This evening, if you have your Bibles, turn with me again to the book of Ezekiel. And we come again to chapter 38, the last portion of this chapter. Last Sunday afternoon, we were looking at the first portion of chapter 38, where the Lord revealed that there’s going to come a confederacy of nations that will attack Israel.
At the heart of this confederacy will be Russia, Turkey, Persia, or Iran, Sudan, Libya. And we see that as you look at the map up here, right under here is Ethiopia. Sudan is referred to as all of the nations that are south of Egypt is what is referred to as Ethiopia, which is Sudan.
And as you look at what’s happening in the world right now, as we mentioned last week, these nations are coming together for the first time in the history of the world and really joining together. And one of the things that they all have is a hatred for Israel. One of the things people have said is this portion of Russia, right up here, is a Muslim as well as Sudan, Ethiopia, and Turkey.
And they all have a Muslim and they hate Israel. As we saw on Sunday afternoon, they’re going to come against Israel and it’s going to appear to be an unprovoked attack. Because as we saw on Sunday, Israel is living in peace at this particular time.
We know that that isn’t happening today, although the confederation of these nations coming together is beginning. And also as you look at what’s happening in the world today, one sees anti-Semitism on the rise. And as you look at what’s going to happen in the last days, where the Bible and scriptures tell us that the whole world is going to come against Israel in the last days.
And it’s going to be unprovoked and there should be no reason for it, yet they will come against Israel. Well, let’s take a look at what God is going to say about Gog and Magog and this confederation that is coming against Israel unprovoked. Let’s pick it up and we’ll go back and read verse 16 to bring us into 17 through 23 that we look at this evening of chapter 38 of Ezekiel.
Ezekiel 38:16
16 and thou shalt come up against my people of Israel, as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter days, and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes.
And this is what we were talking about last week. A lot of people think that God doesn’t exist and God isn’t in control, but God is in control. In the lesson that we looked at on Sunday, we saw that God actually places a hook in Gog and pulls him down to attack Israel.
And if truly Russia is Gog, a leader of Russia, Gog and Russia Gog. We talked last Sunday about the fact that currently their ability to provide natural gas and oil to Europe has been greatly hindered. Israel is beginning to try and take their place in that market.
And that may be one of the things that is going to draw Russia down as well as the hatred for Israel that all these other nations have. But as we see here, the full intent of this happening is, and look at what God says about this, they’re coming against really him and his land as well as his people. And for people to say that the land of Israel is any other group of people’s land, God has given it to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and it’s God’s land to give.
Well, before we go on to the rest of the verses, let’s just follow in prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, as we come before you this evening, help us to understand that you truly are in control. And even though it seems like the world is spinning out of control, and all these things are happening around the world with earthquakes and tidal waves and fires and tornadoes and destruction and wars, yet Lord, you told us that this would happen, but it was only the beginning of birth things.
It was only the beginning of the last days. Lord, help us to see that the events we’re looking at tonight are going to occur in the last days. We truly are living in that time and help us to be encouraged by it.
Help us to long to see your appearing and help us to desire that you would come and take your church home and then establish your kingdom upon this earth. Lord, now I pray that you would speak to us through your word, we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Let’s take a look at verse 17. Well, because Gog has come down with his confederation against the land of Israel, against the Lord, thus saith the Lord God in verse 17,
Ezekiel 38:17
17 Thus saith the Lord God; Art thou he of whom I have spoken in old time by my servants the prophets of Israel, which prophesied in those days many years that I would bring thee against them?
Well, thee is Gog or this confederacy of really haters of Israel and haters of the Lord and them is Israel. And he’s prophesied not only in Ezekiel but he prophesied in Jeremiah and also he prophesied in Zedekiah.
He prophesied in Isaiah, he prophesied in Daniel that these events would occur. And we also see it in the book of Revelation that these things are going to occur before the Lord shall come with his final judgment. And these are going to be the things that will mark the beginning of the end of the world as we know it. This is the first great attack on the nation of Israel that is unprovoked.
