and to continue the importance of the three angels message. So the first two were still tied with the Ottoman Empire and the third angel's message and the fourth angel all this will be tied with the Turks again. And when we first looked at all this, we said if the Turks are still relevant today, yes, all these things will go in greater details.
And that's why we like okay, we will have to study. And here we'll read from the spirit of prophecy, the three angels meant and the Turks. In the future, we must meet stern realities, trials that will test our loyalty to God.
And is true. The beautiful theories that are being presented by some will not help us in the hour of trial and difficulty. Wow.
We are to study the truths of the three angels messages and to believe in and worship a God who is able to carry us through the time of trouble. God desire us to act like men and women who have the truth. The first, second, and the third angel's message are presented in the last book of the Bible in Revelation.
This book is not a mystery. It is a message to the churches easily understood by those who have willing ears to hear the instruction that Christ came to deliver us through his servant John. So here we cannot be settled in the truth in many theories.
We have to be settled in the three angels message according to what was was on the platform and what was preached back then. And I don't know does anybody here really understand what exactly is the eastern question whenever we say it? No.
I I I didn't I didn't think so. But we have yeah we have two definitions we have on the slides there. So, one of them is from britannica.
com and it's a diplomatic problem posed in the 19th and 20th centuries by the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire centering on the contest for control of former Ottoman territories. Any international ch change in the Turkish domains caused tension among the European powers each of which feared that one of the others might take advantage of their political disarray to increase its own influence. So as the Ottoman Empire was losing power, you know, the concern with the European countries was, well, if they completely lose their territory, so who's going to take over?
And that that created tension. And so the plan is well let's keep them where they are you know so that was always a question what are we going to do with their territories if they completely fall away and um we also have a definition from Bible home Bible readings for the home circle for those that don't know that's where you would find all the doctrines for our Adventist church like whenever they would go canvasing they would have one-on-one Bible studies that's that was their book that was was a go-to book. So, you needed to know anything about where we stood as a church, the doctrines, you went to that book and you'd find all the information you needed.
So, this is showing the position of the church. It's the driving out of Turkey from Europe and the final extinction of the Turkish Empire with the world embracing events that follow. It has been otherwise described as the driving of the Turk into Asia and they scramble for it for his territory.
So that was the position of the church, not just Uriah, not just one person. It was the church as a whole that believed in that. Let me ask this question.
We've been talking about this over the weekend. How are we supposed to interpret this idea of Daniel re Daniel Daniel 11 Revelation 9? This Eastern question is this a literal or spiritual thing.
We'll read this quote from great controversy to answer the language of the Bible should be explained according to its obvious meaning. Unless a symbol or figure is employed, if men would but take the Bible as it reads, if there were no false teachers to mislead or con and confuse their minds, a work would be accomplished that would make angels glad and that would bring into the fold of Christ thousands upon thousands who are now wondering in error. So the chapter 11 of the book of Daniel was a literal was considered a literal chapter by the pioneers and that's how they studied it.
That's how they treated it from verse one all the way through verse 45. Yes. And and let me emphasize that it was all the pioneers who took it literally.
Mhm. Every single one of them took this as a literal interpretation. And that's why um when I first wanted to check it out, I fell on James White and he says there is a line of historic prophecy in chapter 11 where the symbols are thrown off.
M this is so important to understand as you will note to be able to come to the truth of Daniel 11 unless you discard any symbolism and take it as a literal history. Amen. Mhm.
And we were like wow we have put symbols into Daniel 11 when there was none. Now what about the glorious land? Because when we're talking Daniel 11 and we get closer to the end, it's talking about the glorious land and you know, people might say, "Oh, well, you're bringing, you know, you think that Israel's going to, you know, literal Israel is going to play a part or how how does this work into this?
" I I know in the church, every time we talk about Israel, we scared to fall into the rapture, all these things, because we don't believe in the third temple either. But people don't want to associate Israel, the glorious land with uh with Daniel 11. And when we did some digging through the pioneers writing, they had a clear understanding of the literal glorious land.
The first time I used to study, they said, "Oh, it's America. " Because it was barren. There was nothing at first.
National Sunday law. This is the glorious land. But when we looked at the literature of the pioneers, we realized, oh, it's the literal Israel.
And this is why if we read Daniel 9 verse two, in the first year of the reign, I Daniel understood by books of the number of the years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet that he would accomplish 70 years in the desolation of Jerusalem. So here we see here from the captivity Daniel is seeing Jerusalem as a desolate place but is it still glorious? That's the question and verse 16 will give the answer.
Yeah. And I want to mention that you know what is the state of Jerusalem now? Is it desolate also?
That would the answer would be yes. It is desolate also right now. But look at how Daniel interprets a desolate Jerusalem in the next verse.
Oh Lord, according to all thy righteousness, I beseech thee, let thy anger and that fury be turned away from thy city Jerusalem, thy holy mountain mountain. Because for our sins and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and thy people are become a reproach to all that are about us. It's still holy.
