up the Starbucks there at Pioneer Square. And just goofy, ridiculous destruction and stuff like that. Kind of sad to see our city just trashed. And it's like nobody even knows about this. Like most people in the greater Portland area, we're just so numb to this now. It's like, we just kind of go, yeah, just whatever you do, don't go downtown. And all the businesses have fled, you know, and I'm pretty sure Starbucks, Apple, they gotta rethink, why would we ever want to try to do business in downtown, you know, what have you. The ignorance is quite profound, to say the least. There was a funny version of the video that somebody did, oh, it was the Babylon Bee, I think, where I found this, about Portland's, the little, remember the guy with the police that got pushed and the rubbermaid? I wanna show you this video, because it's just worth a little, check it out, here we go, make sure the sound's up. In a spectacle of misguided valor, the privileged warriors bravely advanced, placing their faith in rubbermaid and patchouli oil. But the guardians of order stood resolute, repelling the advance like the steel curtain. The would-be revolutionaries met not with victory, but with the cold reality of life. Echoes of the folly of youth reverberated across the nation, a cautionary tale immortalized in the annals of absurdity. Perfect, perfect voice there for that. Anyway, probably shouldn't, you shouldn't be laughing at that. But it really, like again, how bad is the ignorance? I think this is, for me, this is the kind of stuff that's like the epitome of the ignorance. Because this is the kind of stuff we're seeing around the country. And what they don't understand, the one on the left there, the ex-Twitter tweets or whatever it is, queers for Palestine in New York City and queers for Palestine in Iran. They will hang you from a crane in the main street of Tehran or throw you off a building. That's the truth. And so these people that are here in America, they're boasting that we're all LGBTQ and we're pro-Palestine. They wouldn't last 10 seconds in Gaza or in Lebanon with Hezbollah or in Iran or Iraq or any Arab nation. You wanna know the only place these people would be safe in the Middle East? Israel, and I'm not proud of that, but Israel's as gay pride as anybody. Like they're as bad as we are when it comes to gay pride. I've been there when there were big gay pride marches in downtown Jerusalem. And it's such an irony to see in the holy city of Jerusalem, you know, the big gay pride marches, but it's just such an irony. These same people who hate Israel, They would be rewarded to live in Israel while they would be murdered in all the countries that they're supporting here. There was a video done seven years ago. by the UAE foreign minister. And this just kind of caught us as sort of like, this is almost prophetic in some way. I want to show you a snippet of this, the UAE foreign minister talking about where this is going, but this is like before all the major stuff that we've been saying. Listen to what he says here. And let me say this in English so you can understand what I'm saying. I have translation. No, I know you have translation, but I just want to make sure you get it right. There will come a day that we will see far more radical extremists and terrorists coming out of Europe because of lack of decision-making, trying to be politically correct, or assuming that they know the Middle East and they know Islam and they know the others far better than we do. And I'm sorry, but that's pure ignorance. Yeah, that was about as right as it gets. And of course we knew that back then. It's just interesting to hear a guy in the Middle East try to explain that to us, kind of condescendingly, but I mean, I understand why. You know, this idea, now there are people, I think, that are just sort of caught up. You know, there's some interesting studies on, you know, this whole mass, what do they call it? Mass psychological conditioning. What's it called again? Yes, mass psychosis. We talked about that back in the coronavirus days after that Joe Rogan episode with Dr., what was his name? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was an interesting, you know, new, it was a new psychological term, but psychology has rejected mass psychosis as a. mass formation psychosis, they've kind of rejected that because they're too accepting of LGBTQ. You can't have both. But it is a very interesting, real phenomena. I was reading a study last week about how there's a small percentage of the people that really with all their heart believe it, what's happening and what's being said, then there's other people that are just kind of caught up in the current. And that's, you know, like the people that totally believe it is like maybe the 20%. And then there's like a 50% that just kind of got caught up in the current. And they sort of believe it because, wow, look, there's a bunch of people who believe this, so it must be true. And they're just kind of caught up in it. But talk about willful ignorance, not really knowing what you're doing. What does that look like? Well, check out this. This one is about as good of a description of what I just said. This is at New York University, the pro-Palestinian demonstrator. Listen to this girl. What would you say is the main goal with tonight's protest? I think the goal is just showing our support for Palestine and demanding that NYU stops. I honestly don't know all of what NYU's doing. Is there something that NYU's doing? I really don't know. I'm pretty sure they're... Do you know what NYU's doing? Lots of cops and there's some danger. If you didn't hear what the other girl, she said, I wish I were more educated. Ouch. Yeah, you need a little more edumacation right there. Now, you might say, well, Brett, if they're this stupid. Should we be even concerned? Like, why should we be concerned? And the answer is we should be concerned, prayerfully concerned, because, you