American Jubilee: Beginning or the End? (Tim Rumsey)

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:00]So, I invite you to turn once again to our scripture reading. That was Romans chapter 13. We're going to start there this morning.

[00:00:10]Romans chapter 13. Now this chapter begins in the first uh 10 verses with a pretty well-known passage from Paul where he's explaining the Christian duty to be subject to the powers that are uh that be you know the government and um Paul makes his case pretty clearly and he explains in verse number nine which aspects of the law of God A good government will uh defend and protect.

[00:00:45]So if you're looking in Romans chapter 13 verse9, this is what Paul says. Um for this, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness, thou shalt not covet, and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

[00:01:05]Seems that we humans because of the sin problem have a a difficult time loving each other as ourselves. Right? And that's been the case ever since sin entered the human family. Didn't take long uh for the first murder to take place, did it? If you look in the biblical record, it was Adam and Eve's son, their firstborn son, who they probably hoped would be the Messiah. You imagine Eve looking at Cain thinking, "This is probably the redeemer right here." and he ends up being the first murderer. So we humans have had a long ugly track record of not treating each other very well. But a good government according to the Paul and the Bible here, a good government is in place to help us do that. Right? And so this injunction is given in Romans chapter 13. And then Paul comes to the passage that we have for our scripture today. So let's go to verse number 11. He says that knowing the time that now it is high time to awake out of sleep. For now is our salvation nearer than when we believed or when we first believed. Now according to the Bible, every single one of us, whether we're a follower of Christ, whether we claim to be a Christian or whether we don't, according to the Bible, all of us are spiritually asleep.

[00:02:25]So in uh Revelation chapter 3, it talks about the Leodysian church, which is the last phase of the church before Jesus comes back. And uh it's not a pretty picture that the Bible gives us, right?

[00:02:38]We're all lukewarm according to the Bible. We're all sleeping spiritually.

[00:02:42]We need to be woken up.

[00:02:45]But the rest of the world is in no better condition because Revelation talks about the wine of Babylon. And uh the rest of the world is drunken with the the drunkenness of confusion and that kind of sleep as well. So we all need to wake up. Amen. We all need a closer relationship with Jesus Christ.

[00:03:02]Now reading on, he says in verse 12, the night is far spent and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness and let us put on the armor of light.

[00:03:15]So, you know, we we study a lot of things uh as Christians and we study Bible prophecy as well. And there's a lot of Bible prophecy in the Bible.

[00:03:25]Large sections of the Old Testament as well as the entire last book of the New Testament is packed full of Bible prophecy. Why do we study that? So that we can understand where we are in the flow of time, right? We can look back and see God's work in the past and we can also see where we are right now. So as we do that, we should become convicted of the need for a closer relationship with Jesus Christ, especially as we see the day of his return approaching. Verse 13, let us walk honestly as in the day, not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantingness, and not in strife and envying, but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lust thereof.

[00:04:09]So [snorts] the Bible's pretty clear as we study Bible prophecy.

[00:04:14]The most important reason to do this is to grow in our relationship with Christ and to grow in our trust of his word.

[00:04:21]Right now the knowledge that we get about the past or the present or the future, that's also important. God wants us to know the facts. But as I often say, the information must lead to transformation. If it just stays as a data set rumbling between our ears somewhere, it it doesn't help our salvation at all, does it? That data has to become transformation in our lives.

[00:04:48]Now, [clears throat] what are we looking at today? American Jubilee, beginning or the end? We're going to be looking at some things that are going on right now in our nation. And uh with God's help, hopefully uh we'll see how these connect in with Bible prophecy. So last Sunday there was a big gathering on the National Mall in Washington DC. I'm sure many of you have heard about this uh called Rededicate 250, a national jubilee of prayer, praise and thanksgiving.

[00:05:16]And this was very literally a government sponsored event. The organization that put this on, you can see the their web page there on the left side of the picture. Um it was set up by President Trump. It's it's an independent LLC, but it's housed under the opaces. I think it's of the national parks or something like that. At any rate, here is a government sponsored worship service uh that was held last Sunday and there were hundreds of thousands of people that showed up as well with many well-known speakers from the u evangelical and the Protestant community. there were some Catholic representatives as well and um just a very big event that took place.

[00:05:59]So here's an outline of what we're going to be looking at. [clears throat] We're going to start with a brief survey of what the Bible says about the Jubilee because the Jubilee is a very biblical concept. God came up with it and so we need to understand originally what it meant for the Israelites in the Old Testament. Then we're going to look very briefly at a history of the Christian Jubilee.

