Terry Dashner……………….Faith Fellowship Church PO Box 1586 Broken Arrow, OK 74013

Evening services have concluded. Let me get back to what I was arguing earlier. The events of history didn’t happen by luck. They were guided along by hand of Providence. God is bringing all things into swallow of His Glorious Kingdom. After all, we’ve been asking God to bring forth His Kingdom on earth “…as it is in Heaven…” for 2000 years. He does hear and answer prayers you know; therefore, He’s over riding events of humankind for His Sovereign purpose and will until earth becomes His Kingdom completely. God always gets what He wants.

Consider this. What if Phoenicians had not been sea lovers? How far would Reformers have traveled had they not built on sea-voyaging expertise of ancient Phoenicians? Once again author Bill Yenne writes, “Early human civilizations had little contact with cultures other than those immediately adjacent to them geographically. This continued to be true even after rise of great civilizations in Egypt and Mesopotamia.

“The Phoenician fleet—which included military as well as commercial vessels—visited practically every port of any size on both sides of Mediterranean. The fleet sailed beyond Straits of Gibraltar into Atlantic Ocean and called at ports in northern Europe and down coast of Africa.”

Terry Dashner…………………..Faith Fellowship Church PO Box 1586 Broken Arrow, OK 74013

One gentile ruler down and here comes another one. Just like God allowed it, no doubt.

Here comes Daniel’s leopard to pounce on world. (The leopard is one of four gentile powers to rule over Israel throughout world history as stated in Book of Daniel.) His name was Alexander. Let me tell you a little bit about him.

His father was Philip of Macedonia. He brought all of Greece under his rule just before he was assassinated in 336 BC. The great philosopher Aristotle tutored young Alexander. At 20 Alexander succeeded his famous father. Alexander defeated Darius III (558-486BC) in Battle of Issus in 333 BC, Persian Empire crumbled. By time Alexander was 33, he ruled 50 times as much land and 20 times as many people as had existed in empire he inherited from Philip. The territory included Greece, Egypt, all of former Persian Empire and all of what we think of today as Middle East.

Now question I raise is this: How could a man (a young man at that) conquer that much territory in just 13 years if he had been guided simply by luck? He was not just fortuitous in his exploits. God allowed him to move swiftly across world just like Daniel’s “leopard” because it was in His plan. (I hope I’m not being too dogmatic for you. Once again having survived 50 years on this planet, I’m convinced, more than ever, that God rules over affairs of men.) “Even today” says Bill Yenne, “…almost two dozen centuries later, he [Alexander Great] has barely half a dozen rivals to this achievement.

“However, true importance of Alexander’s empire was that for first time, there could be a free exchange of ideas between two different cultures. Unlike most other victorious leaders, Alexander was not only receptive to ideas of his conquered peoples but adopted ideas he learned from Persian political organization. On other hand, Greek art influenced art of India. Before his untimely death of natural causes at age 33, Alexander also built city of Alexandria in Egypt, whose great library survived for a thousand years and which evolved into greatest center of learning in world.”