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The podcast episode delves into the profound historical transitions that characterized the fourth age of the Church, as articulated by Scott Wright. This segment of the discussion builds upon foundational themes established in the preceding episode, wherein the impact of the Black Death and the subsequent sociocultural transformations are meticulously examined. The dialogue highlights the pivotal role of the Black Death, which decimated populations across Eurasia and North Africa, resulting in a catastrophic loss of life that reached upwards of 200 million individuals. This event, coupled with the pervasive famine of the early 14th century, catalyzed a seismic shift in the power dynamics of the Church, ultimately leading to a decline in its authority over European society. Furthermore, the conversation addresses the implications of the Renaissance, a period marked by a resurgence in arts and sciences, which fostered an environment of inquiry and individual interpretation of scripture, thereby diminishing the Church's monopoly on religious knowledge.

As the discussion progresses, the complexities of the Church's internal schisms, particularly the Great Schism of 1054, are scrutinized. This schism not only fragmented the Christian community but also served as a precursor to the broader ecclesiastical challenges that would culminate in the Protestant Reformation. The dialogue underscores the theological and political ramifications of these divisions, as clergy grappled with issues of moral integrity and the encroachment of secular authority upon spiritual governance. The advent of the printing press, introduced by Johannes Gutenberg, emerges as a transformative invention that democratized access to biblical texts, thus empowering individuals to engage with scripture directly—a radical departure from the previous norm where clerical interpretation was paramount.

In conclusion, the episode encapsulates the intricate interplay between historical events and theological evolution within the Church, emphasizing that the crises of the past resonate with contemporary issues facing believers today. The overarching message suggests that understanding these historical precedents not only enriches our comprehension of the Church's trajectory but also informs our responses to current ecclesiastical challenges. The dialogue invites listeners to reflect on their own faith journeys in light of these historical lessons, encouraging a proactive engagement with scripture and a commitment to fostering authentic spiritual practices in a rapidly changing world.

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Welcome to the Kingdom Crossroads Podcast with Pastor Bob Thibodeau.

Pastor Bob conducts personal interviews with Christian influencers from around the globe, helping Christian authors, recording artists, CEOs, entrepreneurs, nonprofit leaders and yes pastors and ministry leaders to get the word out about what they are doing to impact the world with the gospel.

Our podcast has been rated in the top 1/2% of all podcasts in the world by ListenNotes.com so you know your message will be heard.

Now here is your host with today's interview, Pastor Bob Thibodeau.

Hello everyone everywhere.

Pastor Robert Thibodeau here.

Welcome to the Kingdom Crossroads podcast.

Today we're so blessed that you're joining us for part two of what turned into a great three part interview as we are discussing with Scott Wright the fourth age of the church.

And folks, if you missed any of part one, you need to go back and catch up because Scott laid the foundation for what we're going to be talking about today.

I mean we are looking at today.

It's so tempting for me to go back and start talking about what we talked about yesterday.

That's how powerful it was.

But today we're going to be talking about building up to the Renaissance period.

We're talking about the Black Death and we're also going to be talking with Scott about the impact this had on Christianity, on the believers lives as they were basically going through the Dark ages because the Catholic Church would not allow them to possess their own Bible.

Now I don't want to give away more than that.

Let's jump back into the interview now with Scott Wright.

How does the fourth age of the church tie into what we're looking at now in the end times?

Or does it?

Now they still haven't rebuilt the temple, but now it's a lot closer.

And you know that because of those events, those won't happen until the seventh age of the Church.

And in the fourth age of the Church, it's put a stop to.

So I think that's very significant.

I think number two, and I think this is really important, is that there is not only these wars going on between the Byzantines, obviously incorporating the Holy Roman Church as well, and the Arabs, but there is a lot of back and forth between the east and the west.

That is huge because when those split, it also starts to erode some of the power.

And some of this is done over.

This fact.

Okay.

And this would, this would go back and forth for a while, is that it's all about clergy marrying whether they could be married or not.

That becomes a big deal.

And there's other things as well.

And there's lots of little schisms and back and forths.

But here's what's going to happen also during this time.

Eventually we're going to have the Crusades.

Yeah.

And those again, I'm trying to take Jerusalem, take the Holy Land again, trying to force their way in against God's timing.

It doesn't turn out well in the end.

