Good to have you with us. Before we get into what's happening in the world and stuff like that, I'd like to address something important about the days we're living, living in sort of chaotic times. And it's an interesting thing to watch the chaos. And just when you think it's gotten chaotic or whatever you want to call it, ridiculous even, like there's ridiculous or chaotic or insane, or just when you didn't think you could see something weirder, the next day you see something weirder. I mean, those are the days we're living, I think. But a lot of that brings fear, people are dealing with fear and what have you. You know, I think probably some of the biggest threats and fears that I'm, you know, I'm thinking about and, you know, the one that's, the people that actually think about it for more than 10 minutes is the nuclear threat in the world today. If you think about what, you know, the odds are of this happening, most of the experts are shocked that we haven't destroyed the earth already. After World War II, they were kind of like, well, yeah, we all thought we were gonna, during the Cold War, if you're old enough to remember being under the desks at school, that was gonna help you. I remember as a kid thinking, this isn't gonna help. Being under my little desk with your hands like this. It's like, no, your eyes are blue. One blue this way and one blue that way. It's like, that's what happens there in elementary school. But, you know, these crazy nations have nuclear weapons today. And to think that they're not gonna use them might just be a little naive, but people are afraid of what could happen in November, you know, the election. That's gonna be something that's causing a lot of fear and consternation. And there's so many angles, you know, if you're a Biden fan, you're afraid that he won't be able to get out of bed in the morning. Or if you're a Trump fan, you're hoping he can, you know, do his thing from prison. Like hopefully he can, you know, the new Oval Office is kind of rectangular or whatever. But you know, it's like such a weird day that we're living. If Trump gets elected, how many riots? And are they gonna burn down Portland for four years? Like again, are we gonna have to go through all that again? You know, if Biden gets elected, then the question is who really is gonna be the president? You know, like there's all kinds of fearful questions about our future as a nation. And even if you've been following some of the Democrats, they're worried. They're actually voicing out loud, which they don't usually do that. They're concerned about Biden's age and what have you. I'm not being partisan. I'm just telling you about what people are afraid of from all different angles. There's kind of fear no matter what. happens, people are afraid. And then there's that, what I believe is an unnecessary fear, but a lot of people are worried about climate change because they're sure that, you know, we're gonna die in a few years because the earth and all this and, you know, as a Bible believer, the Bible kind of tells us what's gonna happen and climate change is not really the problem. that we're gonna be facing. There's gonna be many other kinds of things. Another one is AI. You know, it's funny how people are using AI these days, but you know, I love this climate change, nuclear weapons, authoritarian governments, pandemics, economic crisis, poverty, corporate greed, conspiracy theories, willful ignorance, and you're scared of me? But the thing is, the ones who've made AI, the guys that are the brainiac nerds behind AI, they're the ones who are raising the flag saying, hello, this could be a problem, and there's all kinds of worry about what that's gonna do. There was a thing, I don't know if it was hype or propaganda, I don't know what to believe on a lot of stuff, but there was a big thing that came out where these two apparent, molecular biologists started using AI and they just changed some numbers and put in some things and basically asked AI to make the most deadly toxin known ever to man. And maybe you saw that and it just in a few minutes started cranking out some of the deadliest of toxins. I saw that and it seemed a little overly dramatic and I'm of that article and stuff, but at the same time, the experts say AI will be able to do those kinds of things. And if some dudes can do that in their den, in their house, with their computer or whatever, what can people that have the real access and computers and all that, what are they going to be able to do is a big question. But AI is a big fear, the economy, people are worried about what's gonna happen when and if it crashes, and there's all kinds of speculation. And then all the other stuff that's normal, wars, Ukrainian war, the war in Gaza. And then also the various rumors of wars, like who's buddying up? And Putin said World War III is here. And whether that's true or not, I guess we don't know yet, but we'll see. But he's threatening nuclear weapons. I mean, there's some legitimate fears that people have, but before we kind of get into the prophecy update portion, I wanted to remind us of a scripture. The first half of this chapter, everybody remembers this is about Bible prophecy. The second half of this chapter, people forget that it's also about Bible prophecy. Let's take a look. It's 1 Thessalonians chapter five. Why don't you turn there with me, grab your Bible, turn to 1 Thessalonians. And there in 1 Thessalonians 5, you know, the rapture is brought up in 1 Thessalonians 4, you know, that then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together. That's the word harpazo in the Greek, rapture in the Latin, and we'll be caught up with them in the clouds and meet them in the Lord, so we shall ever be with the Lord. And then at verse 18, it ends in chapter 4 with wherefore comfort, one another with these words. What words? Well, the words of the rapture, the Lord's gonna come and get us. It's very obvious that we're told we get to be comforted. So when we talk about the rapture, theoretically, that should be words of comfort. For some people, when we talk about the rapture, people freak out and get fearful. And I think that tends to show me that maybe people don't understand what the rapture is and what it means. It's gonna be glorious, it's gonna be wonderful. Now, maybe people think, well, yeah, Brett, the rapture could happen, but things could be a lot worse before the rapture happens, and that's true. But that's where I think the rest of Thessalonians, he kind of wraps up the book with further instructions. Let's take a look. It's 1 Thessalonians 5, verse one. It says, but of the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I write unto you, for yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. We don't know. when the day of the Lord is coming. But to the Christian church, the Thessalonians, he says, I don't need to write this about, because you guys already know. Why do they know? Well, it says, verse three, for when they shall say, not us or you, he says, for when they shall say peace and safety. Then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape. Of course, travail with a woman is talking about childbirth, labor pains. Who else used that illustration of childbirth? Here, Paul uses, here, who else uses that? Jesus in Matthew 24 used the same analogy, the day of the Lord's coming like a baby comes. Birth pains, the frequency and intensity will ramp up and then the baby comes. That's what Bible prophecy, we should see a ramping up of things. So he says that, there'll be sudden destruction, but it'll come like a child pains. But verse four, you brethren are not in darkness that that day should overtake you as a thief. Why not? You, verse five, are children of light. and the children of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore, let us not sleep as do others, but let us watch and be sober." Remember when we were studying last week, when Jesus gave that answer about going to Judea to go heal Lazarus or raise him from the dead. Jesus said, are there not 12 hours a day? And while it's still light, we can be busy about the work that we have to do. This is the same kind of concept that Jesus was talking about there in our study in John 11. It's the same thing here. We're children of the day, so we can be busy doing what we're doing, and while we're doing it, we're sober and vigilant. The church is meant to be sober and vigilant. and vigilant, watching, ready, able, not just sleepy and kind of, you know, sort of snoozing through the last days and saying, oh, who cares about, I'm just a pan-theologist. I just believe it's all gonna pan out in the end. I hear people that aren't into Bible prophecy joke around about that. You pre-trib, post-trib, I'm just pan-trib. Don't let people get away with that. No, the Bible doesn't teach pan-trib. It teaches that we're supposed to actually be aware and not be ignorant concerning Israel and concerning the last days. So that's why we're not gonna be overtaken. We're gonna know what's going on, generally speaking. And that's kind of the goal, by the way. One of the things that Bible Prophecy Update is meant to do here at Athey Creek, is not to be sensational, or not to say, ooh, look at the latest thing, and this is this and that and that, and get all excited about it, as much as to say we need to be sober and be vigilant, not sensational, but just kind of rational, and watching what's going on around us carefully. That's what it means here, be sober, watching and being sober. Verse seven, for they that sleep, sleep in the night, and they that be drunken are drunken in the night, but let us who are of the day be sober. "'putting on the breastplate of faith and love, "'and for a helmet, the hope of salvation. "'For God hath not appointed us to wrath, "'but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.'" This is one of the main reasons why I'm a pre-tribulation person. I believe we're gonna be raptured before the tribulation period, why? Very simple, the time