Forecasting Hope 10: America & the Mark of the Beast (Pastor Greg Hudson, 10/24/24)

So, if you have any questions about any of the message tonight or any other Bible questions,

you can write that on the card and we'll turn that in at the end.

If you have any prayer requests, we've been getting lots of prayer requests for those

that we know that we care about that are sick, those that have different other challenges,

some are looking for homes, some are trying to sell homes and different things like that.

And so we've been praying for those.

And tomorrow night our topic is Revelations Remnant.

That's the topic for tomorrow night.

But tonight we're looking at America and the Mark of the Beast.

So let's bow our heads and we'll get started here.

Dear God, we thank you so much for all that you do for us.

We thank you just for bringing us here to this place tonight.

You've given us truth in your word, truth that we can study, truth that we can learn

more about you.

And God, just be with us.

Open up our hearts and our minds.

Guide us by your spirit because we've been told that your spirit wants to guide us into

all truth.

So just be with us and help us to see you more clearly.

In your name we pray.

Amen.

How many of you, this important question.

How many have ever been to Walmart?

Okay, most hands have been up whether you like it or not.

You've been to Walmart.

And we recognize that Walmart is a store that you can go to practically any time.

In fact, there's some Walmarts that are open 24 hours a day.

I don't think quite as many as there used to be.

But if you want to shop at 10 o'clock in the morning, you can go.

If you want to shop at 10 o'clock in the evening, you can shop at that time.

Maybe the crowds are a little bit better.

And anyone can go in.

There's no restrictions.

You can buy whatever you want.

So second question.

How many have ever been to Sam's Club?

Just about just as many hands.

Except you guys realize that there's something a little bit different about Sam's Club.

Can anybody go to Sam's Club?

Well, you can, but you've got to get something first.

You've got to become a member.

And what do you get if you're a member?

You've got to get a card and to go in the door, you've got to show them the card.

You can't just show up any time.

Everybody can't just show up unless they're part of the club.

And without the card, you can't even get in the door of the warehouse.

You certainly can't buy anything unless you have signed up, unless you have been a member.

And so with Walmart and Sam's, it's not a big deal.

It's just a different way of doing business.

But it's not a sinister scheme.

But in Revelation, we're going to see that in the final crisis of Earth's history, that

there are two different groups of people.

And it's not about having a card or not having a card.

But it's going to be on a much larger scale.

And perhaps it will be a sinister scheme behind.

But Revelation tells us that in the last days, there's going to be two groups of people.

One group is going to be a group that worships God.

But the other group is going to be a group that worships the beast.

One group is going to follow the instructions of God, the commandments of God.

And because they do, Revelation tells us that their lives are going to face a little bit

of turmoil, and they're not going to be able to buy or sell.

And then the other group, we'll see, is following after not the commandments of God, but the

traditions, the commandments of man.

And because they're going along with that, their life is not as disrupted.

And they are able to buy and sell.

And then we see that one group receives the seal of God, and another group receives the

mark of the beast.

And so in that final crisis, Revelation shows us that everybody is going to make a choice.

There's no neutral ground.

There's no fence to straddle.

Everybody has to make a choice.

That means you have to make a choice.

That means I have to make a choice.

And as we've seen over the last several nights, one of the key issues in the book of Revelation

centers around the subject of worship.

We're going to explore that again tonight as we look at two different things.

We're going to look at two different segments of prophecy.

And even as we talk about a final crisis, please be aware that even if you're going

through challenging times or difficult times or a crisis, that God has promised to never

leave you or to never, ever forsake you.

So let's dive into this topic tonight.

So we're going to start just looking at the mark of the beast.

And you know, when people talk about the mark of the beast, there's a lot of different ideas,

a lot of different scenarios that people have come up with.

Some have said, well, maybe it's a computer chip that you can somehow plug into your head

or plug into your hand or maybe, you know, this new technology with AI, maybe that has

something to do with it.

And some have said, no, no, it's probably more like some sort of identification card

with some numbers, maybe like, you know, a social security card or a social security

number that we have.

And some through the years have looked at, you know, those sinister things you buy at

the grocery store that have barcodes on them that perhaps somehow that is tracking you

and recording all of your financial transactions.

Or maybe it's something many of us carry around with us, a credit card of some kind, or maybe

some of that newer technology like cryptocurrency, perhaps that has something to do with it.

And many people have thought that perhaps it's some sort of whether it's a tattoo or

a brand or something like that, that it is a physical emplacement of that number 666

or something similar on your hand or on your head that is physically going to be there.

But I would say that this is kind of unlikely here, that it's going to be a physical stamp

or tattoo on your head because as we've seen night by night that much of Revelation is

symbolic.

