The sermon titled 'Babylon and Her Gods Destroyed' by Scott Brown centers around Isaiah 47 and explores the theme of Babylon's impending destruction due to its sinful ways. Babylon is depicted as the embodiment of worldliness, human pride, and self-indulgence, which leads to its downfall. The sermon outlines the consequences for those who seek pleasure in Babylon, including submission, shame, and silence in darkness. It highlights the importance of recognizing the Redeemer, the Lord of hosts, the Holy One of Israel, as the way out of Babylon's influence. The sermon also draws parallels between Babylon and modern cultures, urging believers to turn away from worldliness and towards holiness. The preacher emphasizes God's sovereignty and justice, warning that all things rooted in Babylon will ultimately be destroyed. The sermon concludes with a call to recognize the dangers of aligning with Babylon and to seek redemption through Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 47. Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for you shall no more be called tender and delicate. Take the millstones and grind a meal. Remove your veil.

Take off the skirt. Uncover the thigh. Pass through the rivers. Your nakedness shall be uncovered. Yes, your shame will be seen.

I will take vengeance, and I will not arbitrate with a man. As for our Redeemer, the Lord of hosts is his name, the Holy One of Israel. Sit in silence and go into darkness, O the daughter of the Chaldeans, for you shall no longer be called the lady of kingdoms. I was angry with my people. I have profaned my inheritance and given them in your hand.

You showed them no mercy on the elderly. You laid your yolk very heavily and you said I shall be a lady forever so that you did not take these things to heart nor remember the latter end of them therefore hear this now you who are given to pleasures you who dwell securely you who say in your heart I am and there is no one else besides me. I shall not sit as a widow nor shall I know the loss of children, but these two things shall come to you in a moment, in one day, the loss of children and widowhood. They shall come upon you in their fullness because of the multitude of your sorceries for the great abundance of your enchantments. For you have trusted in your wickedness.

You have said no one sees me. Your wisdom and your knowledge have warped you and you have said in your heart, I am and there is no one else besides me. Therefore evil shall come upon you. You shall not know from where it arises, and trouble shall fall upon you, and you will not be able to put it off, and desolation shall come upon you suddenly, which you shall not know. Stand now with your enchantments and the multitude of your sorceries in which you have labored from your youth.

Perhaps you will be able to profit, perhaps you will prevail. You are wearied in the multitude of your councils. Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators stand up and save you from what shall come upon you. Behold, they shall be a stubble. The fire shall burn them.

They shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame. It shall not be a coal to be warmed by nor a fire to sit before. Thus shall they be to you with whom you have labored. Your merchants from your youth you shall wander each one to his quarter. No one shall save you.

Let's pray. Oh father we thank you for your word that you've given it to us. Lord that you've allowed us to read it. Now as it comes and is exposited Lord we pray that your spirit would be poured upon Mr. Brown and upon us as we hear.

Lord change our hearts, help us to hear, help us to give you glory. In your name we pray, amen. Isaiah 47 takes us behind the curtain to show us the fate of the worldliness of the world. In this case, Babylon herself. And Isaiah 47 brings us good and bad news, really, depending on the inclination of your heart but what we need to recognize is that in this passage the heart of the matter is that Babylon is going down and she's going down in humiliation you know everything that is rooted in Babylon is going down.

You know, people want to be part of something that's going up, don't they? Well, Babylon is going down. Whatever you want to be a part of, you need to make sure you understand the direction, the trajectory of that thing. And here what we learn is Babylon is going down in many ways you know Isaiah Isaiah is pulling back the curtain saying look look behold that's in verse 14 look at where this is going it says if Isaiah is tearing off the costume of the donkey and showing this vicious devil that is out to destroy and to kill. And I think as we read this chapter we should ask ourselves about our inclinations and our affections because the truth of this chapter reveals that those who are attracted to the worldliness of the world of Babylon will come to an abrupt end.

And while Babylon does rise in prominence, Babylon does have its own temporal victories. Babylon will be destroyed. And her shame will be uncovered in multiple ways. Everyone who loves Babylon will be shamed with Babylon. Everything warped will be destroyed.

All the self-indulgence that people think they are getting away with, they will find that they did not get away with one bit of it at all and thankfully there's a way out in verse four we see it there's one verse in chapter forty seven that shows us the way out of redemption as for our Redeemer the Lord of hosts is his name will unpack that later but but what is Babylon either three answers to that question first of all what is Babylon in the context of Isaiah second what's Babylon in the context of the whole Bible? And thirdly, what is Babylon in the immediate context of chapter 47? Well, Babylon in the context of Isaiah is a prominent theme. At the end of this sermon, we will, I believe, have had five and a half or six sermons on Babylon, depending on how you count. We encountered Babylon in chapter 12, chapter 13.