know, this kind of stupidity or being caught up in the emotion and, wow, I'm at a protest and I don't even know what I'm here for, but it's awesome. And there's cops and danger. Like, you and I might think, well, that's just harmless to us. We don't have to worry about that. But again, I go back to what we started with. If there's one thing we've learned from history is we've learned nothing from history, and this is what's dangerous. That willful ignorance is the thing that becomes very dangerous. And let me just show you some of the... some of the parts in here that maybe people aren't seeing as much that's dangerous. This picture was there in downtown Portland. And this guy was carrying the big flag. But he also had the poster board that said final solution. Now, unless you know history, you don't even know what that is. But that's what, you know, the Third Reich and the Nazis came up, their final solution was to exterminate the Jews completely. So this guy in saying that, he's saying that he wants all Jews dead. That is the final solution. And that's the kind of stuff you're seeing kind of creep in here. But that like, so the last girl that we just saw, she probably doesn't even know what the final solution is, I'm willing to bet. But at the same time, she's gonna think, well, it must be awesome because these people know. And look how radical they are and willing to be arrested because of this. And with this sign right here, I want you to sort of understand, this is where the very real darkness, I think, is. It's the same darkness, and if you ever talk to the people that are still on the planet, which there's not as many people that were alive back in the days, 1930s and 1940s, when the Jews all around the world, antisemitism was at a feverish level, the Jews that are alive today that were alive then are all saying it's worse now than ever. That's what we're hearing from most Jews around the world. They're saying the only difference is at least they have a state they can go to. Back in those days in 1930s and the early 1940s, Jews had no place to go. That's why they all started going to the Holy Land of Israel, the former place where they were. They all were going there because they knew that was not safe. That's the foundation of Zionism. Zionism said, man, there's no safe place on the planet for Jews. If you know the whole story of Zionism, which nobody really does, Theodor Herzl and the whole Dreyfus Affair in France, this was a deal where Theodor Herzl said, there's no safe place for Jews. We're gonna be, we're in trouble. And so that's when they said, we need to go back to the land of our fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So Zionism was based on that. Well, now we're seeing the people bringing up the final solution. It's interesting because when we saw anti-Semitism on some of the marches four years ago, if you remember, and some of our politicians were fighting about what they said about a march with guys with tiki torches and there was anti-Semitic things being yelled. Where are the same people that were so furious about that? Where are they today? Because the antisemitism is a thousand times worse today than it was four years ago. We're seeing it at feverish levels around the world. Again, all of this is stuff that contributes to the times and the seasons of the last days. We know that one of the things of the last days is when all the nations of the world will set their guns against Israel. That's gonna happen. So when we see this coming, we kind of realize this is part of what God says. There's gonna be a hatred for the Jews and the land of the Jews, Israel itself. And we see that. So forget the little, you know, goofy, willful, ignorant people on the street for a second, because that's getting all the news. Meanwhile, there's things that are really happening that should be causing the world great concern. Like this thing, this thing kind of snuck in and most people don't even know it happened this last week, April 29th. What is the International Criminal Court and why is it, it has Israeli officials worried? You know, the Hague in Netherlands, of course, the ICC, International Criminal Court, We talked about this a couple of prophecy updates ago, how they were trying to accuse Israel of being genocidal, and they kind of put it on hold, said, well, we're watching you, Israel, because they couldn't make the, there was no proof whatsoever that Israel was genocidal. They're not being genocidal. You can't call a nation that's dropping aid to their enemies and food and giving warnings before they bomb buildings and stuff, that's not genocidal. Genocidal is trying to kill everyone of any ethnic group, just by definition. We covered that a couple of times ago, what is genocide? So the ICC had to kind of say, well, they're not really doing it, but we're gonna watching you Israel. So now they're saying, the Hague, Israeli officials sound increasingly concerned that the ICC could issue arrest warrants for the country's leaders more than six months into the Israel-Hamas war. