The Religious System of Babylon

Transcript

GR 2042
06/03/2018
The Religious System of Babylon
Revelation 17:1-5; Jeremiah 50-51
Gil Rugh

We’re going to come to our study of the Book of Revelation in chapter 17. Chapter 17 moves us very quickly to the climax of earth’s history, chapters 17, 18 and 19. Chapter 19 is the return of Christ to earth. Chapters 20, 21 and 22 describes the kingdom that will be established by Christ and which he will rule over, forever and ever. If you’ve been with us through the study of the Book of Revelation, you’ll see that there is a sequential movement. There is an orderliness to it. It saddens me when I study the Book of Revelation that so many Christians approach this book as something of a confused mystery and fail to appreciate the wonder of the revelation that’s given here.

Let me remind you since it’s been at least three weeks since we looked at the chart. We’ll put this chart up. All of you are laughing but someday when I give the test, I’ll bet there’s some people who may not pass. When I was in Bible College, I had a professor, Dr. John McGahey. He was great, but he was really solid on the distinction between Israel and the church. John McGahey had silver gray hair then and he was great. He’d come to the snack shop and visit with us but he gave us a test and he was really solid on the distinction between Israel and the Church. He came to class one day after we had a test and you could tell—he was getting red in the face. Someone on this test equated Israel and the Church and boy did he go off. He was red as a beet and he was really going. That has nothing to do—but it reminded me of it with the chart, so I have white hair. If I give you a test and you fail on this chart, I’ll be a tomato face.

We’re in the Church Age. That’s the dark color on the chart, the period of time in which we live. Israel is under judgment and they have been rejected by God, as a nation, not permanently, and by God’s grace, some Jews are being saved, but it is primarily a time of Gentile salvation. This will come to a conclusion with the rapture of the church. The Book of Revelation, from chapter six on, is about the seven-year Tribulation. When we get to chapter 19, we will have the return of Christ to earth. Then we will have the kingdom, so we are right at the end of this seven-year period as we come to chapter 17. There’ll be some overview that will give us a broader picture of what is happening here, but really we are focusing on the destruction of this world’s religious system and its political and commercial system. Then we will be ready for chapter 19 and the establishing of the kingdom.

Maybe you could put up the chart on the major events of the Tribulation because we are right here with the seventh bowl. Remember the series of judgments begin with the seven seals. There was a seven-sealed scroll and that scroll includes everything, through chapter 22, verse 5, so “out of this seventh seal comes seven trumpets. Out of the seventh trumpet come the seven bowls,” so everything is contained in that seventh seal but they are sequential. One follows another, “out of the seventh seal came seven trumpets, out of the seventh trumpet come seven bowls.” Through chapter 16, we have come through these seven bowls. In chapter 16 verse 17, “the seventh angel poured out his bowl upon the air” and we’ve had great preparation for these final judgments because they naturally lead us to the return of Christ.

So there’s an announcement in chapter 16, verse 19. “The great city was split into three parts, the cities of the nations fell.” Now note this “Babylon the great was remembered before God, to give her the cup of the wine of His fierce wrath.” Important that we not lose focus that through history there has been conflict, spiritual conflict between God and the devil. Between the purposes and plans of God and the opposition of the devil with his purposes and plans, and all of this is a spiritual warfare, and every person born into the human race, is part of this warfare.

We are born as sinners. David said, “In sin my mother conceived me.” It doesn’t mean that conception is sin. It means we are sinners from the moment of conception, which tells you something about when life begins as well, and until we experience God’s redeeming grace, we are under the slavery of our sin and the consequences of that sin. It is an ongoing warfare. The devil loves to blur things but there is no blurring, in God’s revelation. You are either a child of God or a child of the devil. There are no other kinds of people on the face of the earth, and the only people who belong to God are those who have come to place their faith in Him, in the Savior He provided in the person of His Son, Jesus Christ and by faith alone trust in Him. Everyone else is a child of the devil, destined to condemnation.

This comes to a climax here at the end of the Book of Revelation because you’ll note chapter 17 begins. “Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and spoke with me, saying, ‘Come here, I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters’” and when we move down here, we’re talking about Babylon. Remember verse 19 of chapter 16, “Babylon the great was remembered before God to give her the cup of the wine of His fierce wrath.” There are two major cities that are the focal point of Scripture and the spiritual conflict that takes place in the world. It will be Jerusalem and we’re well familiar with Jerusalem. We sing of Jerusalem, the holy city, and so on and then there is Babylon.

