Is war inevitable? Join us as Justin &amp; Lyle discuss the Bible’s answer, share about how technology has revolutionised war, and end by sharing the war’s ultimate solution.

<p>Is war inevitable? Join us as Justin &amp; Lyle discuss the Bible’s answer, share about how technology has revolutionised war, and end by sharing the war’s ultimate solution.</p>

North New South Wales Conference

Justin Torossian

Wars and Rumors of Wars

Is the War Bigger Than You Think?

Lyle Southwell

Is Peace Really Possible?

Is Christianity the Religion of War?


A hospital near the front lines is filled with moans and groans of agony, coming from patients with terrible wounds and missing limbs. A plane flies overhead and little children dive onto the grass, ducking for cover, praying that bombs won't drop. A husband kisses his weeping wife and children goodbye as he leaves them at the border of their neighboring country before returning to help and defend their homeland. These heartbreaking tragedies and myriads more are all due to 1 thing, war. ♪♪♪ History Down through history, it seems to be nearly the only constant.

Yes, there are times of peace, but it's always only a matter of time before conflict comes and peace and prosperity give way to the woes of war. Right now, at the time of the recording of this video, we're seeing it. Ukraine has been invaded by Russia. Soldiers and civilians are losing their lives. People are being displaced from their homes.

Fear for the future is filling hearts. When I was in university, I actually had the privilege of living in eastern Ukraine for 3 months, teaching English through teaching the Bible. And I made some wonderful friends and met some beautifully kind and hospitable people in the time that I was there. I loved it. The post-Soviet nation that Ukraine is, people tend to be more stoic.

In fact, at least in the eastern part of the country, if you smile at a stranger on the bus or in public, they think that you're crazy. No joke. 1 Ukrainian friend of mine said it well. He said, we may be cold on the outside but we're warm on the inside once you get to know us. And unlike Americans, he added with a smile, when we're friendly you know it's because we actually like you.

All eyes around the world right now are on this conflict, but most don't realize that it's a fulfillment of the words of Jesus. Not that Jesus desired it, but that He warned us that it would come. In describing the signs and way markers that would alert us to the nearness of Jesus' return, He said this in Matthew 24, verse of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled, for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. Wars and rumors of wars.

You probably know there are a lot of rumors out there about what's really happening, and just what news is fake news and what news is real is often near impossible to discern. Jesus goes on in verse 7 and he says this, for nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom. There'll be famines and pestilences and earthquakes in various places. So international war and natural disasters, that's floods, fires, famines, pandemics, earthquakes, tsunamis, and so on, these would all be things revealing to us that Jesus' coming is near. But wait a minute, you must be thinking, haven't these things been happening over the last 2, 000 years, ever since Jesus spoke these words?

How can they be signs of the nearness of his second coming when they've been happening all along? It's a great question and Jesus actually answered it before you even asked. Verse 8, let's keep reading. It says, all these are the beginnings of birth pains. Your Bible may say sorrows, most translations do, but it's the word in Greek, odinone, which means birth pains.

So just like a pregnant woman's contractions increase in frequency and intensity, the closer they get to giving birth, Jesus said that these things, natural disasters, pandemics, wars, and rumors of wars would increase in their frequency and in their intensity. Has this been happening? Absolutely. And if you wanna hear some mind-blowing statistics on the increase in earthquakes, false Christs and false prophets, and all the things in this chapter that Jesus talked about that we don't have time to cover now, we're gonna put a link to another video in the description below. Check it out, you'll be amazed.

But we're gonna look together now at war. Has there been an increase in war all around the world over the last 150 years compared to previously? Absolutely. The 20th century has been labeled by historians as the bloodiest century in history, with the first ever world war starting in 1914. Jesus' words rang true.

International warfare became a reality. But it didn't stop there. A few decades later in 1941, an even larger and longer world war broke out, World War II. To put this in perspective just a bit, World War I led to about 20 million deaths and World War II more than double that with 50 million lives lost. Wow.

But tragically, these world wars weren't the end of the conflicts of last century, but really in a sense kind of the beginning. Just to name a few of the many, the world saw bloody revolutions and civil wars in China, Cuba, Spain, Mexico, Sudan, and Iran. We saw wars like Vietnam, the Korean War, the French-Algerian War, the Soviet-Afghan War, the Iran-Iraq War, the Persian Gulf Wars, the Balkan War, the Indochina Wars. And intermixed with these wars were genocides like the Armenian genocide where 2000000 people were slaughtered, the Holocaust in World War II, the Cambodian Genocide, and more recently, the Rwandan Genocide. All in all, at least 108, at least 108 million people died in wars and conflicts in the 20th century.

Estimates of how many people have died in war throughout human history range from 150 million up to 1 billion. And I'm not saying that it is 1 billion but if the number 1 billion is correct 1 billion people have ever died in war on planet Earth then that means more than 1 tenth of the people who have ever died in a war died last century. Wow! Talk about the bloodiest century in history. Historians know what they're talking about.

Has there been an increase in war in the last 150 years? Without a doubt. And this increase is another indicator that Jesus' return is near. In war, there's always a much bigger picture than what's happening on the ground. In 1 form or another, war is a battle over territory.

