Today’s mini-sermon is the first of a 9-part series that will be appearing in the upcoming Saturday, Sunday and Thursday editions of the Answers2Prayer newsletters.
As we look ahead at VERY uncertain times, the Holy Spirit continually brings certain scriptural passages to my attention–passages that I KNOW are for such times as these, and that I KNOW I am to share with each of you. One such passage is found in Rev.:
“Then I heard another voice from heaven say: “Come out of her, my people” (Rev. 18:4).
“Come out of her my people” . . . When this text was recently (and rather miraculously, I must say, but that’s a different story!) brought to my attention, it brought up several questions. First of all, just what is it we are supposed to “Come out of . . .”?
These particular words of warning are actually found twice in the Bible. The first reference is in the Old Testament, in Jeremiah 51:45a: “And the wall of Babylon will fall. Come out of her, my people!” And of course the second reference is in the last book of the Bible, Rev. 18:4: “Then I heard another voice from heaven say: “Come out of her, my people”. If you then jump down to the 8th verse of Rev. 18, we read: “With a mighty voice he shouted: ‘Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the great!'”
What is it we’re supposed to come out of? Why, Babylon! We’re supposed to come out of Babylon! But WHY?
Let’s read Jeremiah 51:45 a second time: “And the wall of Babylon will fall. ‘Come out of her, my people! Run for your lives! Run from the fierce anger of the LORD.’” (Jer. 51:45)
Please note that this isn’t just a warning to “Come out of her” . . . but also to RUN for YOUR LIVES, and to RUN FROM THE FIERCE ANGER OF THE LORD!
Now this place must have been REALLY bad! The people must have done something so terrible that, not just the anger, but the FIERCE anger of the Lord has been kindled against them! In other words, whoever or wherever Babylon is, it has committed GREAT atrocities! I don’t know about you, but if I am in a place committing atrocities great enough to kindle the FIERCE anger of the Lord, I certainly would like to “Come out of her”!
The Revelation passage gives more insight into “why” we must “come out of her”: Rev. 18:4: “Then I heard another voice from heaven say: “Come out of her, my people, so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues.”
This place is going to be punished! We are warned to “come out of her” so that we do not share in her sin — that is, so that we remain pure; and so that we are exempted from her plagues!
COME OUT OF HER MY PEOPLE! Come out so you don’t suffer the same consequences as Babylon!
But Babylon was destroyed thousands of years ago! Surely this doesn’t apply to us today!
Or does it????
In His love,
Lyn
Lyn Chaffart, Moderator, The Nugget, Scriptural Nuggets ( www.scripturalnuggets.org ), Answers2Prayer Ministries, www.Answers2Prayer.org
(To access the entire “Come out of her, my People” mini-series, please click here.)