Why We Are Here, Part 5

This sermon was preached during Annual Council 2025 on Tuesday, October 14. Elements of oral style have been retained.—Editors.

Way back in the past millennium, when I was in college, I purchased my second car. It was a 1971 Datsun 240Z. Today in America we have many cars that rust away at the hint of a mist, and in those days Datsuns would do that. In fact, they were prerusted at the factory. They’d be soaked in water for months, and then they would sell them.

When I went to buy my 240Z, I was excited; it looked great in the pictures. I got there and very carefully assessed: Does it have any rust? I looked on the fenders, the usual places where rust would be. There was a little tiny bubble here and there, but the paint was relatively fresh. Ding, ding, ding—warning sign. But it looked fine, so I put my money down and drove away in my Z.

Things were going great. It ran beautifully; it handled marvelously. For those of you who know, early Z cars were some of the best-handling cars in the world at the time.

One day I was in the dorm parking lot. I want to say it was a Sunday. The sun was shining, and the hood was open, which means it’s a good day. I was tinkering there and noticed on the firewall a little spot that didn’t look quite right. For those who don’t know, the firewall is the piece of metal between the engine compartment and the interior where you sit. I looked at it and thought, That’s strange. I took my fingernail over it and thought, You know what? That looks like a little spot of rust. And with rust, you need to catch it quick, because it can spread.

Using a scraper, I found more rust. I wasn’t quite ready for that. I ran my hand down the firewall, and something didn’t feel right. I got a magnet—because magnets connect with ferrous metal—and I put my magnet on there, and it dropped to the ground. Oh, that’s bad. I went a little farther down, and it dropped again.

At that point I was very concerned. I got my grinder and started to gently grind away, and what came off was not metal but dust. Long story short, someone had covered over the rust with fiberglass from the top of the firewall all the way back through the floor under the passenger compartment. I ended up replacing the entire floor and that section of the firewall. I suspect there was other rust in the car, but I sold it before I found out.

There are few things as frustrating as buying, what we call here in the United States, a lemon. It looks so good on the outside, but it’s sour once you taste it. Buying something that looks great on the outside but turns out to be full of rust. Taking possession of something that looks pure and undefiled—exactly what we’re looking for—only to find out it’s actually a disaster.

But as frustrating as that can be with material things, it is infinitely worse when we are dealing with spiritual things. Imagine that someone is “on the market,” not for a car, but for a church. Let’s imagine they find one that looks great. The buildings are new. There are great kids’ programs, wonderful community outreach, soup kitchens, clothing for poor individuals, etc. But in reality, on the inside, the church is plagued by rust. It is inconsistent in its adherence to the Word of God. It is confused in its representation of Jesus Christ. It is not pure. It is not undefiled. It promotes a way of living that doesn’t bring people to Jesus but, in the end, eats away at the kingdom of God and pushes people away from Jesus.

Some of you might be thinking, Well, surely a church like that would be out of business in no time. As it turns out, if I read my Bible correctly, at the end of time—the days we live in now—not only is such a church not out of business, but business is booming.

The Second Angel

“And another angel followed, saying, ‘Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she has made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication’ ” (Rev. 14:8).

That is more good news! I can hardly wait to tell Bob.

“Hey, Bob! It’s me, Shane, again. Listen, I’ve got more good news. Do you have just a moment?” And because Bob’s a nice guy, he’s going to let me in.

“Hey, Bob. You’re not going to believe this. Remember those three messages that God gives at the end of time—messages for you? The first one was pretty good, wasn’t it?”

Bob nods. “Yeah, that was pretty good. I like that.”

Anyone who claims to be a Christian and does not passionately seek full conformity to the will of God is either spiritually sick or not a Christian.

“Well, the second one’s even better. Are you ready for this? The good news here of the second message is . . . Hold on just a second, Bob . . . Honestly, Bob, I don’t exactly know what it says. I’m not sure what it’s about, but best I can tell, you’ve been drinking and sleeping in the wrong bed—in several countries all over the world—and you are fallen. You are fallen from God’s grace, and He is not happy about this.