We had three sermons on those two chapters. We encountered Babylon in chapter 21. And now we've just most recently, as of last week, encountered Babylon and her idols last week, and how the idols of Babylon will wear you out they'll do nothing but disappoint you and tire you out whereas God carries you and and for in Isaiah chapter 13 and 14 you know God is declaring that he's dismantling the works of pride and self-sufficiency. In chapter 13 verse 22, we read, Her time is near to come, her days will not be prolonged. When we were there we said you can't get any better news than that.

Then the destructive works of the devil will be destroyed. And the Lord Jesus Christ of course was sent by God the Father to to undo the works of the devil in your life. First of all by justifying you by faith and then sanctifying you by the washing of the water of his word. But there's also the context of Babylon in the whole Bible. In Isaiah and other places we learn that of course Babylon is a city but it's far more than a city.

It's mentioned about 260 times in the Bible, but in the whole context of Scripture, Babylon is a way of living. Babylon is a way of thinking. It has to do with worldliness. It's symbolic of everything that arises out of the pride of man that says, I want to do it my way. Babylon is known by the various expressions of autonomy and self-indulgence.

It's the spirit of Babylon that legitimizes in your own mind everything that's wrong that you're doing. It's calling good evil and evil good. It exchanges the truth of God for a lie and this is this is Babylon in the context of the Bible. You know, Babylon is a lot like America. You know, in Isaiah 47, there's this idea that you learn that Babylon, you know, the people in Babylon, well, they grew up there.

And all they've known is Babylon. From their youth they've done all these things. And as a result of growing up in Babylon, you end up finding that there are lots of things that are contrary to wisdom, truth, beauty, goodness, helpfulness, everything like that. What the Christian life is partly about is by seeing the works of darkness and running from them, seeing the things that are hurting you and turning away from them and turning to Christ, to look to Christ and be saved but here in chapter 47 in 14 particularly behold behold behold the Lord on the one hand but behold Babylon keep your keep you keep one eye on the Lord and one eye on Babylon in a way because Babylon is always always impacting us So Babylon is man united against the Lord. It's humanism.

It's autonomy. It's narcissism. It's pleasure-seeking It's it's It's personal preference of every kind you can imagine to satisfy lust and to magnify self-love. This is the whole spirit of Babylon. It's not too hard to think of the phrases that we use in our culture that we legitimize that really tell us that Babylon is alive and well today.

And thirdly, there's Babylon in the immediate context of Isaiah 47. In this immediate context, we find ourselves really with the representation of the picture in Daniel chapter 5 at Belshazzar's feast and where where the walls are pulled down where where Belshazzar's kingdom ends in a moment of time and this prophecy is delivered when Babylon is not even a superpower over a hundred years later this will happen God God is giving Babylon a warning here and he's he God is telling telling Babylon and the children of Israel that Cyrus is going to come in and he is going to destroy the works of Babylon. Cyrus accumulated the greatest world empire the world had ever seen at his time and he came in and destroyed Babylon. The historians, some of them tell us that in order to capture Babylon he dried up the Euphrates River just enough to where people could walk, to his army could walk across it. And perhaps that is how it happened.

One of the things I think we should recognize about chapter 47 is that it's early warning. God gives early warning, and he's warning Babylon over a hundred years before. This is God's pattern. God doesn't just swoop in and strike you down. He warns and he warns.

He sends prophets, he sends parents, he sends the Word of God, he sends preaching, he sends all kinds of things, and he sends them over and over again. And God here demonstrates his mercy to Babylon by giving them early warning as he does. So what we found in chapter 46 is a description of the idols of Babylon. The idols are bowing down. Now Babylon itself is being destroyed.

And so we pick up in verses 1 through 5 where we see that Babylon is taken down and we read these first words come down and sit in the dust oh virgin daughter of Babylon sit in the dust Babylon is going down You know you need to be very careful. You know what star you hook yourself to Hook you're hooking yourself to Babylon is the wrong direction Because Babylon is going down Babylon is going down into the dust and you have to recognize that. You know as I say that I'm so aware particularly of you young people today. You know you're at the beginning of your life you don't really know how things are going to turn out. But here's one thing you need to recognize.

