Before getting into the word tonight, I want to say just a word about the book table. One of the frustrating things about a conference is you bring messages, this week's ten messages, but there's so much more to be said than you can possibly cover in one week. And for this reason, I like to bring my books along and put them in the hands of people where they can read them perhaps for years to come and profit by this conference. Now, my purpose in doing this is not a commercial one. It's the idea to get the books in the hands of the Lord's people because books in the warehouse don't help anybody. They have to be in the homes and studies and the minds and reading of Christians in order to be profitable in the Lord's hands. Now, I've attempted to bring some of my books along, and in some case, I'm able to give a very substantial discount. And one of the important books on the book table is what we call the Bible Knowledge Commentary. This is a commentary that Scripture Press Victor Books asked the Dallas Seminary faculty to write some ten years ago and more. And we produced two volumes, the Old Testament, fifteen hundred pages and the New Testament, a thousand pages. It has a hundred maps and charts of various sorts. It's an explanatory commentary that takes the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation and explains what it means. Now it's my theory that every Christian home should have a commentary that they can trust, and when they come to a portion of Scripture that isn't clear to them, they can turn to the commentary in the right place and find the answer. And that's exactly what these books do. And because I'm selling it at half price, it's very affordable, and I trust you'll examine it on the book table. We've sold some four hundred thousand copies of them. In order to get this discount for you, I have to buy a thousand volumes at once. But this enables me to give the bookstore a good discount and they can pass it on so the discount is some fifty percent. Now I also have a book that's unusual on the book table called the Prophecy Knowledge Handbook. I've written a number of books on prophecy and the publishers have been after me to write one book that explains all the prophecies of the Bible. There's nothing in print like this as far as I know. And so I wrote this book. It's eight hundred pages. It starts in Genesis and moves through all the prophetic passages of Scripture through the book of Revelation and gives an explanatory comment on them so that you can understand them. In the process, I covered one thousand passages on prophecy, sometimes single verses, sometimes whole chapters that are part of the prophetic word. And here you have in one volume, which you'd probably have to buy a hundred copies, a hundred volumes to equal and you have the explanation of all the prophecies of the Bible. So you'll find that also at fifty percent off. It's a wonderful book selling for fifteen dollars only. You have all the prophecies of the Bible explained. Then I have a number of other books in prophecy and some that aren't in prophecy. There's major Bible prophecies which covers thirty-seven doctrines of the Bible, topically prophecies of the scripture and trace them through the Bible. There's still another book called just prophecy that takes a more simple approach of fifteen doctrines And then, of course, the book that outsold all the others, Armageddon, all the Middle East Crisis, which we wrote back in seventy-four and then renewed in ninety-one, which was written to explain end-time prophecy to a non-Christian. And if it's true of you as it is sometimes of Christians, they're not entirely clear as to how the prophetic future unfolds. This book will tell you, because it gives you charts of the prophecies about Israel, in order and the prophecies about the nations and prophecies about the church and list the prophetic events as they will occur in the future. And it's an inexpensive book and you can buy that and get a grounding in prophecy. Then there's many other books like Revelation and Daniel commentaries and there's also a book on major Bible themes which covers fifty-two doctrines of the Bible. So help yourself and see what you can find on the book table be of help to you. The seminaries also sent me some free literature, our Kindred Spirit Magazine, which is free, and it's out on the table near the door. Help yourself. And also a few copies of our quarterly Bibliotheca Sacra, which is a scholarly journal, but some of you might be interested in it, and they're all free. And you can get the Kindred Spirit a year for nothing by simply asking for it by postcard. Now, this week I'm attempting to demonstrate that the Bible... gives us solid evidence that the rapture of the church is near. And as I explained on Sunday night in the first message, the rapture does not give any signs of the rapture in the Bible. But what we are seeing in the world is a setting of the stage for the major events that will follow the rapture. And because these very strikingly have come into focus in the last fifty years, It gives us some solid basis for believing that Christ could come anytime and come soon to take his church home. Now, we considered the matter from a popular standpoint, as it's faced in the Gulf War, is Armageddon ahead. Now, Armageddon is a geographic location in northern Israel. I've been there as a tourist. Maybe you have two. It's literally the Mount of Megiddo. Arm is mountain, and Megiddo is from Megiddo. And you can get on top of this mountain. It's not much of a mountain. It's about eight hundred feet high. And if you look to the west, you can see the Mediterranean