The Apostate Church

Transcript

GR 428
1/10/1982
The Apostate Church
Selected Verses
Gil Rugh

This morning we're going to be in the Book of Revelation in the 17th chapter. Picking up on the matters of prophetic significance that we've been looking at on Sunday mornings and we've been considering some of the various things that are yet to come as far as the future is concerned. God's plan as laid out regarding coming things. For us as believers, our immediate anticipation is the rapture of the church when we'll be caught up to meet Jesus Christ in the air. Following the rapture of the church, there is a period of approximately seven years where God brings to a completion His program with Israel in preparing them for their Messiah and His rule and reign over the earth.

So the matters that we are looking into in these weeks are matters that relate to events after the rapture of the church. I say that because we have to be careful about making pinpoint identifications with things going on today. The most that we can say in light of what the Bible says is that certain things going on today fit the pattern of what God says is going to happen after the rapture of the church. Now depending upon when the rapture of the church occurs, there can be much adjustment and change. But as you look across the scope of Biblical prophecy, you see many items that fit the pattern of what God says will be taking place after the rapture of the church. We looked at the federation of states and the revived Roman Empire. Saw there will be ten nations comprising the western world kingdom. There will be a man, the anti-Christ, who will dominate this confederacy and during the last three and a half years of the tribulation will rule and reign as world ruler.

This morning we want to look at an aspect of these years which has to do with the first three and a half years of the tribulation. And that has to do with what is called the apostate church. The religious system, the church as it will be constituted and functioning after all true believers are removed from the earth. The Bible is clear. At the rapture, every believer in Jesus Christ will be bodily removed from the earth. But religious activity will continue on and flourish during the first three and a half years. In fact, during those three and a half years, religion will have perhaps its greatest influence ever in the world. Being a dominant influence in the political situation in the western world. Now obviously is a system which is contrary to God’s purposes and plans. Contrary to the will of God. It is comprised of individuals who are opposed to God and His plan. Because it’s comprised of those who are not believers in Jesus Christ and so were not removed at the rapture of the church.

Look at a couple of passages before we look at the details in Revelation 17.
Come back to Matthew 24. The Bible speaks about the religious activity of the last days and something of its character so that we realize that it won’t be that men and women are becoming less religious but, if anything, more religious. But at the same time, more unbiblical and antibiblical. In Matthew 24 as Jesus talked about these days after the rapture of the church. A period of time during the seven years tribulation. In verse 11 of Matthew 24, He says, "And many false prophets will arise, and will mislead many." You see during this period of time it’s going to be characterized by charismatic religious leaders. Charismatic as regards their personality. I'm not talking about the gifts of the Spirit necessarily. Individuals who arise with a prophetic kind of ministry. Drawing people after them. And you note "they will mislead many." People will be looking to satisfy that religious desire and inclination. They will find fulfillment in false prophets.

Down in verse 24 of Matthew 24: "For false Christs and false prophets will arise and will show great signs and wonders, so as to mislead, if possible even the elect." You know it's going to be a time of tremendous miracle workings, signs and wonders. Words used throughout the New Testament to depict the miraculous. And we see something of a revival of an interest in this area in our own days. Tremendous increase and interest among people on the miraculous. The miraculous gifts—gifts of healing—healing ministries. These kinds of things. This is going to flourish in the tribulation. Those who are going to be false messiahs and false prophets doing such miraculous things that if possible even the elect would be deceived. We'll be talking some about this in coming days. There will be people saved in the tribulation. That's the elect He's talking about. Particularly the nation Israel would be the focal point. So after the rapture of the church there are no believers left on the face of the earth. But during that seven-year period, many people will come to trust Jesus Christ. And the ministry of these false prophets and false messiahs is so convincing that even the elect of God may be brought to confusion by it. And that's not any wonder because we're not in the tribulation today. We're not seeing anything on the miraculous level compared to what there will be, but we have many Christians, many of the elect of God, who are in confusion today. You have a man who carries on an unbiblical ministry but he claims miraculous gifts and you have Christians who are sending money to support him. It goes on all the time because Christians are confused. They're deceived. They're misled. That's going to even be worse in tribulation days. I think we see something of the preparation and the groundwork being laid for that today by what is going on all around us.