“Now, about those baptismal studies I was talking about—did you want to start tonight, or maybe we could come back on the weekend?”

Bob’s pretty sure he’s never going to do any kind of study with me if he can avoid it.

Here’s the truth: In my experience, most Adventists don’t know what the second angel is saying. At least with the first angel, the words are graspable. With the second angel we ask, “What does that mean? Adultery? What is that about?” And yet, this is an integral part of God’s last-day message to the world. We cannot afford to not understand this.

Let’s do some digging. The good news is that the Bible very often interprets itself. The word “adultery,” as used here, is a reference to God’s people turning away from Him to other gods. How do we know? We’ve already seen in Revelation 12:1 that there is a pure woman who represents God’s people. The church is also represented as Christ’s bride (Eph. 5). Therefore, for the bride of Christ (the church) to commit adultery is not a reference to physical adultery, but to spiritual adultery.

How does a church do this at the end of time? The text tells us: by drinking Babylon’s wine. And what is this wine? We’re not talking about physical realities here. We are speaking of spiritual wine, and there are at least two ways the Bible uses that symbol.

First, when referring to the actions of God, wine often symbolizes the pouring out of His judgments on sin (Jer. 25:15, 16; Rev. 14:10; Rev. 16).

Second, when Scripture speaks of the “wine” of unfaithful people, it refers to what those people are teaching others to believe and do. It refers to their doctrines, values, and beliefs lived out in people’s lives, leading them to apostasy—that is, to spiritual adultery.

When you realize these two symbols, we discover that whoever this Babylon is in the second angel’s message was, at some time, united with Christ as His true bride before leaving and following Satan. Through false teaching, this Babylon leads others, even the nations of the world, to “commit adultery” and leave Christ behind, all while looking outwardly like the true bride of Christ.

Knowing all of that, who’s Babylon? The Bible here says it’s fallen. We need to understand who this Babylon is.

Righteousness by Faith

Much of Revelation comes from the Old Testament, either a direct quotation or an echo. Therefore, the Old Testament helps us understand who Babylon is in the second angel’s message.

To start, we’ll read a few snippets about a story often titled “The Tower of Babel.” Babylon in the second angel cannot refer to literal Babylon, as literal Babylon has been dust for hundreds of years. Instead, we are dealing with spiritual Babylon. The actual nation of Babylon’s roots go back to the Tower of Babel. The root term in those days meant “gate of the gods.” The Jews, however, associated it with a different word—confusion.

The first recorded instance of working one’s way to heaven, one brick at a time, is in Genesis 11:1-4.

Why did they want to build a tower to the heavens? They wanted to avoid another flood. They did not take God at His word when He said He would never again flood the earth with water. They said, “No, we don’t buy that. Because God isn’t going to save us, we must save ourselves.”

Babylon has a gospel, but it’s a counterfeit gospel, and it’s spelled D-O. It’s about what you do to appease a God you know you’ve offended. It’s as if you get on the religious treadmill: You give tithe, help elderly people cross the street, try not to swear in Washington, D.C., traffic, give offerings, go to Sabbath School, become vegan, but it’s never enough. Many people—millions of people—have gotten off that treadmill and out of church and away from God.

The real gospel—the gospel of Jesus Christ—is spelled D-O-N-E. It’s about what Jesus Christ has done . . . when He stretched out His arms and died on the cross as a substitute for our sins. For anyone who accepts Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, Christ forgives. They are moved from darkness to light, from guilty to forgiven. Jesus Christ comes in and sets them free. It’s spelled D-O-N-E. This is the real gospel.