Sea. And to the east, there's a broad valley that stretches out for many miles and opens up into several other valleys, which will be the focus point for the final world war that's underway just before Christ returns. And Armageddon has come to symbolize the final war between God and man and the judgment of God upon a wicked world. And so Armageddon has captured the imagination of people. And of course it's mentioned in Revelation sixteen that he gathered the armies in a place called Armageddon or the Mount of Megiddo. Now tonight I want to continue that study and this time take a look at what the Bible predicts about a coming world government. This again is something that's come into focus in the last fifty years. I don't think before the twentieth century that anybody really contemplated one empire covering all the nations of the world. And yet that now is in foreview. And after World War I, there was the United Nations, or rather the League of Nations, they called it, and attempted to organize that our own Congress wouldn't back it, and so it fell apart. But then after World War II, the United Nations was formed. And while it's not what the Bible predicts, It indicates how people who are thinking through the problems of our world say that the ultimate solution for our problems is one government that covers the whole world that is led by perhaps a dictator or a ruler at the top. Of course, that's exactly what the Bible teaches, when it teaches that it will not come about in any useful way, any good way until Christ returns and brings in His millennial kingdom. But before that ever happens, the Bible predicts there will be a world government in the Middle East that will be in power for the years just before the second coming. Now I believe it's very important in our study of prophecy to have in mind the background of major future events. And I find it's very rare in a prophecy conference that any speaker takes time to do that, but I think it's so important to know your point of reference. Now there's a series of important things, and you perhaps have not heard this quite this way before, until Sunday night at least. I want to get it firmly in your mind because this is our point of reference when we start looking at future events that are going to take place. Now the next event, I believe, is the rapture of the church. Christ coming for his own, and we're going to be considering that especially on Thursday morning and again on Thursday night. Christ coming for his own, what the Bible teaches about it. And that's the next event. It could occur any time we believe could occur tonight. When that occurs, the Bible describes the world situation, particularly in Europe, and tells us that there will be a revival of the Roman Empire. Now, we're not told when that takes place, but it seemingly is in place at the time of the rapture or shortly thereafter. See, the Roman Empire was the great empire of the past when Christ was on earth and has died out now, but it's going to be revived as we saw Sunday evening in the form of ten countries banded together. And as I pointed out, the situation in Europe today is precisely in place for that because, for the first time in history, the nations of Europe are not fighting each other and are not preparing to fight each other because of the atomic bomb. It's useless now to have such a war. And so now they're beginning to unite in what the secular world tells us is going to be United States of Europe. Now, the Bible doesn't give us the names of the ten countries involved. It could include some from Western Asia and Northern Africa that also is in the Roman Empire, but in any case it would be predominantly European, and of course that's the situation we face in the world tonight. So the very fact that that's in existence now, especially since the fall of the Berlin War and coming apart of Russia and the Soviet Union, all this points to the idea that we could be very close to the rapture and the revival of this empire. The first event, then, is the rapture. The second event is the revival of the Roman Empire. The third event is a dictator who arises, and as we saw, he's going to conquer three in all ten countries. And that's going to take place, I think, very quickly. There's no time frame given in the Bible for this, but I assume it'll just be a year or two at the most. It's going to come very quickly once end-time events begin to unfold. When he gets to that place of power, the fourth situation is going to arise. And he's going to impose a seven-year peace treaty on Israel. And this is very important because for the first time, you have a specific time frame, seven years, that will climax in the second coming of Christ. Now, these seven years are divided into two halves. The first half is the time of peace, and the second half is the time of great tribulation, world government, and world chaos, as the Bible describes it, which will climax in the second coming of Christ. Now the Bible also predicts that before Christ ever comes back, there will be a world government with a world dictator. And I want you to see how that's found in the scriptures tonight because we're living in a world where this now is a possibility. And I want you to see how in the lifetime of you and me, there is a great preparation for just exactly such a situation. and such an outcome. Turn once again to Daniel chapter seven. In this chapter, Daniel is talking about the four great empires of Gentile history, beginning in Babylon, meet of Persia, and Greece, and then finally, Rome. And of course, the Roman Empire was the greatest of all the empires. In chapter two, you