of the tribulation period is called the time of the wrath of the Lamb. What are we supposed to be afraid of, Lambo, Brett? The wrath of the lamb? Sounds really scary. No, the lamb who's also the lion of the tribe of Judah. You have to understand that Jesus came as a humble carpenter servant in his first coming, but his second coming, he's coming as a conquering king. And there's no joke about that. Revelation 19 kind of pictures how that's gonna look. And that's gonna be a fearful sight, to say the least. But see, you and I, we are not appointed unto wrath, but to obtain salvation through Jesus Christ our Lord. So what are we supposed to do? Comfort one another with these words. That's what we're supposed to do. It says, we are not appointed to wrath. That's what the tribulation is called, time of the wrath of the Lamb, but to obtain salvation. who, verse 10, Jesus who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Whether we're alive or dead, we'll be with him. Then verse 11 again, wherefore, comfort yourselves together and edify. The word edify means to build each other up. edify one another even also as you do. Now pause there for a second. So this is the second time Paul says this. He says in verse 18 of chapter four, wherefore comfort one another with these words. And also verse 11, wherefore comfort yourselves together and edify one another even as you also do. What is Paul trying to say to these guys over and over again? Comfort each other. See, to me, the days we're living, the darker they get, the more discomforting they might tend to be. You know, you might be troubled by things that are going on in the world, but you and I as Christians can comfort one another because guess what? We're not appointed unto wrath, but to obtain salvation. We're not gonna be overtaken like as a thief in the night, like they will be who are not saved, but we get to obtain salvation through Jesus Christ our Lord. And we have heaven to look forward to. Like the reason the Bible is so encouraging, especially when we see the crazy stuff, the more chaotic it gets in the world, the more you and I can say comfort. we find comfort and rest to our souls because we follow the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ. So we're supposed to comfort and edify each other. Boy, if you're into Bible prophecy, which if you know me, I'm pro that. Like I've said, a lot of churches ignore it altogether and they don't wanna talk about it. It's too controversial, it's too divisive, nobody agrees. And so they say, just rip that part out of the Bible and let's just not talk about it. That's an error, that's a huge error. Yeah, but Brett, Bible prophecy divides. Well, that means they're probably doing it wrong. Bible prophecy is meant to bring, when we study it and know it, it should bring comfort to the reader, to the learner, to the listener. We should say, man, good news, the Lord has got a plan and a purpose for this world and for us, his people, and we're the bride of Christ, and he's not gonna put his bride through the time of the wrath of the Lamb. We get raptured, taken to the marriage feast of the Lamb for seven years, meanwhile, back on the earth, seven years of tribulation, judgment, wrath, upon a God-rejecting, Christ-rejecting, sinful world. That's called the tribulation period. Then we get to come back with them, because once you're raptured, you'll forever be with the Lord from that point on. So wherever he is, there you may be also. Does that ring a bell? So that's what happens, you're raptured, you're with the Lord, wherever he is, you get to be, so you're there in heaven. And then at the seven year period at the end, he returns and we'll return with him for we will be those 10,000 of his saints that come with them there in Revelation 19. That's the reason why you and I can be of great comfort, comfort one another. Well, it goes on now. Now, by the way, This is interesting because this is where the Bible prophecy buffs say, see, we just looked at 1 Thessalonians chapter five, and then you almost forget to read the rest of the chapter or you wait for a through the Bible study when you cover that portion, because it has nothing to do with end times or Bible prophecy, but that's just not right. I want you to connect the dots here because it keeps going and it's still talking about the end times, the rapture of the church and the day of the Lord. Let's keep reading verse 12. It says, and we beseech you, brethren, to know them which labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their work's sake and be at peace among yourselves. So isn't it interesting that the church of Jesus Christ right now is in chaos? I'll show you a little bit of that maybe later tonight, but so sad to see what's happening in the church. And what's happening is there's some bad churches that have gone off the rails. Apostasia might ring a bell for your Bible prophecy. We're seeing, I think, the beginnings of that right now. That's gonna happen, especially when great deception comes. during the tribulation period, when we're in heaven, it's getting even worse. But the church is so deceived today, and pastors and leaders have failed, and there's some bad leadership. There's people that claim to be churches that are not, even though they're, you know, so there's division, there's people that are angry, and you know, it's amazing, because they're mad at megachurches, which is interesting, and there's a lot of reasons why people should be mad, I think, at megachurches. There's a lot of wacko megachurches. The problem is there's also some good megachurches. At least I hope there's at least one. I know that there are good megachurches out there. It's funny how the good megachurches aren't really thought of as megachurches for some reason, generally speaking. But if you're from the outside, it has to do with how many people attend your building, which is ridiculous. There's good churches, there's bad churches, there's division. But meanwhile, what does Paul tell the church here for us? And this is for our day too. To know those that labor among you, that is those that are over you. As it turns out, the way the structure of the church is formed, that there's elders, bishops, deacons. These are the men that are supposed to lead in the church. And there should be people that are leading the church in a good way. And if you're not finding a good church, just find a good church. Do whatever you can to find a good church. And maybe if you're watching online, do your best to find a church that has a leadership that's biblical, following the Lord, doing its best, and bail out of the others. But at the same time, finding the true church of Jesus Christ, remember, there's no perfect church. So if you're saying, well, I don't know if I like the music, that's not a good reason. I don't know if they dress as classy as Pastor Brett. Well, that's not a good reason either. Like some people will try to compare churches and well, that's not like this church. I'm not talking about the little nuancy, small things that are variables that are okay. I'm talking about, do you believe in the infallibility of the scripture? Is Jesus the only way? Are you saved by grace through faith alone? You know, just some of the basic, you know, essential doctrines of the Christian faith and find that church and plug into it. That's what we're called to do. So, you know, it says that, you know, you're to, know them, which are laboring and working in that role of leadership over you. And verse 13, to esteem them very highly in love for their work sake, not for their sake, not because we want celebrity pastors, but they're to be encouraged so they can keep going in their job. and be at peace among yourselves. So we need to all stop bickering and arguing. I'm shocked at how much bickering and arguing, the more we have podcasting and YouTube and TikTok and the bickering and chatter that goes on now is just dizzying. but we're supposed to choose to be together, unified. Well, verse 13, or pardon me, verse 14, he goes on, now we exhort you, brethren, warn them that are unruly, comfort the feeble-minded, support the weak, be patient toward all men. So this is what we're supposed to do as a church. What are we supposed to do? I mean, we could just spend all night talking about that. Warn them that are unruly. Unruly means that they're not following in line with what the Bible prescribes for his church. And if people are out of line, they should be warned. Comfort the feeble-minded, those that are mentally not strong. Support the weak and be patient toward all men. How are you doing on your patience toward all men? We need to all work on that one, I think. That's an important one. Verse 15, see that none render evil for evil unto any man. Boy, that's tit for tat today. If you've wronged me, I'm gonna wrong you. And people feel like that's the righteous way, but that's not. See that none render evil for evil to any man, but ever follow that which is good, both among yourselves and to all men. Whew, are you guys sensing how radical this is? This is radical. I mean, it's easy for us to be like-minded together as Atheist Greekers in our prophecy update this evening. But when it brings in that last phrase there, that we're supposed to do good both to people that are in this room, yourselves, but also to all men. And if you look up the word all in the Greek, what does it mean? All. All men. That means the people that you don't like. Now again, we're still talking, I'm gonna show you and prove this in a second. We're still talking about the last days, the rapture of the church. We're still talking about the day of the Lord. The context of this chapter continues. Now we're getting into some basic check boxes. I love this. Verse 16, rejoice evermore. One of the things I ask you is if you're a Bible prophecy student, are you rejoicing? I like some of the Bible prophecy guys that aren't taking themselves too seriously and that they still have a little joy in them. If you get too myopic in Bible