And I'm not complaining, I'm
not. I'm just telling men back in the nursery, if the Lord don't
help you preach and the Lord don't give you understanding
and doesn't open the scriptures to you, I'd just be up here speaking
in an unknown tongue. There's so many times I wish
there was somebody else doing this. And I've not met a preacher
yet that didn't feel that way. Let's read these first six verses
of chapter 17. And there came one of the seven
angels, which had the seven vows, and talked with me, saying, come
hither, come hither. I will show unto thee the judgment
of the great whore that setteth upon many waters. with whom the
kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants
of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness, and
I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet colored beast full of names of
blasphemy, having seven heads and 10 horns, And the woman was
arrayed in purple and scarlet color and decked with gold and
precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full
of abominations and filthiness of her fornication. And upon
her forehead a name was written, Mystery Babylon of the great
mystery Babylon the great, the mother of harlots and abominations
of the earth. And I saw the woman drunk with
the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I wondered
with great admiration. And the angel said unto me, wherefore
didst thou marvel? I will tell thee the mystery
of the woman and of the beast that carried her, which has seven
horns, seven heads and 10 horns. The beast that thou sawest was
and is not, and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit and
go into perdition. And they that dwell on the earth
shall wonder whose names," now listen to this, whose names,
everybody's gonna wonder but these people, whose names were
not written in the book of the life from the foundation of the
world. We're not gonna wonder, we understand that God is controlling
everything. When they beheld the beast that
was and is not and yet is, he is the mind that hath wisdom.
The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sitteth. Gonna talk about the judgment
of Babylon. Now when you think about Babylon,
you think about the old time Babel and Babylon in the scriptures. and how abominable they were,
and how they mistreated God's people, and how they took them
into bondage, and tried to teach them their language. They had
music they had to dance to, great idols that they had to bow to,
certain areas that they had to pray to. So they had things that
there was great judgment come upon them if they didn't. And
that's when we find out about Daniel, Shadrach, and Meshach,
and Abednego. But in Revelation 7 through 19,
where we're going now, going on from here now, we have the
fall of the dragon and all of his allies. And the dragon, of
course, is Satan. We've seen to this point five
enemies of our Lord Jesus Christ, five enemies of our Lord Jesus.
The dragon, Satan. Oh, what an enemy he is of Christ.
What an enemy he is, that if our Lord hadn't defeated him,
we'd be, there'd be no hope for us. And there's the beast that
came up out of the sea. That's one of the enemies of
Christ. Then there was the beast that come up out of the earth,
which was the false prophet. And then here's the harlot Babylon. And then the fifth one is the
men with the mark of the beast. Now back in chapters 14 through
16, we saw happen to those who had the mark of the beast. God
destroyed them. God cast them down. God judged
them greatly. And then we had those seven angels
that poured out their vials of wrath upon the earth. And in this vision here, God,
John sees in symbolic picture what happens to Babylon. What happens to the beast out
of the sea and the false prophet. And we'll see Satan's final,
final defeat. And I'll tell you what, his final
defeat don't come till Revelations 20. So a broad outline, let me
give it to you if I can. Chapter 17 describes the nature
and history of that great harlot, Babylon. Babylon, Babylon. You know where Babylon started
at? Started in Genesis 11. That's where Babylon started
at. You know what happened? There's a great hunter named
Nimrod. And he gathered a whole bunch of people around and he
said, listen, I'll tell you what we're gonna do. We're gonna build
us a tower all the way to heaven. We're going to build us a tower
till we can get up to heaven itself. We don't need no other
way to get there. We can just build it ourselves.
We can surely make us a way to get to heaven. And they started
building them a tower. Started building them a tower.
And that's when everybody on the earth all spoke the same
language. And God, he said, he looked down and seen that bunch,
and he said, I'll tell you what, man, what a wicked human being
he is, and he made everybody start speaking a different language,
and none of them could understand one another, and they went here,
yonder, and everywhere else all over the world. But that's where
Bible started. Bible became Babylon, the great
city, the great nation of Babylon. And I'll tell you, you know,
you look at America, and you look at the world, and you look
at the nations, and you look at all the great nations of the
earth right now, and you can see Babylon. You can see Babylon. You can see it so plainly. And
then in chapter 18, we have the complete destruction and fall
of Babylon. We have the fall of Babylon.
