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Father, we continue to worship you. Thank you for the beautiful music. Oh, it it just touches our hearts, Lord.

Thank you now for your word, which will change our hearts. And I pray that during this message the Holy Spirit will do a mighty work in us. We can never thank you enough.

Your greatness is greater than we can imagine. Your love is wider and deeper. Your mercy never ends.

And here we are people pitiful little people standing in time trying to comprehend a God that is infinite. We can't. But what we can do, Lord, is hear the word you gave us today.

And then we can apply it and walk it out. Give us the grace to do that. In Jesus' name I pray.

Amen. Smile at somebody on the way down. If you have your Bibles turn to Revelation 17.

If you have a an electric device turn on your Bibles to Revelation 17. Last week I preached to you on the danger of mixing. You remember that.

And of course I used the illustrations of taking a bottle of water and if you add anything to the water it is no longer pure water. It is whatever you add to it. I also made the point from Nehemiah that God is sorely displeased with mixed marriage.

But you heard me say, "I'm not speaking of color and culture." Did you hear that? Because the editors are out there watching. It was about trying to mix the holy with the unholy.

The chosen with the unchosen. That's what that was about. So, I'm going to begin with the first verse of Revelation 17.

I'm not in a hurry. I got a job to do this morning. Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and talked with me saying to me, "Come, and I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters, with whom the kings of the earth committed fornication." Pretty strong.

"And the inhabitants of the earth were made drunk with the wine of her fornication." Wow. The Bible does not mince words about sexual immorality. So, he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness, and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast which was full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and 10 horns.

The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls. Sounds pretty religious to me. Having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the filthiness of her fornication.

There it is again. And on her forehead a name was written, Mystery, Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and of the abominations of the earth. And I saw a woman drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus.

And I'll tell you right now, he's talking about man-made religion. Man-made religion has killed more people than bad governments ever have. And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement.

But the angel said to me, "Why did you marvel? I will tell you the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and ten horns. The beast that you saw was and is not and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to perdition.

That's the antichrist. And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, those who were left behind, did not go in the rapture, whose names are not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was and is not and yet is. The antichrist will be a resurrected person and it will cause the whole world to marvel.

Here is the mind which has wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. I don't know of another place on the globe other than a Rome where you have the seven mountains on which the woman sits.

There are also seven kings. Those are the nations that have by God's sovereignty existed and have persecuted Israel. Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Rome, and then the one that's coming will be a revived Roman Empire.

Verse 11. The beast that was and is not is himself also the eighth. He will be one of those.

And is of the seven and is going to perdition. God wants you to know he's going to hell. The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet.

But they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. Ten nations are going to align themselves with the Antichrist. These are of one mind and they will give their power and authority to the beast.

He's going to take over. These will make war with the lamb and the lamb will overcome them for he is Lord of lords and King of kings and those who are with him are called, chosen, faithful. Hallelujah.

Then he said to me, "The waters which you saw where that woman is sitting, see that woman is sitting on waters, seven mountains, and the beast. She's having a good old time. The waters which you saw where the harlot sits are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues.

And the ten horns which you saw on the beast, these nations will hate the harlot, make her desolate, and naked, eat her flesh, and burn her with fire. Those ten nations that align themselves with the Antichrist, who give him power in Europe and eventually around the world will decide that religion doesn't belong anymore. And they will destroy the harlot, the mother of harlots.

And all this religious stuff started at the Tower of Babel with Nimrod who built a city and that Babylonian religious system exists even unto today. For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill his purpose. God's doing this.

God's making everything happen. God's bringing everything to pass. To be of one mind and to give their king kingdom to the beast until the words of God are fulfilled.

And the woman whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth. What religion has controlled more governments than you can count? Let's talk about this for a moment.

My favorite one of my favorite biblical scholars / commentators, I mention him often. Is John Phillips. And in his commentary out of this book on this chapter uh simply says that in 306 AD Constantine became a Roman emperor who apparently had a vision about Jesus and decided to make the state religion Christianity.

He was going to require that everybody be a Christian. John Phillips said it is the single worst decision that a powerful leader has made in the history of the world for what it has produced even up to our time. Qualben is another favorite author of mine.

He wrote a history of the Christian Church. And he simply said when Constantine did this the world was Christianized and the church was paganized. Mixed.

Merged. That's what I'm preaching on. To this very day we are suffering some of the uh effects of Constantine's decision to try to make Christianity a forced and accepted religion.