Over in First Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter 4 Now with the passing of time these things are happening. The false teaching, the deceitful doctrines. What will happen is they will reach their culmination, their full bloom, during the tribulation. Their false doctrine, false teaching, miracles from hell, from Satan will reach their fullness. First Timothy chapter four verse 1. "But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons." You see that demonic activity growing and increasing, luring people from the truth of the Word of God. It's deceitful, deceptive so that people are subtlety lured from the truth of God under the guise of serving God. That's the purpose of religious activity, is it not? Here they are being deceived by deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons. The doctrines of demons are doctrines that have their origin and source in demons. Ever wonder where some false teachers get such brilliant doctrines? They get them from Satan, not from the Word of God.

Now these doctrines are promoted by false teachers and false prophets, hut their source is in the demon world. So we have to keep ever mindful. We talk about doctrines, we talk about miracles and so on. There are two elements to the superb- natural. There is the good where God is working and there is the evil where Satan is working. So just because something is supernatural, does not validate it. Must be supernatural in conformity to the Word of God.

Verse 2, "By means of the hypocrisy of liars." Now note the strong language here. "Deceitful spirits, doctrines of demons, the hypocrisy of liars." That’s strong language. They're hypocrite^ they’re liars. These liars are playing the role of hypocrites. They are pretending to be something they are not. They are pretending to represent God and His truth and they may even think they do, but in reality they are tools and instruments of Satan. "Seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron. Men who forbid marriage and advocate abstaining from foods, which God has created to be gratefully shared in by those who believe and know the truth." Note, there is a certain ascetic bent to this teaching. To forbid marriage. It is better not to marry. Don’t eat certain foods. We've got some of that doctrine pretty close to home regarding regulations and restrictions on what you eat. That’s one of the characteristics of these latter days. Those who want to have a false kind of devotion. It seems, Oh look how dedicated they are. No marriage, no time for that. They won't eat these foods. It gives a false appearance of dedication. It’s not true dedication to God. Because those who know the word of God, know that God wants you to gratefully partake in these things. I realize Paul speaks about the benefits of the single life. That’s not what it’s talking about here. Paul never says that it brings you into a better relationship with God. That it is a matter of your spiritual standing to be married or not married. It is never made a regulation binding on anyone. Paul gives his recommendation on it and why, but it's never a regulation regarding marriage or food.

One other passage before we get to Revelation. Over in 2 Timothy, chapter 3. We'll look at two passages in 2 Timothy. Second Timothy chapter 3, Note, verse 1. "But realize t-is, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God." That’s quite a list. You know you think that maybe there’s a little bit of hyperbole here. He is gone beyond. I mean you really think people are going to be that bad? Well, exactly what they're like. But note what he says in the very next verse, verse 5, "Holding to a form of godliness." These people who are lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, etc., etc., etc., are holding to a form of Godliness. You talk about contradiction. People of this character, and yet they're trying to hold on to be Godly? But, they have denied its power. They have denied the heart of what is Godliness. They are not those who teach and proclaim the message of salvation through faith in the death and resurrection of the Son of God. Who preach and teach the Bible as the Word of God. They have denied the power, but they want to have a form of Godliness. They want to have the external ritual. And in false religion, ritual becomes everything and the prime concern is going through certain motions and certain activities. And your relationship with God is tied to the observance of these certain matters. So they have a form of Godliness. That's the way it will be in the tribulation. There will be a form of Godliness but the power is denied.