In chapter 19, we have all the saints in heaven rejoicing because
God overthrew Babylon. And in there we have the marriage
supper of the Lamb. That's something to rejoice about.
And we see also the one who triumphs over Babylon, the false prophet
and the beast. And guess who he is. Guess who
he is. So I tell you, let's look at
the judgment of Babylon here. Judgment of Babylon. Now there
came one of the seven angels, which had the seven vows. One
of them, just one of them, seven of them, they had seven angels
with seven vows. One of those who had the seven
vows talked with me, told me, speaks friendly to John. And
he says, you come hither, I'm gonna show you something. I want
you to see something. And he showed him, he said, I
want you to see the judgment. And this is what he calls it,
the great horror which setteth upon many waters. And he said,
I want you to see what's gonna happen to this woman. I want
you to see what happens to this great harlot who sets herself
up over the whole world and seduces people and people go and they
get seducer. And she sets upon many waters.
Now you know what these waters are? Look down in verse 15, it
tells you what these waters are. And he saith unto me, the waters
which thou sawest were on the whore saideth, who are they?
Peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues. She ruled all over
the world. She ruled all over the world.
She sat on all these people and sat in all these nations. She
ruled in all these nations. Then he says, so he carried me
away, and he said, in verse three, he said, and he carried me away
in the spirit into the wilderness. He carried him now. He didn't
take him, he carried him over there. And he said, I want you
to see in the wilderness, I saw a woman. He said, no, and we
showed him this. I saw a woman set upon a scarlet-colored
beast. You know, our Lord said, though
your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. That's
what we say, Jesus paid it all. Though our sins were so black,
our sins were so dark, our sins were so awful, but the blood
of Christ washes them all. And this scarlet be sinful, though
your sins be as scarlet. And I tell you, this symbolizes
the world as it's the center of persecution. She's got all
this colored beast, garlic colored beast. And listen to this, and
this beast is full of the names of blasphemy. Blasphemy. Oh, how many times has God blasphemed
in this world at any given time? You know, I don't wanna say it
this, well, there's no other way to say it, but you take people,
You know, our own families, the very fact that they ignore God,
knowin' what we believe, knowin' what we preach, knowin' what
we stand for, knowin' what we bow down and worship to, the
very fact that they ignore Him, that's like blasphemin' God.
Say, God thumbs down on God. I don't need God. I don't need
anything about God. I don't want nothin' to do with
God. And I want to go to the world,
I want to go where there's fun, where there's a harlot ruling
in the world, and she's got all this pretty garment on, and she's
got the hair done up right, and she's got all this makeup on,
and she's just gorgeous. And that's the way the world
sees this world and all that's in it. And I all the time, and
this doesn't mean just one time in history, You know, this has
happened in history over and over and over again. Government
after government after government. And peoples, they follow one
another in history. You know how many governments
have been like this? How many governments? You go
back to when the world was first created. God said he saw the
imagination of man was only evil continually. Not just every once
in a while, only evil continually. And what did he say? He said,
I ain't gonna let man get by with this. And that's what's
the matter now. Oh, listen, now he came in there
and he saw in all these, history, look at history. Listen, all
the nations that's come up and all the people that's come up.
Listen to Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar, you know what
he said at one time? He stood up on Babylon, and they
say, and you know, history tells us that Babylon, the city around
it, was so wide that you could put seven chariots on it, and
ride around that thing with seven chariots, side by side, going
around that thing. They told about the wonder of
the world was the gardens of Babylon. Old Nebuchadnezzar stood
up there one day, and he said, hey, look at this great Babylon. Look at it. I built it. And I built it for my honor.