No.

It turns into something that's ugly.

And a lot of people think it's a black mark on Christ.

I'm like, no, it's a black marker on the Church, on the Western Roman Church, not a black mark on Christ.

Amen.

Amen.

They weren't successful, for one thing.

Yeah.

Ultimately they will not be successful and it will increase persecution of Christians as a result.

In no way, shape or form does the Crusades do anything to put a black mark on Christ, but it does on the Church itself.

Amen.

This is a very dark period of the Church.

But here's also, I believe God.

I was just going to ask you, are we as individuals, are we destined to repeat these Church ages but on a smaller scale in our own life?

They, you know, you can look at the patterns and absolutely, you can see this.

I mean, if you're reading the.

About the fourth age of the Church, if you're Actually reading the book of Revelation, chapter 2, verses 18 to 29, it talks about the Jezebelian spirit.

Okay.

It says, you tolerate the woman Jezebel who calls herself a prophetess.

Well, there was a lot of sexual immorality going on with high ranking officials, royalty and clergy during this time.

And there would be a lot of backlash from that.

There would be popes that would come in and try to clean it up and then it would happen again.

And it went back and forth and it was ugly.

So it also went on with royalty who was claiming Christ, but yet they would have multiple partners.

Yeah.

Having children with them.

We know that that happened.

This was not a pretty time.

And think about this.

Think about how a lot of women were probably being used by the enemy, the devil, to try to get with these men and actually control them and how they thought.

Yeah, like that's never happened before.

And I'm being sarcastic here, obviously, but this was going on and it was a huge thing.

And guess what?

Jesus predicted that it would be a huge thing.

Yeah.

Amen.

It's not only immorality of that.

It says to eat food, sacrifice to idols.

So imagine how they were royalty and clergy were gaining that food.

You know, think of all the different ways that they could have been doing that.

Think of feudalism.

It really gets set in stone during this time.

And I mean, feudalism was just a form of slavery.

Yeah, it really was.

Go read about it.

I mean, it's honestly slavery in this country.

The idealism of that came really from feudalism in a way.

You know, the.

Those peasants may not have had shackles and they may not have been called slaves, but they had no choice.

Right, exactly.

That's slavery.

That's bondage.

They either did what they were told or they either were killed or they starved to death.

And that happened.

That was going on a lot.

So we can't.

We.

We have to.

To me, a lot of the roots of the modern slavery in the United States came from feudalism.

Yeah, Amen.

It really did.

And so that was another ugly part of all of this.

And then it's funny how in verse 22, behold, I will cast her onto a bed of sickness.

Well, let me tell you what else happens during this time, all right?

And of course, we go back.

We can go back and look at this.

Food sacrifice to idols.

And they will suffer great.

And all, by the way, they will suffer great tribulation unless they repent of her deeds.

You know what happens during this time?

Yeah.

And it will still linger even past that.

That's just kind of the culminate.

The heart of it in the.

I guess the main part of it is.

Best way to say it.

But during that time we have the bubonic plague, which is the Black Death.

That will lead to 75 to 200 million deaths in Eurasia and North Africa.

That is some 45 to 60% of the population.

And in some places, some locations, it was a higher percentage than that.

That is devastating.

Yeah.

Predicted right here.

I will cast her into a bed of sickness.

That sounds like a bed of sickness to me.

Amen.

And.

And we're looking.

Just to use these terminology, we're looking forward to the same thing in the end times as well.

Exactly.

And I will tell you that this Black Death will help eventually lead to the breakdown of the power of the Roman Church, just like it will.

Just like Italy wrote it in the end times.

It will.

This mass death of a third of humanity is going to lead to the.

Basically the.

The loss of control of these individual governments, forcing the hand of, you know, we need to consolidate things right now.

Yep.

And, you know.

Yep.

Amen.

And they're gonna.

They're going to be thinking about consolidating even spiritual practices.

Yep.

Think about that.

Think of all the parts that will be tied into that.

So, you know, that's something to think about.

And.

Yes.

So you.

You sort of see this pattern that could.

That's going to, in a way, play out later.

That's the papal schism is another sign of the breakdown of the power of the Roman Church.

French monarchy now influencing who the leaders were.

The big.

There is a.

And this is a big deal.

And we're going to start getting the Renaissance during this time.