[00:06:21]And then we'll make some additional observations about what's going on right now in our nation. I apologize for the flickering. I'm not sure what's going on. Our building got either struck by lightning or had a power surge a few weeks ago. And so we've got lights out as you can see here. And there's just some weird things going on. Um and then we'll we'll conclude in our fourth part of our study here with the antityypical Jubilee. And this is one we can all participate in and we want to because it's this is the one God has in store for us when he comes back. So that's our journey this morning. We'll start with the biblical Jubilee. Take your Bible if you have one. Let's go to Leviticus 25.

[00:07:01]Leviticus chapter 25 and beginning in verse 10, we read this.

[00:07:14]This is God speaking through Moses to the Israelites. He says, 'You shall hallow the 50th year and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof. It shall be a jubilee unto you, and you shall return every man unto his possession, and you shall return every man unto his family.

[00:07:31]So the jubilee was like a once- ina-lifetime event. Maybe twice in a lifetime if you were lucky, right? If one happened when you were very young and you lived long enough to see the second one. But for most people, this would only happen once in their lifetime. And yet, it was a recurring event for the nation as a whole, every 50 years. And some very significant things happened or were to happen on the Jubilee. It's interesting. We have all of Leviticus 25 and a few other shorter passages that explain God's intent for the Jubilee. But there's actually no record in the Bible explicitly where it says, "And they kept the Jubilee." And uh as I was researching that a little bit this week, even the the other uh extra biblical sources, like sometimes we go to Josephus, the Jewish historian, there's not a lot said even in those extra biblical sources about if and when the Israelites actually kept the Jubilee. But this was God's intention for it. Every 50 years, they would not plant their crops. Uh they would not harvest. The land would rest. And that actually happened more frequently than that, but we'll touch on that in a minute. Also, it says, "Every man will return unto his possession, and you shall return every man unto his family."

[00:08:44]So, this was a year of release and of freedom. If a um Hebrew had been sold or had sold themselves into bondage to pay off a debt, say, on the year of Jubilee, they got to go home. So there was no um permanent uh slavery or servantthood if you were a Hebrew. Also, I think we read that in the next verse here, verse 11, a jubilee shall that 50th year be unto you. You shall not sow, neither reap that which groweth of itself, nor gather of thy vine undressed. Okay, so that's talking about the agriculture would come to a stop, which was a big deal, right, for an agricultural society. And in fact, the year before that, and again, we'll see this in a minute, the year before was also a year of rest for the land.

[00:09:33]So, two years in a row, no planting, no harvesting. And God had promised that the year before those two years, he would bless abundantly and they would have enough left over or the land would produce of its own. So, it was a year of faith, wasn't it? Is God going to provide for us? Is he going to do what he said?

[00:09:51]Uh so in addition to the captives or the those sold in bondage returning home, the original piece of real estate that God had given to each family when they entered Canaan would also revert back to that original family. Um and this was a great equalizer, right? So if you had to sell your land again to pay off debt or something like this on that 50th year, all the land would revert back. Um, so you can imagine people looked forward to this year, didn't they? Uh, here's a good summary from Eastston's Bible dictionary on what this meant for the nation of Israel. The Jubilee would prevent the accumulation of land on the part of a few to the detriment of the community at large. Right? So, you wouldn't have one class getting in increasingly rich over generations and another class plunging further and further into poverty. It would render it impossible for anyone to be born to absolute poverty since everyone had his hereditary land. If you remember the story of King Ahab, the the wicked king, right? Um and he had his palace and next to it was a beautiful vineyard owned by a g guy named Nabboth. And so Ahab says, "Can I buy your vineyard?" And Nabboth says, "No, it belongs to my family."

[00:11:08]Right? Nabboth said no to the king because he understood this was the land given by God to my family. I don't really have the right to sell it and I don't want to sell it and I'm I don't have to sell it. Well, Ahab gets angry and he actually his wife has Neabboth killed and then he takes the land. But this was one of the many reasons that God did away with Ahab in his family line. The Jubilee. Back to our list here. Number three, it would preclude those inequalities which are produced by extremes of riches and poverty and which make one man doineer over another. It would utterly do away with slavery, and it would afford a fresh opportunity to those who were reduced to adverse circumstances to begin again their career of industry in the patrimony which they had temporarily forfeited.

[00:11:56]So, pretty good year, right?

[00:11:59]um one of the great blessings that God intended for the nation of Israel.

[00:12:05]Now, one of the things about the Jubilee is that it is intimately connected with the concept of the Sabbath, right? Six days of work, seventh day for rest. And so, we understand that at creation, God sets up the weekly cycle. He creates for six days. Genesis 2 and 3 tells us that God rested on the seventh day. And so from creation, we have this pattern of the 7-day week. [snorts] But then this pattern served as a template for a yearly cycle as well for the Hebrews. So earlier in Leviticus 25, we won't read the verses there. God sets up a seven-year cycle for the nation of Israel. Six years there to plant and and sew and and harvest and so forth. But the seventh year is a year of rest for the land and for the people. So every seven years actually they would have to trust God to provide for them based on last year's harvest.

