Unmasking the Final False Prophet: Revelation's Deceptive Beast

Revelation 13 verses 11 through 18 is where we'll be focusing.

Revelation 13:11–18

And this is all the final false prophet is what we're looking at tonight.

So let's take a look at God's word. It says, then I saw another beast coming

up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon.

He exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence,

and he makes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast

whose fatal wound was healed. We talked about that last time we were together.

He performs great signs so that he even makes fire come down out of heaven to

the earth in the presence of men.

And he deceives those who dwell on the earth because of the signs which it was

given him to perform in the presence of the beast,

telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who had the

wound of the sword and has come to life.

And it was given to him to give breath to the

image of the beast so that the image of the beast would

even speak and cause as many as do not worship

the image of the beast to be killed and he causes all the small and the great

and the rich and the poor and the free men and the slaves to be given a mark

on their right hand or on their forehead and he provides that no one will be

able to buy or to sell except the one who has the mark,

either the name of the beast or the number of his name.

Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast,

for the number is that of a man, and his number is 666.

666. Reminds me of that old DeGarmo and Key song. So anybody know who I'm talking

about? DeGarmo and Key. Okay.

But anyway, that's chapter 13, verses 11 through 18. So I want y'all to see

tonight that the major weapon in Satan's arsenal is deception.

Satan, Jesus declared, John 8, 44, if you know that verse, Jesus declared Satan

is a liar and the father of lies, right?

Who disguises himself, it tells us in 2 Corinthians 11, as an angel of light.

To deceive people. That's the whole purpose from his first appearance on earth.

If you remember in the garden of Eden, all the way back in Genesis chapter three,

verses two through six, until his final appearance at the end of the millennium,

which is be found in Revelation 27 and eight,

Satan is a liar and a deceiver, right?

He constantly seeks to confuse people, Blinding, Scripture said,

the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel

of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

It tells us that in 2 Corinthians 4, 4.

Have you ever wondered sometimes why people can't see what God has done for them?

Why don't they see the kind of love and how he's came and how he offers salvation

and rescue to their situation? how can they not respond?

Well, Satan is a liar. He has blinded the eyes of those who are unbelievers

so that they won't see the glorious light of the gospel.

That's his purpose, is to try to do that, right?

And so since Satan is a deceiver, it follows that his agents,

both human and demonic, right, are also deceivers.

The apostle Paul actually warned that Satan's servants also describes themselves

as servants of righteousness in 2 Corinthians 11 verse 15.

2 Corinthians 11:15

Now you may have seen some of this today. I don't know. Have you ever seen Satan's

servants disguise themselves as servants of righteousness?

Yeah. Though they're purveyors of wickedness, lies, and deceit,

the devil uses them to spread his damning doctrines of demons,

as it actually calls it in Scripture in 1 Timothy 4, verse 1.

1 Timothy 4:1

And the Bible repeatedly warns of the danger of false prophets.

Moses paused in the midst of giving God's law to Israel, actually,

to warn of those who would lead people astray from it.

Listen to this. He said, if a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you

and gives you a sign or a wonder,

and the sign or the wonder comes true concerning which he has spoken to you,

saying, Let us go after other gods whom you have not known, and let us serve them.

You shall not listen to the words of that prophet or the dreamer of dreams,

for the Lord your God is testing you to find out if you love the Lord your God

with all your heart and with all your soul.

You shall follow the Lord your God and fear him, and you shall keep his commandments.

Listen to his voice, serve him, and cling to him.

But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death because he

has counseled rebellion against the Lord your God who brought you from the land

of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery to seduce you,

scripture says, from the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk.

So you shall purge that evil from among you.

That's Deuteronomy chapter 13 verses 1 through 5. But Jeremiah also warned Israel

Deuteronomy 13:1–5

not to listen to false prophets.

Listen to this, Jeremiah 23, 16. Thus says the Lord of hosts,

do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you.

They are leading you into futility.

They speak a vision of their own imagination, not from the mouth of the Lord.

And then he goes on to say, I do not send these prophets, but they ran.

I did not speak to them, but they prophesied. But if they had stood in my counsel,

then they would have announced my words to my people and would have turned them

back from their evil way and from the evil of their deeds.

That's in Jeremiah 23, verses 21 and 22.

Jeremiah 23:21

And then also listen to this. He says, I've heard what the prophets have said

who prophesy falsely in my name saying, I had a dream. I had a dream.

How long? Is there anything in the hearts of the prophets who prophesy falsehood,

even though these prophets of the deception of their own heart,

who intended to make my people forget my name by their dreams,

which they relate to one another, just as their fathers forgot my name because of Baal?

The prophet who has a dream may relate his dream, but let him who has my word,

listen to this church, speak my word in truth.

What does straw have in common with grain, declares the Lord?

Is not my word like fire, declares the Lord, and like a hammer that shatters a rock?