Ellen White writes of John Wesley’s conversion. Prior to the Great Awakening that happened through the Wesley brothers’ ministry in the eighteenth century, John Wesley was a legalist. She writes, “Through long years of wearisome and comfortless striving—years of rigorous self-denial, of reproach and humiliation—[John] Wesley had steadfastly adhered to his one purpose of seeking God. Now he had found Him; and he found that the grace which he had toiled to win by prayers and fasts, by almsdeeds and self-abnegation, was a gift, ‘without money and without price.’ Once established in the faith of Christ, his whole soul burned with the desire to spread everywhere a knowledge of the glorious gospel of God’s free grace. . . . He continued his strict and self-denying life, not now as the ground, but the result of faith; not the root, but the fruit of holiness. The grace of God in Christ is the foundation of the Christian’s hope, and that grace will be manifested in obedience.”[*]

Three lessons. First, good works are the fruit, not the root, of salvation. Second, we don’t do good things to be saved; we do good things because we have been saved. Jesus is living inside us now. The change has begun. And third, good works do not establish the remnant; they simply reveal it.

The Bible is crystal clear: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:8-10).

This is why, in the judgment, they look for fruit—not because the fruit saves you (only Jesus does that), but because the fruit is the evidence that Jesus is living inside.

Babylon says, “No. You must earn your salvation.”

That’s the first side of spiritual Babylon: trying to earn my salvation. Now, notice the second side. Remember, this is talking about spiritual adultery: “Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she has made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication” (Rev. 14:8).

Let’s be more specific.

“The Lord said also to me in the days of Josiah the king: ‘Have you seen what backsliding Israel has done? She has gone up on every high mountain and under every green tree, and there played the harlot. And I said, after she had done all these things, “Return to Me.” But she did not return. And her treacherous sister Judah saw it. Then I saw that for all the causes for which backsliding Israel had committed adultery, I had put her away and given her a certificate of divorce; yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but went and played the harlot also. So it came to pass, through her casual harlotry, that she defiled the land and committed adultery with stones and trees’ ” (Jer. 3:6-9).

The essence of this spiritual adultery is taking God’s law and replacing it with one’s own desires. The second side of Babylon sets aside God’s law and replaces it with something else.

This represents a huge portion of the Christian world today who have done one of at least two things regarding God’s law. Some believe the law of God was done away with at the cross. This is impossible, according to Jesus Himself in Matthew 5:17-19. Others take some parts of God’s law as written but attempt to change other parts and replace them. The most famous example is the fourth commandment—transferring Sabbath’s solemnity to Sunday.

Notice what happens when they do this. They are not only breaking God’s law; they are harming themselves.

After all, what is the law of God for? It doesn’t earn us our salvation. It certainly convicts us of sin, but there’s more: the law of God is given that we may know Him.

Jesus said, “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent” (John 17:3).

Salvation is a relationship with Jesus Christ. Praise the Lord for the forgiveness of sins, but that’s not the point of why Jesus died. Forgiveness is a means to an end. Salvation just begins with the forgiveness of sins. We are privileged to move into relationship with the God of the universe. We may come from places of darkness, debauchery, arrogance, but now, by the grace of Jesus Christ, we are lifted up to heavenly places. Our best friend gets to be Jesus. Do you understand the privilege that has been extended to us?

Salvation is a relationship with Jesus Christ. And any other understanding of it runs afoul of the very words of Jesus Himself.

Those of you who know Greek and Hebrew know that this word “know” is not just factual knowledge. If that were all it meant, the devil would be in the kingdom—because he knows Jesus, right? No, no, no. This is an intimate knowledge. In the Old Testament it’s used to describe the intimacy between husband and wife that God blesses them with. This is an intimate knowing that Jesus calls us into. This is the gospel. This is its core. It’s why Jesus died on the cross.

And here’s the thing: The law of God is from His mind. It’s based upon His heart. God is not a God who steals; He’s a God who gives. He’s not a God who is faithless, who leaves us, or runs away; He’s one who is faithful to us. The law of God is based on His heart. It is therefore an excellent reflection of who He is. If we throw out God’s law or alter it, we cannot know Him as deeply as He intends.

