Lesson No. 13. God's Final Warning Message to Christendom

GOD'S FINAL WARNING MESSAGE TO CHRISTENDOM

  God is giving a last warning message to all honest-hearted persons to lay aside substitutions and heathen traditions and return to the Law of God and the Testimony of Jesus Christ (Revelation 12:17). Since these undenominational messages are for the purpose of calling men and women back to God's Perfect Law, the Ten Commandments, our responsibility before God requires that we give this solemn warning in our part in this message. God, in His mercy, always gives warning before executing judgment upon a people or system. Sometimes people will not even listen to the warning, but God gives them a chance to hear and if they refuse to even listen, they seal their own doom. "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee . . ." (Hosea 4:6). Remember also that there is a way that seems right to a man, but that way leads to death (Proverbs 14:12). Friends, we urge you all to take these messages seriously and prayerfully. Study them in the light of God's Word (2 Timothy 2:15).
  "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His Commandments: For this is the whole duty of man, for God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil" (Ecclesiastes 12:13,14). Please note that it is the duty of man to keep the Commandments of God and not to follow the traditions of man when they are in conflict. We are to be judged by the Law of God and every secret thing will be there against us (James 2:10-12; Ecclesiastes 12:12,13).

WARNING MESSAGE

  In Revelation 18:4 we read, "And I heard a voice from Heaven, saying, 'Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.' " This is, no doubt, a warning from the Lord that was to be given at a certain time. The message is from Heaven, but God uses human beings to give the messages. It is a warning. "Come out of her, my people." The message is to honest people that are partaking of the sins of "Babylon the great" (Revelation 18:1,2). They evidently are professing Christians who are innocently partaking of the sins of Babylon because they do not know that some of their religious customs are heathen traditions and substitutions from Babylon the great and not from the Bible as they have been taught. Such a warning message would indicate that many honest people would be partaking of her sins. The warning is that those who refuse to come out of her sins will receive her plagues. In verse 8 "her plagues" are defined to be utter destruction under the judgment of God. Ten kings are to execute God's judgment upon her (Revelation 17:16,17).
  A description of Babylon the great is given in Revelation 17. The angel said to John, "I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters" (verse 1). She is called an harlot because she committed fornication with the kings of the earth (verses 1,2). The inhabitants of earth were made drunk with the wine, or the false doctrines, that came as a result of her fornication with the kings of the earth. This is symbolic language, but it is easy to get the key to the meaning. The True Church is repeatedly illustrated as a chaste woman (Revelation 19:7-9; 2 Corinthians 11:2; Revelation 12:1-3). Ancient Israel was spoken of as God's wife, and when she went off into idolatry and disobeyed God, she was guilty of spiritual adultery and was called an harlot (Jeremiah 3:1-8). From these texts we conclude that an harlot is a symbol of a corrupt church system. The whore in Revelation 17 represents a great corrupt church system that committed spiritual fornication with the kings of the earth. There was unlawful union of church and state and the doctrines of the Church were forced upon the people at the point of the sword for centuries and many false doctrines were adopted and forced upon the people in the name of Christianity.
  Revelation 17:3-6 gives a further description of the harlot. John was shown a woman arrayed in very costly garments and jewels, also she held a golden cup in her hand "full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication." This full cup symbolized the sum of her false doctrines that she made the people or nations drink. The sad part of it is that this great church claimed to be the true Church of God, and all her false doctrines were given in the name of Jesus Christ. John was shown this woman seated upon a scarlet-colored beast having seven heads and ten horns and full of the names of blasphemy. A beast symbolizes a nation or kingdom. This woman, or Church, was organized into what history calls "A spiritual monarchy," and her empire  became known as the "holy Roman Empire." Her church government was patterned after the Roman government. The great Spiritual Monarchy had a "World Priest" and a "World King," each claiming divine authority according to history. God knew that such a church system would come into power in the days of  the Roman Empire and that they would "think to change times and laws" (Daniel 7:25). God gave a name to that church system, "Mystery, Babylon the Great, The Mother of Harlots and the Abominations of the Earth" (Revelation 17:5). Because she ruled over so many nations of people for hundreds of years, her religious traditions became so fully established in the minds of the people that some of them are observed by most Protestants today. Heathen customs were adopted, whitewashed, and handed to the people as Christian customs. This also was foretold in Revelation 2:20-23. Jezebel was used in this text to represent the heathen religion, and there was a time when heathen customs and doctrines were taught in and by that church.  "Thou sufferest that woman Jezebel . . . to teach and seduce my servants and to commit fornication: and to eat things sacrificed to idols" (Revelation 2:20).

