Dr. Michael Youssef: In that new city of God, we will have
an uninterrupted fellowship with Jesus.
There will be no television news to depress us.
There'll be no tabloid newspapers to catch
our attention.
There will be no terrorism to frighten us.
There will be no power to harass us.
But in the new city, in the new Jerusalem
that Abraham looked forward to, Jesus will always
be there and his name will always be lifted high.
<i>male announcer: The clock</i> <i>is ticking for Christians in</i>
<i>America and the Western world,</i> <i>and time is running out.</i>
<i>Dr. Youssef reveals this unholy</i> <i>alliance between aggressive</i>
<i>secularists and radical</i> <i>Islamists, unveiling their</i>
<i>sinister plan to literally wipe</i> <i>Christians from the earth</i>
<i>as they attack with full force.</i>
<i>"The Hidden Enemy: Aggressive</i> <i>Secularism, Radical Islam,</i>
<i>and the Fight for Our Future,"</i> <i>you need this book right now.</i>
<i>You can call or visit us online</i> <i>at ltw.org to pre-order</i>
<i>"The Hidden Enemy."</i>
[music]
[music]
Dr. Youssef: Have you ever experienced the overruling of
God's hand in your life when you have completely blown it?
You know what that means.
All by your little self, nobody helped you.
And then you are sitting on a pile of mess and you have
no one to blame but yourself.
Well, mercifully, in this message, I'm not gonna talk
about past failures and keeping to learn the same thing again
and again, but I'm gonna talk about the amazing overruling
of the hand of God.
And we saw in the last message how one of his descendants,
Ham's descendants was Nimrod, and Nimrod is the man who went
even further in departing from God, and he built Babylon,
the city that is designed to be a city without God, to be a city
that stole the glory of God, to be a city that took the glory of
God and gave it to the zodiac and to the horoscopes
and to Satan himself.
It was a city that was so preoccupied with self-worship,
and that is why the Bible talks about the mystery of Babylon,
and we saw why.
Because from that time on, any city, every city, any culture
that departs from God and turns against God and depart from
God's moral absolutes, they become like Babylon.
And while the city of man was full of arrogance and pride and
self-worship, Abraham, his heart was set on the city of God,
a city that's only built, founded, designed,
framed by God himself.
Abraham himself was not really looking to that temporary city.
He was looking to the city that is to come, the new Jerusalem.
He was not satisfied with an earthly city.
And so, now, I want you to turn with me, please, to
Hebrews chapter 11, two verses, 9 and 10:
"By faith Abraham made his home in the Promised Land like
a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac
and Jacob, who were heirs with him in the same promise.
For he," that is referring to Abraham, "for he was looking
forward to the city with the foundation, whose architect
and builder is God."
I think I speak for most believers in
the Lord Jesus Christ when I say that one of
the hardest things in our Christian walk, in our walk with
Christ, in our life in Christ, one of the hardest things--there
are a lot of hard things, but one of the hardest things
is waiting.
Can I get a witness?
Amen, I know.
You see, during the time of waiting, we are tempted to say
even to God, "Oh, promises, promises, promises."
But no one experienced such unbelievable waiting for God
like Abraham, no one.
I mean, he waited for years, over 25 years,
for the promised son, Isaac.
And yet, he waited all of his life for that earthly city so
that will be a symbol of the city that is to come, which he
really looked forward to, and he never saw it with his eyes.
But he never gave up waiting.
Hear me right on this one.
I make no apologies for saying this to you.
It's my testimony.
Ever since I was a young man, I've been looking forward,
and this is nearly 50 years now, two things.
I've been praying and looking forward to maybe I see a revival
in my lifetime.
But above all, I'm looking forward to seeing the return
of the Lord.
I may yet see it.
With the way things are, I may yet see it.
But even if I don't, if I go to glory before the Lord return,
it doesn't make any difference.
I will never give up waiting for the return of the Lord.
