Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the judgment of the great prostitute who is seated on many waters, with whom the kings of the earth have committed sexual immorality, and with the wine of whose sexual immorality the dwellers on earth have become drunk.”  And he carried me away in the Spirit into a wilderness, and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names, and it had seven heads and ten horns. The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her sexual immorality. And on her forehead was written a name of mystery: “Babylon the great, mother of prostitutes and of earth’s abominations.”  And I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. When I saw her, I marveled greatly. – Revelation 17:1-6 ESV

Warrior;

The Bible talks about Babylon the Great all throughout the book of Revelation. It is written: Then another angel, a second one, followed, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who has made all nations drink the wine of the passion of her immorality [corrupting them with idolatry].” (Revelation 14:8) The book of Revelation is how things end.  It is the eschatological ending of what began in Genesis.  But Babylon is talked about all through the Bible. Hear the Word of the Lord, “Announce and declare to the nations; lift up a banner and proclaim it; hold nothing back when you say, ‘Babylon is captured; Bel is put to shame; Marduk is shattered, her images are disgraced, her idols are broken in pieces.’ (Jeremiah 50:2) She saw that because faithless Israel had committed adultery, I gave her a certificate of divorce and sent her away. Yet that unfaithful sister Judah had no fear and prostituted herself as well. Indifferent to her own infidelity, Israel had defiled the land and committed adultery with stones and trees. Yet in spite of all this, her unfaithful sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but only in pretense,” declares the LORD. (Jeremiah 3:8-10) Notice the common theme of harlotry and adultery with stones and trees. This is symbolic of false religion. Revelation 17:1 says Babylon the Great sits on many waters. The term “many waters” refers to “peoples, multitudes, nations and tongues”. Revelation 18:24 says in her is found the blood of the prophets and saints. Jesus said the religious leaders would be guilty of the “blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world” (Luke 11:47-51). This Babylon the great is also called the “Mother of Harlots” (Rev. 17:5). 

Leader, the word Babylon is a shadow, it has become synonymous with false religious systems. Where did it all begin?  In the Book of Genesis, where everything began. The word Genesis means beginning, and so it is the book of beginnings. It is written: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters. (Genesis 1:1-2) In Genesis we find the beginning of our introduction to God, we find the beginning of the universe, the beginning of man, the beginning of sin, the beginning of God’s redemption, the beginning of confusion and the beginning of a relationship with God and the beginning of religion.  Religion being defined as man’s attempt to MAKE GOD accept him, mandate God’s approval. It is written: At one time all the people of the world spoke the same language and used the same words. As the people migrated to the east, they found a plain in the land of Babylonia and settled there. They began saying to each other, “Let’s make bricks and harden them with fire.” (In this region bricks were used instead of stone, and tar was used for mortar.) Then they said, “Come, let’s build a great city for ourselves with a tower that reaches into the sky. This will make us famous and keep us from being scattered all over the world.” But the LORD came down to look at the city and the tower the people were building. “Look!” he said. “The people are united, and they all speak the same language. After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them! Come, let’s go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won’t be able to understand each other.” In that way, the LORD scattered them all over the world, and they stopped building the city. That is why the city was called Babel, because that is where the LORD confused the people with different languages. In this way he scattered them all over the world. (Genesis 11:1-8) The beginning is right here.  Babylon was the first great empire and NIMROD, later deified as Tammuz, was its first leader. It was the beginning of the false religious systems as they had journeyed from the place on Ararat where the ark had rested and some of them came. into the plain of Shinar.  Still upset about the destruction of the world by God, they decided there to build a civilization and then to make a tower whose top would reach to the heavens a tower by which they might touch God.

Conduit, this was the beginning of the false religious systems as they had journeyed from the place on Ararat where the ark had rested. some of them came into the plain of Shinar where they disobeyed God and did not cover the earth, instead they decided there to build a civilization and then to make a tower whose top would reach to the heavens a tower by which they might touch God. Hear the word of the LORD, “Then God blessed Noah and his sons and told them, “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth.” (Genesis 9:1) The Tower of Babel, was a typical Babylonian ziggurat, which were places of worship, the study of the stars and their endeavor to ‘touch God’, and thus the beginning of the false religious systems- all of the false religions of the world follow a similar pattern they start with the earth base and then they attempt from there to reach heaven. It is man’s effort to mandate God’s acceptance of man. There is within man a built in DESIRE after God. A desire to reach out and to touch God.  God put into every man’s nature the innate need for God. The psalmist expressed it; thus, “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? (Psalm 42:1-2) Babel which literally means the ‘gate of heaven’, was changed by man- it is a word today synonymous with confusion though originally the word meant gate to heaven. That is why it is called Babylon…Babel on! Christianity has its base in God, not in man. For God so loved the world that he reached out and sent his only begotten Son. God reaching down to you, reaching out to you. That’s the story of Christianity. Religion is the story of man reaching out to God. This is the gift of Christmas.  God came after man! God never intended Christianity to be a religion. And as man has made a religion out of it, he has brought confusion because religion always leads to confusion. True Christianity is not a religion. True Christianity bears some similarities to religion, in that it is a system of belief that demands faith to receive but that’s where the similarity ends. Religion starts with an earth base in the endeavor to build ‘the tower’ to touch heaven Christianity starts with a divine base.  Jesus’ ministry is reconciliation. Jesus IS the bridge, The God Man.  Jesus is the REASON for the SEASON, and Jesus is our STRONG TOWER, connecting an unrighteous man to a RIGHTEOUS GOD.  The gift of JESUS, of REDEMPTION is priceless, and it is unmerited!  Hear the Word of the Lord, “Blessed [gratefully praised and adored] be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant and boundless mercy has caused us to be born again [that is, to be reborn from above—spiritually transformed, renewed, and set apart for His purpose] to an ever-living hope and confident assurance through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1 Peter 1:3) – the Babe in the Manger!