Down in chapter 4 of 2 Timothy, verse 3, Paul tells Timothy, "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting -to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires; and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths." It always amazes me, and yet the Bible is precisely accurate, how people who deny the reality of a revelation from God. Who deny the reality of the finished work of Jesus Christ, still go on to carry on a religious ministry. I've shared with you. I visited with one of the pastors of one of the larger liberal churches in town. Godless apostate. Unbelieving. Wretched man. Even though he's well respected and well looked up to. He believes nothing about the Bible. All just the * writings of men. The work of Christ’s salvation by faith—irrelevant issue. Yet the man pastors a church. What do you have to say to people? What is your purpose for all of this? But there is some sense of being religious. You know, as far as he's concerned it's a nonentity.

But what do people do, verse 3. He's got a large crowd that comes to hear him week after week. You know what? Verse 3. "They will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled." An expression that communicates very well. "They will accumulate for themselves" and it means to accumulate in piles literally heap them up, teachers in accordance to their own desires. In other words, there are going to be an abundance of these teachers who are saying just what people want to hear. And people just love to hear it. You see this popularity in many of our television programs as well. They are geared to what people want to hear. How many programs do you turn on the television today where they are speaking of the fact that you are lost and on your way to hell and you need to believe in Jesus Christ.
But you'll hear, "something good is going to happen to you." But he never follows that through. Let me tell you, if you don’t believe in Christ, you’re going to hell. "No, something good is going to happen to you." All this kind of junk. And people love to hear it, "Oh, tickle my ears, tell me more. Preach it brother. Oh, yes and how much did you want me to write that check for? Yes." Why? They just love it. Not the truth. Where's the word of God? I was listening to a couple of these men to get me cranked up this morning. (Laughter) Hadn’t done that for quite a while, then I remembered why. You feel like you need to go and get your shower all over again. Junk—and the most disastrous part about it I think, and there’s Christians listening to this. We need to be careful, but people heap to themselves, teachers having itching ears.

Now all of that to get us over to Revelation chapter 17. And those of you who have been here for a while should be proud of me that we got here as quickly as we did. But, we'll have more to say about this subject. Revelation 17 gives us the description from God's perspective of this world religion that will find its culmination, its full bloom, during the first three and a half years of the tribulation. False religion will prosper as it has never, ever done up to this point. The western world will be consumed by a religious fever. Become a dominate element in politics and in everything. Revelation 17 gives you the description and it's not very pretty.

Down, chapter 17 opens up, and if you’re not familiar with the background, you’ll have to go back and fill that in. But one of the angels who had the seven bowls. The seven bowl judgments are the climaxing judgments in the Book of Revelation. You have three judgments. Three series of sevens. And here you have the bowl judgments. One of these angels who was involved in that says, "Come I will show you the judgment of the great throne, the great harlot who sits on many waters," That tells you how God sees it. This religious system, He calls a harlot, a whore, a prostitute. A very understandable picture drawn from the Old Testament, used of Israel by Isiah and by Ezekiel. So the readers of John’s letter would be very familiar with it. Where Israel had been accused of playing the role of the whore or the harlot. Prostituting themselves. Because they had been betrothed to God and yet they had become unfaithful with other lovers. Because when they went after other gods, small "g", other religious activity from God's perspective, they had become unfaithful to Him. So the analogy is used, they have used other lovers. Some of the prophets like Jeremiah use very explicit language in speaking of Israel's spiritual unfaithfulness in these matters.

