Herbert W Armstrong

   And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.

   The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse those mysterious specter like rates riding out of a dream towards John at the end of the first century on the island of Patmos of which he wrote in the book of Revelation in your Bible. Do they mean us now, today the twentieth century your life twenty, thirty years from now? There is a way to find out and the only way is to take a look at Bible prophecy and see if it really does apply to us in this modern space age.

   Is this the vision of four ghost-like specters riding across the heavens with their messages of death, of doom, of famine, destruction, and war? Does it mean us in this modern age or can we afford to ignore the prophecies of the Bible? One-third of the Bible is prophecy. And the Book of Revelation, along with Matthew 24, the absolute heart and the core of Biblical prophecy.

   The last couple of times, I've been showing you a little bit about that dream that appeared as if in vivid technicolor nightmarish proportions to John, an original disciple of Jesus Christ is that John now grown elderly was on the island of Patna off the coast of modern-day Turkey. This about the close of the first century A.D., what he saw, he recorded in a book called Revelation or the Apocalypse.

   This brand new booklet right off our presses of Ambassador College Press in Pasadena, California, over in Sydney, Australia, and near London in England, printed on three presses on three continents, distributed to people around the world and the Plain Truth magazine. And these booklets eventually coming out in five different languages. This is the newest of all of them. It's a brand new booklet that takes that major segment, the Book of Revelation, the Four Horsemen of Revelation Six and makes them come alive in the light of today's world news.

   So you in your own home can read and study with your own Bible there to underline it, to make linear markings or notes as you choose to jot down meaningful things that will unlock to your understanding exactly what these mysterious race-like specters meant. Envision to the Apostle John so long ago, the last couple of times in an introductory program to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. And then the exposition of what is the meaning of the first and the second, we have come now to the definitive explanation of that second Horseman, the Red Horse of Revelation, the sixth chapter. And what does it really mean?

   I have shown time and again that the Bible is one-third prophecy. And that the Bible interprets the Bible. It does not need any private interpretation. I am neither qualified nor capable to interpret the Bible to you nor to my own understanding. Only Jesus Christ of Nazareth can do that. It shows in the Book of Revelation the very first verses that it is not the revelation of quote, John, the divine end quote, which is something men added years later to the title. But the inspired writing says the Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him to show unto his servants those things which must shortly come to pass.

   What is religious about the Book of Revelation? There is not one segment of the Book of Revelation that tells you to do anything with your hands that tells you to walk in a certain way that tells you to make all sorts of funny sounds that tells you to stand with your hands clasped, that explains to you a position of prayer. Therefore, this whole hang-up the world has about what is religious and what is not religious needs to be explained because the book of the Apocalypse, apocalypse meaning revealing is advanced news. It's like reading a newspaper printed in say the 1980s, 1990s drawn into the 20 hundreds wherever and whenever that may be. But reading it in advance.

   Now, the writers of the Bible use the language of the day. If they say a sword, it may be by modern implication, obviously because of technological development, nuclear weapons. If they said chariots, it may mean tanks. If they said stones of fire or brimstone, it may mean a nuclear explosion. This is an obvious thing and not to be strained at or worried about.

   There is nothing religious in the sense of being very mysterious and rather like the occult or rather smacking of astrological symbolism. In the book of Revelation, the Book of Revelation is a book to reveal, not to cloud and conceal, but to open up. And the word apocalypse means precisely that. It says that it is the revelation of Jesus Christ. He is the one qualified to interpret it. The last couple of times I have shown you, as I'm going to do now, that the Bible itself interprets the Bible, that Jesus Christ of Nazareth in Matthew, the 24th chapter, which is the Olivet Prophecy, the pivotal point of all of biblical prophecy. He, in that step-by-step sequence of events, that series of happenings, lays out for us a chronological step-by-step sequence of events.

   We take this armed with it, armed with what Jesus says, not what we want, what we think, what someone tells us, but what Jesus says, we then let that scripture explain for us the ones which look as if they could be rather mysterious. The Book of Revelation appears at first glance to be rather mysterious, but believe it or not, Jesus Christ of Nazareth has now determined it has come his time that this world is going to understand what that book really means.