We've looked at symbols, we've looked at many different things, and so when we consider

that the Bible says the mark of the beast is going to be in the forehead, well we could

consider what could that symbolize?

What could the forehead symbolize?

Well, the forehead is where your brain is, where your mind is, where the center of your

decision making is, the control center for the whole body.

And so it seems like, as we'll discover, that this mark of the beast is not a tattoo or

a physical mark, but it is simply someone who is making a willful, intentional choice

with their mind, with their brain to follow after the beast instead of following after

what God says.

Because Revelation, the Bible also says that there's going to be a group of people that

receive the seal of God on their forehead.

And that would be a group of people that is intentionally making a choice that they're

going to serve God, that they're going to follow after him, and they have chosen, in

contrast to that, to resist the beast.

And so we need to keep this in mind as we go through Revelation here.

And so we're going to begin going to Revelation chapter 14.

Revelation 14 · chapter mention

We've been here a couple times through our series, and it's a serious little topic here.

And so we're going to look at Revelation chapter 14.

Revelation 14 · chapter mention

As I've said night by night, verses will be on the screen, but I always encourage you

to look things up.

Don't just take my word for it, but let's see what the Bible says.

And so we're going to start in verse 6.

And we've looked at this a couple times as we've gone through here.

Revelation 14 and verse 6.

It says, Then I saw another angel flying in the midst of heaven, having the, what does

he have with him?

The everlasting gospel, the good news, the good news of Jesus dying on the cross for

all mankind.

And it's an everlasting good news.

And it says that it's to preach the gospel to those who dwell on the earth, to everyone,

to every nation and tribe and tongue and people.

This is the good news of Jesus, and it's for every person.

It doesn't matter their nationality or their language.

So what is this message of this first angel?

Verse 7 goes on and it says, saying with a loud voice, fear God and give glory to him

for the hour of his judgment has come and worship him who made the heaven and the earth,

the sea and the springs of water.

And so we see that this first angel is telling us that we're living in the last days, the

hour of his judgment has come, we're living in this time of the judgment hour.

And then there's a challenge or an invitation to worship God as the creator, to worship

him who made the heaven and the earth.

And we've talked about this from night to night, and this is a call back to Genesis.

And this is a call back to the Ten Commandments, and it's a call back to the seventh day Sabbath

that memorializes the work of creation that God did.

And so this first angel is telling humanity to worship God, to worship the creator.

And we'll see in just a moment that that's a theme here.

Because we go to the third angel in verse 9, and notice what the third angel says.

The third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice.

Now this is a warning.

If anyone worships the beast and his image and receives his mark on his forehead or on

his hand, he himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured

out full strength into the cup of his indignation.

And so the first angel gives an invitation to worship God as the creator.

The third angel gives that opposite warning.

Don't worship the beast or his image.

And so we see this theme of worship, and then we see it continue down in verse 12.

How do God's people respond?

How do they stand up against this beast power?

Verse 12, it says, here is the patience of the saints, God's people.

Here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.

And so Revelation 14 gives us here some ideas of what this mark of the beast is all about.

And I'm going to put them up on the screen.

And these are things that we just read from scripture.

It's something to do with worshiping the creator.

Here's a warning to not worship the beast.

And then the response by God's people is here are those who keep the commandments of God

and the faith of Jesus.

And so whatever this mark of the beast is, it has something to do with worship.

It has something to do with God's commandments.

It has something to do with standing up and honoring for God, honoring God.

And so that's some important clues because it determines I'm either worshiping God or

I'm worshiping the beast.

I'm either keeping what God says or I'm keeping the traditions of man instead of what God

says.

And it seems like these are the crucial issues, the key issues here in the book of Revelation.

And so we have to ask ourselves an important question.

Who is the beast?

Now we spent an hour in our last session looking at the Bible, looking at some clues from Daniel

chapter seven.

We saw this entity called the little horn power.

And then we looked in Revelation 13 and we see this beast power and we looked at 13 different

clues which point to who this beast is.

And we looked at it straight from scripture and we determined that the beast, the only

kingdom that can possibly fit that bill because a beast is a kingdom.

We saw that in Daniel seven.

The only kingdom that could fit those 13 clues is that church of Rome or the papacy or Vatican

City, whatever name we want to give it.

And so I would encourage you if you weren't able to be here to go back and watch that

session and open up your Bible and see those clues that we talk about it.

But if you weren't here I also have to reiterate something.

We're not talking about individual people.

We're not talking about friends or family members who may be part of the Catholic church.