recall this was involved in the image of Nebuchadnezzar, which Daniel explained when he was still a youth. Then many years later, more than forty years later, Daniel, after the Babylonian Empire had been destroyed and conquered by the Medes and Persians, he had a series of four visions. And the first one is found in chapter seven of Daniel, and he sees these same four empires as four beasts. And we concentrated on the fourth one, the Beast of the Great Iron Teeth, and pointed out how that was graphically fulfilled in the conquest of the Roman Empire back in the early centuries of the Christian era. But there is also an intimation here that this would end up in a world government. If you'll turn to chapter seven of Daniel, verse seven talks about the ten horns, which are described as ten kings in verse twenty-four. But then in verse eight it goes on to say, I was considering the horns and there another horn was A little one came up among them, before whom three of the first horns were plucked up by the roots, and there in this horn were eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth speaking pompous words. In other words, he's a dictator, he's a man, and he gains control of three of those ten countries, and from there on the scriptures without explaining how describe him as the leader of all ten nations. And so he's this future ruler. and he'll come on the scene after the church is raptured and after the Roman Empire has been formed. Now, we constantly see people who are trying to identify who he is, and it's utterly futile. I was in a prophecy conference recently where one speaker spent a whole hour trying to prove that he was King Alfonso of Spain. And there's been all sorts of other nominations. very prominent radio television prophecy teacher, said it might be Clinton if he had a second term. Well, he must be a Republican, I guess. And then in our twentieth century, you've had John Kennedy nominated. We've had Mussolini. He seemed to be a ripe candidate to head up a Roman Empire as the ruler of Italy. And then they had Hitler, you know, and Stalin. It always goes back in history. Almost every generation is that somebody who people try to identify as the man of sin, this ruler. But, of course, it's all so futile. I believe the Bible makes it very clear that until the church is raptured and gone, this man cannot be identified. We're going to see that when we get for a brief moment and Thursday on Second Thessalonians, too. And so this is the man we're talking about, this coming world ruler. Now in verse twenty-three of Daniel seven, it anticipates this very briefly, but this is what it says. The fourth beast shall be a fourth kingdom on earth, which shall be different from all other kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth and trample it and break it in pieces. Here is a prophecy that this man will become a world ruler. Now there's a number of pastors that speak of this. You go to chapter eleven of Daniel. He's talking about the end time wars. And he describes the king in verse thirty-six of Daniel eleven. The king shall do according to his will. He shall exalt and magnify himself above every God and shall speak blasphemies against the God of God and shall prosper till the wrath has been accomplished for what has been determined shall be done. It goes on in this passage, particularly verse forty and on. to describe the final world war as armies see-saw up and down the land of Israel and struggle for domination. He is this future world ruler. Now as we move on to the New Testament, the book of Revelation, we have a whole chapter dedicated to this. Now I know the book of Revelation has to do with the revelation of Jesus Christ. In other words, when he comes back in his second coming, We are told that every eye will see him. Now, that's not true at the rapture, but this is true of the second coming, because the sky will be alive with the glory of God and the millions of saints and angels that will accompany Christ from heaven to earth. We have this described for us in Revelation, verse eleven, and the following. Now, the book of Revelation unfolds, do you remember? John, the apostle, is given a vision of heaven, and he's introduced to this scroll, this parchment rolled up on a roller. in heaven and has seven seals on the side. And the question is raised, who is worthy to open the book? And of course, Christ is the one who is considered worthy. And as this scroll is unrolled, it signals great events. I'm going to talk about these more tomorrow night in connection with the end time catastrophes the world is facing. But when each of these seals is broken, it signifies an event. And then when the seventh seal is broken, it introduces a second series of sevens, which are called trumpets of angels. And these are described in the book of Revelation. And each one is a catastrophe that covers a third of something in the earth, one after the other, a port on the earth. And then when the fourth, when the seventh seal is, seventh trumpet sounds, out of this comes in chapter sixteen, a third series of sevens. that are called bowls or wrath of the wrath of God. They're bowls that are full, that are poured out on the earth. Now, that's the structure of the book of Revelation. And right after those seven bowls of the wrath of God, I believe the second coming of Christ occurs. Now, periodically in the book of Revelation, while that's the sequence chronologically, it seems to be, there is a pause, and as it were, The focus of prophecy focuses on a single aspect of the situation. I think it's Dr. Ironside that describes this like a person climbing up a mountain road where