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has written in general terms about the ICC action against Israeli troops and officials, and Israel's foreign ministry has said it is also tracking reports of pending action. It's interesting that they're talking about an arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu, because he's a genocidal fascist or whatever, like the amazing accusations, even though there's been no army in the world that's been more careful to try to avoid collateral damage and the killing of civilians. And I know there's people that will argue those points, and even the numbers. But even if you give the Palestinians or the Hamas the numbers they're claiming of death in Gaza, it still beats the wars of the United States. by far exponentially more casualties from civilians in all of the wars we've fought. Exponential levels compared to the Gaza conflict. And that's true of just about any conflict in the world's history. Israel's got the lowest number, even though you can say 30,000 dead. But when we went into, for example, Afghanistan, hundreds of thousands dead. And we just kinda, as America's kinda, la la la la la, we don't wanna talk about that. Because it doesn't serve the purpose. but to demonize Israel, say, look at all the dead civilians. Nobody likes dead civilians, unless you're maybe Kim Jong-un or Adolf Hitler, or like there's people that do like dead civilians. But I really resent when people say, you Bible prophecy guys, you don't care about the dead people in Gaza. Well, that's just not true at all. You know, Christians, all the Christians I know are heartbroken. And the dead Israelis, the dead Palestinians, the dead people of this conflict, it's been going on for centuries and it's heartbreaking. But for Israel to just lay down their arms means that they're the ones who will be genocided because as it turns out, Hamas is genocidal and they chant it in the streets of Portland. You know, when they say, you know, the final solution, from the river to the sea, I heard one chant that was Columbia University, from the river to the sea, Palestine will be Arab, which means they're getting rid of all the Jews. That's their goal. So this is all part of that willful ignorance. And so it's not just the goofy, you know, protester that doesn't know what she's talking about. You've got the ICC courts making up stuff about how they're gonna, arrest all the Israeli and the defense foreign minister, some of the IDF soldiers for going in and clearing a building or a town, they're gonna call them war criminals. Now, this is interesting because if there's one thing we've learned from history is we've not learned from history, what about that Holocaust situation? Are we seeing kind of a similar thing being repeated? I don't know. The potential is there, and most Jews are very nervous. I don't know if you saw the footage, I can't show you tonight, some of the Jews, students that are just trying to go to class. There's one girl, I think that was down at, was it UC Berkeley, I think, where she was bludgeoned, beaten, bloody, left there laying on the concrete bleeding. A Jewish girl just trying to go to class. This is what we're seeing today. And you have to kind of ask, what happened in those days of the Holocaust? Where are those, see, this is where, as Bible prophecy, Bible teacher, I speak out on these things, because I love the Bible, and I love talking about what the Bible talks about, but there's some that are churches and pastors that say, that Pastor Brad over in Anthony Creek, he's always so political. And I always like to say, no, I'm talking about biblical themes. I'm not being political. I don't wanna just talk about political things, but when we're talking about biblical things like God's plan for Israel and the worldview and things the Bible says don't be ignorant about, I'm gonna choose to talk about the things the Bible tells us not to be ignorant about. I don't try to defend myself on that. I'm just telling you, I'm not a political animal. I'm just saying we love the Bible. And anybody who loves the Bible should probably take note and then do what the Bible says. Stuff like, pray for the peace of Jerusalem, for they shall prosper that love thee. That's a very clear, literal thing we get to do. The Lord talks about, I will bless the nations that bless Israel, and I will curse the nations that curse Israel. So we should actually be concerned about the situation, even though they're in unbelief and they're not perfect, the Jews, and they make mistakes all the time and aren't always righteous. We're not saying they're God's perfect chosen people. When I say they're God's chosen people, it doesn't mean perfect. They're quite sinful and quite misguided in a lot of ways, as everybody else is on the planet. Nonetheless, they're still called God's chosen people and they're gathered in unbelief. What happened? Where were the pastors and the churches in World War II Germany? From the 1930s all the way into the 1940s, where were the pastors and the churches? Well, as it turns out, this is one of the, if you're a Christian that lived in Nazi Germany back in those days, you're gonna wish you kind of redid that the way you'd handled that. That'd be a really embarrassing thing if you're one of the people, yeah, I lived in Germany, I was a pastor in Germany during the Third Reich, the rise of Nazism, and I just stayed silent. Like that'd be a person I wouldn't wanna be. because suddenly they're wanting to do the final solution. What did the Catholic Church, I'll talk about the Protestant Church in a second, because they're almost worse in some ways. But the Catholic Church during the Holocaust, it was under the leadership of Pope Pius the, what was it, the 12th, I think, Pope Pius. The Vatican finally released some documents about World War II and the Catholic Church in Germany. This just came out yesterday, and the Catholic Church, this is an admission of guilt from the Catholic Church. They admit complicity with the Nazis, and this is a tough admission. The article here from Times of Israel, after decades of ambivalence, document prepared by clergy says hundreds of priests gave spiritual guidance to Hitler's soldiers on the front, lent war an additional sense of purpose. The document said most German bishops, motivated by nationalism of all things, and anti-communist sentiment, and a desire to preserve the church by avoiding confrontation with the Nazis, told their followers to support the regime during the war. So that was the message of the pastors. Just support the Nazis, lay low, whatever, but don't make waves. That was the message of the Catholic church. Now, when it comes to Pope Pius himself, what was his position? Well, this is a really controversial topic, and the documents didn't really fully