Chapter 6 - Spiritual Babylon
What is
spiritual Babylon today? Opinions rival one another.
Alexander Hislop argues that the woman in Revelation 17 said to be
"sitting on seven mountains," and having on her forehead the name written, "Mystery, Babylon the Great," is associated with the Roman apostasy
[the Roman Catholic Church].
fn
{9} Others are of the opinion
that Babylon is the whole world system which is under the domain of Satan. A friend of
mine has a convincing argument from scripture that the United States of America is modern
Babylon. An internationally recognized prophet in our time has said that New York City is
modern Babylon.
I say that Babylon is all of the above, yet more. Babylon was once a
city in Mesopotamia. It has been spiritualized in the scriptures as something that is in
contradiction to God. It is now a type of something spiritual. Babylon is not the Roman
Catholic Church, but is a type of something often found in the Roman Catholic Church.
Babylon is not the United States of America, but is a type of something in the United
States of America. Babylon is not New York City, but is a type of something in New York
City. Babylon certainly is not the body of Christ, but is a type of something in the
hearts of many in the body--something that ought not to be there.
As I defined in chapter one, Babylon is all that the carnal mind of
man devises in the exaltation of Self--the preeminence of Self over God whether in
nations, cities, politics, government, science, technology, religion, philosophy,
psychology, sociology, commerce, education, entertainment, or church. It is all
that is in the world and of the world. It describes the spiritual condition of the church.
THE CARNAL MIND
Spiritual Babylon is primarily characterized by the idolatry of the
carnal mind. Carnal is another word for the flesh. "Flesh" often refers to that
fallen sin nature of man that is at enmity with God. The carnal mind is all thought,
reason, logic, imagination, opinion, and speculation that is associated with the old
Adamic mind of fallen man. We practice Babylon when we do things according to our notion
rather than God's.
The apostle Paul explained that those who do things according to the
flesh, set their minds on the things of the flesh; but those who do according to the
Spirit, set their minds on the things of the Spirit. "For to be carnally [fleshly]
minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind
is enmity against God." Rom. 8:5-7a.
The appeal in the garden was for Adam and Eve to exercise the power of
their God-given intellect to elevate themselves in their own minds. God told Adam that he
could eat from all of the trees in the garden except one. He was not to eat from the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil. "For in the day that you eat thereof," God
warned, "you shall surely die." Gen. 2:16-17. This ban was clear and simple. God
said what He meant and meant what He said. That should have settled it.
Satan, however, slithered onto the limb of their intellect and
reasoned, "You shall not surely die: for God knows that in the day you eat thereof,
your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." Gen.
3:4-5. Knowing good and evil was an appeal to the idolatry of the mind. Once they yielded
to the temptation and ate of the fruit, their minds became fleshly. They were transformed
into a nature that was different from the way God created them.
Genesis 3:6 tells us three things about Eve: She saw that the fruit of
the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and desirable to make one
wise. This verse also tells us that God created man with the ability to make choices, with
the desire to be like God, and with the vulnerability to be deceived. Eve was enticed with
the prospect of having knowledge and being equal to God. So, she bit into the lie and gave
it to her husband to eat of it also. Gen. 3:6.
The ability to make choices is not a sin. It is a gift from God. We sin
when we make choices contrary to God's will. We think we know better than God. Therefore,
we exalt our knowledge, logic, reasoning, opinions, imaginations, speculations, and every
other high-minded thing above the knowledge of God. 2 Cor. 10:5. We ignore that part of
God's word that does not agree with our aspirations, expectations, theologies, and
doctrines. We believe what we want to believe. We foolishly make ourselves out to be God.
We even make up God to be the way we want Him to be. Thus, we are in rebellion against God
just as Adam and Eve were.
Paul wrote against the arrogance of knowledge saying, "If a man
thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself." Gal. 6:3.
Again he wrote, "If anyone supposes that he knows anything, he has not yet known as
he ought to know." 1 Cor. 8:2 NAS.
DECEPTION
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by deception. Satan deceived Eve. He
implied that God had lied to them. If, indeed, they ate of the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil, Satan argued, they would become like God, knowing good and evil.