We're talking about a system of a combination of civil government, political government,

and religious government, a combination of church and state that took place in the Middle

Ages.

And if you look back at history it was an unfortunate time as the Bible was hidden from

people.

It was illegal to even translate the Bible into a language that people could understand.

The truth of the good news, the gospel of Jesus on the cross, the light of the cross

was hidden.

And that's why it's known as the Dark Ages.

And anybody who disagreed with that church was persecuted or even put to death.

And so we've seen in Revelation that in the first century when Jesus was walking on this

earth that the government in charge was the Roman Empire, this iron empire of Daniel chapter

Daniel 2 · chapter mention

2.

And then in the Middle Ages it wasn't the civil Rome, the empire of Rome, but it was

the church of Rome that was persecuting those who were standing up for God.

And what we're going to see tonight in Revelation is that in the end times, in the final crisis,

it appears that history is going to repeat itself.

That history will give us a very similar picture.

When we get to the final crisis a beast power will arise again, a beast power that will

have controlling influence on the world.

And once again God's people are going to have to make a choice.

Am I going to stand with Jesus or am I going to stand with the beast power?

So with that in mind, recognizing that this beast power of the first half of Revelation

13 and Daniel 7, that this beast is Rome, well that leads us to the next obvious question.

What is the mark of the beast?

What is the mark of Rome's power, of Rome's authority, something that would track down

from the Middle Ages that would still come to our world today?

So let's just review.

We've talked about some things here that in the final crisis there's a group of people

that are going to have the seal of God because they're honoring God.

There's a group of people that are going to receive the mark of the beast because they're

taking that stand, they're making a choice to follow after the beast power.

Am I going to listen to what God says or am I going to listen to what humanity says?

And so we saw there in Revelation 14 there's a call to worship God as the creator.

There's a warning not to worship the beast and then it talks about how God's people are

those who because of their faith in Jesus are going to stand for God and keep his commandments.

And so then it appears that this mark of the beast is somehow connected to Rome and it's

going to have something to do with worship.

Am I worshiping God or am I worshiping the beast?

There's a choice that has to be made.

And so we have to ask two different questions.

What is a sign or the sign of Rome's authority?

And then what is a mark, what is something of Rome's power that has forced people to

choose between God and between man?

And that's what we're going to explore here.

So I want to read a quote here.

We're going to look at several historical quotes.

And as we do, just recognize this is the context that we're talking in.

And so we need to make sure that our individual faith, that our walk is a walk that we are

taking with Jesus each and every day.

And so here is a quote from 1995 from St. Catherine Catholic Church Sentinel.

And we've talked about something like this before.

It says, perhaps the boldest thing, the most revolutionary change the church ever did happened

in the first century.

The Holy Day, the Sabbath, was changed from Saturday to Sunday, not from any directions

noted in the scriptures, but from the church's sense of its own power.

So this takes us back to something we've talked about before, this issue of the Sabbath as

one of the changes that was made in the Middle Ages that tracks down all the way to where

we are today.

And it specifically claims, the claim is it was done not because anything that the Bible

says, not because of a command of scripture, because we've seen the Bible says, you know,

remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy and different things like that.

But it was done because the church had a sense of its own power that they could override

even what scripture says.

Now the next screen, you're going to think that I made this up, but I promise I didn't.

This is just the quote.

This is just the quote.

It goes on and says, people who think that the scripture should be the sole authority

should logically become Seventh-day Adventists and keep Saturday holy.

I promise, I'm just reading the quote.

But that's what that quote says.

And so there's some issues to consider that man's law has been placed above God's law

and that a particular church, a particular faith lifted up its own power above the word

of God.

And so in essence then, what man says, man's power, man's authority is elevated above God's

authority.

And it brings back this topic that we've mentioned of the Sabbath.

Think about this.

What was the Mark of the Beast issue in Revelation 14?

There was a key thing that the first angel said and the third angel said.

It had to do with worship.

And the way that God's people responded was because of their faith in Jesus.

They were keeping the commandments.

And so we can look at what the first angel says, fear God and give glory to him for the

hour of his judgment has come.

And then it says a direct quote from the Ten Commandments.

It says, worship him who made the heaven and the earth, the sea, and the springs of water.

That fourth commandment in the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20, it ends and says, for in six

days the Lord made the heavens and the earth and the sea.

Worship him who made the heavens and the earth and the sea.

Who's that?

The Lord made the heavens and the earth and the sea.

And so the first angel of Revelation 14 is pointing us to the Sabbath commandment.

Revelation 14 talks about this Mark of the Beast issue and it's pointing us to this Sabbath

commandment.

Why?

Because the Sabbath has to do with worship.