If you love the pleasures of Babylon, the pleasures of Babylon will take you to the dust. And you will sit on the ground without a throne. You hoped Babylon would give you a place, an image, a you thought it would give you some happiness and it absolutely takes away everything you hope for. You'll go down without a throne. You will no more be called tender and delicate.

All your desire to have some kind of image, some kind of a life, some kind of a look will be absolutely destroyed. If your pleasure is in the pleasures of Babylon, there's no hope. You are going down into the dust. And that's what Isaiah is opening with in this chapter. Come down and sit in the dust.

Now there are four things that happen to those who seek their pleasure in Babylon. First of all is submission. Come down and go into the dust. This is an imperative. It indicates the strength of God over all empires and all peoples.

He commands them to rise, he commands them to fall, and now what happens is that he takes you from the throne to the ground. You will be in submission to him. You know, in a word spoken from the mouth of God Everything changes and here what here we find that come down and sit in the dust the first thing that you you will experience If you seek the pleasures of Babylon is that you will be under submission. Secondly, well not secondly, let me continue on this, you'll no longer be delicate. This whole matter of being tender and delicate, you know, the tender and delicate can do whatever they want.

They can labor any way they want. They can do the work that they desire. But here we find that that desire is taken away. The tender and delicate life that you so think that Babylon is going to give you, it will actually be stolen from you. And now there's hard labor labor that you did not desire the labor of your hands you you're you're you're no longer able to do what you want to do and that brings us to the second distasteful labor subjected to distasteful labor take the millstones and grind the meal verse 2 remove your veil take off the skirt uncover the thigh pass through the rivers you know the tender and delicate you know where were the wealthy and the preferred now they're going down into the milling houses to grind meal their apparel has changed you know I think that the King James says unbind thy curly locks it indicates the the self-indulgence of beauty, and particularly women's apparel.

It's compromised. Instead of beautiful clothing, your finery is gone. God is likening people to a woman, to a woman who loved their finery and their delicateness. They want so much to look and be a certain way and Babylon will steal it all from you. And he says that you'll pass through the rivers, possibly a reference to escaping Babylon as Cyrus diverted the waters of the Euphrates and brought it down to about waist deep so that they could pass through.

Perhaps it's referring to gathering up their skirts and fleeing from the destruction that's coming upon the city. It could mean something else, but it's quite likely that it's that. The third thing that will happen when you seek your pleasure from Babylon is your shame will be exposed. Verse 3, your nakedness shall be uncovered. Yes, your shame will be seen.

I will take vengeance and I will not arbitrate with a man." I think the key phrase in verse 3 is, your shame will be seen. And it'll be so obvious to you and to everyone else how unprofitable Babylon was to you, how it only hurt you, how it only shamed you. And this is the truth of every person who turns to Babylon. He says, I will not arbitrate with a man. And I'm not exactly sure what that means.

It most likely means not taking man into account. God is accomplishing his own glory. He's taking history to its own right destination. And as a result, he's not consulting in man. He's doing what is good for man.

He takes man where man ought to be taken. And there really are only two ways that man is taken, one down the broad road and the other down the narrow road. But God is not consulting man. God is glorifying himself through the salvation of man and also through the destruction of the wicked. But he's not consulting man and and there's this there's this removing of the veil and taking off the skirt and uncovering the thigh and the nakedness being uncovered This whole matter of being a virgin and all these kinds of things.

I think he's speaking about the fact that there's no protection, no protection of a husband, no redeemer, no help in the world that can really help you. And so you have no husband, you have no protection. But then in verse four, it's a startling change in the language and it's verse four Just kind of stands there in at least it almost Seems to me like it was you know cut and paste from another part and put in here, but it wasn't Verse 4 is a Proclamation of a Redeemer and as for our Redeemer the Lord of hosts is his name, the Holy One of Israel." This is an interlude of praise in the midst of humiliation. This is what one commentator said it was. And there are three words that are descriptions of God as a redeemer, and they're very precious, they're very helpful to help us to understand God.

We've been seeing Babylon, we see what Babylon does and is, See where Babylon takes you. Now in verse 4, it says a bright light has been shined upon the glory of God to sort of interrupt this picture of destruction in Babylon. And the three words are Redeemer, first, second, Lord of hosts, third, Holy One of Israel. Those are the three words. God is proclaimed as the Redeemer, And he uses the language out of the whole doctrine of the kinsman-redeemer, the kinsman who will redeem his kin from danger, the near relative, who takes you out of your poverty, and He stands with you and for you And this is why even job could say in job 1925 I know that my Redeemer lives and he shall stand last on the earth in other words He will not be destroyed Babylon is going down, but a redeemer is not going down I know my redeemer lives and this is the whole logic of this chapter of Scripture and he's assuming our great need for redemption in a Redemption is the payment of a price, a ransom, it's a liberation of slaves.