No wonder James writes of “the perfect law that gives freedom” and proclaims that we will be blessed if we do, not because the law saves us—only Jesus does that—but because the law constantly points us back to Jesus (James 1:25, NIV).

Prior to accepting Jesus Christ as our Savior, the law stands against us as our enemy; it is there to condemn us. But after accepting Jesus, that relationship is transformed, and the law becomes candy for the soul. It is sweet in the heart and in the life. It is the essence of the footsteps of freedom.

Before we accept Christ, keeping God’s law is empty and dry. But after we accept Christ, there is a change of attitude in us. God creates in us a clean heart. He renews a right spirit within us. We have new cravings and new desires—not for that which is evil, but for that which is good.

No wonder after we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, He invites us to passionately pursue obedience to His law. In fact, anyone who claims to be a Christian and does not passionately seek full conformity to the will of God is either spiritually sick or not a Christian.

“By their fruits you will know them” (Matt. 7:20). “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). This is not to be saved, but because we already have been saved, and the change within has begun.

We long to know Jesus better and better, and we are able to know Jesus better and better. This is the miracle of salvation. This is righteousness by faith in Jesus Christ.

Did you know the three angels’ messages are also a chiasm? Think of the ladder leaning against a mirror that I spoke of yesterday. The first and third angels are the bottom rungs in that ladder. The second angel is at the top with this beautiful understanding of good works and grace.

You cannot earn your way into the heart of Jesus Christ. He already loves you. “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). Don’t try to be good enough for God to love you. He already does. Don’t try to be good enough to earn your salvation.

If you get to the pearly gates and Peter says, “Why should I let you in?” the wrong answer is “Well, I kept all the Ten Commandments.” That’s the wrong answer. He’ll say, “I’m sorry, that’s the wrong one. We have another place for you.”

But if you come to those pearly gates and Peter says, “Why should I let you in?” and you say, “I only have one answer: Jesus Christ,” he’ll say, “Perfect. You’re in the right place.”

And once the change has come, there will be fruit. You can’t stop it, friends. You can say no to Jesus and walk away if you want to, but if you keep saying yes to Him, there will be fruit. You will be changed. The drunkard will stop drinking. The man who beats his wife will stop beating his wife. The liar will start telling the truth. Because Jesus now lives inside.

Never apologize for the tone of the third angel’s message. It may be the only thing that brings your friends and mine back from the brink of destruction.

This is why, in the judgment, they look for fruit—not because the fruit saves you (only Jesus does that), but because the fruit is the evidence that Jesus is living inside.

This is the perfect balance. This is righteousness by faith in Jesus Christ. It is the truth of the three angels’ messages in verity, we are told. This is our core message to the world in these last days—and it’s all about Jesus Christ.

And Babylon says, “No. You can’t have it. The law is gone, or it’s been changed. And thus you cannot know God to the depths that He calls you to. You cannot walk in the freedom that He longs for you to have.” And millions of honest, God-loving people suffer because of this every single day.

Now we’re ready to nutshell the second angel’s message.

The first angel said this: Honor and worship the Creator, for justice is coming, and time is running out.

The second angel said this: Trying to earn your salvation or setting aside God’s law won’t work.

Anyone or any organization that says you must earn your own salvation, or that God’s law has been ripped away from His people and done away with, is Babylon—be they Catholic, Protestant, pagan, evangelical, or Seventh-day Adventist.

And right now, we need to go back to Bob.

“Hey, Bob, it’s me, Shane again. Just one more chance, please.”

Because Bob is a nice guy, he’ll let me in.

“Bob, thanks for letting me in. I need to apologize for the second angel. I think I got it wrong. I went back and studied more, and this is what I discovered. The truth is, Bob, that God loves you, just as you are right now. If you’ll trust Him, He will take you just as you are. Whatever it is that you’ve done, He loves you, and He will accept you right now if you’ll just put your trust in Him.