And it has to do with whether I'm going to follow the commandments of God or the commandments

of man.

And so we can begin to put these things together and this next quote is going to maybe connect

even a few more dots.

This is from a document called the Catholic Record.

Notice what it says.

It says, Sunday is our Mark of authority.

The church is above the Bible and this transference of Sabbath observance is proof positive of

that fact.

We've got to just stop there.

Once again, Rome says, claims that they are above the Bible.

I appreciate the honesty but I disagree with the theology because they come, okay yes,

they say we can change that.

We have the authority to change that.

I appreciate that they're saying that but I disagree that they have that right.

And they say what is the proof?

Why do we have this proof?

Because almost all churches believe that and follow that change.

Almost the entire religious Christian world ignores one of God's commandments and takes

after this thing that they have said is the mark of our authority.

And so we could modernize this a little bit.

The papacy claims that the change of the Sabbath was her act.

And this act is the mark that they've got the power and the authority in all religious

matters.

And the thing that proves that is that so many follow after them.

Notice this quote from Louis Seguer.

It says, thus the observance of Sunday by the Protestants is an homage, an homage they

pay in spite of themselves to the authority of the Catholic Church.

So they're like yeah, okay, we're paying tribute, in essence, tribute because we're doing this

even though it's not in scripture at all.

Now it's not politically correct to say this but Revelation is really not a politically

correct book.

And so God warns in these prophecies, he warns his people that a kingdom was coming, a

beast was coming that was going to persecute his people, that would change God's law, and

that would take the Bible away from his people.

And we look into history and we see that yes, that was fulfilled.

And so what Rome says to us, that's happened.

They changed it.

Is it a mark of their authority?

For some it is because a vast majority of churches, different organizations follow that

and they're putting that above what the Bible says.

And so there's two different things that come to light.

There's God's seal or God's mark, which is the Sabbath on the one side.

On the other side you've got Rome's mark of authority, this pagan tradition that we've

looked at that comes down from the Middle Ages.

It's the seventh day Sabbath which points to God as the creator or another day which

points to man's traditions.

And so we as individuals, we have a choice to make.

We have to choose what authority am I going to follow?

Who am I going to give my allegiance to?

We see this Sabbath and Sunday is actually, it's deeper than we think.

It has to do with this subject of worship.

It also has to do with the commandments.

We've seen this a couple times tonight.

We're invited to worship the creator.

We're warned about worshiping the beast and we see in verse 12 that God's people respond

to this because of their faith in Jesus.

They're keeping God's commandments and we know the Sabbath is at the very heart of that.

And so some people say, okay, yes, I see that.

I recognize that.

I see that in scripture.

But when I go to church on Sunday, I'm not choosing to rebel against God.

And what we have to recognize is that worship is not just about a building that we go to

or pews that we sit in.

It's not just what we say, but it's what is in our heart.

It's what we're verbally, what we're showing to other people, not just what we're verbally

saying.

I've mentioned several times that some of you have met my wife, Jolie, that I love Jolie

with all of my heart and mind and soul.

And if I said that and you believed it, but then every weekend you saw me out at a restaurant

with some other lady or several other ladies every other weekend, you would question the

words that I said if my actions are showing something completely different.

And in the same way, we need, we recognize that Jesus is the savior of our life, but

we have to ask ourselves, have we made Jesus the Lord of my life?

Am I responding in all that I do to this savior by making him the Lord of my life?

Here's another quote from Dr. Edward Hisscox.

This is in a book called The Baptist Manual.

This was a long time ago that this was written.

And he made a statement about Sunday that can catch our attention here.

It says, what a pity that Sunday comes branded with the mark of paganism and christened

with the name of the sun god and then adopted and sanctioned by the papal apostasy and then

bequeathed as a sacred legacy to Protestantism.

And so this Baptist preacher recognizes what we've been talking about.

He sees where this particular day of worship has come from.

He recognizes that it's from paganism, that it's come from this apostasy of the Middle

Ages and he says, what a shame that is.

When the light of truth shines into our life, we have to ask ourselves, am I going to follow

that light?

What voice am I going to listen to?

Some of you have known me, some of you just over the last few weeks have heard me talk

and you may recognize that what many people know that I've got a few quirks.

And so we could ask ourselves, why is this important?

Why make such a big deal about this?

We've talked about the Sabbath several times.

Why do you keep bringing it up?

Well, one, because it's in revelation there.

We've seen this issue about worship that is there.

And if we've been given a clue that the mark of the beast has something to do with worship,

and if we see something that has come from this beast power and we recognize that the

Sabbath comes from God, then we've got to make a choice.

