I am trusting that the Lord is really going to bless us as we study His Word together.  I have learned that for those among God’s professed people who are willing to take out time to gather together to study His Word, the Lord gives special blessings.  I hope and I pray and I trust that the Lord will give us a special blessing as we study His Word together. 

Open your Bible to Romans13; I want to start reading at verse 11.  It says, “And knowing the time, that already it is the hour for you to awake out of sleep; for now our salvation is nearer than when we believed.  The night is far gone, the day has drawn near.  Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us be clothed with the weapons of light.  Let us walk becomingly as in the day, not with carousing and drunkenness and sexual orgies and sensuality, not with strife and jealousy.  But clothe yourself with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not make provision for the flesh that you should do its lusts.”  That is quite a Scripture isn’t it?

Paul says now is the time.  It is the hour already for you to awake out of sleep.  Do you know the time?  Do you know that now is the time?  Now is the time to wake up, because we don’t have very much time.

I want to look at just two things.  The first thing is knowing the time in the world.  We will not take time to prove this, because that might take many minutes.  Not that we can’t prove it; we could go to the eleventh chapter of Daniel.  Since I spent so much time in airports yesterday, I read a lot of verses in Daniel 11 from my Bible.  If you compare Daniel 7 and Daniel 11, you will see that the great time of persecution of God’s saints, which was to last 1260 years, was to extend until the time of the end.  When that period was over, then the world was going to enter the period called, in Daniel’s prophecy, the time of the end.  Most Bible writers call it the latter days or the last day.

That period of time (1260 days) came to an end in 1798.  We then have been in the last days or in the time of the end for over two hundred yeas.  The last days—the time of the end—is the last epochal period of this world’s history.  At the end of that time, probation will close, and Jesus will come, and that will be the end of this age, the end of the world, as we know it.  We are not at the beginning of the time of the end; we are at the end of the time of the end.

The second thing I would like to look at concerns knowing the time of the world.  Daniel says, in Daniel 12:4, that at the time of the end two things are going to happen. 

He says that many are going to travel to and fro; in other words, it is going to be a time of great travel.  Are we living in the time of the greatest travel since the beginning of the world?  There has never, ever been a time like today.  Never! 

We thought that we were living in a time of great travel when I was a boy, because we had airplanes.  I traveled half way around the world when I was about seven years old.  But let me tell you, it was absolutely nothing compared with today.

When I was boy, I used to go with my father to the Stapleton Airport in Denver, Colorado.  My Father was a businessman, and sometimes he had to travel by plane.  When we went there, I would look out the window, and there would usually be four sometimes five airliners out there—DC7s and a few Lockheed Electras.  Those planes would hold between 40 and 50 passengers.  That was the total number of airplanes generally at Stapleton in Denver at any one time when I was a boy.  I was there many times.

How is it today?  Oh, we go there now, and there are between 50 and 100 airplanes at any one time, and those planes don’t just hold between 40 and 50 passengers, like they did when I was a boy.  They hold 100, 200, or more passengers. 

We are living in a time when there is more travel.  I’ve done a little traveling myself, and I’ve been in the airports in London and in Paris, in the airports of New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., Dallas, and Los Angeles.  You go in any one of these places, and you can see people from all over the world right there.

There has never been a time like this before.  We are living in the time of the end.  In the time of the end, travel is going to be increased.

But then the second thing mentioned, in Daniel 12:4, is that in the time of the end there is going to be a great increase of knowledge.  It says, “Knowledge shall be increased.”  Are we living in a time when there has been an explosion of knowledge?

Some of you are too young to remember how things used to be, just a few years ago.  Do you realize that just a few years ago, if you had a cataract in your eye and you wanted to have that cataract removed, you had surgery done, and then they sandbagged you?  They put sandbags around your head, and you had to lie in a hospital bed, sometimes for two weeks or more.  But you know what kind of surgeries we have today?  I took a close relative of mine to have a cataract removed some days ago, and it was an outpatient procedure.  We walked in, got it done, and walked out and went home—pretty much business as usual the rest of the day.  That is just one example; there are hundreds of other examples.

Another example of increased knowledge is our cars, our planes, and our machines.  Computers now monitor these things to tell us when they need service and what needs to be repaired or changed.  I’m an old enough man that I can remember when it wasn’t that way.  It wasn’t that way in our planes; it wasn’t that way in our cars; it wasn’t that way in our machines.  Things were mechanical, and we thought we had a great increase of knowledge then, but now things are electrical, and everything is connected with a computer.

