This is “The End Times In Our Time”. Esther is a type of the end times church. She’s going through life staying away from controversy and just trying to stay off the radar. She looks great and she’s playing her role. The modern-day church looks good—beautiful buildings but the culture remains unaffected. God did not call us to have a church to have a “beauty contest.” We are called to far more. We were made for more. We are under attack but yet we remain silent in our churches and in our daily lives. Buts, like Esther, we were made for such a time as this. It’s not just about you anymore. We have been through difficult times but we can’t allow those times to make us stronger—not weaker. Jesus says that the end times will have difficult times rapidly. The end times are upon us. You cannot be a part of the beauty contest of doing church. These are extremely unusual times and we are so insulated from the trouble and pain of millions of people all over the world today. We have to start paying attention. We have to pray and worship like never before. Jesus is coming again and we have to reach the unsaved right now. Take note of the moment we are in. Embrace the challenge to wake up and get in the game. This is not the time to slumber.
>> Hello and welcome
to Kingdom Connection.
Thank you so much
for joining me today.
I believe you need a fresh
word from God.
A word that is relevant
to what you’re facing
in your life, and that’s why
I believe you’ve tuned in
to this program.
Let His word speak to you today.
♪ ♪
>> If you have your Bibles,
I wanna just highlight several
scriptures for the sake of time.
This is the story of Esther,
chapter one starts out in
a beauty contest.
The king is a bachelor,
and he wants a wife and there’s
127 provinces and they send
the most beautiful girl
in their area to win
the bachelor.
That’s not a new television
series, it’s in the Bible.
And the one that wins
the beauty contest
is a girl named Esther.
But then troubles comes,
and Haman, a killer, and evil,
evil wicked man devises a plan
to destroy all the Jews.
We pick up the story in
verse four, “When Mordecai
learned all that had happened,
he tore his clothes,
put on sackcloth and ashes,
when out into the midst
of the city.”
Listen, “He cried out with
a loud and bitter cry.
He went from the front
of the king’s gate, no one might
enter the king’s gate
clothed in sackcloth.
And in every province where
the king’s and decree arrived,
there were – there was fasting,
weeping, and wailing and many
lay in sackcloth and ashes.”
Notice verse four,
something I’d not seen
before and,
“Esther’s maids and eunuchs
came and told her, and the queen
was deeply distressed.
Then she sent garments
to clothe Mordecai.”
“She sent garments to clothe
Mordecai and take his sackcloth
away from him, but he
would not accept them.”
Quickly move to verse 11
and there it says, she said,
“There’s a law that says I can’t
go in and fight for our lives,
I can’t go in and fight
for the Jewish people because
I’ll be put to death unless
the king extends his scepter.”
And then, that powerful verse,
verse 13.
“Mordecai told them to answer
Esther: “Do not think in your
heart that you will escape
in the king’s palace any more
than any of the other Jews.
For if you remain completely
silent at this time,
relief and deliverance will
arise from the Jews from another
place, but you and your father’s
house will perish.
Yet who knows whether you have
come to the kingdom for such
a time as this?”
It’s amazing that this story
starts out with
a beauty contest.
I think Esther is a type
of the church, I believe she’s
the type of the Last Day Church.
I believe she’s a type
of the church and the culture
of the church in the time
when Christ, the king,
will come again.
And notice what she’s
consumed with.
She’s involved in a beauty
contest, she’s all dressed up,
she’s playing the role of queen,
she’s taken beauty baths
if you read it.
She’s relaxed, she doesn’t
want to get involved,
she doesn’t want to get into
controversy, she doesn’t want
to use her voice.
She’s silent.
There’s treacherous,
dangerous things happening
in the nation and she is in
a beauty contest.
Sounds like the church,
the modern-day church has
beautiful buildings
and beautiful music,
beautiful people.
There’s the steeple,
and there’s the doors,
open up the doors and there’s
all the hot people,
the good-looking people,
the well dressed, fit people.