“If you trust Him, then by His power you will become the kind of person that you and God have always dreamed you could be: a person of love, of courage, of honesty, of power, of dignity, of respect, and of strength.

“God longs to do this for everyone, Bob. And He’s already made full provision to do it for you—if you want it.”

And Bob looks very thoughtful right now, because there’s nothing else on the planet like it.

The Final Angel

Which brings us to the third angel.

“Then a third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, ‘If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand, he himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out full strength into the cup of His indignation. He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever; and they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name’ ” (Rev. 14:9-11).

Not much joy in that message, huh? Let’s see what Bob thinks.

“Hey, Bob! It’s Shane again with more good news. You’re going to like this one. Bob? Hey, Bob!”

And because Bob is an eternally nice guy, he’s going to let me in.

“Hey, Bob, listen. I have got such good news. Remember the first two of these three messages that God sends at the end of time?”

Bob nods. “Yeah, yeah, I remember that. They were pretty good. I liked those.”

“Well, you’re going to love the third one. This is off-the-charts good. Are you ready for this, Bob? At the end of time, God is having a barbecue. And Bob—you’re on the menu. He’s going to make you into a shish kebab. Did you see what I did there, Bob? Shish kebob? You’re going to sizzle and fry and never die! Are you with me, Bob?”

And Bob’s pretty sure that he needs to move and find different neighbors.

The truth is, this does not seem like, by any stretch of the imagination, good news. Instead, this is the strongest warning in all the Bible. It is the “mother” of all warnings in Scripture. You can read from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22, and you will not find a warning more strongly worded than this one. It’s at the top of the list.

So what do we do with this? We’ve had some pretty good news from the first two angels. Is God having a tantrum? Is this a bad day? What’s going on here? Can we possibly find some good news even in the third angel?

The answer is yes. But to do so, we need to understand at least two things.

Love That Yells

First, God respects your power of choice.It is sacred to Him. Quite literally, He would rather die than take that power of choice away from you.

Ellen White talks about this in several places. If God had wanted to, He could have tweaked our wills. He could have forced us to worship Him, to obey Him. He could have done that. But for love to be love, it must also have the option not to love. If you don’t have the choice, then it’s not love.

The Bible tells us, “God is love” (1 John 4:8). Therefore, choice is sacred to Him. It is utterly sacred. He died on the cross because He was unwilling to take away our power to choose.

The power of choice is sacred to God, and that is true for those of you sitting here; it’s true for every single person on the planet. God will not force Himself on anyone. God is a gentleman. He will not come in where He’s not wanted.

And the second thing you must understand if we’re going to find some good news in this third angel is little Johnny.

Little Johnny is your son. One day you take little Johnny and the rest of the family for a picnic. It’s a beautiful day. The sun is shining, the sky is clear and blue, the grass is green, the birds are singing—but you can’t hear them, because just 100 yards (90 meters) away from where you’re sitting is an eight-lane freeway. Eighty-miles-per-hour (130-kilometers-per-hour) traffic. Four lanes this way, four lanes that way, and no guardrails.

Why you chose to have your picnic there, I don’t know—but you did.

You’re sitting there on the blanket, eating your sandwich, enjoying the day. Then suddenly you look up, and where little Johnny was sitting a moment ago is now empty.

And you think to yourself, Oh, no, surely little Johnny isn’t . . .

You look up toward the freeway, and sure enough, there he is, sprinting for all he’s worth straight toward the traffic.

Because you are a parent who loves your child, you do the only thing possible. You throw your sandwich onto the blanket, jump up, and cup your hands to your mouth and whisper, “Johnny! Johnny, you stop right now! How many times have I told you not to go near the freeway? Johnny, stop!”

Is that what a parent who loves their child would do? Would they whisper in such a situation?

No! Of course not.

A loving parent would throw the sandwich down, leap to their feet, and begin to sprint as fast as they can, yelling at the top of their lungs, “Stop! Johnny, stop! Please stop! Don’t go any farther! Come back!”