   One of the enigmas of all time has been understanding the book of Revelation. For instance, the phrase the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse is common in our language, but few know the true meaning of these symbolic horsemen. The Ambassador College booklet, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, brings you that understanding. If you dare to know with biblical proofs, each of the horsemen is described and their meaning made clear: religious confusion and misdirection, war and upheaval, drought and famine disease epidemics. You can now understand what The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse mean and how you can escape their destructive forces.

   For this vital information, request your free copy of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Send your request to Ambassador College, Box 345 GPO, Sydney, New South Wales. That's Ambassador College, Box 345 GPO, Sydney, New South Wales.

   Jesus Christ of Nazareth was a prophet. Most people don't seem to really think of Christ as a prophet who foretold world events of really global significance. What's your own personal idea? Your own personal attitude. Now that we're on the subject, I get letters by the ton, letters by the hundreds that come in. People want to express what they think about religion because they see this program and it's a program with which people can get involved. They see suddenly someone talking about the Bible and about religious things that doesn't get in some straitjacket, sanctimonious, kind of a model and sentimental tone of voice and the wheat all over the place because he's talking about the Bible or he's talking about you out there just out there talking about now get a point of contact, look out, take off your shirt, pouring water out of the glass, jumping up and down, and people do get involved. And I'm glad I'm very thankful for that. I'd like them to, I'd like them to be a part of this whole challenging new concept of letting the Bible teach us, letting the Bible predict and teach and explain and elicit and make clear the Bible instead of us deciding what we think the Bible says.

   Well, what do you think Jesus Christ is like? What is he like to you? Is he just a well-intentioned, well-meaning man that came along well in advance of his time, completely misunderstood by people? There was a kind of a vagabond hippie type that made lots of gentle sayings about love one another and love your enemies. Why haven't you heard out of the pulpits of Canada and America of Britain, Australia, South Africa, Northwestern Europe, the democracies and the English-speaking countries, and primarily those countries which are supposed to be the supporters, purporters, printers, distributors, and believers, if not practitioners of the Christian Bible, why haven't you heard out of the pulpit where you go about Jesus Christ as a prophet who looked beyond his day and clear on into hours and foretold world events the way they would be occurring to us right now?

   And what is religious about a war? Except that sometimes religious nuts, scattered dazes, Dangells, bugaboos or whatever they are, idiots start wars. Adolf Hitler, as far as I'm concerned, was a demented Satan-inspired, maybe demoniacal idiot. One of the world's great fools of all time, not that he was not in a perverted sense a semi-intelligent man. I think that successes one after another can be horribly dangerous to a man in whom is deep inferiority and semi-intelligence. Because in this particular case, each success went to the man's head to the point it convinced him of his infallibility. And the more his successes, the more enormous his ego and the more his exaggerated role of his divine calling in life, which included incidentally exterminating you and me.

   I don't know what there is about that, but every time I see, which is not all that often, somebody who feels it is his divine calling in life to get rid of me, I'm suspicious of his religion. I kind of agree with the Jewish people there when people come up with these various solutions to what's wrong with the human race and they want to persecute the Jews. I had a letter, one guy said, now what we really do to straighten out the world, get rid of all these Jewish money lenders and all these bankers. I mean, the world is really full of Archie Bunkers. That's why the program goes on so well because people enjoy and laughing at that character portrayed by this man who portrays the world's greatest bigot. And they don't really realize that a lot of those same types sitting there enjoying that might be an exact carbon copy of him. But I get letters from people like that once in a while.

   What about you? Why is it? You have not heard about the Jesus Christ of Nazareth who forth told in advance the world in which you live today? Who in this prophecy of Matthew, the 24th chapter, told his disciples what would be the major overall conditions and trends that would lead to what we call in the Bible? What the Bible says is the end of the world, but which is the Greek word aion that really means the end of the age. The Greek word is aion; it means the climax at the close of an age. Why have not more people heard those words?

   The first thing you said then, which I covered definitively last time, was; many will come in my name saying I'm the Christ and shall deceive many. And that fulfilled what it says over here, which is the very first of those seals or the first horseman riding a white horse with a bow and a crown who went out to conquer.

   Last time, we explained by showing those viewing then or listening if they were listening to the audio track, which is the radio program that the 19th chapter of Revelation explains very clearly. This cannot be Jesus Christ. And since many other scriptures, II Thessalonians, I said that too fast. The second chapter along with II Corinthians, the 11th chapter and many others, which I didn't have time to cover show there will be false Christs and false prophets, false religious confusion and ideologies and the like. And that this fulfills that. Now the second horse, the one we introduced the program with this time, Jesus said. And the next thing he said, you shall hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that should be not troubled for all these things must come to pass. But the end is not yet for nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom.