For example, Easter. All of this pagan pageantry around Easter with bunny rabbits and eggs which is a pagan kind of worship to a pagan god came out of that man's decision and people in even in the Christian world accept it as nothing. But it is is it's a pagan practice.

So let me say right now there are many religions in this world, but there is only one faith. I don't belong to a religion. I belong to the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ.

True Christianity is not a religion. It's a relationship with true and living God. All the other denominations that don't preach the gospel and believe the word are indeed religious.

But God has a pure church. And I'm adamant and passionate about doing my part to keep the church pure and keep the world out of the church. That's why you hear me, I guess, ad nauseam talking about false prophets and false teachers and false doctrines and doctrines of devils cuz I know how Satan can slide into a congregation and I'm just not going to have it.

I'm just not going to have it. I'm not going to ignore it and turn a blind eye to it and let it come in and get a foothold. No.

I'm going to spit and sling and fight and preach and declare the whole counsel of God. And I just want to tell you, any attempts to mix will bring confusion. Confu- People get confused when there is no identifiable difference between the church and the world.

And they get it all mixed up like church and government are are all the same thing. But But see, even worse than confusion is the fact that it brings impurity into the church and impurity brings weakness. And weakness brings the disapproval of God.

And I hear people say it all the time, "Oh, we just need religion in government. Uh we need some religious people to get up there and get in government." Folks, we already have religion in government. Fornication is already being committed in government.

It makes God sick. This attempt to amalgamate religion with government is spiritual fornication and it shows that the great harlot is still alive and she's still riding the back of government and the government's allowing it. You see fornication is when you use somebody for your own pleasure without any commitment and that's exactly what is going on.

Oh, brothers and sisters, we have religion in our government. I'm talking about our government. We have Judaism in the Senate and Congress.

You know who they are. We have Islam in the government. You know the Muslims that make the noise.

We have atheism in our leadership. That's a religion. We don't believe there's a God.

Then that makes you your own God. That's a religion. We have racism in the government.

Racism is a religion. I DON'T CARE IF YOU'RE A WHITE NATIONALIST OR A BLACK PANTHER. If you blame somebody else for where you are and what's happened and you are angry with that group of people, you are not Christian and your religion is racism.

But you don't have to clap. Of course you might ought to cuz it's going to get worse after a while. >> [snorts] >> We have agnosticism in our government.

Agnosticism, I don't know if there's a God or not. I don't really care, you know, some people worship, some don't. I don't really care.

That's agnosticism. We have deism. Some of our founding fathers were deists.

If I remember correctly, Thomas Jefferson was a deist. He believed in a God at times. He just didn't know what God or which God.

We have the LGBTQ religion in Congress and the Senate and in other places of leadership. It's there. That's See, that's your religion.

Whatever you embrace and pour your energy into and think about and work for becomes your religion. They're there. And I got a little upset this morning because I know it was yesterday morning.

I don't know which morning it was. It's irrelevant. But I saw where the president signed a proclamation to observe the Sabbath.

Check it out. And he was doing it for the Jewish constituency. He was encouraging them to celebrate Shabbat on this particular day.

And then he encouraged everybody else to do the same kind of thing because it's our 250th anniversary and we should be uh all having some type of celebration day. And that upset me. I want to tell you why.

Because no government official ought to have his hands in anybody's faith. He should not make any proclamation. Leave it alone.

Sign all kinds of presidential orders, but leave faith out of it. because now you've opened Pandora's Box and all the other crazies will say what about our day? What about our religion?

We need an authoritative affirmation from the president and this just never going to stop and that's fornication. That's the harlot and government working together and it will never get better. The door has already been opened.

So I want to say a few things this morning. The first thing is there is no such thing as a liberal Christian. The second thing is there's no such thing as a conservative Christian.

A Christian is a Christian. Here we go. Just hang on a minute.

I I have said many times from this side and this side and from right here. There is no such thing as a black church or white Evangelical Church or Hispanic Church. You cannot put an adjective in front of church or Christian.

A Christian believes one thing in the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob whose son is Jesus who came to this world born of a virgin and lived A HOLY SPOTLESS LIFE AND allowed wicked men to nail him to a tree and he bled to death and he paid for the sins of the whole world and he was buried and on the third DAY HE GOT UP OUT OF THE tomb and he walked out AND AFTER THAT HE MADE A CHURCH and he went to heaven and he's been interceding ever since and he's been blessing AND FILLING WITH THE SPIRIT AND ONE DAY HE'S COMING BACK TO MEET US IN THE CLOUDS OF GLORY AND WHEN HE DOES WE'RE ALL GOING TO RISE UP. HALLELUJAH [screaming] TO GOD. WE'RE GOING TO SEE HIM FOR OURSELVES AND NOBODY ELSE.

