Revelation 13:11-17 The Mark Of The Beast /Greg Bahnsen {Part 49 of 63}

Let's begin with a word of prayer. Our Father, we pray that you would teach us to be faithful to you by this lesson from your word this morning. We pray that you'd forgive us of all the many times that we have compromised our faith, that we've been untrue to the faith. We, in one way or another have departed from that path of obedience that you've laid before us to walk in. We ask you, Lord, that you'd forgive us for this faithlessness and that you would see the faithfulness of your Son, Jesus Christ in our behalf. We thank you for his perfect righteousness and his obedience imputed to us, for we would lay hold on him in faith this day, seeing in him the only way of salvation, the only way that we can be made right with you. Lord, we praise you for your grace and your mercy, that you would make us right with you, that you should take the initiative in loving us and thereby showing what a faithful God you are. We thank you for your covenant faithfulness this day. We pray that you might bless us through your word. For it's in Jesus name that we ask all these things. Amen. We're in Revelation, the 13th chapter again this morning, and I'd like to read the chapter over again so that we have it in mind the basic points that John's trying to make about the Antichrist, or perhaps better, the beast of Revelation. And then we'll do a little bit of review from last week and continue at Revelation 13, beginning at verse one. And he stood upon the sand of the sea, and I saw a beast coming up out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads, and on his horns ten diadems, and upon his heads names of blasphemy. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and and his mouth is the mouth of a lion. And the dragon gave him his power and his throne and great authority. And I saw one of his heads as though it had been smitten unto death. And his death stroke was healed, and the whole earth wondered after the beast. And they worshipped the dragon, because he gave his authority unto the beast. And they worshipped the beast, saying, who is like unto the beast? And who is able to war with him? And there was given to him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies. And there was given to him authority to continue 42 months. And he opened his mouth for blasphemies against God, to blaspheme his name and his tabernacle, even them that dwell in the heaven. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And there was given to him authority over every tribe, and people, and tongue and nation. And all that dwell on the earth shall worship him. Every one whose name hath not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life. Of the lamb that hath been slain, if any man hath an ear, let him hear. If any man is for captivity, and to captivity he goeth. If any man shall kill with the sword, with the sword must he be killed. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints. And I saw another beast coming up out of the earth. And he had two horns like unto a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. And he exercised all the authority of the first beast in his sight. And he makes the earth and them that dwell therein to worship the first beast, and whose death stroke was healed. And he does great signs that he should even make fire to come down out of heaven upon the earth in the sight of men. And he deceives them that dwell on the earth by reason of the signs which it was given him to do in the sight of the beast, saying to them that dwell on the earth that they should make an image to the beast who hath the stroke of the sword and lived. And it was given unto him to give breath to it, even to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause that as many as should not worship the image of the beast should be killed. And and he caused all, the small and the great, the rich and the poor, the free, and the bond that there be given them a mark on their right hand and upon their forehead, that no man should be able to buy or to sell, save him that hath the mark of the beast, even the name of the beast and the number of his name. Here is wisdom. He that hath understanding, let him count the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666. One of the more awesome chapters of the Bible, to be sure. Also one of the more debated chapters of the Bible, as I explained to you last week as we began our exploration of it. Revelation 13, as you know, shows us the second great enemy of God's people in the ancient world or in the early Church. The second great enemy of God's people that had to be overcome in order for the church to thrive and survive. The first great enemy of God's people, taken up earlier in the book of Revelation is who? Once again, that's right, the apostate Jews centered where? In Jerusalem. And what judgment will God bring upon Jerusalem for its persecution of the Christians, its destruction? Is that something that we await? It happened in AD 70. Is it necessary for God to repeat that to make prophecy good? It's already been fulfilled. See, if we look at what God predicted he would do to our enemies back in the early days of the Church, we are to look upon the Book of Revelation as Jesus said we should look upon all fulfilled prophecy as an encouragement to us that God is faithful to his word. God never abandons his people in that day. It must have been very difficult for a Jewish to become a Christian, especially when you see all of his fellow countrymen. Well, not all, but he would be surrounded with fellow countrymen who would be taunting him for doing that, for saying that he had really departed from the true faith, that he was in trouble with God and with man. And the temptation was there for a Jew had become a Christian to go back into Judaism. We know the book of Hebrews addresses that very problem in chapter 6. Especially Christians or Christian Jews are warned about going back into the elementary points of the faith, back into the Jewish religion, when they've had the superiority of Jesus Christ made clear to them. So there would have been a great deal of pressure upon Christians to compromise. And they may well have wondered when the Jewish people began to persecute the church, when Christians were being killed for their faith and at the hands of those who claimed to be the very people of God from many, many years past. It would have been easy for people to think that they had made a mistake, that maybe God didn't care that he had withdrawn his support for the Church, that he wasn't present