Therefore, behold, I'm against the prophets, declares the Lord,

who steal my words from each other.

Behold, I'm against the prophets, declares the Lord, who use their tongues and

declare, the Lord declares.

Behold, I'm against those who have prophesied false dreams, declares the Lord.

And related them and led my people astray by their falsehoods and their reckless boasting.

Yet I did not send them or command them, nor do they furnish this people the

slightest benefit, declares the Lord.

That's also in Jeremiah chapter 23. So do not listen to the words of the prophets

Jeremiah 23 · chapter mention

who speak to you, saying, you shall not serve the king of Babylon,

for they prophesy a lie to you, for I have not sent them,

declares the Lord, but they prophesy falsely in my name in order that I may

drive you out and that you may perish, you and the prophets who prophesy to you.

Then I spoke to the priest and to all this people saying, thus says the Lord,

do not listen to the words of your prophets who prophesy to you saying,

behold, the vessels of the Lord's house will now shortly be brought again from

Babylon for they are prophesying a lie to you.

Jeremiah 27, in that passage 14 and 16.

And then the last one here, Jeremiah 29, 8, 9 says that, For thus says the Lord

of hosts, the God of Israel,

Do not let your prophets who are in your midst and your diviners deceive you,

and do not listen to the dreams which they dream, for they prophesy falsely to you in my name.

I have not sent them, declares the Lord.

So if you think about the Sermon on the Mount for a moment tonight,

as he concluded the Sermon on the Mount,

The Lord Jesus solemnly declared something in Matthew 7, verse 15.

Matthew 7:15

You know what he declared? He said this. He said, beware of the false prophets

who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.

Wow. I mean, in his second epistle,

Peter actually wrote, but false prophets also arose from among the people,

just as there will also be false teachers among you who will secretly introduce destructive heresies,

even denying the master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.

It talks about this in 2 Peter 2, verse 1.

2 Peter 2:1

So the apostle John also cautioned us.

He said, beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether

they're from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world in 1 John 4.1.

Scripture also records, you know, just examples, numerous examples of false prophets.

Some names, some are anonymous. Isaiah mentioned unnamed false prophets who

were active in his day, and as did Jeremiah.

Jeremiah 28 actually records Jeremiah's encounter with the false prophet Hananiah,

while the next chapter in that passage, in that book there, in Jeremiah,

that very next one also mentions the false prophets Ahab and Zedekiah as well.

And so the Old Testament also names another Zedekiah as a false prophet,

as well as two false prophets named Shemaiah.

Ezekiel 13 mentions false prophetesses. The false prophetess,

I believe it was, I'm trying to remember the name, her name.

Nodia, Nodia or something like that.

I can't remember it exactly, but that notorious false prophet as well that you're

probably already thought of in the Old Testament, Balaam, remember that one,

who led Israel into idolatry and sin.

And the New Testament records the apostle Paul's encounter on the island of

Cyprus with the false prophet Bar-Jesus, if you remember, in Acts 13 as well.

And so, but several vices actually characterize false prophets,

apart from the obvious one of teaching lies, right?

Scripture actually denounces them as wicked.

Wicked, that's in Jeremiah 23. Adulterers is another one, Jeremiah 23.

Greedy, that's another one. Ezekiel and Micah, 2 Peter.

Also self-deceived, that's in Ezekiel. idolaters. That's in Jeremiah.

So not surprisingly, God will judge them severely.

Deuteronomy 18 verse 20 actually pronounces the death sentence on them.

Deuteronomy 18:20

Says the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in my name,

which I have not commanded him to speak, or of which he speaks in the name of

other gods, that prophet shall die.

That's how seriously God takes somebody saying, thus says the Lord.

That's why I've always said to people, when you say, thus says the Lord,

you better have the Bible with you to back it up.

I'm just telling you, because that's serious business when you claim to have

a direct revelation from God, For one, God said that it's over, right?

I mean, you know what I'm saying? We're not going to get new words today.

Everything we need is complete in the Bible. Every bit of it is sufficient.

And so when you say, thus says the Lord, you need to be proclaiming God's word, okay?

Not coming up with some kind of junk, I call it, right?

That you're saying, thus says the Lord, because you had a warm fuzzy, okay? That's not it.

Be careful when you say, God told me something. Be careful with that language.

You might want to modify it just a little bit, right? I believe that God was

saying this to me, but I don't know for sure.

Have a little humble spirit about it. Because when you declare that,

man, you are saying to the world, God told me this, thus says the Lord is straight

from heaven. You better listen.

And God here in his words already told us what he feels about those kind of prophets.

They shall be put to death. That's how seriously he takes it.

And so as we look at this, Peter spoke the judgment of God on all the false

teachers when he wrote that they will utterly perish in their own corruption

and will receive the wages of unrighteousness for whom is reserved.