Its "the great harlot who sits on many waters" and this will be interpreted for us in a moment. "with whom the kings of the earth committed acts of immorality and those who dwell on the earth were made drunk with the wine of her immorality." So you see, here is a woman in the picture with whom the kings of the earth have been involved. Those who dwell on the earth had become drunk with the wine of her immorality. In other words, all have been involved in her whoredom. Very ugly picture of depicting all kinds of people, kings and leaders and everyone else have become caught up in this apostate religious system. So you see how God is seeing it. He's not looking down and saying, "My, it's too bad they're not worshipping me this morning, but at least they're carrying on religious activity." You don't say that in a marriage relationship. You don't say about an unfaithful wife, "Well, it's too bad she's not making love with her husband, but at least she's making love with someone." That's, you know, that almost is something not fit to talk about. That's exactly how God is talking here. You know, these people are playing down here in immorality. Whoredom. God's not up there saying, "Well they're not worshipping me, but at least they're worshipping God in their own way." He says, "They're down there playing in the realm of whoredoms. They’re being unfaithful with a harlot." That's how God sees it. Nothing good about it. Nothing desirable about it. Repulsive in every way.
Verse 3, "He carried me away in the Spirit into a wilderness; and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast, full of blasphemous names, having seven heads and ten horns." Now some of this we've seen already. Seven heads and ten horns. We've already talked about that. The seven heads depicting the empires of the world as seen in connection with the nation Israel and the seven major empires. The last form of world government focused on is that ten-nation confederacy coming out of the Roman Empire. The seventh head. So the picture here is clear. This woman is sitting on a scarlet beast says something about the support she gets from the political situation in these three and a half years. It also says something about her prominence. We'll see in this some form of leadership, of dominance during the first three and a half years. You see the key role that religion plays. This woman is sitting upon the beast in a dominant position. In a key role. There's something to be said and a warning about the political involvement of much of religion today.
And it gets to be more and more. The woman was clothed in purple and scarlet.
Adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls. Having in her hand a gold cup full of abominations and the unclean things of her immorality.

You see, everything about this woman is repulsive to God. And I believe that the reason God uses an analogy of prostitution of whoredom, of marital unfaithfulness, is because it is something we can relate to so quickly. We can understand something of the awfulness of it. That you have a wife who is just indiscriminate with any number of lovers. Who is playing the role of a prostitute, of a whore. In our society, we shouldn't talk about that. That's how firm God wants it to be fixed in our mind, How He sees this system. Verse 5. "Upon her forehead a name was written, a mystery," This name is a mystery. Now that’s the way it ought to be and the King James Bible says, "mystery Babylon". That’s not part of the name. The name is a mystery. And we've talked about the w7ord "mystery". The rapture was called a mystery by Paul. "Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep." Something that needed God's interpretation. Needed revelation from God to be understood. And if you’re going to understand apostate religion, you’re going to understand this false religious system, you’re going to have to have God’s revelation. That’s why the unbeliever views all of this ridiculous and foolish. But from God's perspective, here is the unfolding of it, here is the insight into this apostate system. The mystery? "Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and of the abominations of the earth." This apostate religious system and a woman in Scripture is used consistently to depict apostasy in religion. That comes over in the Book of Revelation with Jezebel as well.

Babylon the Great, viewed here as the Mother of Harlots. In other words, here is the fountain head of a whole line of prostitutes. This has been the mother of harlots. The one from whom many prostitutes have come. And what you have here, here is the source of false religion, Now we'll take various turns and various twists and various forms, but you can carry it all back to the fountainhead. Babylon the great. This is the source. And that's why as we examine this we will see certain characteristics that are the same in all these false systems. Because they go back to one source. One mother. And particularly the focal point as far as we’re concerned is here in the western world. And that religious form which will be in existence during the first three and a half years of the tribulation. This woman is described in Verse 6 as "drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus. And when I saw her, I wondered greatly." Here is a woman, this false system has been guilty of the martyrdom of many believers.

VERSE 7, "The angel said to me, Why do you wonder? I shall tell you the mystery of the wm>man and of the beast that carries her, which has seven heads and ten horns." Isn't this interesting? We don’t have to grope about for an interpretation. The angel says, "Let me tell you about it." "The beast that you saw was and is not, and is about to come up out of the abyss and to go to destruction." I’m talking about here both the empire and the leader of the empire. We saw this back in chapter 13 of Revelation with the coming of again into existence of this revived Roman Empire. An empire that to all intents and purposes has been dead, will be revived. Comes out of the abyss. Tell you what he’s talking about here is its motivation controlling factor for this is satanic, "Those who dwell on the earth will wonder, whose name has not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast, that he -was and is not and will come.”