Okay.

So that's going to start happening.

Then we're also going to get an invention that is going to change humanity forever.

And that is the printing press.

Yeah.

But he gets it financed.

And this is really the key.

Matter of fact, the Adventures of Marco Polo will be the most published or the most printed book other than the Bible during that time.

That will lead Christopher Columbus, in his way of thinking, to go east by selling west, which will eventually allow him to find what's now the modern day, basically Bahamas.

That will lead to the, the flooding out of these Western European empires to go grab resources now in north and South America.

Yeah, and it wasn't.

They weren't going over there for the spread of the gospel initially.

They were going over there to get the gold and bring it back home.

Exactly.

I mean, think about, you know, the dollar sign comes from Spanish silver.

That would have came when Spain was pulling out silver during this time period.

Once they figured out what element it was missing and they put that together and they start coining it, that becomes really the first global unit of trade is Spanish silver.

Okay.

And they start being plundered by pirates.

You know, Britain sending out their pirates to do that and to try to take the Spanish gold because it becomes the universal currency, global currency.

The first you mentioned, you mentioned the Renaissance.

How did that impact the church?

Well, it was a rebirth.

It's really a rebirth of the spread of arts, culture, science, mathematics, technology, philosophy, literature, music, politics and religion.

And it, what it does is it brings a more independent level of thinking in the printing press, allows people to learn how to read.

Because now the church cannot control who's hearing who, what they're being fed.

Fed, okay, by the clergy.

They can read the Bible now for themselves, and they start realizing that there's things that they're not being told.

They're only being told what the church wants them to know, what these clergy, and a lot of times these clergy were being influenced by these local governors as to what they could say and not say.

So they're being influenced.

And now people can read the Bible for themselves.

They can see what's being taught and what's not being taught and what should be being taught.

And again, that.

That relates to what we're seeing today.

Absolutely.

You know, I mean, there's countries, Canada is one of them right now, where you can't preach what's in the Bible without facing backlash on certain subjects.

Just leave it at that.

And I know I was invited to speak to a church up there.

And, and he, the pastor told me, please don't say anything about gays and stuff like that because they'll shut us down.

I mean, he was.

That's the, just the rule of law.

Up there right now.

And this was 10 years ago.

Right.

You know, I mean, that was, you know, and then, as you said, the, the, the being able to read your own Bible instead of relying on them telling you what it says is huge.

But one of the big.

I can't say one of the big concerns I have with the modern church that you see a lot.

Nobody takes their own Bibles to church anymore.

They always put Scriptures up on the screen so you can read it.

Yes.

How do you know it's right?

You know, because you're just taking that person's point of view on it, you know, and, and to me, that is one of the big complaints I got about the modern day church is they try and make it easy.

You know, we'll tell you what it says.

You don't have to worry about lugging your Bible to church.

Lugging your Bible to church.

Exactly.

I think.

Come on.

Yeah.

And you know, when I. Yeah.

Don't get me going down that road, brother.

That is one that just gets under my craw.

That's huge.

When I go to church, I still carry my Bible with me, you know, but it may not be the same version they're reading up there, but that's okay.

Yeah.

I always have my Bible app open and I'm reading different versions of my Bible apps because I like to, I like to compare all the different versions of the Bible.

The different, you know, I like the bsb.

I like the King James.

I like the net version.

I like, I like to read a lot of different versions.

I encourage people to do that.

I know some people are married to a certain version.

I tell them not to be.

Exactly.

Read them all, compare them, and you'll be able to see things and pray over it.

Pray over what you're reading and let the Spirit talk to your heart because that's how you learn the word of God.

That's actually things that I'm going to be teaching in my podcast is how to do that.

Yeah.

Right now I'm walking through and the Holy Spirit's led me to read Judges and the Book of Numbers alongside the book of Revelation, chapter 3, verses 14 through 22, and understand that process that I taught and how that all relates together.

So I'm, I'm doing that right now.

I hadn't even spoke on it because I'm not finished with it.

Right.

And that'll actually be a couple of months before I'm done with that.

But that's the type of thing I'm talking about and kind of relating to what you're saying.

We need to be doing this for ourselves.

And yeah.

We owe a debt of gratitude to Andres Dresden, who financed Joanna's Gutenberg, and a debt of gratitude to Joanna's Gutenberg for doing this.