I know it will happen.
William Carey pioneered the Protestant missionary movement
in all of the world, and he went to India, and he was a man of
faith who worked hard, worked faithfully.
You've heard me quoting him one of his motto that impacted me,
"Expect great things because we have a great God."
And yet, throughout his years of laboring in India, he had very
precious little fruit to show for it.
But I submit to you that for the last 200 years, and even to
this day, every missionary, every missionary movement, every
great revival that took place in India, all the millions of
people who came to Christ, they all owe their results to
William Carey.
Do you understand what I'm talking about?
God wants us to be faithful, and he's gonna do some great and
mighty things, even if we look at and see them from heaven.
I had the joy and the privilege of leading some people who in
their senior years.
And I remember several of them, but one particularly would cry
and weep hot tears and he said, "You know, I am just sorry that
my parents did not see this, because I know they prayed
for me that I'll be saved."
I assured him that the Lord is gonna tell them in heaven.
God's timing is always perfect.
True faith in the promises of God is death to doubt.
True faith in the promises of God is dumb to discouragement.
True faith in the promises of God is blind to
the impossibilities.
Abraham looked forward to the city like no other city.
And not until John the Revelator in the book of Revelation does
he talk about that city that Abraham looked forward to.
No matter how many temptations Abraham faced, no matter how
many temptations he succumbed to, no matter how many
temptations that beckoned him, his eyes were never off
the city of God.
His eyes were never taken off what he knows that God is going
to do at the end times.
This darkness that we're seeing, that we would be seeing
these dreadful things that are happening in our culture, and
we're seeing how so many of us are lamenting how our culture
has been hijacked, like Abraham, we must keep our eyes on
the city of God.
Look to that city that is built, an architect and framer
and designer is God.
Please hear me right, this is important.
There is no greater cure to discouragement and fatigue and
self-pity than thinking of being with Jesus for all of eternity.
If you allow your focus to be only on the darkness of this
world, only on the problems of this world, only on
the difficulties of this world, you are going to get mightily
depressed and stressed out.
Why do you think the Apostle Paul urges us,
"Set your minds on things above, not on things here below"?
This is not just for old people.
This setting your mind on things above is for teenagers.
It's for those in their 20s and 30s.
It's for those who are parents.
It's for everyone.
This divine city, this new Jerusalem that Abraham looked
forward to is called by many names in the Bible.
But to me, the best description is found in Ezekiel 48:35.
Ezekiel 48:35 says: "The Lord is there."
I couldn't think of a better way to get me all excited, even no
matter what's going on around me.
"The Lord is there."
Of all the beautiful things that are in that city of God,
the best part is that the Lord is there.
Beloved, faith is powerful because faith sees
the invisible, and faith hears the inaudible, and faith touches
the intangible.
Now, faith accomplishes the impossible.
Ah, but listen, faith is not wishful thinking.
Faith is active, that you have to take a step of faith, that
you have to take a step of trusting in the promises of God.
In his sovereign grace, God provided an earthly city
for his people Israel.
It was supposed to be the shadow or foreshadow of the city of God
that John saw coming down from heaven.
It was a temporary provision to lift up the name of God
on the earth.
It was a temporary provision that gets people from all over
the world to come and know the one true God.
It was a temporary provision to know the peace of God
in the midst of difficult times.
And that is why it is called Yerushalayim.
Yerushalayim, can you say that with me?
"Yerushalayim," Jerusalem, the city of peace.
Why is it called the city of peace?
Because Melchizedek, who was a type of Christ, was not only
the king of righteousness, but he also was the king of peace.
Today, every faithful church, every faithful Sunday school
class, every faithful home group, every faithful ministry
must be and need to be the place where God is present in
a very unique way.
He's with us all the time, but these are the times when we
gather in Jesus's name, that he is to be present in
a unique way.
It is to be a place where the peace of God is found.
It's to be a place where the Word of God held in high esteem.