Ezekiel 38:18
18 And it shall come to pass at the same time when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord God, that my fury shall come up in my face.
And as you begin to see and it was even mentioned this evening, one of the things you see, the Lord tells us that we’re going to see all these events occur that are going to be, the world’s going to refer to them as natural disasters and catastrophes.
And oftentimes you listen to the weather and it says, you hear the weatherman go, Mother Nature was really a bit mad today and there was a tornado that occurred and wiped out Appleton, Wisconsin. No, it wasn’t Mother Nature, it’s the Lord. And the Lord controls the winds.
The Lord controls the storms. The Lord controls the seas. The Lord controls the earth as it moans and groans.
And we see the great earthquakes that are coming. It’s interesting to, I saw a little deal about a volcano and tremendous earthquake that occurred a little over a hundred years ago on the island of Krakatoa. And you may have heard of that.
The island basically consisted of a volcano and it was a fairly large volcano. No one really lived on the island, but there were other islands close by. That volcano exploded and literally the island was blown apart by the volcano.
It didn’t exist after the volcano erupted. The earth’s weather was changed for two years. The temperature dropped because of the ash cloud that surrounded the whole earth from the volcano.
The explosion was so strong. Krakatoa is in the Pacific Ocean and the explosion was so loud it was heard all the way to Los Angeles and other parts of the United States mainland because of the sound of the volcano. Now I want you to stop and think that was a great explosion and right now scientists are saying Krakatoa, the island is rebuilding itself because the volcano is beginning to move again and the island is rebuilding itself.
In Wyoming, you have Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone National Park has one of the largest volcanoes in the world. And Yellowstone National Park, the activity of the geysers and all of the material that is evident of the volcanic activity that’s there because of that volcano is beginning to increase and there’s concern about that.
There’s concern about earthquakes and right now in Israel, the land is, there’s a breaking apart of the land and it’s breaking apart towards the Mount of Olives where the land is separating and there’s a crack in the earth that’s going towards the Mount of Olives. The Bible says that Jesus is going to return when he returns, he’s going to return and stand upon the Mount of Olives and when he does, the Mount of Olives will split and there’ll be a, the whole topography of that area will change and it appears that something is happening there. There are, I don’t know if you heard, there was just a huge earthquake in Japan again and they’re concerned about the number of people that were killed there.
Two giant earthquakes in Venezuela about two or three weeks ago. Both of them came just about simultaneously over 7.0 on the Richter scale. And so we see that as you look at all of these events happening, people could say, what’s behind this? Well, the Lord tells us, he said, as you begin to see what’s happening with my people and my land and then you see these other events going around the world and the scriptures tell us that the earth begins to moan.
We need to lift up our heads for our redemption draweth nigh. Well, let’s take a look at what else Ezekiel is told to say.
And it shall come to pass at that time, in verse 18, when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord, that my fury
Ezekiel 38:18-19
18 And it shall come to pass at the same time when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord God, that my fury shall come up in my face. 19 For in my jealousy and in the fire of my wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;
And a great shaking could be referring to a giant earthquake.
God has also brought earthquakes at other times when God is going to deal with the nation of Israel. During one of the kings of Israel, there was a giant earthquake and it’s referred to in scripture and it was marked as a period of time as the earth shook in the land of Israel. Israel sits right on top, if you look at where Israel is in the land, it sits between three continents.
Down here you have Africa, over here you have Asia, up here you have Europe, and Israel sits right here between all three of those continents. There is a giant fault line that runs right through Israel and much like the San Andreas fault, it’s not will this happen if there is a giant earthquake, but when will it happen. I’m concerned about California, you always hear about the San Andreas fault.
Right now out there, there are things happening with that. Scientists have studied earthquakes and studied the earth’s movements and the movements of the plates. They are saying something big could be coming to the west coast.