Eve believed Satan's lies and immediately structured her own false
reality around those lies. She incorporated those lies into her paradigm of reality. She
constructed her own truth about God and sighed, "Oh, I see now!" Rather than
having her eyes opened, however, she actually became spiritually blind.
Before they went in to possess the land of Canaan, God warned the
Israelites to guard their hearts lest they be deceived. Deut. 11:16. Paul wrote,
"Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seems to be wise in this
world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise." 1 Cor. 3:18. He charged his
readers several times not to be deceived. 1 Cor. 6:9; 15:33; Gal. 6:7. To the Ephesians he
wrote, "Let no man deceive you with vain words." Eph. 5:6. To the
Colossians he wrote, "Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit,
after the traditions of men, and not after Christ." Col. 2:8. To the Thessalonians he
wrote, "Let no man deceive you by any means." 2 Thess. 2:3. We can be
blinded to the truth by lust, pleasures, malice, envy, and hate. Titus 3:3. We can be
hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. Heb. 3:13. We can deceive ourselves by being hearers
only of the word and not doers. James 1:22. We can deceive ourselves by being religious.
James 1:26; 1 John 1:8. John adds: "Little children, let no man deceive
you." 1 John 3:7. With this battery of scriptures in mind, do you believe we can
possibly be deceived, even as believers in Christ? "For many deceivers have
entered into the world, who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver
and an antichrist." 2 John 1:7.
Hosea spoke for God saying, "Hear the word of the LORD, you
children of Israel: for the LORD has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land,
because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land...My people are
destroyed for lack of knowledge [of God]: because you have rejected knowledge [of
God]." Hos. 4:1, 6a. Spiritual Babylon--all that the carnal mind devises--is the
exaltation of what we construct as truth over what God says is truth.
PRIDE
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by pride. The prideful nature of
Self thinks it knows. It thinks it knows better than God. It makes decisions all day,
every day without consulting God, without even asking for wisdom. When smitten with pride,
we are lifted up in who we think we are and what we think we know. Self is prideful,
arrogant, and haughty. "Knowledge puffs up." 1 Cor. 8:1.
Spiritual Babylon is associated with the arrogance of
those who followed Nimrod to the land of Shinar (Babel).
fn
{10} The Bible says they were of one language and one speech
and said to one another, "'Let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly.' And they had
brick for stone, and they had slime for mortar. And they said, 'Let us build us a city and
a tower, whose tip may reach heaven; and let us make a name for ourselves'." Gen. 11:
3-4.
Churches
and ministries are snared by the prideful temptation
to gather larger numbers of people, build bigger buildings with steeples pointing to
heaven, and make names for themselves, succumbing to the temptation to exalt Self. We name
our churches, ministries, and institutions after ourselves. We dedicate
stained-glass windows and pews in memory of men. We put our names on things for
self-glory.
What a contrast to those who follow Jesus! As Paul exhorted, "Let
this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus who, being in the form of God, thought
it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him
the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion as
a man, He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the
cross." Phil. 2:5-8.
EXALTED SELF
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by the exaltation of Self. The
exalted Self says, "I can save, heal, deliver, and fix myself." "I will
increase my knowledge in science, my power in politics, my performance in religion, my
investments in the marketplace, my insights into the psyche of man." "I will
alter the genetics of humans, clone humans, abort babies, and change the laws so I will
feel comfortable doing these things." "I will become an entertainer, rock star,
model, sports superstar, politician, writer, musician, or televangelist in order to
achieve fame and fortune." "I can build a church around my revelations,
my teachings, and my programs by which I imply that others can be saved, healed, and
delivered."
This is the spirit of the king of Babylon in our hearts which Isaiah
calls Lucifer (meaning "light-bearer"--the name also given to Satan). He is the
one of whom Isaiah writes: "How are you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the
morning! How are you cut down to the ground, which weakened the nations! For you have said
in your heart, 'I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt my throne above
the stars of God. I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the
sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I
will be like the most High.' Yet you shall be brought down to hell, to the sides of the
pit." Isa. 14:12-15. "I," "I," "I."