I remember telling people 20 years ago that we were living in an age of an explosion of knowledge—that there would soon come a time when, through a computer, we would be able to access central data banks and find out whatever we wanted that is known by man.  We’ve been doing that now for several years.  We are living in a time when we have an explosion of knowledge.

Third, Jesus said that in the last days there would come a time when there would be great earthquakes.  Have you read that in Matthew 24?  Have you noticed the increase of earthquakes lately?

We used to live in southern California, and while we lived there, we were always apprehensive of earthquakes. When I was in southern California recently, I was shown a newspaper, which identified the different places where there had been an earthquake in the last several weeks—over 60 places.  You don’t even hear about those earthquakes on the news, because the little ones they don’t even talk about.

If you want to do an interesting study, look on the Internet for the web site that is just about earthquakes.  Do you know when the incidents of earthquakes started increasing?  About 1800.  See, the time of the end is going to be the time of earthquakes.  They started increasing, at the time of the end.  It is interesting to note that the number of earthquakes stayed about the same for many hundreds of years—for over a thousand years—until about 1800; then, for some reason that nobody can explain, they started increasing.  Why?  Jesus said that in the time of the end there were going to be earthquakes.  Since 1950, the number of occurrences has just skyrocketed.  So much so, that between 1980 and 1990 there was as many serious major earthquakes as the world had experienced between 526 and 1797 A.D.  That is a period of almost 1,300 years.  Sometimes somebody challenges that they didn’t record them all in old times, but they did record them when something major happened.  They didn’t have seismographs, but they recorded the big ones, when buildings started falling down.  It is one of the signs that we are living right near the end.

Then another sign, the fourth I will mention, that Jesus gave was that there would be “wars and rumors of wars.”  We don’t need to talk much about that.  World War I was going to be the war to end wars.  Have you read that in the history books?  Did it end wars?  We were in another world war within 20 years after it ended.  Since World War II, there has been a war somewhere in the world all the time—some coup d’etat, revolution or war somewhere in the world.

The fifth sign of knowing the time in the world we don’t have time too dwell on, but I will just mention it in passing.  You can study it out for yourselves.  Bible prophecy tells us that in the last days there is going to be a great, international religious peace movement.  Predicted both in Isaiah 2 and Micah 4, it is not a true revival or a true religion.  Read Micah 4:1–6 carefully, and you will see that is the case.  They are going to be preparing for war at the same time they are talking peace. 

And then number six.  In Luke 21, Jesus says that the time of the end will be a time when men’s hearts will fail them for fear.  Are we living in the time when men’s hearts are failing them for fear today?  Here’s what people are afraid of.  First they are afraid of what is happening to the worldwide economy—not just the United States, not just Europe, but the economy of the world.  The worldwide economy is shaky today, and economists are scared to death.  We say we are out of the recession, but we are deeper in debt than ever before. 

We are concerned about the environment.  We are destroying our environment.  We are concerned because of the natural disasters.  Have you heard on the news of the concern in Yellowstone National Park, in Wyoming?  Certain areas of the park have been closed off, because the experts say that this one area could blow at any time.  It would be the biggest volcanic explosion ever.  It would be heard hundreds of miles away. They say that at this huge crater, where the ground is lifting, the temperature is rising and has now risen so much that the fish are all dead and there is nothing living right around there.  Just a few inches under the soil the temperature is 200 degrees.  If this thing completely blows, the scientists say it would completely cover the entire United States with five inches of ash.  It could bring on a miniature ice age; it could destroy crops all through the Midwest.  They say that if this thing completely blew, there could be no living thing within about a 600-mile radius—everything would die.  Now I’m not saying it would be that bad; nobody knows.  But let me tell you, the people that have studied this thing are scared.  Jesus said, “Men’s hearts would be failing them for fear because of the things that are coming on the earth.”  Do you realize the economic consequences of something like that?  If that happens, it could cause a worldwide depression, just that one thing alone.

And then, of course, there is terrorism.  Everybody knows about terrorism today—not just the United States.  They know about it in Spain.  They know about it in the Middle East.  They know about it in South America.  Terrorism!  And, of course, crime, crime, crime.  That is number six.