So I'm going to share these quirks that I have.

And this is just in good fun.

This is a serious issue.

So just we'll see what some of these quirks are.

One of the quirks I have is that there's some colors that I really just don't like.

And somebody left some little cloths up here.

I just don't like the color blue.

Blue it reminds me of the cold, makes me feel blue, makes me sad.

I just don't like this blue.

So forget that.

And another color I don't like is red.

Red reminds me of the heat of the Georgia summer.

And it's so hot that I just get sweaty.

I start sweating and I'm worried that a bull might come and charge me.

I just don't like the color red.

And white.

What a boring color is white.

Is it even a color?

There's no excitement there.

It's just white.

It's boring.

So I don't like blue and I don't like red and I don't like white.

I don't like red or white or blue cloth.

And you just thought I was weird when I kicked those off.

But I don't like red or white or blue.

No, I'm not going to do it.

I saw some heads shaking.

Jason was about to jump up and beat me.

I'm going to pit it right back.

Just note that that did not touch the ground.

I did not step on it.

What's the difference?

Red, white, and blue.

It's just cloth.

Nobody was going to clock me for that.

But what's the difference?

That's a banner.

That signifies something.

That symbolizes something.

And even though we all recognize that our nation is not perfect, that flag stands for

symbols and ideals that are important.

It stands for life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness and that we can make choices

to serve God.

We can make choices to not serve God.

And so there's something different about it simply because of the way that it's put together,

because what it symbolizes.

These things, they don't symbolize anything.

You could care less.

You could just think, I'm a quack.

And yeah, probably so.

But something else symbolizes something.

And so why does it matter?

Why is this important?

Why would we talk about this?

Because it symbolizes something different.

It's like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

There were trees.

There wasn't anything important about trees except one of those trees God said, no, don't

eat from it.

Sabbath and Sunday, it's days.

There's nothing big about days except God said that those days symbolize something.

That God's seventh day Sabbath symbolizes God is the creator of the universe and we

can remember all that He has done for us, that He has created us, that He sustains us,

that He died for our sins.

And we can see that a different day symbolizes somebody trying to put something above God's

Ten Commandments.

When God has given us 24 hours that He wants to connect with us, that He wants to honor

us, or we can see that there's another thing that wants to rise up man's traditions.

And so John wasn't kidding when he wrote in Revelation that all the world would wonder

and marvel after the beast.

And so we can look at what Jesus says because sometimes we see something new and in John

12.35 Jesus says, walk while you have the light.

You know if you've got a flashlight and you're in a dark place, you follow where the light

goes because the light is going to keep you safe.

The light is going to protect you.

And we can't look at people that we've cared about from the past and say well they never

did this so I don't have to worry about that.

They didn't know that they were living up to the very best light that they had and so

they couldn't follow it because they hadn't seen it.

It's like asking God how much truth can I ignore and still be saved?

It's like asking your spouse how much of our marriage vow can we forget about and you'll

still stick with me?

That's not how it works.

We need to be asking God you died for me.

What more can I do for you?

And so some will say you know there's so many people that don't know about this.

There's so many people that don't understand this.

How will they ever know?

Well there's two ways.

One, you can tell them and I can tell them and as you experience a blessing of Sabbath

rest you can tell what that means to you and you can share that.

That's one way.

Another way is through Bible prophecy that's going to be fulfilled because right now this

may not be a big central issue but Revelation tells us that in the final crisis this subject

of worship and this subject of the commandments is going to take center stage.

That's what we've already seen.

Wasn't it Jesus that said if you love me keep my commandments?

And so we're choosing to show people our love by how we respond to what God has to do with

us.

That's the first little topic we're looking at tonight but we're going to transition to

another one that is connected to this.

We're going to go back to Revelation chapter 13.

Revelation 13 · chapter mention

We were in Revelation 13 on Sunday night but we're going to go to the second part of Revelation

13 and we're going to see if we can answer this question.

Does the Bible ever mention in prophecy the United States of America, our nation?

We've seen like in Daniel chapter 2 that a whole bunch of nations are mentioned through

Daniel 2 · chapter mention

Bible prophecy.

Some that have passed away, others that still exist.

So in Revelation 13 we see that it actually talks about two beasts and we only studied

the first beast.

And so tonight we're going to look at the second half of the chapter and see what is

going on with the end of Revelation 13.

So we saw that that first beast represented that Church of Rome or the papacy.

So what about the second beast?

I'm going to start reading in verse 11 and we're going to read about six verses straight

through and then we're going to come back and summarize and talk about them.

So Revelation 13 and verse 11.