The King of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, walked in the palace of his
kingdom and said, "Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the
kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honor of my majesty?" Dan. 4:30. We who
lift ourselves up like King Nebuchadnezzar will be brought down like King Nebuchadnezzar.
"While the word was in the king's mouth, there fell a voice from heaven, saying, 'O
King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is spoken; The kingdom is departed from you.'" Dan.
4:31. He was driven from men to dwell in the field with the beasts where he ate grass as
oxen do, possibly for seven years. This happened to him that he might come to know that
the most High God rules in the kingdom of men and gives kingdoms to whomever He will. Dan.
4:32.
We have believed the lie of the serpent in the garden; we believe that
we are our own god. How pathetic! We get so joined to this lie that it is perceived as
truth and as something to be desired. We esteem ourselves over God.
Jesus said, "Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he
who humbles himself shall be exalted." Matt. 23:12.
CONFUSION
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by confusion. Babel means confusion.
Gen. 11:9. The Lord saw that the settlers in Shinar were one people and spoke one language
which meant, according to God's own words, that nothing would be held from them that they
imagined to do. Thereupon, God said, "Let us go down, and there confound [confuse]
their language, that they may not understand one another's speech." Gen. 11:7. The
Lord scattered them to all parts of the earth so that they were not able to finish
building their city.
Everything that is in the world continues to be marked by confusion. We
have confusion among nations, confusion among ethnic groups, confusion in government,
confusion in the economic marketplace, confusion in education, confusion in science and
technology, confusion in the home, and confusion in the local church. Because
Christians have refused to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit and have insisted upon
building their own little towers to heaven, we have great diversity, disunity, and
confusion among us. If we find ourselves in confusion, something other than or in addition
to God is talking to us. The carnal mind is in operation and in opposition to the Spirit
of God.
James says: "For where envying and strife is, there is confusion
and every evil work." James 3:16. If we have the mind of Christ, we will be of one
mind. If we are not of one mind, one or all of us are wallowing in the slime of the carnal
mind. When we, as God's people, however, seek His will, He will not cause us to be in
confusion. God is not the author of confusion. 1 Cor. 14:33.
IMAGINATIONS
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by vain imaginations. God said of
those in Babel that "nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined
to do." Gen. 11:6. They were building unto themselves by their own hands with brick
and slime what they had imagined in their minds.
The ability to imagine, as with the ability to reason and make choices
is a God-given virtue. Imaginations are not evil in and of themselves. They become evil
when we glory in them and glory in those things we invent as the result of them. We can
accomplish spectacular things with the work of our hands from the imaginations of our
minds. We walk the moon and put land-rovers on Mars. We pack gigabytes of memory onto tiny
computer chips. We surf infinite miles on the information superhighway of the World Wide
Web. We dwarf the great pyramids of Egypt with our modern skyscrapers. One person in the
right place with the wrong mind-set can push a button and annihilate large cities in
minutes.
By the same powers of intellect and imagination, we can build
mega-ministries, universities, cathedrals, and circle the globe with "Christian
television" and "Christian programming." We do what appears to be
"mighty exploits for God" in the arm of self-strength. Nothing seems impossible
to us if we can only imagine it.
Mary said of Jesus while He was yet in her womb: "He has scattered
the proud in the imagination of their hearts." Luke 1:51. Paul wrote regarding the
unrighteous that "they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became
vain in their imaginations, and their foolish hearts were darkened." Rom. 1:21.
We are to cast "down imaginations and every high thing that exalts
itself against the knowledge of God," and bring "into captivity every thought to
the obedience of Christ." 2 Cor. 10:5. Unless our works are inspired of God, they
will not withstand the fire of God. They are wood, hay, and stubble. 1 Cor. 3:11, 15.
BABBLE
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by babble. Babble is useless
chatter. "In the multitude of words sin is not lacking, but he who restrains his lips
is wise." Prov. 10:19 NKJV. Words, words, words. Have you heard it said of some
people that they babble on and on? Their words are often senseless, boring, and toxic.
They talk when they need to be listening. They answer before they hear. Of such, Proverbs
18:13 says, "He who answers a matter before he hears it, it is folly and shame to
him." Such people are said to have no ears.