Something big is coming to Israel. The Lord says that His fury is going to come. Now what is His fury there for? Part of it is all these nations, and this is a confederacy of nations, that are going to come and attack Israel, and they are going to attack Israel not because they have been provoked, but because they desire to destroy her, and they desire to plunder and take what she has.
Ultimately, whenever you see them come against Israel, they are really coming against God. People have said, why does the world hate Israel so much? Why does the world hate this little tiny country? Why do the Muslims hate Israel so much, when they’ve got all of this land up here is Muslim, this land over here is Muslim, this land here is Muslim, this land down here, and if you had Africa, go over here, that’s all Muslim. They have all this land, but yet they want this little strip of land, Israel, and they want one city, Jerusalem.
The whole world wants Jerusalem. The Muslims want Jerusalem. The Muslims want to have total control of the Mount.
And yet, at the same time, when they get control, they destroy it. A brother was just listening to a man the other day, who had been doing some more excavation in Israel, and they dug down under the Temple Mount, and they found the pools of Siloam that go out away from Jerusalem, and they found a lot of different things. She was sharing with me that this guy said that as late as the early 70s, you could go into the pools of Siloam and Solomon, the pools of Solomon, I’m sorry, the pools of Solomon, and you could go in there, the water was clean and fresh, and the Muslims gained control of it, because somebody drew a line wrong in the settlement, in one of the peace agreements, and they took control of it, and they since have basically just about destroyed the whole thing.
It’s filthy, and it’s just not what it was when Israel had control of it. And that’s happening in the Middle East, and God’s angry. The Lord says, if you try and divide my land, He’s going to be angry.
He says, you will not divide my land. It’s His land. Not the Muslims, not the Palestinians that don’t exist, not any other nations, it’s not the Roman Catholic Church’s land, it’s not Jerusalem isn’t their city, it’s His.
And the Temple Mount, Mount Zion, is His. And so He says here that His anger grows great, and He begins to come against Gog. This earthquake that’s going to occur, it’s going to be something like what happened with Mount Krakatoa.
It says here in verse 20,
20 so that the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that creep upon the earth, and all the men that are upon the face of the earth, shall shake at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground.
And like I said, a lot of people say, well yeah, that’s not going to happen. Well it’s happened before with Mount Krakatoa.
It happened, if you go and talk to the people in Venezuela, something similar to this occurred down there, although it was a relatively small space. He says, the whole earth is going to feel this. As God’s anger is displayed, and he shakes the earth, and all the animals will feel it, and all men will feel it.
Ezekiel 38:21
21 And I will call for a sword against him throughout all my mountains, saith the Lord God: every man’s sword shall be against his brother.
Now it’s interesting, what is he speaking of here? When God leads Magog and the Confederation that hate Israel and want to take over their possessions and take over their land against Israel, they’re going to come unprovoked.
The walls are going to think they’re at peace. In all likelihood, part of this will be that they have given up much of their military weapons in exchange for peace. And so they will be basically, the scriptures indicate, relatively defenseless.
And we also know that as you look here, they’re not going to have anybody to help them. And it’s going to appear like it’s going to be a total devastation, but God is going to come, and it’s going to start with this giant earthquake, and then he’s going to bring about other things that appear to be natural catastrophes, but he’s in total control of. And they’re going to come not against the Jewish people, but they’re going to come against the enemies of Israel.
And it says here that he’s going to call on the sword against him throughout all my mountains. Whose mountains? God’s mountains. Where are God’s mountains? In the land of Israel.
The whole land of Israel is going to call the land to come against Gog and Magog. And it’s interesting, the very thing that God has done in the past, he’s going to do again here. During the time of Hezekiah. Hezekiah was being besieged, the city of Jerusalem was being besieged by the Assyrians.
It appeared that there was no hope for Hezekiah, and Hezekiah cried out to God. He cried out about his sin, the sin of Israel, and he went and sat clothed in ashes before the Lord and asked for God’s help and deliverance. And God delivered the army of the Assyrians.