It says, Then I saw another beast coming out of the earth and he had two horns like a lamb

and spoke like a dragon.

And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence and causes the

earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed.

He performs great signs so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in

the sight of men.

And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those whose signs which he was granted

to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to

the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived.

Where at verse 15, he was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast that

the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image

of the beast to be killed.

He causes all both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave to receive a mark on

their right hand or on their foreheads that no one may buy or sell except one who has

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

That's a lot of information that we just read.

So let's go back.

I'm going to put on the screen some summaries here, some activities of the second beast.

So double check me, make sure that what we're saying is from the scripture.

The first thing, this beast is going to rise to power and be like a lamb.

The second thing that we saw, this beast will eventually speak like a dragon and cause all

people to follow the first beast.

And so somehow this beast is going to change character.

That first beast, remember, is Rome.

The second beast is going to have some sort of transformation from lamb to speaking like a dragon.

And then the third thing, this second beast will set up an image to the first beast and

make that image speak.

So somehow it's going to partner with that first beast and then fourth, it's going to

force people to worship that image and to receive a mark.

So that's what we saw.

Let's go back now and look at it kind of verse by verse.

Verse 11 again.

Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth and he had two horns like a lamb.

Let's pause right there for a second.

So what is a beast in Bible prophecy?

A beast, according to Daniel 7, is a kingdom or a nation.

And so we saw the first beast in the first few verses of Revelation 13 and now here comes

a new beast, a new nation that rises on the scene.

So where does this beast come from?

In verse 11.

I saw another beast coming out of the earth.

Now that may not seem like a clue, but when we remember where the first beast came from,

where did the first beast come from?

In verse 1, out of the sea.

And so we saw in Revelation 17, 15 that the waters are peoples, multitudes, nations.

And so the waters in Bible prophecy represent a place where there's a great population.

There's a lot of people.

And that's exactly what happened with this church in Rome.

It came up there in Western Europe.

It came up where there was great population.

And so now we see another beast coming up out of the land, the opposite of water.

And so if that water represents many people, then land would represent a place where there's

not many people, a sparsely populated area.

And so we see that this new nation is coming up in a part of the world with little or no

population, sparsely populated.

And so we see a new nation rising up in a new land with not many people.

That may be enough, but let's look and see if there's some other clues here.

When, what's the time frame, what's the timeline of this beast?

When does it come up?

Well, when we looked at the first beast, we saw that it lasted and it gave three different

terms in different places of scripture.

I don't know if you remember any of those terms.

One was 42 months.

Another was 1260 days or a time, times, and half a time.

And we saw that in Bible prophecy, a day equals a year.

And so those 1260 days represent 1260 years.

And that time period went from 538 when Emperor Justinian gave civil authority to the Pope

in Rome.

So there was this combination of church power and government power.

And it went down to 1798 when General Berthier of Napoleon's army was sent in and he arrested

the Pope.

And that was that deadly wound that caused that separation of church and state.

It took that authority away.

And so this first beast lost its power in 1798.

And if we use that as a pinpoint, then we see that somewhere around this time period,

somewhere around 1798, this new nation, this new beast is going to be rising up from a

place with not many people.

And what kind of a nation is it?

Well, verse 11, it said it's going to be like a lamb.

Anybody have lambs or livestock?

Lambs are typically pretty gentle, right?

Mary had a little lamb.

Its fleece was white as snow.

And everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to go.

Now if you were to turn your back on a goat, poor Mary might have got knocked over because

that goat might have butted her down the hill or whatever.

That's Jack and Jill.

That's another nursery rhyme.

But lambs are typically gentle and they follow along.

And so this nation is going to be gentle in its origin, but then it says it's going to

speak like a dragon.

And it says that it has horns like a lamb.

Now if you look at that first beast up earlier in Revelation 13, it has 10 horns in verse

1, and those horns have crowns.

But the second beast, no crowns.

What does a crown mean?

Who wears a crown?

A king or a ruler, an individual ruler, a monarchy would wear a crown.

And so these other nations have individuals or kings or ruling families, but this appears

to be a little bit different.

There's no crown.

There's no king.

Perhaps it indicates freedom might take place.

And so here's what we've learned.

This beast, it rises to power sometime around 1798.

It's going to be a lamb-like beast.

It's going to come up in a place with not much population.

There's not going to be a king.

There's no crowns represented here.

It's going to be a new nation.

And this new nation would rise to a place of worldwide influence.

That's what we saw here, right?

Those are the things that we've seen.

Now you can probably all look back to not 10th grade history now, but like second grade

history, and you could probably all recognize that this is talking about none other than

the United States of America, our great nation.