the road's been cut out of the side of the mountain, and he climbs and climbs. He comes to a broad place in the road. Then he can turn around and see where he came from. He also can look up the mountain and see where he's going. In other words, it's a panoramic thing. There's a number of these what we call parenthetic chapters in the book of Revelation. And one of these is found in chapter thirteen, where the spotlight of prophecy focuses on this world government that I believe is going to take place in those last three and a half years, the time when this ruler of the ten nations becomes so powerful, he proclaims himself ruler over the entire world. Now this is what John writes. I stood on the sand of the sea, and I saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, And on his horns ten crowns and on his heads a blasphemous name. Now this takes you right back, of course, to Daniel seven, to the ten horns and the heads of these ten horns. Now the beast which I saw was like a leopard. His feet were like the feet of a bear. His mouth like the mouth of a lion. And the dragon, we learned the previous chapter, is Satan. The dragon gave him his power. his throne and great authority. Now, remember in chapter seven in Daniel, the four empires are described as animals. Babylon is described as a lion, Medo-Persian. The second empire is described as a bear. It's not Russia. It's Medo-Persia. And then the third empire is that of Greece. It's the leopard, signaling the rapid conquest of Alexander the Great, the king of Greece. Then the fourth empire is what we talked about, the beast with the great iron teeth. Now, that is here before us. It's obvious that it's talking here about the final stage of that fourth beast, or, in other words, about the future revival of the Roman Empire. Now, this beast is described as having the characteristics of the previous empires. In other words, he was like a leopard. In other words, like Alexander the Great in his Grecian Empire. He had the feet of a bear. In other words, he was like the muted person empire. And then... He had the mouth of a lion. That, of course, speaks of Babylon. You see, as these empires succeeded each other, they absorbed what they took from the past, so that they had the same territory, some of the same characteristics. Only the Roman Empire was by far the greatest of them all. Now, we learn here that the dragon or Satan gave this final ruler, this world ruler, his power, his throne, and great authority. In other words, there's not simply a great leader here that is recognized, but there is satanic, supernatural power backing this person. In fact, he comes on the world scene as a supernatural person, as you read on this passage and find out. So this is this final world ruler, and the spotlight is on him. Now, in verse three, it says something that caused endless speculation. I saw one of his heads. Remember there were seven heads? I saw one of his heads as if it were mortally wounded, and his deadly wound was healed, and all the world marveled and followed the beast. Now, what does that deadly wound? Well, in the course of human church history, there's been all sorts of explanations that this man is actually someone who died and is resurrected. And they name all sorts of people such as I've already named as the future world ruler, some of whom are now dead. Of course, some nominate Judas Iscariot and Nero. And all through history, dynamic leaders of various kinds are sometimes pictured as fulfilling this picture. But, of course, none of them did. And now in the future, they say one of these people out of the past is going to be resurrected to fulfill that role. Now, I think they're wrong because Revelation chapter one, states very clearly that only Christ has the power to raise somebody from the dead. And it doesn't make sense to me that Christ would raise somebody from the dead to be the Antichrist. See, that's a contradiction to me. So it must have another explanation. Now there are several explanations. Probably the most plausible one is that this ruler suffers an assassination attempt, and he receives a wound that would normally cause death. Now, a lot of people don't realize that Satan has supernatural power. He can heal. And I take it he heals this wound before it causes this man's death. Now, that's in the realm where satanic power will work. But the point is, when he comes on the scene of the last days before the second coming of Christ, he comes on the scene as a person who is supernaturally empowered. He's empowered by Satan, of course. That's what it tells us. And it tells us that the world, they worshiped the dragon, that's Satan, who gave authority to the beast, and they worshiped the beast, saying, who is like the beast, who is able to make war with him? The beast is this ruler that is described here in this passage. So this is this future world leader. Now, we have, of course, all sorts of nominations for this person. And... There's been all sorts of explanations given. I get letters all the time from people who think they have solved the problem, who the Antichrist is. I don't know if you've ever read any of them, but if you read any book on Revelation, you'll find page after page covering some of these things. Now, the point is that in ancient languages like Greek and Latin, the letters of their alphabet also had numerical value. Now, we're most familiar with Latin. where a V is a five and a C is a hundred and X is ten and so on. And we can have what we call Roman numbers just by assembling the right letters that add up to what we want it to be. And so they try to find somebody whose name in the past, if