HALLELUJAH. >> [applause] >> LIBERAL AND CONSERVATIVE IS only in man-made government and man-made religion. A true Christian walks according to scripture.

Loves the Bible. It's not your interpretation of the scripture. It's not what they teach at Duke Divinity School or Rhema Bible College.

They're both crazy. >> [snorts] >> There has never been a Christian nation. You don't live in one now.

We had godly people get on boats and come over here so they could worship. Godly people. We've had the greatest Bible preachers in the 15, 16, 1700s.

Godly people. Some of the people that constructed this country godly people. But it has never been a Christian nation.

And never will be. Listen. There never will be a Christian nation.

Because after all this is over there will be a kingdom. The kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. And in that kingdom the church will rule and reign with Christ.

Not only as his body, but as his bride. For a nation to be Christian, it would have to honor and serve glorify and obey everything that the Bible teaches. So, I just want to say just because we have scriptures on our our monuments and our buildings and just because we acknowledge our creator in our creeds and constitution, does not make this a Christian country.

A Christian is one that's born from above and abides in Christ. A Christian nation would be a nation full of people who are born from above and abide in Christ. We're not a Christian nation.

You see, a Christian nation would not have killed and displaced 20 million Native Americans who are still marginalized and suffering greatly. A Christian nation would never have thought that owning slaves was somehow pleasing to God and okay to do or that it lined up with scripture. Not only did we practice it, but it was so important to us that we split a nation, had a civil war, fought against each other, and 500,000 Americans DIED BECAUSE SOME PEOPLE WANTED TO OWN AS PROPERTY OTHER PEOPLE.

MORE PEOPLE, MORE AMERICANS died in the Civil War than any other war we've ever fought in the history of this country, including World War II. No Christian nation would thoughtlessly murder 80 million unborn babies. Mostly minorities.

Thoughtlessly throw them in a trash can and be done with it. MOSTLY MINORITIES. "I'M PRO-CHOICE." PEOPLE SAY.

WELL, uh you are for the most racist stance in this country. Knowing that abortion affects minorities more than anybody else, and you stand for that? Do you think a Christian nation would be gender confused?

A Christian nation would fund and finance the butchering of children's bodies to change their sex because abusive adults were so empty and lost that they would advise young children who don't even understand biology, much less the sexual process, to have their bodies changed? Do you think a Christian nation would praise and promote same sex union. A woman marrying a woman and a man marrying a man.

You notice I said union. I didn't say marriage. The only definition of marriage is one woman and one man.

Or any other perverted union. Could could a could the conscience of a Christian nation allow that nation to spend billions of dollars on sports stadiums while the poor, the hungry, the jobless sit in the shadow of those arenas in rat infested low income housing. No.

Christian nation wouldn't stand for that. No Christian nation's heart would allow sports and entertainment to become more important than the Bible, God's word, godly instruction. And basic skills in school like reading, writing, adding, subtracting, counting back change.

No. A Christian nation wouldn't let only the prospective great athletes have all the privileges and all the wealthy people have all of the blessings. A Christian nation would weep and do something about our military veterans slipping on the streets.

I mean do something about it. A Christian nation would not allow sick, poor people to suffer without medicine because big pharma companies charge too much money. A Christian nation WOULD SAY, "NO WAY.

GET medicine and get help to these people." No Christian nation would ban the Bible or remove the Bible from anything. So, I just thought I would lay that before you and maybe see if we can't understand some things. >> [snorts] >> The Church of Jesus Christ in this country is the only light there is.

We're the only redeemable savory factor in this country. We are not a religion. We are the light of the world.

We are the body of Christ walking around giving grace and truth to people. We are a disciplined people who have died to this world and the world has died to us. And there's nothing in this world we want more than we want Jesus.

And we don't even want Jesus 80% of the time and the world 20%. You can't divide your passions. All these things I mentioned a while ago, all this activism stuff, you you can't be half activist and half Christian.

You can't do that. You can't bring that into your life and we won't bring it into the church. BUT WHAT WE CAN DO IS GO OUT THERE AND TELL PEOPLE what the truth is.

AND TELL THEM IT'S NOT JUST SOCIAL ISSUES. THESE things are not just things we're having to deal with. We're we're dealing with sin.

Sin does all this. Sin is the culprit. BUT IF IT'S NEVER CALLED OUT AND PREACHED AGAINST, NOBODY will do anything about it.