It be a place where encouragement is found.
It's a place where we spur one another into faith.
I wanna tell you very quickly three things about that earthly
Jerusalem that foreshadow of the real city of God that is coming
down from heaven where all the believers will be gathered
at the throne room of God, this city, the heavenly Jerusalem
that Abraham looked forward to.
Earthly Jerusalem was a temporary city that was chosen
by God's grace.
Secondly, earthly Jerusalem was a temporary city that received
a conditional promise, not unconditional,
but a conditional promise.
Thirdly, earthly Jerusalem was a foreshadowing.
It was a mere foreshadow of the real city that we are
looking forward to.
First of all, it was a city that was chosen by God's grace.
There can be no doubt that David, King David had
one overriding desire.
You see it not only in the history, you see it in
the psalms.
Read the psalms, and think of David when he was writing those.
You can see the desire of his heart in all of these psalms.
He had one overriding desire, and that is to honor the Lord.
He really did.
He had one overriding desire, and that is to revere the Lord.
David's deep desire was to be in the presence of God
all the time.
As you look at the darkness of our world today, just horrible
stuff going on all the time, when you see all of that,
but you refuse to compromise, and you refuse to budge from
your faith and trust in Jesus, or when you choose to honor
God in the midst of all of this, when you choose not to fear, but
exercise faith, when you choose to glorify God above all things,
regardless of the consequences, when your desire is to bring
honor and glory and blessing to the name of the Lord, I can tell
you, on the authority of the Word of God, like David, God
is gonna rule and overrule your fumbling and your stumbling,
amen.
Listen, it's not a secret.
Any Sunday school elementary knowledge know that David,
King David messed up royally, royally, and yet he loved to
honor God, even in the midst of messing up and blowing it.
Look at the psalms, particularly Psalm 120 all the way to 134,
those 14 psalms.
They are known as, "The psalms of ascent," because these are
the psalms that they would sing as they were climbing up the
mountain, going up to Jerusalem to the temple to worship.
In fact, Psalm 46, 48, 67, 84, and 87 were known as,
"The psalms of Zion."
Read them when you go home.
They were synonymous with the presence of God in worship.
Ahh, but they were only foreshadowing of the real city
that you and I look forward to it.
It's a foreshadowing of the city of God that is coming down
from heaven, where you and I are gonna be spending
all of eternity in the presence of Jesus.
Jerusalem was a temporary city chosen by God's grace.
Secondly, Jerusalem, earthly Jerusalem was a temporary city
that had a conditional promise.
David and Solomon offered to the Lord when they built that
temple.
They offered to God what Cain failed to offer, sacrifice.
Deuteronomy, God warns them before they go into
the Promised Land and he said to them, he said,
"Now, I place before you a blessing and a curse,
you choose."
Thank God that in the New Testament,
his promises are unconditional, and I'm glad I'm
living in the New Testament.
You see, in earthly Jerusalem, God's blessings was conditional.
It was conditional on their obedience.
But in the heavenly Jerusalem, God's blessings will be
unconditional because we will be like Jesus.
And I'm so grateful Jesus said, "Those whom the Father has given
me, I'll lose none," that it is not up to me to hold on to God,
but God is holding on to me.
Because it's up to me to hold on to God, I would have run a long
time ago.
Those of us who are living between the city of man or in
the city of man looking forward to the city of God.
We're always tempted to take our eyes off the city of God and
plunge headlong into the city of man.
Finally, when Jerusalem had totally rejected God by
crucifying his Messiah, at that point, earthly Jerusalem ceased
to be the place where God dwells.
You see, God's conditional promise, "You reject me,
I leave."
Thank God his children, he never leaves his children.
In Luke 19:41 all the way to 44, Jesus lamented over their
rejection of the Father's plan to save them, and he lamented
over Jerusalem, and he said, "Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
had you known the time of your visitation."
I believe with all my heart that Jesus is weeping in heaven
over many a church.