People are going to be amazed at the revival of this empire and of the leadership of the anti-Christ. "Here’s the mind which has wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits; and they are seven kings; five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come; and when he comes, he must remain a little while." The seven heads are seven mountains. We’ve already looked at this in Revelation chapter 13, The seven kingdoms, earthly empires, going back to Egypt and down to Rome. There are some who also see a double identification here. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits which sees Rome as the seven-hilled city which has been known from ancient times. A city which is located or situated on seven hills.
I have no problem with that because I think Rome is in view here and we’ll talk more about that in a moment, as the key city in these closing days. But I think the prime emphasis here is that the seven mountains represent seven kingdoms. A mountain in Scripture is a kingdom. Remember in Daniel chapter 2? With a stone cut without hands crushes all the empires of the world and it becomes a great mountain. A great kingdom filling all the earth. And so you see it’s seven mountains—there’s seven kings. A mountain is a king or a kingdom. A king and a kingdom are interchangeable. "Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come." We have alluded just to this already. But mention it to refresh your mind. "Five have fallen", that was up till John's time, up till the Roman Empire. "One is" that was the Roman Empire, the sixth. The seventh would be the ten-nation confederacy. And after the ten- nation confederacy, there will be verse 11, "The beast which was and is not, is himself also an eighth, and is one of the seven." In other words, remember it is out of this seventh kingdom, the ten-nation confederacy that the anti-Christ rises to power. John says for the last three and a half years you could even call him the eighth kingdom because he will dominate the world himself. So John breaks it down even more finely than has been done heretofore.

Verse 14, "These will wage war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, because He is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with Him are the called and chosen and faithful. And he said to me, The waters which you saw where the harlot sits, are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues." So at the end of verse 1 we saw the harlot sitting on many waters. This refers to people of all nationalities. So this apostate system has encompassed people all over the world.

Verse 16, "The ten horns which you saw, and the beast, these will hate the harlot and will make her desolate and naked, and will eat her flesh and will burn her up with fire." So we have an overview here that for the first three and a half years, this apostate religious system will dominate in the western world, In the middle of the seven-year tribulation, this ten-nation confederacy under the leadership of the anti-Christ, will turn against the apostate religious system and destroy and annihilate it. So here you have a conflict—even the unbeliever rejecting the unbelieving religious system. Because what's going to happen in the middle of the tribulation is the anti-Christ is going to declare himself god. And the only worship allowed in the world is worship of him. And there is no place for apostate religious systems.

Now, I want to do a little bit briefly with you on mystery Babylon and then look a little more into detail with this tonight on the characterizations of mystery Babylon. I think you’ll see as we go though some of the characterizations, but let me tell you at the front. I think this apostate system finds its center, this religious system. Chapter 17 of Revelation zeros in on Babylon and its religious aspect. Chapter 18 of Revelation deals with Babylon in its commercial aspect. The religious aspect of Babylon—a mystery. The mystery of Babylon the great centers in Rome. My conviction is Roman Catholicism will be at the heart of this system. That's not to say Roman Catholicism is more in error than a modern-day protestant— liberalism. What will happen is they will be wed together in an apostate system.
You see the elements more clearly in Romanism perhaps, but Protestantism is just as apostate as Romanism. Some of these elements are more clearly carried to the fore in the Roman system.

For Babylon and its background, you go back to Genesis chapter 10. Babylon was founded by a man named Nimrod who was a mighty rebel before God and that begins his characterization. Nimrod, just to give you the line, was the grandson of Ham, the son of Noah. So you’re in that line. Genesis chapter 11 you have the building of the tower of Babel. Bab-el, the gate of God. God came down and confused the languages and it became Babel—confusion.