Well let's double check.

America was rising to power around 1798.

When was the Declaration of Independence signed?

1776.

And then there was about eight years of a revolutionary war, and there's articles of

confederation, and then finally the Constitution is put into place.

And so around 1798, America has now made a name for itself.

It's began to have some influence in the world, and it rose up in a new region that was sparsely

populated.

There wasn't a lot of people on this continent at the time.

Number three, there was no monarchy, no king.

That was one of the things that they instilled and instituted in that.

And then it says it begun like a lamb.

It began mild and gentle with political and religious freedom.

Next month, we're going to gather with family around a table, maybe with some turkey and

pumpkin pie and cranberry sauce.

What day do we celebrate?

Thanksgiving.

If you remember Thanksgiving, maybe you've gone to some school play and there's been

little children with a black hat and little buckles on their shoes because they're pilgrims.

Why did the pilgrims come to the United States, come to North America?

Because they wanted religious freedom.

They were being persecuted in Europe because of the way that they were choosing to worship

God.

And so they came to this country because there would be a separation of church and state.

The founders did that on purpose because they had been persecuted.

Their fathers had been persecuted and they did not want that to happen in America.

And so in the Constitution, there was this separation of church and state.

They wanted to make sure that dark ages would not be repeated.

And because of the freedom that was given, people flocked to America.

And because they flocked to America, it wasn't long before it rose to a position of power

and influence.

So that's a pretty incredible fulfillment of that prophecy.

And oh, I wish, I wish, I wish that it stopped right there.

But it doesn't.

It says that this lamb would eventually speak like a dragon.

Verse 11, I saw another beast coming up out of the earth and he had two horns like a lamb

and he spoke like a dragon.

What a drastic character change.

What a change the Bible prophecy is telling us is going to happen in the character of

the United States.

America declared in its Constitution that there'd be freedom, but it appears that that's

no longer going to be the case at some point in the future.

And if someone would have preached this 100 years ago, when people preached this 100 years

ago, people said, there's no way.

That can't happen in the United States.

But guess what?

People don't say that as much anymore.

People don't laugh about it because you can already begin to see perhaps a character being

changed, values being changed.

And the older you are, the clearer it becomes.

Because could it be that words like a dragon are already being spoken?

How does a nation speak?

Well, a nation speaks through its laws, through its actions.

You can see what a nation stands for by looking at what its laws say.

And believe it or not, many of the laws coming, being spoken about, being talked about, show

that America is changing.

Notice verse 12.

It says, He exercises all the authority of the first beast in His presence and causes

the earth and those who dwell on it causes them to worship the first beast whose deadly

wound was healed.

It says the second beast causes people to worship or obey the first beast.

And so as we've looked at this, that would tell us that America is going to exercise

some sort of power, some sort of authority that way back in the Middle Ages, that's what

was being pressed down upon people through a union of church and state that people had

to worship in a certain way, that people had to do a certain thing and the result was persecution.

And Revelation, these prophecies seem to be telling us that slowly but surely this character

of America, this great nation is going to change.

That there's going to come a time when a union of church and state will take away religious

freedom because it says it's going to cause people to worship in a certain way.

Like I said years ago, people said, oh that can't happen in America, but people don't

say that anymore.

Because whenever church and state unite in history, it doesn't matter the nation, there's

always persecution that comes as a result of that.

Because not everybody looks at things the same way and we saw way back in the Garden

of Eden that God gave people the freedom to choose, to choose to follow Him or to choose

to not to follow Him.

But there's a push even now in this nation to do away with this separation of church

and state to change what's written there in the Constitution.

Let's go on in this prophecy, verse 14.

It says, he deceives those who dwell on the earth, telling those who dwell on the earth

to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived.

He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, this is verse 15, that

the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image

of the beast to be killed.

This is a persecution that's taking place.

The second beast makes an image to the first beast.

What is an image?

It's something that looks the same.

When you wake up in the morning and go into the bathroom and you look into the mirror,

what do you see?

You see yourself, you see an image of yourself.

And so when church and state unite to enforce some type of religious practice, I hate to

say this, but America is going to look like that time in the Middle Ages.

That this prophecy says that America is going to do something to force people to follow

and obey Papal Rome.

Now this is not now, this is not yet.

And so something doesn't really say what.

Something has to happen for such a drastic change to take place.

And you would say, why would anybody want to do that?

Why would anybody want to do away with religious liberty?

But there's many religious leaders who already want to see this done away with.

Or pushing for a certain day of the week for worship to be required or for businesses to

be closed.

And Vatican City has been foremost in this.

Notice this statement from Pope Benedict's speech a few years ago.