you give numerical equivalency to his name, will add up for six, six, six. Later on in this passage it talks about that. And of course that's quite a game. Back when Kissinger was Secretary of State because he has Jewish background, some people thought he was the Antichrist, and they figured out that if A equals six and B equals twelve and C equals eighteen and so on, it's adding six in each letter, you take the last name of Kissinger and take the numerical equivalent of the letter, it adds up to six, six, six. It does. The problem is, in the course of human history, there's been dozens of them that have had that same thing. Another way of computing it is that A equals one and B equals one hundred and two, and so short names could be chosen, and they try to identify Judas or somebody else as this Antichrist, this world ruler. And, of course, they've all been wrong. I don't think any of them have been right up till now, and I'm not sure that's what it means. And it says that he was given a mouth... Speaking great things and blasphemies, he was given authority to continue for forty-two months. Now, people sometimes complain the book of Revelation has got so much symbolism, you can't understand it. Well, along with the symbolism, there's a lot of literal things. And here it tells us exactly how long he's going to reign. Forty-two months or three and a half years. The last three and a half years, you see, of that seven-year period that's pictured in Daniel nine-twenty-seven. and it's going to culminate in the second coming of Christ. But meanwhile, he's allowed authority and blasphemed God and persecutes the saints. It says in verse six that he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God to blaspheme his name, his tabernacle, and those who dwells in heaven. It was granted to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And authority was given him over every tribe, kindred, and tongue. every tongue and nation. In other words, he is described as a ruler over the entire world, something that's never been true of anyone before. Now, what's happening, of course, is that Satan is trying to promote this man who's allied with Satan to be a substitute for Jesus Christ, who is the true king of kings and lord of lords, and who in his millennial kingdom will rule over the whole earth. See, that's what they're trying to imitate. Satan is the great imitator He wants to be like the Most High. That was his original downfall in heaven. He started out as a holy angel but sinned because he wanted to be like the Most High. And that's been his goal ever since. He wants to be worshipped and obeyed just like God is worshipped and obeyed. And this is going to be his hour of triumph that God permits. Now it also tells us in verse eight that all who dwell on the earth will worship him. whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. There's going to be universal worship of this man except for those who come to Christ in that day. And the world is going to have a final form of world religion, which will be satanic in its power, and worship a man instead of the true God. And actually, as we go back to the Old Testament... To Daniel chapter eleven, we learn this man is an atheist. He doesn't regard any God above himself, as we saw in verse thirty-six when I read it. In other words, he's a person who takes the place of God, and people are going to worship him. And this is going to be the final form of world religion. Now it goes on to describe that in verse nine and following. If anyone has an ear, let them hear. There's always an appeal to individuals to listen and respond. He who leads into captivity shall go into captivity. He who kills with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and faith of the saints. In other words, the evils of the world are going to continue. We're not going to have peace. We're not going to have justice. These things are alluding us now in our present world. Our world is getting worse and worse instead of better and better. And we'll continue to do that till this final out form of evil in that great tribulation, this great time of trouble. And at that time, Christ will return and establish his kingdom and put into judgment all these wicked people. Now in verse eleven we have a second individual mentioned. Now the man of sin or this world ruler is mentioned in the Old Testament as I pointed out in Daniel seven eight and Daniel eleven thirty six in following and it's mentioned in the New Testament. Here it's mentioned as one of the heads of the beast. It becomes a world ruler. But there's a man who assists him. And this is the only passage that really talks about him. And he's called a prophet. In verse eleven it tells us this. Then I saw another beast, that is another individual, coming up out of the earth and he had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon. Now he looked like a lamb, that is he's meek, but he's actually a representative of Satan. And he exercises all the authority as a first beast in his presence. and caused the earth and those that dwell in it to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed. You see, his purpose is to induce the entire world to worship this world ruler. Now, some have pointed out that this is what is called an evil Trinity. You know, in our Christian faith, we have God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. and the Son reveals the Father, and the Holy Spirit causes us to worship the Father and the Son. Now here, in this end time, we have Satan's counterfeit of that, where the devil takes the place of God the Father. This world ruler, this man of sin, takes the place