The Essential Issue Behind our Babylonian Captivity

For many years I have been reluctant to inform people about the negative elements of our captivity to Mystery Babylon. This is because most of the time those who have published such reports have attempted to motivate you through fear, anger, hatred, or some other negative emotion. Invariably, their objective is to overthrow the system by educating enough people about the problem.

The missing ingredient in this has always been an understanding of Scripture. First, they do not often recognize that the rise of Mystery Babylon was prophesied in Scripture. Secondly, they do not understand that God has done this to us and that the wise men of Babylon are merely inadvertent pawns in the hand of God. Thirdly, they do not know the mind of God, and so they do not understand His reasons for putting us under this Babylonian system.

The Book of Judges was meant to teach us how to avoid such captivities. It gives us the reasons for captivity and shows us the path to freedom. Whenever Israel worshiped other gods, God brought them into captivity to the nations that those gods had "chosen" as their people. It is all part of the principle of God's Jealousy.

In effect, God says, "Oh, so you think Molech is the true God? That provokes Me to jealousy. So I'll honor your opinion for a while so you can see what life is like under Molech. By the way, Molech is the god of the Ammonites, so the Ammonites are his 'chosen people.' Therefore, according to your desire, I will allow Molech to elevate his 'chosen people' to positions of power, and I will put you Israelites under the authority of the Ammonites."

Israel then comes into captivity to the Ammonites, not because the Ammonites are so strong or so intelligent, but because Israel decided that the god of the Ammonites was the true God. The solution presented in Scripture is not to secretly store weapons or assassinate leaders or engage in guerrilla warfare. The biblical solution is to repent--to stop thinking that Molech is the true God.

When the people finally got tired of God treating the Ammonites as if they were the chosen people, Israel became "jealous" and said, "Hey, wait a minute. WE are supposed to be the chosen people--not the Ammonites. Why are we in captivity to them?"

So God provoked Israel to jealousy, because He Himself was jealous over His own people when they began to consort with other gods. Thus, in Romans 10:19, Paul quotes from Deut. 32:21, saying, "I will make you jealous by that which is not a (chosen) nation. By a nation without understanding will I anger you."

That which God did throughout Scripture, He is doing today. The only difference is that after the first Pentecost at Mount Sinai the authority was given to the whole nation itself, while after the day of Pentecost in Acts 2, the divine authority was given to the "good figs" of Judah--the disciples of Christ, whose numbers grew, and which soon became known as the Church.

In other words, the modern captivity to Babylon was not caused by the wrong decisions of the unbelievers, but by the wrong decisions of the Church. In fact, to be more specific, it was the Church under the anointing of Pentecost, for on Pentecost in Acts 2, "King Saul" was crowned and given this divine authority.

This was all prophesied in the story of King Saul, who was crowned on the day of "wheat harvest" (i.e., Pentecost) in 1 Sam. 12:17. Saul was a pentecostal type in the Old Testament, and this means that the Pentecostal Church in the book of Acts was crowned and given an awesome authority by divine decree. In time, the world would have to conform to the decrees of this new "Saul" in the world.

The Church did quite well in the first century, even as King Saul had done well in the first year of his reign. But then the spiritual degeneration began to occur, as the leaven of Pentecost spread throughout the loaf of bread. God brought many judgments to the Church for centuries, but they never truly repented and never learned the basic lesson that the story of King Saul taught us. That basic lesson was that we ought to be ruled directly by God, rather than desiring a king like the other nations (1 Sam. 8:5).

When the Church wanted to be ruled by men sitting in God's throne, rather than to be ruled directly by God Himself, they manifested the problem of Saul. According to the prophet Samuel, the purpose of Pentecost and the outpouring of the Spirit was to show the people their sin in asking for a king (1 Sam. 12:17).

We had a revival of Pentecost a century ago when the Spirit was poured out in Topeka, Kansas on January 1, 1901 under the ministry of Charles Parham. His wife wrote his biography in 1930 shortly after he died in The Life of Charles F. Parham. One of his students later started a secondary movement at Azusa Street in 1906, which denominationalized in 1910.

These neo-Pentecostal movements occurred shortly before God gave America into the hands of Mystery Babylon in late 1913 and early 1914. Why? These Pentecostal movements were supposed to teach the Church the same lesson that Samuel had tried to tell Israel--"that you will know and see that your wickedness is great in the sight of the Lord by asking for yourselves a king" (1 Sam. 12:17).

Yet still, they did not get it, and so they denominationalized in 1910, setting up a spiritual monarchy to rule in place of God. This was our final opportunity to avoid a century of slavery to Mystery Babylon, but we did not heed Samuel's warning. More than likely, it never occurred to the Church back then that Saul was a pentecostal type. If they had known the law, they would have recognized the day of wheat harvest to be Pentecost. But somehow they missed it.

And so we have been under the authority of Babylon ever since then. The solution is not that we must deal with the Babylonian officials. No, we must deal with God who put them into those positions of authority over us. Scriptural patterns in the Book of Judges tell us that we will not be delivered until we repent, change our minds. In what way? We must desire the direct rule of Jesus Christ instead of the rule of men who make laws according to their own carnal minds.

This will not start with a change of civil government. It can only start with a change of religious government. Yet if we look more closely at the biblical patterns, we see that David replaced Saul as king of Israel. Did this not perpetuate the problem? Was this not a continuation of man's rule in place of God?

No, it was not, for David was a man after God's own heart (1 Sam. 13:14). The difference between Saul and David is this: Saul felt that because he was divinely chosen to rule Israel, God would then rubberstamp whatever he decided to do. David, on the other hand, sought to know the mind of God, heard His voice, and then decreed the decisions of God.

In essence, Saul usurped the place of God to establish his own will, while David ruled by the mind of God. Usurping authority is the key concept to grasp here. This has been the problem in the Church (all denominations) almost from the beginning of the age.

We are now about to see a greater outpouring of the Holy Spirit, greater than what was seen in a century ago. It is led by David, not by Saul. This time, I believe, the Church will get the message of Samuel. Great ministries and denominations will fall to the ground as a result. It will appear to be disastrous to those caught in the firestorm, but in fact it will be the beginning of the solution. When Babylon's work has been completed in teaching Christians how to repent, then God will deal with Babylon.