In his book, The Divine Unfolding of God's Plan of Redemption, James Graham says that Satan historically has used two tactics to try to bring down God's people. He calls those two tactics murder and mixture.
Graham says if you look at God's historical narrative, Satan sometimes will come against God's people and try to bring them down through murder, overt destruction, overt persecution, killing Christians, that's murder. His second tactic is mixture, which means let's get God's people to compromise. Let's get them to try to fit into the culture. Let's get them to lay down some core beliefs and try to go along to get along. And James Graham says sometimes murder works, but throughout history, mixture has worked a lot better. That's Satan's main tactic, to try to bring down God's people.
Just calm down and just kind of compromise to get along, mixture. We're now at Daniel 11, and we actually see the murder and the mixture there in Daniel 11. But in this passage, Daniel really emphasizes the mixture component, God's people compromising, giving up on their values to get along with the surrounding culture. You see that here in Daniel 11. Now, remember the background, Daniel's been praying for his people, the Jews. They've been in captivity for decades, and now they're about to be released. And Daniel thinks everything's going to be great.
They're going to be released from captivity, they're going to go back to the homeland, and everything's going to be just fine. And God reveals to Daniel, actually, Daniel, no, for the next 300 years, it's going to be really, really rough. I want you to understand this. God always has the big picture in mind. God, in his divine wisdom, always plays the long game. And playing the long game means there will be times when God's people have some setbacks.
You probably need to listen to me when I say that. There's going to be some setbacks. There's going to be some disappointments. God looks at the big picture, the long game.
Are you with me on that? And that's what he just told Daniel. He says, Daniel, here in Chapter 11, over the next 300 years, there's going to be four kings, he adds a fifth one that's going to be a future king that we know is the Antichrist, but there's going to be four kings over the next 300 years that makes it really, really hard on your people, your fellow Jews, God's chosen people. Now, what we're talking about is that time. You ever wonder about this? What happened between the very last book of the Old Testament and when Jesus Christ comes on the scene?
Have you ever wondered about that? We don't really know a lot about that. We Christians don't really pay attention to that timeframe. This is that timeframe that we are looking at between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of Jesus' tenure here on earth in the New Testament. And I'm not going to go through a lot of detail in this, okay, because we'll get weighed down in a lot of this.
Let me just say this. Of the book of Daniel, what I'm about to share with you gives the skeptics the most problems. The skeptics look at this and they say, there is no way Daniel wrote this because Daniel lived 300 years before all this happens.
We know what happens in history. So Daniel didn't write this. Somebody wrote this after the fact, after all this took place, and they pretended to be Daniel. That's not true. Daniel wrote this.
But the precision is incredible. Let me just give you some examples here. We're not going to work through this a lot, but let me give you some examples of how skeptics say Daniel could not have written this. Because 300 years before, in verse 4, it says, the great king, first king he talks about, will die and his kingdom will be divided into four parts, and yet he'll have no descendants to rule. We know 200 years later that's exactly what happened. The great king, Alexander the Great, died. He didn't have any descendants. He had one mentally incapacitated son, but he couldn't be king. And so his kingdom was divided into four parts, just like Daniel says there in verse 4. Look at verses 16 through 17. It says, this king of the north will give his daughter in marriage to the king of the south as an alliance, but his plan will fail. We know that 300 years later, Antiochus the Great, who is the king of the north, says to his daughter, I'm going to give you in marriage to the king of the south, the king of Egypt. Here's what I want you to do.
I want you to be my spy. Pretend like you're married to him and you really love him, but report back to me what's really going on. So that's what happened. She marries the king of Egypt, but she falls in love with him, and she says, I'm not going to turn on him.
He's my husband. And his plan failed, just like that verse said it would happen. Look at verse 18. It says, the king of the north, Antiochus the Great, will try to take over the coastlands, that means Greece, but a commander from another land will defeat him. Several hundred years after this, Antiochus the Great tries to take over Greece, and a Roman commander thwarts him, and he goes back in shame, just like that verse said would happen. Verse 20 says, the king of the north will die and be replaced by a tax collector, and that tax collector will die a natural death.
About 300 years later, Antiochus the Great died, his tax collector ruled, and his tax collector didn't die in battle, his tax collector died a natural death, just like the verse said. So can you see why skeptics say Daniel did not write this? This is too precise for a man living 300 years before the event. Do you understand this? And yet, Daniel did write.
But here's where I want to focus. In verses 21 through 25, Daniel talks about yet another king. This is not Antiochus the Great, this is a man who called himself.