[00:13:02]So that was called the sabbatical year based on the weekly cycle. Now after seven sets of sabbatical years came the jubilee.

[00:13:13]So 7* 7 is 49 years. And then after the completion of those seven sets of seven sabbatical years, then you have the jubilee that occurs after this. So my point is simply this that the jubilee in God's eyes cannot be separated from the Sabbath principle, the Sabbath concept.

[00:13:31]Does that make sense? It's all based on these cycles of seven. And what happened on the the Jubilee? We just went through that. Uh in summary, it's all about release. It's all about freedom. It's all about restoration, isn't it? Uh it's all about wholeness and completeness and God providing for his people. These are all lessons that are also connected with the Sabbath, aren't they? This was just these were those lessons explained on a grand scale for the entire nation every 50 years. Now, there's one more concept that I want to connect with the Jubilee before we go on with our study. And that is that the Jubilee was also very connected with the theocracy. And when we say theocracy, that's the form of government that God gave to Israel in the Old Testament, right? God is ruler.

[00:14:19]He's the king. Uh and so it's divine law that is being uh communicated and upheld usually by the priesthood, right, by religious leaders. So let's see what the dictionaries tell us. The Jubilee would periodically rectify the disorders which crept into the state in the course of time, preclude the division of the people into nobles and plebeians or plebbeians and reserve the theocracy in violet. So that first quote doesn't explain in a lot of detail why the jubilee helps support the theocracy. It just says that it does. Well, let's read the second one.

[00:14:56]The law of the Jubilee was intended to benefit all, the masters as well as the servants. They should never lose sight of their being brothers and citizens of the theocratic kingdom. They owed their life to God and were subject to his sovereign will. Only through loyalty to him were they free and could ever hope to be free and independent of all other masters. Now, that gives us a little more detail, doesn't it? When God pulled Israel out of Egypt, he promised to uh protect and preserve and build the nation, didn't he? He promised them, 'If you obey me, if you keep my laws, I will make you the head of all the nations, and you won't be able to contain all the blessings that I give to you. Then he followed that up with warnings of curses, right? If they chose not to follow and obey him. God wanted that theocracy to be a blessing not only to the people of Israel, but to everybody in the world, and he wanted its boundaries to grow. And so the Jubilee is also connected with this form of government of the theocracy.

[00:15:58]It was a blessing for society. It was connected with the Sabbath and it's connected with the idea of the theocracy as well. Here's what God said to Israel when he pulled them out of Egypt. Exodus 195 and 6. Now therefore, if you will obey my voice indeed and keep my covenant, then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people, for all the earth is mine.

[00:16:21]You know Israel's history well enough to answer this question.

[00:16:25]Over time, did they really want to be different than all the other nations or did they want to be more like the other nations?

[00:16:32]They wanted to be like the other nations, didn't they? Give us a king, right? Um the Jubilee as well as other things that God gave to Israel like his law and the sanctuary and so forth, these were all intended to help them maintain that idea that we're not supposed to be like everybody else, right? God has something better for us. Verse six, you shall be unto me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.

[00:17:00]So as Christians, we talk about the priesthood of what?

[00:17:04]All believers, right? Priesthood of all believers. What does that mean? It means that in Christ, when we walk through these doors, there's no ranking, right?

[00:17:13]There's no level one Christians and then the mediocre Christians and then the the I don't know what you call it, level three Christians, right?

[00:17:23]We're all the same in Christ and we all have the same access to our savior Jesus Christ. We all have the same promises.

[00:17:31]We all have the same purpose which is to share the gospel. Right? Um this is the same thing that God was trying to communicate to Israel and set up for Israel as well. a nation of priests or a kingdom of priests. If you have a a permanently wealthy class that rules everything, the no nobility and you have a perpetually poor class, the bottom cast of society, you can't really have a priest of all believers, can you? And so the jubilee by preventing that stratification of society uh at least on a permanent basis was to support the theocracy as well.

[00:18:10]Now, I want you to keep these things in mind, these three purposes of the jubilee. It's to be a blessing to society, to write wrongs. It's connected with the Sabbath principle, and it is to sustain and support the theocracy.

[00:18:26]Let's move to our second section here, and that is a look at, and I put it in quotes, the Christian Jubilee. Now, why is it in quotes? Well, we just looked at the biblical Jubilee, which was set up for the nation of Israel, right? It was set up for the Jewish nation, the theocratic kingdom there in the Old Testament.