reveal Pope Not-So-Pius. But some Jewish groups and historians have said Pope Pius, who was the pope from 1939 to 1958, stayed silent during the Holocaust and didn't do enough. to save lives. His defenders at the Vatican and beyond say he used quiet diplomacy, but kind of behind the scenes, and encouraged convents and other religious institutions to hide Jews. So there's question whether he actually did try to help some Jews and hid them in some convents. So we don't really know. That's kind of an interesting bit of history. But in Germany, the Catholic church was like 20%. The majority of the church was Protestant there in Germany. Where were the Protestants? Well, what you have to understand is the Protestant church in Germany, with Martin Luther and the Reformed Church back in the 1930s, was very much following Martin Luther's teaching, but even in the bad stuff that I just told you about. This propaganda poster is from 1933. It reads this. Of course, that's a picture of Martin Luther or a drawing of him. It reads, Hitler's fight and Luther's teaching are the best defense for the German people. Adolf Hitler and the Nazis used Martin Luther's writings. He wrote a whole book, by the way, about how You really need to kill Jews. Martin Luther did write that book, whether you want to admit it or not. It's not even up for debate. I have actually seen the book and read parts of it, and it's scary how bad Martin Luther was off course when it comes to the Jews. But a very few, very few Christians that were in Nazi Germany opposed the Third Reich and the Nazis. Only a few, a very small few opposed the Nazis while others saw themselves as either neutral or actually supporting Nazism. In fact, there were some Protestants that were so supportive of Nazism, they called themselves stormtroopers of Jesus Christ. That was before Star Wars, for you Star Wars fans out there. There were people who called themselves Stormtroopers for Jesus, and they were the pro-Nazi Protestant Christians during that time period. You can look it up. As a result, the Protestant churches responded to national socialism. Some struggled to preserve independence of their churches from politics and government, while others sought to claim the central place of Christianity within Nazi Germany. They really just wanted to blend in and do the whole thing. Probably the most famous, if you ask me, Christian was a pastor that maybe you've heard of. His name, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. interesting fellow, was born in 1906, died in 1945. Apart from his theological writings, Bonhoeffer was known for his staunch resistance and very vocal resistance to the Nazi dictatorship, including in a vocal opposition against Adolf Hitler himself, and his so-called euthanasia program. You're like, what about children in Asia? What are you talking about? No, euthanasia meaning death to the Jews. It was the final solution, the program and genocidal persecution of the Jews. But this guy, interesting, he was quite cerebral, very much a thinker, but put himself out there in real danger. But he wrote these words, he said, silence in the face of evil is evil itself. God will not hold us guiltless, not to speak is to speak, not to act is to act. This is the only guy, like, I'm gonna say that sort of probably overstating this, but he's like the only guy in Germany that went down swinging, saying, yeah, Nazis bad, Hitler's bad, and killing Jews are bad. This guy went on record. And so what's so sad is he was hanged on April 9th. 1945 during the collapse of the Nazi regime. Like right when the Nazi regime was all collapsing, that was one of the last things they did is they went out and hung Dietrich Bonhoeffer. But this is where, you know, when you look at who's right on the right side of history, by the way, there's some of these Portland protesters are running around, we're on the right side of history. You know, that's one of their mantras today. But I'm telling you, the question I'm gonna ask is the churches in Portland, the churches in America, the pastors in America, are they gonna be on the right side of this? Should the Lord tarry? Let's say that this is just another birth thing that we're going through, it's possible. And we have another 10, 15, 20 years. Who knows? I don't think so. I think the rapture could be tonight. I'd love that. But if not, who's gonna be on the right side of what's going on in this world right now? And I'm pretty convinced that there's gonna be churches that are gonna go down embarrassed, just like, only it's just, it's not one single issue. Should the Lord tarry, I think there's gonna maybe come a day, if the Lord lets us continue as long as maybe, you know, He does, let's just say for another decade or so, I think there's gonna come a time where it's not just the Arab-Israeli issue, it's gonna be the gender issue, the LGBTQ issues, all of them. One in 10 gay and lesbian youth are suicidal. Just came out last week, one in 10. The transgender community is 40% suicidal, the most suicidal group in the world, and yet we're affirming transgender care, even though it is the most suicidal group that's out there. And there's churches that are just silent. Oh, Brett, that's political. We don't wanna talk politics. Even though the church was silent there in Germany and watched 6 million Jews exterminated. And now I'd be embarrassed to admit I was a Christian in Nazi Germany back in those days. And I'm not sure I'd really wanna stand before God with that record on my tab. I wonder if maybe it's time for us as Christians to realize this is a good time. Now is a good time to speak out and not be afraid and just speak the truth. Yeah, but brother, it could cost me my job or people think I'm a weirdo or people think I'm hateful because they make that narrative. Oh, do you think the Nazis were psychologically tweaking and twisting people's words and was it dangerous? Well, obviously for Dietrich