Sunday must be a day of rest for everyone.

So people can be free to be with their families and with God.

By defending Sunday, one defends freedom.

Sunday is the day of the Lord and of man, a day which everyone must be able to be free.

Free for family and free for God.

Why is it that some religious leaders want this separation to end?

Why would they call for Sunday loss?

I think it's in essence, it's in their mind for a good thing.

Because they see the challenges in our world today.

They see drug challenges and crime issues and morality on the downfall.

And we see natural disaster after natural disaster.

And we've seen in Bible prophecy in Matthew 24 and others that it says it's going to get

worse as we get closer to Jesus coming.

And some would say that this is happening because America has turned away from God.

And they would say we need revival.

America needs to come back to God.

And I would agree with that.

We do need revival.

We do need to come back to God.

But you cannot legislate revival.

A law is not going to cause revival.

When force is involved, it's not revival, but it leads to persecution to those who don't

comply.

How does real revival happen?

Well God tells us it's when we are following Jesus, when we're allowing the Holy Spirit

to lead us.

Revival doesn't come from the Senate or the House or the White House or London or Washington

or Moscow or anywhere else.

Revival is personal.

Revival comes from within.

It starts in the human heart.

And we can't call for laws to force revival in our nation until we allow God to make a

revival in our heart.

And so if America, just think about it, if America was going to come back to God, if

there were laws that were going to legislate that people could come back to God, what would

that look like?

What day would people be called on to come back to God?

The obvious answer would be Sunday.

That day that we've seen comes from this beast power.

And yet it's the most popular day in the religious world.

And it's already being promoted as we saw in some veins in some areas.

And this goes way back to Constantine in 321.

On the venerable day of the sun, let the magistrates and people residing in the city's rest and

let all the shops be closed.

And this was done for unity, to bring people together.

And Revelation tells us that at some point America is going to make an image to the beast.

It seems like to unite, in essence, to unite a divided society.

And yet it will be uniting not for a good purpose, not for real spiritual revival, but

to cause America to worship this image of the beast.

And then people will have to decide, am I going to follow God's seal?

Am I going to follow this tradition of man?

Do I keep the commandments of God?

Do I take this tradition that humanity has lifted up above God's commandments?

Who do I surrender my life to?

We can look back to that response in Revelation 14.

How does that last generation on earth, how do they respond?

Revelation 14, 12.

Here is the patience of the saints.

Here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.

We need to start by surrendering our hearts to Jesus today so that when anything comes

in the future we can know that we are surrendering our hearts to God then.

And so this can seem really, really scary as we look at these final events, as it talks

about not being able to buy and sell, it talks about persecution, it even talks about being

killed.

And we wonder, are we going to be alone as we stand for this?

But I want to look at one more passage here in Psalm 91.

This is an amazing Psalm.

I challenge people to read this and not just read it, but if you want to memorize scripture,

this is an amazing place to start.

Psalm 91.

But we're going to look at verse 14, but this whole Psalm is amazing.

But at the very end it says, because he has set his love upon me, therefore I will deliver

him.

He shall call upon me and I will answer him.

I will be with him in trouble.

I will deliver him and honor him.

When you take a stand for Jesus, you can know that Jesus is standing right beside you.

He has promised to never leave you, to never forsake you.

And it's my prayer, it's my hope that each one of us from this day forward will choose

that no matter what happens, we're going to stand with Jesus.

We're going to choose to honor Him.

We're going to choose to have that faith of Jesus and to keep His commandments that will

turn our eyes upon Him.

I hope that you'll take out that little response card that you got.

I'm going to invite my friend Jacqueline to come up and she's going to sing a song for

us, a song that she wrote.

And if you have any questions, if you have any comments, if you have any prayer requests,

please write them on the back of that card.

And if you would like to do Bible studies at some point in the near future, just check

that and mark that.

And please prayerfully go through that.

Dear God, what an incredible story and an incredible message.

A story of a Savior who dies for us.

Lord, help us to live for You.

Help us to walk with You each and every day.

Help us to live in all that we do that others might see Your love shining through us.

I want to pray for each person that's here, each family that's here.

Guide and bless them as they go home this evening and help them to be moved to live

their life for You.

In Your name we pray, amen.

So tomorrow night our topic is Revelations Remnant.

So we hope that you'll be here tomorrow night.

And then Saturday morning we're going to have our final session.

And I forgot to mention something very important because after Saturday morning's final session,

on the fourth week, this place has something called the Asian Lunch.

So you are going to want to make sure that as you come you stay for a delicious Asian

lunch.

So we hope you'll be back tomorrow.