So that's why I'm as passionate as I am. I know I pound the pulpit a lot. I watched it the other day and I point, pound, and I go back and forth and I'm always looking angry.

I always do. I wish I couldn't I wish I could just not look angry. And I'm not angry.

I got a job to do, you see? >> [applause] >> And I'm passionate ABOUT KEEPING THE BODY OF CHRIST PURE. KEEPING THE WORLD OUT SO THAT WE CAN BE who we're supposed to be in Jesus Christ.

You see, religion and the world have made this country the way it is. Now, I blame preachers for the condition this country is in. I BLAME PREACHERS, SO-CALLED.

NOW, A LOT OF THEM ARE not even called. They just decided they want to do it. And some of them are just activists.

Reverend Al Sharpton. HE IS NOT A CALLED MAN OF GOD. HE is an activist and using that name and all he does is stir up strife.

Same thing WITH JESSE JACKSON. NOW, SOMEBODY'S WONDERING, WHEN'S HE GOING TO TALK ABOUT A WHITE DUDE?" I THEY'RE OUT THERE. I'VE ALREADY talked about them quite a bit, but you got a crazy man out in California, Talarico, who says that God is okay with uh the LGBTQ thing, and he calls himself a minister.

Folks, they're out there. They're the They're a dime a dozen. They're The woods is full of them.

You can't get upset because I called your favorite person out. You see, if you're really a reverend Here we go. If you are truly a reverend, a called MAN OF GOD, YOU WON'T WALK AROUND AND STIR UP STRIFE AND SHOW UP EVERY TIME something uh is questionable about race AND GENDER.

NO, SIR. IF YOU'RE A real reverend, IF YOU'RE REALLY CALLED BY GOD, WHEN YOU STAND UP, YOU WON'T JUST HAVE A SPEECH IN YOUR HAND. YOU'LL HOLD UP THE WORD OF GOD, THE SPIRIT OF GOD, AND YOU'LL PREACH THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IN CHRIST JESUS.

YOU'LL TELL THE TRUTH, THE WHOLE TRUTH, NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH, AND EVERYTHING ELSE WILL BE LEFT OUT OF YOUR LIFE. >> [applause] >> WHAT I'M AGAINST is politicians in the pulpit. What I'm against is preaching social gospel instead of the true gospel of Jesus Christ.

What I oppose is political rallies on church property and in church buildings. It will not happen here. Look.

See that smile? Uh I'm a teddy bear, really. But it ain't going to happen here.

Cuz I know what God has called us to be. YOU'RE A CHOSEN GENERATION. A HOLY NATION, A ROYAL PRIESTHOOD.

A CALLED OUT AND PECULIAR PEOPLE THAT YOU SHOULD SHOW FORTH THE PRAISES OF HIM WHO CALLED YOU OUT OF DARKNESS INTO HIS MARVELOUS LIGHT. WHO WERE NOT A PEOPLE, BUT NOW [screaming] ARE A PEOPLE OF GOD. WHO KNOW YOU WERE REDEEMED WITH CORRUPTIBLE THINGS LIKE SILVER AND GOLD, BUT WITH THE PRECIOUS BLOOD OF CHRIST AS A LAMB >> [cheering] >> SLAIN FROM THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD.

>> [applause] >> So you just can't merge or you lose your purity. You lose your power. We see a lot of fornication going on in government buildings and in the political cycle and season that we're in.

Well, Pastor, what are you telling us to do? We just quit? We pull out?

No, you've heard it for years. I'm not talking about isolation, I'm talking about insulation. We don't pull out cuz we were put down here to go in.

But we have to make sure that we don't let the world get into us. We got to go to the world, but we can't let the world get into us. This is so not isolation, insulation.

Like like a a brave fire person who has on the proper equipment and has its own breathing supply on the inside, oxygen. And goes into A DANGEROUS BURNING BUILDING BECAUSE THEY WANT TO SAVE A LIFE. BUT THEY KNOW THAT THEY HAVE TO BE CAREFUL ELSE THEY BE BURNED IN THE PROCESS.

SO, LET ME PREACH RIGHT HERE. YOU PUT ON THE WHOLE ARMOR OF GOD. YOU BREATHE THE SPIRIT OF GOD.

YOU GO INTO THE DARK DANGEROUS FIRES OF THIS WORLD AND YOU TRY TO SNATCH EVERY SOUL FROM THE FLAMES THAT YOU POSSIBLY CAN. NO, I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT ISOLATION. I'M TALKING ABOUT BEING CLOTHED IN THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD, BEING WRAPPED UP SO THAT THIS WORLD CANNOT GET to you or get in you.

