Sermon for Pilgrim Church May 2022
We know from chapter 12 that the one behind the persecution of Christians is the devil. Chapter 13 gives us an explanation of how the devil accomplishes his evil work. He does so through corrupt government and false religion, both of which are called beasts in this chapter.
1 The dragon stood on the shore of the sea. And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on its horns, and on each head a blasphemous name. 2 The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority. (Rev. 13:1-2 NIV).
The sea in Revelation is a place of evil. We already saw that the sea monster in the OT represents evil kingdoms opposed to God’s people. And out of the sea comes a beast. There are two beasts in chapter 13 and both resemble the beasts in Daniel’s visions. Daniel saw four beasts in Dan 7 and each came out of the sea. The first was like a lion, the second like a bear, the third like a leopard and the fourth had iron teeth. A series of horns appeared on the beasts. These beasts represent different kingdoms, each of which will eventually be crushed by the kingdom of God. The first beast in Rev 13:1-2 seems like a conglomeration of all these beasts from Daniel, including the fact there it has ten horns and seven heads.
There is a strong similarity between the dragon in chapter 12 and the beast in chapter 13. The dragon has “seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads” (12:3) and the beast has “ten horns and seven heads and ten crowns on its horns”. The number seven and the number ten both imply that the power of the dragon and the beast is total. The whole earth is subject to them. The crowns represent rule, although the rule of the beast is not legitimate as such because he has usurped the rule of the Lord Jesus over the earth. The blasphemous names the beast has written on his heads indicate that he is utterly opposed to God in what he thinks and does. His power does not come from God but from the dragon. The dragon gives the beast his power, rule and authority.
Many people have associated the beast with the Roman empire and particular Roman emperors, especially Nero. However, the fact that the different beasts from Daniel are merged into one here implies that this is not one ruler at one particular time only, but many earthly kingdoms over many centuries until the end of the age, all of who rule in opposition to God’s rule. If we associate the beast only with one particular person, we end up back in the space where nothing in the book makes any sense before the last five minutes of history. Rather, Revelation is intended to encourage the saints throughout history.
3 One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast. 4 People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?” (Rev. 13:3-4 NIV)
This passage has been associated with Nero, who died by his own hand and was rumoured to have returned to life. But that is too narrow an interpretation. Instead, we should think in terms of the parallels between Christ and the beast. Jesus is the Lamb who has been slain and is alive again (5:6) while the beast seems to have died and been healed (13:3). The beast forces people to receive his mark (13:16). But the saints are marked with the name of Jesus and God the Father (14:1). Christ has a throne (5:6) and the beast has crowns (13:1). Jesus was slain to redeem people from every tribe, language and nation (5:9; 7:9) and the beast has authority over people from every tribe, language and nation (13:7). The saints worship the Lamb (5:8-14) and the people of the earth worship the beast (13:4, 8). Effectively, the beast is a false Christ. We know that there have been and will be many false Christs because Jesus said, “For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect” (Matt. 24:24 NIV). There may be a final and ultimate antichrist at the end of history, but there are many in history who fit the description of the beast.
The dragon has been defeated and yet continues to work his evil work through the beast. This is manifested in the beast and his actions in government. This is a parody of the resurrection of Christ. The difference between the resurrection of Jesus and the beast recovering from his mortal wound is that Jesus is alive forever, but the beast is as defeated as the dragon and can rule only for a set amount of time.
The people of the earth live under the deception of the devil and only the gospel and the Holy Spirit can open their eyes. Consequently, they worship the beast and also the dragon because he is the power behind the beast. When they ask “Who is like the beast?” they are making the beast out to be god. The OT often asks the question, “Who is like the LORD?” (Exod 15:11, Ps 35:10; 71:19; 89:6; 113:5) saying in effect that the LORD is above all gods. To ask this question of the beast is simply blasphemous.
5 The beast was given a mouth to utter proud words and blasphemies and to exercise its authority for forty-two months. 6 It opened its mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander his name and his dwelling place and those who live in heaven. 7 It was given power to wage war against God’s holy people and to conquer them. And it was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation. 8 All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast– all whose names have not been written in the Lamb’s book of life, the Lamb who was slain from the creation of the world. (Rev. 13:5-8 NIV)
The key to this passage is the words “it was given”. The beast was given a mouth to utter blasphemy, he was given authority to rule, he was given power to wage war against the saints, and he was given authority over all other people. None of these things belong to the beast by right. He has been given them by God, who has true sovereignty over all, and they are temporary. The time limit is 42 months. 42 months is the same as times, time and half a time, or 3 ½ years. We have seen these numbers before and they represent the time of tribulation, that is, the church age. This may seem like a long time, but it is a finite time. What the beast has is not eternal, but will come to an end. Then he will be subject to judgment by God. This is our assurance that this evil will not last.