prophecy, your blood pressure starts rising and you just start getting real angry about what's going on in the world. I can sense that when I start talking about the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Palestinian situation because it's so ridiculously against history. It's so out there. As far as what the worldview is today, I can find myself, I have to kind of like, oh boy, I gotta check my pulse here. Because man, it's just so ridiculous. The rewriting of history and the narrative out there. I'll show you more of that later tonight, hopefully. But the idea is rejoice evermore. I hope we always keep our joyful attitude. It's said of Jesus, he was anointed with the oil of gladness. That's what we should have as Bible people, Christian people. So rejoice evermore, pray without ceasing. You know, we tend to podcast without ceasing. Or we tend to, you know, promote or, you know, even rebel and riot and like, you know, picket without ceasing. But man, that's where work gets done. Pray, pray without ceasing. Verse 18, in everything give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. One of the things that will help you from being bitter is to be better. And one of the ways to be better is to be thankful for everything. So in everything, give thanks. So whoever wins in November, you and I as Christians, we can give thanks to the Lord. Well, bro, what if it's not the one I wanted to get elected? Then we can just say, whatever, I'm glad your will wasn't done, because we're praying for God's will to be done. And maybe he wants the other guy. Oh, I'm sure he doesn't want that other guy. Are you so sure? The Lord raised up Samson. He was an idiot. Samson, I can say that, I'll say it to Samson's face in heaven. Are you sure you wanna do that? Yeah, he's a weakling now, remember? So I'm not worried about, no, I'm just kidding. No, but Samson was a prostitute visiting, self-centered wacko. And God says, yeah, but I'm gonna use that prostitute visiting, self-centered wacko to be the leader of Israel and judge Israel for 20 years. And I could go on. Should I go on of all the people God used in the Bible? See, the point that I'm making is God will raise men up and put men down. And as long as you and I are praying, the Lord's will be done and put our trust in the Lord, then whatever happens in November, we say, thank you, Lord. We're gonna trust that you know what's best. And we can rest in that as Christians. I'm not arguing that we don't vote and that we don't do our diligence as Christians and as Americans and all that, of course. But when it all comes down to it, we just put our trust in the Lord. So boy, we can just go on and on. Verse 19, quench not the spirit. Boy, that's something we would never wanna do. The Spirit is gonna be moving in even exponential ways in the last days. The Bible tells us that. So you and I, as Christians of the last days, I think we look, Lord, would you move by your Spirit in your church and through us, your people, and not to quench the Holy Spirit. That's what makes us effective, is the Holy Spirit. Verse 20 is interesting, despise not prophesying. If you look up the word there, prophesying, it's just prophecy. Well, which one, Brad? Is it the Old Testament prophecy or is it the New Testament version of prophecy? If you know your Bible, there is a difference. Old Testament prophecy is the prophets speaking the word of the Lord and sometimes telling the future about what would happen in the last days, stuff like that. And then Jesus died on the cross and the last of the prophets, does anybody remember who Jesus said that was? John the Baptist was the last of the prophets. So then what about the ministry of prophecy in the book of Acts and 1 Corinthians 14 and all that? Well, the manifestation of the spirit of prophecy is a little different than the Old Testament version of prophecy. It's not foretelling the future, or foretelling the future, I should say, it's foretelling. It's speaking a word of exhortation, comfort. 1 Corinthians 14, edification, exhortation or comfort. It's a little different. It's the way the Holy Spirit speaks to his people today. But it's not as much telling the future or anything like that. So which one is this? I think it's both. Despise not prophesying, because the word can go either way, Old Testament version or New Testament version. We're not supposed to despise that. Isn't it interesting that more than half of the churches in the world today despise prophecy and say, yeah, get it out. We don't want to read it. It's so sad. They're missing out on huge, important things from the Bible. Then verse 21, prove all things, which means test. Hold fast that which is good. I'm reminded that we should test everything we hear. One of the things we Christians, especially prophecy people, I think we get hooked into believing stuff that's not really true sometimes. We tend to gravitate toward the sensational and the stuff that really suits our fancy and we can get into that stuff. But I think we should test everything that we see, prove all things. That's the idea. And then when you see good things, hold fast to the good stuff. Don't hold fast to the bad stuff. Have you guys ever noticed the tendency to hold on to the ugly stuff and remember the bad stuff and forget to hold fast to that which is good? That's something that I have a tendency to do, even as a pastor. I could have a hundred people come and say, oh, Pastor Brett, thank you, and you're a blessing. And it's really encouraging to hear those things, but then you get that one person, I think you're antichrist, Pastor Brett. or you need to go on a diet. Like I hear that one, or there's mean stuff that people say, that's great, but those are the ones you hang on to. Have you ever noticed that? And man, you gotta learn how to sort of fight through that. But hold on to that which is good. That's important. Well, it goes on and says, abstain from all appearance of evil. Man, we're living in a day where evil's everywhere. Don't even do things that appear like they look like they're evil. Stay away from that. That's a good rule of thumb. Should you do A or B? When you're trying to decide, am I gonna do this or that? Well, does it appear? Could it ever be misconstrued even as being evil? Then run from it, that's the idea. Verse 23, and this is the big one right here, verse 23. And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly, and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. See, this is the context again. The whole chapter is about the last days. And then he sort of gives this final word. Let's put this last verse up on the screen because it's so important. So what does the Lord say through Paul the Apostle? He says, the very God of peace, sanctify you wholly. That word sanctify is kind of important. We'll mark it here for a second. And then Paul says, I pray God, your whole spirit and soul and body. We're made up of body, soul, and spirit. That's the three part being of humanity. but all three of those be preserved and blameless so that we're set apart. The word sanctify, that's what that means. To be blameless means that you are different than the rest of the world. We're not out there sending it up and just doing it like everybody else. Have you noticed how Christians oftentimes will try to creep into worldliness as far as they can and still not cross the Christian line. I've noticed there's a bunch of Christians back in the late 90s and early 2000s where drinking alcohol was suddenly freedom in Christ, man. We can all drink, and the Bible doesn't say you're not supposed to drink alcohol, and that's true, but I noticed a lot of Christians, back when I was younger in ministry, most Christians that I knew, maybe it was the people I hung out with, they were a bunch of teetotalers or something, But do you guys remember the day when the church kind of said, yeah, let's try to avoid alcohol? Do you guys remember that? Anybody remember that? Yeah, some of you. That makes me nervous. Maybe I was by myself. But then, you know, bottoms up, man. And then we're freedom in Christ, which it's true. We really are free. And there's nothing wrong with a glass of wine with your dinner or beer and watching a football game or something. But drunkenness is a sin. But I noticed that a lot of my Christian friends with liberty started using that liberty for an occasion to sin. And I wasn't trying to be judgmental. I was just noticing that, man, it's like we always try to push that limit. You wanna know what the latest one that I'm noticing? Maybe you're too, is cussing like sailors. It's cool to be a Christian now who drops an F-bomb once in a while. I can't believe that. I know you're saying, Brent, you're just such a, you know, Christian hoity-toity, goody-two-shoes. Well, you know, most people that are trying to be sanctified will be called those kinds of names, trying to be blameless. There's pastors from the pulpit that are cussing now. That's not being sanctified. That's not saying let's have the whole body, soul, and spirit be blameless. until the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. We need to, instead of let ourselves creep into more and more sinfulness, we should be fighting to get closer and closer to holiness of what God wants us to be. Well, you're just being legalistic, right? No, legalism would say you gotta be saved by being whole. You gotta be saved by not cussing. You gotta be saved by not drinking alcohol and getting drunk. That's not what we're saying. There's gonna be a lot of cussing drunkards that are gonna make it to heaven by the grace of God. but they're not living that life that's sanctified and blameless until the coming of Christ. There's benefit to the person who's saying, I'm gonna just choose to be set apart for the things of the Lord in the last days. So man, verse 23 is huge, blameless. The word sanctify is, you can mark that, it's the Greek word hagiadzo, which means to make holy, to purify or consecrate, be holy or sanctify. There's a lot of churches that won't talk about this, that we should, as Christians, work on this idea of setting ourselves apart from the rest of the world, being consecrated, set aside and to be made holy. We love the positional holiness we have in Christ. That is, when you accepted Jesus, He forgave you of your sin, washed them away, and He put your sin as far as the East is from the West. But practically, you and I are pretty far from just real practical holiness, but that's what we're supposed to do is work toward that as we get closer to the day of the Lord. So all this to say, this whole chapter is about the end times, and you and I are given our marching orders. So rather than being fearful, We should be seeking that which is good, watching, being sober, being vigilant, be sanctified, hagiadzo, set apart. I'm reminded of what Paul told young Timothy in 2 Timothy 1, 7, for God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and love and of a sound mind. And remember this, and Jesus said this on the Mount of Olives, on the Olivet Discourse, he reminded them in Matthew 24, six, and you shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. And notice he said, see that you be not troubled, for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. Even in Jesus' most heavy word about the end days, the last times, the end of the world, even in the most heavy verses, the Olivet Discourse, he was reminding them, but see that you be not troubled. Do you remember what we read about in John 14 one? Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in you. Question, what's the context of John 14 one? Tumbleweeds are blowing across the sanctuary right now. I heard crickets in the corner over there. What is the context of John 14 one? Yeah, we just went over this. The way, the truth, and the life. But what did the Jews hear when Jesus started talking about this? He's coming again. He's coming again. This is about when Jesus returns. Let's remember, let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, let not your heart be troubled. So that's the first thing. In my Father's house are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for you. And I go to prepare a place for you that where I am, I'm gonna come again. This is the second coming of Christ. I'm gonna come again and receive you unto myself. That's the rapture of the church right there. Can I just say, John 14, we forget that's an end times passage of scripture. We're talking about the rapture of the church and the second coming of Christ. That where I am, you may be also. Remember the wedding that we talked about and the bridegroom and the bride and that whole thing? This is end times stuff. John 14, one through six is all about that. The reason I say that is because, again, in the context of the second coming and the rapture of the church, here's the Lord saying, but don't let your hearts be troubled. Meanwhile, I see in prophecy circles, we let our hearts get troubled, and our blood pressure rising, and we tend to get a little bit weird about stuff, and we shouldn't. The goal would be to choose just the peace that comes from knowing Christ. And that's why I just wanted to kind of label this one tonight, chaos or Christ. It's really your choice. You can choose. You can either get all caught up in the chaos and get all up with your blood pressure and see what's going on in the world. Or you can choose to say, you know what, I'm gonna just choose to follow the peace of Christ. Let that rule my heart. the ruling of the heart with the peace of Christ. That's what God wants for us. Keeping your eyes on the chaos or keeping your eyes on the cross. It's really a question of what you're gonna do. What are you gonna do? And I'd like to encourage us to always keep our eyes on the Lord Jesus. Hebrews 12 too, looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith. So with all that said, then you start looking at what's going on in the world, and we just keep reminding ourselves of Christ, that He's coming, that He wants to give you a peace that passes understanding, and that He has a plan for you and me. He's got a plan for Israel. He's got a whole plan for the whole world, and we can put our trust in Him. So that should always be the premise. That should always be the tone setter for all of our prophecy updates and what have you. Just a quick reminder of that. Well, let's get to it. Mainly what we like to do here on Prophecy Updates is kind of look at the world scene from a Christian worldview, from a Bible prophecy worldview. It's pretty fun to do that. It's fun because we know the end of the story, and it's all gonna work out good, God's plan, so we can rest in that. By the way, if you're just joining us online and you only watch Bible prophecy updates, I'm gonna say this is 4% of what we do here at Athey Creek. Somebody did the math for me the other day. 4.2% of what we do is these prophecy updates. The other 96% or whatever is through the Bible, verse by verse, chapter by chapter, book by book. And if you haven't tuned into that, I'd like to encourage you to that. That's our bread and butter. That's the main thing that we do. We go through the whole Bible. And I would recommend that if you don't have access to through the Bible study, it's there for you online. Every single passage we've ever covered, which is the whole Bible. So good stuff. Well, let's get to it. The first thing I wanted to kind of bring up is some things that are going on in Israel, of course, the epicenter of Bible prophecy. But I wanted to talk about this so-called two-state solution that is being brought up again and again and again. But even if you watched President Biden's address a couple days ago, he's kind of back on this sort of idea, the two-state solution. which always sort of cracks me up because it's such a non-possibility. And yet, it is something that, the reason it sort of cracks me up is because the Arabs don't want it, the Jews don't want it, and I can't even say that about the Jews for even up until recently. I'll show you what I mean here in a second. But the two-state solution has been pushed by Biden, but who really has rejected this two-state solution? The scenario's proven elusive. with the Palestinians because from the very beginning, they've refused to recognize the Jewish nation, Israel. And even if they did recognize Israel, Palestinians have not shown any capability in constructing a governing body or being able to govern themselves in any way, shape or form without being in chaos. whether a democracy or an autocracy, either way, it's failed them miserably. Hamas was who they voted in in their last election. I'd like to remind you, the Palestinians, 80% of the Palestinians support Hamas, which is something that you don't hear very often, but that's well documented. So when we dropped the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, You know, the death toll was shocking. And it's because, you know, love it or hate it or disagree with it or agree with it. It's because millions of men were dying in battle in World War II. And, you know, our president had to make a decision. Do you drop the bomb that was newly invented? killing hundreds of thousands of people, innocent men, women, children, old people, young, we made that decision. And people speculate, well, we should have never done that or whatever, but most people are pretty sure that had we not done that, at least hundreds and hundreds of thousands of our own people would have died in the continued wars. But once those bombs were dropped, end of World War II. Everybody's mouths were shut. Everybody said, okay, whatever you guys say, America, we'll do it. And because of that, most people who've done the math believe millions of lives were saved by the dropping of the bombs. Now, philosophically, that's a hard one to put your brain around, whether that was right or wrong, good or bad, God's plan, no plan. It's hard to even figure that out. But as it turns out, You know, Japan, they, at that point, surrendered. Unconditionally surrendered, because they knew there was nothing more they could do about it, and so they unconditionally surrendered. They attacked us, but they unconditionally surrendered, because they knew they were toast. Now, with that, the United States went to repair Japan, to help them rebuild. We didn't allow them to rebuild it the way they used to do it. We didn't even let them have military for a long time. We just said, we're going to rebuild your nation for you, only you got to be our friend now. And it's funny how that kind of worked out. Now, if you compare that with what's happening in Gaza, you say, well, it's such a smaller scale thing. Yes, it is. But when the Hamas says that there's 35,000 people that will be killed, most people don't believe the Gaza Health Administration. They believe those are exaggerated numbers. The experts know that's an exaggerated number. But even if we did give them 35,000, which is horrifying and sad, But the Jews can't just continue to let a nation just throw missiles over their border all day long by the thousands. That's been happening for decades. And the Jews, the October incident that happened, I shouldn't call it an incident, it was a horrifying event. The Jews finally said, that's enough. We're not gonna let our people be beheaded and our women raped. So they attacked because they were attacked. And then, you know, Israel has really gone through and cleaned out Gaza Strip. And way more surgically than we did. With our nuclear bombs, we just wiped out cities with one bomb. Just whole cities, just men, women, and children. That's what we did. The Jews have tried to surgically do it, but the problem is the Gaza Hamas have used their innocent women and children, Palestinians, as shields. Like this is stuff that, you know, anybody who knows what's going on there, they know that's what's happened. But you'd think at this point, you know, now that Rafa's taken and, you know, really largely most of the Gaza is covered by the IDF. Wouldn't you kind of think