EASTER AND THE SABBATH?

  One of those heathen customs that led to direct substitution and change of one of the Ten Commandments is Easter Sunday. No Christian should celebrate Easter for two reasons: (1) It is of heathen origin and it perpetuates a false theory about the Resurrection of Christ. The Bible gives no authority for celebrating Christ's Resurrection on Sunday or any other day, but it does teach that the Resurrection was late on the Sabbath and not on Sunday (Matthew 28:1-6). The Easter Sunday Resurrection theory originated in Rome and not from Christ or the Apostles. History verifies this fact. (2) The second reason that no Christian should celebrate Easter Sunday is that it serves to perpetuate the false theory that the Christian day of worship is not the Sabbath day, but that the first day of the week was set apart as a holy day of worship for Christians as a memorial of Christ's Resurrection. This false theory came from the Roman Church. It is based entirely upon tradition and not on Bible authority. This theory has led many honest people to believe that Jesus did change His Father's Law. This theory teaches that the command to keep the seventh day ended at the death of Christ and that by divine authority the first day of the week became the Christian's Lord's Day. Church laws and regulations for Sundaykeeping are numerous, but when we take the Bible alone as authority we find no authority for Sunday observance. On the contrary, Jesus and the Apostles kept the Sabbath day and taught obedience to all the Ten Commandments. No change was made by divine authority. The change was made by human or church authority. This church deceives many people causing them to believe that God's Law was changed even though God's own Son said that it would not be changed. The fact is that no change was made in God's Law because the Church has no such authority. The Church of Rome frankly admits that there is no Bible authority for Sunday observance, but that it stands on church authority alone. They also address a friendly challenge to Protestants who observe Sunday. Let us prove this by a quotation from the Faith of Millions or The Credentials of the Catholic Religion by John A. O'Brien. From page 146 we quote, "The Bible does not contain all the teachings of the Christian religion, nor does it formulate all the duties of it's members. Take, for example, the matter of Sunday observance, the attendance at divine services and the abstention from unnecessary servile work on that day, a matter upon which our Protestant neighbors have for many years laid great emphasis. Let me address myself in a friendly spirit to my dear Protestant reader: you believe that the Bible alone is a safe guide in religious matters. You also believe that one of the fundamental duties enjoined upon by your Christian faith is Sunday observance. But where does the Bible speak of such an obligation? I have read the Bible from the first verse of Genesis to the last verse of Revelation, and have found no reference to the duty of sanctifying Sunday. The day mentioned in the Bible is not Sunday, the first day of the week, but Saturday, the last day of the week. It was the Apostolic Church which, acting by virtue of that authority conferred upon her by Christ, changed the observance to the Sunday in honor of the day on which Christ rose from the dead, and to signify that now we are no longer under the Old Law of the Jews but under the New Law of Christ. In observing the Sunday as you do, is it not apparent that you are really acknowledging the insufficiency of the Bible alone as a rule of faith and religious conduct, and proclaiming the need of a divinely established teaching authority which in theory you deny?" (Emphasis mine.) End of quotation. There it is, my friends, in words that no one can misunderstand. The Sabbath was never changed by Jesus Christ, but the substitution of Sunday came from the Church of Rome. The four inspired Gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, who recorded the life and teachings of Jesus, all agree that Jesus taught and observed the Sabbath day. Luke, who gives us 32 years of Church history in the "Acts of the Apostles," speaks of the Sabbath day as the day that was recognized and observed by the Apostle Paul and the churches of that time (Acts 17:2; 18:1-11; 16:3). The first day of the week is mentioned but once in all Luke's record of the "Acts of the Apostles" (Acts 20:1-14). This one meeting of Christians on Sunday was for the purpose of taking the evening meal, as he says that they came together to "break bread." (See Acts 2:42-46.) Paul gave his farewell message to these brethren at that time and left at daybreak for Assos. He walked some 18 miles that Sunday morning to join Luke and others who had been sailing that night around the peninsula to Assos. This one first-day meeting was a farewell meeting and not a word is said about a custom or manner of meeting on that day. Furthermore, Luke speaks of the day as the "first day of the week" and no sacredness is attached to the day at all.
  The same Church that gave us the tradition of Sunday observance also forbade Christians from "Judaizing and keep the Sabbath" in 363 A.D. at the Council of Laodicea. See Encyclopedia Britannica, 14th Edition, Art. "Sabbath." In Ancient Rome each day of the week was sacred to a Roman god and the first day of the week was known as sun's day. When Constantine the Great enacted the first Sunday law he was a heathen sunworshipper and his law commanded rest upon "the venerable day of the sun." Who was he venerating or giving reverence to in this law? It was his own favorite heathen diety, the Sun God. It was a crafty way of giving the heathen a weekly sabbath day and he chose to make it in honor of the Sun God. The churches in Rome had drifted far from the teachings of Christ and many were seeking for advantage in the Empire. It was not long before their church councils were following Constantine's example and were making laws that commanded all Christians to observe "the venerable day of the sun" as the Christian's Sabbath day. And these same church councils also made laws that forbade Christians keeping the Sabbath that God blessed and sanctified at the Creation for man (Genesis 2:1-3; Mark 2:27,28).
  Do you wonder now that God warned of the earthly power that would think to change time and laws? God's warning that Jezebel's heathen doctrines would again be accepted and taught as doctrines of the Church of God is most certainly true. Honest people in many churches are still observing those heathen customs because tradition has taught them to believe that God authorized them. But God says, "I have not spoken (Ezekiel 13:6,7). Sunday observance is not an honor to the Lord Jesus Christ because it was never authorized by divine authority, but, on the contrary, it is an honor that is paid to the heathen sun God by many unsuspecting people. It was human authority that gave to us Sunday observance and God is calling honest people to "come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins" (Revelation 18:4). Does it really make any difference if people do observe Sunday? Yes, it does make a difference. The difference is the difference between heathen worship and the worship of the only true God. It is sin to worship other gods. All who knowingly honor or worship heathen gods must pay the penalty except they repent.