Churches that once proclaimed him as the only way to heaven
and to the Father, now they're preaching tolerance of sin.
The founding fathers of this great country,
the United States of America, they believed that they
are founding a city on a hill that shines a light
to the world.
And yet, today, the courts and the people in power have
rejected any thought of obeying God and the laws of God and the
Word of God and the absolutes of God, and they're putting
politics ahead of everything else.
John Knox and John Wesley, great men of God who founded
denominations for the sole purpose of lifting up Jesus as
the only Savior, now, so many of these denominations have allowed
their feelings and their instincts and what is popular
to take place.
Earthly Jerusalem was a temporary city chosen by
God's grace.
Earthly Jerusalem had a conditional promise.
Thirdly, earthly Jerusalem was only a foreshadow of
the heavenly Jerusalem.
Jesus had an encounter with a woman.
We call her, "The Samaritan woman,"
in John chapter 4.
When no man would talk to her, he honored her and talked
to her.
When no Jew would talk to a Samaritan, he walked out
of his way and talked to her.
And then he said to her, when she was confused about where to
worship, Jesus said to her, he said, "I tell you, the day is
coming and now is when true worshipers," can you say,
"True worshipers"?
"True worshipers will worship my Father neither in Jerusalem
nor in this mountain.
They're gonna worship him in truth and Spirit."
Earthly city of Jerusalem is more a foreshadow.
You remember, back in the old days before your iPhone
and the pictures you take on your iPhone, we used
to have the negative?
You remember that?
I know it's a long, long time ago.
I mean, those negatives look terrible.
You don't know if it's a man or a woman.
You don't know what, who's--I mean, you have to really
look hard.
That's what earthly Jerusalem, it's a foreshadow,
it's the negative.
It's gonna develop, and the full picture is gonna be in the city
that is coming down from heaven.
Earthly city Jerusalem was just a foreshadow.
Earthly city Jerusalem was a mere representation of what it
means for God to dwell in the midst of his people.
Earthly city Jerusalem is only a sketch.
It's only a small model of what will happen when the heavenly
city Jerusalem, the heavenly Jerusalem come down from heaven
for the believers to dwell in.
And that is why Abraham, the Bible said,
"He looked forward to that city, whose architect,
whose designer, whose builder is God."
And that is why nothing that is evil or wicked will be
in that city.
Why?
Because Jesus is there.
The Bible tells us, "Only in Jesus can we begin to comprehend
what it means to have him as Immanuel, God with us."
But we, like the earthly city Jerusalem, we can never fully
comprehend what Immanuel really means, what it means for us
to dwell with God.
God dwells with us.
Why?
Because we tend to run away from him.
We tend to forget about him.
We tend to get so busy in all the problems of this life,
and we ignore him.
We tend to be persuaded by other voices.
Oh, but in that new city of God, we will have an uninterrupted
fellowship with Jesus.
I can't wait to get there.
I can't wait to get there.
There will be no television news to depress us.
There'll be no tabloid newspapers to catch
our attention.
There will be no terrorism to frighten us.
There will be no power to harass us.
In the earthly Jerusalem, they experienced the presence of God
when his name was lifted high, but in the new city, in the new
Jerusalem that Abraham looked forward to, Jesus will always be
there and his name will always be lifted high.
In the earthly Jerusalem, blessings were conditional,
but in the new Jerusalem, his unconditional blessings is
going to overwhelm us.
In the old earthly Jerusalem, the presence of God was
sporadic, but in the heavenly Jerusalem, the new Jerusalem,
his presence will be permanent.
In the old Jerusalem, God's people may or might not show up
for worship, but in the new Jerusalem, believers
will worship him day and night.
In the old Jerusalem, his people served him occasionally, when
they feel like it, but in the new city of Jerusalem,
we will be serving him 24/7.
In the old Jerusalem, even his own people forsook him and
ignored him and ran after other gods, but in the new Jerusalem,
they will not.