there, and that he wasn't supervising the events of that day in a way that indicated the truth of the Christian religion. And so John writes the Revelation and he indicates that God is indeed going to vindicate his saints, that the blood that is at the foot of the altar, the golden altar in heaven, the blood of the saints cries out just as the blood of Abel cried out in the Old Testament. And God hears that cry, and God will answer it. And what is it that they cry out, the martyrs? What do the Christians cry out according to the Book of Revelation? How long, O Lord the Almighty, how long do we have to wait for this vindication, for this turning of events? And finally the point comes from the Book of Revelation, where God says, and time shall be no more, a verse that's very often been misinterpreted to mean that somehow the conditions of creaturely existence will be passed and the new Jerusalem or something, that they'll no longer be the succession of moments that we call time. Well, that isn't what the verse is saying at all. What it's saying is that the time of waiting is now past. There'll be no further time, no further delay. God is now going to decisively act. And when God decisively acts, he does vindicate his Saints. And in AD 70, we know that the city of Jerusalem fell. Jesus had said this would happen. In fact, Jesus told his followers that when they saw the the Roman army surrounding Jerusalem, they knew that it was time for them to take off for the hills. And they did. History tells us they fled to Pella. In Revelation the 12th chapter, we read that this is precisely what took place when Satan attempted to persecute the people of God. They fled into the wilderness. And Satan cast forth from his mouth a river of water by which he wanted to drown the Christians, which is metaphorical. I think of the Exodus. He was trying to destroy them as he did it, tried to destroy the Jews at the Red Sea. And God delivered them well. Since Satan was not successful in destroying the church in Jerusalem, since they escaped and the Roman armies vindicated the blood of the saints by destroying the apostate Jews, then the very last verse of Revelation 12 tells us Satan has a new plan. And the dragon waxed wroth with the woman he was mad with the faithful woman that is the bride of God, and went away to make war with the rest of her seed. The rest of her seed, then not the Jewish Christians who had fled, but now the Gentile Church as a whole. And it's interesting that we're not only told that it's the Gentile Church, but we're told what characterizes those who are members of the church, those that keep the commandments of God and hold the testimony of Jesus. It's very difficult to sustain, in terms of New Testament teaching, a Christianity that is lawless. It's not by any means a new idea that we're under grace and therefore not under law, meaning thereby that we are directed somehow by an inner dynamic of the Spirit which doesn't have an external, objective, verbalizable pattern of behavior, that the Spirit just kind of is an inner compass or something like that for the Christian. From the very beginning of the church down through our own day, any number of Christian groups would teach that the commandments of God are something to be put aside. We are not under Law. We're under grace, after all, which is a perversion of the Pauline teaching in Romans 6. But let that pass for the time being. The. The church here is designated the faithful Church is those who keep the testimony of Jesus. And that cannot be expunged. It cannot be suppressed and ought not to be de. Emphasized. So that's fine. But I want to point out that those who keep the testimony of Jesus are those who keep his commandments. In the Book of Hebrews, chapter 5, verse 9, we read that Christ became a savior unto all those who obey Him. Let's look at that very quickly. And having been made perfect, he became unto all them that obey him the author of eternal salvation. Does this in any sense challenge the Pauline teaching that we are saved by faith, for by grace are ye saved through faith, and that it's the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast, is now the author of Hebrews being concerned with the Jews falling back into what is sometimes called an Old Testament perspective on salvation. We're saved by works. We're saved by obeying the law. No. Well, just think of the Pauline teaching. We are saved by grace through the instrumentality of faith. But to what end? For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. According to verse 10 of Ephesians 2. The purpose of salvation is not to save us from the law, which is the very standard that we have violated and puts us in need of salvation. The purpose of salvation is to save us that we might be able to keep the law. In fact, that's what Paul is saying in Romans 6. The reason why we're under grace and not under law, because law is impotent to bring about obedience. The reason we're under grace, he states, we're under grace is because we're no longer the slaves of sin. And sin, of course, is lawlessness. And so when God saves us by his free grace and through the instrumentality of faith, he creates us new people. He gives us a new heart on which is written his law, according to the teaching of the prophets and the apostles, so that we might keep it. And Hebrews is reflecting on that when it identifies those who have received the eternal salvation of which Christ is the author, identifies them in terms of their obedience to him. Jesus said in the upper room three times before he went to the cross, if you love me, keep my commandments. And so here John is only being faithful to what he had learned in the upper room, faithful to the teaching of Paul and the other apostles. When he says that the rest of the woman's seed, the Gentile Church, are those who hold the testimony of Jesus and keep the commandments of God. All right, and now we're introduced to the second enemy. We know the Gentile church is going to be the object of Satan's wrath. And he's going to use the instrumentality of this second enemy, the beast, the beast that I have identified in the past as the Roman Empire and Satan stood upon the sand of the sea. And John saw a beast coming up out of the sea and having ten horns, seven heads, and on his horns ten diadems, and upon his head names of blasphemy. The beast arises from the sea. It's as though you must think geographically as Satan stands on the sand of the sea. What sea are we talking about? That's the well known sea. It's called the sea often in the Bible just because of