Bonhoeffer, it was dangerous in fact. Um... You know, it is dangerous to be a person who believes the Bible and takes it literally. But I think we just need to sit up and say, what kind of Christians are we gonna be? I'm not arguing for this evangelical Christian nationalism movement that I see out there that doesn't really match the Bible. Be careful. I suppose there's probably some of you that are watching online. Maybe some of you that might even be here that would say, Brett, be careful on that one. I'm a Christian nationalist. Listen, I'm a Christian nationalist. depending on what you mean by that. I think it's Christian nationalism is one of those terms that can mean any number of things. And I would put it on a spectrum from really nice and wonderful to pretty much demonic and satanic. So it depends on what you mean when you say Christian nationalism. I'm a little worried with what we have in front of us, the election this year, Trump and Biden, I'm a little worried. Christians, we kind of lose our minds a little bit during these times. We've gotta be balanced and biblical. We gotta be, I'm okay, I love being a proud patriot. I love the country that I live in. But I think we also have to realize what is our main objective? My main objective is not to make sure someone's elected at the end of this year. My main objective is I'm gonna vote because I'm a patriot. I love this country. I'm gonna encourage people to vote. I'm gonna teach the Bible and hopefully people will know how to vote because they know their Bible. I'm not gonna force them or tell them how they should vote. I'm gonna tell them what the Bible says. But here's the thing. More than who the president is in November, we need to say, how have we been doing sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ? How are we doing loving one another? You know, that's where sometimes bad Christian nationalism, love goes out the window. And you can do as much as you want, but 1 Corinthians 13 says, unless you have love one for another, you're just a big gong show. That's what the Bible says, read it. 1 Corinthians 13 is very clear on that one. So while I'm suggesting Bonhoeffer's way was right, the reason I say that is not that he was an activist trying to be political. He was a guy who was a pastor who knew the Bible enough to say, this is wrong and we can't quietly sit by. And he was right. Silence in the face of evil. is evil itself. God will not hold us guiltless. I have to agree with that. Boy, there's a lot going on all that stuff. Things that we should not be quiet about. You know, there's an interesting bill that was passed this last week, that I wonder if maybe there's too many Christians being silent, or at least not knowing what the bill says. Maybe you saw this World Net Daily article, House Adopts Anti-Semitism Bill Despite Worries It Criminalizes Biblical Beliefs. See, the first part of this, you and I as people who say, let's love the Jews and care about Israel and be good to Israel, because the Bible talks about that. You say, great, we need an anti-Semitism bill. That's wonderful, but wouldn't it be just like, you know, the people in our government and those that are lawmakers to put something in this bill that is actually not gonna be helpful to Christianity? Well, this is exactly what's happened. For example, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, I'm not saying I support her or anything like that, I'm just gonna read what she said. I will not be voting for the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act today that could convict Christians of anti-Semitism for believing the gospel that says Jesus was handed over by Herod to be crucified by the Jews. Now, you might say, oh, she's that radical, you know, whatever, crazy person, whatever. But all you gotta do is look at the bill itself. It's easy. When you pull up the bill, let me show you the wording here. The ninth point on this bill, you will be declared antisemitism, hate speech, and you can be convicted of that if you're using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism. Here's an example, claims of the Jews killing Jesus. or blood libel to characterize Israel or Israelis. As it turns out, I do teach that the Jews killed Jesus. Because the Bible teaches that. Now, but if you've been here at 8th and Creek, who else was involved? All of us, we were all, see, that's the difference. We're not antisem, we're as least antisemitism in this church as anybody that I know of churches. We support Israel. I've spent a lot of time in Israel. A lot of my friends are Israelis and live in Jerusalem and are great people and I love the Jews for sure. But I am not an antisemite, but I'm gonna say it historically. If I teach the Bible, that could be a reason for Nancy Pelosi and Schumer and some of these guys to come and take me in cuffs and put me in jail. Because I'll say, well, I teach the Bible where it says, yeah, that Herod handed over Jesus to the Jews and the Jews were involved with that whole process. Be careful. Things that look good today really aren't. They call good evil and they call evil good. Everything's so manipulative. We have to be careful. But this is the stuff that I think we should speak out about. And oftentimes the people that do speak out about these things are deemed crazy, fanatical, wacko, and what have you. Let's be level-headed. Let's be kind, loving, joyful, but let's call things what they are. And I think that bill, the ninth point particularly, is very unfortunate. They always sneak stuff into these bills and these budgets and stuff that's passed. They always sneak stuff in that's just dastardly, too bad. How crazy are things? Well, if you speak up about women in sports and so-called women in sports, you're gonna be hated. This article, maybe you guys saw this last week, they banned girls from girls' sports. Did you guys hear this one? This actually happened. Riley Gaines, she's the