And we learn as history charges on into the time of the Lord Jesus Christ that redemption is accomplished by the shed blood of Jesus Christ. He is the Redeemer, he is the liberator because the wages of sin is death and sin requires a sacrifice. The wrath of God has been incited and how do you deal with God's wrath toward you, a Redeemer? One who pays your penalty, who buys you back, who perches you off the slave block. God, who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us he gave his son and so there's this Redeemer and the Son of God who who died in our place we were We weren't redeemed with corruptible things like the things of Babylon, but by the precious blood of the Lamb.

And then he speaks of the Lord of hosts. This is a picture of God's power, His absolute vanquishing unstoppable power in the universe. He's the Lord of the armies of heaven. Nothing can stop him. Nothing can stay his hand.

All of the greatness of Babylon and her thrones are nothing to him. He throws them down into the dust. The greatest empires are raised up and they're thrown down. This is historiography. This is a biblical philosophy of history.

God is almighty. Why is it that nations disappear so quickly? They rise and they disappear almost in a lightning flash historically in time. Why? It's because God is demonstrating that He's ruler over all the kings of the earth.

If you see a kingdom go down, if you see the map of Europe being reconfigured as we have in the last several decades, it's because God is proving that He is the Lord of hosts and He raises up and He takes down. And here he's taking Babylon into the dust, but he is the Lord of hosts, who is the ruler of it all. And then he's the Holy One of Israel, thirdly. Isaiah uses this phrase over and over again, as he does the Lord of hosts. But he's spoken of as the Holy One of Israel.

And he's holy in at least two ways. He is absolutely separate. There's nothing like Him. There is none like God at all. He is completely different and separate.

And secondly, He is separate from sin. He is pure. You know, we ought to always be thankful for God's holiness. His holiness is our only hope for our own wholeness. His holiness is the key to all of our sanctification.

And we become like Him. Holiness is the key to everything in life. If God were not holy, there would be no hope. You would be lost in yourself. You would become more and more like yourself.

You would come up with one thought after another out of your out of your brain and you would just become more involved in your own devolutionary thinking. And this is the tragedy of modern man he's always devolving he's always going down he's headed down into the dust and this is the matter that Isaiah is making very clear if you hook you if you hook yourself to Babylon recognize what that means and recognize where you are going. But he is the Holy One of Israel. You recognize him as holy. He makes you holy.

He pours out his Holy Spirit. And what does the Holy Spirit do? He makes holy. Notice he says, the Holy One of Israel. I take the Seminah as he is the Holy One of the called.

God does not make all holy. But he's bringing benefits to his people in Babylon. The third thing that will happen to those who are seeking their own pleasure in Babylon is they will sit in silence. Silence and darkness. This is what you get with all of your happiness in Babylon.

Sit in silence and go into darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans, for you shall no longer be called the lady of the kingdoms." And here there's a picture of darkness, which is why the Lord Jesus Christ said, I am the light of the world. There's either light or darkness, but if you love Babylon, then you will have to tolerate darkness. Babylon tries to make itself look so good, and every once in a while somebody needs to peel back the costume and show who's really there to pull back the curtain and say look at this is you've seen the Lord but look at Babylon behold Babylon and see what is really happening So these four things will happen to those seeking their own pleasures in Babylon. I already said them, I'll repeat them. First, submission.

Second, subjected to distasteful labor. Third, exposed to shame. Fourth, silence and darkness. You know, one of the qualities of young people is that they think that somehow tomorrow they can decide. After they've experienced such interesting things that somehow tomorrow will be a better day to decide, but the Lord is revealing the truth about Babylon.

Turn from Babylon, learn to hate Babylon. If you don't learn to hate Babylon, Babylon will unleash the hatred and the wrath of God upon you. And it's so clear here, there are several things that happen to those who seek pleasure in Babylon. And Isaiah is very careful to itemize them one by one. And then Isaiah turns to the reasons for God's anger in verses 6 through 11.

He says, I was angry with my people. I have profaned my inheritance and given them into your hand. So He first mentions God does what he did with his people and then he gives the various reasons for his anger. And we learn in verse 6 what God did. That God had a reason for their captivity and it is shown here.