that. It's the Mediterranean Sea, which of course is one of the borders of Israel. And so Satan stands upon the sand of the Mediterranean Sea and, and up out of the sea, see over on the horizon, arises then this beast from where? I mean, when you stand on the sand of the sea in Israel, do you turn to the west or to the east to look at the sea? That's not a tough question. Now come on everybody, wake up. That's right, you turn west. Okay. And as you look across the Mediterranean Sea to the west, what do you find? Italy. And out of the sea arises the beast. Okay, so I'm beginning to just have you go through phenomenologically, if you will. I won't bother to explain that word, experience, if you will, what John must have experienced as he looks then and sees the beast arising out of the sea with Satan almost, you know, beckoning his henchmen to come forth. And the beast that comes forth has 10 horns, which indicates what horn is a symbol of strength or power or might. And having 10, he has complete strength. To use the traditional numerological symbol. He is a very strong or fierce beast and he has seven heads. What does that mean? A head is a sign of life or a source of life. Often in biblical symbol has seven heads. It's kind of like, you know, we say a cat has nine lives. That's really a weak and crippled analogy, but it will help you to understand what John's trying to say. And this beast has seven heads. I mean, it just seems that it has vitality that can hardly be suppressed, you know, the ancient mythological monster. I'm going to forget what it is The Hydra. Is that right? What would happen when you cut off one of the heads of the Hydra? Two would replace it. Two would replace it. Right now, we don't have any of that sort of thing explained explicitly, but the idea of the multiple heads gives the idea that this beast, you see, is very hard to kill. He's mighty, he's hard to kill, and he has 10 horns and 10 diadems and upon his head, names of blasphemy. I've explained already the names of blasphemy. The Roman emperors were in the common. It was common for them to be designated as divine or as God. They were worshipped as gods. In fact, it was required of the early Christians that they would offer incense to the God of the Roman Caesar. And if they would not do this, then they would be considered disloyal to the empire and traitors, and they would be executed. So the names of blasphemy and the diadems, we're told, are upon his horns. Did I explain that last week? I can't recall now whether I did or not. This is not really very encouraging to not hear you answer that. Okay, let's do a little bit of reading here from Rushduni's commentary on Revelation. Thy kingdom come. Finding my page number for a second. The fact that the crowns or the diadems were upon the horns is significant because ordinarily, the crowns or the diadems would be upon the head, you see, of whoever rules. But John is trying to point out that this beast rules. The diadem rules in terms of his horns, and the horns being a symbol of what? Of might or strength. And so I think Russ Jr puts his finger on it very well when he says the fact that the horns, rather than the heads, are crowned signifies that in this world, power is the source of authority and sovereignty. And men give obedience not to legitimate leadership, but to power. As such might makes right, and might is worshiped and obeyed. In its every implication, the names of blasphemy indicate that human governments arrogate to themselves the authority and the sovereignty which properly belongs to God. This is true not only of kings and dictators, but of democracies also, with their blasphemous doctrine. Vox populi vox dei, the voice of the people is the voice of God. So the beast comes forth from Italy, from Rome. He's a very powerful beast. He's hard to kill. He has names of blasphemy. He rules in terms of arrogating to himself divine prerogatives. And the principle of his rule is Might makes right, which fits in well with the programs of the Roman Empire as we know them from history. But it's not just the Roman Empire. Last week I went into some detail, talking about the principles and presuppositions of humanism. What is the basic. What would you call the basic or the essential doctrine or axiom of humanism? It can be put any number of ways. So, I mean, put it in your own words. That's okay. Man is the measure. Man is the measure of all things. That's, of course, a classic way of expressing it in terms of the sophist doctrine of the ancient Greek philosophers. Man becomes the rule. Man becomes the law. Man becomes the standard by which we measure all things. Whereas humanism goes beyond saying that man is simply the standard. Humanism also maintains that man is capable of taking care of all of his problems in terms of his own standards, in terms of his own analysis, in terms of his own programs for salvation. Any examples of humanism come to your mind today as being present in our own culture? The who, the movies. Okay, that's right. Mass media today, newspapers as well, certainly present man as the standard of all things. I mean, the sexual promiscuity of the movie is just to take one element of that is justified in terms of, well, if it brings man pleasure, doesn't hurt anybody, if it's an expression of love, all of which are understood in human terms in terms of what is beneficial to man on a horizontal plane, then it's all right. Do governments express humanistic creeds and procedures today? Secular education was at one time in this country thought early in this century, especially thought to be the be all and end all for taking care of the problems of society. If but children would learn to be socialized, if they would only learn to be productive, good citizens in a democracy. John Dewey said, if the public schools would but serve that purpose, then we would await a golden age and a. A new Jerusalem on earth. Anybody want to make an assessment of where the public schools stand? At the very end of the 1970s, very few schools today in major cities don't have policemen assigned to them to take care of the crime in the hallways and to protect the teachers from abuse. The educational level is deplorable. In the public schools, virtually nothing is taught because children who will not be submissive are not made to be so. The standards of the humanist, you see, have worked out, as Rushduni said also in a quote from last week, toward their epistemological self consciousness. What is epistemological self consciousness? Now I want somebody to tell me, and I won't tell you today. Okay, Epistemology