And I built it for my glory. And that's what everybody in
this world, this is mine. Old Scott used to say, bless
his heart, he'd get on it. He'd say, boy, people, you know,
they buy them a piece of property, and then they put them a mailbox
out there, you know, great big, and they put their name on it.
And then they put, no trespassing. No, no trespassing. They want
you to know, it's mine. It's mine. I paid for it. I bought
it. I worked for it. It's mine. And that's what this woman does.
And I think she's got this world so seduced and so corrupt and
so enticed that they think they're absolutely doing everything. They think they're having the
time of their life. The time of their life. And I
tell you, this beast has a woman sitting on it. They saw a woman
on this beast. Sitting on this beast. And I
tell you, her marriage is full of blasphemy. And look how this
woman was dressed now. She is dressed in purple. Purple
represents royalty and scarlet. And listen to this, she's decked
out with gold. Oh my goodness. In the margin
it says gilded. Oh, she is decked with gold.
She had precious stones and a golden cup in her hand. Boy, oh boy,
she looks nice, don't she? Man, she's got all these pearls
on. Rings on every finger. Oh my, she's got gold hanging
all off of her. She's got a golden cup in her
hand. I bet she's got something so tasty, so wonderful in that
cup. I bet, oh my, wouldn't you like
to have a drink of it? Well, look what it's full of.
Abominations. Filthiness of her fornication. Oh my. And that's what she says. He said, here, come have a drink
of my cup. And the world and the government,
all the governments come and say, give me a drink of that. The world says, give me a drink
of that. The government said, let me have
a drink, let me hold that cup and drink, have a drink out of
it. And I tell you what, God said this world's like a
drunk man staggering. And oh, she's dressed, she's
decked out. But I tell you, it's full of
abominations and filthiness of her fornication. And look what
happens to the people that drank of this cup. Back up there in
verse two, look what it says up there. With whom the kings
of the earth have committed fornication and the inhabitants of the earth
have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication. Oh,
we love this stuff. This makes us powerful, makes
us smart, makes us wise. And that's the first thing, the
first law that our first parents believed. You eat that fruit,
you're gonna be like God. You eat that fruit, you're gonna
be wise. You eat that fruit, you're gonna
have your eyes open. You eat that fruit, and you're
gonna know everything you need to know. And that's why she says,
you drink my cup. You drink my cup. She's dressed,
oh my goodness, she's beautifully dressed. And I tell you, that's
the way they entice people. And let me take a minute and
say this. You know, when people get drunk,
they do some of the awfulest things in the world. People that
get drunk, they just commit horrible, terrible acts. And she'd get
men drunk, she'd get these nations drunk on the wine of her fornication. But I'll tell you where the greatest
fornication and where she's deceived people more than any place else
is in religion. You go to Proverbs and it says
the way to her house is the way of death. And you take religion,
you know how abominable a religion is? How abomination it is? What blasphemous it is? How blasphemous
this is, you got people, and I'll name some names, Joel Osteen,
he's got tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of people
following him. And all he tells them is, is
how to live a good victorious life. And then you got all these soul
winners, and you got all these churches, and you got all the,
you got the Catholic Church, and I'm telling you what, you
talking about full of abomination. That's the most abominable thing
that God let exist on this earth, is the Catholic Church. Whenever a man can say he's a
vicar of Christ, that he's taking Christ's place on the earth, And that you can't get your sins
taken care of until you go to a man? That you pray to Mary instead
of Christ? And then here's the most abominable
thing that you can imagine. Oh man and his mighty free will. You gotta have a chance. God's gonna give you a chance,
and if you're cooperating when he gives you a chance, then you
can be saved. And everything's left up to you,
your free will. You gotta make the choice. God's
got a wonderful plan for your life if you can just find it.