About a quarter mile away in our imaginary situation are Mr. and Mrs. Smith, with their newborn baby in a buggy. They can see something going on and hear some noise, but they can’t understand the words. Mr. Smith looks over and says, “Oh, Mrs. Smith, can you believe how bad parents are today? That man is running after his kid, waving his arms. I’ll bet he’s going to beat that boy when he catches him. I’m sure glad we’re not parents like that, Mrs. Smith.”

Jesus today is looking for those who will love Him—pure and undefiled—not because of their own righteousness but because of the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

And Mrs. Smith replies, “Oh, yes, you’re right, Mr. Smith. I’m glad we’re not parents like that too. We’re good parents. We’re not bad parents like that one.”

And the truth is exactly the opposite. Ladies and gentlemen, never apologize for the tone of the third angel’s message. It may be the only thing that brings your friends and mine back from the brink of destruction.

Now we’re ready to nutshell the third angel as well.

The first angel said: Honor and worship the Creator, for justice is coming, and time is running out.

The second angel: Trying to earn my salvation or setting aside God’s law won’t work.

And my best understanding of the third angel is this: I can choose my own destruction, because the power of choice is sacred to God. I can do that. But God, in His love, will do all He possibly can to change my mind, even if it means He has to raise His voice. Because He loves me so much, He is willing to do it.

And right now, I need to go back to Bob.

“Hey, Bob, it’s me, Shane, again. Bob? Bob, there are only three angels. There’s not a fourth one. This is my last time.”

And because Bob is a nice guy, he’s going to let me in.

“Hey, Bob, listen. I’ve got to apologize again. You know these three last messages that God gives to you and to everybody on the planet? I really don’t think I got that third one right. I did some more studying.”

And right about then, Bob interrupts me.

“Shane, hold on just a moment. After you left the last time, I was pretty sure you didn’t know what you were talking about. So I bought a Bible, and I’ve actually been studying it. I think you’re wrong about that third message.”

I’m stunned. “What do you mean, Bob?”

He continues: “I went back and tried to figure out what it’s about. And you know what I found? It turns out that God respects me enough that I can choose to ignore Him. I don’t have to follow Him. He is the most powerful being in the universe, yet one word, no, will stop Him from forcing Himself on me. But He loves me so much that He tells me the consequences of my own choices before I experience those final consequences. Because I found a God who loves me after studying this Bible for quite a while, Shane, I gave my life to Jesus. I’m a Christian now. My life is being changed,” he says. “You know, Shane, this is a pretty good book. You should study it.”

The mission of the Seventh-day Adventist Church is the Great Commission of Matthew 28:18-20, and we take it one final step further: the three angels’ messages of Revelation 14:6-12.

Some of you might be thinking, Well, we’re waiting now for a final statement to sum up what our mission is, right? And we’re going to do that tomorrow, because there’s one final piece of the puzzle still missing. What is it? The Great Commission, the three angels’ messages—what more could there be?

Come back tomorrow morning. There’s one final thing that has to be done, one thing we must recognize if we’re going to fully understand what our unique mission is.

Until then, my appeal to you is simple. Jesus today is looking for those who will love Him—pure and undefiled—not because of their own righteousness, but because of the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

He’s not looking for rust in His church, because He knows that the rust will ultimately harm His children.

We have the privilege, as Seventh-day Adventists, to go out and spread the good news of Jesus Christ in the three angels’ messages so that people might be called out of Babylon. This is not a time for fear. This is a time for courage. The finest hour of the church lies just before us.

May God grant us an abundant measure of His Holy Spirit so that we will be faithful to say what He has asked us to say and to do what He has asked us to do so that as many as possible might be saved before He returns.

To read part 1 of this sermon series, click here.

To read part 2 of this sermon series, click here.

To read part 3 of this sermon series, click here.

To read part 4 of this sermon series, click here.

[*] Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy (Mountain View, Calif.: Pacific Press Pub. Assn., 1911), p. 256.