Here's his name. He says, I'm calling myself Antiochus Epiphanes, which means God in flesh. Can you imagine a human being calling himself Antiochus, God in flesh, and he was a wicked, evil, brutal man. And he marches into Israel, where all of God's people are now back there, and in verse 32, Daniel prophesying about what's going to happen to this guy. In verse 32, it says this, he will flatter and win over those who have violated the covenant. Verse 32 is one of my favorite verses in the entire Bible. I quote this verse all the time. He says, Antiochus is going to come, take over Israel, and he's going to win over one group of people.
Who's that group of people? It's those who have violated the covenant. Let me explain to you what Antiochus Epiphanes did when he comes to Israel. He brings Greek culture with him. Greek culture was Hollywood, or as I like to call it, Hellywood, Beverly Hills, New York City, San Francisco, all rolled into one. It was the cool culture.
Antiochus brings the cool culture, the Greek culture, to Israel, and everybody is smitten. They want to be just like the Greeks. They're like, yeah, we have this strict, backward religion. We got to read our Bibles. We got to live godly lives.
We hate doing that. We want to be cool, just like Antiochus. And two groups in particular, if you look at history, got sucked into this mess. Number one, the religious leaders got pulled into this. There was a Jew named Jason who said, I want to be high priest because I make a lot of money. So he says to Antiochus, this Greek king that has come and taken over, he says, I'll pay you all this money if you make me high priest.
He said, done. He made him high priest. And immediately, this high priest changed the name of Jerusalem to a Greek name. He started dressing like a Greek, started acting like a Greek, started compromising in Scripture.
Why? Because the cool culture was now in charge, and I want to be cool as a priest just like them. Later on, it's interesting, another man, I think his name was Onias, but I can't remember, comes along and he says, hey, Antiochus, I'll pay you even more money than that guy if you make me the high priest.
Even though I'm not part of the priestly lineage, I'll pay you money. You have priests buying the office of priest. They got pulled into this messed up culture because they want to be cool, and urbane, and accepted, we're tired of our old boring God religion, we want to be accepted by the world.
A second group got pulled into this as well. The young Jews in Jerusalem want to be cool, and urbane, and fit in. And so when Antiochus came and brings in the cool Greek culture, the Beverly Hills Hollywood culture, here's what these Jewish kids said, they said, we're going to change our name. We don't like our Jewish names because a lot of those names has the name God in it. We don't like that. We're going to change our name to Greek names, the cool names.
They dress like Greeks instead of like Jews. And now this is... Oh, just a moment for just a second. I'm not trying to be crude, okay?
I got to be crude for just a second. Antiochus, let me tell you how far he went to try to bring Greek culture to Jerusalem. He built a humongous, beautiful gymnasium right there outside of town. I mean, it was humongous. Imagine like a lifetime fitness with all the bells and whistles.
It was incredible. Here's it gets a little bit weird. When you went to the gym to exercise, you exercised naked. You took off all your clothes, okay? That was just common back in those days, all right?
Make sure you wipe that bench press down before you use it, okay? Now, imagine this big gymnasium with Greeks and Jews, they're all naked, they're all exercising. It's obvious who the Jewish boys are, okay?
Y'all with me on that? And the Jewish boys wanted so badly to be accepted by the Greek culture, they underwent incredibly painful plastic surgery to renew their foreskin and look just like a Greek. That's how desperate they were to fit in. And that's what verse 32 is talking about. And it's interesting, it says, Antiochus, this wicked Greek king, he won all these Jews over.
He won God's people over, do you see this in verse 32, through flattery. He tells these young Jews who reputed to their religion, you know, I want to congratulate you. You broke free from your strict religious upbringing. You think for yourself.
You're a free thinker. I want to congratulate you. That's flattery. News stories in the Jerusalem News and Observer talked about a new open-minded Jewish high priest who's apologizing for the narrow-mindedness of the Jewish religion, telling Jews they need to be more tolerant and you need to be more dedicated to showing how all lifestyles and all religions are equally valid and the newspapers flatter them.
Great job. You're an open-minded pastor. I can imagine the high priest saying, does it really matter what our Bible says about our God, Yahweh, creating the heavens and the earth in six days? Come on, we're a little bit more scientific than that.
We're a little bit more urbane than that. Can you really trust that part of Scripture? I can see this wicked King Antiochus saying to these priests, look, I really appreciate you. You're so open-minded.
You're not judgmental. What our world needs are more open-minded pastors like you. Do you see what he's doing? He is trying through flattery to win the priests over to him. He does it to the kids as well. He does it to the kids.
He does it to the priests. What he's saying is, this wicked, pagan, godless culture needs to replace your godly culture and I'm going to flatter you and I'm going to put so much pressure on you. And priests and young people left and right bailed and started following this pagan culture.