Babylon and the system associated with Babylon, both religiously, politically commercially, involves all that is opposed to God and involves all the people that have not experienced His redeeming grace. Jerusalem is the city of God. It was the city appointed as the capitol city for His people Israel in the Old Testament. The city of David, because David was the one used of God to take control of that area, that place and Jerusalem became the central city. We are going toward the new Jerusalem ultimately, and that’s the conflict. That’s where God’s people will be for eternity. The devil’s people are part of the Babylonian system with the Babylonian city. God’s people ultimately will be part of the Jerusalem that will be the climax. Babylon is destined to destruction. Jerusalem, the new Jerusalem as we’ll see, is an eternal city.

You see this brought out as we get to the end. The Book of Revelation is God’s final word to His churches. Chapters 17 and 18, really chapter 17 verse 1 into chapter 19 verse 10 are about Babylon. Then you come over to chapter 21, verse 9 through chapter 22, verse 5, it’s about Jerusalem, and that conflict. The end of the Babylonian system and all that’s associated with it and the establishing, of Jerusalem for the kingdom that Christ will rule over forever, so these two cities become the center of what is taking place. It’s not until the Book of Revelation that you understand with clarity how this plan has been moving. It had it’s beginning early in biblical history, but the clarity that this has been the center of Satanic work in the world, and all he is doing, does not become crystal clear until we get to Revelation chapter 17, and then we see God winning the ultimate victory.

Let’s look a little bit, then I want to put another chart up shortly that will come up in a subsequent verse. You’ll note how chapter 17 opens. “Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and spoke with me saying, ‘Come here, and I will show you, the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters. . .’” Come over to chapter 21 verse 9. “Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues,” so another, is connected to the seven last bowls. “One of the seven angels” associated with the last bowls again, “spoke and said, ‘Come here, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb,’” so in these last judgments, here you have the angels associated with those judgments. One of them comes, says to John, “come here, I will show you the judgment of Babylon,” to summarize it. Then later, “come here, I will show you the new Jerusalem” and you see how the comparison and contrast is drawn. He’s going to show Babylon as doomed to destruction, Jerusalem destined for eternal glory, that’s what is happening in these last chapters.

That’s why people, who don’t understand the Book of Revelation, fail to be able to see how everything is brought together with a finality and a clarity that enables everything preceding to make more sense and to fit more clearly. This is said to be in verse 1 of chapter 17, “the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters.” That’s the subject as we said of chapter 17 really down through chapter 19 verse 10. The judgment on this harlot and this harlot will be Babylon and all associated with Babylon and the Babylonian system, religiously politically commercially. Babylon has always been Satan’s counterfeit to God’s work, so it’s time for judgment.

The harlotry here is spiritual harlotry, and that will become even more evident as we move along, but that’s a common analogy. In the Old Testament Nineveh, in the prophecy of Naham, chapter 3, that city, the capitol of Assyria was viewed as a harlot. The city of Tyre in its godlessness, in Isaiah 23 viewed as a harlot city. Babylon and we’ll be looking at this in Isaiah 47 and we’ll be in Jeremiah 51, referred to as a harlot because it’s a city which is characterized in all of its activity as being in opposition to God, centers of false worship, corruption, so it’s all part as it comes together in the climax of earth’s history, in Babylon.

This harlot city, this center of spiritual rebellion against God. This is the one with whom the kings of the earth committed immorality. Those who dwell on the earth “were made drunk with the wine of her immorality.” In other words, this harlot and this harlot city, and we’ll see the details of that associated with it as we move through these chapters, but it has been a source of corruption for the world and people at all levels. The different rulers of the world have been involved with this corruption because “the whole world lies in the evil one.”

The sovereign plan of God is a result of the rebellion of Adam and his ancestors. The devil exercises authority and control. Remember, we’ve looked at this in the temptation of Christ in Matthew. Satan shows Christ all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and says, “I can give all these to you because they’ve been given to me,” so now we’re seeing in chapter 17, the final pulling together in one focal kingdom, one focal city, all that rebellion that has characterized the world since the early days. The kings of the earth committed immorality. Those who dwell on the earth were drunk with the wine of their immorality. You see how God sees all the worship activity of the world.