They went out in the morning and the army was gone. They weren’t there. Same thing happened other times in the history of Israel where God has defeated the army and it wasn’t the nation of Israel during the time of Gideon.
Gideon was trying to gather men to come against the Midianites and God kept saying, too many, send them home. Still too many, send them home. And by the time he was done, there were only 300 men and thousands of Midianite soldiers.
Scriptures tell us that God caused the Midianite soldiers to take their swords and fight against one another. He confused them. So they began to kill one another and 300 men and Gideon, through being faithful to the Lord and doing what God said, caused a big portion of the Midianite army to be destroyed and then they fled and then the nations of the other tribes of Israel came and joined Gideon and pursued them.
But we know that God has done this in the past. He’s going to do it again. When Gog and Magog and the confederacy that they formed come against Israel, it’s going to appear that there’s no hope but God will rise up and be the one who is the Deliverer.
And part of the reason he’s allowing this to happen the way it is is so that there will be no doubt in the minds of the people in the world who is the Deliverer of Israel. Whose land is it? Who is the true and living God? And we go on and we see in verse 22.
Ezkiel 38:22
22 And I will plead against him with pestilence and with blood; and I will rain upon him, and upon his bands, and upon the many people that are with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire, and brimstone.
Has that ever happened before? Has God used these things in judgment? The answer is yes.
Go back to Sodom and Gomorrah. Sodom and Gomorrah, the people thought that they were the ones that could control their destiny and they could live any way they wanted to live. They mocked the Lord and they came against not only Lot and his family. They vexed him daily but also they came against the angels the Lord sent to destroy them. They tried to do despicable things with them.
We see that God brought brimstone and fire down upon Sodom and Gomorrah. They recently done archaeological excavations in what appears to be where Sodom and Gomorrah were and what they are finding is that it is as if some type of atomic bomb went off. Because the way that the rocks and things have been changed by the tremendous amount of heat that happened. God is going to do the same thing here and God can be selective God can preserve one people while at the same time judging another people and I know that God has done this in the past as well and so he is going to come against the enemies of Israel and he is going to destroy them with what appear to be supernatural catastrophes giant hailstones huge rainstorms and floods and fire and brimstone as well as causing them to turn on one another.
Ezekiel 38:23
23 Thus will I magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be known in the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I am the Lord.
The nations of the world today want to deny the authority and power of God. That can be seen in what the United Nations promotes and what the Olympics promote and what other organizations that really represent the world promote at the last Olympic Games. The Olympic Games are getting so disgusting you can’t even watch the opening and closing ceremonies because they are so wicked and evil and worshipping of the occult and Satan. The UN the UN with all of the wickedness that is going on in the world you have in Iran that is killing thousands of its own citizens innocent people, gunning them down. You have the atrocities that are going on in the Muslim countries where in Africa, many of these Muslim countries literally hundreds and thousands of Christians have been martyred for their faith in Jesus you have other areas. For example in Europe where women are being molested by Muslim men at a horrendous rate and yet nothing is said and the UN says nothing they have hardly brought any condemnation against any of this and now one of the persons that has been put in charge of the Human Rights Committee for the UN.
Let’s just close in prayer Father I thank you for this day and I thank you for the opportunity you give us to study your word Lord I thank you that you are in control and even though men would be vile and wicked and try to destroy that which you love and that which you cherish yet you will be the one who determines who is judged and Lord I pray that peace would come to the city of Jerusalem and the nation of Israel and I pray that as we look at these events beginning to unfold in the Middle East this compilation of nations that hate Israel and they are coming together just as you said in your word they would come and Lord as they could prepare to attack as things change in the Middle East Lord help us to realize that your return for your church is ever drawing near and Father that the Antichrist could be coming at any time as you come and take the church away through the rapture and then we see the Antichrist shall come and deceive the nation of Israel and bring them to peace and then battles will come Lord I pray that you would