They come to church,
and they leave,
it’s a beauty contest.
Culture is unaffected, week –
the whole week is unaffected.
There’s a beauty contest.
But there comes a time in
a nation and there comes a time
in the kingdom when God says,
“The beauty contest is over.”
I believe we’re living
in that day where no longer
can the church just be
a beauty contest.
Of beautiful buildings,
and beautiful music
but nothing changes.
What amazed me is Mordecai gets
a burden and tears his clothes
and he challenges Esther
to come out of the
beauty contest
and get into the fight.
The fight for the nation,
the fight for the sons
and the daughters, the children
and the grandchildren.
The generations to come
that would perish.
“You cannot remain silent.”
He began to cry out.
And I believe that there
are thousands of pastors
in America who need – I’m one
of you, I don’t put down
and criticize pastors,
but I’m giving a call today.
I feel like I’m an old man
for a reason, I feel like I’m 59
and about to turn 60 this year
and I have the right.
I’ve been pastoring the same
church for 34 years,
I have a right to speak
like a father now.
And if ever pastors needed
direction, it is now.
If we don’t get involved,
we’re gonna lose our children
and our children’s children.
We’re gonna lose freedom
of speech, we gonna lose
freedom of religion,
we gonna lose freedom
of worship, we going to lose it.
It’s not something you can
just go through like
a beauty contest and say,
“That’s not my problem,
we don’t mix our faith with
nothing – it’s just,
we’re just here.”
What did Mordecai say to Esther?
He said, “You have come
to the kingdom for
such a time as this.
Not to be a beauty contestant.”
And you know that when she
heard that he had torn
his clothes and put on sackcloth
and ashes, the next part
of the verse amazed me.
The scripture said,
“And she sent to him garments.”
“She sent to him garments.”
New garments, she said,
“Just put on some glad rags.
Just cover it up.
Just let the church kind of do
their thing and sing the songs
and preach the little message
and everybody have burnt
some candles and do whatever
you wanna do and
then just go home.
Put on new garments, put on
some glad rags, just put a smile
on your face, just get up
and preach the messages of seven
ways to enjoy your vacation.”
We need more than that.
The end times are happening
in our times.
If you can’t see it,
if you can’t see the threat of
the freedom, if you can’t see
what is going on in the world
and it’s like the church
is totally disconnected.
Family’s falling apart,
marriages falling apart,
culture changing, redefining
of genders and all kinds
of things happening.
And people like Elon Musk,
who’s not even claims to be
a Christian, he’s fighting
for freedom of speech while
the church is quiet and doesn’t
want to offend and doesn’t
want anybody – may we might
lose people.
You came to the wrong church.
We are not that silent church,
we have come to the kingdom.
God has given us this to affect
this nation and this world.
We’re not ashamed of the gospel
of Jesus Christ.
[applause]
It’s real and I’m not –
I’m not preaching today
to get you whipped up.
I’m preaching today
to get you woke up.
Real wokeness needs
to hit the church.
I love it when Billy Graham
used to get up, when he was
alive and he would say one
thing over and over if you watch
any of his old clips
of sermons he would say,
“And the Bible says!”
And the Bi – it doesn’t matter
what my opinion is
of gay marriage or transgender.
I don’t have an opinion,
my opinion is what
the Bible says.
The Bible says.
The Bible says, “I’m not gonna
be mean, I’m not gonna be ugly,
I’m not gonna harass.”
But you have a right
to live like you live,
post anything you want to post
but you don’t have a right
to cancel me and say I can’t
say, “The Bible says.”
It’s called freedom of speech
and it ought to unite
every American to say,
“We will fight for this.”
Live any way you want to live,
live in and let live
but don’t say, “You can’t have
a voice, but I can.”
And I won’t say,
“I can and you can’t.”
That’s called freedom.
But what touched me was Esther
arose and I saw something
else I’d not seen because
the scripture said she said,
“But you don’t understand
Mordecai, I can’t go in
to the king because they
passed a law.”
You ever read that?
