As the year draws to a close, so too does our Bible reading schedule.

And I want to thank you, everyone who joined us in 2024 in the Navigator's Bible reading plan.

As we get this late in the year, we find ourselves in the final chapters of Revelation,

tomorrow reading Revelation 17 together, a chapter on the mind

of Dan, who is a new listener to the podcast. Welcome, Dan. He asks this, Pastor John,

hello, and thank you for taking my question. This year of 2024 turned out to be another

tense year in geopolitics with two wars happening. At least.

At least, yeah, civil war in Sudan as well.

Leading to lots of talk about the breakout of World War III overgrowing tensions between the United States and the West against China and Russia and North Korea and Iran.

I think I used to understand God's relationship to the rulers of superpowers of this world

as predictive he was sovereign in that he foreknew what global rulers would freely do. Then I

encountered Revelation 1717. This verse stopped me in my tracks. Everything has changed for me. Can you explain the meaning of this text,

whether it generally explains how things work today? And if so, what rule God is playing in

geopolitics right now? Well, before we cut to the question and actually quote the text,

so people will know what he's asking about. Let me celebrate Dan's

submission to the particularity of biblical teaching. Oh, how I love this. Oh, how needed this is.

So many people today are treating the Bible as a kind of non-directive, open-ended story that people can

mold into whatever view of God or ethics they want. But the Bible, in fact, is made up of sentences

and paragraphs that have intentional meanings from God-inspired authors,

and we ought to bring our lives into submission to what those sentences truly teach.

What I long for and pray for, Tony, in our APJ listeners, is that they would be faithful readers of their

Bibles.

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