[00:18:45]What is the Christian Jubilee?

[00:18:49]Well, usually when people use that word, they go back to the year 1300, which is when the first Jubilee was declared by Pope Bonafice VI.

[00:18:59]Um, and here's a short history from it.

[00:19:01]This is from Vatican News. Pope Bonafice VI proclaimed the first jubilee in the year 1300. Now, it's not the first jubilee. God came up with the idea, right? But this is the first jubilee that was celebrated within Christendom.

[00:19:16]The first jubilee is a spiritual reinterpretation of the ancient Hebrew tradition. While the biblical jubilee focused on freeing slaves, the Christian version offers liberation from sins and from the punishment due to sin that must be faced in purgatory. So, you can see the Catholic twist on this, right?

[00:19:33]That's whole idea of purgatory. Um, [clears throat] why would Well, let me say it this way.

[00:19:40]Here is what Pope Bonafice VIII uh offered to people if they participated in the uh pilgrimage is what they would have to do there in 1300. So, he offered a complete remission of temporal punishment due to forgiven sins to any truly penitent who visited the major Roman basilas and attended mass for a set number of days.

[00:20:04]So you understand probably the a concept of purgatory, right? In the Roman Catholic tradition is that when you die, uh most folks are going to go to this place called purgatory where you have to burn away enough of your sins or what remains of your sins before you can go to heaven.

[00:20:22]And so even if you've accepted Jesus right as your savior, even if you've done all the things that the church says you need to do as penance, there's usually still some sins that need to be paid for somehow. And so purgatory is the holding pen before someone goes down or up. And so and there's some burning there, but it's not like the full fires of hell. You know, basically, no one wants to go in purgatory. Nobody wants to hang out in a place called purgatory. And so Pope Bonafice said, "Listen, here's a way to get yourself or even your dead loved ones out of purgatory. Do these things in the year 1300, and you can get this complete remission of temporal punishment in purgatory." So for Romans, those living in Rome, visit the basilas of St. Peter and St. Paul at least once a day for 30 days. And that would then fulfill the requirement. If you were a pilgrim or you had to come from another place, visit these two basilas at least once a day for 15 days. So you only had to do half the work. I guess the other half was getting there to Rome. But the condition for everybody was that they must confess their sins and be sincerely repentant. Okay? So you had to go to Rome and do confession there in the confessional confessing your sins to the human priest.

[00:21:36]Um this was not the first recorded pleenary indulgent indulgence. The first one that we have record of was in 1095 by Pope Urban II.

[00:21:49]he needed to gather an army together to go drive the uh the Otto not the Ottomans at that point but the um the Muslim power from Jerusalem. And so he offered a plenary indulgence to anyone who would go in the first crusade and fight. Uh I guess people figured out over a few hundred years that it was kind of dangerous to fight in a crusade.

[00:22:12]So this was a pretty popular option that Pope Bonafice offered in 1300. All I have to do is go to Rome and I can have this complete indulgence. Okay, that's the history. Now, what happened as a result of this? Apparently, this is what historians tell us is a lot of people took him up on this offer. They went to Rome. They did what they were told. And the net effect is that it greatly increased the spiritual and temporal authority of the papacy because two years later the same pope issued one of the most famous papal bulls in all of history. This was called unum sanctum in which he stated two things. He said the church is above the state and secondly you must recognize the authority of the pope to be saved. So this is from imple papalencyclicals.net.

[00:23:07]Just a few excerpts from this bull.

[00:23:10]However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority subjected to spiritual authority. For since the apostle said there is no power except from God, and the things that are are ordained of God, but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other, and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.

[00:23:30]So this concept of two swords is the spiritual or religious power and the civil power. And he's very clear that in his view uh and in the church's view the spiritual is above the civil power. And that's pretty much how Europe was was governed for hundreds of years. Now he also said this at the very end of this document. He said, "Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman pontiff."

[00:24:03]Now, this form of government in the middle ages was a theocracy.

[00:24:10]That's not me saying you can look that up anywhere. You know, that's just history. It was a theocracy. Did this Jubilee in 1300 strengthen the theocracy that was ruling at the time? And the answer is yes. It did. Absolutely strengthened that theocracy.

[00:24:28]Now, just to bring this into a modern context, last year 2025 was declared by Pope Francis a year of jubilee. So, there was another jubilee held last year. And uh it's kind of interesting what happens on a Jubilee year. All of these holy doors in the basilas of Rome are opened wide.

[00:24:50]And this is the only time these years of Jubilee are the only time you can walk through those doors.