   When he said, see that you be not troubled he implied very strongly then that wars and rumors of wars are a trend, a condition, a general condition of mankind for the space of many, many decades. Because let's face it, wars and rumors of wars were extant long before Jesus Christ of Nazareth walked the earth. They were extant during his experience on the earth in 70 A.D. and after his resurrection, his death, burial, and resurrection, the entire area of the city of Jerusalem. And that entire nation was completely destroyed by the armies of Titus. Even as the 24th chapter of Matthew in type as a let's say, preliminary fulfillment did predict it came to pass except that in its complete fulfillment, one stone not left upon the top of another that didn't happen. And Jesus Christ did not come. They didn't hear the voice of an archangel. He did not descend from heaven with a shout. Much of what he said is yet to be fulfilled.

   Still, there was a typical prior fulfillment in type only of that 24th chapter of the book of Matthew. He gave a sequential series of events. Let's notice then what that second horseman looked like here in the sixth chapter of Revelation verses three and four (Revelation 6:3-4). When he opened the second seal, I heard the second beast or living creatures, as the Greek has it say, come and see. And there went out another horse that was red and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth and that they should kill one another and there was given unto him a great sword.

   And so here is the symbol of warfare. The red horse of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Jesus said wars and rumors of wars. That was the second thing in sequence that he mentioned. And what is the second horse of revelation written by John, but inspired by Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the horseman atop the red horse with a sword in his hand with power to take peace from the earth, which means warfare. Now, let's explain that in a little greater detail, and you shall hear of wars and rumors of wars, he said in verse six of Matthew 24 see that you be not troubled for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet for nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom. And, and these in the sequential order that I mentioned earlier, there shall be famines and pestilences and earthquakes in diverse places. That is the second seal that you see.

   Now, let's take a look at what Jesus said about that time, which is called the great tribulation. He said in verse 21 and two of that same chapter (Matthew 24:21-22). "And there shall be great tribulation such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, known or ever shall be," so at the time unparalleled in the history of the world. And he dates it by saying this verse 22, "And except those days should be shortened, should be cut short, there should no flesh be saved. But for the elect's sake, those days shall be shortened."

   The elects, who are they? Well, Jesus Christ talked about his elect. He talked about his little flock to whom he said, "Fear not, little flock. It is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." He talks about people who are called. He said, "Many are called and few are chosen." He talks about people who repent, who are converted, who are growing and overcoming. "To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with me in my throne? Even as I overcame and am sat down with my father in his throne. To him that overcomes will I give power over the nations," Jesus said, "And he shall rule them with a rod of iron." And here is Jesus Christ talking about the elect's sake on earth which includes, believe it or not, whole nations of people according to the book of Isaiah, "Israel mine elect whom he is not going to allow to die."

   Take a look again at Matthew 24. "There should no flesh be saved," he said, "but for the elect's sake." So this strongly implies, obviously implies right before our eyes, a time when it could be possible that there would be a man, woman, or child left alive, that's what no flesh be saved means. So that puts us in the picture, that takes this ancient scripture written nearly 1900 years ago and puts it right now in the newsprint in this modern 20th century. It means we are living in a time when those words are more poignantly alive and more vividly meaningful than ever before in all the world's history.

   We're living in a time when except God Almighty himself took a hand and cut short human events, human activity, human plant and human wars, there would not be a man, woman, child, not even a pet, and maybe not even a little bit of green algae left alive on the face of this broad green earth.

   History shows there have always been wars, disease, and famine threats to the local population. Never before, however, has the possibility of total annihilation of the human race existed until this age of the arms race, nuclear stockpiles, overkill, and the hydrogen bomb.

   An entire generation has learned to live under the shadow of the mushroom cloud. We've heard talks not of if World War III comes, but when. Jesus described a critical juncture in history, when except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved. He called it the end time. Our climactic age is vividly portrayed in the light of Bible prophecy in the booklet, "Is This The End Time?" Are we now living in that age? You need to know, request your free copy of the important booklet. "Is This The End Time?" Send your request to Ambassador College, Box 345 GPO, Sydney, New South Wales. That's Ambassador College, Box 345 GPO, Sydney, New South Wales.