The people of the Lamb are contrasted again with the people who dwell on the earth. The people who dwell on the earth do not have their names in the Lamb’s book of life. They do not have eternal life. Therefore, they are fooled by the beast and worship him. They love the beast. Only the people whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life can understand what is going on in the world, that is, only they can see the devil behind the scenes. The people who do not have their names in the book of life are given over by God to a great delusion (2 Thess 2:9-11). The gospel alone opens eyes.
9 Whoever has ears, let them hear. 10 “If anyone is to go into captivity, into captivity they will go. If anyone is to be killed with the sword, with the sword they will be killed.” This calls for patient endurance and faithfulness on the part of God’s people. (Rev. 13:9-10 NIV)
This is an allusion to Jer 15:2 and 43:11. When Judah was faithless and brought under judgement, many were killed by the sword and many were sent into captivity in Babylon. But it was not merely the wicked who experienced these things. The righteous also experienced these punishments, most obviously the prophets who announced the judgments. In the same way, the saints are godly and worship the true God, but they must live in a world under judgment and therefore experience suffering for their faith (see 1:9; 2:10; 6:9; 11:7; 12:11; 17:6; 19:2; 20:4). This truth must be heeded: “Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear.” Knowing that God has decreed that the church will suffer is not the same as saying that the devil wants to kill us all. The devil is simply out to destroy us. But the devil’s power is limited by God. On the other hand, God’s plan for his people is good and will result in our maturity and holiness. God is to be trusted because his promise of eternal life in Christ is true. We can trust in God to use our suffering for good and we can trust that he will bring about the end of our suffering.
The final exhortation to patient endurance and faithfulness is a very clear indication to me that there is no rapture of the church away from the tribulation. We must go through it, not escape it. If the church is going to be taken away from all this and the world left to suffer, then why would we be told to endure suffering patiently?
11 Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon. 12 It exercised all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. 13 And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the earth in full view of the people. 14 Because of the signs it was given power to perform on behalf of the first beast, it deceived the inhabitants of the earth. It ordered them to set up an image in honour of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. 15 The second beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed. 16 It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17 so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name. (Rev. 13:11-17 NIV).
Now there is a second beast. This one is described differently but is no less demonic. The first beast is a conglomeration of the four beasts in Dan 7. The second beast is like the beasts in Dan 8 (in which there is a ram and a goat, both with horns). We have already met the Lamb in Revelation and he is the Lord Jesus Christ, the one who was slain for sinners. The second beast is a parody of the true Lamb of God. Being like a lamb, he looks innocent, but in fact he is more of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. He spoke like a dragon because he is the instrument of the devil himself. Later in the book he is called the false prophet (16:13; 19:20; 20:10) and here it is clear that false religion is his primary way of controlling the world. He makes the people who live on the earth worship the first beast. He does this in various ways.
He does great signs and deceives people with them. Just like the true prophets of God in chapter 11, the second beast calls fire down from heaven. The fire in chapter 11 was the word of God convicting sinners. The fire here must therefore be a false word from God. False religions are everywhere. In the West we tend to bastardise eastern religions and make them suit our hedonism. These can serve the second beast as well as anything. However, there is reason to believe that the second beast operates within the church, not merely outside it.
The second beast demands that the people set up an image/idol of the first beast. In the ancient world it was not unusual to find images of kings around the place. King Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon made an image and demanded that people worship it on pain of death (Dan 3). In our time, the images are less concrete and probably more subtle. However, there are constant demands on Christians to compromise by falling into line with the cultural expectations around us. Right now I think the most pressing demand is to give up on a Christian view of human sexuality and acquiesce to the LGBTQ agenda. That this is an idolatrous agenda is evident in Rom 1:18ff. Various laws have been enacted to stop Christians from teaching the truth about human sexuality, that people are made male and female. Victoria is leading the way and WA will probably follow suit soon if they have not already. Will we be killed for not worshipping the image of the beast? At this point in history, no. But we don’t know what will happen in the future.
