God has a will that must be fulfilled
Revelation 17:17 “For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled.”
God is the one who put it in their hearts to do the action. Although it is Satan and their own doing, but we know who’s ultimately in control of everything. Even Satan can’t do things without God’s permission.
The reason why God did this is to fulfill His will. He has a will that must be fulfilled.
These 10 kings are going to agree with each other that they’re going to combine forces together to go against the Catholic church.
They have an agreement that they’re going to give their kingdom to the beast.
That’s the key over here. If this is their kingdom, then it makes more sense by going with the Club of Rome on what they claim they’re going to divide their territories with 10 different groups under 10 kings. Why? Because they have to betray her. Since this is her kingdom, they have to betray her so that they can give it fully to the Antichrist. The Antichrist isn’t in Rome anymore, he’s in Jerusalem at the temple.
It’s amazing how this betrayal goes back and forth. The Antichrist, who is Roman Catholic by religion, betrays the Jews and then when he lives in the land of the Jews, he betrays the RomanCatholic power. Why? All he can think about is himself, that’s why never trust the devil to make a contract. He will always lie to you and deceive you. That’s what he did with the Roman Catholic church system, he betrayed them.
The word has to be fulfilled, that’s why verse 17 God puts it in their hearts to fulfill His will. This is all under the will of God.
Even when Satan, the Antichrist, the Roman Catholic church are all doing their own thing, but God is still on the throne and He is in control of everything and all the things that they do are just fulfilling His words.
The great city, Babylon is Rome
Revelation 17:18 “And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.”
Notice that the Roman Catholic church, the whore, is the city. There’s no doubt that this is all a picture, a representation, over and over again.
It’s one city that rules over all kings around the world. That should prove to you it has to be the Vatican city because there is no city in the entire world that has power over nations around the world.
It doesn’t make sense to say that it’s America. Washington DC doesn’t take charge over all the kings of the world, the Vatican city does. All presidents bow down before the pope.
Also, Babylon the great is not referring to America because this is talking about a city, it’s not talking about a nation. Even though throughout the Bible, it’s known as a nation but God sees in the future, it’s going to aim at a particular city.
A glow for angels and for Christians
Revelation 18:1 “And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory.”
After John saw everything in Revelation 17, he saw another relevation.
You can’t divide Revelation chapters and verses by chronological sequence, you have to divide it by revelations, different things, and visions of what John saw. That’s why Revelation is not in chronological order.
This is a different outlook that John is seeing.
John is seeing another angel coming down from heaven and the angel has a lot of power.
When the angel comes down out of heaven, his presence lights up throughout all the world. This angel over here, he’s supposed to have a glow.
Jesus said, at the book of Matthews, that our resurrection will be like the angels in heaven. If the angels have this glow around them as we saw in Revelation 18:1, that means that we Christians will have a glow too. So when we go to heaven, we’re going to have a glow.
This makes sense then that before Adam retained his earthly image, he had the image of God. That’s why angels are known as sons of God, they had retained His image.
God is light, there’s no darkness in God. God has glory and a glow, the angels have it and believers share that. That means that before Adam and Eve fell, they had a glow about them.
In Dr. Ruckman’s ad-lib commentary, he said that when Eve partook in the fruit, the glory and glow was lost.
1 Corinthians 15:40-41 “There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory.”
Verse 41 here is referring to this glow, this light. Celestial bodies retain this glory.
1 Corinthians 15:49 “And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.”
‘image of the earthly’ : no glow
‘image of the heavenly’: just like the heavenly star, sun etc, all of them have a glow.
We (saved Christians) are going to have a glow.
Babylon is fallen (Commercial and Spiritual)
Revelation 18:2 “And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.”
The angel went down upon the earth, lighting the whole earth with his glory and now he’s giving a very huge cry with his voice.
He’s talking about Babylon is falling apart, because chapter 17 shows it.
Some people think that this fall of Babylon in Revelation 18 is a different fall from Revelation 17, they claim that there are two different falls of Babylon and they call Revelation 18 the ‘commercial Babylon’.
If you read Revelation 18, this has to do more with merchandise and commerce if you look at verse 3, 9, 11 and 12. All of this has to do with commerce, something secular, whereas Revelation 17, it’s more of a spiritual, religious Babylon.
However, Pastor Gene Kim agrees with Dr. Ruckman that this has to be referring to the one and same Babylon. The reason is that Revelation 17:16 is referring to her fall, and chapter 18 is continuing to describe the story of her fall.
It makes logical sense from looking at the context that this is referring to the same Babylon.
The second point is that why can’t you mix commercial and religious-spiritual Babylon together? Vatican city is the perfect example of mixing politics and religion, it is the best city in the entire world and throughout all history that combines secular and religious power together.
Revelation 18 consists of spiritual Babylon as well.
Revelation 18:3 “For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies.”
The nations have drunk the wine and wrath of her fornication. That’s spiritual. It’s the same thing as Revelation 17:2, it’s the same spiritual fornication.
Revelation 17:4 talks about a golden cup in her hand, that matches up with Revelation 18:4. That’s religious here.
Revelation 18:13 describes all of commerce, but look at the last part, ‘souls of men’. This is religious.
Revelation 18:24 matches with the Roman Catholic Inquisition and it matches with Revelation 17:6.
This is all referring to the same Babylon, it makes more sense to combine spiritual and secular Babylon together.