Number seven.  Jesus said that in the last days there would be pestilences.  We are experiencing pestilences like never before in world history.  For example, cancer.  Oh! Somebody may say that we have had cancer for hundreds of years.  Of course we have, but in 1945 do you know how many people were getting cancer?  One in fifteen.  Now in 1945 [if you read the Spirit of Prophecy], the number getting cancer had skyrocketed from what it was in the past.  Do you know what it is today?  One in three.  Is that a pestilence?  It is a pestilence, friends.

Then we have the new pestilences such as Mad Cow Disease.  If you have ever read the book Deadly Feasts, you know that Mad Cow Disease is a ticking bomb that in the future could absolutely decimate western Europe and the United States and many other countries of the world.  Some people think this is even more dangerous than AIDS.  Whether it is or not I don’t know.  It is one of those things that have a long lapse from the time a person is exposed until something develops.  In addition to AIDS, we have the plague or the pestilence of all the old diseases that we thought we were going to cure.

For example, when I was in graduate school—less than thirty years ago—we were told that the disease of smallpox would be completely eliminated, because smallpox is a disease only of human beings.  We were told that there would be vaccines to vaccinate all the people, and this would eliminate it.  It would die out and not be known of anymore except in the history books.  Well, of course, we didn’t succeed in doing that. 

The diseases that we were so confident that we knew how to control, we are finding out we can’t.  For example, have you heard in the news that we now have new bugs or new microorganisms?  They are the old ones, but they are resistant to our drugs.  Have you read about that?  Let me tell you, this is serious.  If especially an elderly person gets a staff infection that doesn’t respond to drugs, you are in a very critical situation.  There is not enough time to address all this. 

We need to get on to what we really need to study, but let me just cover two or three other things really quickly.  In Luke 17:27–30, Jesus said that in the last days it was going to be like it was in the days of Lot.  Now, you have read the story of Sodom and Gomorrah in the book of Genesis.  You’ve read what Ezekiel says about it in Ezekiel 16:49, 50.  You’ve read what Jude says about it, and you have probably read what Peter says about it in II Peter.  Jesus said that is the way the world is going to be in the last days when the Son of man is going to be revealed.  Now, let me tell you something.  I studied this a few years ago, and it was shocking what I found.  Do you realize that never before in world history has homosexuality been accepted worldwide until our time?  It was accepted in Sodom, and it was accepted among the Canaanites.  That is one of the reasons the Canaanites were destroyed.  You can read about that in Leviticus 18.  It was accepted in the ten tribes of Israel, and that is one of the reasons that they were destroyed, sent out as wanderers among the nations.  It later was accepted in the city of Rome, and that is one of the reasons that Rome was destroyed.  It later was accepted in the nation of France, and that is one of the reasons for the French Revolution.  But in the last days, it wouldn’t be a country or a city; it will be the whole world.  We don’t realize how true prophecy always is.  When it says worldwide, it means worldwide.

A few days ago my wife and I were visiting with our nephew who is serving in the United States armed forces.  Right now he is in Afghanistan.  I would solicit your prayers for him.  He is in a very dangerous situation.  It is only the providence and protection of the Lord that could keep him alive over there.  He told me something that I didn’t know before.  You think you can never get shocked, but by the time you think you can never get shocked you learn something new.  He told me that over there, among the Muslims, homosexuality is rampant.  He said they don’t want the Christians to find out about it; they try to keep it secret.  But, he said it is rampant throughout those countries.  The United States military has to instruct the soldiers to be careful in certain situations.  The prophecy of Jesus has been fulfilled exactly.  We are living right at the time of the end.

When homosexuality becomes accepted, study the story of Sodom; study the story of ten tribes; study the story of the Canaanites; study the story of Rome; study the story of France.  God is not going to let that go on, friends.  It is going to end.

Number nine.  We don’t have time to get into this one, but in the last days, according to the Book of Revelation, according to the words of Jesus in Matthew 24:24, there will be a time of gross darkness of the greatest deceptions that there has ever been in the world.  We are living in that time.  We can’t get into that, because we have some other things to study.

And finally number ten.  According to II Peter 3:3–7, the last days would be a time of great unbelief.  The unbelief will be so great that it says they would deny that the heavens came into existence by the Word of God.  That is exactly what we’ve done in the last few years—and all that has happened since 1798.  The theory of evolution to explain how we got here without God has been developed.  We want a reason to explain how we got here without God.  It says, in II Peter 3, that they would say that “since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning.”  Do you realize that that is a word-for-word description of the theory of Uniformitarianism on which modern geology is based?