one, of course, that competed against the swimmer that was transgender. And she's one who's stood up and speaking out against men competing in women's sports. And she gets all kinds of flack. She's been attacked physically, but also across the board, she's been attacked. But Riley Gaines, she reacts to the five female students being banned for protesting against trans students. There was a group of junior high girls on a track meet, they were all shot putters, and there was a boy that said, I'm a girl, and he was going to compete. And the, was it Virginia, I think, declared that you have to let the boy compete. That was the law, you know. But... So the girls, they just took a second a piece. And when it was their time to do the shot put, they went into the ring and stepped out and fouled out and just refused to throw the shot put. And they all did that. Well, guess what the school district did? Banned them from competing from that point forward. But the boy gets to keep competing. This is such ironic. They ban the girls from girls sports while the boy gets to do the shot put and stuff like that. This is where I hope people will be vocal and say, this is evil. Like, this is really wrong. And if the parents in that school district don't stand up and, you know, demand that this is changed, I think that that's just sitting silently and letting evil run rampant. I don't think that's really what we're called to do. Well, Brad, I like to only talk about... I want to be like Jesus. I want to only talk about the things I'm for and not the things I'm against. Read the Gospels. Jesus had a lot of stuff he was really against. I'm always marveling and we're going through the Gospels right now. We're going through the Gospel of John. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, Jesus hammers away at evil and is brutal even. His words are sharp and pointed and brutal when it comes to things evil. So keep that in mind. We've gone through that. Well, These are things that I think we have to pray about. Lord, give us wisdom. When it comes to supporting Israel, that's one of the things I think that's very unpopular, but to stand and say, you know, Israel deserves a place. Israel was given their country by God. They were given their country after World War II because of the Holocaust by the UN or the League of Nations. They actually bought much of their land when they were a Zionist moving from Europe before Israel was even a nation. They went in and purchased land with money. How many of us can say that? We need to support and speak the truth in those things. Speaking of Israel, I'd like to get you updated, changing gears just a little bit before we're done. Well, I've still got a lot here to go. Let's just talk about where are we at with the Iran-Israel conflict? Because last, we did the Addendum Prophecy Update with Steve, the tour guide. That was great having Steve. But I wanted to, we sort of left on a cliffhanger. What was Israel going to do in retaliation to this massive Iranian attack on Israel that was a huge failure on the Iranian part? Just a quick review of the events. We saw, you know, Kind of what happened, we have to go back to April 1st, where Israel had a strike on a building in Syria, and they were trying to make it, they struck the embassy in Syria, that was not what happened. It was a building, it was a compound adjacent to the Iranian embassy in Damascus. But because of this, the Jews, by the way, they killed longtime IRGC force officers and one of the generals there. So the Iranians said, we're gonna get you Israel for doing this. So everybody knew Iran was claiming that they were gonna do something. But what happened was, Iran's attack was shocking to the world. We were shocked at the amount of weapons and rockets. More than three... 1,000 rockets have been launched from Southern Lebanon into Israel since October 7th. That's kind of interesting already. But the reason they're doing that is they wanted to exterminate Israel. This is the same problem. So basically after this, Iran attacks Israel. This is some of the footage we saw. This was over 300 missiles and drones launched at Israel, including 170 drones, 30 cruise missiles, And they all came, well, mostly from, directly from Iran. It was a coordinated attack, the Houthis from Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq. It was a timed attack so that all the ordinances, the drones, they let off first, because it took 12 hours for the drones to get to Israel, and then the rockets, and then the ballistic missiles, so that it all hit Israel at the same time. The reason I emphasize that, it was the goal was to overwhelm Israel's defense system. They wanted all the ordinances to hit at the same time. They wanted dead Israelis. There's a problem where the world looked at that attack and said, oh, the Iranians, they were just kind of messing with the Jews, sort of as a warning. That's not understanding. Israel. it was a biblically miraculous defense that it was like miraculous. The experts are saying that. It was an impressive integrated layer anti-missile defense system Israel has, and also support from primarily the United States, but also with UK and France, but even significant and notable cooperation with the Arab partners Jordan and others, kind of shocking that they helped out, but nobody died. One child was injured, sadly, but with that many ordinances and munitions, that was a shocker, we saw that. By the way, the Friday before this attack, Biden was asked, what's your message to Iran? And do you remember what he said? Let's just review that. Here we go. My message to any state or any other hostile actor. Thinking about attacking Israel remains the same as it was a week ago. Don't. Don't. Don't. Now, sounds pretty tough. Or it sounds like a three-year-old on a playground. Don't. I don't know. You be the judge. So how did Iran respond to his warning a few days before? They shrugged their