of Jesus Christ as King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and this false prophet takes the place of the Holy Spirit that causes people to worship the other two. And so there's so-called evil Trinity, as mentioned here. Now it says in verse thirteen, he performs great signs so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. A lot of people don't realize that Satan can be supernatural in his power. And you and I are delivered as Christians from some of that because if it wasn't for that, we wouldn't have any freedom at all. I think Satan would kill every Christian who has any kind of testimony if God didn't protect him. We see that illustrated in the book of Job or Satan could get at you, but only as far as God permitted. And that's still true for the Christian today. And to get to heaven, we're going to realize how much God protected us from evil that could have been if he hadn't protected us. And that's, of course, true here. He performs these great signs, even causes fire to come down from heaven. What he's trying to do is to prove that the first ruler is God. And it says in verse fourteen, he deceives those who dwell on the earth, by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on earth to make an image of the beast who is wounded by the sword and lived. Now, one of the things this ruler is going to do, at the beginning of that last three and a half years, was referred to by Christ in Matthew twenty four, fifteen and following, where he predicts, according to Daniel, that there will be a desecration of the Jewish temple. in that time. Now, the Jewish temple doesn't exist today, but we believe somewhere in the sequence of future events it's going to be built. We don't know where. The Bible doesn't say it, but presumably on the holy site on the Mount there in Jerusalem, where the mosque Omar is today, or in that area at least. There's a lot of debate about this, but this is not something you have to worry about because this takes place, at least it's fulfilled, after the church is gone. But he's going to desecrate that, and he's going to set up an idol of himself to be worshipped. Now we read here that he's going to create this idol. In verse fifteen, he was granted, he granted power to give breath to the image of the beast. That the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast who would be killed. Now I think we've all seen dummies like this that are made that look so lifelike. Now we don't know whether this is supernatural or natural, but it's going to appear like he was able to resurrect this image and make it alive. Now apparently he symbolizes breath, but he doesn't actually raise anything from the dead here. This beast is not alive, but apparently he fools people into thinking he has, and that's going to cause them to worship the beast. And then verse sixteen says he causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive the mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one might buy or sell except one who has the mark of the name of the beast or the number of his name. Here's wisdom, that him who has understanding calculates the number of the beast, for it's the number of a man, his number is six, six, six. Now, this is a very mysterious thing, and again, commentaries go on for pages trying to discuss this. But the point is that in the end time, everybody will be required to worship this world ruler in order to get a mark which will permit him to buy or sell. Well, there's nothing very mysterious about that. It's possible to mark living creatures. They do that all the time even now. They mark fish, they mark birds, they mark cattle, and they trace their migration and so on by this means. And I once had a book, perhaps a hundred pages, given to me of all the different ways that a person can be marked, possibly without any disfigurement of their own skin, their hands, or forehead, but marked so that they could be identified as a worshiper of the beast. In fact, now they even think they're going to have some electronic means of doing that. And I'm not concerned about the method because it's perfectly natural for this to take place. But the point is, they're going to have to have the number of the beast, which is six, six, six. And as I pointed out, there have been lots of speculation as to what that six, six represents. Now, if you read the passage carefully here, you'll find that it gives us an indication of it. It says that the number of the beast is the number of a man. Now, I'm not sure that we'll understand this completely. We're not going to be here when it happens, so don't get uptight about it. We're going to be up in heaven if you're a Christian. But what does it mean? Well, you see, in the book of Revelation, seven is the perfect number. And you have seven seals, and you have the seven trumps, and you have the seven bowls of the wrath of God. You have the seven thunders. There's a series of seven. These are always the perfect number. Now, this man is claiming to be God. Now, if he is God, he ought to be seven, seven, seven. But he's only six, six, six. You see, he falls short of being what God is. And I think that's the point of the number. Now, when the time comes, no doubt it'll be a method of identification. Now, we have a lot of forerunners of this, and sometimes prophecy teachers go off the deep end on this because there's so many ways by which people can be identified. You know, we have credit cards now. And the problem with credit cards, they can be stolen or imitated or forged. And how wonderful it would be if every person would have something on his person like his hand or his forehead that