This is why Christians are counseled, and we’ve looked at this that you do not want to become involved in any kind of false worship, false religious activity. That is fellowshipping with demons. Now you want to be careful. Some think, well you know we have a lot to agree on in moral areas, social areas, and concern for helping people, the poor or the disadvantaged or others. The world is divided by God between those who experience the power of his saving grace through faith in His Savior alone, and everybody else.
We have to see it the way the world sees it. It is black and white in the sense of what is God’s is clear, what is not.

Now that doesn’t mean we can tell on every single person, well that person is truly saved that person is not. Only God sees the heart, but the issue and the basic division is clear as it could be, and that’s what God is saying here. Everybody involved in that Babylonian system, from its inception to its final climatic form that brings it all together in one religion with one ruler for the world. Everything tied into that is just simply the pulling finally together of what has been somewhat diversified and when we get to the new Jerusalem, it will include only those who have experienced God’s saving grace, so immorality, that’s how God sees false religion. It is a rejection of Him and all creation belongs to Him by His creating activity. We’ve seen this in the Book of Isaiah, but in the plan of God with their rebellion, Satan has been given authority over fallen humanity, but God has intervened with His grace to rescue those who come to salvation in His Son.

So in verse three, John is “carried away in the Spirit into the wilderness.” Now we’re not told what the wilderness means and why he is carried there. Perhaps the simplest explanation is, we’re talking about Babylon. It will be the city of Babylon, and you’re familiar with present day history where Babylon is and where ancient Babylon was. It is a wilderness type region, so that may be the reason he talks about a wilderness here because this is going to become the center of Satanic activity in the last days as we prepare for the coming of Christ.

“He saw a woman, sitting on a scarlet beast, full of blasphemous names, having seven heads and ten horns.” A woman sitting on a scarlet beast. This is the beast, we met in chapter 13 if you want to come back there, verse one. “I saw a beast coming up out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads, and on his horns were ten diadems, and on the heads were blasphemous names.” Now this is the beast here and there’s a woman sitting on the beast, and we’re going to see the woman portrays the religious aspect of the Babylonian system.

The city Babylon, just like Jerusalem. We call it the holy city because it becomes representative of God’s presence and God’s work as God dwelled among His people, and ultimately in the future He will have His throne in the new Jerusalem, so Babylon becomes that center of satanic activity and satanic religious activity and worship. So the woman sitting on the scarlet beast, this will be explained. The first six verses give you the vision and then, John is given the explanation. I’m going to be jumping ahead a little bit from time to time, but we’ll go through the details of the explanation in the last part of chapter 17 but for now I’ll just tell you the woman sitting on the scarlet beast portrays the religious dimension of this Babylonian system.

The scarlet beast…that beast, remember, is the Antichrist, the political ruler, and as we’ll see later, particularly during the first 3½ years, the religious system and the political system have merged. You’ll note the woman is sitting on the beast, and for a time this religious system will have a dominant role, in the Antichrist’s rise to power and assuming power because the satanic system has always had religion as its focus. What does the devil want? What did he tell Christ? Fall down and worship me, and I’ll give you all these kingdoms, but the devil is all about usurping God’s place. We’ve been back in the Old Testament, Isaiah 14, Ezekiel 28, “I will, I will, I will.” His desire is to usurp that which belongs to God alone and have the creation worship him, so this woman at this time representing the religious aspect of the Babylonian system is on the scarlet beast.

Now we have another chart just to remind you. We’ve seen this picture before of the beast, the seven heads the ten horns. These are the major empires in biblical history. We’ve looked at this before. We have the verses here. Come back to chapter 12 verse 3. “Another sign appeared in heaven: and behold a great red dragon,” and we’re told down in verse nine of chapter 12 that the dragon is the devil, and you’ll note he has “seven heads and ten horns, and on these heads were diadems,” so it’s the same picture. Here it’s the devil wearing this.

Then you come to chapter 13 verse 1. “Then I saw a beast coming out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads, and on his horns were diadems and blasphemous names on the heads.” The same thing as you saw was on the head of the devil. Why? Because the devil is the spiritual enabling power for this political ruler the beast, so the connection there, but you have the seven heads ten horns, seven heads ten horns. Then when we come to chapter 17 and verse 3, we have the seven heads and ten horns and then down in verses 9 and following, we’ll have more detailed explanation of these things.