He profaned his inheritance and gave them to Babylon. And what does it mean to profane? The word means to wound or to pierce. God sent his people into Babylon to wound them so that they would turn to him. Remember back in Isaiah chapter 1, God says, why should I strike you again?

You'll revolt more and more. God was striking his people. He was helping, He was correcting his people. He was giving them hardship to get them to turn to him. And when we were going through those first 39 chapters in Isaiah, it became very apparent to us that God had been striking us in ways we didn't even recognize.

We had been blowing off the striking of God. We'd been assigning them to wrong reasons. And they weren't random. They were given to us for a purpose. And here God has sent his people into Babylon because he was angry with them and he was correcting them by wounding them and piercing them.

As is evidenced by this use of the word, I have profaned my inheritance. He struck them to turn their heads so that they could be healed. That's why he sent them to Babylon. They disobeyed his law, they broke his Sabbath, and God in order to turn them gave them Babylon. But then he goes in and speaks about the sins of Babylon.

And he itemizes the sins of Babylon toward his people. He's condemning Babylon for their treatment of his people. And that's what we find in these verses here, in verses 6 through 11, or 6 through 10. And so we see how the Babylonians sinned against the people of God and I want to identify 11 marks of their sin against God's people and sins against God First of all the first sin was that they had no mercy They had no mercy toward the people of God in Babylon. Psalm 74 probably explains some of the details.

Psalm 74-3, lift up your feet to the perpetual desolations. The enemy has damaged everything in the sanctuary. Your enemies roar in the midst of your meeting place. They set up their banners for signs. They seem like men who lift up axes among the thick trees and now they break down its carved work all at once with axes and hammers.

They have set fire to your sanctuary, they have defiled your dwelling place, the dwelling place of your name to the ground. They said in their hearts, let us destroy them altogether. They have burned up all the meeting places of God in the land. And he goes on, read Psalm 74, you can see the brutality but they had no mercy secondly they laid a heavy yoke on the elderly on the elderly you laid your yoke very heavily so they took some of the most vulnerable people in the society in Judah and and they took advantage of them and they were disrespectful to those whom they should have respected. You know back in chapter 46, God says, I will carry you even to gray hairs.

And here we find the Babylonians really abusing those who had gray hairs. And yet God was carrying them, but they were so brutal that they took advantage of the elderly. It reminds me of James 2, 13, judgment without mercy will be experienced by those who show no mercy. You know, back in chapter 1, the children of Israel were being called out by God for the way that they had treated people, how they were unjust, and how they were perverting justice. And now, God is holding Babylon accountable for the same thing.

There are a number of things we could point out here, but one thing that's probably worthwhile is that Babylon is not innocent. Babylon abused the privileges of her victory, and God is holding Babylon to account. It was God's plan that his people would be judged harshly, that they would be pierced and wounded. This was part of God's plan. He was inflicting pain on his people so they would turn to him.

That is absolutely true. At the same time, this does not exonerate the Babylonians for abusing the people of God. And they had a duty to obey the law of God as God sovereignly chose Babylon to punish his people. But this does not exempt Babylon from their responsibility for how they treated God's people. God uses the wicked.

He uses them for His own purposes, and then He judges them for their wickedness. You know, if we're harshly treated by the enemies of God, We can first of all take heart that God ordained it. Secondly, that God will also bring to justice the wrongs done. He will ordain the difficulty, but he will also punish those who sin against you in the midst of your difficulty. So you can always be free.

You can always recognize that God is going to bring justice to everything. He's going to right every wrong. And even if in God's providence you are wronged, God is going to make everything right. And Babylon is a brilliant example of that. God doesn't diminish the guilt of Babylon.

Further, think of it this way. Even though you were in a bad situation, even though you were in a bad environment, It doesn't diminish your accountability. Your environment doesn't make sinful activity less sinful. Every sinner stands completely exposed for the consequences of his own sin. You know, you see this in your children all the time.

You know, there's a conflict. There's a fight. And one child says, he hit me! And that somehow becomes an excuse to hit back. But God deals with sin individually with everyone.

And we're responsible for our own sins and we can't say like well I'm probably getting ready to say something that is going to date me you can't say like the comedian flip Wilson used to say the devil made me do it they're only like a few people who understood what I just said. It's only the old people that understand. There is a comedian who was very popular back in the 60s and 70s. And the only thing anybody ever remembers about this man is this one line where he says in one of his comedy routines, the devil made me do it. No, the devil didn't make you do it.