[00:24:57]So I won't read through this whole paragraph. I've highlighted there's four of these basilas or cathedrals there in Rome. And he said, "All these doors are going to be opened up in 2025 for people to go through and receive uh remission of their sins."

[00:25:13]And there's an image of the golden doors on St. Peter's Basilica there on the left. And on the right is the um holy door for St. John Ladan, also in Rome there as well. Now, that was last year, 2025. There's another Jubilee going on this year. So Pope Leo has extended the Jubilee or added to it and this year 2026 is the Franciscan Jubilee year and uh this is what Vatican news tells us about indicated by the church must be fulfilled. So this is the same thing going on 700 years ago in 1300, right?

[00:25:49]Pleenary indulgence for your sins. What do you have to do to avoid purgatory? Um participate in the sacramental confession. So you do need to confess your sins to the priest. You need to participate in the eukaristic communion.

[00:26:04]That's mass. Certain prayers according to the intentions of the pope and interior detachment from sin and the performance of certain works such as a pious pilgrimage to Franciscan churches, participation in jubilee celebrations, prayer and meditation in the Franciscan spirit, as well as daily acts of charity and humility that express the spirituality of St. Francis. So I just want to illustrate right this is still going on today 2026 we've got the same things going on.

[00:26:34]Now let's bring this back to our topic for today.

[00:26:38]So 2026 has been uh coined as the year of national jubilee.

[00:26:46]And that is not a phrase that was put out there by the Catholic Church. It wasn't a phrase that was put out there by Protestant churches. This was a phrase that was put out by our current government administration.

[00:27:02]Now, I'm not saying that they haven't been in communication with faith leaders, but this is a federal initiative that is dubbing this year as a year of national jubilee. Now, last Sunday, here's a picture of the big stage they set up. And um the seal is the presidential seal that you see on either side there. You see the banner at the bottom, praise, prayer, and thanksgiving. So, this was a worship service that went on for about eight hours and you can watch the whole thing online. Um, and then on the stage itself, obviously, there's a cross in the middle and it says, "Redicate 250."

[00:27:40]And then May 17, 2026.

[00:27:43]There were dozens and dozens of very high-profile speakers. I'll just share very briefly a couple. So, here is um Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House, and he had this prayer. Um, I'll just read the story. As House Speaker Mike Johnson stood before a crowd of thousands on the National Mall on Sunday, May 17, he did something not altogether unusual for the outspoken Southern Baptist, he closed his eyes, bowed his head, and prayed.

[00:28:12]And here's what he said. Just as we in the beginning dedicated this land to your most holy name, today here, Lord, in this 250th year of American independence, we hereby rededicate the United States of America as one nation under God.

[00:28:27]Now, I want to be careful and I want to be clear. Do I would I like to see my government leaders at every level uh to be Christians and to be serious about their their faith? Absolutely. I would prefer that. I'm a Christian, right? I would like to see that. Do I want the government to be putting on worship services?

[00:28:48]I don't feel quite as confident about that because when I look through the Bible, every time that a government power says, "I'm going to lead out in worship," nothing good happens. We have stories in the Old Testament where kings, government powers uh of Israel walk into the sanctuary to offer sacrifices, to lead out in worship. One of those times it was Jeroboam and his hand withers up as a result. Another time, centuries later, it was Isaiah. He makes the same mistake. And um when he tries to silence the priest that said, "You shouldn't be here, right? You're combining church and state," he gets a mark in his forehead.

[00:29:28]There's leprosy that appears in his forehead. So you have a mark in the hand and a mark in the forehead, which is what Revelation 13 tells us about the mark of the beast, right? It's received in the hand or the forehead. It's church and state uniting together. So, while I would love to see them individually be Christians, every single one of them, and to be serious about it, um I don't really want my government telling us that we need to be worshiping in a certain way, even if it's the same way that I prefer to worship as a Christian. It's not the government's role. That's the point.

[00:30:02]Now, I'm going to play a short video clip. You have seen The Chosen, right?

[00:30:08]The main actor that plays Jesus is Jonathan Roomie. I believe >> for the last eight years of playing Jesus on the chosen and the last six as a voice guide on the Hallow app, prayer has been at the center of my life.

[00:30:22]Not because I fancy myself a saint. Far from it.

[00:30:27]But you know I am playing Jesus. So I'm going to pray.

[00:30:34]simply stop and pray.

[00:30:38]And if you still feel burdened, well, maybe it's time to go to confession.

[00:30:49]Now, the crowd cheers when he says that.

[00:30:51]My only point is this, and he has a right to say this and believe this. He's a Catholic. That's fine. But what kind of Christianity is being promoted at this event?

[00:31:02]It's Catholicism, isn't it?