Back in 1979, we came to the East Coast of Pennsylvania to visit my brother who was pastoring there.  During Christmas time we went to the Smithsonian Institute, and while we were there, we split up to go to different places, because we couldn’t see it all, and different people wanted to see different things.  I decided that I wanted to see the geology building, which is where they tell you that this item is this many years old and this item is this many millions of years old.

I decided I was going to every single exhibit to see what evidence they have for this being this old.  Do you know what evidence they had?  They had only one piece of evidence for everything.  The Uniformitarian Theory.  Peter predicted the Uniformitarian Theory before they thought they invented it.  The Bible predicted that it would be in the last days.

Friends, that is just point number one!  Now we come to what really is important to study.  We have quickly looked at ten points about knowing the time of the world.  As important as that is—and that is important—it is even more important to know the time in the church.  Do you know the time in the church?  Well, if you don’t, I hope that you will start to study this subject.  We can’t cover everything in this study, but we will get as far as we can.

Verse 1 of II Timothy 3 says: “This know, that in the last days perilous times shall come,” grievous, difficult times are going to come.  Then it lists a whole bunch of social problems, like children being disobedient to their parents, people being fierce and brutal, not loving their neighbor, loving money.  It gives a whole list of social problems, but when it comes to the end of these social problems, verse 5 tells what is going to go on in the Christian church in the last days.  This includes us, if we are a church.  This is scary.  It says, “having a form of godliness [having a form of piety, a form of religion] but denying its power.”

What is going to happen in the church in the last days?  The people are going to be very religious.  I want to tell you that out in the Midwest they are building the biggest churches they have ever had in the Midwest.  I’ve been in a few.  You can go to churches in Wichita, Kansas, that will hold over 4,000 people.  It is just like a huge amphitheater or auditorium, and you’re sitting so far back that you can’t see the speaker so they have about five or six screens with the speaker blown up big so you can see and hear.  Oh, let me tell you friends, we have religion today.  We have a form of religion, but it says they will deny the power of it. 

Let me describe very briefly to you what it means to deny the power of religion, to deny the power of the Gospel, to deny the power of Godliness.  When Jesus came to this world, He didn’t come to this world just to die on the cross and pay the price for our sins.  That was part of it, but that wasn’t everything.  Jesus came to this world, and before He ever died on the cross, He lived in this world for over 30 years as my example, to show me how to live.  He said, “If you will follow Me, I will give you the power to become like Me.”

John 1:12 says, “As many as received Him to them gave He authority to become the sons of God, even those who believe in His name.”  And when He returns, it says, in I John 1:3, that we are going to be like Him.  What is the power of godliness?  The power of godliness is the power of God to take some wretch like me that has a sinful nature, a weak will, and a wicked mind and transform me, through the power of the Holy Spirit, to make me—I say this reverently—like Jesus Christ.  That is what the Gospel is about.  If you go to church and you have a form of religion and you pray and you sing and you read and you shout and you witness and you do all kinds of good things, but this transformation of character, through the Holy Spirit, never happens in your life, you are not saved.  Jesus said, to Nicodemus, “Except a man be born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.”  He didn’t say he should not; He said he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.  To enter, you have to be born of the Holy Spirit, and when you have the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit will work a miracle inside of you.

Ellen White says that it is through the Spirit that the heart is made pure.  (The Desire of Ages, 671.)  The Spirit has to work a change in me; other wise I can’t go to heaven—even if I go to church, pray, sing, jump up and down and speak in tongues, prophesied, do anything.  You see, the power of God is the power to change my life so I don’t think like the devil any more, but I think like Jesus Christ.  I don’t feel like the devil; I feel like Jesus Christ.  I don’t talk like the devil any more; I talk like Jesus Christ.  I don’t act like the devil any more; I act like Jesus Christ, especially in my home.  “A Christian in the home is a Christian everywhere.”  “Ellen G. White Comments,” Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary, vol. 5, 1085.

But in the last days there is going to be a people that will have a form of Godliness.  They will have all the outward trophies of religion.  They will go to church; they will pray; they will sing; they will witness; they will prophesy; they will talk in tongues; they will work miracles.  Read about it in Matthew 7:21–23.  There you will read about these people that come to the Lord, and they say, “Lord, you made a mistake.  I know I’m saved, because I cast out devils in your name, and I prophesied in your name, and I worked many powerful miracles in your name.”  And then Jesus will say to them, “Depart from Me, I never knew you.  Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.  You that break the law, you are not a loyal subject.”