Now, beloved, I want you to listen to me. The same thing is happening today. Our religious leaders are trying to fit into the pagan Antiochus Greek culture. We have pastors embracing the social gospel and critical race theory and the culture responds, we're so happy. We have pastors pushing the LGBTQ agenda in our churches and the culture say, they say, we need more pastors like that and they respond. We compromise on Scripture, particularly Genesis.
I'm going to tell you what I've said to you a thousand times. If you don't believe Genesis 1-1, how can you believe John 3-16? At what point of the Bible do you start believing the Bible? And I'm saying that to the assemblies of God as well. In 1977, the Assemblies of God position paper on creation said this, the Assemblies of God holds that the Genesis account should be taken literally. We changed that in 2010. The position paper now says, it does not seem wise to be overly dogmatic about any particular creation theory.
Oh, really? Does that include evolution as well? We shouldn't be dogmatic about that? You see what's happening?
The same thing that's happening there in verse 32 is happening today. We are compromising to try to gain acceptance in the surrounding culture. We want them to like us. Listen to me. They will never like you. You will never fit into this place. Jesus said they hated me.
They're going to hate you if you're really a follower of me. And we've seen the same phenomenon that we saw back then, not just with religious leaders and denominations, we're seeing it with our young Christians today. We have young Christian kids changing their view of everything to try to fit in with the Greek culture, to be accepted by this messed up Hollywood, Beverly Hills, New York culture. You look disgusted when I said that the Jewish young men would reverse their circumcision. Well, how different is that than our Christian young people supporting a candidate that's for the genital mutilation of young people?
How is that different? We see this in things like this. How many times have we seen the Steph Curry's, the Russell Wilson's, the Taylor Swift's, and the Carrie Underwood's talk about how Christian they are until they get to be superstars and they bow to the LGBTQIA plus whatever idol?
It's happening today. We're wanting desperately to fit in to the surrounding culture, to this messed up world system. And somebody has said before that the church is like a boat.
When we sit on top of the water, we work really well. But when the water starts to flood the boat, we begin to sink. We can't escape culture. We got to be in contact with the culture.
But here's my problem. This messed up culture is now sinking the ship. It's getting inside the church. Just like we see here in verse 32.
So do you understand what's happening? In verse 32, this wicked man comes to a day and he says, I'm going to murder them. And he did. He murdered a lot of them. But his more powerful technique was to mixture. Let's mix them with the predominant, godless, wicked culture and let's water down what it means to be a follower of God.
That was the first group of people. He will flatter those who violate the covenant. But I want you to look at the rest of verse 32. And here's what I love. This verse right here gets my blood pumping in a good way. My heart starts thumping. I get excited. The adrenaline starts going. The testosterone starts going all over the place because I love verse 32 right here.
I want you to see the second group of people. But those who know their God will be strong and they will resist him. God always has a remnant. You know what I mean by a remnant?
A small group of people who say, I don't care if it costs me my family, my job, my livelihood, or my life. I'm not backing down. I'm going to serve that Lord Jesus Christ forever. Do what you want to do to me. I belong to him. The moment you kill me here, I open my eyes in heaven. I stare at his wonderful face.
Bring it on. That's the kind of people that we're talking about here in verse 32. Bold, strong, uncompromising.
Those who know their God will be strong. Hebrew word, have you heard of this Hebrew word before? Chazak.
That's why we have merchandise. This was not by accident. We have merchandise all over our resource center that has the Hebrew word chazak.
Strong, bold, confident. Did you know this? That chazak, now this is interesting, was actually part of an Old Testament Israeli-Jewish war cry.
Before God's people would go out and do battle, they would shout out, rach, chazak, amat. So it just means this, just be bold and strong. What you're facing today is not Washington, D.C. What you're facing today is not the natural. We are now facing the supernatural.
We're going to war against demonic entities, demonic strongholds. And I say to you, rach, chazak, amat. Just be bold. Just be strong. Just don't wimp out on me. Be bold and strong, church.
And that's what happens to these people. They're bold and they're strong. If you look around... Can I just ask you my question? I'm not trying to slam the under 18 crowd or the under 21. I'm really not, okay? I'm not cool with them. I'm not trendy. I get all that.
Okay, I get it. I'm just looking for one bold, uncompromising, under age 21, man of God. Can I just have one that won't back down? Is it me or are we seeing a whole generation of Christians just compromising?
I want just one, just one pastor who will stand beside me, not in a red state where it's a little easy to make these statements, but in a bluish state to stand with me and to say, we're not compromising. There's something about... Listen to me. Courage is contagious.