Listen to what he said, the blackness of darkness forever.

That's in 2 Peter 2, verses 12 and 13 and verse 17.

2 Peter 2:12

Y'all, do you think that God takes false teachers and prophets seriously? Yes, he does.

So do we. We need to, too. Okay.

And I'm just telling you, God takes this stuff seriously. It leads his people astray.

False prophets have plagued God's people from the beginning of history, though.

But they will get this. As we read this passage tonight, they're going to proliferate.

They're going to increase, in other words, even more as the return of Christ

to establish his kingdom approaches.

And speaking of that time, Jesus said that many false prophets will arise and

will mislead many in Matthew 24, 11.

So persuasive will they be that they'll show signs, wonders in order to lead

astray. If possible, it says in Mark 13, even the elect, that means even those

who are really believers who have put their faith in Christ.

Those false prophets are going to be energized by some of Satan's demon host.

The devil's going to intensify his efforts to deceive the world because his

own doom, right, approaches fast.

And just as the false Christ who plagued mankind, they're going to culminate

in the final antichrist, right?

So also will the false prophets culminate in the final false prophet that we're talking about tonight.

And that tells us that chapter 16, we'll see that chapter 19 and 20 of Revelation.

He will be, get this tonight, Eastwood, he will be Satan's last and most powerful lying deceiver.

And along with Satan, the counterfeit of the Father.

And Antichrist, excuse me, the counterfeit of Jesus Christ, the false prophet,

you probably thought about this and put it together, will form the satanic false trinity.

And he will be the counterfeit of the Holy Spirit. And the false prophet will

be Antichrist's partner in Satan's massive final destruction of the world.

And so while Antichrist is going to be the primary political and military ruler,

he'll also claim to be God.

The false prophet will be his high priest, if you will, the religious leader

who will lead people into the satanic religion of worshiping who?

Antichrist. And the false prophet actually will defy antichrist and convince

unbelievers that he is the only hope for the world's salvation.

He is the only hope that he's going to convince that,

The false prophet will be able to deceive the unbelieving world because of the

power of religion over men's minds is so great.

You know, people, I don't know if y'all noticed this, people are incurable worshipers.

Everyone worships someone or something, whether the true God,

false gods, or themselves.

They become like God. In other words, you know, idolatry, if you will.

And so there is in the heart of every man, the longing for someone transcendent,

someone beyond himself that can deliver him from his troubling circumstances.

And so the terrifying, the unparalleled events, if you will,

that we've been studying and these events of the tribulation,

they're going to intensify that longing in everyone's heart there for some kind

of supernatural deliverer.

And the false prophet will convince the unbelieving world that Antichrist is

the solution to the world's pressing problems.

He may well be the most eloquent, powerful, convincing speaker in human history,

whoever this person is, whoever they're going to be.

And his lofty oratory, if you will, his use of words will persuade the world to worship Antichrist.

John Phillips, who's a scholar, he actually speculated this.

He said, the dynamic appeal of the false prophet will lie in his skill in combining

political expediency with religious passion.

His arguments will be subtle, convincing, and appealing.

His words will be hypnotic, for he will be able to move the masses to tears

or whip them into a frenzy.

He will control the communication media of the world and will skillfully organize

mass publicity to promote his ends.

And I don't know that he's too far off, Brother Thomas, because we've already

seen that the media can be controlled pretty good and people seem to buy it all.

Duh. We've had an example, and this is nothing compared to this.

So it's not far-fetched by any means. He will manage the truth with guile beyond

words, bending it, twisting it, and distorting it, Phillips says.

He said, he will mold world thought and shape human opinion like so much potter's clay. Wow.

I mean, the partnership, though, I want us to see this, the partnership between

political and religious power

exhibited by Antichrist and the false prophet, it's not going to be new.

If you remember, I believe it's Janus and Jembrus, two false prophet leaders

assisted Pharaoh in his confrontations, if you remember, with Moses and Aaron.

He talks about that in 2 Timothy 3.

But Balak, the king of Moab, sought the false prophet Balaam's help to destroy

Israel in Numbers 22. too.

Ahab and Jezebel used the idolatrous priest of Baal to help them accomplish

their evil purposes in Israel in 1 Kings 18 as well.

So the Roman Empire united political and religious power by demanding that its

subject worship the state personified as the goddess Roma and the emperor.

And so in modern times, you could even think today, like communism,

though officially scorning religion as the opium of the people,

has in effect been a substitute religion for those who follow it, right?

And the worldwide joining a political of religious power that we see here in

Revelation, in the end times, it's detailed in Revelation 17.

When we get there, You'll see it. Some of y'all have read ahead, which I'm glad.

But for a time, the two powers will coexist.

We see that again in Revelation 17, 1 through 9. They're going to coexist.

And eventually, however, Antichrist will destroy the false religious system, right?