Some people say that it is just too bad that it is that way, but they guess we will just have to endure it.  Oh, no, it is not that way.  Oh, no, that is not what the Bible says.  We didn’t read the end of the text:  “Having the form of godliness but denying the power of it, from these turn away.”  II Timothy 3:5.  This is where it gets tough.  Paul says that in the last days there is going to be a people who have a form of godliness but they deny the power.  Let me say it plainly: denying the power is the new theology where you are told that you can’t overcome sin.  That is denying the power.

When that happens, Paul doesn’t say to just hang in there and do the best you can, because you are living in the last days.  What does he say?  He says to turn away.  Do you get the thrust of that?  I know people all over—I have friends—who are trying to stick in there.  I heard of one person who said that if it gets too bad while they are studying the Sabbath School lesson he would just go in the bathroom and read his Bible and The Great Controversy.  Is that what Paul said to do?  Go in the bathroom and read your Bible while all this racket is going on?  Paul said turn away!  Do you get the thrust of this?  Let me ask you, Are you going to do it?

I have friends who think that I’m sort of a fanatic.  They decided that they are not going to turn away; they are going to stay in there.  Some of them say they are going to stay in there and fight to clean this thing up.  But let me tell you what happens after they stay in there a few years.  Instead of them getting it cleaned up, they get spiritually anaesthetized, and they don’t even know there is a problem in there any more.  I have seen it over and over.  Don’t say you will be strong; you can resist it; you will be all right; you are going to be a light.  That is not what the Bible says to do.

You are a human being, and when God tells you to turn away from something, if you want to be saved, you had better turn away.  If you don’t, you will become like what you associate with.  Don’t ever forget that.  Why in the world did we even have an Adventist church in the first place?  Why didn’t we just stay with the Baptist and the Methodist and all those Christian churches?  Why?  Because they rejected the truth of the Three Angels’ Messages.

I’m sorry to have to say this, but I believe in preaching my conscience and I’m just going to tell you straight that there are many Adventist preachers and many Adventist churches today that have rejected the Three Angels’ Messages.  If you are in one of them, you had better get out.  From those people turn away—people that don’t believe in the investigative judgment any more, people that don’t know who Babylon is any more, people that don’t even know who the beast or antichrist is any more.  It says there are going to be people that have a form of godliness and denying the power there of and from these turn away.

Point number two is knowing the time in the church.  It is the last days.  It is the time of the end.  What is going to happen at the time of the end in the church?  Read Selected Messages, vol. 1, 406.  Ellen White said that God told her this over and over again.   I want to ask you a question. If God told Ellen White something over and over again, do you suppose that might have more than some rather unusual importance?

What did He tell her over and over again?  He told that our experience in the second advent movement, just before the second coming of Christ, would be very similar to the experience of the Jews just before the first coming of Christ.  That is not just a prophecy any more; it’s happening right around us.

Number three.  We won’t spend very much time on this.  I just want you to study it though from your Bible.  I’ve studied it in my Bible in detail this year.

Turn in your Bible to the Book of Isaiah.  Now, in Isaiah 2 it starts giving a prophecy about the last days.  Notice it starts off by talking about the latter time, the last days, and it goes right on.  Just because you come to the end of chapter two and start chapter three doesn’t mean he is not talking about the last days any more.  He is still talking about the last days in chapters three and four.  Just study it for yourself.  When he gets to chapter three, starting in verse sixteen and going clear on to the end of the chapter, he indicates that there is going to be immodest and prideful dress among the daughters of Zion in the last days.  I want you to study this out for yourself, because I really don’t want to talk about it.

I really don’t want any woman here to think I am trying to point a finger at anybody; I’m not.  I am not trying to say that the women are any worse sinners than the men are.  I am not trying to say that.  See, men have their own problems, and women have their own problems.  Let me explain what the men’s problem is; then I’ll explain what the women’s problem is. 

A man’s problem is that he has a moral responsibility to guard his eyes.  Men have a natural tendency to look at women, and the fewer clothes the women have on, the more they tend to look.  Jesus warned us against that.  I just happened to be reading this morning from the Book of Job, chapter 31.  And Job said, “I cut a covenant; I made a covenant with my eyes.  Why should I look intently upon a virgin?”  He says, “ I won’t do it.”  Men have to guard their eyes.  That is a man’s problem.  A man has a moral responsibility to God to say, “Lord, help me to watch what I’m looking at.  And what I’m thinking about when I’m looking at it.”