that Hamas would say, okay, we have no hope of winning, time to surrender, time to realize we're beaten. But do you know that that's not even close to happening? Not even close. And the reason why is the leaders of Hamas do not care about Palestinian people. They're one of the only people groups in the world that don't care about the Palestinians, it's Hamas. The more they die, the better it is for them. They'll use the pictures of the children being carried through the streets as how the Israelis are committing genocide. That's the narrative of that. And you'd think they'd say, no, let's have a two-state solution. Come on, let's do this. But one of the things you'll know is Hamas has zero interest in a two-state solution. The stuff that our president said from the presidential podium a couple days ago, Hamas wants nothing to do with that. And he was so hopeful, saying, I think we're coming close to a ceasefire and a plan, a roadmap to peace, he said, as they always say, about the Arab-Israeli conflict. But are we really that close to that? It sounded so optimistic. It was kind of laughable actually. Because if you know what's really going on, Biden said, Israel came up with this plan. And Israel said, we did? Did you guys see that? Our president said, no, this is Israel's plan. And Netanyahu and the gang are like, nope. Well, whose plan was it? You know, the Harvard grads that are, you know, in Biden's administration came up with a harebrained plan and said, here's how it should go. And we'll act like Israel made it up and say, we're really close to the roadmap of peace. But actually this week it's shown that there's not even close to that. And then here's the thing, when Netanyahu said, no, that really wasn't our plan, well, don't you guys want a two-state solution? Well, right now, Israel's saying, no, we wanna finish the work in Gaza because we cannot let Hamas continue. I think as long as they're alive and kicking, their whole reason to exist is to make Jews die. And so that's where Israel is. They're saying, yeah, we're, now the narrative is this. The narrative is becoming Israel's rejecting the two state solution. That's the narrative. And it's really going strong right now. The Jews, those horrible occupying colonists, Jews, Zionists, they're all, they're so close down to the two state solution. Is that really even true? Not even close. Did you know that there've been five major, I could do more, but there's five major attempts at a two-state solution since Israel really started to begin as a nation, well, even before that. Let me go over that a little bit with you. The two-state solution has been rejected five times by the Arab people, by the Palestinians. The first one came By the way, which is interesting, if you don't believe me about this, I'm gonna show you, you can look this stuff up. After the breakup of the Ottoman Empire following World War I, the Brits took over much of the Middle East, including the area that constitutes most of Israel, including Jerusalem. And that didn't go very well for the Brits, if you didn't know that whole story, the British there in Jerusalem and in the Middle East. But 17 years later, in 1936, the Arabs rebelled against the British and the Jewish neighbors, and the British formed a task force called the Peel Commission. And you should know this part of history, the Peel Commission, to study the cause of the rebellion. Why are these Arabs rebelling? What's going on? Why are they wanting to kill Jews and Brits? The commission concluded, this was their conclusion, the reason the violence was happening is because there were two peoples, Jews and Arabs, and they are all wanting to govern the same land. So the answer, the Peel Commission concluded, would be to create two independent states, one for the Jews and one for the Arabs, a two-state solution. This is where that was really first brought up. Now, the Peel Commission, as we look at this map, I don't know if you guys can see this in the room here. If you're online, you can probably see it better. But the areas enclosed within the red line were part of the proposed Jewish state. There, just that little tiny section is that what the Peel Commission said, that'll be the Jews. And then the rest of what we know is pretty much Israel would be, this is a zooming in of that. But if you look at the rest of Israel, like the dagger shape, that would be what is kind of the Arab, sort of the Palestinian one. So the black line with the hatched area represents the enclave or corridor, that little corridor, which would be sort of an international zone. which would include Jerusalem and all the way to Tel Aviv, sort of an international corridor. That was their plan. The British suggested this, put this out in recognition of Jerusalem's religious and historical importance. They wanted to keep it international. So rejection number one came in 1937. The suggested split was heavily in favor of the Arabs. The British offered them 80% of the disputed territory and the Jews were offered 20% of the territory yet, Despite the tiny size of their proposed state, the Jews voted to accept the Peel Commission offer, and the Arabs rejected it and resumed their violent rebellion against Brits and Jews. So the Jews accepted the Peel Commission with 20% of the land offered to them. Then you said, we'll take it. This is the first rejection you should know about. Rejection number two came in 1947, just 10 years later. 10 years later, the British asked the United Nations to find a new solution to the continuing tensions. Like the Peel Commission, the UN decided that the very best way to resolve the conflict was to divide the land, same. In November of 1947, the UN voted to create two states. This map represents the UN partition plan from 1947. Again, the Jews accepted the offer and the Arabs rejected it. Only this time they did so by launching an all-out war. Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria joined in the conflict. And it really became 1948 when Israel became a nation by the UN. The Jews accepted it, the Arabs rejected it, and finally the UN said, Jews, we're giving you this land whether the Arabs like it or not. They should have agreed, so we're giving you this land. So that's when the War of Independence took place that I just mentioned with the five Arab nations joining in. Now they failed in that miraculous, biblically proportioned battle. The War of Independence is a shocking victory for the Jews. Israel won the war, got on with business of building a new nation. And they took the territory that they had gained in that war and started farming and making kibbutz and settling in that region, in that land. Most of the land satisfied by the UN and the Arab state, the West Bank, East Jerusalem became occupied territories, what they all called it. Occupied not by Israel, but by Jordan. Do you understand that? The pink area here in 1947, that was largely occupied by Jordanian people. It's funny how the narrative changes to be Jews occupying the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights. So in 1947, the Arabs once again rejected. Then rejection number three happened 20 years later in 1967. If you recall, the Arabs were ramping up their attacks and their threats against the Jews. Egypt, joined by Syria and Jordan, once again sought to destroy the Jewish state. And there was a little conflict known as the Six-Day War in 1967. It ended in a stunning victory for Israel. Jerusalem and the West Bank, as well as all the area known as the Gaza Strip, fell into Israel's hands. The Jews, by the way, the government was, in 1967, the government was split over what to do with all this new territory. Half wanted to return the West Bank to Jordan and Gaza back to Egypt in exchange for peace, land for peace, what an idea. By the way, has that worked very well for the Jews ever? Land for peace, they've tried it, but it's never worked out for the Jews. And there's a reason the Arabs don't want little pieces of land, they want all of it, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Rejection number three happened. They basically, you know, land for peace. Now, remember Moshe Dayan, this is where he gave the Temple Mount back to the, you know, the Arabs, which was shocking to half the Jews. They were like, no way. But it was all land for peace. Give them the Temple Mount. Maybe that'll make them happy and have them stop bombing us, killing our women and children in the streets. So the other half wanted to give it to the Arabs, but eventually they decided to continue to control those occupied, as they're called, territories. But neither initiative about splitting the nation became even real. After this, the Arabs still rejected the idea of giving that land over back to the Arabs. They said, we don't want our little West Bank and Gaza Strip. We want the whole thing. A few months later, by the way, after this 1967 rejection, the Arab League met in Sudan and issued the famous, do you guys know what the famous three no's are? This is important, big part of Arab history. They all got there in Sudan and said, there's three no's and we will never, never, never cross these, ever. No peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel. That was decided. Look it up, the Arab League, Sudan, the three no's, look it up. And if you're wondering, they've stuck to that plan like glue from that day until the very present day. So this whole idea that the Arabs would like to have a two-state solution, they're totally deluded. None of the Arabs want a two-state solution. There might be a few innocent Palestinians who just want peace and wanna have a shop in West Bank or in Jerusalem, and they're like, whatever, to make it peaceful, but the greater group of all the Arab nations, they will not let the Palestinians have a two-state. They don't want a two-state. So the three no's. No peace with Israel ever. No recognition of Israel ever. No negotiation with Israel. Again, a two-state solution was dismissed by the Arabs. Rejection number four, I