You say, “well I don’t see all this.” It’s going to become clearer in our next study as we move through more of the explanation, but for now you’ll see what these seven heads represent. We have gone back to Daniel. Daniel saw the same things but he started with the kingdom, remember, that was in existence when Daniel wrote. He started with Babylon, so he saw Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome, those four empires. Then in chapter 7 of Daniel, he saw the ten horns also present. Then he saw a little horn, which will be the eighth, as we’ll see in chapter 17.

What John does, he is taken back to the beginning of Israel’s history so this beast has seven heads referring to the seven major empires that are significant in biblical history, and Israel’s history. What was the first, Egypt? We talked about this; that’s when Israel became a nation. It went down into Egypt, Jacob with his family, where Joseph had become important. There were only about seventy people. Four-hundred years later, they come out as a nation of 2 million, so Egypt is the first, then Assyria. Assyria is crucial in biblical history because it carries the ten northern tribes of Israel into captivity. Then Babylon that conquered the southern kingdom. Then Persia, Greece, Rome, then the ten nations, then the Antichrist, so the seven heads are these first seven kingdoms.

We’ll get the explanation of the eighth because the eight is the beast who now started as insignificant, but remember from the Book of Daniel that he becomes the dominant power. That’ll be explained down in the later part of the chapter, so that’s what we’re talking about, this beast is not new and we saw this prepared back in the Book of Daniel. Then we got things more clearly. Now we get to chapter 17 and we’re putting together of the pieces finally, and we jumped ahead when we studied Daniel and so on because you really don’t get the complete picture until you come to the Book of Revelation.

So now come back to Revelation chapter 17 and let’s look at verse 4. “The woman,” the woman who’s sitting on the beast, so the picture of somebody riding an animal. They have control on it. This woman, who is a harlot, the whole city and everything associated is harlotry but this religious aspect of it. She’s “clothed in purple and scarlet, adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a gold cup full of abominations of the unclean things of her immorality.”

We’ll, wait a moment, but that gold cup full of abominations that comes out of the prophecy of Jeremiah chapter 51. So some of these things that are prophesied, Jeremiah prophesies 500 years before Christ. Now we’re reading 600 years later what John writes and now God is pulling it together. It’s amazing, the details of Scripture and how God progressively revealed more of His purposes and plans and now finally, in 95 A.D, He’s putting the final pieces so everything fits together. How blessed we are to have the Book of Revelation.

This false religious system is very wealthy, very rich. Clothed in purple and scarlet, this woman, adorned with gold, precious stones, pearls, has a gold cup but it’s full of abominations. Everyone who partakes of this system is corrupted and defiled. This comes to its fullness in this seven-year tribulation, but it’s true of all the false worship of this Babylonian system down through history. Over time, even the evangelical church becomes more comfortable, we settle in and we begin to blur because the world, you know you have to be inclusive and the thing that is unacceptable, is exclusiveness, but Jesus was very exclusive. “He said, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but by Me.’” Now what about that don’t we understand? Now you may reject it and most of the world does, but to give the idea that Jesus was not exclusive is to deny the truth of the bible. There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. To say there is another mediator, another way to God, indicates you’re part of the Babylonian system. We want to be clear and what God does, remember, this was written to the churches with blessing promised to the Church as they heeded this truth. It’s intended to be understood.

We say, “but yeah we’re talking about things that’ll be happening when the Church is gone,” but knowing this is to shape our behavior, it is to clarify things for us so we live with clarity in an unclear world. We’re not confused. Everybody else lives in confusion. The fact that lines are drawn clearly is because God drew them clearly for us. It’s not a matter, oh well, that’s that church’s belief, that’s what that preacher preaches. It’s what God says, but you note this is a prosperous religious system because the people of the world give to it. It’s a wealthy religion, but it is an abomination. It is unclean.

Come to verse five, we get the identification. “On her forehead, a name was written,” so this is the woman sitting on the beast. A mystery, now some of the people think this should be a title instead of a comma after mystery. Put it with Babylon, mystery Babylon the great. Now we have it right in this translation. He is saying on her forehead was written a mystery. Now I’m going to tell you what the mystery is. A mystery in the bible is something you could not know or understand without God’s revelation. It’s not something mysterious and boy, it’s hard to understand. It is something that is unknowable, apart from revelation from God. Now you can read Ephesians 3 as Paul defines what a mystery in the biblical context is, so here is a mystery that is now being made known.