A woman has an opposite problem.  Just as men are tempted to look at women, women are tempted to put on a display for men to look at.  Oh, my dear sister, do you realize that by immodest clothing, by the kind of clothing described here in Isaiah 3, you can help to take some men to hell?  Read Mathew 5:27–30.  It was in regard to this problem that Jesus told men that it would be better to pluck out your eye or cut off your hand to get rid of that, to get away.  If you are a woman and some man went to hell as the result of looking at you, do you think the Lord is going to tell you about that in the Day of Judgment?  I’m afraid so.

Number four.  In Isaiah 8:12, we read, “Say not a confederacy or a conspiracy to all those who say a confederacy or a conspiracy.  Don’t fear their fear.”  That is something that is going on in the church.  It is happening in Adventism right now and has been happening for over 20 years.

This is number five.  In Matthew 25, that is the story of the ten virgins, we see that the church in the last days is asleep.  I want to ask you a question.  Have you ever gone into your closet or wherever you do your private praying and said, “Lord, please have mercy on me and wake me”?  Paul said, in Romans 13, that it’s the hour to wake out of sleep.  It is time to wake up.  I don’t know how to wake you up, but ask the Lord to please wake you up, to send the Holy Spirit to help you hear that still, small voice.  Do you realize that probation is going to close and Jesus is going to come and some Adventists are not going to wake up until it is too late?  Read about that in Early Writings, 71.  Mrs. White describes it exactly.  When the plagues begin to fall, then they wake up.  It is too late to wake up then.

Here is number six.  What has happened in Adventism while we have been asleep?  Jesus told us what would happen while we were asleep, in Matthew 13.  He says while men slept the enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat.  I want to tell you that there have been so many tares sown in Adventism that unless the Lord works a miracle the tares will choke out the wheat crop.  Ellen White said that could happen. 

That is one of the reasons that there are independent Seventh-day Adventist churches today.  Because Ellen White says very clearly that it is possible for the tares to choke out the wheat, so there is no crop.  (Review and Herald, October 3, 1899.)  Now we come to one of the most important points of all.

This will be the last point.  Remember, we are studying to know the time, not just in the world but in the church.  Now, I want to ask you a question: Do you believe that we are in the last years of this earth’s history?  Do you believe that?  Okay.  I’m going to read to you one of the most startling prophecies that was ever written by the pen of Ellen White about what was going to happen in Adventism in the last years of earth’s history.  This was written during the time of the alpha of apostasy.  “In His Word the Lord declared what He would do for Israel if they would obey His voice.”   Manuscript Releases, vol. 13, 379.  What did God promise to do for them, if they would obey His voice?  Oh! He said “You would be the head and not the tail”;  “I will bless you, I will bless the fruit of your womb, I will bless your cattle, I will bless your crops, I will bless your children, I will bless your land.”  (Deuteronomy 28:13; 7:13.)

In fact, if they had followed the Lord fully, they wouldn’t even have had to chase the Canaanites out of Canaan.  The Lord told them He was willing to send hornets after them and they wouldn’t even have to do it.  (Exodus 23:28.)  Read the blessings that were promised to the children of Israel, if they would obey, and it makes your mouth water!  We wonder how, with promises like this, could anybody not pay attention!  But here is what happened.

“But the leaders of the people yielded to the temptations of Satan, and God could not give them the blessings He designed them to have, because they did not obey His voice but listened to the voice and policy of Lucifer.”  Ibid.  Who yielded?  The leaders of the people!  God could not give them the blessings He wanted to give, because they listened to Satan’s temptations.  They did not obey God; they listened to the voice and policy of whom Lucifer.

That is just the easy part to read.  Now we will read something that is absolutely, scalding hot.  Do you get what we just read?  God couldn’t bless Israel, because they listened to Satan’s temptations.  Instead of obeying God, they listened to the voice and policy of Lucifer. 

Now, are you ready to read this prophecy?  “This experience [the experience of the leaders leading the people astray, listening to the voice and policy of Lucifer, and not obeying the Lord] will be repeated in the last years of the history of the people of God, who have been established by His grace and power.”  Ibid.  Who are the people of God who have been established by His grace and power in the last days?  They are the Seventh-day Adventists.  God couldn’t do for ancient Israel what He wanted to do, because the leaders listened to the temptations of Satan; they didn’t obey God.  They obeyed the voice and policy of Lucifer.  Mrs. White says that the same thing is going to happen at the end in the last years.