shoulders and then they proceeded to conduct an unprecedented, complex, large-scale attack directly on Israel, crossing a major Rubicon that is like nothing we've seen in the world's history. How do you think the world sees America at this point? Like a few days after our president looked in the camera for dramatic effect, don't. I think he thought that was awesome. I'll tell you why, because listen to this interview, this is painful as well. As Ukraine succeeds on the battlefield, Vladimir Putin is becoming embarrassed and pushed into a corner. And I wonder, Mr. President, what you would say to him if he is considering using chemical or tactical nuclear weapons. Don't. Don't. Don't. Do you think Putin's there in the Kremlin shaking in his above-dya tenisa? tennis shoes. I probably didn't say that right. Did I say that right? Some of our Russian people here. Yeah, I'm sure Putin is just really worried about this. Don't. Because look, that's what we said to the Iranians and look what they got. Oh, nothing. It's embarrassing. We all laugh at this right now, but this is where those that are experts on these things, people in the Pentagon, and there I have sources, they're horrified. The United States is vulnerable right now because of this. We're not taken seriously. We're showing our weakness. And that's kind of how we left it off at the last prophecy update. So what happened? Israel promised they were gonna retaliate. Big is what they said. And we talked about that on our addendum prophecy update middle of last month. But the Israeli war cabinet here, they came up with a plan. And the question is, what was their plan and did it work? Well, if you followed through a very limited Israeli attack on Iran, and a lot of the world kind of said, well, what happened? Was that anything of significance? And a lot of people were like, man, I thought Israel was gonna do something big and effective, but it sort of seemed to go almost unnoticed. And suddenly the conflict is kind of sort of deescalating. What's going on there? Well, what happened was this. An F-35 Israeli aircraft took off from the very... Remember there was one airbase that the Iranian missiles won, did a little bit of damage to an Israeli airbase? I think this was on purpose, but an F-35 took off from that airbase, launched three precision-guided missiles from an F-35, high-speed, long-range munitions that targeted an airbase in Ifsan. which is just down the road from the Natanz nuclear facility, which is the key most strategic thing in Iran. And so they targeted three missiles, S-300 air missile defense system. They targeted that, the anti-air defense from Iranians. And as it turns out, Israel with those three missiles hit what they targeted. All three missiles hit exactly where they were intended to hit. There's some reporting that there were some small drones, like the Iranians said, oh, Israel attacked us with some small drones, like they were children's toys or whatever. But what did the Jews use the drones for? This is interesting. This is all stuff that they're only kind of, some of the experts are realizing how the Israelis did it. They used the drones to sort of wake up Iran's missile defense system. Iran then would illuminate their radars and then Israel hit all their radar locations and took them all out so that the F-35 and the rockets could go in without any trouble whatsoever. In fact, that not only happened in Iran, the Jews did that up in Syria. They flew over Syria and they cleared out the anti-aircraft radar installments. There were also reports of strikes in Syria and made it clear a path for the Israelis. Now, what's interesting, here's a summary then of what Israel accomplished with three or less missiles. They say probably three is what they shot. Basically, the summary is what Iran tried to do with 300 missiles and drones, Israel could do it with just three, and their missiles hit the target and destroyed their targets. This was a very restrained response by Israel, but it carried a very clear message. What message is this? Basically, this is brilliant, Israel is saying, we can hit anywhere we want in Iran, and we can do it quite effectively. If Iran makes a sprint for a nuclear weapon technology, then we can hit you there. The idea is that in the tents or these other places. Now you say, well, Brett, Iran downplayed and said it was no big deal. In fact, some even denied that anything happened at all. Like, interesting, this Reuters article, Tehran plays down the reported Israeli attacks, signals no retaliation. Yeah, that was so weak, we're not even gonna retaliate. Well, actually, Iran's foreign minister said the drones, which the source said launched against the city of Ifsan, were mini drones, like kids' drones, and that they had caused no damage or casualties, which the Israelis... What are the Israelis saying about all this? Anybody? Nothing. Now, this is part of the Israel. This is very much, first of all, unlike the United States. When we do something, we go on, Biden tells us, we're going to do this, and here's what we're sending, and we're gonna do it at three o'clock tomorrow afternoon. And like, we love to, we're just bluster, bluster, bluster. That's the United States. That's the way we roll. Israel, what was Israel strategic? They had two grand strategic objectives. First, to try to restore some degree of what you might call tattered deterrence. and say, if you hit us directly in Israel, we will respond back and we will hit you. They needed to accomplish that. If the Iranians, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, if they're emboldened and think, man, we can shoot rockets all day long toward Israel, then Israel doesn't have very good deterrence. They needed that. Their second objective was to not see, or at least for now, an escalation in this whole Iranian-Israel war spiral out of, out of control, and Israel wanted to control that. And what I would say is it seems