Yeah, he suffered bad for that.

Oh, my gosh.

These guys were.

They were being persecuted in all kinds of ways for doing this.

Yeah.

Here's something else.

1438 is a big year.

And I want to bring this up.

It's a signature year in the fourth age of the Church, because not only is Gutenberg printing press funded by Drifton, but the Council of Florence affirms the primacy of the Pope over general councils.

And.

And basically what it's doing is just.

It's declaring this whole reunion between the Roman Orthodox Churches.

However, there was one problem with it.

The Orthodox Orthodox Churches did not accept this.

They rejected this.

So.

So that kind of shows some of the degrading power also of the Church.

So you got the Renaissance now you got the printing press, which is really the.

To me, the biggest entity that does this.

But you also had the famine as well as the Black Death.

That kind of really made it happen.

Okay.

Because it breaks down the.

The faith in the Church because they couldn't solve these issues themselves.

Okay.

All right.

And so many people died because of these things.

Well, guess What?

And.

And forgive me if I say that wrong, I'm not.

I don't speak French very well.

That shows the ability of the government's authority to supersede that of the Roman Church.

Now, eventually they would patch this up for a short period of time.

Yeah.

And there were people already against this stuff that was going on in the Church.

He just said out loud and rightfully so.

And.

And we thank him for doing this because he was in a position of power where his voice would have really mattered.

When he posts that, to me, that is kind of like the start of the last little piece of the fourth age of the Church.

It's going to lead into the fifth age of the Church.

Some people say this is the trigger event.

I say no, and I'll tell you why.

And it is because Martin Luther didn't have power there.

The Protestant Reformation is sort of just a.

It's kind of like the warning sign.

What the real power is that's going to flip this age of the Church into the fifth age is the power of Great Britain.

Great Britain is the most dominant modern nation in the modern era of history.

I is the way I would say it of world history.

They are the most dominant nation.

And what if you look at Revelation Chapter two, it's all about what's going on in Rome.

It truly is.

If you go and look at Revelation 3, it's all starting and coming through Great Britain.

Amen.

It does.

There's a shift.

And I always find it ironic that back during this fourth state of the Church when they added verses and numbers, because originally the Bible wasn't written like that.

It didn't have verses and chapters and all this other stuff that was put in during this age.

Okay.

A guy by the name of Rabbi Isaac Nathan adds verses to the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament.

Okay.

Later verses will be added.

So that stuff will.

Will come on during this age.

Well, there's some variant for him.

What was the reason for him editing the Bible like that?

Because it was to give.

To give it easier to make reference.

Okay.

It added references.

You know, the Bible wasn't written like that.

It's just like one long scroll.

Each letter was just a long letter.

Yeah, Paul.

Yeah.

The Gospel was the same way in the Old Testament was the same way.

A lot of people think it was written like that.

I'm like, no, it's written on scrolls and papris and all this other stuff.

And God wrote some of it on stone.

The important stuff.

Exactly.

You know, hey, it was set in stone.

That's literally what that comes from.

That's right, exactly.

So, but, but these things were added to give reference, and so that's why they did it.

And, and for good reason.

I mean, now we can use chapter, verse, and it's easier for us to, to do that.

And now with age, the advent of computers, the way we can break things down because of that is insane.

Mathematics controls the way we think.

Yeah.

We think in very mathematical ways now.

Very linear, very organized ways of thinking that may not have existed.

Like they, they didn't think like we do.

That's true.

They didn't have the technology to think that way.

They thought differently.

Just like I talked to people about the Old Testament, the first five books of the Bible in, in the Jewish customs, the first five books of the Bible actually have more importance and are hold to a higher esteem than the other books of the Old Testament.

Yeah, I know a lot of people don't think that way.

We're like, oh no, it's all.

But originally, what you got to realize is the first five books of the Bible were actually directly spoken by God.

Yeah, that's his, that's his direct speaking.

Not that he doesn't speak directly in other ways and sometimes speak directly in those other books of the Bible, but all of it was directly from God.

Yep.

Every aspect there was.

There wasn't a human element to it other than Moses just recording what God was telling him to say.

Yep, Amen.

And to write.

That's it.

So yeah, that's the difference.

And so we have to remember that.