You watch this. A few of you rise up, be bold, be strong. It's amazing how many other Christians are going to say, man, I've been thinking the same thing you're thinking.
I thought I was the only one that thought this way. It's amazing how your courage and your confidence will give them courage and confidence. Alexander the Great put it...
I love how he put it. He said, I am not afraid of an army of lions led by sheep, but I'm terrified of an army of sheep led by a lion. And there's a lot of sheep in the church today, and I'm just looking for some lions to rise up and be bold. And it says, those who know their God will be strong. And then secondly, we'll resist them. We'll resist this pagan wickedness that's taken over the land. You see what Daniel is saying?
Yeah. God's people begin to bail and wimp out left and right, but there's a select few group of people who are strong and stood fast and said, we're not compromising. I heard that song years ago from a Christian group.
I love this. This song says, every generation's got the fearless few who can't be bought. They don't take polls and they don't look around. They act on truth and then they stand their ground. John Chrysostom was one of those kind of men. Chrysostom lived in the 400s, late 300s, early 400s. Chrysostom spoke out against political corruption in his time. He didn't buy this thing of, just keep your mouth shut and preach the Bible and don't get into politics. Chrysostom stood strong on biblical issues, but he took a strong stand on political issues.
And as a result, it got him into a lot of trouble. And one day, the emperor, Emperor Arcadius, brought John Chrysostom to him in court. He's on his throne. Chrysostom, the preacher, is down here. And Arcadius, with all of his arrogance and pride and pompous power said, Chrysostom, stop preaching or I'm going to banish you to a faraway island and you will never see your friends or family ever again. Chrysostom pointed a finger back at him and said, sir, you cannot because I have a friend in heaven who said he will never leave me and never forsake me and you can't banish me from him.
The emperor's taken aback. He said, all right, well then, Chrysostom, stop all your preaching or I'm going to confiscate all your treasures, everything you have, I'm going to take from you. Chrysostom pointed a finger back at him and said, sir, you cannot. My treasures are laid up in heaven where you can't touch them. And finally, Emperor Arcadius pointed his finger at Chrysostom and said, stop this preaching or I will take your life.
Chrysostom pointed back at him and said, sir, you cannot. My life is hidden with God in Christ Jesus and you can't touch it. And it's said that the emperor finally threw up his hands and said, what do you do with a man like this? I think the world's culture is asking the same question. What do you do with men and women who refuse to compromise? They are bold, they are strong, they love Jesus with all their heart, they're willing to lose their lives for the sake of Jesus Christ. What do you do with people that you can't threaten or bully?
Why do these people do this? Why did these people stand strong and stand confidently and refuse to compromise? It says it right here. The people who know their God will be strong and do exploits. That's the key right there.
I told you this 100 times. When you fear God, you can't fear man. When you fear man, you've lost all fear of God.
The people who know their God, there's a knowledge of God. He's triune, one God and three persons. He's righteous. He's holy. Did you know the holiness of God is the only attribute of God repeated three times over and over again in the Bible? We don't hear God is love, love, love.
God is patient, patient, patient. But we do hear in Scripture, he is holy, holy, holy. He is a holy God, a righteous God. Yes, he's a loving God.
Yes, he's a forgiving God. And the more I know God, the less I care about what people think. I'll tell you right now, that's my cure. When some of y'all ask, you know, how do you say some of the things you say from the pulpit? Aren't you afraid people will get mad at me? Don't you think I'm like, okay.
This is going to sound very dismissive and flippant, but I've stopped caring. You have, you know, 3,500 bosses here at Cross Assembly. No, I don't. I have one boss. I want to please God. I want to honor God. I know him. He sent his son to die for me. I belong to him.
How could I betray the one who's been so good to me? Those who know their God will be strong and they'll do mighty things. So I want you to listen to me. Daniel 11, 32 is starting to repeat itself again. There is a dominant culture seeping into the church, putting pressure on pastors, and Christians, and Christian young people to compromise and go along to get along. You think it's tough now. Maybe I'm speaking prophetically.
It's about to get tougher. And true Christianity is about to be revealed. You know what's interesting? There's a substantial difference between North Korea Christianity and South Korea Christianity. Same people group, but radically different.
Do you know the difference? North Korean Christians follow Jesus Christ even though it might cost them their lives every single day. There is a freedom in the South Korean Christian community that we don't have. I'm just telling you, I know persecution is bad.
I'm not sadistic. I'm not praying for persecution, but I do want you to understand this. There is an upside to persecution, and it purifies the Church of Jesus Christ. The Voice of the Martyrs tells an interesting story from the days of the Soviet Union.