Well, he had a wonderful plan for his son's life, too. He sent
him into this world to live. Not for himself, but for the
glory of God. He sent him in this world to
live. Not for himself, but for those given to him before the
foundation of the world. He lived not for himself, but
he lived to die and bear our sins in his own body on that
tree. God had a wonderful plan for
his life. Son, you're going down there to die. You're going down
there to shed blood. You're going down there to be
humiliated, and spit on, and slapped, and beaten, and then
nailed to a tree, and mopped while you're hanging on that
tree naked. Oh, he had a wonderful plan for his life. And see, what
a wonderful plan he's had for you. Sunshine and roses, ain't
it? Tea and crumpets, bonbons. Oh, I tell you, he said this
is a bomb. These people are drunk on religion. The world, our government's
drunk. Every other government doesn't.
Why? Because this queen, she sits there. She's dressed so beautifully.
That's what John meant when he said, the lust of the eyes, the
lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. Oh, my. Oh, and all of hers drank this
cup, and look what it says how they got, what they also got
drunk on. Look down at verse 6. And I saw the woman, now, this
woman, this woman, this, well, it's
back to verse 5. I'm getting ahead of myself.
And upon her forehead was a name written. Now, oh, God's only
one knows this, can see this. Babylon, the great mother of
Harlots. First of all, she's a mother.
She produces children. She produces children just like
herself. Harlots. Harlots. And abominations of
the earth. She's the mother of all the abominations
on this earth. And there's certainly some abominations.
And then look what it says. And they got drunk, and I saw
the woman, I saw the woman, drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of martyrs,
and I wondered with great admiration, I stood in absolute marvel, I
don't understand what's going on, that's what John said. Drunk
with the blood of God's people, drunk with the blood of the martyrs, And the angel said to John, why
do you stand in here marveling? I'm gonna tell you the mystery
of this woman and of the beast that carries her which has the
seven heads and seven horns. He don't grasp the meaning, so
the angel said, I'm gonna explain it to you, I'm gonna explain
it to you. And look what he says in verse seven, verse eight.
He said, this heart, the beast that thou sawest, this heart
of Babylon, and what Babylon represents. She's called a great
harlot. That which allures and tempts,
seduces, draws people away from God. This harlot's a worldly
city. Worldly city. Pleasure mad. Arrogant, presumptuous, just
like Babylon of old. You go back and you read about
Tyre, Sidon, Nineveh, Sodom and Gomorrah, all these great, great
civilizations at one time were. There was one great, great, the
Syrian Empire. They come and try to take Jerusalem
one time and they had over 185,000 men. How would you like to have 185,000
men surround you? So they've always been these
people that's just trying to destroy God's people, get drunk
on the blood of God's people. And you know what they said?
They said, don't trust your God. Everybody else trusted their
God and we conquered them. And that's what they say. They
made that great statue there of Daniel. I mean, he was a big
old thing. And they said, you got to bow
down to him. When you hear the music start, get on your face
right quick. Everybody did. Daniel didn't. And that's what happened. That's
what he said. Everybody's in wonder about this.
The only people who don't. The only people who understand.
and enticed and allured away from this, from Christ, and allured
into the world, and allured by this beauty, and allured by this
false religion, allured by the world and its glory, and its
pomp, and its honor, and its ambition, and its arrogance,
and its presumption. We're not allured by it, why?
Because our names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life. Huh? And oh my. And a city that's
full, and he talks about a city, and a city that's full of wealth,
art, commerce, culture, to entice, seduce, and turn from God. Oh my. I know people that, that
they, when they want to build a house, they
want to build a million dollar house. They don't, You know,
a house like you and I live in, that's plenty enough for, you
know, two people. Why do two people need a house
that's a million and a half dollars, or two, three, four billion dollars?
Why do people need that? They've been enlived, they've
been enticed, and they want a glory. They want everybody to know how
successful they are, and how powerful they are, and how mighty
they are. And I tell you that God help
us. Don't ever be enticed away from that. Did any of y'all ever
go to Scott Richardson's house? He lived in a little old bitty
four room house. Little old bitty four room house.
There's four rooms in it. One little bitty bathroom. He
raised four sons in that house. And he never asked for any better.