And so here we find that there's accountability for sin. The Lord Jesus Christ spoke of it this way in John 3 19 and this is the condemnation that light has come into the world and men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light that his deeds may be clearly seen that they have been done in God." And so there's punishment. There's punishment for this sin of Babylon to bring a heavy yoke on the elderly. The third mark of their sin is found in verse 7.

Their claims of strength and permanence. You said, verse 7, I shall be a lady forever, so that you did not take these things to heart, nor remember the latter end of them. This idea of this woman, this representation of Babylon, this lady, it implies strength. I will be a lady forever. It implies her prominence.

The word means to rise, to raise. The idea is of being strong, of prevailing and overcoming. And sort of a warrior woman, a victor as this feminine representation is of Babylon herself. It's the woman who's saying she's successful, and she keeps telling it to herself. She just keeps saying that she's strong when she's not.

Babylon is in her veins. And she does not know her latter end. The fourth mark of her sin is she was given to pleasure, verse 8. Therefore, hear this now, you who are given to pleasures. He says, listen to this.

Listen to this. And he's speaking about being given to pleasures, the finery, the daintiness, the pleasures of this world. Thinking only about how you might please yourself in this world. This is the sin of Babylon. When you find it in yourself, you have to recognize its roots and where it's going.

You ought to pull back the curtain and look and see where that's going. And then number five, self-idolatry. Verse eight. Who say in your heart, I am and there is no one besides me. This is something that you say in your heart.

It's a commitment of your heart. Everything revolves around you. You're the only one to consider. You're the only one who's important. It's making a God of yourself and saying in your heart, there is no one besides me.

I, I, even I, am thinking this and want this. And then the sixth mark of their sin, overconfidence. I shall not sit as a widow, nor shall I know the loss of children." In other words, this is this overconfidence that you can wait, that you don't really have to consider God and His holiness. But it's not going to turn out bad for me. You know, maybe it's going to turn out bad for some of these other people, But it's not going to turn out bad for me.

You know, maybe it's going to turn out bad for some of these other people, but it's not going to turn out bad for me. Somehow I'm bulletproof. I'm a Teflon person. All of this is going to bounce off of me. I can drink of the world, I can seek my pleasures, and it's not going to affect me.

It might affect these other people, and the preacher might say it'll affect you, but no, it doesn't affect me. It doesn't bother me. I can drink this stuff, okay? I'm strong enough to drink it. You know, you've met people like this.

They boast in how much they can drink. This is the sin of Babylon. It's overconfidence, feeling that it will last forever, and it will not. And notice in verse 9 there's a speedy fall, but these things, these two things shall come to you in a moment, in one day. The loss of children and widowhood.

God is just revealing that it's not the way you think. You're not bulletproof. You will experience this. You're not really able to drink of the world and come out unscathed. It's not going to happen.

And he says here, the kingdom will fall in one day. How does a mighty kingdom just fall? Well here, the kingdom of Babylon is a parable of a person's life. That God will bring it down in a day. It may continue on like Babylon did.

It may continue its drinkings and its worldliness. It'll roll on but there will be a day and it'll come down in an instant. And this is the final judgment most likely. And this temporal nation, Babylon, is being used as an example of the people of the world. And Isaiah is saying, look behind the curtain, look what is really there.

In Revelation 18, we find very similar language. Therefore, her plagues will come in one day, death and mourning and famine, and she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judges her. The kings of the earth who committed fornication and lived luxuriously with her will weep and lament for her when they see the smoke of her burning. There are so many places you can go to learn about Babylon. Revelation 18 and 19 is a good place to go.

Jeremiah 50 and 51. And you'll see these dramatic pictures of the fall of Babylon, this temporal fall that is meant to tell you of a spiritual reality. Read those today. They're absolutely terrifying. I was reading them last night before we went to bed, and I finally closed the Bible with the terrors of the fall of Babylon.

But these physical kingdoms are a picture of spiritual realities that come upon all people. That's the point. We read Daniel 5 which is so appropriate with Belshazzar having one of his last, actually having his last party. He didn't know it was his last party. How about that?

That's the truth of everyone who keeps drinking in Babylon. They don't know when their last party might be, but there will be a last party. It's like playing Russian roulette. The seventh mark of their sin, sorceries and enchantments, verse 9, they shall come upon you in their fullness because of the multitude of your sorceries for the great abundance of your enchantments now he speaks of the quantity of them. He calls them a multitude and abundance.