COME OUT OF HER, MY PEOPLE

  God would not send a special warning for honest people to come out of the sins of "great Babylon" if it made no difference in the end. All who refuse to heed the warning and continue in her sins will partake of her plagues, which bring utter destruction under the wrath of God (Revelation 18:4-8). Notice that the call is to "My people." That shows that God has people who are honestly partaking of the sins of Babylon. The warning message has not reached them enough to arouse them to serious study of the matter. God honors the faith of the honest-hearted Christian who may not be aware that some of his acts of worship are of heathen origin and without any divine authority. However, God does not expect him to remain in ignorance, else there would be no purpose in sending a warning message. Willful ignorance will lead to destruction (Hosea 4:6). "Therefore to him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin" (James 4:17). God does not endorse heathen worship, and those who love the Lord will be happy to forsake all such customs when they come to a knowledge of the truth of the matter. Sunday observance is one of those customs, my friends, that God is calling you to come out of.
  In closing, we would like to draw a lesson from 1 Kings chapters 16,17, and 18. This gives the account of the time when wicked Jezebel became queen of ancient Israel. Those things were written for our learning (Romans 15:4). This is especially important to us when we are studying of the time when the same thing happened in the Christian era, as it was prophesied in Revelation 2:18-23. Israel was God's Church in ancient time. When King Ahab married Jezebel and she brought her 850 heathen prophets into Israel, Baal worship was established in Israel and prophets of the true God were slain. Elijah escaped after prophesying that a great drought was coming on Israel because of this great sin. Remember that this was happening in the ancient church. Heathen worship was taught at the point of the sword (1 Kings 16:30-33; 18:4-13).
  At the appointed time God sent Elijah back to King Ahab and to all Israel with a message: "How long halt ye between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow him: But if Baal, then follow him" (1 Kings 18:21-46). Elijah stood against 850 heathen prophets in a test before all Israel and won by his faith in Yah, the true God. Israel acknowledged Yah as God and slew the false prophets. Jezebel refused to repent like many today--and she paid with her life later on.
  Today the Elijah message is going forth calling on professing Christians to come out of heathen doctrines and back to the true worship of God. Those who carry this warning message are few compared to the many who oppose the message; but as in the days of Elijah, God is with those who carry His message and those who accept and obey its call. Will you heed the call, my friends?
  This message is to you just as Elijah's message was to Israel of his day, and you must decide for whom you will stand, for God or for the heathen gods of Jezebel of New Testament time. The judgments of God will soon be poured out upon all who refuse to heed the warning. The abomination of sun worship has no place in the true Christian worship (Ezekiel 8:15,16). God's Law says, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy . . . the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God" (Exodus 20:8-11). Roman tradition says that we must keep the first day of the week as a holy day of worship. Which will you obey, God or heathen tradition? Be further warned by reading Matthew 24:11-13; 2 Peter 2:1-3. The decision is yours, dear reader. My prayers are for you.