In the old Jerusalem, his people's heart often sought
after worldly pleasures, but in the new city of God,
the heavenly Jerusalem, his true followers will be delighted
in him day and night.
[music]
Dr. Youssef: The Bible said, "Our weapons are not carnal.
Our weapons are spiritual weapons."
Our weapons is loving people, and even when they least deserve
it because we were loved by God when we least deserved it.
And so, in the final analysis, it is how we're gonna portray
our faith, how we're gonna share our faith.
Now, there are some people who thought the answer is to just
water it down and make it so accepted to everybody, and it
ended up being nothing.
And I've seen that.
They just watered it down, all the way down, until it's really
not the gospel at all.
Now, that is also erroneous.
In fact, that is more dangerous.
I think that truth in love is the formula, it's the
sensitive, that God gave us, and we must use it, and we must
not be ashamed of the gospel.
I keep saying this because in the end, that is
the only answer.
That's the only answer.
[music]
Dr. Youssef: There's nothing worse than the disappearance
of truth.
We'll begin not to trust each other.
When the truth is gone, the nation will disappear.
male: If we get away from objective truth, and we start
leaning towards secular fundamentalism, what set of
moral values are we gonna hold to?
female: We need to fact check what our news sources are, and
look into a bunch of different areas to get what the truth is.
female: It really touched me that Dr. Youssef is not
compromising, how he's not giving his opinion.
He's giving the Word of God.
male: Every single chapter, every single paragraph
ultimately points back to the Word of God
and the infallibility of the Word of God.
female: The book really is a wakeup call to the believers
to speak boldly into the culture around us.
We need to repent and go back to Christ.
It's really the only way that, as a culture, that we are going
to thrive.
Dr. Youssef: I am seeing the forces that are normally opposed
to each other.
And I had to ask the question, "Why, why are they united
against the truth of the gospel, and the whole foundation
of Western civilization?" It's a wakeup call.
male: He takes issues like radical Islam and provides a
historical backing to why things are the way that they are today.
So when you get to the end of the book and you find out
who that hidden enemy is, it's pretty shocking.
female: "The Hidden Enemy" book challenged me to accomplish
the mission that God called me to do, to not compromise
the truth.
I highly recommend "The Hidden Enemy" book
for anyone who's looking for the truth, who wants
to live undefeated by the hidden enemy.
male: It exposes the dangers of walking away from objective
truth in our culture today, and it equips us with the tools to
confront these issues head on.
Dr. Youssef: I don't want you to be part of the hidden enemy.
I want you to be part of the solution to the problems
we are facing.
<i>announcer: You need this book</i> <i>right now.</i>
<i>Call or go online.</i>
<i>Don't wait another minute.</i>
<i>For the sake of your family,</i> <i>this country, the church,</i>
<i>and the future, we cannot afford</i> <i>to sit on the sideline.</i>
<i>"The Hidden Enemy," pre-order</i> <i>a copy today for your gift</i>
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<i>You can call or visit us online</i> <i>at ltw.org.</i>
<i>And when you pre-order your copy</i> <i>today, we will send you a free</i>
<i>digital resource, "The Case for</i> <i>Truth in a Post-Truth Age."</i>
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<i>updates from Dr. Youssef</i> <i>and reports from the team</i>
<i>on the ground.</i>
<i>"Leading the Way with</i> <i>Dr. Michael Youssef,"</i>
<i>proclaim the gospel,</i> <i>disciple new believers,</i>
<i>and help the persecuted.</i>
<i>announcer: Passionately</i> <i>proclaiming uncompromising</i>
<i>truth, "Leading the Way</i> <i>with Dr. Michael Youssef"</i>
<i>thanks you for your faithful</i> <i>support through your continued</i>
<i>prayers and gifts.</i>
Dr. Youssef: If you're ever in Atlanta on a Sunday, it would
be a great opportunity for you to come and worship with us.
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