Now, the Bible doesn’t carry on the development of this system clearly. But secular history does.- And let me refresh your mind. If you are interested in the details of this, many of you have read THE TWO BABYLONS by Hislop. H I S L 0 P, the TWO BABYLONS. Fascinating reading. Where he shows the parallel of the Babylonian system which has come down in our own day. Nimrod, the man, was married to a woman named, Semiramis. Now Semiramis is said by secular history to be the founder of the Babylonian mystery religions. Semiramis bore a son that she claimed was miraculously conceived. A virgin son. His name was Tammuz. Tammuz. He becomes a significant figure. So you have Nimrod marrying Semiramis. Semiramis claims she has a miraculous birth of a child, a son names Tammuz and he was to be a coming deliverer. Now this becomes key. We just came through Christmas season. We celebrate the birth of Christ and you’ll note particularly in the Roman system, the emphases on the worship of Mary and the baby. I'm impressed. My son is in a Catholic hospital now and impressed with the pictures and the statutes and so on. The prominence of the mother and the child. The worship of the mother and the child is the oldest form of idolatry that we can trace. Centuries and centuries before
Jesus Christ. The Madonna and the child are worshipped. It comes out of the
Babylonian mystery religion. You find no place in Scripture in an acceptable sense where the mother and the child are worshipped. That comes from the Babylonian system. And it antedates Biblical Christianity. I do not know how much Satan understands about God’s future plans, but one thing is clear from the development of the Babylonian mystery system. That he understood that a miraculous deliverer would come through a virgin and he attempted to undermine the credibility of that by instituting a false system centuries before Jesus Christ was born. A miraculous child.

He had all kinds of secrets and we won’t go into those details. This child was supposed to have died in various ways and experienced a supernatural resurrection. But let me tell you a little bit about the mother and the child in the other nations of the world. Just so you see how from the Babylonian system it moved out into various parts of the world. Italy—Venus and Cupid. I picked them out because everybody knows of Cupid. We'll sing about him, we'll have Valentines Day come. Venus and Cupid are the development of the Semiramis and Tammuz, mother-son worship as it was carried over into Italy. Greece had Aphrodite and Eros. Different names-- -the worship of the mother and the child. Egypt had it under Isis and Osiris, and other nations of the world had it as well. You read THE TWO BABYLONS. It will give you an extended development. See how she became the mother of harlots?

This false worship, adoration of the mother and her miraculous baby now is spread throughout the world. Different names given to the mother. Different names given to the baby. The same system finding its source in the mother of harlots. Now this was the central heart of the Babylonian system. The worship of the mother and the child. Now there were many other lesser aspects to this religious system. Let me list some for you. Purification in Purgatory after death. That was part of the Babylonian system centuries before Christ was ever born. Wonder where did the Roman Catholic church get its doctrine of Purgatory? Nothing in the Bible at all about Purgatory. It flows in from the Babylonian system. Babylonian mystery religions taught that you had to be purified from your sins after death in Purgatory.

Salvation by the sacraments. You’ve heard that salvation is only in the holy Roman church? And you must partake of the sacraments. That's the disaster if you are excommunicated and cut off from the sacraments. You've been cut off from your means of salvation. Things like priestly absolution, sprinkling with holy water, they offered round cakes to the Queen of Heaven, Turn back to Jeremiah. We're not going to get much further than this. Tonight we'll look at some of these details just to refresh your mind.

Jeremiah, chapter 7. You see centuries before Christ, Jeremiah some 500 years before Christ writes about worshipping the Queen of Heaven, The Babylonian system had made its way into Israel. Israel was being caught up by it. In Jeremiah chapter 7, verse 18. As God condemns Israel through Jeremiah the prophet. "The children gather wood and the fathers kindle the fire and the women knead dough to make cakes for the Queen of Heaven." Now what are we talking about? In the Babylonian system they offered little round cakes to the Queen of Heaven, Israel had picked up this.

Look over in chapter 44 of Jeremiah while you're there. Verse 17. "But rather we will certainly carry out every word that has proceeded from our mouths by burning sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out libations to her, just as we ourselves, our forefathers, our kings, our princes did in the city of Jerusalem and the streets of—in the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem." You see that. The kings, the princes, the people have all committed whoredom with this harlot. Here the leaders of Israel tell Jeremiah, "We’re going to do what we’ve been doing." Verse 18, "Since we stopped burning sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out libations to her, we have lacked everything." They're saying, "Since we quit honoring the Queen of Heaven, we haven't had the same blessings."