is the doctrine of knowledge or theory of knowledge. How do you know things? And what is epistemological self consciousness? Working out the implications of that. That's right. Working out and feeling and experiencing the implications of one's own theory of knowledge. Well, the secular theory of knowledge says that the fear of the Lord is not the beginning of knowledge after all. Maybe the end of knowledge, although we doubt it. We think, you know, science and evolution and all the rest have made it very hard to believe the Bible. But certainly the fear of the Lord is not the beginning of knowledge. And so if the fear of the Lord is not the beginning of knowledge, what's the standard of knowledge? What's the standard of morality? What's the standard of social progress? Well, man is. That's just humanism again, man is the measure. And so the public schools have ingrained that in a generation of students. And the outcome was the counterculture of the 1960s, I believe. And now what is really the death of the schools financially and morally in the 1970s? Well, anyway, I don't wish to get off into another subject altogether, but we need to have some illustration of what John is talking about in terms of the outworking of these names of blasphemy and the power of the beast. Epistemological self consciousness of humanism is a principle being taught here. But now, historically, and more particularly, it's the Roman Empire that's being criticized. John says, the beast which I saw was like a leopard. His feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth, the mouth of a lion and the dragon gave him his power and his throne and. And his great authority. The beast is the epitome of the four beasts that arose from the ocean. In Daniel's prophecy of the pagan empires that would arise after his day. The Roman Empire summarizes all the evil that was in those former empires. And we learned that he receives his power. The Roman Empire received its power, its throne and authority from the dragon itself. There was an alliance between Satan and. And the Roman Empire. I don't mean that you have to think in Fausti in terms of a pact with the devil, necessarily that, you know, the devil appeared to the Caesar and made some kind of an agreement in a literal sense. But John sees the impelling power and the. And the energy behind the Roman Empire and its policies as being Satan himself. John goes on in verse three to say, I saw one of his heads as though it had been Smitten unto death, its deathstroke was healed, and the whole earth wondered after the beast. Remember here that the deathstroke is a deathstroke to one of the heads. And what survives is not the head, but is the beast. You see, that comes close to the Hydra myth, the idea that if you kill one head, then two come up. The idea is if you kill a head, it keeps living. There's nine lives to the cat. And this beast here has seven heads, and one was killed with a deathstroke. Later we see it was the stroke of a sword. I think an indication of Nero's own method of suicide. But the beast lived on. There was great turmoil in the Roman Empire after Nero died. Nevertheless, the beast lived on. It regained itself. It regrouped its forces and went on to continue its persecution and its deplorable policies. And verse 4 says they worshiped the dragon because he gave his authority into the beast. Okay, so Satan received praise for this, and they worshiped the beast, saying, who is like the beast and who is able to war with him? The idea is that nobody can overcome this kind of power. And if nothing else, you can sympathize with that today because any number of us know what it is. You know, who can fight city hall? That's just. But a very, very small, I think, version of the same kind of feeling. Well, who can overcome the beast? I mean, who can fight against this kind of enemy? I mean, he has, look at that, seven heads and horns and diadems and names of blasphemies. Just such a powerful, mighty sort of thing. Who can overcome him? Who can make war with the beast? Verse 5 says that there was a mouth given to the beast. Now, this is a common Semitic phrase. Giving somebody a mouth or someone taking a mouth and opening his mouth and speaking means that one goes on and on with a long discourse. And Jesus opened his mouth, and then he expounded Isaiah and the synagogue according to Luke 4. Okay, so it's a term or a phrase that is denoting or pointing to the fact that this is a long sort of thing. It's not just, you know, one little answer or one little statement, but the. The beast goes on and on and on and on, speaking great things and blasphemies. And he's given authority to continue 42 months. Now, that's interesting, because we know that the persecution of the Christians historically under Nero lasted 42 months. And I think that John is here indicating that the time that God gives over his people to this kind of oppression will be limited, but he wants them to be encouraged all the more. That when they see the exact fulfillment of that, they know that God is sovereignly in control and nothing happens, even the persecution of his people, that he doesn't have some purpose in, and he doesn't have the full reign in his hand on it. And so you'll notice in verse seven all these phrases, and it was given unto him. And it was given unto him. And it was given unto him. And it was given unto him. You see, the beast doesn't operate by himself. The beast is still for all of his pretensions to be God, for all of his arrogating to himself divine prerogatives, the beast is not self sufficient, he's not autonomous, and he's not his own authority, and he's not his own power. God still is in control. God is the one who gives away. God is the one who gives way to the beast. God is the one who gives him his authority and his power and so forth to do these things, but only for 42 months, only for the length of time God ordains. I think at this point it would be well, verse seven. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And it was given to him authority over every tribe, people, tongue and nation. What's indicated here is that the beast rules over a mighty empire. In terms of one way of looking upon the earth anyway, he rules over the entire nations of the world. And as you know, I trust from your ancient history, back in those days, a person who lived beyond the borders of the Roman Empire was considered not to live, you see, in the world. He was something of a barbarian if he didn't, you know, come under the Pax Romana and all the rest. And so the beast rules, you see, in terms of this huge Roman Empire. And John says it's as though he rules over every tribe, people, tongue and nation. He has a mighty empire, an expansive empire. Now verse 8 gives us another designation of those who do not follow the beast. We've already learned that the ones who don't follow the beast are those who keep the testimony of Jesus and the commandments of God. Now John describes him this. All that dwell on the earth shall worship him. Everyone whose name hath not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life, of the Lamb that hath been slain, whose ever name is not written in the Lamb's book of life will give his allegiance to the beast. And of course it's sad for believers to see Many that they presume to have names written in the Lamb's book of Life give their allegiance to the beast. But John's logic is if a man gives his allegiance to the beast, he's not written in the Lamb's book of life, because everybody's going to give that allegiance. But those who are genuine believers, and this is an interesting phrase whose name has been written in the Lamb's Book of life. Actually, John says, speaks of those names that have not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb. Now, there's another way of taking that. Some people say this is their names are written in the. Now I have to reconstruct it. Written in the book of the Lamb, slain from the foundation of the world. All right, the question is, what does from the foundation of the world modify here? Does the right. Was the writing done from the foundation of the world or was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world? Can somebody tell me what the difference is between those two? If the names are written from the beginning and God chose them from the beginning, whereas the other one would indicate that they were not chosen from the beginning, wouldn't necessarily indicate that they weren't chosen, but it would say nothing about their being chosen from the beginning. If you say that the names were written from the foundation of the world, what that means is that God chose his people from the very beginning, from all eternity at the very foundation of the world. God's people were already selected by him or elected by him. To use the theological phrase, God had elected his people. You know very well by now, I'm sure most of you in this class, election doesn't mean God cast his vote and Satan cast vote, and then man makes the difference by breaking the tie. That isn't theological election. Election means God's selection of people out from the midst of humanity. God has elected people, has written certain names in the. In the Lamb's book of life, and he wrote those names from the foundation of the world. It was something that God initiated, it was something that God did from all eternity. Or you can take the phrase now using a different kind of syntax or a different understanding of the syntax that's there. You can take the phrase to mean that Christ was slain from the foundation of the world, that our names as believers are written in the Lamb's book of life. The Lamb who was slain from the foundation of the world. What would that mean? How could Christ be slain from the foundation of the world? Well, now a lot of people and a lot of Reformed people have understood the phrase in that way. And so it does have. I mean, you can. You can give a supposed meaning to that. It would be. That's right. The determination of God from all eternity to save men by slaying his own son. That is the way of salvation was determined from the foundation of the world. That the Lamb was in essence slain. From then there was no question but that God would save in this manner because the Lamb is always seen as the slain Lamb. From all eternity, Christ is viewed as the slain Lamb of God. Now, which is the correct view? It's not as though one's right and one's wrong. They're both correct. The question is, which one is intended by John here? Let me just say my personal feeling is, although I don't think you can be terribly dogmatic, my personal feeling is it's the writing of the names from the foundation of the world. But I don't think anything is lost by saying that. In fact, it's the slaying of the Lamb from the foundation of the world. But you should know that that phrase is understood in two different ways. And someday you may hear a sermon on it one way and another sermon on it another way. The content of both of those sermons will be biblical. But I'm not sure that one of those sermons can in fact claim this passage as its own foundation. Well, let's go on. We have here then, people who have been elect from the foundation of the world, or at least understood their Savior has been set forth from the foundation of the world as one who would die as a lamb. We have these people whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life, those who keep the testimony of Jesus, those who keep the commandments of God on the one hand. On the other hand, we have this beast with his heads and his horns and his diadems and blasphemies, and power and authority given to him from God and all that. I think it's important to jump ahead to verses 16 and 17 to complete the picture of the beast. We learn there that he causes all the small and the great, the rich and the poor, the free, and the bond, that there be given them a mark on their right hand or upon their forehead, and that no man should be able to buy or to sell, save he that hath the mark, even the name of the beast, or the number of his name. If a person is going to have a. The social intercourse and economic industrial kind of communication and relations. If a man is going to enter into the marketplace to buy or to sell. The man is going to get by in society at all, is going to be evident that he belongs to the beast. If nothing else, the mark of the beast is a mark of ownership. Now, I think that's a minimal interpretation. I'm going to interpret it far more radically in a minute. But if nothing else, we know that the Roman Empire, from time to time, tattooed people or put a mark on people as a mark of ownership. All right, which doesn't have the greatest view of human nature. Obviously, some people tattooed and branded like cattle doesn't say a whole lot for the way the master looked upon the slave. But nevertheless, it was a procedure that is somewhat known. But I think it's more here. I think John is saying much more than just Caesar requires all people who wish to get by in society, economically and socially, to belong to him. The mark isn't really a literal mark because the mark here is the name of the beast