It's still holy. It's still important to God. So if and I just want to add something and I apologize if you guys are going to cover this.
No worries. But I would like everyone to turn to Daniel 11 for a moment. I'm sorry I'm I'm diverging here.
So if we go to Daniel 11 and again there's many things talked about in Daniel 11 but I want to emphasize something because here we see in Daniel 9 this city Jerusalem thy holy mountain right when um Jesus is going to come back right when he comes back the third time. So after the thousand years and he comes down, where does his feet touch first? The Mount of Olives.
Is that the literal Mount of Olives or the spiritual Mount of Olives? Literal, right? Yes.
So we we still have to be able to describe what those locations are. And there's no other terms in the Bible for this area because this was the holy mountain. This was the glorious land.
This is where Abraham was supposed to go, right? This was the promised land and it's supposed to stay that way even after the millennium. The new Jerusalem is going to come down and go on the same spot that Jerusalem now is.
Amen. And that's not a spiritual location. It's a literal location in the glorious land.
So I want now that your finger is in Daniel 11, let's go to Daniel 7. And I just want to emphasize this literal understanding here because as Carl said, the pioneers understood Daniel 11 was literal. So why?
Well, we can answer this very quickly. Daniel 7 verse 16 and 17. And I came near unto them that stood by and asked him the truth of all this.
So he told me and made me know the interpretation of the things. So when the angel gives to Daniel the interpretation, it's also known as what? The truth.
So are the symbols the truth or is the interpretation the truth? Interpretation. Okay.
So then he says in the next verse, these great beasts which are for are for what? Kings. Kings which shall arise out of the earth.
So he says, I'll show you the truth. I'll show you the interpretation and that is that kings is the literal context of the symbol beast. Make sense?
This is basic Daniel 7, right? So beast is a symbol. Kings now becomes a literal meaning, right?
So the definition of kings is the literal interpretation or also known as the truth. Let's go back to Daniel 11 verse two. And this is okay if you guys are going to repeat this because it's good to, you know, practice.
So, Daniel 11:2, say amen when you're there. Amen. Amen.
And now will I show thee the truth. Behold, there shall stand up yet three kings in Persia. Is this garban symbols or is this the literal?
He says, I'm going to show you the truth. So I'm going to show you the interpretation. I'm not showing you a garbed prophecy.
So when we take now this term kings and make that a symbol, we're taking the literal and creating a symbol out of the literal. Now we have this loop that is never going to end and it causes confusion. Yes.
So we cannot be mixing symbols with literal. When the angel says, I'll tell you the truth, what is the symbol he's interpreting? The last vision we see is Daniel 8 of the ram and the heiggo.
The ram represents who? Me Persia. And that's exactly where he starts in Daniel 11:2.
He says, "I'll show you the truth. There's three kings yet in Persia. " So the term kings is the literal.
Therefore, all the way to the end of Daniel 11, that word kings is a literal king, not a symbol or a spiritual king. So now this leads into the next question, which is how do we know who is the king of the north or the king of the south in Daniel 11? Yeah.
And this is a this is pretty much the biggest principle that you could understand whenever it comes to who the king of the north and who the king of the south is because as we just read it was talking about the kings of Persia at first. Did it mention king of the north or king of the south yet in those verses? No.
No. No. So we can't just apply king of the north and king of the south to those verses.
We got to take it as it reads. So whenever we come to the Grecian kingdom in Daniel 11 in verse 4, it reads, "And when he shall stand up, his kingdom shall be broken and shall be divided toward the four winds of heaven, and not to his prosperity posterity, nor according to his dominion which he ruled. for his kingdom shall be plucked up even for others beside those.
And the king of the south shall be strong and one of his princes and he shall be strong above him and have dominion and his dominion shall be a great dominion. So what is this talking about? This is talking about in the previous verse there was a mighty king who was Alexander the great.
He died and then his empire was divided into to his four generals in which they went to the four points of the compass north, south, east and west. And when you look at the um where the kingdoms divided and who occupied the territory, it was the king of the south was the Tomlamese in Egypt. You had uh the king of the north being Lysmicus.
You had the king of Salucas being the king in the west, east, east, east. And then you had Cassander which was in the west. Yes.
But why is there only mentioned king of the north and king of the south? You're saying I thought this was divided into four points of the compass. Well, we know through history that Salucas conquered Lysmicus and Cassander.
But the important thing is that um Salucas conquered the territory of Lysmicus. Lysmicus was the original king of the north. So whoever occupied that territory must be the king of the north.
And I want to read this Daniel uh this quote from Daniel in Revelation. If I can just uh just for one quick second. And the reason Daniel 11 is talking about this is because it's the interpretation and the truth of Daniel 8.
And so I'll just read Daniel 8:8. Therefore the hegoat waxed very great and when he was strong the great horn was broken. That's Alexander the Great.
And for it came up four notable ones toward the four winds of heaven. So here we have that division in symbol form. And then we have the literal in Daniel 11.