   Where do wars start? Where do they come from? What causes war? Well, the Bible plainly shows that it comes from man's lust. But what are those lusts? It can be any number of things, whether it's power that a person desires, which is the basic ability to make other human beings do as he wishes them to do, whether it's in economic areas or the lust for greater possessions, whether it's in, let's say, an ethnic sense or a racial sense of the group instinct or tribalism, the desire to promote and perpetuate one's own color, one's own race, one's own religion or language or cultural background, whether it's to enforce religion of a certain type or another upon other hapless human beings that you feel, don't really believe what they ought to believe for the greater emancipation of their mentality.

   But wars come from the rotten, petty perverted grievous, little dirty minds inside of wretched men's hearts. War comes from greed, from vanity, from jealousy, from selfishness, from egotism, from swelling toadish, incredible vanity in the minds of people who imagine themselves in various roles. As savers of people. Or they come simply from the inability of human beings of different linguistic, racial, cultural and religious backgrounds to understand one another and to get along, now, right today we're in a world that is shaping up for a giant war.

   Yes, we are. The United States of America and Russia found themselves as the two great powers at the end of World War II, now really, at that time, we didn't really see that it was up into the fifties, into the sixties and we began to really see that there were only two really superpowers at the end of the war, we thought that there was a big five, you see, but very quickly in the economic disasters that were in the wake of World War II, when America began to look around and realize we had won the war and were rapidly losing the peace. We found that the victors of World War II including Britain and France had their hands full with terrible political problems.

   France had about five presidents in as many years or less. I forget exactly. But it was just absolute chaos in the French government. She had her hands full in Indonesia, I should say in the Southeast Asia, Britain had her hands full around the world and deep economic decay was setting in Britain was withdrawing in her possessions around the world. The dismantlement of the British colonial Empire followed in the wake of World War II as it did with countries such as Belgium and others, Portugal, the one big colonial power still remaining today and with hands full in Africa.

   But very shortly, we found that there was a cold war on that the United States and Russia were at loggerheads over vast global social and other and especially economic, as well as ideological, ideological, I should say differences. But now today, look at how the picture has changed. Now, today there is an emerging new power called the European Economic Community. And right now, the United States and the European Economic Community are at loggerheads on all kinds of economic considerations. Going to the point that maybe it will eventually reach sanctions, embargoes and a complete cut off of foreign trade and take a look at Japan emerging at the super giant in the world of trade.

   And so today, the United States having priced itself out of foreign markets, gotten to the place today that we cannot, it seems compete with lower labor costs and lower price but very good quality goods coming to us from other countries around the world. And so today, we're screaming protectionism, build up the tariff walls and the restrictions and all this type of thing that leads to screaming matches in very high circles because we're talking about multi million dollar industries abroad right now along purely economic lines.

   And then you have to put the feed in of religion and race and pride of one's country and of one's culture where you're speaking of Europeans or Japanese as spin off. But the real thing right now is an economic tug of war. And it's worsening for the United States. The attack on our dollar is basically what we have done to ourselves. It's what happened inside the American nation, not what has been happening to us from outside.

   Now, this book of Ezekiel shows by a prophecy that was a very strange one about Ezekiel taking a little segment of his hair and causing it to be shaved and then divided and weighed and then burnt. It showed a prophecy for our people right now today, believe it or not.

   Here's an ancient prophecy out of your Bible long ago where Ezekiel, a prophet was told to take a sharp knife to cause it to pass upon his head and upon his beard and to take balances and away and divide the hair. He was to burn with fire. A third part in the midst of this little artificial city that he had built when the days of the siege are fulfilled. He was portraying this on the dust of that area and you shall take a third part and shall smite about it with a knife. And a third part, you shall scatter in the wind and I will draw out a sword after them. A third part of you will die with pestilence and with famine shall they be consumed in the midst of you.

