The following "Question" was asked by a member of the congregation at Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California, and "Answered" by their pastor, John MacArthur Jr. It was transcribed by Barbara Swanson of Batesville, Arkansas, from the tape, GC 1301-F, titled "Bible Questions and Answers Part 8." A copy of the tape can be obtained by writing, Word of Grace, P.O. Box 4000, Panorama City, CA 91412 or by dialing toll free 1-800-55-GRACE. ©1977. All Rights Reserved.
Question
Where is the current ecumenical trend leading the church?
Answer
This is a question we’ve answered some time ago in our study of Revelation. Now
we know that there is an ecumenical movement. There is a movement to have a
one-world church. There is an organization called COCU. It’s Consultation on
Church Union, and they are getting all of the denominations together. There is a
tremendous move afoot to wed American Protestantism with itself—all the
fractions, putting it all together, and even marry it to Roman Catholicism for a
one-world church.
This is rapidly happening and I’m sure we’ve all seen this. But we don’t need to
talk about it much because it’s so very, very obvious to everybody that
compromise and ecumenicity and the world church concept is happening. The
National Council of Churches, the World Council of Churches is an effort to
amalgamate all of Christianity into one great huge world church. And the idea of
it, of course, from Satan’s standpoint is it’ll make it a lot easier to control
the whole system of religion if it all comes under one umbrella.
Now in Revelation 17 you have a discussion of this whole movement. Very clearly,
it predicts the doom of the Gentile system of demonic religion. Now you could
even say this is the end of the World Council of Churches.
Now there are only two things necessary for a world church. One is a whole
lot of people who could care less about doctrine, and two is a drive for unity.
And that’s what we have. We have within denominations in America and around the
world now such a liberalism and such an apostasy that doctrine is no longer an
issue. They’re into the same relativity that philosophy’s in, talking about the
same vague concepts of love and unity that philosophy talks about, and so the
drive is on for unity, and it’s going to happen.
And the chapter says some most interesting things about it. This great huge
system will be developed in the tribulation, in the period of the tribulation.
Its name is in verse five. It has a title: “Upon her forehead was a name,
MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATION OF THE EARTH.”
In verse one, it is called the great whore, or the great harlot.
Now listen, if the true church is a bride, then the false church would be a
prostitute, right, or a harlot. And that’s the idea—Satan’s church. And you can
see many interesting features. In verse one, “came one of the seven angels who
had the seven bowls,” and this is indicative of pouring out of judgment. Said,
“Come here and I’ll show you the judgment of the great whore,” the false church,
“sitting on many waters.” Waters seem to have to do with nations, the great
church permeates the nations. “With whom the kings of the earth have committed
fornication.” In other words, this religious system has managed to seduce the
world, seduce the kings of the nations, and all of their systems have come
together and committed fornication. Incidentally, fornication is any kind of
false worship, any kind. “And the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk
with the wine of her fornication.” So this whore, this phony system, set up by
the Antichrist and by Satan himself and his demons, this world church is going
to have seduced the world.
“So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman,”
this is the great whore, the false church, “sit on a scarlet colored beast.” Now
this is the Antichrist. So that we find that the false Christ of the Book of
Revelation will be really riding on the Antichrist system. And it says, “he was
full of names of blasphemy,” and of course his character is blasphemous. “He had
seven heads and ten horns.” The ten horns have to do with the revived Roman
Empire ten-nation confederacy. The beast will head up a European confederacy of
nations. The Common Market today [1977], is a good forerunner to that. And I
think they’re dickering right around ten nations there, so that’s a fulfilling
of prophecy. He’ll have seven heads. The seven heads we’ll see explained in a
moment.
Verse four, “The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and bedecked with gold
and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of
abominations and filthiness of her fornication.” Now it’s most interesting here
that the woman arrayed in purple and scarlet and so forth shows us a religion
that arrays itself in fancy scarlet and purple colors. If we know anything about
Rome and the Roman church, we know that this is the color reserved only for the
popes and the cardinals, which seems to hint at the fact that the Roman Catholic
Church is going to be involved in this. Now lest we have all the Catholics panic
at this point, believe me, the Protestants are going to be there too. They’re
going to be there. All the liberal apostate Protestants are going to be there
and carrying it out as well. But it seems to be indicated here that there will
be a characteristic of its pomp and its color that could be easily associated
with Rome.
Verse five gives the name again, MYSTERY, BABYLON, and the reason it’s called
mystery is because a mystery is something that’s never before been seen, and
this is a kind of church that’s never before been. The reason it’s called
Babylon is because it’s the final stage of false religion, and where did false
religion begin? At the Tower of Babel. So here you have the final form of false
religion consummating in a form called Mystery, Babylon. “I saw the woman drunk
with the blood of the saints.” Incidentally, this false system will be involved
in killing true believers. “Drunk with the blood of true saints, and the blood
of the martyrs of Jesus.” And if you’ll remember, false religion throughout
history has slaughtered the saints. And so he goes on to discuss further about
it.
Verse nine I think is interesting, “And here is the mind which has wisdom. The
seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sits.” There’s one city in
the world that sits on seven mountains. What is it? Rome. And again we find the
connection seemingly that this whole thing will be headed up in Rome, a
statement that would be totally obscure to the mind of John in the 96 A.D., but
seems amazingly accurate to us in the year 1977, again showing us the power of
prophetic scripture. And then he talks about the seven kings, and I don’t want
to go into that in detail, except to say it has to do with different empires
that have ruled. So you can see then that there is going to be this system
rising up connected with the beast.
But what is interesting is in verse fourteen. This whole system makes war with
the Lamb. Who’s the Lamb? Christ. And guess who wins. “The Lamb
shall”—what—“overcome, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings.” Now, where
the ecumenical movement is going is right smack into chapter 17 of Revelation.
And where it ends is in verse 14 when Christ comes in victory over that evil
system.
So that is really where this movement is leading. And I think that we need to be
very much aware of what’s going on. You know when we see these kinds of things
it’s our responsibility to warn people. I grieve in my heart over this kind of
apostasy that we see today. You know it’s a painful thing to hear about a
meeting of seminary leaders from across America who could only agree on “You Are
My Sunshine” as a song to sing. It’s pretty pathetic. And they’re producing the
next generation of pastors. That’s pretty sad. It certainly lays the
responsibility at our feet, doesn’t it, who proclaim and know the truth. That’s
where it’s going and I don’t want to be any part of it, do you? I’m a part of
the True Church.
Added to Bible Bulletin Board's "MacArthur’s Questions and
Answers" by:
Tony Capoccia
Bible Bulletin Board
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