The second beast heads a false church, modelled on the true church and which is very impressive. Many will believe that this is a true church. It is within the church that the antichrist does the most damage. The model of the antichrist is Antiochus Epiphanes. He was a second century BC Greek king who ruled over and persecuted Jews. He took away the sacrifices from the temple and sacrificed a pig on the altar to Zeus. At one point he set up an image of Zeus in the temple and believed himself to be a manifestation of Zeus. His title means “God manifest”. He wanted the whole of his empire to embrace Greek culture and insisted on it. He is clearly not the final antichrist, assuming there is one. The false prophet does a very similar thing. Just as Antiochus Epiphanes set up and image within the temple, the beast will set up an image inside the church and demand that the church worship it. This image is probably not a literal statue. This is what we must be on the alert for, that we are not deceived by charismatic people who lead the church astray.[1]
Now we have come to possibly the most well-known passage in Revelation, the mark of the beast. “16 It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17 so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name.”
The mark is possibly a reference to a tattoo people would receive either as a disobedient slave or as a devoted follower of some pagan god. Either way the people who worship the beast belong to him. As the people of God are all sealed by God, so too the people who dwell on the earth receive the mark of the beast. There are really only two options in life: either follow the Lord Jesus and receive his seal, or follow the beast and receive his mark. I don’t believe that anyone actually knows that is what they are doing. None of us were conscious of the angel of God sealing us before we entered into the tribulation. And none of the people who dwell on the earth give worshipping the beast a second thought. They just do it because that is what sinners do. The mark is not a visible thing any more than the seal of God is a visible thing. What can be seen is whether a person worships the beast and his image or whether the person refuses to worship the beast because he or she only worships Jesus.
The idea that the mark of the beast is a cashless society or that it is the bar codes on products or even that it is a covid vaccine is far too narrow. If it were these things, then Christians could simply avoid one thing. However, it is much more subtle because it involves a long series of compromises with the world. For the early church, it was not possible to buy or sell without the mark of the beast because idols were everywhere and they could not participate in idol worship. Christians would not participate in the idol sacrifices in the meat market. They would not sacrifice to Caesar and so were excluded from the community and its economic activity. If a person were a member of a trade guild, he would have to participate in idol worship. To withdraw from these would mean no work and hence no income. The mark of the beast is something which marks a person as complicit in the culture of idol worship that the followers of the beast find natural.
We have different choices to make about what we do and don’t participate in. Decades ago, I listened to an American Christian, who worked for Voice of the Martyrs. Tom White was in jail in Cuba for 18 months because his plane crashed while dropping evangelistic leaflets on Cuba. Every day they asked him to make a video denouncing the US and every day he refused. He said that choices in prison were narrow and simple, but choices outside of prison were much harder. There is no one choice to be made to avoid the mark of the beast. There are choices to be made day after day. The point is that compromise with the world will make life easier, but since we are God’s and don’t belong to the beast, we must continually choose to live like those who belong to the Lamb.
18 This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666. (Rev. 13:18 NIV).
The number of the beast is something which people find endlessly fascinating. People try to find names to ascribe to it. The way this is done is by using either the Hebrew or the Greek alphabet system of using letters as numbers. This is called gematria. Some names fit the schema if you write the name in Hebrew letters, such as Nero Caesar or Mohammed. More recent historical examples are Hitler and Pol Pot. With these names, it often requires a certain amount of cheating to make the name fit the number. As much as it might be fun to do this sort of calculation, this is probably not the point. The number is symbolic like every other number in the book. 666 is the number of a man, that is, the number of mankind in general. More specifically it refers to fallen humanity. The beast is representative of fallen humans. He wants to be the image of God, even a god himself, but he continually fails at this. If 7 is the number of God, 6 is the number that falls short of God. 666 is a parody of the trinity of three sevens. It is interesting that Jesus’ name when spelled in Greek comes to 888.[2] (Note that this does not work for Hebrew spelling). This would imply that Jesus is greater than perfect, rather than sinners who fall short of perfection.
But, the point of giving us the number of the beast is not so that we can look for names in Hebrew or Greek to find the antichrist. The point is that we should discern the deception of the beast and resist it. The spirit of the antichrist can be anywhere, even in the church (see 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; 2 John 1:7). Instead of looking for a person with the right name, look for subtle opposition to God. This may be in deceptive teaching that is human-centred or money-grabbing. It may be in worship that is directed towards a person. It may be in distortion or misuse of the Bible for evil ends. These things are found in the church or what calls itself the church. They are found in cults and they are also found in things which look like good things but can be turned into idols. I love watching minimalist videos, but minimalism can become a religion. It may not be intrinsically evil, but people make good things into idols in place of God. When that happens, the beast is at work drawing people away from the true God.