She says, “There’s a law
that says I can’t go in
to the king.”
And I love Mordecai’s response.
He says, “You need to test
that law if it’s out of line
with what’s God’s telling you.”
And it’s time to test some laws.
When grown men want to get
in your teenagers –
girls locker room and bathroom,
it’s time to test that law.
When – I don’t understand,
I don’t understand.
Those, I’m not against the jab,
I’m not against the needle,
I’m not against the shot,
I’ve had it twice.
People in my family,
my daughter, my – some of my
people have had the shot.
It’s not an issue for me,
I don’t care.
What I don’t understand
is apparently Covid can be
spread and all over the place
except at the border.
If we would just go to
the border apparently you don’t
need a jab, you don’t need
a mask, you can come in great
numbers by the millions
illegally into the nation.
You can bring drugs,
you can bring criminals,
you can bring gang members,
nobody will get Covid.
Something is crazy going
on and while we sit back and in
one month an entire –
I’m not against my precious
Hispanic people,
I love the people and some
of them are precious and some
of them should come legally
to this nation.
But what I don’t understand
is how is this happening.
How can a whole city,
the city a size of Atlanta comes
in illegally – we don’t know
who’s coming in.
They know of 50 on the terrorist
list that are in this nation
and if they blow up
your kids’ high school,
then maybe we will wake up.
Then maybe we will realize,
and the church is just in
a beauty contest and we’re
just quiet.
And we don’t know how to pray,
and we don’t need prayer
meetings and we don’t need
preachers to get up and –
we just want you to be
non-controversial.
I am non-controversial.
There’s one way, there’s one
truth, there’s one life,
his name is Jesus,
and all must repent.
But even the Bible said,
“Put watchmen on the walls
and make sure you don’t let
just anything come
into your nation.”
Well, I’m a watchman
and you’re a watchman and it’s
time to get on the walls
and realize what’s happening
to our educational system.
What’s happening in our law
system, what’s happening
when you go on Mdweb.com.
If there’s anywhere you ought
to feel safe
is medicaldoctorweb.com
and you see something that
people with great intelligence
and know the human body.
One of the first forms,
if you want information,
check your gender, male,
female, neutral.
And I’m not against the shot,
but the same voices that scream,
“My body, my choice.”
When it comes to abortion,
say, “No.
But if you don’t – you don’t
get my body, my choice and if
you don’t take the shot.”
If you’re a nurse and a doctor,
a hero who save lives
during the pandemic,
you are fired.
And you say,
“That’s not happening.”
We had two nurses,
a man and a – and his wife,
both registered nurses
in our campus in OC.
Both of them fired
from Sinai hospital
in Los Angeles, fired because
they worked all the way through
the pandemic, received
the highest accreditations
at one of the most reputable
hospitals in the nation
but fired because they would not
take the shot in their body.
All I’m saying is this,
that is a precursor
of the mark of the beast.
If you won’t take –
“It was a trial run, it was just
will they go along with it.”
And if you don’t, we don’t
care about your family
nurse, we don’t care about
whether you put food on the
table, we don’t care if you
don’t get out and end up in
a tent outside homeless.
We want you to lose your
salary, we want you to not
be able to buy and eat
and take care of your family
even though you’ve been a hero
and you’ve been working on sick
people while we were sitting
home watching Netflix.
Come on folks,
I’m preaching the truth.
Something is wrong and we’re
getting more and more muzzled,
this is not China yet.
This is not Russia yet
and we refuse to sit silent,
we have come to the kingdom
for such a time as this.
And it’s time for the church
to speak up.
Speak up.
[applause]
I just want to say today
that the censorship
that is starting small,
but it always takes more ground
and more ground and more ground.
While its people just sit back
and let it happen.
What they really hate is not
the church as a historical
building in their city,
they hate the preaching
of the word of God.
And when you understand
what he said to them,
this is what he said, he said,
“I need you now to unite,
we no longer have the luxury
of disunity, we no longer can
be left wing, right wing,
democrat, republican, Black,
White, Asian, Indian,
we can’t do that.