This woman is Babylon the great. Babylon, that attachment, the great. Babylon the great. Babylon the great. This is Satan’s great counterfeit, the mother of harlots and the abominations of the earth. This is Babylon, Babylon the great. This Babylonian system the mother of harlots. It all goes back to this system. We remember this system had its beginning very early. Come back to the Book of Genesis. This is why, when you don’t have the Book of Revelation and this is the devil’s work, they tried to make even Christians think the Book of Revelation is hard to understand; it’s all symbolism and it just pictures, a conflict between good and evil and ultimately God wins. It’s much more than that.

Come to Genesis 10. Look at verse 8. Now we have the flood of Noah and remember Noah’s three sons were on the ark with Noah, so the three sons are mentioned in chapter 10, verse 1, “Shem, Ham and Japheth, the sons of Noah.” Now we’re going to talk about the sons that were born to them after the flood, so verse two starts, “the sons of Japheth,” then we come to verse six, “the sons of Ham,” then verse eight, now “Cush,” so we’re going to talk about Cush. “The sons of Ham were Cush;” Cush is a son of Ham. Then we want to come down to verse eight. “Cush became the father of Nimrod,” so the son of Noah was Ham, then Ham had a son Cush and now Cush is of interest to us.

“Cush became the father of Nimrod. He became a mighty one on the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the LORD; therefore, it is said ‘Like Nimrod a mighty hunter before the LORD.’” The beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. The land of Shinar, these are places all in that area of Babylon, that region. Now you note this one person stands out. The world is united at this point. They’re not people scattered with different languages in different places and he is the person so well known.

Come over to chapter 11. You’re familiar, now chapter 11, verse 1 says, “now the whole earth used the same language,” the same words. “They journeyed east; they found a plain in the land of, Shinar.” Remember that’s where Nimrod was, the land of Shinar. That’s Babylon.

“They said, ‘Come, let’s make bricks . . .’” and they used brick they used tar for mortar, they said, verse four “Come let us build for ourselves a city, and in this city a tower whose top will reach heaven,” and note, remember these are like pyramid shaped buildings but they’re flat, they have no top. They didn’t think they could build a building that would go through the clouds and what it was; this will be our center of worship, so you build it high. Then on that flat top is where your worship was offered by the priest or whoever who represented you, so you want to get closer to heaven, lifted up above the earth. It’s the worship center, so you see, “we’ll build a city, we’ll have a center of worship in that city, and we’ll make for ourselves a name, otherwise, we’ll be scattered abroad over the face of the earth.”

This is Satan’s first move after God brought judgment on the world in the flood, to replace God’s plan. He will bring all the people of the world together in a city with a center of worship. God knows where that is going obviously. This is not His plan. Sin has impacted the world, brought corruption. The flood did not remove corruption. The sin nature of Adam came through the flood in the person of Noah and his three sons, and passed on, so you can’t have the kingdom, so God divides the languages. One morning everybody gets up, and he can’t talk to his neighbor. I don’t know, they’re just mumbling. I don’t know what they’re saying. We have to get away, so they went with the people that they could understand, and moved to different parts, and that’s how God spread people out.

You see, not His purpose, but understand. This is an issue we should understand. I listened to a preacher on the radio this week and I don’t know where he’s coming from, but he should know better, because I have one of his predecessor’s multivolume commentaries on the Book of Revelation in my library and he should reread those. We’re moving toward Globalism. That may not be what your choice would be, may not be what my choice would be, but God says that’s where the world is going. You know it’s the plan of the devil, and it’s the plan of God as well, because ultimately God’s plan is, the world will be united, with Jerusalem as its capitol and Christ as its ruler. The devil’s plan is, the world will be united with Babylon as its capitol and his Antichrist as his ruler, so you may not be a fan of Globalism, but that’s where it is going because ultimately, before Christ returns, the world will be united. We will have one world government, with one world religion, with one world ruler, so even the discussions about it are of interest to us.