or the number of his name. And that mark 666, symbolized in 666 goes two very interesting places. It goes on the forehead and it goes on the hand. And what symbolism does that carry? And what is the significance of the symbolism? Well, let's begin with the forehead. If the mark is upon the forehead, if the name is upon the forehead, I think the idea is that the way a man looks at the world, the way a man looks at life, the way he evaluates situations, the way he schematizes things, the way he understands things, the light in which he evaluates everything, is what? The law of the beast or the name of the beast, the philosophy of the beast, okay? So the man looks at all things in light of, if you will, the presuppositions or the premises or the teaching of the beast. Man is the measure. And the beast requires that if you don't take his measure, if you don't take his premises, if you don't take his teaching and outlook as yours, then you shall not have any place in the society. And then secondly, the mark or the name goes on the hand, which means if you wish to operate in this world, then you're going to have to operate in terms of the law of the beast. Whatever you put your hand to, to use the English phrase now, whatever you put your hand to will have to be governed by the law of the beast. And so the law of the beast, you see, is all encompassing. It's an imperial law. And I don't mean because of the Roman Empire. It's imperial in that it doesn't leave Anything out it is imperious. And that is always trying to engulf the whole of life. The beast says, you must see things my way, and you must operate my way, and all of life will come under my law. It's the totalitarian tyranny, you see, of the beast that we're seeing here. His law is supreme. His law is absolute. Nothing can challenge his law. Who can make war with the beast. And his law covers all areas of life, from the thought to the action. So you begin to get what John is saying here about this beast in the Roman Empire. That's a direct parallel or conversion of Deuteronomy states. Well, it's the very next thing in my notes. And so I'm glad I have somebody following along. Very well. Turn now to Deuteronomy 6:8. I hasten to remind you that John was a Jew steeped in the Old Testament scriptures. The vast majority of the imagery of revelation comes directly out of the Old Testament. And therefore I don't believe it's illegitimate at all to turn back and see what the background is is to this kind of symbol. In Deuteronomy 6. 8 we read these words. Well, let's read verse 4 and following to give the whole context. Hear, O Israel, Jehovah, our God is one God, and thou shalt love Jehovah thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words which I command thee this day shall be upon thy heart. And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children. Thou shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thy house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, when thou risest up. Already we see that this law given by God, this word given by God is imperious right. The children are to learn it, no matter where they are, whether they're rising up or laying down, or whether they're in the gate of their house, or whether they're coming into the house, whether they're eating, or whatever they're doing always this law should inform them, this law should guide them. This law should give them the light in which they evaluate all things. And then verse 8 says, and thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thy hand, and they shall be for frontlets between thine eyes. Thou shalt write them upon the doorpost of thy house, and upon thy gates. And so the word of God, the law of God more particularly here. This law of God is to be as the frontlets before the eyes on the forehead, and bound upon the hand, so that whatever the godly person does, he does it in terms of God's law. And. And however he sees things, he sees things in terms of God's law. We begin to see the significance of the fact that John describes those who oppose the beast as those who keep the testimony of Jesus having their names written in the Lamb's book of life, and keep the commandments of God. God's commandments become for the Christian, you see, the way he structures everything, the light in which he evaluates all things. God's word is paramount. God's word is first, is primary. For the Christian, nothing can challenge the word or the law of God. Nothing can bring it into judgment. Nothing, you see, is allowed to challenge the overall authority, the unchallengeable authority of God's direction in our lives. So the law is written on the forehead and upon the hand. And the beast says, no, my law will be written upon your forehead and your hand. And if my law, if my humanistic law, if my man made or man centered, measure and standard is not the standard by which you live, then you shall have no place in society. Then you shall not work, you shall not buy, you shall not eat, and you'll be pushed out of social life altogether, economically speaking. Now, I think that was literally true and fully true in the days of the Roman Empire when Christians lost their lives and their place in society, lost their businesses, many times were alienated from their families. Just because the beast said, you will not bow down to me, you will not live in terms of my law, and therefore you're cast out. I think we shouldn't pass it off simply in terms of that historical fulfillment or the historical situation. I think we ought to stop and think of the application to our own day in our own lives. I grant that there is no one single world power or one single authority even in this nation that has the audacity and the full strength to say, you obey our law, or else. I mean, in this full sense. But are there not those tendencies there? Once we get at the most elementary level? Some of these blank looks make me wonder if you're thinking through what John is saying here. Think of the businessman. Well, I'll give you an example. My brother used to be the manager of a. Well, we don't have the chain here, but it's called Taco Bell. It's like a hamburger stand, but used as Mexican food. And you see, some people are very happy about that. He no longer does that. He teaches school. But anyway, when he was in college, he was the manager of a Taco Bell and he eventually had to quit. I'm very glad that he did so and that he didn't compromise his faith, but just a very minor thing that he was asked to do by his supervisor. His supervisor wanted him to, to simply change the figures every week a little