should probably hurry through these. Do you remember in 2000, There's Slick Willy and Prime Minister Ehud Barak meeting there with Yasser Arafat at Camp David. This was a memorable deal. If you guys were alive during this time, this was memorable. But the Palestinian, Yasser Arafat, they were there for a long time. And Clinton was trying to propose a two-state, a new two-state plan. They had maps and they were drawing stuff out and trying to do stuff. But Barak, Ehud Barak, the prime minister of Israel at the time, shocked the world at this Camp David meeting, the guy on the left there. He shocked the world because he offered 94% of the West Bank with all of East Jerusalem as the Palestinian capital So Barak was gonna give East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine for the Palestinians and offered 94% of the West Bank. But the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, rejected. In the words of US President Bill Clinton, he said this, Arafat was here 14 days. He was here 14 days and said no to everything. That's what he said. He said, note everything for 14 days. Instead, the Palestinians launched a bloody wave of suicide bombings that killed over 1,000 Israelis, the Intifada wars, and maimed thousands more on buses in wedding halls and pizza parlors. And there's times where I went to Israel when bombs were going off in buses, and to see the aftermath, and my buddy Steve, the tour guide, when I interviewed him here, one of those bombs went off at a market, a little grocery market, right in front of his, where he lived in his house in Jerusalem. And there was these two Palestinian bombers, they had a vest, and they ran in, all the Halkbar pulled the things, boom, boom, and killed a bunch of people on the street there, men, women, children. And the Jews are interesting. They get in there and just clean it right up. They clean it right up, and within a few hours, business is going again. There's a reason they do that. They don't do it because they just are dismissing it as no big deal. They don't want to let it beat them. The Jews, they've cleaned it up, get things going. Well, Steve came home that night to his house and one of the bombers, there was still blood on his front porch from one of the bombers. Part of him landed on Steve's porch. But Steve had a little thing where you go into his house and then you go upstairs and he had this little rooftop patio where the barbecue was and stuff. And Steve went up there that evening, just went up there and found one of the heads of the bombers on his own balcony and had to call, you know, I got a head here that you gotta come and get. That's what happened. People forget that this stuff is real. These things that are real that happened in Jerusalem, people forget. But Steve has seen that up close. One of my trips, there was a bomb, bus 19 blew up. After the tour group left, I took that same bus ride because I wanted to see what it felt like to ride on a bus where just a couple days earlier they blew it up, killed all the people on the bus. And it was kind of sobering watching Jews just have to move on with their lives. We Americans don't know what that's like. But anyway, I'm not supposed to get into all this. But year 2000, that was a big one. Ehud Barak was very much disliked from that day forward by a lot of Jews because they said, you were trying to, Give them everything. What were you thinking? You know, they said to Ehud Barak. And Barak's answer, by the way, I went to see Ehud Barak at the Snitzer. He came and did a question and answer session with one of the CNN people there. And I went there and just listened. And we got to do some question and answer time and stuff. But one of the questions, what were you thinking at the Camp David 2000, you know, when you were gonna give away everything, the kitchen sink? And he said, I did that to show the world that the Arabs are not interested at all in a two state solution. He said, I knew they wouldn't take it and they never will. That's what he said. So the world, like he was gambling, but I'm not sure it was really that much of a gamble. I think he was actually correct and probably has a better sense. Well, that was the fourth rejection. Definitely no two-state solution there. The final and fifth one was in 2008, the big one that was offered. Some say this is even more generous than what Ehud Barak did in 2000. When in 2008, Israel tried again, Prime Minister Ehud Omar, went even further than Eli Barak and tried to include additional land to sweeten the deal. But like his predecessor, the new Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, turned down the deal soundly. And so that turned out to be nothing. So what does from the river to the sea mean? Well, first of all, I'm pretty sure most of the protestors, pro-Palestinian protestors on PSU campus and at, you know, Berserkly and Columbia University, I'm pretty sure all those guys, they don't know what it means. They're saying, from the river to the sea. If they do, what they're saying is basically genocide of Jews, that the Jews should have no place to live on the earth. Because the only place Jews really have that they can call their own is actually Israel, given to them by the world, by the UN in 1948, given to them by God in the Bible, much of the land they purchased during the 1700s, 1800s, and the movement of Zionism. If there's ever a people group that deserved to be on a piece of property, it's the Jews. And yet the world says, you're occupiers. And now we got our brilliant college students saying, from the river to the sea, Palestine needs to be free. It's so ridiculous. It's where your blood pressure starts. Hold on. Yeah, gotta stay calm. Gotta stay joyful. So typical article, like for example, this is what the article is today, basically. This was actually January, but this is Netanyahu publicly rejects US push for Palestinian state. This is the way they frame it. Even though Israel has been voted yes five times for serious dual statehood. Now, by the way, I'm not arguing for statehood. Statehood is a bad idea. Does anybody know, why can we know for sure dividing up Jerusalem in half is a bad idea? Zechariah chapter 12, Zechariah chapter 14 says the nations that try to do that, they're handling a cup of trembling. The idea is you're gonna be toast, you're gonna be nailed if you try to do that. Any nation that tries to divide Jerusalem in half is gonna be part of the bad story of when Christ returns and it's not gonna be pretty. So today, this was from a few months back, but today, Netanyahu and Israel's being touted as, well, these guys aren't interested in peace, they're not interested in a two-state solution, as if Hamas is, or the Palestinians are, but they are not. There's no interest in a two-state solution. The only people that are interested in a two-state solution is the United States and some of the European leaders and what have you, but I would say they just don't know the dynamic of what's going on there. Now, with all that, because of that, Israel's becoming more and more hated. The world, the temperature of hatred against Israel is mounting. People are hating Netanyahu. Netanyahu is kind of gaining popularity again a little bit in Israel, it seems, we'll see. Maybe, maybe not. But at the same time, Israel, you know, the world's saying, Israel, you're becoming more isolated. The more you keep doing your Gaza offensive, you're becoming isolated. Now that language should make you Bible prophecy folks go, whoa, that's what the Bible says is gonna happen. Israel will be isolated. They'll be the only nation standing for themselves. There might be some neutral bystander nations that might be involved in the Ezekiel 38 attack, but also in the second coming, the war of Armageddon, Israel's gonna be pretty much alone and the whole world is gonna be against Israel. You see, the reason I say that is if you know your Bible, that's just the way the Bible says it's gonna shake out in the last days. Well, Brett, it's not there yet. Right, but man, we're pretty close. That's why I think the rapture of the church could happen tonight, because then you only need seven years. And does seven years seem like a long time in today's standard? It really doesn't. But all you need is seven years to get from what's happening now to the whole world kind of coming against Israel. I could see that happening in two weeks. Because really most of the world hates Israel right now. So the point that I'm making is, I believe the stage is being set for the rapture of the church, the tribulation period, which will culminate in the battle of Armageddon, where all the nations will really set their guns toward Israel. Some of the documentation of this is the ICJ ruling. Last prophecy update, I talked about the ICC ruling. All this is is another criminal, international criminal court made another ruling against Israel. If you remember, last time we talked about how they got a hit list. You know, they want to arrest Netanyahu for war crimes. And the ICC, International Criminal Courts, declared Israel, you know, they're trying to say that they're genocidal. They're trying to wipe out the Palestinians, even though there's no army in the history of the world that's tried to protect innocent people as much. Like, it's so funny, the narrative out there. But the Wall Street Journal article about this, UN court orders Israel to halt some military operations in Rafah. International Court of Justice says Israel's continuing Gaza assault imperils civilian population. So a second international court rules the ICJ, which is linked to the ICC, it's a long story, but they're basically adding to the list of war crimes that Israel's supposed to be committing, but they're really just trying to protect their citizens from being beheaded and slaughtered and raped. It's really shocking. In the current scenario, this ICJ, the predicament faced by Israel becomes apparent when we take into account the following facts. The current president of the ICC, International