[00:31:04]very much so. You heard what he said. If you pray and you still don't feel free from go to Rome and go through the holy door, you also must participate in confession and the sacraments and so forth. So this is very clearly a Catholic version of Christianity that is being promoted by the federal government. That's my point. Now, Cardinal Dolan uh had a video message which was also part of the festivities last Sunday, and I'll read a couple of quotes from what he says. He says, "Going back to the days of the Revolutionary War, our very way of life has been defined in part by a few key principles. Prayer, trust, worship, the Sabbath, loyalty to family, freedom of religion, the power and strength of democracy, the principle of subsidiarity, and devotion to the common good. So that's an interesting list of things, isn't it, that he lists. And remember that the Jubilee is also built on the Sabbath principle, right? This cycle of sevens. So it's very interesting that he highlights that in what he says. He goes on to commemorate this momentous anniversary. Boy, am I grateful that we bishops in the United States intend to consecrate the United States of America to the most sacred heart of Jesus on June 12th of this year. So that hasn't happened yet. that happens next month. But that of course is a very Catholic concept and idea, this sacred heart thing.

[00:32:29]Now, last weekend was a very fascinating weekend because uh a couple of weeks ago, President Trump designated last Sabbath, not Sunday, but last Sabbaths starting from Friday evening. He he had the timing right.

[00:32:46]Sunset on Friday, May 15 to sunset on Sabbath May 16 was what he called a national Sabbath. And um it was part of the Jewish American Heritage Month. And I'll again just read a couple paragraphs here. Throughout this historic year, we rejoice in the triumph of the American spirit and rededicate ourselves to the cause of liberty and justice for all. In special honor of 250 glorious years of American independence and on the weekend of rededicate 250, a national jubilee of prayer, praise, and thanksgiving, Jewish Americans are encouraged to observe a national Sabbath. From sundown on May 15 to nightfall on May 16, friends, families, and communities of all backgrounds may come together in gratitude for our great nation. This day will recognize the sacred Jewish tradition of setting aside time for rest, reflection, and gratitude to the Almighty. So he got the timing correct according to the Bible, sunset Friday to sunset Sabbath.

[00:33:44]But uh then he calls it a Jewish tradition which of course is not as we understand it, right? Jesus said in Mark 2:27 that this day was made for man. And we know that the s God rested on the seventh day of creation long before there was a Jew.

[00:34:01]So that that's unfortunately incorrect.

[00:34:03]But nonetheless, he's saying, "Hey, here's a national Sabbath. He's inviting not only Jews but all people to celebrate. So that was in the preamble.

[00:34:12]Now here's the actual declaration that the president put out. Now therefore, I, Donald J. Trump, president of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution of the Laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim May 2026 as Jewish American Heritage Month. I call upon Americans to celebrate the heritage and contributions of Jewish Americans and to observe this month with appropriate programs, activities, and ceremonies. I further call on all Americans to celebrate their faith and freedom throughout this year, during this month, and especially on Shabbat to celebrate our 250th year. So, he's actually calling on all Americans to participate in this national Sabbath.

[00:34:54]Now, that's kind of a curveball because [clears throat] as 7th Adventists and as Protestants, we've been expecting for a long time, right, that there will be a National Sunday law at some point.

[00:35:09]But here, this wasn't a law technically, right? There's no penalty if you didn't participate in the National Sabbath. But it's a very strong suggestion, isn't it?

[00:35:18]They need to start thinking about the Sabbath some more. Um, how do you think Christian activists that want to see this nation become an officially Christian nation, how do you think they're going to feel now that the president has already designated a Sabbath as a national Sabbath?

[00:35:37]Think there might be some push at some point, maybe not too long, for a national Sunday as well.

[00:35:44]And at some point, Bible prophecy tells us that will move beyond a suggestion to become some kind of a mandate or a law.

[00:35:53]We don't know when, but the Bible's clear that it will.

[00:35:57]Now, never forget or don't forget that when he was campaigning for this second term, President Trump promised to give the church or Christians power again.

[00:36:07]So, this was on February 23, 2024.

[00:36:10]Um, President or Donald Trump promised that he would make a triumphant return to the White House next year and that he would restore Christian preachers to power in American culture. He said, "If I get in, you're going to be using that power at a level that you've never used before."

[00:36:28]Have we ever seen an event like a national worship service on the mall where what what we saw last week, we never seen that, have we? So Trump seems to be doing his best to make good on that promise. I want to just very briefly look one more time at this poster on the right. Um these were just a few of the speakers and you know on the top row there you've got speaker of the house and Pete Hegsth and Franklin Graham. Um you've got other religious leaders uh or personalities on the bottom. But who's in the smack dab middle of the picture there?

