Awakening The Bear

November 9, 1989 I remember as a boy watching on telivision / Ronald Regan: “Mr Gorbechve” The Berlin wall being torn down / 13 months later Thirteen months later, on December 25, 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics dissolved. Problem is that that the Atheistic, God hatting spirit didn't die in 1991 / Still very much alive and well / It has awakened and is on the move tonight

The Uprising Bear

A.

-This is a prophecy spoken more than 2500 years ago

-Ezekiel is a prophet in exile and this takes place in the last days

V.8 In the latter years —He is describing an end times event …

Ezek 38:1-2 Now the word of the Lord came to me, saying, “Son of man, set your face against Gog, of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal, and prophesy against him,

-Gog is the leader of Magog which is the land to the far North of Israel (Show map)

-At the time of Jesus, they were called Scythians (Josephus) a war like people from Russia

-Who will raise up as an invading army (Objective is Israel)

Ex: In 1857 Reverend E.V. Pitts spoke before a joint session of the U.S. Congress about the coming day where Russia would become a dominant world power and move against Israel! This 60 years before Communist revolution and 90 yrs. before rebirth of nation if Israel

-Russia was a backward nation, Israel did not exist

* THE BEAR HAS AWAKENED

Ezek 38:9 You will ascend, coming like a storm, covering the land like a cloud, you and all your troops and many peoples with you."

*THIS IS SPIRITUAL

-This type of wanton violence has a spiritual component

Rev 16:13-14 I saw three unclean spirits like frogs coming out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.

-Many are scratching their heads as to why Vladimir Putin is doing this

-There seems to be no good outcomes and he appears increasingly desperate

V.4 I will turn you around, put hooks into your jaws, and lead you out,

V.10 it shall come to pass those thoughts will arise in your mind, and you will make an evil plan:

-Even in his own nation there is major pushback

II The Visible Demonstration of Power

*IMAGES OF BATTLE

-Unlike our recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan …this is a very familiar battlefield

-Modern western style cities, Ukrainian celebrities and sports figures that people identify with

Ex: Klitschko Brothers former boxing champions Ex: Entertainers

1. WAR IS ON THE FRONT PAGE

-Never before has there been an opportunity for the average person to view in real time the horrors of the battlefield

Ex: Personal reports through social media Ex: Russian Parents didn’t know sons were there

Ex: WW2 …huge effort to get censored messages out / Usually took 3 weeks!

Rev 11:8-10 And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. Then those from the peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations will see their dead bodies three-and-a-half days, and not allow their dead bodies to be put into graves.

-Up until recently how could anyone reading that verse process it?

-Going back at least 500 years Russia has always been known as a bear …Like a bear it’s from the North, it is vicious and is at the top of the food chain and …like a bear it hibernates

-The history of Russia is dormancy and then great expressions of power

Ex: 2008 Georgia; 2014 Crimea and today Ukraine

Why are they so powerful?

#1. They are absolutly obsessed with Wold domination

a. They are descendts of Japheth; Literally means To Expand

b. They became a world power under Peter the Great in 1682

c. Then in the aftermath of WW2 Russia built an empire on the ruins of of Eastern Europe this was called The “Union of Soviet Socialist Republics”

d. The whole cold war was simply trying to keep Russia from devouring the world and becoming a Super power

e. In 1991 it collapse / Known as the wounded bear / But their SPIRIT is still as radical as it has ever been

f. Vladamire Putin is still running on the Marching orders of the USSR / He and his group

#2. MONEY; Money equals Power!

1. PROV 22:7 “The rich rules over the poor, And the borrower is servant to the lender.”

a. The Cold war was won on Americas ability to bankrupt Russia

b. But THAT IS NOT THE WAY IT IS ANYMORE

c. It changed when Russia discovered massive amounts or Gas and Oil / They are the 3rd largest oil producer in the world

- Supplies 30% of all the oil Europe needs

- 40 % Of their Natural Gas

- So now here is the difference / You have a warmonger whos war machine is being fueled by Oil and Gas

d. So right now / Middle of Winter / All of Euorpe guzzeling their gas / If they appose Russia they will suffer / They will be cut off!

#3. No one wants to appose them VS 13 - Protest but wont put skin in the game...

- Poland wanted to give Ruissia 39 Migs

- They said We will give them to you / Biden says NO! We dont want to start World war 3!

- Doing anything not to fight is a place of weakness~!

Ultimate Goal : To destroy Israel

Colonel Pavel Chernov of the FSB Federal security service believes Russia should say to the Muslim world “We have the power, the land and the nuclear weapons. you have 1 billion people, living bombs. Lets work together to destroy Israel.

2. THE ECONOMICS OF WAR

-There has always been an economic dimension to war …but this battle has demonstrated how financially interconnected the world is …the nations were slow to respond because of the $

Ezek 38:13 Have you come to plunder? Have you gathered your hordes to loot, to carry off silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods and to seize much plunder?" '

-Spoken by 3rd party nations who are unwilling to get involved

­Ex: US buys 670,000 brls of oil a day from Russia $73 Million a day! Putin worth $200 billion

Ex: By a press of a button ther cut off the Russian national bank from the world

Ex: Canada …shutdown peoples account, GoFundMe

3. MODERN WARFARE IS STILL CONVENTIONAL

Ex: 80 years after WW2 Tanks are once again moving into battlefields …with 1,000 of troops

-Nobody envisioned this in the 1970’s …somehow technology would bypass this

-Yet just as in our text and in the book of Revelation the battlefield will be flooded

Ex: 200K troops massed, 40-mile convoy now moving towards the capitol of Kiev

Rev 9:16-19 They led an army of 200,000,000 warriors… I saw their horses spread out before me in my vision; their riders wore fiery-red breastplates, though some were sky-blue and others yellow. The horses' heads looked much like lions', and smoke and fire and flaming sulphur billowed from their mouths, killing one-third of all mankind. Their power of death was not only in their mouths, but in their tails as well, for their tails were similar to serpents' heads that struck and bit with fatal wounds.

-The new wrinkle is that Putin has put his Nuclear Arsenal on highest alert

Zechariah 14:12 And this shall be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the peoples that wage war against Jerusalem: their flesh will rot while they are still standing on their feet, their eyes will rot in their sockets, and their tongues will rot in their mouths.

-Description of what happens to people in close proximity to a nuclear explosion

III HEROES AND SAVIORS

*AS IN ALL BATTLES THERE ARE HEROES AND VILLAINS

Ex: Sergiy Stakhovsky …professional Tennis Player, wealth …returning to Ukraine to fight

Ex: Vlodimir Zelensky 5 years ago a comedian playing the President on TV …now leading the nation in its darkest hour …Won respect by not fleeing (Afghanistan!)

Ex: Dennis video

*THE SAVIOR

Zech 12:10 They will look on him they pierced, and mourn for him as for an only son, and grieve bitterly for him 13:1 "At that time a Fountain will be opened to the people of Israel and Jerusalem, a Fountain to cleanse them from all their sins and defilement."

-Whether its this war or another …Jesus is our only hope

Luke 21:28 Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near."