bit on his stock so that it would look like they're selling more tacos or burritos or whatever it was than they really were. It would all work out in the end, but it's just a question of changing the figures on the stock. And when my brother said, no, I can't do that, and then what he was told essentially is if you don't live by my law on your forehead and your hand, then you don't have any place here. And so they parted. All right, so that's just a very, very simple day to day mundane thing. Businessmen run into that all the time. But how about politicians? You know, the name of the game in politics is compromise, isn't it? Isn't that what politics is? After all, it is formally defined by some men and aggressively pursued as the art of compromise. Politics is you have one power group here and another power group here and you find some way to try to give as much as possible to each side. And so everybody's happy with each other. That's politics. And so men don't rule in terms of legitimate authority and principle in law, they rule in terms of what? Expediency? In terms of self gratification, in terms of power. The state tells schools, well, you can have your private Christian school, you can have it. That's fine with us. As long as the school, you know, abides by our standards first, then we don't care what you know in the little area we've left for you after that, we don't care if you carry on your business. The state is very gracious, right? Being the all encompassing authority over every aspect of life, the state considers itself gracious to give a little bit of leeway for a Christian school within certain defined boundaries. Boundaries defined by what? The state. As long as you'll have the Beast Law upon your forehead and your hand, then your Christian school will be all right. One must begin to wonder though, if you follow out the implications, and I mean you have to follow out the implications, it's not just in virtue of this, but if you follow out the implications of submitting to the beast law there, do you have a Christian school at all? John says, look, there is an absolute diametric contrast and you can't have Any middle ground between it. You either have God's law upon your forehead and your hand, or you have the law of the state. Well, now, one other application that also has application today in terms of the way we look upon ethics, social ethics and political ethics in our lives as Christians. Is it possible to have some merger or synthesis between the principles that rule your society as given from a humanistic standpoint, and the law of God? Can a Christian baptize humanism and call it a Christian approach to ethics? We see what that means in terms of, let's say, the outcome, the study of homosexuality in the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America. Most Christians stood back. I think most evangelical Bible believing Christians stood back and said, well, isn't that great? By a margin of 6 to 1, the United Presbyterian Church has said that homosexual relations are not in the will of God. Well, praise the Lord. That is true. That reflects what the Bible says minimally. The Bible goes on to say it's abomination to evah, and that calls for death and all the rest. But nevertheless, it was outside the will of God and it was declared to be so. But then over and above that, the church went on to say, but no man will be in fact disciplined if he's a homosexual. You see, what you have there is baptized humanism. Yeah, the law of God comes in at some point there, but it doesn't have any teeth in it. The law of God doesn't have any effect. It's not really the standard by which we live. The standard by which we live is live and let live toleration. And so that if a man is declared homosexual in the church, it would be unchristian to discipline him. Or if a person wants to join the church, or if there's a church that wants to be in fact a homosexual church, Presbyterians can't say anything adverse to that. And so what looks publicly like such a grand thing, 6 to 1. The United Presbyterian Church condemns homosexuality, condemns it on paper, but won't live by that condemnation in terms of the life of the church and the life of individuals. Now, I tell you that John is trying to make it very clear to you that upon your forehead and your hand, on your activities as well as your thoughts, it will either be the law of God that guides you or the law of man. It will be the law of the state, ultimately. Okay, so enough about the beast and the conflict between the beasts. By the way, that conflict comes out again in chapter 14. At the beginning of chapter 14, John says, and I Saw and behold the Lamb standing on the Mount Zion. And with him 140 and 4,000 having his name and the name of his Father written on their foreheads. And then, Let me see, I think it's verse. Yes, verse 12 of chapter 14. Here is the patience of the saints, they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. Okay, John says, and Satan stood upon the sand of the sea. That is, he's on the Mediterranean Sea. And we look across and see the beast arising over from the realm of Rome. So the beast is standing upon the sand of the sea. I mean the dragon, Satan is standing upon the sand of the sea and the beast is coming at his bidding. And then chapter 14, John says, and I saw and behold on Mount Zion. Where's Mount Zion? What is Mount Zion? Don't everybody rush to answer at once. Now come on, where's Mount Zion? Jerusalem. That's right, it's Jerusalem. And more particularly, what hill in Jerusalem is Mount Zion? It's obvious what is exalted above the mountains. The hill of God's own choosing, where he sets his name. It's the hill on which the Jerusalem Temple sits. Well, John says, now think of this. I mean, it makes a great movie. I mean, John seeing this all worked out, he sees Satan on the sand of the seashore, the Mediterranean Sea. And he turns and on Mount Zion you see the very holiest place allegedly in Jerusalem. There's the Lamb. And who's with the beast? Well, all the nations of the world that have upon their forehead and hand his commandments and his name and his law. And John sees on Mount Zion 144,000 saints, the church universal, faithful to the testimony of Jesus and the commandments of God. And if you think there's going to be any synthesis, if you think there's going to be any conditions of peace, if you think there's going to be peaceful coexistence between these two forces, then you're just dead wrong. You see, there's going to be an all out war. The Lamb is going to war with the beast. You have to think in