Proverbs pictures the wordiness of Babylon in these verses: "He
who opens wide his lips shall have destruction." Prov. 13:3. "In the mouth of
the foolish is a rod of pride." Prov. 14:3. "Idle chatter leads only to
poverty." Prov. 14:23 NKJV. "The mouth of fools pours out foolishness."
Prov. 15:2. "A fool's lips enter into contention, and his mouth calls for strokes. A
fool's mouth is his destruction, and his lips are the snare of his soul. The words of a
talebearer are as wounds, and they go down into the innermost parts of the belly."
Prov. 18:6-8. "See a man who is hasty in his words? There is more hope for a fool
than for him." Prov. 29:20.
Some people talk and never say anything. Some people talk until they
say something. Rare are those who talk only when they have something to say. Peter wrote,
"If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." 1 Pet. 4:11. Would not
that be the day!?
ACCUMULATION OF KNOWLEDGE
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by the accumulation of knowledge.
The extremely rapid increase of knowledge in this present day is foretold in Daniel 12:4:
"Conceal these words and seal up the book until the end of time; many will go back
and forth and knowledge will increase."
The time in which we live has been classified as The Information Age.
Knowledge mushrooms. Every new piece of knowledge multiplies what we learn. There seems to
be no limit to the knowledge we can accumulate today. There seems to be no limit to what
we humans can do with the knowledge we accumulate. Because of what we know, new thresholds
in space are constantly crossed with each succeeding launch. Computers and computer
programs are outdated by the time they hit the market. Major surgery is performed without
intrusive incisions. High-tech wars can be won in a matter of days. Knowledge becomes more
powerful than money.
We rely upon our own abilities to research, explore, examine, know,
understand, and discover things. We have an insatiable appetite for more knowledge, to
pull things up by the roots to see what they are made of. We have become a society of
technomaniacs. We presume that we can solve our own problems with more knowledge.
Knowledge is one of our Babylons, one of our high places, and we are
the god we worship. Knowledge that leads to self-idolatry is the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil. Every year men and women graduate from seminaries by the thousands to
fill pulpits around the world. There they will apply the higher-critical and near
atheistic interpretations of the scriptures which they learned. They are spiritually
bankrupted by such high-minded learning and are spiritually bankrupting their
parishioners. Paul would have the same fear today that he had for the Corinthians:
"But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so
your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." 2 Cor. 11:3.
SECTARIANISM
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by sectarianism.
After the people in the land of Shinar purposed in their hearts to
build a city, a tower, and a name for themselves, the Lord came down and said,
"Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they
begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them. Come, let Us
go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another's
speech." The place was called Babel because the Lord confused their language and
moved them to all parts of the world. Gen. 11:2-9.
Because this Thing we call church is of the flesh and is an
aspect of spiritual Babylon, it is under this same curse of confusion and
sectarianism. It is founded on sectarianism, even thrives on it. It
promotes the disunity of the body of Christ. Its very existence depends upon how
each church system differs one from the other. This is easily seen in how their
names billboard their differences.
Sectarianism says, "I am of Paul, I am of Apollos." Paul
accused the Corinthian believers of being "fleshly" and "mere men"
because of their sectarianism. There was jealousy and strife among them. They put their
identity in personalities (Paul, Apollos, Cephas) rather than in the person of Jesus
Christ. Apollos and Paul were both servants of the same Jesus. One planted; the other
watered; but it was God who caused the growth. The one who plants and waters is nothing,
but God is the One who matters because He causes the growth. When we understand that we
are all fellow workers, God's field, God's building, then sectarianism will be edged out
of the way. Disunity in the body turns into unity, oneness. There can only be one
foundation, Jesus Christ. If what we have is sectarian and contributes to the disunity of
the body, it has been built upon the wrong foundation. 1 Cor. 2.
Once we see this truth, we should have no need ever to name ourselves
in order to identify what we are about. We are all about the Father's business, allowing
the Holy Spirit who dwells in us to build us up as the temple of the Holy Spirit. "If
any man defiles the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy,
which temple you are." 1 Cor. 3:17. The more we separate ourselves within the body of
Christ, the more we destroy the temple of the Holy Spirit.