Criminal Court, and part of the ICJ is a criminal court justice by the name of Nawaf Salam. Have you ever heard of Nawaf Salam? That's this guy. He's the president of this international sort of court. The reason I point this out is just so you know, it's noteworthy to mention that Nawaf Salam is a citizen of Lebanon. which is one of the countries that are part of the no, no, no thing. We will never recognize Israel as a nation. So here's an international court guy who doesn't even believe Israel has a right to exist. He's the president. Consequently, the leader of the court not only hails from a nation that denies Israel's nationhood, but is now overseeing the issuance of an order against Israel. And Nawaf Salam has actually posted on his own social media statements that deny the legal existence of Israel. He's been very bold about that. So why should Israel pay any attention to the international court? Well, they're not. There was a news article that said Netanyahu's thinking over what the international court's saying, but that's all he's probably gonna do. Basically, the nations that are strong and powerful don't care about international courts. Israel, United States, Russia, we just sort of kind of go, yeah, whatever to these courts. These courts have had power within some of the smaller nations, but we'll see what happens with this international court. The more we move to globalism, the more we might see the ICC and the ICJ become more part of the globalistic thing, along with the Antichrist and all that stuff. Stuff to watch, if you're wondering. Now, the idea is, everybody's trying to get Israel to a ceasefire. Israel's saying they need to finish the job. This New York Times article, here's a closer look at the hurdles to a ceasefire deal. Neither Israel nor Hamas have said definitively whether they would accept or reject a proposal outlined by President Biden, but sizable gaps between the two sides appear to remain. So when Biden just a couple of days ago was saying, we're getting close to a ceasefire, Both sides are saying, no, we're not. That's just kind of important to know. Meanwhile, Hezbollah in the north, that's heating up quite literally. Did you guys see what's going on in the north there in Israel with Hezbollah? Ever since October, you know, this Gaza war began, Hezbollah have been lobbing rockets over the north from Lebanon into Israel. Of course, Hezbollah, they are Iranian proxies. Their weapons are from other Iranians. The Iranians are directing the Hezbollah army. But it's been ramping up. And the big question is, when is Israel going to start saying it's not just a Gaza war, it's also a Lebanon war. And that's what's percolating right now. And one of the things that's happened is Hezbollah is the largest military threat to Israel, probably in the Middle East right now. According to Israeli and regional security experts, They believe that since 2006, when Hezbollah stood up to an all-out assault with Israel, they've only grown stronger since then. So Israel knows that when they go to war with Hezbollah in the north, it's going to be quite a battle. It's going to be much more difficult than the Gaza offensive. So what's heating up about this? Well, did you see, they're shooting these or sending these drones. Hezbollah is sending drones over to Israel and lighting places on fire with these drones. And so it's been quite a problem for Israel. This is the NBC video of some of the fires. Now Oregonians, this is every summer to us. So welcome to our world right here. But in Israel, they don't have vast lands like we do. They've got a tiny little footprint, Israel does, and they need every square inch of their nation, but these fires are burning and causing trouble all over Israel right now. The Jews are kind of saying, man, we can't just let this go on. So the footage released by Israel's Fire and Rescue Agency showed the forests burning. The blaze is said to have been caused by rockets and drones by Hezbollah from Lebanon. Meanwhile, speaking of Iran and the proxies, what's going on in Iran? I can't do a prophecy update without mentioning this, even though this seems like so long ago. Anything important happened in Iran this last month? If you didn't know, Iran's president died, and a foreign minister died in a helicopter crash at a moment of high tensions in the Middle East. This is interesting, you know, it's like, you know the old saying, April showers bring May flowers? Well, in April, Raisi, the president of Iran, showered Israel with 320 rockets. Those are the April showers, and now we have May flowers at the funeral of Raisi. Sorry, that's just the way my brain works. The old Frank Sinatra song, Flying High, and then the next day you're... What is it? I forget. You're flying high in April and shot down in May. Yeah, that's Raisi's story. We should have done a response music video. Anyway, you say, Brett, you're being light. This guy was called the Butcher of Tehran by Iranian people. When he died in this helicopter crash, one of the people called it an helicopter as a turn on an Assad agent named Ellie something or other, probably was mechanical. But anyway, this helicopter went down. Now, who are the Iranians blaming? Biden. That's kind of interesting. Why are they blaming Biden? Well, because of our financial, Trump and Biden, our restrictions that we put on financially on Iran, they haven't been able to get the helicopter parts they need. They've been using these same helicopters for the last 20 years and the parts are old and they're blaming the mechanical malfunction to United States sanctions. That's kind of interesting. But Iran's president and foreign minister die in a helicopter crash. In a moment of tension, I'll say, right after 320 missiles and rockets went over to Israel, and Israel unscathed, isn't it interesting, he dies the next month. It's interesting to me whether it's a Mossad agent, or just what the Bible says, if you curse Israel, you're cursed. If you bless Israel, you're blessed. Do I think the Lord could take a guy that's like a president of a country and say, oh yeah, you're gonna attack my people like that? It wouldn't be a surprise to me if God just said, nope, you're done, Reishi. Now, the guy, Reishi, the question is, who will replace him? That's the big question. The supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Now, if you're confused by these names, don't feel bad. We're all confused. The Ayatollah Khomeini, remember him? He was the first one after the Islamic revolution in 1979. And then I think he was up till like, what was it? 1988, I think. And then 1989, they got the next guy and he's the leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. So a different guy, but he's been the guy, the supreme leader, as they call him, for a long, long time now. He's 85 years old, but he's the main guy. Now, Raisi was the president under the supreme leader, okay? So the supreme leader stuck a dude in there that nobody really knew to fill in. There's supposed to be an election in Iran, but when Raisi died, they had to squash the celebrations in the streets of Tehran. Excuse me. Because people were lighting off fireworks and celebrating the death of their president. This reminded me to pray for the Iranian people. Because I think, from what I gather, there's a lot of Iranian people that just really don't want anything to do with all the Islamic nonsense and weirdness of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei. and all the way, you know, the destruction and the craziness that they're promoting. I think there's a lot of Iranians. There's even rumors of Christian revival that has actually happened in Iran over the last decade, which really would be something cool. We gotta remember to pray for those people. Talk about putting your faith on the line there. Being a Christian in Iran, there's not much of a future in that, except for heaven, that's the real future. Well, all that to say, There's a great vacuum of leadership in Iran. They're worried that this guy's dead. They're worried that Ayatollah Khamenei will die as an 85-year-old guy. So who's going to control this crazy nation that's trying to get nuclear weapons? Some suggest they already have them. that wanna kill Israel, it's gonna be really interesting. In fact, 2024 is something you and I should take note. World leadership is something to watch as a Bible prophecy student. Because I see a great vacuum in the world for leadership. Did you see this map? Maybe you saw it somewhere on the news. This is called the super election year. These are the countries where a national election will or has been held in 2024. Expected number of voters, two billion people in the world are voting. for new leaders. That's a lot of people. The share of free elections, 38%. There's a bunch of interesting notes there. Burkina Faso, the African country I talk about all the time because I've been there three times. The State Department just said it's the most dangerous country in the world right now, Burkina Faso. because there's a military coup going on and Islam is overtaking Burkina Faso. We need to be praying for our Christian brothers and sisters in Burkina Faso. But not all that to say, you know, these elections, the world's up in a sort of arms for leadership. The things we sense about the Biden-Trump election and the uneasiness I mentioned earlier, that's the way most countries feel about their leaders right now, which to me, sets the stage for the coming world leader, the false shepherd, the Antichrist, as he's called in the Bible. That's kind of important to see. So something to watch, the vacuum of leadership. I think that the antichrist will come and try to fill that and the world will be sucked into it. That's gonna happen after the rapture of the church. So we won't see that, but the stage is set for that. One more thing before we pack it up. We can't go without talking about prideful month. What do you think? Prideful Month. There's some interesting memes I wanted to show you. Like the