It says this. Let me just read this from the Voice of the Martyrs. This happened even in the Soviet Union where it was illegal to be a Christian. You're talking persecution.
That was persecution. It says, they were singing choruses when the two soldiers entered with rifles. The service came to a halt as the Russian soldiers stared at the believers with wild crazy eyes.
What are you doing here? They shouted. Worshipping your imaginary God? The church members cowered in their pews wondering if there were more soldiers and more guns outside the church. All those who are faithful to God moved to the right side of the church, said one of the soldiers, a face, his face, a mask of just hatred. You will be shot for your faith. You who wish to go home and keep your life stand on the left side.
Got it? You believe in God, go on the right side of the church. We're about to kill you.
You don't really believe in God, go to the left-hand side of the church and we will keep your life. Ten minutes earlier, everyone had sung praises equally. Now, it was a question of life or death. Some stood to the left looking sadly or waving apologetically to their friends and family on the right. Some stood on the right, their eyes closed in last-minute prayers. You're on the left, you're free to go, one of the soldiers said moments later. And those people filed out taking one last look at those who'd soon be dead.
When only those on the right remained and the doors were locked, the soldiers put down their weapons. Brothers and sisters, we too are Christians, they said, but we wish to worship without the hypocrites. Now, let's worship the Lord together.
And we're seeing the same kind of sifting take place in our country today. I've heard there's only two kinds of people in the world, those who divide the world into two kinds of people and those who don't. Okay, I'm the kind of person, I divide Christians into two kinds of group. Those who violate the covenant and those who know their God and they're going to be strong and firmly resist the evil.
I pray that God will raise this church up to be bold, strong, confident people. Can I tell you something? We actually have something that Daniel and those Jews who didn't bow down, we actually have something they didn't have.
Did you know this? You said, Jeff, how am I going to stand strong in these last days? How am I going to stand strong if it means I might lose my job? How can I stand strong if it means I might be defriended by a bunch of people?
How can I stand strong? The apostle Paul says in Philippians, it's going to blow your mind because Daniel didn't have this, those Jews didn't have this. Here's what Paul says, the same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead now lives in you if you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's how you're bold and strong and confident. The Holy Ghost power that raised him from the dead now belongs to you. So be bold, be strong, and keep your eyes on Jesus and don't bow and don't compromise and Jesus Christ is going to come back one day and you're going to hear these words echoing in your ears.
I know it was tough. I know it wasn't popular, but well done, good and faithful servant. Enter now my kingdom.
That day is coming. Stand with me right now. Can we raise our hands and thank the Lord God? Seriously, I want to thank Father right now. God, in the name of Jesus, thank you for that resurrection power that's now in me.
I'm not alone. We don't operate by our own power. The Holy Ghost resurrection power is now living in us. God, make us bold, strong, uncompromising Christians. Father do it now in the name of Jesus. Let's just sing to the Lord right now.
Can we sing? Your name, your name is victory All praise will rise to Christ our King Your name, your name is victory All praise will rise to Christ our King And by your Spirit I will rise from the ashes of defeat The resurrected King is resurrecting me In your name I come alive to declare your victory The resurrected King is resurrecting me By your Spirit I will rise from the ashes of defeat The resurrected King is resurrecting me In your name I come alive to declare your victory The resurrected King is resurrecting me Your name, your name is victory All praise will rise to Christ our King So I'm going to sound like a broken record. I say this every Sunday for the last 21 years. Be bold, be strong, and the Lord your God is with you. I know it's a messed up world.
I got it. But in this dark world, have you noticed this? The darker it gets, the more God's people stand out. Because you have this anointing upon you. You got the Holy Spirit anointing on you.
It's like a light. Everywhere you go, you push back in the game of darkness. Look, I want you to be so filled with the Holy Spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ that when you walk into a room, demons are more afraid of you than you are of demons. I want you to be so filled with the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ that you're not even trying.
Everywhere you go, strongholds just start coming down. I've said this before. A Christian who's filled with the Holy Spirit will do more for Jesus on accident than a Christian who's not filled with the Spirit will do on purpose. Raise your hands, warriors of the most high God. And let's leave this place today with an offensive mentality, not a defensive mentality. Let's go against the enemy. Let's make him more afraid of us than we are of him. And I say to you that great Hebrew war cry, which means God's people be bold, be strong, do not be afraid, and do not be terrified of anything.
Why? Because the Lord your God is going to be with you everywhere you go this week. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, we pray. Amen and Amen. God bless you, beloved. Let's go change this world for Jesus Christ.