RELIGION
Spiritual Babylon is characterized by religion. Even though masses of
people seem to abhor religion of any kind, our sinful nature has a bent toward it because
it is under the curse of condemnation and works. The first Adam was driven from the
presence of God (condemnation) and told that he had to till the land and eat his bread in
the sweat of his face (works). Gen. 3:19, 23. Because the fallen man of flesh and sin is
under the curse, he feels shame and wants to do something to make himself feel okay. Pagan
man made up gods and then made up rituals (religious things to do) to try to appease their
gods. Some of them even fed infant children to these gods of their own making.
Even though many people may be truly redeemed of the Lord, they still
bring their shame-based flesh tendencies over into the life of the church; they
know of only one way to relate to God, that is, through religion. Religiously inclined
people love religion. It does not matter from one end of the spectrum to the other how
people choose to express themselves religiously. Religion is still religion.
They love the religious atmosphere of church because it
gives them something to do to salve the guilt of condemnation. Many well-meaning
Christians are unaware that they go to church and do religious things out of a
false sense of duty. They go because it makes them feel good. Perhaps they have not fully
comprehended that there is "now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who
walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." Rom. 8:1.
Religion is foreign to God. He requires no religious thing of us. We
are made spiritual beings by the presence and power of His Holy Spirit dwelling in us. His
presence and power in us causes us to be and do what the Father requires of us. There is
no way we can be righteous without it being His righteousness at work within us. That is
why it is called grace. "For by grace are you saved through faith; and that not of
yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his
workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained that
we should walk in them." Eph. 2:8-10. Religion stinks in the nostrils of God because
it keeps us from having intimate relationships with Him. Our relationship is with our
religion or with our church.
Flesh man deceives himself into thinking that if his religion makes him
feel good, it must be good; therefore, he goes on doing his religious things. For such a
one, church is often the religious thing he does. Yet, at the end of the day,
after all is said and done, nothing is any different in him than it was before he engaged
in that religious activity. He is just as empty on the inside as he was before. An abiding
relationship with the Father through Jesus Christ is the only food that fills the soul to
satisfaction.
RELIGIOUS SYSTEMS
The religious systems that make up and govern that Thing we call church
characterize spiritual Babylon. Just as Judah and Jerusalem were once in Babylonian
captivity, so are God's people today who are joined to church in their hearts.
The brick and slime are the sectarian doctrines, creeds, traditions, festivals and
celebrations, liturgies, rituals, lectionaries, polities, heritages, and ecclesiastical
calendars. These things stand in place of or alongside a personal, living, dynamic
relationship with God. These things that govern church have little to do with the
Kingdom of God.
Most of us were born and raised in spiritual Babylon and have never
known anything else. We have never seen what the body of Christ looks like as a pure and
holy bride. Even though we know that all is not well within what we call church,
we think that it can be fixed or at least made better, but it cannot.
THE ABOMINATION THAT MAKES DESOLATE
The rebellious carnal mind--immersed in deception, pride, the
exaltation of Self, confusion, imaginations, babble, the accumulation of knowledge,
sectarianism, religion, and its religious systems--is in the church as well as in
the world. The abomination that makes desolate the holy place of God's temple of whom we
are as believers, is rule of the carnal mind over obedience to God.
Jesus talked about this. While picturing the signs of the end to His
disciples, He mentioned the abomination of desolation which had been spoken of by Daniel
the prophet. He told them that when they saw the abomination of desolation standing in the
holy place they were to take various actions. (Read Matt. 24:15 and Mark 13:14.)
The abomination that makes desolate is described by Daniel for a future
time. Dan. 12:9-11. Daniel was told that a vile person shall arise, muster forces, defile
the sanctuary fortress, take away the daily sacrifices, and place there the abomination of
desolation. Dan. 11:21-31 NKJV.