would clearly identify him that couldn't be transferred to anybody else and couldn't allow them to get something on your credit. Now we're living in electronic times already. You go to a chain store and make a purchase and they ring it up on what looks like a cash register. Actually it's inquiring perhaps of a computer it's a thousand miles away whether you have an account with that firm. and whether your credit's good. If it does, your purchase is charged against your account. At the same time, the computer records what you bought, this number, its color, its size, and so on, and stores that in the computer so when this item gets low in supply, they can reorder automatically. It's all done electronically in just a few seconds. And, of course, that's true now, isn't it? We used to wonder how... Anybody could keep track of all the transactions of the world. We have giant computers that could do that now. When you back off from this, what do you learn? The world is headed for a world government, and it's going to come. It's not going to come before the rapture, but it's going to come. Do we see any indications of it? Yes. That's one of the amazing things of our generation, that while there are no signs for the rapture, this is one of the major signs... that were nearing the end. You see, before the twentieth century, there wasn't any sign of a major world government. But today, it's different, isn't it? Now, what do you have to have to have a world government? It's rather interesting to me that in my lifetime, I've seen this question answered. You first of all have to have rapid transportation. And this has become a major item in our twentieth century. We have giant planes now. that can carry men and supplies around the world, a matter of hours. And, of course, that's the present reality. That's all developed in the last fifty years. Now, when the Gulf War broke out, you remember, Kuwait was invaded and conquered in short order, and President Bush ordered airborne troops from the United States into Saudi Arabia. Now, they weren't a large force, and they probably weren't anywhere near a match for the invaders of Kuwait. But now the problem was that Saddam Hussein invaded Saudi Arabia. He'd be attacking American troops. He didn't want to do that. So he stopped. Now just think what would happen if all this had taken place fifty years ago. Fifty years ago we didn't have these giant planes. Fifty years ago we'd had to use boats. It would have taken us months to get men and supplies and arms to the Middle East. And he would have had time to conquer the whole Middle East before we ever got there, you see. and the only way to uproot it would have been a world war. So you see how dramatically different suddenly things have become in the matter of world transportation. In fact, our own United States won its independence from Great Britain because back in those days the only connection were sailboats. It took weeks to go back and forth with men, supplies, and commands. And it was just too tenuous, it wasn't enough, and we were able to win our independence. But you see, today we do have rapid transportation as many of us have experienced. We also have rapid communication. In our twentieth century, we've developed telephone, telegraph, radio, and even television. Now, when a war takes place, we're right at the battlefield, and television can witness what's happening at the present day even. You see, it's different. We have rapid communication. And of course that's absolutely necessary for a world government. You can't have a world government unless it knows what's going on all over the world immediately, you see. And we've experienced this. I'm sure you have. Telephone, for instance, I've had occasion to talk to Europe a number of times and going over there one time and needed a hotel reservation in Sweden and I was having trouble getting it. So I looked at our alumni director and here's one of our alumni living in Uppsala. I got his telephone number. It was, I guess, in the alumni directory. And just dialed the number like it would the neighbor next door, got right through to him. And he was able to get me the reservation. Another time, several times, I had to phone Australia. I was having trouble getting a visa to go in to do some preaching. And I had to talk to a businessman there. And the same thing, you just dialed the number. And it's immediate communication. You see, international businesses are connected by wire. And they know all the time what's going on. But that's absolutely essential for a world government. And we didn't have that before World War II, you see. At least not in the forms we have it today. And then we have also, as I've mentioned in this passage, giant computers that can keep track of people's purchases. And we already experienced that in our country, where computers are a part of our life. And the so-called paperless money is accomplished by electronics, where formerly we had to use paper or checks. And then, of course, there's other things. Since World War II, we've developed missile warfare. And missile warfare is so powerful because you can send a missile anywhere in the world in thirty minutes or less. Now, this world ruler, if he conquers the whole world, will have at his disposal all the missile hardware of the world that exists at that time. And he can threaten any country that wants to rebel against him in annihilation if they disobey him. And there'd be no retaliation, of course, because they couldn't do that. And so it's going to be an important weapon in the hands of this world dictator. Putting it this way, you can see how in our generation, the lifetime