Now that doesn’t mean you have to vote for a Globalist. You know we have freedom to vote and that but we need to be careful that we’re out there talking like we think. I listened to this preacher, and we think God made this man president, and that’s what it is, and we have to do this, and we have to do that. I believe God appointed this president to be president. I believe He appointed the previous president as well, and the previous one before that. In fact, Romans says that God appointed every ruler at every level. That doesn’t mean every ruler is obeying Him, but every ruler is doing His ultimate will, because He even uses sinful decisions to accomplish--so we want to know where everything is going.

Babylon started back here. Finally the devil, after God frustrated the original plan in Genesis 11, now in the plan of God is able to pull things together. We will have this unity in these seven years, so let’s stop in Jeremiah 51, 50 and 51 because I want to pick up a couple of things you see tie together. Then I want to talk—there’s some interesting things from history about the Babylonian religious system. Very early, you can see elements that have continued down through today, even with the diversity of religion that has spread around, but in Jeremiah chapter 50, Jeremiah chapters 50 and 51. They’re long chapters, forty-nine verses and sixty-four verses. It’s all about Babylon. There are other things said in here but in the context of God going to destroy Babylon.

You note how chapter 50 begins. “The word, which the LORD spoke concerning Babylon, the land of the Chaldeans, through Jeremiah the prophet;” and this is to be “declared and proclaimed among the nations” and so on but note the context here. Verse 4, “’In those days and at that time,’ declares the LORD, ‘the sons of Israel will come, both they and the sons of Judah,’” so the northern kingdom and southern kingdom are brought together. “They will go along weeping as they go, it will be the LORD their God they will seek.” “They will ask for the way to Zion, turning their faces in its direction; they will come that they may join themselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that will not be forgotten.” That’s when the nation as a nation, Romans 11, comes to faith in Christ as their Messiah and Christ returns to bring deliverance to them.

You see the context here. As is often true, the Old Testament prophets talked about things that were more current, but then the Spirit of God directed them to future matters and we’re going to talk about the future destruction of the future Babylon and this is all going to take place in the time when God is going to restore Israel. Down at the end of verse 15 of chapter 50. “This is the vengeance of the LORD: take vengeance on her; as she has done to others. “Cut off the sower from Babylon” and so on and then verse 19. “I will bring Israel back to his pasture. He will graze on Carmel and Bashan. His desire will be satisfied in the hill country of Ephraim and Gilead.”

Israel is back in the land, prospering. “In those days at that time,’ declares the LORD, ‘search will be made for the iniquity of Israel, but there will be none.’” All the sin of Israel will have been cleansed. “The sins of Judah, they will not be found; I will pardon those whom I leave as a remnant.” That brings us to the end of the Tribulation and the return of Christ. That’s the remnant of Israel, and those that are represented in Romans 11. All Israel will be saved.

He goes on talking about the judgment of Babylon. Come down to chapter 51. It opens up, “thus says the LORD: ‘Behold, I am going to arouse against Babylon,’” and talk about—verse 5, “for neither Israel nor Judah has been forsaken by his God, the LORD of hosts, although their land is full of guilt before the Holy One of Israel.” How can people believe in the replacement of Israel with the church? How can you deny a future for Babylon? What does God say; “Neither Israel nor Judah has been forsaken by his God, although their land is full of guilt.” The sin of Israel cannot cause God to go against His word. They’re under judgment now, but verse 6, “Flee from the midst of Babylon.” We’ll get to this in chapter 18 where that same call will be given. “Each of you save his life! Do not be destroyed in her punishment.”

“This is the LORD’S time of vengeance. He’s going to render recompense to her.” Verse 7 “Babylon has been a golden cup in the hand of the LORD, intoxicating all the earth. The nations have drunk of her wine; therefore, the nations are going mad, and then suddenly Babylon has been broken; wail over her! You see the context here. See it’s similar, that golden cup that the woman has in her hand, that was a cup given to her by the LORD. God is sovereign in this, but all that have partaken of her; have been corrupted by her. “It’s been intoxicating the earth,” verse 7, they’re going mad.

Remember God is sovereign. They owe Him their worship and ultimately, “every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father,” but some will do it going to hell. Some will do it going to glory in the new Jerusalem. Verse 15, “it is He who established the earth by His power, who established the world by His wisdom, by His understanding He stretched out the heavens,” and so on, all that. He’s the Creator. Anyone who doesn’t worship Him is in rebellion against Him, and the only way to worship Him is according to, His instructions. “No one comes to the Father but by Me,” Jesus said.