He never thought that I deserved better. Henry Mahan lived in a very modest
house. I'm telling you, what I'm telling
you is that God's people are different. This world does not mean, we're
like Abraham, and I said this morning, God gave us a promise
in Christ, and he fulfilled that promise in Christ. We grab that
promise and put it up to our heart, and we're gonna hold it
right there when God calls us home. And when we do that, we're
saying, I'm a stranger, I'm a pilgrim in this world. I'm looking for
a city whose builder and maker is God, whose foundations God
himself laid. That's what I'm looking for.
This world, I tell you, you ask me all the time, how's the world
treating me? I said, the world has never, ever treated me good. Has the world ever been good
to you? You know why you have to go out
in it? You gotta make a living. And just as quick as you possibly
can, when you get done with your day, you're gonna hold just as
fast as a marten to its gourd, thankful that you got to the
end of another day and you don't have to deal with it anymore
today. Let's go home and let's find a place to rest. And that's
why you come over here tonight, because, oh, I've had enough
of this world. I gotta go get cleansed again, gotta get washed
again. Huh, ain't that right? Oh my. And when we view Babylon, this
mystery of Babylon this way, you look at its past and its
present and future, it forms changes, but it always stays
the same. And her and her beast are so
close that she sets upon this beast, and they derive their
power from one another. And I tell you, look what he
goes on to say now. And then verse eight. Now I just go down to here. I
think that's where I left off. The beast that thou sawest was,
and he's not now. And he shall ascend out of the
bottomless pit. God doesn't have him in the bottomless
pit. He's gonna ascend out of the bottomless pit and go into
perdition, into damnation. And they that dwell on earth,
they're just gonna absolutely wonder, just like it says over
in 2 Thessalonians, they just absolutely stand in wonder and
amazement over there at that mystery of iniquity. And they
wonder whose names were not written in the book of the life from
the foundation of the world, when they beheld the beast that
was and is not, and yet he still exists. And look what he says
here, and here's the mind that hath wisdom. And this is very
easy to understand. I believe it is all seven mountains
on which the woman sits. Now in John's day, Rome was the
most powerful government in the world. I mean it reached all
over the world. All roads led to Rome. They was
in Great Britain. Bath is named after the baths
that the Roman Empire built. They built roads all the way
into England. all over the world. And I tell
you, Rome was, this beast was in the form of Rome in John's
day. You know why? She seduced Rome to such an awful
state that they persecuted the saints. And you know what they
did? They had the Roman circus. You read this stuff in history.
Give you a little history lesson. They had the Roman circus. And
what they'd do, thousands would come to this circus. And they'd
use Christians in that circus. And they'd put them out there,
and then they'd turn a line over here, and a tire out over there.
And they'd let them charge at them.
And they'd start chomping on them, start chomping on them. Bones breaking, blood squirting. And them Romans would jump up
and scream and holler and clap and say, boy, oh boy, what entertainment,
what entertainment. They would put them up, hang
them up, and let them animals jump up
and try to get them. And then it became, under an
emperor named Domitian, it was against the law, against the
law to be a Christian. It was against the law. You reckon
they'll ever pass a law like that in America? I don't think they'll do it in
my lifetime, but I believe they'll do it one of these days, just
as sure as God's on His throne. It'll be, we cause too much trouble. We won't mind the government
enough. And oh my, she seduced the saints. Roman Babylon filled with vanity,
luxury, and pleasure. Look over here at chapter 4,
18 in verse 4, look what God tells us to do now. Because we
don't see our downfall yet. Look what God says, I heard another
voice from heaven saying, come out of her my people. that you be not the taker of
her sins, and that you receive not of her plagues. God called
us out of this great heart, called us out of this world that's so
powerful and so seducing, so seducing. I could say a lot of things about
a lot of things, but I tell you, To me, it's obvious as the nose
on your face in the way this world is right now. Babylon's
all around us. And everybody's, you know, the
world and the governments and my children and some of your
children and my grandchildren and all adults, they're drunk
on this seduction of the world. Seduction of the world. It's
sad, ain't it? That's sad. But ain't you glad
God said, come out? That's where he got me at.