of you and me, the world suddenly has been a place where a world government makes sense, where it's physically possible, where it could be successful. In fact, that's exactly what many people believe. I recall when World War II was over, they were forming the United Nations just a year or two after. They'd said it was impossible, but now they were doing it. And KRLD radio station in Dallas at that time had their main studio down at Hotel Adolphus right over the busiest corner in downtown Dallas on the second floor. And they ran a line down from their second floor to the sidewalk, put an announcer at the end, and he buttoned old people going by and asked what they thought about a world government. I happened to be tuned in on my radio and listened to it in my car. And you know, everybody that came to the mic said, yes, in a world with atomic weapons and all the other things that we face, the only thing that makes sense is the world government. When they were asked how soon it would come, some said thirty years, they were a little optimistic, and some said a hundred years, but they said ultimately this has to be the way out of world chaos and world self-destruction. We need one government controlled at the top for the entire world. Now, of course, if that ruler were benevolent and good and just, it might work. But the trouble is, when the Bible tells us about this future government, he's an evil character, satanically controlled, blasphemous against God, and enabled to put to death a multiplied thousand of people who trusted in the true Lord. And so that's what's ahead. A world government's ahead. So you see today, we not only have Europe in a situation where the ten nations of the revived Roman Empire could take form very quickly, especially if the rapture took place, but we also have the other components. We have the possibility of a world ruler who will conquer these three and then all ten countries, and then impose his peace treaty on Israel, and then finally become world ruler in the last three and a half years. It all adds up to the fact that we now have some good, solid reasons, not just wishful thinking that the rapture could take place very, very soon. You see, if the rapture is before these events and the world stage is all in order for these events to take place, then the rapture itself could be very near. Now, I'm not able to set dates. I know people are doing that. I'm not able to do that, but I can say this. that the possibility or the probability of Christ coming any day is greater now than ever before in the history of the church. Obviously, every day passes, we're one day closer, regardless when the day it is. But the evidence is piling up that we have, we're coming into a crisis. Something is about to happen in our world. And I believe that something is the rapture of the church. Now, as I mentioned before, it leads to two very important questions. First question is, are you born again? Because only those who are born again, who have new life in Christ through accepting Him personally as a Savior who loved them and died for them in the cross and rose again. It's only for them that Christ will be coming. Everybody else will be left behind. Then, of course, if you are a Christian and are sure of it, and you're sure of the rapture because of that, the next question is, what are you doing about the life that God's given you? Because after the rapture, the question is going to be, what have you done with the life I gave you on earth to accomplish eternal things that bring honor and glory to God? And that's a very searching question, which I face, which you face. And I think it's very exciting to look at our life from the standpoint of how we are serving God and how our life will really count for eternity. And so as I look at these things, we're living in a very exciting hour. Now tomorrow I want to deal with the catastrophes of that period because one of the leading questions in prophecy about this whole thing is whether the church has to go through this future time of trouble or whether the church is going to be raptured before it. Now before you can answer the question of whether the church will go through the tribulation or not, you have to find out what the tribulation is. Tomorrow now I don't want to look at that. Not a very pretty picture, but this is what's ahead for the world and what an incentive it is to trust in Christ and be saved so that you won't enter that period at all. You'll be born to heaven and won't be here when these end-time events take their tragic turn leading up to the second coming of Christ. You know what the Bible calls the rapture? A blessed hope, a happy expectation, a comforting hope. Something that's wonderful, and I trust tonight, that you're thrilled as I am with this prospect of not going on forever and a world is getting increasingly bad, but coming to see the Savior in the sky and almost before we know it, to be on our way to be with the Lord forever and ever. Where He is, we're going to be forever. We're going to discuss that in later messages. Shall we bow in prayer? Our Father, how grateful we are for the evidences that your coming could be very, very near. And Lord, this is so confronting to us because we realize that life isn't going to go on just like it is now forever. There's coming a day when suddenly our present life will be over. And we'll be facing the Savior. And so our Father help us to realize how wonderful it's going to be to be in His presence with our loved ones in Christ forever. And at the same time, how challenging it is as we anticipate that event to get ready for the event before it happens. Korea.