[00:37:03]Well, it's not Jesus, but it's the actor that plays him, right? And then on the left and right side of this Jesus figure, you have the Catholic representatives. You got Cardinal Dolan and uh forget the bishop's name.

[00:37:17]I don't want [clears throat] to make too much of that, but clearly Jesus is shown in the middle. And who is closest to him?

[00:37:25]It's the Catholic Church, right? So if we I'll phrase it as a question. is the idea being put out there that if our nation wants to come back to God, we need to go through a Catholic version of Christianity.

[00:37:42]Now, Ellen White was very clear about the danger of mixing politics and religion, church and state. These are all similar statements and they're short. The Roman Catholic princ Roman Catholic principles will be taken under the care and protection of the state.

[00:37:58]this national apostasy will speedily be followed by national ruin. And she repeats this warning about national ruin over and over again. That was from review and herald June 15, 1897. Here's from the book Evangelism uh page 235.

[00:38:12]When Protestant churches shall unite with the secular power to sustain a false religion for opposing which their ancestors endured the fiercest persecution, then will the papal Sabbath be enforced by the combined authority of church and state. There will be a national apostasy which will end only in national ruin. And again from the Bible commentary, when the state shall use its power to enforce the decrees and sustain the institutions of the church, then will Protestant America have formed an image to the papacy and there will be a national apostasy which will end in national ruin.

[00:38:46]And she goes on with other similar statements.

[00:38:49]So, American Jubilee, is it the beginning of something great or will it ultimately prove to be the end of what was great?

[00:39:01]I'll let you answer that question based on Bible prophecy. I want to finish here with a look at the antityypical Jubilee.

[00:39:10]And we're going to look now at Christ's return.

[00:39:14]But turn with me to Isaiah 61.

[00:39:18]Isaiah chapter 61, a beautiful chapter full of promises and hope. And there are many connections in this chapter with the Jubilee concept, [clears throat] the Jubilee that God sets up, right?

[00:39:31]Biblical Jubilee. Beginning in verse number one, the spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek. He hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all that mourn. This is uh Jubilee talk, isn't it? Set let setting the prisoners free, letting the captives go back, the acceptable year of the Lord.

[00:40:03]This is the passage that Jesus quoted in Luke chapter 4 when he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and he stood up to read and as he was trying to explain his mission and his identity as the Messiah, he picked this passage. So our Jubilee ultimately is in Christ.

[00:40:20]All right? He is the one that will set us free from the power of sin. Verse three going on. To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified.

[00:40:39]Why does God set people free from sin?

[00:40:44]Yes, because he loves us. Yes, because he doesn't want us bound by these things. But ultimately, it's to bring him glory.

[00:40:53]Why are we seeking freedom from sin?

[00:40:57]Hopefully, it goes beyond just blessings in this life, right? Hopefully, it's to bring praise to our creator and our redeemer as well to bring glory to him.

[00:41:06]Now, the the p the chapter continues with some beautiful promises. Verse four, they will build the old wastes.

[00:41:12]They shall raise up the former desolations. They shall repair the waste cities, the desolations of many, the priests of the Lord. We talked about a priesthood of what? All believers. It's going to be realized at some point. God will have a people here on earth that he can say here is these are my citizens, right? This is my nation. This is my kingdom. And every person that is naming my for confusion. They shall rejoice in their portion. Therefore, in their land, they shall possess the double.

[00:41:39]Everlasting joy shall be unto them. For I the Lord love judgment. I hate robbery for burnt offering. And I will direct their work in truth. and I will make an everlasting covenant with them. Remember these words. We're going to see it in Revelation in just a second. Verse N.

[00:41:56]And their seed shall be known among the Gentiles and their offspring among the people. All that see them shall acknowledge them that they are the seed which the Lord hath blessed.

[00:42:06]God wants his church, he wants his people to be an influence in the world.

[00:42:11]Amen.

[00:42:13]And he, you know, he doesn't do the work of salvation in I mean it is personal.

[00:42:18]It is individual. But he doesn't do it off in a corner where nobody can see. We have the Bible full of stories of even faithful people like Abraham that make all kinds of horrible mistakes. And God lays it out here for the whole world to see. Why does he do that? So that he can receive glory. so that we can have courage and hope that hey, this person was in the same mess I am and yet God pulled them through.

[00:42:43]Let's finish the chapter. Verse 10. I will greatly rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my God for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation. He has covered me with the robe of righteousness. As a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adornneth herself with her jewels.

[00:43:01]Revelation talks about the marriage of the lamb when his people are prepared to stand in his presence when he comes back. Isaiah is describing the same thing here and that that ultimate jubilee when we can stand in Christ's presence and not run away in terror but stand face to face with our our savior.