If we are now in the last days, what do you think is happening right now?  The leaders of God’s people have succumbed to the temptations of Satan.  They are not obedient; they are not in Bible order.  They’ve listened to the voice and policy of Lucifer.  And then somebody says that we have to stick with this; this is God’s church?  Wait a minute!  Is the synagogue of Satan and God’s church the same thing?  What is going on here?  She says, “Men whom He has greatly honored will in the closing scenes of this earth’s history pattern after ancient Israel.”  Ibid.

Jesus and Lucifer do not work in partnership.  Don’t ever get that wrong.  Jesus and Lucifer do not work in partnership.  We had a clergyman call us quite irate a few years ago.  I’m not saying that the people in our church didn’t make a mistake, because they went to his church’s parking lot and put literature on the windshields of the cars parked there when the people were in church.  That wasn’t wise, because it was private property.  Anyway, this clergyman was quite irate because of this literature.  (This clergyman was a clergyman in Babylon.)  This literature told the evils of Halloween.  Halloween is a holiday that has its origin with the Druids and Satan worship.  Halloween is all right today, he said, because [concerning his church] we sanctified it.  Can you sanctify what Lucifer does?  Friends don’t laugh; Adventists think like this today.

They think that we, because we are Adventists, can sanctify something and it’s all right, even if it is the voice and policy of Lucifer.  They can’t get that figured out.  How do you relate to all this, when you see that prophecy has been fulfilled?  Ellen White said that these leaders of ancient times listened to voice and policy of Lucifer, and it’s going to happen in the last years—and it’s happening.  It has been happening for several years already. 

How do you relate to this?  Some people get angry.  There are a lot of angry Adventists today, because of the wickedness and evil going on in Adventism.  There are some people who are just absolutely, white-hot angry.  They’re like the zealots in the time of Christ.  They were angry, too.  They were ready to start a revolt and drive out the Romans.  One of those zealots was one of Jesus’ disciples.

But then there are other people that say we are to just stay in there no matter what the church or its leaders do, because it is the true church, and you will lose your soul if you leave it.  We have already studied in II Timothy 3:5 that Paul said, in a situation like that, we better turn away.  We need to investigate the question.  We need to understand the answer to that question.

Ellen White was shown that just as it was before the first coming of Christ, it would be just like that before the Second Coming of Christ.  It is one of the greatest signs that we are right at the end.

How are you going to come out of all this?  Friends, Jesus is coming soon.  Ellen White saw that few Adventists would be saved.  (See Testimonies, vol. 1, 608, 609.)  I’m sorry that few people are going to be saved in the world, and I’m sorry that few people are going to be saved in the Adventist church.  I have said that I wish I could get the whole city of Wichita saved, but I can’t.  I can preach, but then they have to decide.  I wish I could get the whole Adventist church to be saved, but I can’t, and you can’t either.  But you can make the decision as to whether or not you are going to be saved.

I have often thought about Noah and his family in the ark.  When the rain was falling, do you suppose any of them said, “There are so few of us in here; I wish I were out there with the others.”  Do you suppose any of them said that?  The people were drowning out there!  Even though there were only a few in the ark they were glad they were in the ark.  I want to tell you something friends.  The few people that stick to the Three Angels’ Messages will triumph with it.  Do you want to be part of that group?

I’m sad.  I’m not happy reporting to you from the Spirit of Prophecy and the Bible about what’s happening.  I don’t like to see people lose their souls.  I’m not happy about that, but I can’t help it.  I tell them, and they won’t listen.  They say that I am a fanatic.  Is anybody listening?  Is anybody willing to live by the Word of God?  Is anybody willing to say, Yes, I’ll still believe, and I will still spread the Three Angels’ Messages?

The Three Angels’ Messages are bound to triumph.  They are infallible.  If you stick with it, you will triumph with it.  I’ve decided that is where I want to stay; I’ve decided that is the only place I go to church.  I am not going to go to a church where the Three Angels’ Messages aren’t preached any more, no matter what the name is on the front.  It is the Three Angels’ Messages that are going to triumph, not a name.

Do you want to be part of the Three Angels’ Message when it triumphs?  If you do, pray and ask the Lord to help you.