You see those two words? Multitude and abundance of sorceries and enchantments. This is the way that we go and seek advice. We go to all the wrong places we go to the world we go to the enchantments of this world the entertainments and the voices of this world there's so many ways that we do this you know but when the people of God truly turn to God, they burn all their magic books just like they did in Ephesus. You know, I'm planning to have some meetings with men to speak to some of our young people about business and life skills and things like that and one of the men I was speaking to very successful businessman He told me the other day.

He said Scott you know if I come here's what I'm going to tell these young men burn your business Books follow Jesus Christ and him alone turn to him worship him He'll tell you what to do Burn the business books. That's what he said. The eighth mark of their rebellion, security. Security in their rebellion. This is in verse 10.

For you have trusted in your wickedness. They felt secure in their rebellion. They thought that day would never come, but it is coming. And it's a false sense of security. And at some point, somebody's got to pull back the curtain and say, look, behold, Babylon and her end.

You're playing around with worldliness, you're drinking a little bit here and a little bit there. Don't fool yourself. Number nine, the ninth mark. Brazen rejection of reality. You have said, no one sees me.

This is a people who fear no shame. They have no barriers in their souls. Nothing is holding them back. They don't want to be put in some kind of a fundamentalistic box. They don't want to be put in some kind of a box.

And as a result, they don't see reality at all. They say no one sees me. They have no barriers to their souls. You know, being caught in theft or adultery, those who are caught, somehow it's as if they think no one will ever see, that there would be no consequences. And somehow they couldn't see themselves at the grinding wheel.

They couldn't see themselves naked and exposed. They couldn't see that. And if you're like that, you have no fear of sin. Cry out to God that he would give you a fear of sin that That you would not be like the person who says, no one sees me, but the person who is terrified at sin. To be afraid of sin is one of the greatest gifts that God can give the human conscience.

But God's judgment is inescapable. You might not see yourself at the grinding wheel, naked and exposed. And you might think, I can keep this up, I'll change later. I'm untouchable right now. I'm young.

I can do whatever I want. I can keep drinking just a little bit. It won't be that bad. You have said, no one sees me. And then tenth, there's warped thinking.

Verse ten, your wisdom and your knowledge have warped you. You know, this is the spirit of Babylon. This is what Babylon does to your thinking. It warps you. It twists your perspective on everything.

You can't see yourself clearly. You can't see others clearly. You can't see the government clearly. You can't see God clearly. You're warped.

And, you know, what happens to us when we're born into Babylon is we just keep getting more and more warped. Our only hope is Jesus Christ. He is the way and the truth and the life. He's the only one who can deliver us from this warped trajectory that we've been on. And all the warped people around us, what would we do?

Look to God and be saved. Look to Jesus Christ. Number 11, the final mark, obsession with self. And you have said in your heart, I am and there is no one besides me. This is the self-obsessed life, the life that only cares about how things affect him.

You know the sullen, the rebellious, they only care about themselves. Recognize this in your children. When you see, when you see this, there is no one besides me. When you see the sullenness, when you see the rebellion, when you see the unhappiness, when you see the pickiness, when you see the dishonor, recognize what this is, pull back the curtain and look, it's Babylon. It's Babylon at work in your house.

These eleven marks, no mercy, heavy yoke on the elderly, claims of strength and permanence, given to pleasures, self-idolatry, overconfidence, sorceries and enchantments, security and rebellion, brazen rejection of reality, warped thinking, obsession with self. In Babylon you become your own God, you become your own arbitrator, and you can't listen to anyone else. Here's my prayer. Some of you who have not been listening to God and have not been listening to the preaching and the urgent appeals to turn to Christ that somehow today would be the day when your ears would open and you would stop it would it would end it would end you're just hearing blah blah blah blah blah blah blah because that's what it's been it's just been one more in one more endurance that you have to go through. My prayer is that somehow you could see what's behind the curtain and you would repent.

And then we find Babylon's impotent defense in verses 11 through 15. Therefore evil shall come upon you, you shall not know from where it arises, and trouble will fall upon you. You will not be able to put it off and desolation shall come upon you suddenly which you shall not know." So in verse 11 he announces what is going to happen, this sudden trouble, that it will end. You will have your last party. Apart from God.

And you'll know what Babylon really is then. There's suddenness of trouble in verse 11. And then in verse 12 and 13, you're standing there with your enchantments and your sorceries in which you have labored from your youth. And God says perhaps you will be able to profit. Perhaps you will be able to prevail.

What God is saying is your enchantments, all your counselors, they're abandoning you. You will only be before God. And you will stop listening to all the other voices in the people and you'll be before God and God alone. He says in verse 13, He says in verse 13, you're weary in the multitude of your counselors. Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators stand up and save you from what shall come upon you.