Verse 19, "The woman said when we were burning sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out libations to her, was it without our husbands that we made our sacrificial cakes in her image, pour out libations to her..." down to verse 25: "Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, as follows, "As for you and your wives, you have spoken with your mouths and filled it with your hands saying, we will certainly perform our vows that we have vowed—to burn sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven, pour out libations to her." Then he speaks of judgment. See the Queen of Heaven? That was part of the Babylonian system. They were worshipping the Queen of Heaven under the condemnation of God 500 years before Christ, and centuries before that, cause here the leaders say that our father's fathers were involved in this. The Queen of Heaven didn't come into existence with Mary and the Roman Catholic church. The Queen of Heaven was part of the Babylonian system adopted into the church. When it amalgamated many of these practices to make it more acceptable to pagans as Constantine attempted to Christianize the world.

The Babylonian system dedicated virgins to God. Those who were the leading women—religious women—were virgins, they were unmarried and -were to remain so. Interesting, and we'll talk a little bit about this perhaps when we have time this evening, There was a period of forty days set aside for weeping for Tammuz leading up to his resurrection, This was leading up to the great festival of Ishtar. Now you don't even have to be a great student of ancient history, The feast of Ishtar was preceded by a forty day feast—ah a forty day period of weeping, A period of Lent. Now we’ve carried the name Ishtar over and we use it today. In a couple of months we’ll celebrate Easter, the festival of Ishtar, And in many religious systems that will be preceded by forty days of Lent. It had nothing to do with Christian practices. Tonight I'll read you a quote from a man in the early centuries who said when the church was pure there was no such thing as Lent, It's a pagan practice that has adopted by the church. Carried over from the Babylonian system/as pervaded and infiltrated every part of modern-day activity, particularly in the Roman church. Now I hate to emphasize that too much lest some will go away and say, "You know Rugh at Indian Hills.is anti-Catholic," No, I'm anti-whore and whatever is apostate religion I want to be anti, I want to view it as God does. If these things are Babylonian then they partake of the character of harlotry. Now what will happen is that this system will find its great blossoming during the first three and a half years, We find it going on today. How many millions of people are involved in this system? Practicing the Babylonian things, where in the Bible do you find Purgatory? Where do you find in the Bible the worship of Mary? These kinds of things, Priestly absolution. You don't. But why do you find millions of people doing it? Because it's the Babylonian system.

Now God has laid it out clearly, It's a matter of people choose to reject the truth of God and heap to themselves teachers haying itching ears. They want to believe this and they don't want to believe God, We're going to break there in the middle tonight, We'll look at some of the other characteristics, We as believers need to be aware, We develop a subtle acceptance of these things, "Well, they're not Biblical but can they hurt anything? Is there anything significant to it? I mean so here's the statute of Mary with the little halo around her head as they call it, A little baby in her arms, What's the harm? The harm is it's Babylonian, And I cannot mix the two, I cannot play with a harlot and worship God, Now He demands that I be pure
and faithful to Him,

Now, let me say one other thing lest there’s any misunderstanding. Truth is truth because it's found in the Word of God. It’s not truth because Gil Rugh preaches it or believes it, I’m not saying everyone who disagrees with me is a harlot, or fooling around with harlots, what I’m saying is everyone who is involved in worship contrary to the Word of God and the teaching of Scripture is involved in harlotry. And this standard is the one that I must be measured by as well as you. The only question is, what is the basis for your worship? What is the basis for your religious activities if I can use that expression? Have you come to understand and believe that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died for you? Is that what you’re trusting for your eternal salvation? If you're trusting anything else, any form of religious activity at all, you're involved in a system of harlotry. An unfaithfulness to God in opposition to Him, Because it says salvation is only by faith in the death and resurrection of His Son,

Let's pray together,.,.