And really all the other books of both the Old and New Testament, they are centered around those first five books of the Bible.

Yeah.

Amen.

You know, you mentioned, you mentioned about the, you know, is written one continuous scroll.

And yes, one letter is one letter.

It wasn't broken up chapter and verse.

No.

And sometimes people lose track of that.

And you know, and sometimes when I'm up preaching and I'll, I'll be preaching on a certain topic and I'll tell them, you know, now skip, you know where it says chapter two, Just skip over that and just keep reading it like it was one continuous thing because it makes more sense.

And I was just studying this.

It's funny you mentioned this guy just.

I was just studying this a few days back in Hebrews chapter one and chapter two.

You know, I'll just go, Hebrews chapter one, verse, you know, 13.

But to which of the angels did he ever say at any time, sit on my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool.

Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them who should be heirs of salvation?

And that's where people stop.

And then tomorrow they come back up and they pick up.

Chapter two says, therefore we ought to give more earnestly to things we've heard less than any time we let them slip.

But that word, therefore, you have to back up to see what it's there for.

Right.

And that's why I say it's just one continuous thought.

And it makes so much more sense when we say, are they not all ministering spirits set forth to minister to them who are heirs of salvation.

Therefore, we should give more sort of the things which we've heard less than any time.

We should let them slip.

You know, it's one continuous thought, but when chapter and verse are brought into it, it breaks it up.

And it doesn't make, as it's not as powerful a statement.

We'll put it like that, you know.

Exactly.

So that's exactly what you're talking about.

When you said that, it just made me think about, you know, I just read.

And that was the perfect example.

Exactly.

I mean, you, you hit the nail on the head.

And so there's some great things that come out, and this is part of that.

These are some really good things that come out of this age of the church.

And, and Jesus did not totally condemn every aspect of this church.

You know, he did.

There were some pluses as well.

You know, there's some pros and cons here, which is in every age of the church.

If you re.

If you really read it and study it, there's pros and cons.

However he.

He puts his foot down on this church, he's like, enough is enough.

I've given you plenty of time.

If you read verse 21, even though I have given her time to repent of her immorality, she is unwilling.

That shows that he gave this church plenty of time.

Well, this church is going to last literally a thousand years.

This age of the church.

Is it to me, is right on that same level of Martin Luther's 95 thesis, because it's going to create an amazing change while Constantinople is going to be taken over by the Muslims and the Byzantine Empire is going to fall and be destroyed.

Basically.

It's going to end it.

It's going to lead to the age of exploration because it's going to cut off all the trade routes between east and west, Forcing.

Yeah, guys like Christopher Columbus to go east.

Go west.

To go east.

Yeah.

That's what it does.

It changes how they do things, which is going to lead to the discovery of the Americas.

Yeah.

Now I will tell you, the Knights Templars were already coming over here, which also comes out of the sage of the church.

Yep.

Yeah, they were already coming over here.

They have a lot of evidence to show that it's not just conspiracy.

They just weren't publicizing it.

Christopher Columbus makes it a public spectacle.

And now all the Western European empires have to fight for these resources because they're fighting each other.

They don't want to get.

They don't want to let another country get the upper hand on them.

Yep.

Amen.

And that's exactly what happens here.

That competition leads to all of this.

Hey, folks, Pastor Bob here at war all that time again for this portion of this great interview discussing the fourth church age with Scott Wright.

Now, this is part two of what turned into a great three part interview.

So you do not want to miss the final episode as we conclude our discussion on this.

But today he just laid out about the Black Death and the great famine.

These are just a shadow, folks, of things that are coming in the great tribulation.

Then we get to the Renaissance period and that is just something that totally transformed our thinking.

The believers were grasping more detail.

And then the printing press, when the printing press was invented, that removed the power from the Catholic Church.

It removed the power that they were withholding the gospel from the people.

And now the people could get their own Bibles in their hands.

That is a significant moment in church history.

It really is.

And he goes into more details on all this.

And we will be concluding this interview in the very next episode.

So you don't want to miss it.

In the meantime, drop down the show notes, click the links right there.

Get in touch with Scott.

Be sure to order a copy of his book, but be sure to come back for the conclusion of this great interview in the very next episode.

Till then, it's Pastor Bob.

Romania.

Be blessed in all that you do.

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