Some believe Daniel's prophecy was fulfilled around 165 B.C. when
Antiochus IV (Epiphanes), Greek ruler of Syria, did the unthinkable. He sacrificed an
unclean pig on the holy altar of the Jewish Temple. Others believe it was fulfilled when
the Romans destroyed the Temple in 70 A.D. Still others suggest it will
be fulfilled when the "man of sin" takes over the Temple and forces people to
bow down to him, making himself to be like God.
fn
{11}
All of these suggestions point to natural,
historical events. Perhaps it was or will be one of them. Perhaps it has multiple
fulfillments and includes all of them. Consider, nonetheless, that what is generally
expressed in the natural is also fulfilled in the spiritual realm. The New Testament
writers explained that the spiritual is not first, but the natural; the spiritual follows
the natural. 1 Cor 15:46; Heb. 9:11.
Jesus placed this abomination of desolation event in the future, even
as a sign of the end times. Paul's writings agree that it was for a time future to his. 2
Thess. 2:3-4. Matthew indicated that the reader would need understanding. Matt. 24:15.
Consider that the body of Christ is spiritual Israel and the temple of
the Holy Spirit. Where, then, would the abomination that makes the holy place desolate
take place? It would take place within the minds and spirits of members of the body of
Christ. We have already established from scriptures that it is possible for believers to
be deceived.
The abomination occurs when the carnal mind is given precedence over
the word of God and the mind of Christ. When we allow that, the holy place of our spirits
is made desolate. When we bow down to those idolatrous systems of men's traditions as
enshrined in our churches, we allow the abomination into the holy place which is
our spirits. Our idolatries pollute the temple of the Holy Spirit. The carnal mind rules.
THE FALL OF BABYLON
This Babylonian church will fall just as did historical
Babylon.
Historical Babylon was used by God to judge Judah for her idolatries.
Isa. 10:5-6. Daniel called Judah's judgment in Babylon a time of indignation (wrath). Dan.
11:36. When that seventy-year period of God's indignation was accomplished, God brought
judgment against Babylon. Jer. 25:12. God prophesied to Babylon through Isaiah saying,
"I was angry with My people, I profaned My heritage, and gave them into your hand.
You did not show mercy to them." Isa. 47:6, NKJV.
God notes Babylon's pride: "Now, then hear this, you sensual one,
who dwells securely, who says in your heart, I am, and there is no one besides me. I shall
not sit as a widow, nor shall I know loss of children." Isa. 47:8.
He predicts what is going to happen to her: "Sit silently and go
into darkness...For you will no more be called the queen of kingdoms...These two things
shall come upon you suddenly in one day: loss of children and widowhood. They shall come
on you in full measure in spite of your many sorceries, in spite of the great power of
your spells...and destruction about which you do not know will come on you suddenly."
Isa. 47:5-11 NAS.
God's judgment upon historical Babylon foreshadows His judgment upon
spiritual Babylon. When we go to Babylon, we are more than captives in Babylon. We run the
risk of becoming Babylonians. If we stay in Babylon and in our idolatries, we can expect
God's judgment to fall upon us. We can expect a time when God will empty the Babylonian
systems of His children, leaving them childless and without husbands. Isaiah 47, quoted
above, has as much to do with God's impending judgment upon us in spiritual Babylon as it
did upon historical Babylon.
Revelation predicts that a time is coming when an angel will come down
out of heaven, having great authority, and will shout with a mighty voice, saying,
"Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become the habitation of devils, and
the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. For all
nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth
have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through
the abundance of her delicacies." Rev. 18:2-3.
Then another voice from heaven was heard saying, "Come out of her,
My people, that you might not be partakers of her sins, and that you not receive of her
plagues." Rev. 18:4.
This speaks of the one in Revelation 17:5 who had written upon her
forehead the name, "MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND
ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH."
Coming out of spiritual Babylon is not easy. We are comfortable there.
The institutionalized church makes us feel safe, secure, and sufficient. It
gives us status, position, reputation, security, and identity. We have become
institutionalized within the institutions of our own making.
Footnotes
{9}
Hislop, p. 1.
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{10}
Shinar was that territory that later became known as Babylon. Babel is the Hebrew name for
Babylon.
<< Back To Text
{11}
Nelson's New Illustrated Bible Dictionary, s.v. "abomination of
desolation".
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