   And the third part of you shall fall by the sword round about you and I will scatter a third part into all the winds and I will draw out a sword after them. A prophecy toward the people identified in your Bible as Israel. Where are those people today? Is it Judah? I mean, is it the Jewish people of the nation called Israel today? If that's true, then why is it that the very first place in the Bible where the word Jew is ever used? It's in II Kings 16:6 and it shows that Jew or Judah is at war against Israel who are allied with the Syrian people. Why is it? There are four whole books of the Old Testament devoted to the separate national histories, a separate dynasty of kings, separate capitals, a separate geographical and a separate political entity of Israel on the one hand and Judah on the other, believe it or not, this prophecy about impending famine and warfare implies the United States of America, the Canadian people, the British and South African people, the offspring of the people of Israel whose names were Joseph divided up into Ephraim and Manasseh, Benjamin Issachar, Dan Gad, Asher Zebulun. What are these names?

   You need to write for a special booklet I haven't announced in years. I imagine. I don't know if we have them in print right now, but I'm sure we can have a few remaining called The United States and the British Commonwealth in Prophecy, which I had not intended to announce this time. But a couple of other booklets. But these prophecies are enormously important to us today. They could be a very grave warning for the United States of America. I know that economic pictures being what they are, that the world geopolitical picture being what it is that these biblical warnings about an impending nuclear bomb war could mean us in the United States of America.

   And it's time we began to wake up and take heed that we are headed in the direction of impending nuclear bomb war. The Bible says when they all say peace, peace, then sudden destruction comes upon them. Well, you need to be informed in advance by writing for these booklets. Is this the end time? Can you prove it? And this booklet entitled The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, these are free of charge. There is no price for them whatsoever. This brand new booklet, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse takes that single segment, the sixth chapter and certain other relevant portions of the Book of Revelation and makes them leap to life in the light of present day world conditions.

   And you can see this graphic, beautiful artwork showing the vision just the way John might have seen it. You will see the time setting, you'll see how the Book of Revelation can be unfolded to your understanding. You'll see every single one of these horsemen with other scriptures from Jesus Christ's own first person quotation out of the gospels over in the book of Matthew verse. Well, the 24th chapter some of those verses as well as other sections of The New Testament included in this II Thessalonians, the second chapter and other scriptures that show you exactly what this Book of Revelation. The sixth chapter, those Four Horsemen are all about.

   Now, this booklet is very logically done. It is easy to understand. Even if you have not graduated from high school. If you're elderly and your eyes are not as good as they once were. The type is large enough that you can understand it. It's very plain, very simply put. And yet, even if you're a college professor or a theologian, you'll find it challenging and interesting and straight to the point.

   So this book with, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse a brand new booklet, unveiling a part of that mystery book of all the books of the Bible, the Book of Revelation. And by the way, you need to write for this booklet on How To Understand Prophecy because everything I talk about, about prophecy, unless you understand the biblical interpretations of many-headed beast of a woman, seemingly standing clothed with his son, with the moon at her feet of hills and mountains of seas that appear to be multitudes of people. Unless you certainly can grasp some of the vital keys that prophetic language entails, then you're going to be confused about it.

   Many people think biblical prophecy is virtually all done away that it's all been fulfilled. Or they think that Bible prophecy was merely warnings of old sages and seers of yesteryear to affect certain sociological changes during their time. I've come on the air for so many years. If you've listened rather regularly, if you heard me say time and again, that one third of the Bible is prophecy and that most prophetic sections of the Bible apply to today, that about 90% of that is yet to be fulfilled. Well, what about proving that to yourself?

   You know, I've been amazed at how many people will listen and are reluctant to write letters. It's almost like there is a syndrome about letter writing. As a matter of fact, you find people 40 years of age and under are very unaccustomed to writing letters. We've grown up in an age of television and of the telephone and it's a lot easier to just pick up the telephone and ask someone a question or to ask a neighbor or to chat about something over lunch, to meet someone in the supermarket and say, say, what did you think that guy Armstrong meant when he said, such and such? And to compare opinions about it.

   This book on, How To Understand Prophecy goes through the entire story of who were the prophets, what kind of men were they? And what kind of a calling did they have? Was it a divine calling or did they just imagine it? It's called How To Understand Prophecy. And all you need to do is to request it by sending your letter to post office box 345, Sydney New South Wales. Be sure to tell us the call letters of your station. We need that. That's all there is no cost. But tell us the name of the radio station to which you've been listening, the call letters and then send your letter to box 345 Sydney New South Wales. Until next time, this is Garner Ted Armstrong saying goodbye friends.

   You have been listening to the World Tomorrow. If you would like more information, write to Ambassador College Box 345 GPO Sydney, New South Wales. That's Ambassador College Box 345 GPO Sydney, New South Wales.