We must come under one thing
and understand our very
existence is on the line.
If we’re going to preserve
this nation, if we’re going
to preserve the constitution,
if we’re going to preserve
the freedom of speech,
the freedom of worship,
the freedom of whatever it is.
The justice that we desire,
even though it’s not
a perfect system,
it is the most close thing
to perfection of any government
on the planet
and in human history.
The nation that you live
in is a great nation,
the nation that you live
in still says, “You can dream,
and you can do.”
And I realize there are
disadvantages, I’m not blind
to that, understand that but
somewhere we have allowed
teachers, unions and leaders
of those unions to erase
the good history of America.
And they said, “If you don’t
get in this fight and we don’t
create the war machine
of freedom, we’ll lose it all.”
And the same applies
to the pastors that will not
stand against
the lies of censorship.
I love what Mordecai told
Esther, he said, “There’s
a decree to kill all the Jews.”
And she said, “Well, the law
says I’ll die if I go in
without permission.”
And Mordecai just kind of looks
at her and says, “You gonna die,
’cause you’re a Jew.
Now if you go in, you got
a chance that he might hear you.
But if you don’t go in,
you gonna die.”
I wanna say it’s coming to
your family.
It’s coming to your home,
it’s coming to our state,
we are watching things before
us and we just sit quiet,
and nobody says anything,
and we come to church and we
hear another thing and blah,
blah, blah.
And I – I don’t know, I just
feel like if I’ve got
any influence, I’m so old
I don’t care anymore.
I don’t care, I don’t care.
And Covid’s so wrecked
the church that I used to preach
to empty seats, every week
for almost two years.
In this place, we just recorded,
and nobody came,
you didn’t need to come.
And I’ve I guess I’ve been
there and now it’s full again
and this is awesome
but I don’t preach for crowds,
I preach because I really
that I’mma stand before
the Lord one of these days
and I cannot look my children
and my grandchildren
in the eye and say,
“I left you a nation without
freedom of worship,
freedom of speech,
freedom of prayer,
freedom to speak up
and say, ‘The Bible says.'”
[applause]
The Bible says.
Turn to somebody and say,
“The Bible says.”
“Thou shalt
not commit adultery.”
“Thou shalt not steal.”
“Thou shalt not lie.”
“Thou shalt not have
no other God’s before thee.”
The Bible says!
[applause]
“Thou shalt honor thy father
and they mother.”
“Thou shalt remember
the Sabbath
and keep it holy!”
Playing games, right?
Just like Jesus said,
“They’ll be going, giving in
marriage, taken in marriage,
having entertainment, going
down to the mountains,
going to the beach when suddenly
in an hour that you think not
the son of man cometh.”
He’s coming just like he said,
it – we’re on the verge,
the Russian bear is on the move
just like Ezekiel 38
and 39 said, it would happen
just like China has become
a prominent force.
He said, “The kings of the east
will unite with the kings
of the north.”
If – directly from Jerusalem,
if you look on a map,
totally north,
is Russia.
Russia.
What it – Iran is mentioned
in the Ezekiel 38 when Russia
starts moving, China will come
alongside them.
They have not been silent since
the Soviet Union
has been dismantled.
They’ve been pulling together
their extreme Muslim nations
like Syria.
Did you know that Russia
has an airport with their
fighter jets in Syria?
Do you understand that Syria
is bordered right up to Israel
and that is the battle
of Gog and Magog?
And is it gon’ happen –
is this the one?
No, I don’t believe this
is the one, but I believe that
the Anti-Christ, spirit stirring
President Putin of Russia
to get the armies ready,
to keep moving, to start
the march because they’re really
not fighting and
hating the Ukraine.
They don’t know that
there’s a demon
that hates Israel.
I gotta quit, y’all.
I – but you gotta understand,
the end times are happening
in our times and the church
is in a beauty contest.