first Pride Month that was celebrated many, many centuries ago. If you know what that is, that's that famous artwork of Satan falling from heaven. Why? Because he was lifted up with pride. Maybe you saw this meme. I thought this was kind of interesting and really kind of true. Boy, some of this really does strike me as demonic, what's happening. You know, and it's sad how it's creeping in more and more to churches. Did you see the Episcopal Church is so proud of their new shield, of their symbol of their church. If you know the Episcopal Church, they had a shield that was sort of their symbol of their church, the Episcopal Church, which is not a church anymore. They call themselves a church. but they are no longer part of a true church. They're apostate church. And, you know, that flag, of course, not only celebrates gay and lesbian, but transgender and all the plus, all the, you know, things the Bible calls an abomination, they're celebrating. The United Methodist Church, I was listening to Albert Moeller briefing. If you ever wanna listen to him, this guy, I like his podcast. He's the president of the Southern Baptist Convention Seminary, but he's a smart guy and he just does a daily briefing, it's like 25 minutes long. But he was talking about the United Methodist Church, which let me read you what he said in his podcast. The United Methodist Church, which after these days is not so united. How could a denomination lose more than a million people in one day? We're talking about 1.2 million adherents just left in one day, the United Methodist Church. The United Methodist Church in the Ivory Coast, that's the African part of the United Methodist, they voted on May 28th to exit the denomination. This is the loss of 10% of the church in just one day, and it's a direct result in the theological liberalization and the absolute surrender of the United Methodist Church to the moral gender and LGBTQ revolutions. It's so sad because the church is being chiseled away and the church is more wanting to appease the LGBTQ alphabet soup than they want to please the God of heaven who gave us the Bible. And that's what we're seeing sadly today. Now, you know, if that's not crazy enough, the church celebrating homosexuality, you know, I still don't get these drag queen things. How can anyone think the drag queen thing is okay? Even if I wasn't a Christian, I think I'd be like, yeah, let's not have our kids sit in front of a guy that's dressed like a woman who's, you know, like, I just don't get it other than kind of a demonic thing. Here's a drag queen that is, you know, wanting to do reading time at the library. This happens all the time, by the way, but using a little song that maybe some of you recognize in trying to indoctrinate children about the Palestinian issue. Check this out. If you didn't know, this is crazy right here. Today what we're gonna do is we're gonna shout, Free Palestine. Can I hear that? Free Palestine! If you're a drag queen and you know it, shout, Free Palestine! If you're a drag queen and you know it, and you really want to show it, you're a drag queen and you know it, shout, bring it on. Excellent. Now who are these parents sitting in the background filming their kids being like, like this is just like this. If this isn't crazy enough, just what do you think, man, who would listen to that? Someone comes to the rescue on this just because if you're a thinking person, how would that guy do in Palestine? He would be hung from a crane by the neck or thrown off a tall building. It's illegal to be gay or like, you know, whatever, drag queen. It's illegal to do that in, you know, Palestinian Hamas-controlled Gaza, let alone most of the Middle East. If you were in Iran, by the way, dressed like that, they would hang you from a crane and let your body rot in the center of the city. And yet these guys are saying free Palestine. But if you thought that was crazy, wait till the drag queen starts figuring it out and smarter than... Well, I'll just show you. And so I did a study abroad in the Middle East with Israel and Palestine. Would you say you're pro-Palestine or pro-Israel? Pro-Palestine. As a gay man, I would be punished and or put in prison or killed if I were openly gay in Palestine. How do you react to that? I didn't know that. It is illegal to be gay in Palestine. You are punished by prison or death. Is this the same as Israel? No, Israel has gay pride. Israel is completely open to lesbian and gay people. Palestine puts them in prison or kills them. You weren't aware of that? I was not aware of that, no. So that does pose an interesting aspect. Have you seen the Queers for Palestine movement? It's a very common movement, but I don't see any Muslims for Queer movement. Uh, yes. That's where it gets grey, right? Like, that's where I feel like- Well, for me it's not grey. Just when you thought it couldn't get crazier. I mean, it's weird to almost for a second go, well, that guy is right. But it's just, we are so whacked out today. America and the United States thinking, so, excuse me. So this is, I don't know if you heard the first thing that she said. She said, I'm a student here and I'm studying Middle Eastern studies. So she needs her money back for her education that she's not getting about this. But this is just twisted. Every part of this is troubling to me. Meanwhile, something that is interesting, LA Times article, Americans approve of LGBTQ plus people living as they wish, but their support drops for trans people poll shows. This article just has a lot to say with a kind of a, snarky attitude, but basically the public offers less support for transgender and non-binary people. And support for all LGBTQ plus groups drops among Republicans. People who identify as Protestant and those who don't personally know anyone queer, the poll found. So it is interesting that I think this whole cramming it down people's throats, there's some people that are starting to realize that it's not cool. And there is a little bit of a pushback, which is kind of interesting. I hope that's true, not because I hate gay people, but because it's quite the opposite. We need to stop affirming things that's destroying people's lives. The suicide rate amongst homosexuals and transgender people is alarming. The disease and the trouble that homosexual people deal with is heartbreaking. Somebody needs to step in and say there's a better way. But you can be sure that our Portland students in Portland schools are not getting that. In the Oregonian, you saw this maybe just yesterday, Portland Teachers Union links to lessons urging students to pray to a law and write Biden to stop funding Israel. That's what your tax dollars are paying for. Lesson plans on Portland Teachers Union website drew condemnation from Jewish leaders in Portland this week. and that the union finally removed and reposted them on a more, moved to a different, more discreet location online. They urged public school students to pray, make posters, write letters to leaders in support of the Palestinians. This is a flag and a walkout of Portland high school students. They're walking out of their class. The school district supported the kids in this. See, where did the high school kids get the idea that this was a great idea? It's because they were taught that at their schools, and it's part of the Portland Teachers Union and all that. You know, all that to say, they're trying to push transgender and homosexual lifestyle and letting people be free to do whatever they want, but it's really so heartbreaking that people are buying this because people are hurting. If you really wanna be free, don't be free to just do sinful abominations. If you wanna be free, follow Christ. I love what John 8, 31 and 32 says, then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, if you continue in my word, then you are my disciples indeed, and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. I guess that must be my alarm, it's time for me to wrap up here. But, But freedom for any person, transgender, gay, overweight, angry, whatever your problem is or sin, we all need to turn to Jesus Christ. Jesus is our answer. Repenting of sin doesn't mean you're perfect. You'll still struggle with sin, but Christ wants to forgive you and save you and take you away from that yoke of slavery. So you really have a choice. You can choose the chaos and be in trouble and in bondage, or you can choose Christ to be freed up and liberated. Again, it's your choice. John 14, 27, I end with this. Jesus, this is the choice I made. I choose Jesus over chaos. Peace leave I with you. My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives, give I to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. This world is troubling. You can either be troubled by the chaos or you can be comforted by the Christ. It's up to you. It's up to me. Let's go the Jesus way. I hope all of you watching online, every watching this, that you choose Christ over chaos in Jesus' name. Lord, as we close up this prophecy update tonight, I pray that you'd just set our hearts in the right place. We do pray for the whole gay and lesbian and transgender community and how they are being affirmed by the world. But I pray, Lord, that you just convict their hearts and that more and more people would just see through the lies of the enemy, even the demonic nature of what we're seeing happening in our country, that more people would want to have this peace that only comes through your son, Jesus. I pray that the Christian church would point people to the light and that we would walk in the light as children of the day and not of the night. Help us to do what 1 Thessalonians 5 reminds us, to pray without ceasing and everything give thanks, rejoice evermore, that we would be sanctified and set apart in this dark world. Help us with that, Lord. This we pray, blessing. And we also pray blessing as much as possible on the Cinnabon that's out in the foyer, Lord. Bless that, bless the fellowship that takes place now in Jesus' name, amen.