This is the whole impotence of worldliness and God is saying, bring them on, bring on your best enchanters. Give me your best philosophies right here. What have they done for you? What are they doing for you now in the time of your downfall? You know, I think these are the high priests of our hearts, our culture, the academics, the scientists.

You know, the people who are telling us how things are. But God says no, this is how they are. The modern incantations and the propositions of this world out of Hollywood and academia, all of these things, these things are just sales jobs for wickedness, it's all they are. And they will come down. And they will not be able to protect you.

I think it's another way of saying, you know, let your wearying, corrupt, you know, epistemology save you. Let your philosophy save you now. You know, let the way that you've really ignored God save you now and there's a multitude of these counselors you know Isaiah earlier in Isaiah 30 said woe to those who take counsel but not of me who devised plans but not of my spirit that they might add sin to sin this has to do with living a life out of seeking the Lord to to go to God for all of your councils for everything that you're doing to lay everything before him instead of these alternative saviors the astrologers and the stargazers and the monthly prognosticators. And then in verse 14, he bids us to watch the fiery demise of Babylon and her idols. Behold, verse 14, they shall be a stubble.

The fire shall burn them. They shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame. It shall not be a coal to be warmed, nor a fire to sit by. So Babylon will be broken down to stubble and quickly burned. You know stubble goes up in flames.

You know the smaller the wood the quicker the burn and that's what's happening here and it won't be and a nice fire like the one that you have in the wintertime in your house it'll be a raging flame And verse 15 he says no one will save you if you love Babylon Babylon will not love you and You know one will save you thus verse 15 they shall be to you With whom you have labored, your merchants from your youth. They shall wander, each one to his quarter, and no one shall save you." He calls them dealers, laborers, merchants. They're involved in this false economy. And it says that they just kind of grew up in their corruption. The infections of your times always are infecting.

And you need to know what they are. You need to know the difference between Babylon and Jerusalem. You know, you grow up and you see how your society has duped you. You see how your peers have distracted you. You see how your media has polluted you, you see how your politics has disarmed you, you see the futility of it all.

But the problem is we often in the Christian community train up our youth to walk in the ways of Babylon. Here's a big question. Is there any way that you are training your youth to walk in the ways of Babylon? And please be honest with yourself. It happens from your youth up and you become so entangled, your only hope is a massive deliverance from God.

There are two things here in this passage that I want us to recognize. First of all, everything warped will be destroyed. Babylon will go down. It'll go down into the dust. Well that's also the hope, isn't it?

Because Babylon will be defanged. Babylon will go down. And in Jesus Christ, Babylon begins to die and there's hope. The only hope in the world of Babylon is the hope of Jesus Christ. All people were born with inborn sin, and it's a stain that nothing can take away except by the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ was sinless. He was stainless, and He died on a cross, and as a result of his death and resurrection our stain was transferred to him he was made stain and sin for us and he lays upon us his righteousness as this marvelous exchange takes place in the human soul when when a human being says oh Lord have mercy on me save my soul and the worst of you is placed on him and the best of him is placed on you. This is salvation in Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God opening the door to a holy God, satisfying the wrath of God, redeeming sinners from their slavery, pardoning them and saying to them, there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ him ransoming, freeing by the completed work of Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ was crucified and buried and he rose again on the third day and he ascended into heaven and he's seated at the right hand of God and he is destroying the works of Babylon. You know there's all this press out today that the church is declining, it may not actually be true.

It's the false church is declining. The mainline denominations are losing hundreds of thousands. They were never converted in the first place. I think there's a purifying going on in the church today where those who love Babylon are being exposed and they're changing and those who love Jesus Christ are being glorified. There's nothing more important in a person's life than to say to the Lord Jesus Christ, I believe in you, I repent before you.

I receive you. I obey you. And I see, I see what's behind the curtain. And Lord, all my life long, help me to run from Babylon. Babylon is going down.

Oh Lord, Lord, we recognize you as our Father and as the only sovereign. And, oh God, I pray that in this church you would break out a hunger for holiness, for a hatred of Babylon, to recognize the wolf in sheep's clothing, to look behind the curtain, and to behold Babylon and to turn. Oh, God, I pray that you would in our church, work in our hearts such a love for holiness, that you would banish all worldliness from our congregation oh God that you would convict by your Holy Spirit I pray oh Holy Spirit that you would come down and pierce all of our hearts To hate Babylon and to love you with all of our hearts Amen