Sometimes I say sin makes you stupid, and some people think I shouldn’t say those kind of things, but let me read verse 17. “All mankind is, stupid devoid of knowledge” in case you don’t understand what stupid means. This is what false worship is, it’s stupidity. Sin makes you stupid. All mankind is stupid, why? “Because all have sinned” and they live partaking of the cup of the immorality, the spiritual corruption of this Babylonian system, whatever form it takes. It makes no sense. You cannot win in rebellion against the living God. As we read in the previous chapter, everyone’s gone mad! It’s, you know, its insanity and yet you’re supposed to live in this make believe world, and it becomes more obvious now.

You know you don’t know what a man is, what a woman is, what a boy or a girl is. It’s whatever they want to be. Oh isn’t it wonderful, and this fantasy world comes out of their fantasy, religions. They have rejected the God of heaven, the Creator of all. What kind of wisdom do they have? They have no wisdom. They are stupid. They are devoid of knowledge. We don’t say that with arrogance because we were just like them, stupid, devoid of knowledge. It wasn’t our wisdom that brought us to God. It was God’s wisdom, in His grace, that reached down and drew us to salvation in Christ. This is the Babylonian system so prophesized.

Come to verse 45, I’m still in Jeremiah 51. “Come forth from her midst, My people. Each of you save yourselves from the fierce anger of God.” You have to escape the city of Babylon and all that’s associated with its corruption. The only escape is in Christ. Verse 47, “Therefore days are coming when I will punish the idols of Babylon. Her whole land will be put to shame. All her slain will fall in her midst. Then heaven and earth and all that is in them will shout for joy over Babylon.” We saw that in the lead up to these judgments. Heaven rejoicing, is what the prophet said would happen. Why, verse 55, “The LORD is going to destroy Babylon.” At the end of verse 56, “The LORD is a God of recompense, He will fully repay.”

That’s where we are in Revelation 17 and 18. What has the devil done to the Church and the churches that they don’t study the Book of Revelation? They don’t think it’s for our understanding. This is the devil saying, “I don’t want you to know the future. I don’t want you to understand what’s going on today leading to this climax.” It’s a corrupt system, it’s a corrupt world. There’s no hope for it. It is a Babylonian world in that sense, and it’s political, we’ll get to that in chapter 18 and its politics, and its commercialism and in its religion and the religion is the subject of chapter 17. It is a corrupt system.

We are not here to reform the world or to make it better or to hope that this ruler or that law given that things are going—there’s no salvation of the world apart from Jesus Christ. I mean we believers end up denying what we came to believe. We get caught up in all the emotion of the politics and everything that bombards us day after day. We think, boy we’ve got to get involved in this. These things, I can’t understand what they’re doing, we have to stop that and--It’s going to Revelation 17.

How are we going to stand before God and say, “well Lord, I thought I should do—.” That doesn’t mean I don’t want to do good, but I don’t want to lose perspective. I cannot rescue the world from its doom. I can only present the gospel of God’s grace so people in this doomed world can reach out to the salvation that is in Christ. Take hold of Him. Think of it. You sit here and you haven’t trusted Christ--you are stupid, but I was stupid too. You know what, there’s hope for us stupid ones that got an “F” on our report card, you know that failed in the basics of knowing the true and living God, but now that you’ve heard, why would you continue to say “no?”

I’ll take my chances. Well, you’ve got your beliefs. I’ve got mine. My beliefs don’t matter your beliefs don’t matter, what God says matters and if you don’t believe that, you’re doomed. How beautiful it is.

I’m so excited we can work through chapters 17 and 18 and get to chapter 19 and Christ comes with final rescue, and there is ultimate redemption because as we saw in Revelation chapter 5, there is the Lamb who was slain, and that’s why we can have, chapters 21, 22 of Revelation. There is eternal glory. There is a new Jerusalem. The devil loses. Babylon is destroyed. The Savior wins!

Let’s pray: Thank You Lord for so great salvation. Thank You that the hope for each individual in the world and the ultimate hope for the creation, created by You, is that the Lamb was slain. That Christ came and died and in His death, He paid the penalty in full for our sin. He was raised in glory and You in Your grace and love offer salvation as a free gift to all who will believe in Him. May we be faithful to You as we anticipate His coming to bring us to glory in Christ’s name? Amen.