Decisions made by some, often at the top, affect all. And there's a power struggle at the top, and often the true details are shrouded in mystery and inaccessible to the common folk like you and me. We, that is all of us on planet earth, are in the midst of a war. A war bigger than any picture Hollywood's wildest sci-fi movie has ever painted. We didn't choose to be in this war but here we are right in the middle of it.

There's a power struggle at the top but unlike the wars of this world through the Bible our king pulls back the veil and gives us insights into the details of this cosmic war between good and evil, between God and Satan. Revelation chapter 12 verse 7 gives us a glimpse into this cosmic history, and it says this. And war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought with the dragon and the dragon and his angels fought Wow so the first war ever recorded in the universe actually took place in heaven the passage goes on good news it says in verse 8 but they did not prevail nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So God won the battle against the dragon, Satan, this once perfect angel who chose to start a revolution against God.

What was the result? Verse 9 goes on and it says, so the dragon was cast out, that serpent of old called the devil and Satan who deceives the whole world. He was cast to the earth and his angels were cast out with him. Fast forward to the creation of the first humans ever, Adam and Eve. Like the angels in heaven, they were given a choice.

They could choose to love and serve God, their compassionate creator and king, or they could choose to join Satan and his angels in their rebellion against God. Just a side note to say, God never works by force. He always works by choice, because God is love, and his creatures can only love him back if we can freely choose to do so or choose not to do so. That's how love works. Adam and Eve's choice was simple.

Follow God's instruction and avoid eating from 1 tree in all of the Garden of Eden. Or eat the piece of forbidden fruit from the tree and be aligned with the evil rebellion. Sadly, they bought into the lies of Satan through the serpent and plunged planet earth with all their future descendants into a war. Our first parents witnessed for the first time in the universe things actually dying. This would have been absolutely devastating to them because never had they imagined would this ever happen.

Through sin, death had barged into planet Earth and it's been an unwelcome guest ever since. Now the human race was caught up in the midst of a war, this war between God and Satan, between light and darkness, between good and evil. We can thank God that through the cross Jesus conquered Satan and the powers of darkness. He guaranteed a way for humans to dwell again in a perfect world. And the devil's future destruction is as good as done.

The war will soon be over. Jesus will return to rescue his people by airlifting them up off planet Earth and taking them home to heaven. But in the meantime, the war wages on around us. In writing to the Christian believers in the city of Ephesus, Paul wrote this in Ephesians chapter 6, starting in verse 10. Amazing, Goes on and he says this in verse 12, the highlight of this passage, For we do not battle, we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places.

So Paul explains here, he says, we on this planet are in the midst of a war between good and evil, but it's not a war with missiles and bombs and fighter jets and nuclear bombs, but rather it is spiritual warfare. Now, we're in the midst of this war and it's a battle over territory, but not land. It's a battle over the territory of the human mind. There is no neutral ground. There is no third option.

We either align ourselves with the powers of darkness that will destroy us eternally eventually, or we surrender ourselves to the King of Light and we put on his armor as Paul describes and we fight on the winning side and we fight the fight of faith. The little boy threw his book across the room and the mother asked what's wrong and he said ah Sheriff Brown Sheriff Brown in this series of books I've been reading, I love it, he's the hero. He always beats up the bad guys and, you know, wins and rescues the town, but right now it looks like he's gonna lose. This bad guy is too tough for him, and he's just, he's embarrassed him and he's been run out of town. A few days later his mom walked by his room and she heard him happily saying, if you only knew what I know.

She came in and she saw him reading and she asked him and he looked up from his book and he said, Mom, I came in the next day and I decided to read the back of the book. And Sheriff Brown, at the end of the story, he beats that bad guy after all. And peace and harmony was restored to the town. So now whenever I'm reading and it looks like that bad guy's gonna win, I just remember the back of the book, the end of the story, and I say to him, oh, if you only knew what I know, if you only knew what I know. Friends, we know what's in the back of the book, the good book.

Revelation chapter 21 verse 4 explains the end of the story, the end of the war, the result of the war between good and evil. God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain for the former things are passed away. No more sorrow, no more war, no more death, no more dying, No more tears, no more pain, because those old things will be a thing of the past.

Friends, we know how the story ends. God wins the war. Peace and harmony will be restored to planet Earth and to the whole universe forever. If you've not yet made up your mind, I want to invite you to join the winning side of this war to end all wars. Choose the day to be on God's side.

Friends, we've barely been able to scratch the surface together when it comes to the topic of this great galactic cosmic war between good and evil, between God and Satan. And we want to offer you an epic book that you won't want to miss out on receiving. It's called The Great Controversy. Just text the word CONTROVERSY to the number that you see on your screen, and we will send you a copy completely for free. And you won't want to miss it.

This book basically follows the path of freedom down through the dark ages from Christ's ascension to heaven all down through the dark ages down to today and checks out current world events and also talks about what will happen in the future according to Bible prophecy before Jesus returns. So text us the word controversy to get your free copy of The Great Controversy. Tomorrow, don't miss out. Lyle's going to be sharing with us on the role of religion in war down through history, even leading up to the current issues in Eastern Europe. So don't miss us for that epic message that Lyle will be sharing with us.

We'll see you there.

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Series

Wars and Rumors of Wars

Is the War Bigger Than You Think?

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Other Teachings in Series

Is the War Bigger Than You Think?

15m

Is Peace Really Possible?

19m

Is Christianity the Religion of War?

24m

Sound Doctrine