I need to make a comment here. From time to time over the years I have heard of presidents >> [snorts] >> calling on preachers to come and pray for them. Pray with them.

What's wrong with that? Nothing. From time to time born-again spirit-filled men will be asked by THE OVAL OFFICE, "COME AND Come and pray with me." The sad thing is that people, once they see that preacher go pray with that president, they say, "Aha, he's on their side." And you get tagged with a political name.

That to me is sad. Because when someone calls on a preacher for prayer you got to remember that's why you're down here to start with. That's why God laid His hand on you, sir, because there might be a time when Ahab calls on Elijah.

Elijah doesn't say, "I can't go over there and talk to Ahab. They'll think I've jumped ship. They'll think I'm one of them." Elijah said, "I'm a man of God." And he went and confronted Ahab, the wickedest king Israel ever had.

Folks, don't do that to God-fearing sincere preachers who believe that God opens doors for them to go to the highest of offices to pray. I'll tell you I would. Yes, I would.

And I don't care what party they belong to. If someone sincerely said, "Pastor Livingston, could you come and pray with me?" I'll go. Why?

Cuz I'm a man of God. I'm a Christian. They're asking for help.

For light, for guidance. I'd go in a heartbeat. I applaud those who see it this way.

And they go ahead and they suffer through the stigma and the criticism. And they get pushed over in a certain corner, but they go anyway. Brother, I bless you and I thank God that he opened a door for you.

Oh, yeah. Besides Elijah and Ahab, there was Esther. Yeah.

Her people were going to be exterminated by a wicked man, and a king was listening to the advice of that wicked man. And her cousin Mordecai or uncle said, "You You can't just sit here and do nothing. You can't just say, 'Oh, woe is me.

The government's going down the hill, our people are DOING YOU DON'T JUST SIT THERE. YOU DO SOMETHING. AND THERE ARE MEN AND WOMEN IN WASHINGTON RIGHT NOW DOING SOMETHING.

THEY HAD A MUCH BETTER LIFE BACK HOME JUST WORKING AND BEING WITH THEIR FAMILY. BUT NO, THEY'RE IN WASHINGTON BECAUSE THEY BELIEVE GOD SENT THEM THERE. I KNOW SOME OF THEM PERSONALLY.

You can't just sit back and watch it rot. Then there was Daniel. Daniel served in the administration of three pagan governments.

Then there was David. David with a target on his back, Saul wanted him dead, but David never cursed him once. Never said, "YOU'RE GOING TO GET YOURS.

GLAD WHEN YOU'RE I'M GLAD WHEN YOU'RE DEAD." David respected the office. And when Saul died, David mourned. Then there was Paul.

Time and time again, he stood before politicians and powerful people. He didn't say, "No, I can't do that. I don't want to be associated with government." He said, "I'll go." And every one of them heard the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.

So what I'm telling you is we can never mix, but we can go there and tell them the good news. I I want to finish with this verse of scripture right here. If you don't mind, turn to Ephesians.

I'm sorry, Philippians. Now to our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen.

Greet every saint in Christ Jesus. Understand now, Paul is writing this from jail. He's in jail.

Greet every saint in Christ Jesus. The brethren who are with me GREET YOU. ALL the saints greet you.

But especially those who are of Caesar's household. There it is. Paul was saying I'm in jail here.

But I'm always talking to some people that work for Caesar. They come and check on me. Some of them are in his family.

They're taking care of me. In fact wicked Nero's throne room. That's who it was, Nero.

He was awful. God's people were walking around in Nero's throne room taking care of God's business while pretending to take care of Nero's business. They were put there by God.

Do you see what I'm saying, brothers and sisters? We can never let Caesar's house into God's house. But we can take God's truth into Caesar's throne room.

Stand with me. >> [snorts] >> Hallelujah. Everybody, when I get your attention, I want to make an announcement.

I feel deeply impressed to call prayer meeting for tomorrow night at 7:00. We are indeed coming up on our 250th anniversary as a nation. I love this country.

I'm thankful to be an American. I am so glad that God let me be born in the United States of America. I am My father was a dedicated World War II veteran.

We pay our taxes, we [music] vote. Don't we, babe? We do it all because I'm thankful to be an American.

But I also realize >> [music] >> the country's under attack. And there's some gangrene setting in. [music] And I just think it would please the Lord if we would gather tomorrow night at 7:00 and cry out to God for revival in the pulpits, for revival in the churches, that God might do something in the government.

>> Defense!