those terms. This Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, or this Lamb chosen of God to be the Savior of men, is going to make war with the beast. We're going to see the outcome progressively as we go through this, week by week now in Revelation. But the war you see is between the Lamb and the commandments of God, you see, on the one hand, and the Beast and the commandments of the beast. And that raises the question of what attitude the Christian should have toward the state then. I mean, what John has laid out for us is war between the church and the state. Now, I realize that's putting it a little bluntly and maybe simplistically, but what he's saying is those who are with the Lamb and have the law of God are going to go to war with the state and its imperious claims over all realms of life. And with its law to govern us, we're going to be battling against that. So you have the lamb versus the beast or the the apostate state versus God's church. Now, why does that pose problems for us? At least initially? I think there's a resolution to those problems. But initially that seems to contradict some other things we learn in the Bible, doesn't it? Seems to. Let me give you a suggestion. In Romans 13, we find Paul. We've been looking at Revelation 13. Now I'm going to look at Romans 13. In Romans 13, Paul instructs us in this way, let everyone be in subjection to the higher powers. For there is no power but of God, and the powers that be are ordained of God. Therefore, he that resists the power withstands the ordinance of God. And they that withstand shall receive to themselves judgment. Paul says, if you withstand the authority that God has ordained in the state, then you'll receive to yourself judgment. John says, if you don't withstand the power of the state, you'll receive judgment. How do you reconcile those two things? Let me read what G.B. caird says in his commentary on Revelation about what John is saying, respecting the state. All political power is the gift of God. But when men deify the state, either directly by a religious cult or indirectly by demanding for it the total loyalty and obedience that are due to God alone, it ceases to be human and becomes bestial. There's the key, I think, to resolving the contrast between Romans 13 and Revelation 13. Romans 13 is very often read, I'm afraid, as a blanket endorsement of all human government, come what may, no matter what, under all conditions. Whatever the state may do, it has the blanket of God's endorsement over it. Now, I don't believe Romans 13 teaches that. I don't believe that it teaches that. If you just read Romans 13 by itself, but certainly in terms of Revelation 13, one cannot hold that Romans 13 is teaching that, or else you have the Word of God pitted against the Word of God. I think Herod is right. God doesn't bless and condone all human governments, no matter what. But rather when human Government cease to operate in terms of God's word and God's law. And when they arrogate to themselves the authority of God alone to rule contrary to his law and over all areas of life, then they cease being human governments and become bestial governments. And at that point, the people of God are not called upon to submit, but to oppose and withstand. Now, we're running out of time, and that's a. That's a bad note to end on just because it's so subject to misunderstanding. And I wouldn't want that to happen. I don't want this to kind of, you know, work its way out in your life this week so that next week you come back as revolutionaries, you see, ready to go. That's not what I'm saying either. What I am saying, though, is that there is an ethical or a law structure or a point of view in morality that Christians maintain that is set over against the humanist point of view in morality that is embodied in the state and its imperious claims. And John says that pits the beast against the lamb. And you must side with the lamb and the commandments of God over against the commandments of the state. Romans 13 is teaching us that we owe allegiance to the state, but never allegiance where the state violates the dictates of God. You see, what Paul is teaching in Romans 13 is not simply that you must be submissive to the state, but he begins by teaching that the state must be submissive to God. For all authority is ordained of God. And what does he say of the state? What does he say of the magistrate? That he is what the minister of God ordained as a terror to evildoers. Evildoers as defined by God's word and God's law. And when the state begins to oppose those who are not evildoers, but defines those who are doing God's law as evil, then it's time for God's people, those who keep the testimony of Jesus, to stand back and say that we will withstand and we're not going to obey the commandments of men. Or to put it very simply, in closing, Peter said we must obey God rather than men. Let's pray. Lord, we want to thank you again from the bottom of our hearts that for all of our failures and for all of our sin, for all of our departure from those things that you would have us to do, for all of our wicked and evil attitudes and emotions, you nevertheless have loved us and have been faithful to us. And we thank you that you care for us and you are true to your Word and that you never abandon your people. Lord, we trust that you would make us very sensitive, especially in this day, to all of the subtle ways in which we are tempted to depart from your Word and your law. We ask you, Lord, that you would make us sensitive to faithlessness in our own lives. That you would make us sensitive to compromise with a pagan culture and with apostasy about us. We ask you, Lord, that you would enable us, by the empowering of your Holy Spirit, to fulfill the ordinance of the law. That we might obey every commandment given to us by men that conforms to your standards, but that above all, we would be faithful and loyal to you. That we might worship you above all, that Christ might be preeminent in our lives. That every thought, word and action would be conformable to his name being written upon our foreheads and our hands. Work out in us a true Christian witness in the midst of our culture, before our neighbors, our relatives and our friends. We ask, Lord, that you would do this. Not that there would be attention drawn to ourselves, but rather glory given to the Savior. And that you would do this so that our witness would be empowered and the day would be hastened in which the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ. For it's in his matchless name that we pray. Amen.