>> As you listened
to this program today,
I really believe that the
Holy Spirit knows how to
direct a sermon and a message
right to the area of your life,
and this is so important,
at the right time.
Maybe you’re watching me
right now,
there’s no doubt about it,
someone’s watching me right now
and you desperately need
a change in your life,
and what I just preached
has touched your heart,
and you’re on the brink
of a miracle called salvation.
Forgiveness, mercy, and grace.
Open up your heart,
pray this prayer with me.
Say, “Jesus.”
Just say those words.
“Jesus, I receive you
as my Lord and Savior.
Wash me and cleanse me,
forgive me, and restore
and renew me.
Thank you for mercy,
thank you for grace,
thank you for the love of God
that will never let us go.
I receive that love,
that forgiveness
in Jesus’ mighty name.”
Amen and amen.
Thank you so much for watching.
You know, when you watch
this program, it only comes
to you —
we’ve been doing this
for a long time,
for decades, and it’s because
people like you hear
the messages week after week,
and say, “I want to be
a part of that ministry.”
We are 100% funded by viewers
who watch this program.
That’s why we have committed
a one million dollar gift
to the Ukraine.
Through your help,
we have been able to already
send over $600,000 to
80 churches in the Ukraine.
that have been turned
into refugee camps.
This is the real deal,
and it’s beautiful ministry,
and we’re so honored
and proud to stand
hand-in-hand with our Ukrainian
friends there,
Christian brothers and sisters
and show the love of God
to that nation that is going
through a living hell.
Help me today.
If God speaks to your heart.
I’m not going to tell you
what to give,
I’m gonna ask you to ask God
what you should give.
And I believe it’ll be
more than enough.
We’re gonna reach,
we’re close to it,
that million dollar gift
completed.
What a miracle.
Only God could do that.
Most importantly,
those refugee centers
that we’re supporting
preach the Gospel of
Jesus Christ and souls
are being saved every day
as they’re handing out food
and supplies,
they’re handing out Bibles,
and telling them about
a Jesus who loves them.
Help us today,
I know God’ll bless you for it.
Thank you so much,
and we’ll see you next time
on Kingdom Connection.
>> The war in Ukraine
rages on.
Millions of Ukrainian people
have been displaced.
They have lost everything.
They are now refugees,
just trying to survive.
Jentezen Franklin
Media Ministries
has taken action from the
start of this war.
Immediately, we partnered
with over 80 churches
in Ukraine who have been
taking in these
precious refugees.
These churches have opened up
their doors to provide food,
medicine, and safe shelter
to these desperate families.
So far we have sent $1,000,000
and have heard hundreds
of stories from people
who are so thankful
for your generosity.
The war is not over,
and neither is our work.
We need your help during
this refugee crisis.
There are millions of more
mothers, children, and even
elderly who need a safe place
to go.
When you give $50 or more
this month, we want to send you
a copy of Jentezen Franklin’s
brand new book,
Overcoming When You
Feel Overwhelmed.
Millions of Ukrainian refugees
need your help.
This is your opportunity
to be the hands and feet
of Jesus.
Call now or go online today.
>> I’m excited for you
to get a copy of my latest book,
“Overcoming When You
Feel Overwhelmed.”
Sometimes life throws multiple
things at you all at once.
Have you ever been there?
Have you ever felt like
there’s no way out of this?
With everything happening,
it’s so easy to feel
completely overwhelmed.
That’s why the title is,
“Overcoming When You
Feel Overwhelmed.”
And it’s not a fake feeling,
you absolutely feel like
you can’t hardly go forward.
Yet, God’s Word gives
a road map to victory.
This is a must book
that you need to read that’s
gonna change your whole
perspective on trouble
and what to do when
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>> Available now at Amazon
or anywhere books are sold.
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
Get up on your feet,
put your hands up.
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
We hope you’ve enjoyed
this teaching
by Jentezen Franklin.
For more information
about this message,
and other ministry resources,
visit us online
at JentezenFranklin.tv.