[00:43:20]That will be a jubilee unlike any other.

[00:43:22]Right?

[00:43:23]>> Verse 11. For as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring forth, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth where?

[00:43:37]Before all nations.

[00:43:39]This is why this is why God promises to give you victory over your sins right now while we're still in this world. Because his glory has to be seen before all the nations, before all those people that say, "It's not possible. I don't want to serve this God." Forget it. Right? God is going to prove his point in front of the entire world.

[00:44:07]This is why he doesn't say, "Well, I'll give you victory, but you got to get up to heaven first." Right? That won't be before all nations. It's going to happen here, and it can happen for each one of us as we claim the promises of God.

[00:44:21]Now our last passage, go to Revelation chapter 6.

[00:44:27]Revelation chapter 6, beginning in verse number 12. This describes the very final events that happen here before or as Jesus is coming back. We'll read the last five or so verses. Revelation 6:12. And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and lo, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackloth of hair, and the moon became as blood, and the stars of heaven fell under the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. Verse 14 goes on, "And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

[00:45:10]and the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief captains and the mighty men and every bond man and every free man hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains and they said to the mountains and the rocks fall on us and hide us from the face of him that siteth on the throne and from the wrath of the lamb for the great day of his wrath has come and who shall be able to stand now the question is hanging out there right who can stand in God's presence when he comes back and the answer is given in the first three verses of the next chapter revelation chapter And those verses talk about the seal of God.

[00:45:45]Now in Isaiah 61, it said God will establish his people like a tree, right?

[00:45:51]He will give them his covenant. The question is asked or it's the command is given in Revelation 7:1. After these things, I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth holding the four winds of the earth that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on what?

[00:46:09]any tree.

[00:46:12]Now, God does care about physical creation, but he's talking about people here, right? He is waiting until his people are ready to be sealed.

[00:46:22]And in Psalm chapter 1, it's a short beautiful psalm also saying that God will establish his people like trees.

[00:46:30]Verse two, another angel ascends from the east having the seal of the living God. Verse three, and he seals the servants of God in their foreheads.

[00:46:40]Okay, I want to finish by reading Ellen White's commentary on this passage in Revelation that we just read. And she connects all of this with the Jubilee.

[00:46:49]This is from early writings, page 35. In the time of trouble, we all fled from the cities and villages, but were pursued by the wicked who entered the houses of the saints with a sword. They raised the sword to kill us, but it broke and fell as powerless as a straw.

[00:47:04]Then we all cried day and night for deliverance, and the cry came up before God. The sun came up, and the moon stood still. The stream ceased to flow. Dark, heavy clouds came up and clashed against each other. But there was one clear place of settled glory. Wence came the voice of God like many waters, which shook the heavens and the earth. The sky opened and shut, and was in commotion.

[00:47:26]The mountain shook like a reed in the wind, and cast out ragged rocks all around. the sea boiled like a pot and cast out stones upon the land. Is there any doubt that she's talking about the same sequence of events that we just read in Revelation 6 here? It's the same thing, isn't it? What happens next? As God spoke the day and the hour of Jesus's coming and delivered the everlasting covenant to his people.

[00:47:48]Remember Isaiah talked about the covenant being given to his people. He spoke one sentence and then paused while the words were rolling through the earth. The Israel of God stood with their eyes fixed upward, listening to the words as they came from the mouth of Jehovah, and rolled to the earth like peels of loudest thunder. It was awfully solemn. And at the end of every sentence, the saints shouted, "Glory, hallelujah." Their countenances were lighted up with the glory of God, and they shone with the glory as did the face of Moses when he came down from Si.

[00:48:18]The wicked could not look on them for the glory. And when the never- ending blessing was pronounced on those who had honored God in keeping his Sabbath holy, there was a mighty shout of victory over the beast and over his image. And here's what she says next. Then commence the jubilee when all the land should rest.

[00:48:36]So even at the end of time, the great antitypical jubilee that takes place when Jesus comes back, it's connected with the Sabbath, isn't it? It's connected with the kingdom of God, the true theocracy of the universe, and it will write all of the social ills that have plagued our world. Praise God for that, right? No more crying, no more tears, no more death, no more pain. He will fix all of that.

[00:49:05]The good news is that we can live the rest of eternity in a jubilee year that never ends. Right? I look forward to that. I want to be there. I want my family to be there. I want you and your family to be there as well. And I want more people to be there. More people need to know. Amen. So, let's pray that as God prepares us, he will use us to prepare others as well for the true jubilee that is coming someday very soon. That's your desire. Let's stand as we sing our closing hymn together.

[00:49:36]Believe it's God of our fathers [clears throat] number 645.