And he's going to institute the worship of who? Himself.

That's in chapter 17 of Revelation, by the way. that will happen. Do you know when?

What point in the tribulation is that going to happen? Here's the beginning.

Here's the end. What point is it going to happen? Huh?

You got it. At the midpoint of the tribulation, when Antichrist sets up the

abomination of desolation, we've talked about it, and having reached the pinnacle,

if you will, of his power,

Antichrist is going to destroy all other religions all of them and the worship of Antichrist is,

that is going to be fermented by the false prophet will become the only religion that's tolerated.

That's it. That's it. And so John's vision of the false prophet reveals three key elements.

I probably won't have time to go through all of them tonight,

but I may go through the first one. We'll see. His power, or actually it's to

say his person, his power, and his program.

His person, his power, and his program. So let's look at his person.

I think we can get through this.

We'll as we break it down. He said, Then I saw another beast coming up out of

the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon.

So having seen the terrifying vision of the first beast, Antichrist,

in verses 1 through 10, John then saw another beast.

And some view this second beast as an institution, a form of government, or an ideology even.

But the use of alas, there in Greek, another of the same kind is what it literally

means, indicates that he,

like the first beast, will be a person because of that Greek word that's used

there, another of the same kind.

And further proof of that comes from Revelation 19 verse 20.

Revelation 19:20

We hadn't got there yet, but it says this, it says, and the beast was seized

and with him, the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence by which

he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image.

These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone.

So obviously it is people, not ideologies, institutions, or governments that

God is going to cast into hell.

And in contrast to the first beast who'll come up out of the sea,

right, Antichrist, the second beast, look there in the passage,

will come up out of where?

The earth, right? It'll come up out of the earth.

And so as we look at that, like Antichrist, the false prophet will be indwelt

by a demon out of the abyss, which is pictured here as the flaming depths of the earth, basically.

With less mysterious and it was maybe a little bit less mysterious and foreboding

than the sea Antichrist, where he came from, right? That picture there.

That false prophet arises from the earth.

It really suggests, Brother David, that he's going to be subtler,

right? He'll be a little more subtle, right?

Gentler, if you will, less overpowering and terrifying than the Antichrist.

He'll be winsome in other words. He'll be persuasive.

You know, if you stop and think about this verse that we quoted earlier in Matthew

7, he'll be the epitome of the wolves in sheep's clothing that Jesus warned about.

You know, in fact, you see that description there of the first beast with its

ten horns, right, that we saw the first time, seven heads, ten crowns,

and seven blasphemous names, right?

It was grotesque and frightening, very frightening. And in contrast,

the second beast that we read about tonight merely had what? Two horns.

That's it. That indicates that he's not characterized, y'all,

by the same massive might as Antichrist is.

And unlike that savage, ferocious, fierce, and deadly Antichrist,

who's likened, by the way, to a leopard or a bear and a lion,

as it talks about in verse 2 of this same chapter.

The false prophet here seems as harmless, you said it, Brother Thomas, as a lamb.

He doesn't come as a conquering dictator, but on the surface he appears as just

a subtle deceiver with meekness and gentleness.

Though I want us to see not without great authority, because he does have great authority.

And despite his deceptively mild appearance, the false prophet is no less,

I want y'all to get this, no less a child of hell than the antichrist.

And that's evident because look at that same verse. He spoke as a what?

Dragon. A strange voice indeed for a lamb, is it not?

The false prophet like Antichrist will be the dragon, Satan's mouthpiece,

speaking Satan's words.

But he'll not echo the blasphemous tirades against God that's going to pour

from the lips of Antichrist.

Instead, what is he going to do? He's going to speak winsome,

deceiving words of praise about the Antichrist, luring the world to worship

that vile satanic dictator.

I mean, if y'all ever know somebody, just think of maybe somebody that you've

known in your life that just had a way with words.

They were like what we call a wordsmith, right? I mean, they just could just

about, you know, they just had a way with words. It's like they could talk people into anything.

Or maybe you'd believe every word they said, and maybe it wasn't even true, right?

They just were that, they were likable, right? They were likable.

They had a way with words. They deceived.

This is like this false prophet's going to be. False prophets often appear,

I want y'all to get this, meek, mild, and harmless sometimes.

They often offer hope and solutions

to the problems that are troubling mankind, right? To women, men.

Yet they're still ever the voices of hell.

And when they open their mouth, Satan speaks.

And so it'll be amid that unspeakable horror of the tribulation that false prophet

will come like a lamb, speaking those false, deceptive words of comfort.

He'll promise the suffering, tormented people of the world that all's going

to be well if only they what? Worship the Antichrist.

But those who fall for his subtle lies will face the terrifying judgment of God, won't they?

They will. Well, next we'll come to his power, and we'll save that for a couple

of weeks from tonight as we talk about his power.

But that's his person, but next will be his power.