exactly, Israel achieved exactly what they wanted to. While they didn't, you know, high five each other publicly, you kind of get a sense that the Israeli war cabinet's like, mission accomplished, because the Iranians, they're piping down saying, okay, yeah, that was nothing, no big deal, but we're not gonna do anything else. You know, it's like they're nervous because they know Israel can hit them whenever and however they want, mission accomplished. Israel's approach is just what Israel does. You know, the United States, we talk big and perform little a lot of times. Israel, they just let their actions do the talking. And that's exactly what happened with this whole thing. So in the meantime, Iran is sort of, the whole thing is kind of deescalated. For those of us who are like, could this be a precursor to the Ezekiel 38 war? I think we're still seeing those players in that part of the world, and it still could happen overnight. But the deescalation is interesting. Birth pains, maybe just more of that. We're just kind of seeing the deescalation. Although, don't mistake the Houthis, Hezbollah, and the Hamas are still the proxies of Iran, and they're gonna keep doing what they're doing, don't be shocked by that. Other noteworthy Prophecy Update topics, let me just give you a few more. This is something you should note. Here comes the World War III, NATO chief confirms Ukraine will become a NATO, a member of NATO, pushing us closer to nuclear war with Russia. Nuclear war with Russia is what we don't want, for those of you who are curious. This is the announcement and everybody thought it was so wonderful. Ukraine's rightful place is in NATO. Ukraine will become a member of NATO. The work we are undertaking now puts you on an irreversible path towards NATO membership. So that when the time is right, Ukraine can become a NATO member straight away. right or wrong, this is what Putin has promised he's not gonna allow happen. And it'll be interesting to see what he does with that. Then our guys announced the whole same thing, Blinken, Ukraine will become a member of NATO. If you're curious, love him or hate him, Elon Musk, this was his take on the whole thing. This is literally how the nuclear apocalypse movie starts. And he's not wrong, pretty important. How are you guys doing with climate change? Are you guys all worried about climate change? Because it's science, the science. I just wanted to give you this. This was noteworthy in the sort of, you can't make this stuff up category. Two stories were published on the same day, one from NBC News and the other from CBS News. The first one, the NBC News, melting polar ice is slowing the earth's rotation with possible consequences for timekeeping, March 27th, 2024. That was the NBC article. But as it turns out, the CBS News article, Earth is spinning faster than it used to. Clocks might have to skip a second to keep up. Do you remember what the Bible says? And this is so true. We laugh, but it's sad. Oh, Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, opposing of science falsely so-called. So vain babblings, that's a lot of what we hear in news and so-called science, but science falsely so-called, which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with you, amen. I think that there's people that erred away from true faith in Jesus in the Bible because of their proclivity to follow falsely so-called science, whether you're talking about origins and creation versus evolution or climate change, that's become a religion in and of itself. We did a whole prophecy update on that. But all this, you know, in summary, it helps us kind of discern the days we're living, the signs of the times. 1 Thessalonians 5.1, but of the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I write unto you. Why? Because we as Christians are supposed to be aware of the signs of the times. That's what this is all about. That's why we talk about what's going on in the world. It's not just to say, try to fit geopolitics and Bible prophecy and try to fit it all together and make everybody weird out or freak out. No, it's for us just to discern, hey, these are the days we're living. Let's be the watchman on the wall, watching, ready, waiting, and being aware of the days we're living. That's what Paul expected of the church. And by the way, take advantage of the signs of the times. I believe it's a good opportunity for you and me to share the good news of the gospel with people. Because people come to you and say, man, can you believe the protests? Can you believe what's going on in the world today? Even your secularist will say, man, things are crazy. And that is an opportunity to say, you know, it's interesting, while it kind of feels like things are falling apart, this kind of shows what the Bible says, things are falling into place, exactly as the Bible told us it would. And that does get people's attention. People are curious about that. And it's maybe an open door to ultimately get to the fact that we're all sinners. That's the goal, not to talk about Bible prophecy. The spirit of prophecy is Jesus. That's what the Bible says. So it's to get to Jesus, talk about Jesus, that people need him to be saved, that they might be saved from their sins. Well, there it is, prophecy update for May, and we will be back at it the first Friday of June. So that'll be in no time at all. Or we'll be raptured. Either way, could happen. Well, Lord, we thank you so much for just a good chance to get into your word, consider what you're saying in these days that we live. I pray that you'd bless each person here, those watching online. Give us the ability to be creative in how we just share the gospel in these days, these dark days. May we have Jesus right on the forefront of our thoughts, our minds, and that which we communicate. Bless these folks as we go our way. Bless these cinnamon rolls, Lord, as much as possible as we eat them tonight. In Jesus' name, amen.